“Yes, I want them to be wrong. I want the babies we brought home from the hospital to be the ones who should have been in our homes all along. I just don’t want you to be caught up in any of this. I mean you and Luna.”
“Thanks.” She cleared her throat, not sure what to say.
“With everything else going on, I haven’t even told Mom or any of my brothers and sisters about the potential switch. I figured all the other incidents had involved Colton businesses. Even the cut fence. But this one, it’s personal.”
“I doubt your dad would say that the shooting wasn’t personal. I mean, if he could.” She winced. “Sorry.”
Willow took a few more bites of her dinner, though she was no longer hungry. Why hadn’t she thought it through before making a joke like that? It wasn’t as if his dad was at the ranch convalescing from a golf injury. Though the family wasn’t talking about it, no one knew if Payne Colton would ever come home from the hospital.
Asher reached for his plate again and finished off the last of his lasagna.
“Yes, he would say it was personal,” he said after a few minutes. “He’d also be furious about it, if he’d only wake up.”
“He will,” she found herself promising. Strange for her to say those words about a man she’d spent so many years and so much energy hating.
Asher’s smile was a sad one.
“Thanks. I am sorry, you know.”
“For what?”
“That you might be caught up in all of this because of my family.”
“We still don’t know that. And we won’t until the DNA results come in. We have no proof there’s a connection between the circumstances with your family and the threats here.”
“That’s why I’m going to hire a couple of guards to watch your place during the daytime. Just for extra peace of mind. Then for nighttime, the two of you should move into our place—”
“I can’t accept help from you, and we’re definitely not going to stay at the Triple R.” She’d already said hogs would have to take flight before she would even visit the ranch.
“You wouldn’t be with Harper and me, specifically. There’s plenty of space.”
She was already shaking her head. “Not going to happen.”
He settled back in the chair and crossed his arms. “Hear me out. I just need to know that you and Luna are safe.”
Something warmed inside her at his words, but she pushed thoughts that he cared about their well-being to the back of her mind. “And I can’t move into the same house where my mother was thrown out like garbage.”
“This isn’t only about you.”
They shot glances at the occupants of the two high chairs. Both infants had stopped pounding on their trays and were dozing off, their shoulders swaying and heads nodding.
“Guess our conversation isn’t all that riveting,” she said.
For several seconds, neither spoke as they watched their sweet, drowsy children.
“We have to figure out something,” Asher whispered. “For them.”
This time Willow nodded. As much as she hated to admit it, he was right. No matter how they’d ended up where they were that night, this involved the girls and their safety.
She pulled the tray back and unbuckled her child, who immediately whined.
“It’s okay, sweetie.” She lifted Luna into her arms, rested the infant’s filthy face against her and spoke over her shoulder. “Let’s clean them up, change them and put them down. I’ll grab a portable crib from downstairs.”
“I guess it wouldn’t hurt for a while.” He bent to unstrap Harper.
“We’ll do the paperwork for Harper—” she paused, shrugging “—and then we’ll figure out the other thing.”
She might have been reluctant to accept assistance for herself, but for the child she loved, she would do almost anything, even take help from a Colton.