Chapter 5: Bruce character

"Yes, sir."

Down in the street, he could see people scurrying about, going to work, returning home. Did some of them also feel as if they'd been hit with a two-by-four? Was he the only one who felt isolated from everyone around him? Rafe put his hand on the glass and leaned forward until his muscles strained.

Those kids believed he was their father, despite this Bruce character that was in the picture. What did that asshole look like? Was it the man who fathered the twins, the man she chose over him?

A small part of him, a part he didn't want to acknowledge, wished they had his eyes instead of hers. That they were made in his image. Then he could've let her convince him there'd been a mistake all those years ago. He'd have Lindi again and two sons, and maybe he'd be able to fool himself that he trusted her. That he was the kind of man a woman could love as well as desire. But they had her beautiful eyes. Their darker skin didn't mean they were his. He knew of at least one other man with his coloring who'd sworn he had been with Lindi.

Like he'd done these last five years, he ruthlessly pushed any thought of Lindi and her children out of his mind and got back to work.

His cell rang an hour later while he still struggled to concentrate on the reports on his laptop. He kept seeing Lindi, wondering if she'd still melt for him if he kissed her. "Rafe," he said.

"One of my men followed them to their home." Jose gave him the address. It was in a lower-middle-class neighborhood. Before the economic crises, it had been well on its way to becoming a trendy neighborhood. During the crises, the area had become rundown, some properties abandoned. When the economy revived, the neighborhood had never gotten back on track. It was on a slippery slide to becoming the kind of area you avoided. Why would she live there? It wasn't safe for her and the kids. She and the twins were well dressed. He didn't have the impression that they struggled.

"Sir, she went to see the lawyers on the third floor," his chief of security said.

"I see." She'd studied to be a criminal lawyer when they'd been together. And she'd been dressed like one. An image of Lindi as a sexy lawyer in a tight skirt flashed into his mind. Why couldn't he keep his thoughts off of her? Why did he keep wondering how many differences he'd find in this new mature Lindi?

He doubted she worked in his building; they'd have run into each other before now. Maybe the firm she worked with had business here.

"Do you need me to dig deeper?" Jose asked, and if he was curious, he hid it well.

"No, that will be all."

The rest of the day, Rafe forced himself to concentrate on work, but a pair of beautiful blue eyes haunted him. And the memory of two pairs of identical eyes staring at him, accusing him of making their mother cry, kept popping into his head.