One Heir...Or Two?

With shaking fingers, she keyed in the phone number for the bank and went through the menu options that would finally lead her to a human voice. Kayla felt her throat choke as she told the customer service rep just how much money should be in her account. She ought to know. After all, she checked it on her phone every night. And last night... The sick dread that enveloped her thickened and made her stomach flip uncomfortably. Last night she’d been checking her balance when there’d been a knock at the door to her apartment. She’d left her phone on the coffee table when she’d gone to answer and Zoe had been alone in the living room for about five minutes. Through the roaring sound in her ears, she could just hear the customer service rep.

“You made a large withdrawal last night, Ms. Porter. It’s all there on the screen—a payment to one of your regular payees, a Ms. Zoe Thompson.”

“But I didn’t do it. She must have done it herself.”

Kayla swallowed back the tears that collected in her throat. All her money. Gone. How the heck was she going to cope?

“Did you give Ms. Thompson access to your account? Under the terms and conditions—”

“I’m well aware of the terms and conditions, and no, I didn’t give her permission to access my account.”

“Ms. Porter, even if the payment was made by mistake, please be advised that we cannot reverse that payment without the consent of the person who owns the account the funds were paid into.”

“But I didn’t authorize the payment!”

Kayla’s voice rose on a desperate note and in the bedroom she heard Sienna stir—the sound of her mother’s distress obviously having woken her.

“Ma’am, if we assist you to recover a payment made from your authorized mobile device, we will have to charge you an electronic credit recovery fee. You’ll find the fees set out in our guide.”

“Whatever, do whatever you can, whatever your fees are. I accept. I need my money back.”

It was only later, when the bank called her back to say that Zoe had closed out her accounts and the funds could not be retrieved, that Kayla felt all hope die. After filing a claim with the bank and reporting the theft to the police, Kayla finally gave in to the tears that had burned at the back of her throat for what felt like hours.

Kayla looked around her. Her only remaining belongings were her furniture, her personal things and the small amount of cash in her purse. Zoe had left her with nothing else. No backup money, no nest egg. Zip. Zero. Nada. Rage, fear, confusion and a deep sense of violation all jangled within her. When she’d brought Zoe into her apartment, adamant in her belief that giving another person a fair chance to make a good life would help put something worthwhile back into the universe, she’d thought she was making a positive difference in the other woman’s life. And she’d trusted her. So much so that she’d left Sienna with her on a day-to-day basis.

She knew Zoe had had a hard past, having to look out for herself after losing her job and being thrown out of her apartment by her boyfriend. Kayla knew Zoe didn’t trust easily, but she’d believed they’d gotten past that and thought Zoe had learned to see the good things that life had to offer. And Zoe had at that, a scathing little voice inside Kayla said. She’d seen what Kayla had to offer and she’d taken it—all of it.

Kayla brushed tears from her cheeks. It was all her fault. She trusted people. Always. Now it had bitten her well and truly in the backside. The hard reality of what this meant pressed down on her like a ton of lead.

“Think, Kayla, think. And breathe. You can’t lose it now,” she said firmly to herself, desperately trying to calm the shudders that now began to ripple through her body.

She tried to center herself—to breathe in slow and deep and find the inner calm that was usually never far from the surface of her mind—but all to no avail. The police hadn’t been optimistic about her chances of getting her money back. Despite the information she’d given them about Zoe, she was just one opportunistic thief in a great big city full of them. She could even have gone out of state by now.

What the heck was she going to do? Her mind remained a blank. It was hopeless. She was hopeless. She needed money—those precious savings had been for her babies’ future and to help her raise them, not to mention covering rent and utilities while she couldn’t work—but who would loan her what she needed? The bank clearly wouldn’t be any help, since they seemed to hold her responsible for losing the money in her account. She didn’t have any family left. Most of her friends were in the same financial situation as she had been before she’d decided to have Sienna’s kids—choosing to live in the present rather than plan for the future. So, if her friends were out, who did that leave?

One name whispered through her mind, making her nerves vibrate with tension and a swarm of butterflies skitter about in her stomach—Van Murphy. Even though he’d made his position painfully clear today, perhaps with time he’d soften his stance. Surely any man with a shred of decency left in him would want to help his children? It wasn’t as if he was strapped for cash.

But no, she remembered the coldness on his face as he’d threatened to keep her from using Sienna’s remaining embryos. He wouldn’t help her. In fact, he’d do whatever he could to stop her.

There was no way she could afford a legal battle—especially against the kind of lawyers he could afford. She’d have to scrape together whatever resources remained and go through the procedure without any kind of nest egg.

The alternative was giving up on those babies and her promise to her sister completely—and that was something she would never do.

* * *

Van ended the call with his lawyer and calmly and deliberately slid his cell phone back into his pocket. He didn’t dare move, or he might destroy something, although right now a bar brawl would come in handy to help him relieve the anger that infused every cell in his body.

She’d gone and done it.

Despite what he’d said, or maybe in spite of it, she’d carried on with the transfer of Sienna’s remaining embryos before he could arrange an injunction to stop her. Two embryos, to be precise, if his lawyer’s information was correct. Van slowly let go of the breath he’d been holding and focused on the picture on the wall of his office. Normally the vista, painted from the balcony of his home overlooking the sea on the Monterey Peninsula, calmed him. Reminded him of just how far he’d come. But nothing calmed him now.

This was his worst nightmare come to life.

For the first time in a long time, he was lost for what to do. Automatically he pulled out his car keys. He shrugged into his suit jacket and walked down the corridor and into his private elevator. Down in the parking garage, he slid onto the fine dove-gray leather seat of his late-model Audi and activated the GPS—inputting the address he’d committed to memory about two hours after Kayla had left his office just over a month ago.

He hadn’t wanted to see her again—hadn’t wanted to need to have this conversation—but with her decision to ignore his wishes, he had no other option. Anger rolled in waves beneath the surface, forcing him to utilize every last ounce of training he’d ever endured to keep it under control. One step at a time, he reminded himself. His primary objective right now was to see her, talk to her. What he wanted to say—well, he had no idea yet, nothing civil, anyway, but he knew something would come to him.

The roads were relatively quiet heading out of the city and he made the journey to Lakeshore in good time. Van’s brows pulled into a frown when he saw the red-and-blue flashing lights as he drove up to Kayla’s apartment building. He got out of his car and locked the doors.

He scanned the numbers on the rows of apartments and his frown deepened as he saw that Kayla’s was very near where two police cars jutted out from the curb, along with an ambulance. Even from where he was, Van could hear the angry yelling of a woman the cops were guiding toward one of the cruisers.

“You owe me, Kayla! You owe me! You were supposed to help.”

Van’s blood ran cold. Had this crazy woman attacked Kayla? He quickened his step and drew closer to the crowd that had gathered on the sidewalk. Two police officers tried to restrain the wild-eyed woman, who spat and bucked and twisted and fought them with every step. Where the hell was Kayla in all this? Van looked up to a second-story balcony where a curtain billowed out through a broken glass slider. Without realizing he’d made a decision, he pushed his way through the crowd and started toward the building, only to be stopped by another officer on the sidewalk.

“Sir, you can’t go up there.”

Like hell he couldn’t. “Kayla Porter, where is she?”

“And you are?” The officer gave him a hard stare.

“A friend. A family friend,” he emphasized.

“She’s over there in the ambulance, sir, with the baby.”

Ambulance? A cold rush of fear washed through him. Was she hurt? Was the baby hurt? Without another word to the officer, he strode toward the ambulance. As he neared the back of the vehicle, he spied Kayla inside, a stark white dressing on her forehead. His gut knotted until he saw the sleeping baby in her arms—not crying, not visibly injured, he noted almost immediately. He felt his taut muscles begin to ease. They were okay. A ridiculous sense of relief coursed through him, replacing the chill of alarm that had been there only seconds ago.

From the look on Kayla’s pale face, she was shaken, but aside from that dressing, it looked like she and Sienna were all right. Kayla hadn’t seen him yet. Her eyes were fixed on the woman being bundled into the back of the patrol car. Even from here he could see the way shock and strain had drawn Kayla’s blanched features into a mask of horror and disbelief. She grew visibly paler at the vitriol being flung at her by the woman as one of the officers closed the back door of the cruiser and the vehicle pulled away. A paramedic moved inside the ambulance, blocking Van’s view. As much as it frustrated him, he reminded himself it was okay for now. Kayla was getting the care she needed. The baby was fine. There was nothing else he could do right now but wait.

After another ten minutes he saw Kayla being helped down to the street. He resisted the urge to rush forward. A female officer led Kayla and Sienna back across the street and into the building. He followed them up the stairs.

The front door to what had to be Kayla’s apartment was wide open. He stepped through the threshold, his gaze instantly assessing the chaos inside—the overturned side tables, the broken lamp, the cupboard doors hanging open—their shelves denuded of whatever had been inside.

“Sir, this is a crime scene. Please go back downstairs,” the officer instructed when she caught sight of him.

“I’m a friend of Ms. Porter’s,” he repeated, then forced himself to say his next words. “And the father of the baby.”

“Is that right, Kayla? Do you want him here?”

Kayla came through a doorway and closed it quietly behind her. The second her eyes lit on him, she seemed to jolt in surprise. Shock, rapidly followed by something else—guilt, probably, he surmised, since she likely knew good and well why he was here—shot across her face.

“Yes, that’s okay,” she said. She averted her gaze and studiously avoided looking at him again.

The officer turned to Van. “Fine,” she said. “You can come in.”

He gave the woman a curt nod and moved farther inside, picking his way through the debris to where Kayla stood near an overturned sofa. Shudders racked her body even though the evening air coming through the broken window was pretty mild for May. She was clearly feeling the effects of whatever had transpired here. Looking around, he knew it couldn’t have been pleasant. Van shucked off his suit jacket and placed it over her shoulders. She flinched at his touch as his hands briefly rested on her upper arms, but she didn’t refuse the warmth his jacket offered.

He waited patiently while she gave her statement, his hands curled into impotent fists as she described the invasion of her home by a woman she’d once trusted. But his interest sharpened at the officer’s next words.