Kitabı oku: «His Long-Lost Family»

“She’s your daughter.”

His mouth snapped shut, his face paled. “Why would you concoct such an outrageous story?”

“It’s not a story—it’s the truth.” Kelly should have known telling him would be a mistake. She stood up. “I thought you—and Ava—had a right to know. But I’d rather she didn’t know the identity of her father than know he doesn’t want her.”

Jackson pushed away from his desk as she reached for the handle of the door. “Wait.” He slapped his hand against the frame. “You can’t drop a bombshell like that and just walk out.”

He stood so close that he breathed in her hauntingly familiar scent. Memories of that long-ago weekend teased his mind, and something stirred low in his belly. Even now, when she was making accusations that could turn his life upside down, he couldn’t ignore the heat thrumming in his veins.

“We’re done here,” she said.

He moved closer. “We’re not even close to being done.”

About the Author

BRENDA HARLEN is a former family law attorney turned work-at-home mum and national bestselling author who has written more than twenty books for Mills & Boon. Her work has been validated by industry awards (including an RWA golden Heart Award and the RT Book Reviews reviewers’ Choice Award) and by the fact that her kids think it’s cool that she’s “a real author.”

Brenda lives in southern Ontario with her husband and two sons. When she isn’t at the computer working on her next book, she can probably be found at the arena watching a hockey game. Keep up-to-date with Brenda on Facebook or send her an email at brendaharlen@yahoo.com.

His Long-Lost Family
Brenda Harlen

www.millsandboon.co.uk

This second book in my series about brothers is dedicated to my brother, Jim, who was part of my inspiration for Jackson Garrett—and who will no doubt experience much of the same angst as this story’s hero when his beautiful daughters get to be Ava’s age…

With special thanks to Emily Baker for proofreading Ava’s scenes to ensure that I wasn’t completely out of touch with the current teen generation. Someday you will find a romantic hero worthy of you—in the meantime, enjoy the journey, YOLO

Prologue

Kelly Cooper glanced at her watch as she slipped her feet into a pair of navy blue pumps and bit back an exasperated sigh. Every day, it was the same. No matter what time she woke her daughter, it seemed they were always running behind schedule.

“Come on, Ava. We’re going to be late.”

The twelve-year-old raced down the hall, her backpack in one hand and a piece of paper in the other.

“Sorry, Mom. I forgot that I need you to sign something.”

Kelly dug into her bag for a pen. Her daughter was famous for holding on to trip permission and lunch order forms until the morning that they were due, usually when they were already late getting out the door.

Ava flattened the page out on the table by the door so that Kelly could scrawl her signature on the dotted line. But something about the way her daughter’s hand was splayed over the top of the page triggered Kelly’s maternal radar. She tugged the page out of Ava’s grasp, caught the headline at the top—CONSENT FOR BODY PIERCING OF A MINOR.

When she was sure that she could speak calmly, she turned to her daughter and said, “Nice try, Ava.”

“Come on, Mom. Please.”

“No.” She tore the paper in half, then in quarters, and opened the door. “Let’s go.”

Ava’s deep green eyes, the mirror image of her father’s, filled with tears. “It’s just my belly button.”

“It’s not just anything,” Kelly argued. “Which I told you last week when you came home raving about Rachel’s sister’s hips being pierced. I am not letting you permanently disfigure any part of your body with holes or ink.”

“Why not?”

“Because you’re twelve years old.” She locked the door and headed down the hall to the elevator.

“I’m almost thirteen,” Ava said.

Actually, she’d only celebrated her twelfth birthday a few months earlier, but that wasn’t the issue. “Still nowhere close to eighteen,” she pointed out. “If you want a belly button ring when you’re eighteen, I won’t be able to say no. But until then, that is the answer.”

“You’re so mean.”

“You’ve mentioned that once or twice before,” she acknowledged as they exited on the ground floor.

“Miranda and Corinne have belly button rings, and Rachel’s getting hers pierced on her birthday.” Ava climbed into the passenger side and latched her belt. “Because her mother’s cool, and because she believes it’s a way for Rachel to express her individuality.”

“How can it be an expression of her individuality if she’s having it done to be like everyone else?” Kelly countered.

Ava huffed out a breath. “Why do you always have to treat me like a baby?”

“Because you are my baby,” she reminded her.

Her daughter was silent for a long minute, but Kelly knew better than to think that she’d given up. It wasn’t in Ava’s nature to back down on anything. As she proved when she said, “I bet if I had a dad, he’d let me get my belly button pierced.”

It was a familiar argument. Whenever Kelly didn’t give her daughter what she wanted, Ava played the no-father card. And while Kelly didn’t let the arguments sway her, she couldn’t deny the guilt that inevitably swamped her. Because Ava did have a father, but she’d never met the man who had contributed to her DNA—and that man had no idea that he had a child.

She tried not to think about him, but she’d never forgotten him. Not since the night of her sixteenth birthday, when he’d kissed her. In that first moment that his lips touched hers, he’d also taken hold of her heart. It was several years later before their relationship progressed beyond that single kiss, before the one weekend they spent together changed her whole life.

He was the only man she’d ever really loved, and when he’d chosen to be with someone else, Kelly had taken her shattered heart and her unborn child and moved as far away as possible. But it turned out that halfway across the country still wasn’t far enough to outrun the memories, guilt and regrets.

“This isn’t negotiable,” she said firmly.

Ava fell silent again, pouting.

On her way to her daughter’s school, Kelly tried to remember what she’d been like as a twelve-year-old girl. She’d been shy and withdrawn through most of her childhood, cautiously trying to find her way in the world. Thankfully, she’d had Lukas Garrett to guide her. Maybe it was because her best friend was a boy, but she’d never thought too much about clothes or makeup. She’d never worried about keeping up with fashion trends or trying to attract boyfriends; she’d never dyed her hair or worn black nail polish. And she certainly hadn’t been thinking about body piercings or tattoos.

Of course, she’d grown up in a different time, and Pinehurst, New York, was definitely another world. Though fifteen years had passed since she’d first gone away to college and the population of the town had increased exponentially, she knew that not much else had changed. Pinehurst still was, and probably always would be, a small town at heart. It was a place where neighbors talked to one another on the street, where the residents baked cookies to welcome newcomers, and where traditional values continued to be revered. Recently Kelly had found herself thinking that it would be nice to raise her daughter in a town like that.

As she pulled up in front of the school to drop Ava off, her thoughts drifted back to the email Lukas had sent to her the previous day, and she cursed him for tempting her with the link to a job posting at Richmond Pharmaceuticals. Because she was tempted and she didn’t want to be; because going back to Pinehurst would inevitably mean revealing the secret she’d kept throughout her daughter’s entire life.

If she stayed in Seattle, on the other hand, everything would remain status quo. Unfortunately, the status quo was no longer as satisfying as it used to be. And while a cross-country move wouldn’t make Ava happy in the short term, Kelly believed it would be the best thing for her—maybe even for both of them—in the long term.

A new start in a new town, a new school, new friends…and maybe even a chance to finally meet her father.

Chapter One

Four months later—

“Sorry I’m late.” Jack Garrett slid into the vacant seat across from Gord Adamson, a former law school classmate and occasional courtroom adversary, at The Winking Judge, a small pub across the street from the courthouse.

“I was surprised to get your call,” Gord admitted. “I thought you’d given up criminal law.”

“So did I,” he agreed. “But every once in a while, there’s a client I can’t turn away.”

“Because you believe in his innocence?”

“Because I believe that he deserves a break.”

The waitress came over, momentarily disrupting their conversation. Gord ordered a scotch, neat, and Jack asked for a bottle of the locally brewed Millhouse beer.

“I reviewed the file, Jack. And I’m sorry, but I don’t see probation for Travis Hatcher.”

“Come on, Gord. He’s just a kid.”

“A kid who took a baseball bat to a Mercedes that is worth more than twice my annual salary,” his colleague pointed out.

“It was his father’s car,” Jack told him, though even he wasn’t sure if that was a mitigating or an aggravating factor.

“With incidental damage to two other vehicles.”

“Restitution has already been made to the owners.”

Gord sighed. “What’s your connection to this kid?”

“I handled his parents’ divorce a few years back,” Jack admitted.

“Rough one?”

“I don’t seem to get any other kind, but this one was particularly difficult. A ten-year marriage that fell apart because the husband couldn’t keep his pants zipped and the wife couldn’t keep looking the other way. They fought over each piece of artwork and every stick of furniture, but mostly over who was going to get stuck with their ten-year-old son.”

Gord, a father with two sons of his own, winced. “Damn, Jack. You’re yanking on my heartstrings here.”

“He isn’t a bad kid,” Jack insisted. “He just got caught in a bad situation.”

“Give me some background,” the prosecutor suggested.

“A few months back, Travis was invited to a weekend camp to try out for the national amateur all-star tournament. There wasn’t anyone at the camp who doubted he would make the team. But instead of being offered a roster spot, he was sent home.”

“I can understand that he would be disappointed and upset,” Gord acknowledged. “But that doesn’t justify his actions.”

“That’s not the end of the story,” Jack told him. “About two weeks before the tournament, the number-one center fielder breaks his collarbone. There’s no way he can play, so Travis calls the national team coach, asks him to give him another chance to prove that he can fill the vacancy. And the coach bluntly tells him, ‘You’re good enough, but you’re never going to play on any team that I’m coaching. If you want to know why—ask your father.’”

“The kid’s dad screwed the coach’s wife,” Gord guessed.

Jack nodded. “Which he finally admitted when Travis confronted him after baseball practice.”

“Jesus.” His friend lifted his glass, swallowed a mouthful of scotch.

“There was no premeditation—he had the bat in his hand, and he simply reacted,” he explained. “Under the circumstances, can you blame him?”

“Actions have consequences, and he has to be responsible for those consequences.”

“Absolutely. But the consequences should be commensurate with the action. He had a moment where he acted impulsively and recklessly, but a criminal record will stick with him for life.”

“You stay up late last night working on that spin?”

“The truth doesn’t need spin.”

Gord considered that for a moment. “Is he remorseful?”

“Very.” Jack passed a handwritten note across the table.

His colleague skimmed the page; he scrubbed a hand over his jaw. “Damn you, Jack.”

“You’re repeating yourself, Gord.” He passed over several more pages. “Character references from his teachers, guidance counselor, principal, high school baseball coach, his boss at the grocery store where he works part-time, and supervisor of the homework club where he volunteers twice a week.”

Gord sighed. “You really think you can get probation?”

“With a joint-sentencing recommendation, I do,” Jack said.

“I’ll go joint if anger management is one of the terms of probation, but the final decision is still up to the judge.”

“Of course,” he agreed.

Gord took another sip of his drink. “You still dating Angela from the registry office?”

Jack shook his head. “That was over a long time ago.”

“No thoughts about settling down and starting a family at this stage in your life?”

“Hell, no.” His failed marriage might be in the past, but it wasn’t so distant that he’d forgotten. And how could he when he spent almost every day in meetings and motions with husbands and wives who had once promised to love, honor, and cherish their spouses and were now hating, dishonoring, and spurning them?

His friend chuckled. “Are you sure you don’t want a minute to consider your response?”

Jack shook his head. “I was married once,” he confided. “When I was young and stupid.”

“Was it that girl you were with in Chicago?”

Jack paused with his bottle halfway to his lips. He’d forgotten that Gord had been at the same law conference he’d attended more than a dozen years earlier in Chicago. “No,” he said now. “That wasn’t her.”

“So who was she?” Gord asked curiously. “Because I seem to recall that you had some pretty intense chemistry with her.”

He frowned, as if trying to recall the details of those three glorious days that were still indelibly imprinted on his mind, then shook his head. “I don’t remember.”

His friend snorted. “Yeah, and I took a job in the district attorney’s office for the extravagant salary.”

“Why did you leave private practice?” Jack asked, because it seemed like an opportune moment to shift the topic of conversation.

“Because when Sheila and I got married, she understood that I wanted to get my practice off the ground before I took any time off for a vacation. On our third anniversary, she reminded me that we still hadn’t had a honeymoon.”

“And yet, you’re still married,” he mused.

“Because I was smart enough to realize that I needed to balance my personal life and my professional life. Five years and two kids later, it was the smartest move I ever made—even if it means that my kids will have to go to public school.”

“Thankfully not something I have to worry about.”

“Never say never,” Gord warned.

But Jack wasn’t worried. He was thirty-seven years old and happy to be on his own. And while he dated—albeit a lot less frequently than he had in the past—he always said goodbye without any regrets. The sole exception was the one unforgettable weekend he’d spent in Chicago with Kelly Cooper.

Yeah, he had a boatload of regrets where she was concerned. He regretted walking into The Four Brothers pub for a drink—and not walking right back out again when he realized the gorgeous bartender who’d snared his attention was none other than the girl who’d lived next door when they were kids.

He regretted giving in to the irresistible urge to taste the sassy mouth that had tormented him for more years than he wanted to admit; he regretted succumbing to the need to explore every inch of her soft, silky skin with his hands and his lips; he regretted losing himself—over and over again—in her warm, willing body. Mostly he regretted ever letting her go.

“Speaking of family,” Gord said, drawing Jack’s attention back to the present, “I should get home to Sheila and the boys.”

He started to call for the waitress, but Jack shook his head. “You go ahead. I’ve got the bill.”

“Thanks.” Gord slid out of the booth, offered his hand. “I’ll bring your client’s case forward for a plea on Wednesday, when Judge Parrish is sitting.”

“I appreciate it,” he said, confident in the knowledge that Judge Parrish had never overruled a joint recommendation.

After his colleague was gone, Jack sat alone, nursing a second beer. He was grateful for Gord’s cooperation with Travis’s case—and annoyed that just the mention of Chicago had brought memories of Kelly Cooper to the forefront of his mind.

Not that those memories were ever very far away, especially not since his brother had informed him that she was coming home.

He didn’t understand why she was the one woman he couldn’t forget. They’d spent one unforgettable weekend together, but neither of them had mentioned the possibility of anything more. So when Kelly called a few months later—shortly after Sara had decided she’d been too hasty in ending their engagement—he’d been completely caught off guard. Just the sound of her voice had the memories flooding back and desire stirring. Then Sara had walked into the room and pointed to her watch, and he’d admitted to Kelly that he had an appointment with a wedding planner. After a brief moment of awkward silence, Kelly had offered a quick congratulations and an even quicker goodbye.

Six months later, he’d married Sara. About two years after that, Kelly married some guy out in Seattle. Now they were both divorced, and despite all the years that had passed, he hadn’t forgotten about her. For some inexplicable reason, memories of one long ago weekend still stirred his blood more effectively than most of the flesh-and-blood women he’d dated in recent years.

Maybe it was because he still felt guilty about the fact that he’d slept with the girl who had been his brother’s best friend since childhood. Yeah, it was the guilt, he assured himself.

Because Jack refused to consider that he might have had feelings for Kelly that ever went any deeper than that.

The knots in Kelly’s stomach tightened as the plane touched down on the runway.

This was it—there was definitely no going back now.

Not that she wanted to go back. Although she’d made the decision to move back to Pinehurst quickly, it hadn’t been impulsively. Which made her realize she’d been thinking about it for a lot longer than she’d been ready to acknowledge. Because no matter where else she might have lived, Pinehurst was still home.

She’d had such grand plans when she’d moved to Seattle. A new city, a new job, a new husband. Even when she and Malcolm had gone their separate ways, she hadn’t wanted to leave Seattle. Of course, Malcolm’s mom—the only grandmother Ava had ever known—had still been a big part of their lives. Kelly knew she wouldn’t have made it through those first few years without her former mother-in-law, and when Beverley Scott had passed away, she’d been at a loss. Not only because Bev had willingly stepped in whenever Kelly needed someone to watch her little girl, but because the older woman had been Kelly’s best friend in Washington.

Now it was time for a fresh start again. After more than a dozen years on the West Coast, she had no regrets about leaving. But she wasn’t entirely sure she wouldn’t regret coming home.

The plane pulled up at the gate, and the knots multiplied.

Okay, she was more than a little nervous, but she reminded herself that she was doing this for Ava. This decision, like every other decision she’d made since she’d learned that she was pregnant, had been focused on what was best for her daughter. Even if Ava didn’t agree.

And the words she spoke, as they made their way off the plane, confirmed that she didn’t. “I can’t believe you made me leave Seattle to come here,” Ava grumbled.

Kelly hadn’t expected that her daughter would be overjoyed by her decision, but she had hoped that she would have accepted it by now. “You know, if you weren’t so determined to hate it, you might actually like it here,” she told her.

“I doubt it.”

She didn’t argue. The choice had been made and their new life was about to begin, so all she said was “Grab your suitcase.”

They’d packed only what they needed for a few days, with the rest of their clothes and household items being shipped.

Ava hauled the bag off of the conveyor belt. “How are we getting to Pinecone?”

“Pinehurst,” she corrected automatically. “And Uncle Luke said he would pick us up and take us to our new place.”

“When are we getting a car?”

“Before August fifteenth,” Kelly assured her, because that was the date she was scheduled to start her new job as an in-house accountant at Richmond Pharmaceuticals.

Ava rolled her eyes. With the purple streaks she’d added to her hair during her last sleepover at Rachel’s house and the gloomy expression on her face, she looked too much like a typical sullen teenager—and she was still only twelve. As much as Kelly desperately hoped this move would help turn things around with Ava, she knew that any change would take time.

“I’ll probably start looking tomorrow,” she said, hoping to appease her daughter. “I just wasn’t keen on picking up a rental and then driving to Pinehurst after spending all day on airplanes.”

“How far is Pinetree?”

“About an hour from here,” she said, not bothering to correct her on the name of the town again. Instead, she grabbed the handle of her own suitcase. “Let’s go find Uncle Luke.”

Kelly headed out of the baggage claim area, then stopped so abruptly Ava plowed right into the back of her.

“Geez, Mom,” her daughter grumbled.

Kelly didn’t—couldn’t—respond.

Because standing at the car rental counter, where Lukas said he would be waiting, was his brother, Jackson, instead.

“Mom?” Ava prompted, sounding genuinely concerned. “What’s wrong?”

Kelly had to remind herself to breathe, and she exhaled slowly. “Nothing’s wrong,” she lied, not wanting to alarm her daughter. “I just lost my train of thought for a moment.”

“Well, put brake lights on next time,” Ava suggested. Then, after looking around, “I don’t see Uncle Luke anywhere.”

“Apparently there’s been a change of plans,” Kelly noted, trying to keep her tone light while she inwardly cursed Lukas Garrett all the way to hell and back.

“Does that mean we’re going to rent a car?” Ava asked.

“No, it means you’re going to meet Uncle Luke’s brother.”

A lot sooner than I had planned.

She stood for another minute, still rooted to the spot, and just looked at Jackson. She hadn’t seen him in thirteen years, but she’d recognized him immediately. But it was more than the dark brown hair that was always immaculately trimmed, more than the exquisitely shaped mouth that had inspired so many of her teenage fantasies, and more than the green eyes that were as dark and clear as emeralds. It was even more than the fact that he was six feet of solidly built male, with broad shoulders and strong arms that ensured any woman would feel secure and protected in his embrace. It was, more than anything else, the way Kelly felt when she looked at him—all hot and tingly and tongue-tied.

Sternly reminding herself that she wasn’t still sixteen years old—or even twenty-one—she took a step toward him.

He glanced up from the book he was reading—a legal journal of some kind—as if he sensed her approach. She’d noticed that the book was in his left hand, and that the third finger was bare. But the fact that he’d been divorced for quite a few years now didn’t make him any less off-limits.

As he closed the cover of the journal, his gaze skimmed over her, from the top of her head to her toes in a quick, cursory perusal that nevertheless caused heat to flare low in her belly and spread through her veins. She hadn’t counted on this, and that was a definite miscalculation on her part.

But how could she have known that, after so many years, he would still have this effect on her? Because even from a distance, even after so much time, she couldn’t deny her body’s instinctive response to him. Or the ache in her heart.

She pushed her bangs away from her face and silently reprimanded herself for even noticing that her hair was as flat and tired as the rest of her. She’d dressed comfortably for travel in a pair of faded jeans and an ancient University of Chicago sweatshirt and had put on the barest touch of makeup before heading out to the airport more than ten hours earlier. As a result, she felt not just unprepared but ill-equipped to come face-to-face with Jackson now.

When she’d decided to return to Pinehurst, she’d known it was inevitable that she would see him. But she hadn’t planned on seeing him when she was looking like this. She knew it shouldn’t matter, but when a woman was facing an ex-lover, she wanted to look her best. Unfortunately, she wasn’t even close.

Those green eyes lifted to her face again. “Hello, Kelly.”

Two simple words, but after so many years of silence, the achingly familiar voice was like a warm caress.

Her heart was pounding inside of her chest, but she inclined her head and responded in a similarly casual tone. “Jackson.”

His lips curved, just a little, and she suddenly remembered that no one else, aside from his mother, had ever called him “Jackson.” At least not more than once. But he’d never been Jack to Kelly—that name was too common, and Jackson was anything but. She had, occasionally, shortened his name to Jacks, but that seemed too familiar now.

He shifted his attention to her daughter again. “You must be Ava.”

The girl nodded, her gaze darting from her mother to Jackson and back again, as if she sensed the strange undercurrents between them.

Kelly held her breath, waiting for any sign of recognition. But there wasn’t any. And why would there be? Unless Lukas had shared the occasional photos that she’d sent to him, Jackson had never seen her daughter before. But she’d thought he might see some of the familial resemblance that Kelly saw whenever she looked at her little girl.

“I’m Jack Garrett, Luke’s brother.” He offered his hand.

Kelly fought an almost irresistible urge to cry as she watched them shake hands. It broke her heart to see the distance between them, but what had she expected? It was her fault that neither of them knew the truth of their connection.

Thirteen years ago, Jackson had been focused on his career above all else. He’d been clear that he had no interest in having a family, at least not any time in the near future. That was one of the reasons why Kelly had honestly believed she’d made the right decision. But she didn’t know what was right for any of them now.

She wanted Ava to know her father, but only if Jackson was prepared to be a father. And she was afraid to finally reveal the secret she’d kept for so long because she knew that when she did, it was quite possible he would hate her—either for keeping his child from him for so many years…or for bringing her into his life now.

“You seem surprised to see me,” Jackson said, speaking to Kelly again as they made their way toward the exit.

Surprised was barely the tip of her emotional iceberg, so she only said, “I was expecting Lukas.”

“He said he’d let you know that I’d be meeting you instead.”

“Maybe he tried,” she admitted, taking her cell out of her purse. “I turned off my phone when we boarded the plane.”

She powered it up now and heard the familiar chime that indicated a text message. But since it was written in Luke’s unique form of shorthand and without any punctuation, she had to read it twice before she figured out what it said.

Srry kel ER at clinic cant meet u sending j instead will stop by ur plc if not 2 late

Gee, thanks for the warning, Lukas.

“I’m guessing that’s his message,” Jackson said, his voice tinged with humor as he popped the trunk of his car to load their suitcases.

Of course he would find this amusing. He wasn’t the one who’d been blindsided by the change of plans.

“You guessed right,” she agreed lightly, then slid into the soft leather passenger seat of his luxury sedan.

Ava was already in the backseat with her mp3 player plugged in, leaving her mother to make conversation with Jackson. But Kelly didn’t know what to say. She’d known that she would see him again—but she hadn’t expected that he would be the first person she saw at the airport, and she mentally cursed Lukas again.

Of course, he couldn’t know what he’d done. After all, he didn’t know that his brother was the only man she’d ever really loved.

Well, this is more than a little awkward, Jack thought, as he pulled out onto the highway heading toward Pinehurst. He’d suspected that it would be, considering that the last time he’d seen Kelly, they’d both been naked. Which was definitely not something he should be thinking about right now—not under any circumstances and certainly not with her daughter in the backseat.

He tightened his grip on the steering wheel, but the smooth, warm leather beneath his palms made him itch to feel the much softer, warmer texture of Kelly’s skin. Not that he really knew what her skin felt like—it was ridiculous to think that he could recall those kind of details after so much time had passed. So why was he convinced that her skin was softer than silk? Why did he remember that her body had responded not just willingly but eagerly to his touch? And why couldn’t he forget that, throughout that one weekend they’d spent together, he’d wished it would never end?

Of course it had ended, and they’d gone their separate ways. Since then, they’d both married and divorced other people. The main difference being that Kelly had come out of her marriage with a child. He frowned, trying to remember the age of her daughter. For some reason, he couldn’t recall Luke ever mentioning that she was pregnant or that she’d had a baby. He’d just one day mentioned Kelly’s daughter as if the little girl had always existed.