Stay with me

Chapter 77 - Playing without rules

- Good evening!

- Mirai, are you coming home so late from work? - Engin Astarkhan frowned with displeasure. - This is bad for a mother who has three children.

It started! Mirai suppressed a flash of irritation and calmly replied:

- I have no choice. My job allows us to live a normal life. Not starving or needing.

"So what," Mehmet said. From the moment she got out of the car, he did not take his unblinking gaze from his ex-wife. - All the time while you are at work, eight-year-old girls are at home alone?

She wanted to hit him. Hard. So that he doubled over and howled in pain. She was already opening her mouth to reject the moralizing claims of her ex-husband when a deep and confident voice rang out behind her:

- During the day, my daughter Kumru looks after the girls. She is seventeen and she is a very serious and responsible girl.

Kartal walked over and stood so close that Mirai felt the warmth of his body. It seeped through the skin, flowed into the chest, and reached the heart. It warmed her up and gave her the strength she needed now to hold confidently.

- Yes? - Mehmet angrily glanced at Kartal. - Then I can rest assured that my daughters are being looked after.

"You can be calm in any case," Mirai said sternly. - It's stupid after so many years to pretend to care and make claims.

"I'm not pretending anything," Mehmet hoisted. - I really care about the life and safety of the girls.

- Didn't you care for seven years? - Mockingly retorted Mirai. - When they and Mert were left without a roof over their heads and with a real threat of starvation, then their life and safety were indifferent to you?

- You're overreacting!

"I'm just telling the truth!

They looked into each other's eyes, and Mehmet was the first to look away. Cowardly, he turned aside and muttered that it was impossible to talk sensibly with this woman. Mirai smiled ironically and said nothing.

"Daughter," said Engin Astarkhan. - You're not going to change?

- What for? - Mirai was surprised.

"On a horse farm, you will be uncomfortable in a business suit," the man explained. - Go put on something comfortable.

Mirai raised one eyebrow and looked at her former father-in-law in disbelief.

- Daughter, you are not going to come with us to watch the horses? - The father intervened. "You love them so much.

- I love, - confirmed Mirai. - But I'll look another time.

He couldn't hide his disappointment. And he didn't want to. In recent months, he rethought his life and realized that what he had been strangling in his heart for many years is the most important thing in life. The opportunity to see his daughter-in-law and grandchildren has now become the highest point in the scale of his life values. But he once destroyed this possibility and now could only be content with crumbs.

Asli and Jeren ran out of the entrance. Mert came out next. The girls, having casually greeted the men, flew up to Mirai and clung to her from both sides. She hugged both of them and asked:

- Be careful and listen to Mert.

- Okay, mommy! They promised.

Probably, it was necessary to introduce the father and grandfather to the daughters, but Mirai did not dare to do it. Deciding to let the Astarkhans figure it out on their own, she looked at her son and smiled affectionately at him.