“That was different. She needed me. He doesn’t need you. You don’t need him. You and the girls are better off without him and his influence anyway.”

“What the hell are you talking about? Influence?” Kelly asked.

“He’s not good for the girls. They need to spend less time with him, not more. Inviting him into your home doesn’t fit those goals.”

“Whose goals are those?”

“Naturally, when we marry, I’ll adopt the girls. Once he can’t have you anymore he’ll lose interest anyway.”

Kelly went very cold. “You know my story and you’d actually suggest I hold my children away from their dad? Are you kidding me?”

“I’ll be their father. That’s for the best. Can’t you see that? I’ll take Kensey for the day and you can tell him he can’t stay here when he goes to the hospital with you. I’m not like your father. I’ll take care of them. I’ll protect them from harm. He will only bring pain.”

She tried to find words but ended up looking like a goldfish as she kept opening and closing her mouth. “You can’t possibly be serious. Where is all this coming from?” It was absurd.

“Don’t you think I can see how he watches you? He lives the kind of life that’s wrong for you. He cheated on you. He doesn’t value you.”

She blew out a breath, trying to find patience but she was nearing the end of her rope. “Ross, I didn’t know you felt this way.”

“Well, you do now. I’m sorry I have to insist, but that’s how it is. I’ll tell him if you feel uncomfortable doing it.” He crossed his arms over his chest as if the matter was settled.

“That’s not going to happen. You’re going to get hold of yourself and realize you’re being ridiculous and saying things you don’t mean. Saying things you can’t take back,” she added. “I invited him to stay and I’m not rescinding that invitation. It would be rude. It’d give the girls a bad message. I want him to be an involved father. The girls love him. He loves them. End of story. Imagine yourself in his place. If one of your children had been in the hospital. You’d never leave their side. Which is how it’s supposed to work. Show some empathy.”

“I don’t want him here. He’s trying to take my place. If I can’t be around during this time, he’ll get all the time with Maddie. Building trust with her. I could be doing that. Experiences like that are important in creating long-term bonds in blended families.”

“I don’t think I can marry you.” In her head, it had sounded like a panicked blurted wail. Surprisingly, her voice remained calm. Once she said the words she had to fight the overwhelming urge to fall face-first on the bed with relief.

“What?” Ross paused, surprise on his handsome features.

“You’ll make someone a good husband, but I’m not for you. You’re not for me. Not in a let’s-get-married-and-merge-our-lives way.”

“I don’t understand,” he said.

“You demanded that I choose you or Vaughan. This doesn’t have anything to do with him. I’m choosing me and my children.”

“You don’t mean that. We’re good together.” Ross still didn’t get it.

Honestly, she wanted to go to the hospital, pick Maddie up and grab Kensey, running away from everyone who wanted to make all her choices.

It wasn’t that they’d been bad together. Just two days before he’d been lovely to her by showing up at the hospital. Only now she realized it was some sort of territory marking with Vaughan.

“I think we were good together, too. But not in a forever way. I’m not going to make you happy. This is going to come up over and over in our marriage. You’re not going to adopt them! They have parents and neither of us would sign away our rights to Maddie and Kensey like that. I’m frankly really disgusted that you’d ever think I’d want such a thing. Or that you’d want it. What would it do to my children to have their father sign them away as if they were property?”

She pulled off the beautiful engagement ring he’d given her three months before and put it in his palm.

“I’d have treated you like a queen. He’s going to hurt you again. That’s what men like him do. And then what will happen to your children? I hope to God they don’t take after their mother when it comes to picking losers to love.”

She knew he was hurt and striking out, but she’d had enough.

“You need to leave now before either of us says anything more. I’ll go through everything over the next two days and whatever is here I’ll bring to your house. I wish you the best and I hope after a while that we can remain friends.”

She led the way to the door, opening it and heading downstairs. She wanted him out of her house before he came out of his stupor and decided to make a scene.

Laughter came from the family room where Stacey and Kensey were playing Go Fish for probably the nineteenth time. Kelly unlocked the door to the garage and then opened the bay, letting the door to the house close behind them.

“Here.” Kelly pulled the keys to his house—for emergencies as she still always knocked when she came over to visit him—from her key ring and handed them his way. “It’s easier for you to give mine back, too. Since we’re already here and all.”

She stared at him until he handed her keys over. Near the open door to the driveway, Kelly spotted the air pump she’d borrowed for the basketball and handed it over, stepping into the open of the driveway. “This is yours.”