A Father for Her Triplets: Her Pregnancy Surprise by Susan Meier

got a sweet deal going with this wedding cake thing you’re doing. I just want what’s coming to me.”
    “What should be coming to you is jail time!”
    “Aren’t you being a little melodramatic?”
    “Melodramatic? You beat Mom to within an inch of her life so often I’m not surprised her heart gave out. And you beat me and Althea.” She stopped. A short cry rang out.
    Then Missy said, “You get the hell away from me! Now. Mom may not have wanted to call the police, but the next time you show up here I’ll not only call the police, I’ll quite happily tell every damned person in this town that you beat us. Regularly. They’ll see that the happy-go-lucky diner owner everybody loves doesn’t really exist.”
    “You’d never get anybody to believe you.”
    “Try me.”
    By now the kids had huddled around the knees of Wyatt’s sweatpants. No sound came from the house, but the front door slammed shut. With his hands on the kids’ shoulders, Wyatt quickly shepherded them to his side of the shrubs, where Monty couldn’t see them.
    As her father screeched out of the driveway, Missy came barreling out the kitchen door. Standing on the porch, she screamed, “Owen! Lainie! Claire!” as if she’d gone looking for them after Monty left, found them gone and was terrified.
    Wyatt quickly stepped out from behind the thin leafy branches, three kids at his knees. “We’re here. They came to get me to play in the sandbox.”
    She ran down the porch steps and gathered her children against her. “They haven’t eaten breakfast yet.”
    “I didn’t know that or I would have given them cereal. I have plenty.” Not knowing what else to do, he babbled on. “Gram had enough for an army, and most of it still hasn’t hit the expiration date.”
    She looked up at him. Tears poured from her blue eyes, down her cheeks and off her chin.
    He stooped down beside her and the kids. “Hey.” His heart thudded against his breastbone. What did a man say to a woman when he’d just heard that her dad had beaten her when she was a child?
    Wyatt didn’t have a clue. But he did have a sore, aching heart. She’d had a crappy husband and a rotten father. While he’d had two perfect parents, talent, brains and safety, she’d lived in fear.
    The knowledge rattled through him like an unwanted noise in an old car. He couldn’t deny it, but he didn’t know how to fix it.
    And the last thing he wanted to do was say the wrong thing.
    He set his hand on her shoulder. “You go inside. Take a shower. I’ll feed the kids.”
    “I’m fine.”
    “You’re crying.” He hated like hell stating the obvious, but sometimes there was no way around that. “Give yourself a twenty-minute break. I told you I have lots of cereal. We’ll be okay for twenty minutes.”
    Owen broke out of her hug. “We’ll be okay, Mommy.”
    Fresh tears erupted. She gave the kids one last hug, then rose. Her voice trembled as she said, “If you’re sure.”
    “Hey, we’ll make a game out of it.”
    Owen tugged on the leg of his sweatpants. “Can we wook for tweasure?”
    Wyatt laughed. “Yeah. We’ll wook for treasure.”
    * * *
    She’d never abandoned her kids.
    Never handed them over to another person just to give herself time to pull herself together. But she also hadn’t had a visit from her dad in...oh, eight years?
    And he’d decided to show up today? Knowing she had money in her checking account? Demanding that she give it to him?
    How the hell did he know she had money?
    She put her head under the shower spray. Now that she’d had a minute to process everything, she wasn’t as upset as she was surprised. Shocked that he’d shown up at her house like that. But now that she knew she was on his radar again, she wouldn’t cower as her mom had. She’d stand her ground. And she would call the police. If he touched her or—God forbid—her kids, he’d be in jail so fast his head would spin.
    She got out of the shower and dried her hair. In ten