I tried to keep the kids busy as best I could, but my thoughts were with Sean. He was meeting Glen Wilson, Sarah’s biological father, at the diner in town. Sean had wanted to talk to him in private, but after he had threatened Glen when he’d come to the house, Glen had requested a public meeting place.
I sent the kids to their rooms to do some reading while I cleared the breakfast dishes and pulled out some meat to thaw for dinner. Just as I was drying my hands, Sean walked through the door. The look on his face told me that the meeting hadn’t gone the way he’d hoped.
I rushed over to him and pulled him into the kitchen where we could talk quietly without the children hearing. “So?” I asked.
He sighed heavily and shook his head. “It didn’t matter what I said, he wants to know his daughter.”
I hung my head and took a deep breath. I was both understanding and angry. I got that he wanted to meet and know his child, but I couldn’t help but feel it was incredibly selfish of him to try and take her from the only father she’d ever known.
“I’m sorry, Sean,” I said, placing my hand on his chest. “What’s going to happen now?”
Sean shrugged, looking utterly defeated. “I asked him if he could wait until Sarah was older and she could make the decision herself if she wanted to meet him. I told him that she was finally healing from the loss of her mother and really settling in here. I told him she was happy. He said he understood, but that he’d lost so much time with her already and he didn’t want to wait anymore.”
I shook my head, my frustration building. “Can’t you file an injunction against him or something? I mean, you are the one who’s been raising her!”
Sean paced back and forth. “It doesn’t matter. He’s the biological parent and he wants her.”
I felt the tears stinging the backs of my eyes and I couldn’t stop them from falling. “Oh God, what
are we going to do?”
“I asked him to give me forty-eight hours to prepare her,” he said sadly.
“Dad?” came Tommy’s voice from behind Sean.
He tried to pull himself together as best he could and turned to greet his son as I quickly swiped the tears off my cheeks.
“What’s up?” Sean asked.
“We’re hungry, can we have chinese for dinner?” Tommy asked, his eyes moving from his father to me and back.
“Sure thing, bud,” Sean said, ruffling his hair. “How about you go get your sister and we’ll go into town?”
Tommy dashed off up the stairs to fetch Sarah and my emotions threatened to overtake me again. I didn’t know how I was going to get through dinner.
**
Sean had decided to make a whole night of it. After we left the Chinese restaurant, we went for ice cream, and then for a long drive with the windows down and the warm air in our hair. By the time we pulled into the driveway back home, both Tommy and Sarah were sound asleep.
I went to lift Sarah out of the car, but Sean shook his head. I knew he needed to hold his little girl as much as he could right now. My heart broke into a million pieces as I watched him carry her into the house. Tommy was too big for me to lift on my own, so I stayed out in the car with him and waited for Sean to come back.
After about ten minutes, Sean stepped out the front door looking broken. Tears streamed down his handsome face as he leaned in and picked up his son. I locked the car and followed him inside. Once he’d put Tommy to bed and came back down, I pulled him down on the couch next to me and held him while he wept.
The next morning, Sean came into the kitchen while I was making my breakfast and smiled down at the kids. I knew that he’d barely slept the night before. Between crying and angrily pounding his fist into his pillow, he’d exhausted most of his emotions, but sleep had still eluded him.
“How about we all go to the park after breakfast?” he asked.
“Yeah!” the kids both cheered.
I served breakfast and offered to stay behind and clear the dishes while he took the kids to play. I knew he was planning on telling Sarah about her father that afternoon and thought maybe he would want some time alone with them.
“Absolutely not,” he said as the kids were getting their shoes. “This is a family trip.” He leaned down and kissed the top of my head.
Though my heart swelled at the thought that I was part of this family, I ached with the knowledge that one of us was going to be ripped away. I took a deep breath and slapped my game face on. My family needed me and I wasn’t going to let them down.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE - SEAN
Emily and I sat on a bench while Tommy and Sarah played, marveling at how little fighting was going on. I watched my little girl, the one who’d slept on my chest for months after her mother had died, and wondered how in the hell I was ever going to be able to give her up.