Free Longing for Kayla by Lauren Fraser Page B

how people like me didn’t deserve to keep their kids.”
    Chris’ jaw clenched. Just what he needed. Why did he have to deal with that crap on top of everything else? They should know better than to voice their opinions where anyone could hear.
    “I have no doubt if you go to the shelter, you’ll be able to keep your kids with you.” Chris turned to his partner. “You want to make a call?”
    Granger nodded and left the room, leaving Chris alone with the woman.
    “I bet you think I’m pretty stupid to put up with that.”
    Chris raised his shoulders. “It’s not my place to judge you.”
    The empty, hollow sound of her laughter spoke of her despair. “I was raised that good girls get married and have kids. They do what their husbands say, make sure the meals are on the table.” She wiped angrily at her uninjured eye. “I thought I was doing what I was supposed to. I thought that was what love was.”
    Her words hit Chris in the gut. How was what he was doing any different? He had this picture in his head of what love and a relationship were supposed to look like. What he had. What he wanted. It didn’t fit into that pretty picture at all.
    But looking at this broken and battered woman, she had the picture-perfect life. The ideal. And behind the scenes there was nothing idyllic about it. This woman would be better off alone. It was sad the things people were willing to accept trying to hold on to a dream. Hell, he didn’t even know if the dream existed.
    Was he being an idiot to pass up what he could have with Jesse and Kayla just because it didn’t fit the mold he thought he should have?
    He rubbed his hand across the ache in his chest. What the hell was he going to do?
    * * * * *
     
    Kayla flipped open her cell phone to check that it had service for about the tenth time. Why the hell wasn’t Chris calling her back? Oh, he could be such a stubborn jerk.
    It was killing her that she hadn’t been able to talk to him since he’d stormed out of the cabin. They’d waited for him, but he never came back and they’d finally had to leave to get Jesse back to work that night.
    How had things gotten so messed up? She’d lost her two best friends. Maybe she should never have admitted her feelings. But as her mind raced back over their time together, she couldn’t regret one single moment. She loved them both and knew how good it could be between them. She prayed Chris would come to the same conclusion.
    She needed to get her mind off him. She felt as if she’d been walking around in a fog all night. She couldn’t focus, she hadn’t seen or heard from Chris in five days. She was worried, it wasn’t like him not to call her. She knew he had a lot to figure out, but it just seemed like it would be easier to figure out together.
    A light tapping on her door pulled her out of her thoughts. She looked up to see Anita, one of the intake workers.
    “What’s up?”
    “Officer Granger just called. He and Officer Hanson are bringing in a woman and her two kids, three and five. She’s been pretty roughed up.”
    “Okay, when are they arriving?”
    “They were just leaving the hospital, so about twenty minutes.”
    “Okay, get Melissa to make sure room four is ready to go.”
    “Will do,” Anita said and left the office in search of the other woman.
    Chris was bringing someone in. Well, at least she’d get to see him. Normally they preferred female officers to come to the house, but Chris was one of the few officers who put the domestic abuse women at ease. For a big guy, he had an incredibly calm, gentle way about him with both the women and their children. It was as if they instinctually knew they were safe with him. And they were.
    Watching the Transition House’s security monitors, she saw the unmarked police car pull up. She buzzed open the gate. When the car parked, Chris and his partner both picked up a sleeping child from the backseat and carried them toward the house through the snow, with the woman