My stomach dropped.
Great.This was all I needed.
The second thing that happened was that the door flew open to reveal DJ standing in the threshold, red-faced and mad as hell.
“I thought I told you tofuck off,” my son roared at his father.
Evan rounded on him angrily. “And I told younot to speak to me like that.”
I pulled away from Donovan and stepped toward my son. “DJ. It’s okay. Go inside and let us deal with it.”
My boy turned to me, his eyes stricken. “No, Mom.” He threw his arm out toward Evan. “He can’t keep doing this. He always puts his girlfriends before us. We see him once every two weeks, and he’s always working, then at night he takes out whatever woman he’s with at the time and leaves us indoors. And after all that, a few weeks later, we visit again, he’s moved a new woman in, and the cycle starts again. You’ve only ever brought Donovan around, and he’s done more with us in six weeks than Dad’s done with us in sixteen years.”
“Did you hear him?” Evan demanded, turning to me. “He’s got no respect.”
I stared up at Evan, wishing I could defend him. Co-parenting consisted of us being a united front so the kids were never confused about what we expected of them, but how could I have my ex’s back when our son was obviously so hurt by him?
“Yeah, I heard,” I murmured, my eyes sliding to DJ. “And I wish he’d told me a lot sooner because I would have done this a long time ago.” I stepped toward Evan, got up in his face, and screamed,“Get the fuck off my property!”
Evan looked as if someone had slapped him across the face, and fuck me, if I could’ve done exactly that and got away with it in that moment, I would have.
“Rosie...” he began, but I slashed my hand through the air, cutting him off.
“How fucking dare you neglect our children?” I snarled as I shoulder-checked him so hard he went on the back foot. “I sent them to you because I never wanted you all to lose each other. The kids needed you, and you needed them, so I sacrificed to give you that. You got a promotion and moved to Idaho, so I drove hundreds of miles to get them to you because you were busy, then I’d say goodbye and cry all the way home because I already missed them so much. I hated it, Evan, but I did itfor you.”
A hand curled around my elbow, and Donovan’s voice murmured, “Baby,” as he tugged me back and into his warm body.
I ignored the sweetness in his voice, fixing my glare on my ex-husband. “Get off my fucking porch, Evan. Go home. If and when the kids want to see you, they’ll call.”
“You can’t stop me from seeing them, Rosie,” Evan shot back stubbornly.
“Dude,” Donovan began. “If you don’t do what my woman asked,I’llget involved, and believe me, you don’t want that.”
“Me too, asswipe,” Atlas called up from where he stood watching at the bottom of the porch steps. “Been bidin’ my time with you on account of my sister beggin’ me not to get involved in her business and make things worse for Gabby and DJ. But you can consider yourself moved to the top of my shit list after pullin’ this stunt.”
Any other man would’ve seen what he was up against and admitted defeat, but not my ex. Instead, he rounded his shoulders and declared, “I’m not going until I’ve seen Gabby.”
“She doesn’t wanna see you,” Donovan cut out.
Evan leaned slightly toward him and yelled, “This ismyfamily. Not yours. Fuck off.”
“The only one of us leaving is you,” Donovan argued, reaching out and shoving Evan away from me. “You fucked upyour chance withyour family. You dicked around and lost them, and now you need to stop blaming the world foryourfuckups and start owning your shit.”
Evan leaned further forward and squared up to Donovan.“I know!”he roared, his chest heaving with pent-up anger.“You think I don’t know that?—?”
“Daddy?” a small voice said.
Evan whirled toward the door to see Gabby standing there looking as if she’d burst into tears at any second.
“Baby,” I breathed, stepping forward, but Evan was faster, and he reached for her, sucking in a sharp intake of breath when she shrank back from him so quickly that his face crumpled before setting hard as stone.
“Gabby—” he began, his voice breaking.
“Go home, Daddy,” she pleaded. “You’re upsetting me.”
“I just wanna talk to you,” he explained. “Rachel didn’t mean what she said.”
“I don’t care about her,” she stated. “I care about you. I wasn’t rude to Rachel; I just forgot to unload the dishes, and she screamed at me and called me names. I thought you’d help me, but you took her side instead, and it hurt me. That’s why we left.”
