content staying with the Sterlings. I was still pondering just what might be going on at the Newton house as I pulled the car to a stop in the Sterlings’ circular driveway and stopped the engine.
“Matthew! Noooooo!”
I sprang out of the car at the sound of the loud shriek and was greeted by the sight of Matthew in the center of a ring of children, which included Olivia and Jenny, plus a dimple-cheeked boy who looked maybe two, and a couple of older children I took to be Skylar’s half-siblings, Annabelle and Christoph. Matthew was holding Olivia with her arms around his waist while he twirled around and around, causing her feet to fly out behind her.
“Ahhhh!” she screamed with the kind of joy I had never heard from my daughter. Not in nine and a half years.
“Hold on, kiddo!” he cried as he whirled faster, until finally they were both out of breath.
He released her gently back to the ground, and almost immediately, he was tackled by her and the rest of the children, the smaller ones begging for their turns while the older two just seemed to enjoy the chorus of hugs and contact.
“Wait, wait, wait, you hooligans!” Matthew cried, grinning hard as he fought to free himself of all the tiny hands. “I need a break! Hold on, Liv, lemme say hi to your mom. Then the merry-go-round is back in service.”
“I’ll take his place!” the boy, Christoph, volunteered with a slight French accent and was almost immediately pounced on by the other kids while Matthew made his escape.
“Hey, doll,” he greeted me, still out of breath as he wiped his brow.
He was red-faced and gleaming with joy. I wanted nothing more than to kiss every part of him, and maybe lick the drips of sweat from his neck.
I shivered. Oh, no. I couldn’t go there. Not now.
“Having fun?” I asked.
“Sure am,” he said.
“What happened to the game?” I asked, checking my watch. It was nearly five o’clock. Good lord, where had the time gone?
“Ah, it was a shitshow, if you want to know the truth. Sox won, nine to zero.” He scowled adorably. “Pathetic. And now I owe Brandon a Benjamin, to top it off.”
I hid a smile. I couldn’t have cared less about baseball, but I enjoyed his passion. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
“You were gone a while. Get everything done?”
I turned back to the children, not wanting to dive into the nightmare I’d found. “For the time being.”
“So, moving in to your new digs this week, I take it.”
“Not likely.”
“What happened?”
I sighed. And then because I had to tell someone, I proceeded to fill him in on the house’s strange new denizens and the man with the gun. By the time I finished, Matthew was rubbing his jaw, forehead furrowed so deeply his brows were almost touching.
“Do you have to go back?” he asked.
I shrugged. “Tomorrow, I suppose. I’ll probably need to hire an attorney to serve the eviction notice. I wouldn’t normally push right now, but the house is in such disrepair, and, well, it’s mine.”
“Of course it is, baby, of course,” Matthew murmured, rubbing a sympathetic hand on my shoulder.
I fought the urge to collapse into him and accept his comfort for real.
“Take Brandon and Skylar up on their offer,” he said. “Stay here while you figure it out.”
I looked up. “You knew about that?”
Matthew shrugged. “Brandon might have mentioned it at the game. Apparently, Skylar’s pretty keen on you, doll. Not that I blame her.”
There was a loud whoop as Annabelle and Christoph were now taking turns spinning Jenny and Olivia around in the grass.
I sighed. “I can’t think why. She barely knows me.”
A finger slid under my chin, and Matthew tipped my face gently toward his. “Because she knows the goods, baby. And you’re the goods.”
For a moment, I almost believed him. But then the finger dropped, and I turned away, back toward the kids who had all collapsed, aside from Luis, into the green blanket of grass.
“I’ll go with you,” he said. “You all drop the kids off in the morning, right?”
I nodded. “Yes.”
“Right. We can dig around public records. Find out what’s going on with the people living there, contact the police if we need to. You don’t have to do this alone, Nina.”
We turned back to watch the kids again. There was something soothing about watching children simply be happy. Olivia in particular continued to shriek with unabated joy as she and Jenny whirled around together in