After a week of caring for Abigail and our son, I felt that Abby should be ready to talk. But, as always, she surprised me.
"You want to talk about custody?" she stiffened and glared at me.
"No," I said calmly. "I want to talk about us."
"There is no us, and there will never be an us. And if you bring it up again, you will be out of here so fast it'll make your head spin. If you try to talk about the non-existent us, I will get my lawyer involved and we will make this into a legal situation with everything spelled out and approved by a judge. Is that what you want?"
"You know it's not," I snapped. "I just thought you could see what you mean to me –"
"What I mean to you," she scoffed bitterly. "Just stop! One more word and you're out. If you want to talk about Griff, that's fine. But he is the only topic we have to discuss. Nothing else exists between us."
From the look on her face, I could tell she was serious and committed to turning this from a casual agreement to a legal one if I didn't stop.
"My mother wants to see him," I said finally, dreading that conversation.
Abby shrugged. "Invite her over."
"I've told her if she mentions anything but the baby, she's out of here."
Again, Abby shrugged and I found I hated it. I wanted the passion and exuberance she'd always shown, not this cool, detached robot.
An hour later my mother arrived, her eyes sparking but her face composed. She had not liked, not one little bit, when I threatened her if she mentioned Charlotte. She didn't like that I was so protective of the woman who she refused to believe didn't get pregnant on purpose to trap me.
Abby was sitting on the couch, holding our son, when my mother walked into the room. She walked over and stared down at her grandson.
"He's so beautiful," she breathed. "He looks just like you, Kincade, just exactly like you."
Abby smiled tightly. "Would you like to hold him?"
My mother sat down next to her and accepted the sleeping baby into her arms. I hunkered down beside her, tracing a finger on my son's head. "He's pretty amazing, isn't he?"
Tears began to slide down my mother's face. "He's gorgeous."
Then her tears turned into sobs. "Mom? What's wrong?"
"This is what you should have had with Charlotte, not her. He should have been Charlotte's."
Faster than she could have imagined, I took the still sleeping boy from my mother and stood up, bending low to get in her face. "Get out."
"Kincade, you know –"
"Get out now, Mother. Get out of this house right now."
When she opened her mouth to speak, I got right in her face and snarled, "You even say one word before you leave, and you will never see my son again. Not one word."
Reading the truth of that threat in my eyes, she left without another word.
When she'd gone, I turned to Abby, who was watching me in shock. "You matter, Abigail. I won't let her treat you like you don't."
