Page 6 of His Custody

At this very second though, he was losing patience with said legal system and was preparing to hunt Keyne down wherever they’d stashed her in the labyrinthine building and haul her off in a fireman’s carry. His trademark unflappability was, well,flapping,and he needed to do something instead of sitting here, watching his chances of taking Keyne home at the end of the day ebb away.

Despite Deja’s best efforts, they were still talking about the validity of the will and whether that should take precedence over anything else. If it did, Keyne would be off to Miami with Sean and Deborah where they’d do everything they could to get their hands on her money, all the while likely neglecting her at a time when she should be with people who loved her and would do their best to support her. Plus, being in a place where she didn’t know anyone and would be too isolated to ask for help if she needed it?

Not acceptable.

He pushed back in his chair, the screeching drawing the attention of everyone in the courtroom.

“Mr. Andersson—”

“Your Honor, before this goes any further, could I say something?”

Deja shot him a look that saidDon’t you fucking dare. Most of the time, he followed her advice because Deja Wright was one of the smartest people he knew and a top-notch attorney. He’d gone to business school with her, and his company had been taking off when she’d graduated from law school. He’d snapped her up with the promise of a hefty salary and the lure of a challenge. Who else would be able to keep him in line? She’d shaken her head.No one. I’ll consider it my mission in life to keep you from crashing and burning. Also, I want a car.

He’d had the keys to a brand-new BMW messengered to her apartment along with an employment contract the next morning. His respect for her and her advice—legal and otherwise—had kept him out of a lot of hot water, and he was almost always smart enough to listen.

Not today. He ignored her and her black-as-night glower, tenting his fingers on top of the table.

“And what is so important you feel the need to interrupt these proceedings, Mr. Andersson?”

The bull inside him charged and gored the judge before she could get the last word out, but the man—and he needed to be a man, not an animal—took a deep breath. “Your Honor, I have known Keyne O’Connell since she was born. I held her in the hospital, I saw her take her first steps. I could tell you which wrist she broke when she fell off her horse in the third grade and that her favorite book isPeter Pan. I could tell you she’s allergic to penicillin and that she’s afraid of ladybugs. Ladybugs. Who’s afraid of ladybugs?”

He had to stop and take a breath because he was a quarter inch to the left from losing it. “These people,” he ground out, pointing a shaking hand at the O’Connells, “don’t know any of those things. I’ve spent more time with Keyne O’Connell in the past month than they’ve spent with her in her entire life.”

“That’s all well and good, Mr. Andersson, but we’re not talking about Miss O’Connell’s favorite cereal—”

“She doesn’t like cereal,” he muttered, unable to stop himself. You couldn’t get Keyne O’Connell to eat something that wasn’t hot before eleven o’clock. Oatmeal, eggs, pancakes, sure. Offer her cereal or yogurt and she’d rather starve. She wouldn’t even drink juice. You’d be pushing it with a banana.

“We’re talking about what’s best for a seventeen-year-old girl. It would be highly unusual for the court to award custody to a single, unrelated man such as yourself. You’re going to have to come up with a case more compelling than trivia to get me to believe you would be a fit custodian of Miss O’Connell.”

Oh, he had a case all right. He’d been building it since the second Deja told him he wasn’t listed as next of kin. He knew this wasn’t going to be a cakewalk, but he wanted to throttle Sean for making it even harder. And that bastard, looking like a bulldog who’d been stuffed into a too-tight-suit, came across as too damn smug for Jasper’s taste.

“I live here. She wouldn’t have to leave her school or her friends. I’ve already been coordinating her care with her doctors and Mr. McCarthy.” He darted a glance at the social worker, compelling him to agree. McCarthy took the hint, and dropped a nod. “I’ve gotten her into grief counseling. If she wanted to stay in her own home, her own room, I’m willing to live there with her.”

So far Keyne had only managed to go back to her house once and showed no interest in going back, but that might change. Not that he would blame her if she never wanted to step foot in there again. Too many memories, too many ghosts. He’d never admit it, but he’d been avoiding his parents’ home as much as possible for the same reason. Had been sending Ada or Deja over whenever he could.

“And you have an empire to run, Mr. Andersson, do you not? How many hours a week do you work?”

“Seventy, give or take.” Give. About twenty. But Judge Angela Pollard didn’t need to know that.

“You believe that’s going to give you enough time to see to Miss O’Connell’s well-being?”

He gritted his jaw against her skepticism. “I’m willing to take a leave of absence. I’ve already handed over some of my responsibilities and I’m prepared to delegate more of them for as long as I need to.”

“You’ve also a bit of a reputation as a ladies’ man.”

Jasper swore in his head but managed to bite it off before the curse made it out of his mouth. “I’ve been in my current relationship for four months.”

He wished Sarah were in the courtroom so he could point at her, fine, respectable woman she appeared to be. She was filthy as sin in the bedroom and he knew a few less-than-savory tidbits about her as well. You could never be too careful about who you climb into bed with. But she wasn’t crazy about the idea of him being Keyne’s guardian any more than this hard-ass judge appeared to be and she’d declined to come, which was for the best. Still pissed him off though.

“And what about your own mental state, Mr. Andersson? You also lost your parents and your younger brother and your godparents in the accident, did you not? You must be grieving. Caring for a child, never mind a traumatized child, is difficult under the best of circumstances and you’re in just about the worst, wouldn’t you say?”

A crack formed in the wall Jasper had been using to keep his own grief at bay, his sorrow threatening to leak through the cracks. This was no time to think about the fact his own parents had been taken from him far too soon and he’d never get to watch his kid brother become a man. Or that the people who’d been like a second set of parents to him were gone now as well. He used some mental mortar to seal up the cracks and cast about for another emotion, locating anger in the stead of bereavement.

Jasper saw red and had to dig his nonexistent nails into his palms to keep from yelling. But snapping in front of the judge would hardly make her more likely to trust him with Keyne. He could put on the façade of a reasonable, responsible adult. He could. “I would not say that. Yes, I suffered a loss. A heartbreaking loss. I wake up in the mornings and have to remind myself I won’t be going to my brother’s basketball game, I won’t be meeting up with my parents for dinner, I won’t be going sailing with the O’Connells next weekend because they’re dead and rotting in a crypt. But that also means when Keyne wakes up in the morning and has to face the same thing, when her guardian says, ‘I know how you feel,’ I’ll fucking mean it.” The judge raised her eyebrows at the last and Jasper dragged in a breath to his aching lungs. “I apologize, Your Honor, for the language. It was disrespectful and it won’t happen again.”

He wasn’t a big apologizer, but he would get on his knees and beg if it meant he’d be able to keep Keyne away from her father’s family. He’d crawl across the courtroom if the judge asked for it. But she was staring at him from the bench, her dark eyes sharp with appraisal. He didn’t break eye contact with her. “I’ll take that under advisement, Mr. Andersson.”

She shuffled some papers on the bench and then looked up, surveying her courtroom. “Unless anyone has anything else to add, I think I’ve heard enough. We’ll recess for lunch and reconvene at two when we’ll hear from Miss O’Connell.”

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