I had no idea who Brother was, but if I had to guess, it was Sister’s brother.
But without sounding stupid when I said ‘who,’ I chose to remain silent.
Logan stared back at me, his hand still holding my wrist, blinking at me rapidly.
“I meant Sister,” Tasia snarled.
“Well,” I said. “Like I said, unless you’re related to the lawyer, I highly doubt you’ve had a chance to talk to them yet. Also, you might want to consider calling at more normal hours.”
“Eight o’clock is normal,” Tasia countered, voice filled with venom.
I could tell that I was getting to her. My calm demeanor and off-handed, flippant comments were driving her wild.
“Well,” I said. “If this was all that you had to say…”
“Oh, there’s more,” she snickered. “I’m going to be asking for more child support, soon.”
That was when rage started boiling in my guts.
“You could,” I said softly. “But just remember, if you start taking puck shots at us, remember that it works both ways. If you can go for an increase in child support, he can go for custody.”
“Yeah, but he hates this kid. Why would he do that?” she laughed.
I clenched my teeth and tried not to call her a bitch like I really wanted to do.
“He doesn’t hate the kid. You don’t hate the kid for something the mother did. He sees the child as a symbol of your infidelity. He also sees that baby as part of his best friend. As part of a man that was taken advantage of.” I paused. “Is that the only way you can get it? Taking advantage of men that have reduced faculties? Because if that’s the case, I feel sorry for you. Also, seeing as Logan’s mine now, I can’t see how you could’ve ever left him. He’s absolute perfection…”
Logan pulled me to his hard chest, startling a small squeak out of me.
That small squeak, however, was drowned out by Tasia’s growl of outrage.
“He tell you why I had to go to such lengths, huh?” Tasia snarled. “Because I’m all for telling you.”
Logan held his hand out for the phone, but I shook him off.
“No, why don’t you tell me, Tasia? You know that you want to,” I chirped.
“He has a low sperm count!” she cried out. “He couldn’t give me kids!”
I laughed then. “Maybe that was God’s way of saying that you didn’t deserve them. That you are a crazy bitch, and crazy bitches don’t deserve innocent children.”
Logan’s arms tightened around me and before I could say another word, the phone was slipped out of my hand, and Logan was talking softly into it.
“Listen, Tasia,” Logan began. “We already know the court order says from when we originally went to court about Brother and Sister. Please, feel free to pursue it further. And if you feel you’re in need of more child support, you can again take me to court.”
There was a long silence, and then Logan shook his head and hung up the phone.
“Brother?” I asked softly.
Logan’s face went pained.
Literally, pain etched into his every pore as he said, “Sister and Brother were both from the same litter. We got them at the same time. Only difference between the two were their sex.”
I felt that there was more to the story, so I waited for him to explain instead of pushing him to talk about it if he wasn’t ready.
I’d wait all day if I had to.
“You’re not going to ask what happened?” he murmured.
“I was, but I figured patience is a virtue and you’d explain what happened when you wanted to,” I admitted frankly.
Logan’s lips turned up at one corner before he sighed and dropped the handcuffs and the key to his bed.
“I got the dogs in the divorce.” He sighed. “Only, I’m fairly sure that while Tasia had them, she fed them something that would make them sick before I got them. Purposefully trying to rack up my bills seeing as she knew that I’d take care of them. Unfortunately, where Sister survived what they think was a grape poisoning, Brother didn’t. He died the week after I got him back from Tasia.”
My heart lurched in my chest.
“Oh, Logan,” I said softly. “I’m so sorry.”
Logan shrugged, and though the move was unaffected, the pain still on his face was not.
“I don’t think she was trying to kill him. I just think she was trying to make him sick enough to force me to take him in. To cause me to have to pay for something when I didn’t have the money to do that with. Unfortunately, grapes are poisonous to dogs,” he murmured.
I fisted my hands and placed them on my hips.
“That’s just…diabolical,” I finally finished with. “I can’t believe…”
There was a sudden, intense knocking coming from the direction of the front door, only it didn’t sound like his door as much as the neighbor’s door.