~ Madison's POV ~

Weeks went by just like that, living in Santiago's house, instead of being at home just with my babies.

We didn't speak unless we spoke about the twins or anything that affected them, or about food and stuff like that.

I was even still sleeping in his bed but we just stayed on separate sides and didn't get close at all.

The only time we had an actual conversation was when he told me about the trip to Disney World for the twins birthday so that I could book time off work for it.

That is how we ended up sharing another bed, but this time a much smaller one at the hotel in Florida than the one in Santiago's bedroom.

"These are so damn irritating, why do we need them?"

"Because I don't want to be anywhere near you." I could just imagine Santiago rolling his eyes from where he was next to me in the bed, on the otherside of the pillow wall that I created.

"Trust me, after where you've been I don't want to be anywhere near you either."

He definitely wasn't over what happened between Asher and I, even after all these weeks.

But, I was over feeling guilty about that, instead I was just angry, at Asher of course, but mostly Santiago.

He was just being a jerk which was absolutely unnecessary.

I let out a scoff at his words, instantly coming out with my own retort.

"Says the one who had sex with a woman who acts as bait for a living."

It fell silent for a moment before Santiago replied.

"What?"

Instead of replying I just ignored him and closed my eyes in an attempt to finally get some sleep after the long flight here. We also had a long day tomorrow because no doubt for the four days we were here, the twins would want to see and do everything that they could.

"Madison what are you talking about?" I let out a sigh before I spoke in a bored tone still facing away from him.

"You slept with Katia. So you don't really have the right to judge me for what I did with Asher when all this time you actually knew what Katia has done."

"Even if I did, which I didn't, she doesn't actually do anything with any of the men she baits."

"Good for her but I don't care, now let me go to sleep."

Santiago just scoffed at my words but did stay quiet this time. Eventually I fell asleep and a few hours later we were awake again when Mackenzie woke up and this time with Cameron.

The twins had a connecting room with mine and Santiago's and Arturo had his own. Stevie didn't come with us since she was busy with work.

I actually hadn't seen her for quite a while, this was the longest we'd been apart since we left college.

"Mama, I don't like it here." I gave her a tired smile as we walked to mine and Santiago's bed where Cameron was already lying on top of him.

"Cameron get off daddy please."

"No." He shook his head and seemed to wrap his arms tighter around Santiago's torso as he rested his head on his chest.

I couldn't help but laugh when Santiago tried to sit up but Cameron just let out a whine and held on even tighter.

"Baby come on, lie down on the bed properly." I picked Kenzie up to put her on the bed since it was a lot higher than our one at home.
She shuffled across to Santiago before trying to tug Cameron off him.

Her action just caused him to let out another whine and soon Santiago just turned over on his side so that Cameron was lying on the bed.

"Daddy no!"

"You're too heavy to sleep on my chest all night Cameron, just lie down next to me here."

Cameron just let out a quiet whimper before he eventually just curled up into Santiago and closed his eyes. Then, Mackenzie snuggled up to her twin brother before closing her eyes to go back to sleep.

Santiago placed his arm over both of them before closing his eyes to go back to sleep too, once I'd turned off the lamp by my side of the bed.

<<<<<<< >>>>>>> <<<<<<<

"Mama!"

"Oh wow, relax Cameron, I'm coming." I rolled my eyes as I closed the door to our room before following the twins and Santiago down the hallway to Arturo's room.

"Arty too slow." Mackenzie let out a huff as we waited for him to come out of his room, while Santiago just laughed at her nickname for Arturo.

"I've heard people call him a lot of things, but never Arty."

"Daddy what is your name?" Santiago rose an eyebrow at Kenzie who was looking at him with a frown.

"It's daddy, Kenzie. You just said it." I couldn't help but laugh at the way Cameron spoke with so much attitude.

"No, he has another name. It's Sam...Sam..." Kenzie was clearly trying to repeat the name she'd heard as she scrunched up her nose trying to remember.

"Santiago."

"Yeah!" Mackenzie nodded her head while Santiago just laughed.

"My name is Santiago, but you call me daddy."

"Can I say your name?" Cameron looked at Santiago with wide eyes, as if he was scared of his reaction which was really cute.

"You can." Santiago nodded his head and we all waited for Cameron to say his name out loud.

"Santi...Santi...ago?"

Both Santiago and I laughed at the way he pronounced the second part of his name. Instead of saying it properly, he pronounced 'ago' as the English word rather than the way you would say it for the Spanish name.

"Shall I tell you a secret?" Both the twins nodded their heads as Santiago bent down to speak to them.

"Your mama couldn't say my name when she was around your age either." Santiago glanced over at me before he smiled at the twins.

"Really?" They both looked at me with wide eyes. I manage to force a small smile onto my face as I nodded although I had absolutely no idea why Santiago was bringing that up.

He didn't need to do it, we agreed we wouldn't talk about anything from our past.

Thankfully before they could ask any questions or before Santiago could say anything else, Arturo finally came out of his room, half asleep.

"Do you know how early it is? What kind of weird family are you?" Arturo shook his head as he started walking down the hallway while the twins followed excitedly, however both Santiago and I just stood there for a moment.

We weren't a family, not a real one.

Not the four of us anyway.

We finally made it downstairs to the restaurant where breakfast was served and we got a table for five after the waitress was finally done flirting with Santiago.

"You want to go and get some juice?" I pointed over at the bar where all the fresh juices were in dispensers in a line and the twins nodded before getting off their chairs, coming over to me.

I held their hands as we walked through the restaurant and then stopped to discuss which juice they wanted.

"You don't like orange juice Mackenzie, choose something else."

"But I want orange." I shook my head as I held her glass in my hand. "Remember the chocolate ice cream? Pick something you will actually like."

"Fine mango." I nodded my head as I filled her glass before I filled Cameron's with orange juice when he chose it. I walked with them back to the table before I went back to get three more glasses of orange juice for the rest of us.

"Sorry, can I just get a glass?" At the sound of a voice next to me, I turned my head to the side to see a dark haired man smiling at me.

He was definitely good looking.

When I just continued to stare at him, he cleared his throat, gesturing to the stack of glasses I was standing in front of.

"Oh, yeah, sorry." I stepped to the side as I finished filling the first glass of orange juice.

"How many days have you been here?"

"Oh, this is our first." He nodded his head as he picked up a glass and then started taking his time as he read the labels for each flavour of juice.

"Are you here with your family, on vacation?" I nodded my head, giving him a small smile.

"It's actually my twins fourth birthday tomorrow."

"Oh, wow. I thought you were here with your parents. You have children?" I let out a laugh as I nodded my head, watching as he chose a flavour finally.

"Yeah, is it really hard to believe?"

"You just look so young, that's all. I didn't mean any offence." I nodded my head in understanding as I finished filling the final glass.

"It's okay, I get that a lot. Anyway, I should go but it was nice meeting you. I hope you enjoy your time here."

"Wait, what's your name? You know, in case we meet here again tomorrow." I let out a laugh when he gave me a joking smirk, gesturing to the bar.

"Madison."

"I'm Julian."

I gave him one last smile before I made my way back to the table, ignoring the look Santiago was giving me when I sat down.

I'm sure in his head he was thinking 'stranger danger', but, unlike him, I didn't hate every single stranger I met.

<<<<<<< >>>>>>> <<<<<<<

"You could at least act like you're enjoying this." I tensed up when Arturo stepped between Santiago and I, wrapping his arms around our shoulders while he spoke.

"We've been in this stupid line for twenty minutes and we haven't even moved yet."

"That's the beauty of these places Santi. You just get to stand in one spot with the ones you love for hours, am I right?" Both Santiago and I just glared at him when he tightened his grip on us, pulling us in closer to him.

"If you don't get your arm off me within the next three seconds, tomorrow the housekeepers are going to find a lot of blood in your room."

Santiago gave Arturo a cold glare while the latter just smirked teasingly.

"Oh, kinky." I couldn't help but laugh at his response before I stepped out of Arturo's grip, moving his arm away from me. Finally, he also released Santiago before he stepped over to the twins who were standing patiently in the line for the rollercoaster.

"I bet now you're wishing you just bought them a crap-tonne of toys instead of a vacation." I glanced over at Santiago who let out a small chuckle while nodding his head.

"I already did that aswell, but yes."

It took me a moment to understand what he said before I turned to him, letting out a sigh.

"You did? Santiago they have enough toys, they really don't need anymore."

"A vacation isn't enough though." I rolled my eyes at his words as I glanced over at my children who were dressed in the mini and Mickey Mouse items that they'd bought from the gift shop.

I had to admit though, the mouse ears were super cute on them.

"They've bought a bunch of toys and things from here too, why would they need anymore?"

"Relax Madison, they're children, they can never have enough toys."

He rolled his eyes at me as he leaned against the railing which kept the line in order.

"They're going to grow out of them and it's not like we're going to have anymore ch...children." My sentence trailed off when I realised what I was saying, but instead I just finished it, then turned away from him, ignoring the frown that had formed on his face.

This was definitely something I realised almost instantly when I found out that I was pregnant.

Santiago and I would never have anymore children together. Maybe he would have some with someone else or maybe I would, but the twins would never have any full siblings, just half siblings.

At least they had each other though - they were closer than full siblings.

Neither of us spoke again after that, but thankfully the line started to move a little faster and soon we were on our billionth roller coaster of the day.

This one was just like the one before that and the one before that - absolutely boring.

It was a roller coaster for four year olds, don't blame me for hating every second of it.

Once the twins were all tired out from their day, we went to get some dinner and then went for a walk, looking at all the big iconic buildings and castles before we took them back to the hotel to go to bed.

Their bedtime was usually around 9pm which meant Santiago, Arturo and I were left with nothing to do after that.

That same day Santiago and Arturo went out together to a club, but the next day which was the twins birthday for some reason Santiago didn't want to go.

Although the second day at Disney World was the twins actual birthday, it turned out to be pretty similar to the first one. We went for breakfast and then spent the entire day at the park that they'd chosen to go to before we went out for a nice dinner and had a cake too. Then, when we got back to the hotel we spent half an hour with them just playing before we eventually put them to bed.

We also did the same thing on the third day and by then, I was getting kind of sick of the roller coasters and fun houses, but of course I wasn't going to tell anyone that.

"Come on bro, I went alone yesterday, just come." Arturo gave Santiago a pleading look just as I came out of the twins room after I'd put them to sleep.

"Go where?" They both looked over at me before Arturo spoke.

"The club."

"Oh. You should go." Weirdly, they both looked surprised at my encouragement. "I should?"

I nodded my head as I dropped down on the bed, picking up the TV remote.

"Yeah, there's nothing else for you to do here and you were here yesterday. Just go, have fun." I shrugged my shoulders like it was no big deal and Arturo let out a laugh.

"I knew I liked you Madison. Be ready in thirty minutes." With that Arturo left our room to go to his own to get ready.

"You know he's only going so that he can get laid. He's going to ditch me after a few drinks."

"So? Do the same thing then, unless you have a girlfriend then I don't advise you to do that." As I spoke in an absentminded tone, I kept my eyes on the TV, but really I was trying my best gauge his reaction to that.

Even after living with him for so many weeks I still hadn't figured out if he had a girlfriend or not.

It would be kind of weird if he did considering I was sleeping in his bed every night, but some men don't care about stuff like that unfortunately.

From the corner of my eye I could see him looking at me for a moment before he spoke.

"I don't." Finally, I glanced over at him when he looked away, watching as he thought for a second before he eventually stood up and headed to the bathroom. "I don't want one."

Even though he mumbled the last part, I could tell he still wanted me to hear it. But I had no idea why.

He probably just liked sleeping around, he seemed like he was that type of person.

Although, I actually couldn't imagine Santiago with a girlfriend. He never had one in highschool although by the end, he had done something sexual with most of the girls in our class.

He was what you would call a man whore. But, somehow he still managed to make me feel like the only girl in his life.

My thoughts were interrupted when my phone started buzzing next to me. Looking at the caller ID, I smiled when I saw my mom's name.

"Hey mom."

"Madison? Oh Maddie, please come home baby. You need to come home."

"Why? What's wrong?" I heard her let out a sob before there was some shuffling on the otherside.

"We should have told you, but he just didn't want to see your reaction. He didn't want to see you sad."

"Mom what are you talking about? You should have told me what?" I sat up properly from the position I was lying in as I spoke.

"Your father...he had a heart condition."

"Wait...what?" She fell silent for a moment, allowing me to digest the news before I spoke again. "Had?"

"He passed away Maddie."

As soon as she said this she let out a small cry. "He was sleeping and then, he just never woke up."

"He's dead?" I could imagine her nodding her head as a gasp escaped my lips.

"I'm so sorry baby." She didn't say anything else when I fell completely silent and eventually without saying anything else I just hung up the phone.

After I hung up, I just sat there, staring off into space as I thought about what I'd just been told.

My dad was dead.

I saw the signs that day, I knew something was wrong and I just let him talk me out of it. I should have known, I should have been with him during his last days.

Instead I was in Florida on the otherside of the country while he was dying.

I let out a shaky breath, my vision quickly becoming blurry when my eyes filled with tears.

It didn't even feel real. It couldn't be real.

I only saw him a few weeks ago and now...I'll never see him again.

"Madison? What happened?" I turned my attention away from the blank wall and over to Santiago who was frowning at me in the doorway to the bathroom.

"Santi..." As soon as the tears started falling down my cheeks, he came over to the bed, sitting down next to me.

"What's wrong?"

When I still couldn't bring myself to say it, he just pulled me into his arms as I rested my head against his chest. We sat like that for a moment until I finally spoke.

"He died."

"Who did?" He gave me a frown as I lifted my head to look at him properly.

"My dad...he died." It seemed to take him a second to process what I just said before he let out a sigh, mumbling a curse word under his breath as he pulled me in closer to him.

He didn't say anything as I just cried into his chest, holding onto him tightly. At first my cries were quiet and then the longer I was crying the more real it felt and the harder my sobs came out.

"It's okay Maddie, shhh."

"He's dead Santiago." He nodded his head as he rubbed my back, but he didn't say anything after that. A while later my cries finally subsided when I couldn't cry anymore but I still just stayed in his arms.

He didn't even seem to mind as he held me for what seemed like ages until there was a knock at the door.

"I'll be back in a second, okay?" I nodded my head before releasing my grip and moving back, allowing him to get up off the bed. He went to speak to Arturo, most likely to tell him what happened before moments later he came back and got back on the bed.

This time instead of sitting down with me he lay back against the headboard and pulled me into him, allowing me to rest my head on his shoulder.

"What happened?"

"My mom said it was a heart condition. That day, when we went for his birthday I knew something was wrong. He just wouldn't tell me what it was." My voice was void of any emotion as I told him about that day.

I just felt numb all of a sudden.

"Maybe he just wanted to feel normal. You know, maybe he didn't want to think about it."

"He should have told me. I should have been there instead of here." As I spoke, more tears began to roll down my cheeks.

"Madison it's okay, you don't-"

"No, don't! Don't try to tell me it's okay Santiago because it's not okay. I'm horrible daughter, I'm a horrible person." As I spoke, I sat up from where I was lying next to Santiago so that I could shout more easily at him.

"No you're not Madison, you're one of the kindest people I know. He knew what he was doing, if he wanted you to know, he would have told you."

"You don't know anything about him or me." Although I was clearly redirecting my emotions towards him, he didn't seem to care much.

"Madison, I'm not saying that I know him, I'm trying to explain to you that he obviously knew what was going on and he chose not to tell you. So, don't beat yourself up about it."

All I did was scoff as I shook my head, angrily wiping away the tears that were still rolling down my cheeks.

"Why don't you just focus on your own life and stop pretending like you care about me, because you don't."

"You think I don't care about you?" He sat up as he asked me the question while I just shook my head.

"You don't. I don't even know if you ever have. I was probably just a joke to you in highschool, right? Something to pass the time."

Santiago almost instantly shook his head as he frowned at me.

"Of course you're weren't Madison. You know I-"

He cut himself off before he could finish his sentence and eventually he just let out a sigh and shook his head, opting not to finish whatever he was going to say.

It fell silent between us before Santiago moved even closer to me, taking my hand in his.

"I know you're hurting right now Madison and I may not know how you feel, but I promise I'll do everything I can to help you. Despite what you may think, I do care."

I continued to stare into his eyes as he spoke. I had no clue what to say or what to do, I didn't know how I felt. I didn't know what I wanted to feel.

I just felt numb.

Numb and yet, so hurt and sad.

In that second I lost all common sense, or any sense at all. I just needed some kind of comfort, or maybe a distraction form what was happening, so, I did the worst thing that I could ever do.

The one thing that would completely ruin whatever kind of weird and twisted relationship that Santiago and I had.

I kissed him.

I quickly leaned forward closing the gap between as my lips connected with his soft plump ones, my hand going to the back of his neck as I kissed him.

Santiago stilled for a long moment under my touch before he eventually placed his hands on my shoulders, pushing me away from him.

When I saw the frown on his face as he leaned slightly away from me, it was only then that I realised what I'd just done.

And that he'd just pushed me away, like I didn't mean anything to him.

I felt completely mortified as I sat there with wide eyes which filled with tears almost instantly once I'd realised what I'd done.

It was just a dream, that he could ever even think of me like that.

A dream I didn't even know I had until I felt that pain in my heart when he pushed me away.

Without waiting for him to say anything, I pretty much scrambled off the bed and rushed into the bathroom, closing the door behind myself.

I let out a shaky breath, covering my mouth with my hand as I leaned against the counter, trying to catch my breath as the tears continued to silently fall down my cheeks.

"Madison...open the door."

"Go away." He stayed quiet for a moment before he let out a sigh.

"Just come out here and talk to me."

"No, there's nothing to talk about."

~ Santiago's POV ~

How it's it possible that I managed to screw things up so badly?

Of course I wanted to kiss her.

Any man would want to kiss her.

But she just found out her father had died, she didn't mean it. Not in the way I would want her to mean it. She wasn't in her right state of mind, I didn't want her to regret it.

So I pushed her away, it wasn't the right time to kiss her. Not under those circumstances.

And I was just too shocked to even know what to say when I did push her away until she ran into the bathroom, but then it was too late.

She didn't come out of the bathroom for another ten minutes and when she did she went straight into the twins room to sleep with them instead of in our bed.

All I wanted to do was follow her and tell her to come back. I wanted to be there for her, I wanted to help her get through all the pain and heartache she was feeling.

But I also didn't want her to get even more upset around me. We weren't together, we weren't even friends, it wasn't a situation where she went into another room but really she just wanted me to follow her and try to make sure she was okay.

She really would hate it if I followed her, so I didn't.

The next morning when she came back into our room to get ready for our last day here, I could tell she hadn't slept. She's been crying all night.

She didn't even look at me as she got ready. The only time she spoke was to the twins although I could tell it was taking everything in her to keep her facade. She didn't even say a word to Arturo as we went down to breakfast and then got on with the rest of the day at the stupid park.

She was right, I really did wish that I got them a room full of toys instead of this stupid vacation. But, I guess every time I saw the twins smile, it made it worth it.

Even if I'd hated every second of the last four days.

"Madison?"

We were busy walking to the next rollercoaster the twins wanted to ride when we heard someone call her name, causing us all to come to a stop.

"Yes?" She gave the man a blank look causing him to frown for a second before he smiled.

"I'm Julian, remember? We met the other day at breakfast."

Even though she did eventually remember she just shrugged her shoulders and looked away as if she was done with the conversation - something she would never usually do.

"Can I help you with something?" This Julian man turned to face me, glancing between Madison and I for a second before he rose his hands in surrender.

Something about him struck me as odd, but I couldn't quite place my finger on it.

"Sorry, I didn't know she was yours. I wasn't trying to do anything, I was just being nice."

"Nice? No you were just being a man who thought there was a chance he could get his-"

"Shut up." I gave Arturo a glare before I stepped closer to Julian, keeping my glare firmly fixed on his face and my tone low and cold.

"Walk away. Now."

He held eye contact with me for a moment, that 'innocent' act he had dropping for a second as he smirked and nodded his head.

"Okay Santiago."

Oooooh 👀

What did you guys think?

Sorry these chapters are taking so long, I just don't have that same flow with this book when writing as some of my others so I'm trying really hard to make the chapters good 🥺

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