Page 71 of Hey, Daddy

Ben’s first wife died during childbirth, and for the first five years of their lives, Ben did it alone.

Then came Kendall.

Surprisingly, she was one of Julia’s friends.

Also surprisingly, the moment that Kendall found out about Julia’s affair, she’d dropped Julia and chose us over her longtime friend.

“I’ll hoist them up like that to clean it off when you want me to,” I teased.

“You better.” She winked. “Ben and Desi are inside finishing up dinner. They both got home late. Desi has a new boy at school that has a crush on her. Go easy on her when she tells you.”

I snorted.

I loved my kid, but I didn’t like her love interests.

They always left a lot to be desired.

When I got inside, it was to see Desi at the sink washing her dishes, and Ben standing up beside the stove shoveling chili into his mouth.

His eyes came to me, and they were sparkling with mirth.

“What?” I grumbled. “This better not be about the boy that Kendall just told me about.”

“Dad!” Desi groaned. “Come on!”

Ben was silently laughing as he tried to finish his bite of chili.

I flipped him off and said, “Just wait. You only have a few more years and you’ll be going through this with Carrie.”

That wiped the smile off of his face.

“Dad, why are we not staying here for the night if we can’t stay at your apartment?”

That got my grin sliding off my face.

And, since my kid was nearly an adult now, I let her stay in the room as I explained.

Everything.

An hour later, we were at Nastya’s new place, but nobody else was.

I pulled out my phone and called her.

With no answer, I decided to check the camera app, and nothing.

My next call was to Shasha.

He answered on the first ring and said, “Problem?”

I told him I’d only call if there was a problem, so he was understandably worried.

“You got an ETA on your guy?” I asked. “I thought Nastya would be here by the time we got here, but no one’s answering the door.”

“Code to get in is 883388,” he said. “Let me call him and check in.”

I let us in and was stunned by the house.

Now, I knew that she was crazy.

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