“No thanks.” Nick wanted all his wits about him.
“I see you’ve already become friendly with your half siblings,” Charles II said. “Isn’t that nice.”
Nick’s mouth curved. That bothered the old man. Okay. “So far, so good.”
“But you had no interest in coming forward to meet me,” Charles II said. His tone was mild, but Nick could still feel the poison drip from it.
“Nope.”
“Really. Why is that?”
“Simple, really,” Nick said. “I already have a father. And if my mother thought you were a horrible enough person to leave the state and hide your identity from me for my entire life, that didn’t exactly make me want to seek you out for a meeting.”
The mere mention of her had made something shift in Charles II’s eyes. Bloodthirst. “Then let’s stop with the pretense. Who is your mother?” he demanded.
The open animosity toward his mother made a chill rush through Nick’s veins. But he wasn’t having it. Let the old man twist in the wind a bit longer. “You don’t know?”
“I want to hear it from you!” Charles II huffed. “Not to mention I believe I have the right to know. And if we’re going to prove your preposterous claim—”
“Preposterous?” Pierce laughed. “You just said yourself he looks just like you. Give it up, old man.”
Charles II whirled on him, pointing down at him with an accusatory finger. “You haven’t spoken to me in years. Don’t start now. In fact, why don’t you shut the hell up?”
Nick kept his cool, but his heart started pounding. There was the man Pierce had told him about in excruciating detail.
As if reading his mind, Pierce looked to Nick and said, “There he is. The real Charles Harrison the second. So polished and refined . . . father of the fucking century.”
“Shut your damn mouth,” Charles II growled at him.
“Don’t you speak to him that way,” Tess said sharply. “You shut your mouth.”
Charles II looked at her with a combination of ire and hesitation. His lips pursed, and he shoved his hands into the pockets of his tailored slacks.
Fascinating, Nick thought. The man clearly, openly hated Pierce . . . and adored his daughter so much she could put him in his place with a few strong words. The layered family dynamics here were a psychologist’s wet dream.
Pierce sent his sister a wink. “I’m fine, Tessie. But thanks.”
“Dad,” Dane said, “just gotta say, this is not a great way to make a first impression on your newest son.”
Charles II’s face darkened, the red rising from his neck to his hairline as he looked back to Nick. “Have we established that without a doubt? That he is?”
“Yes, we’ve more than established that,” Charles said from behind the bar. With silver tongs, he dropped an ice cube into his glass. “You saw the paperwork. So why the bluster? Think you’re going to scare him into recanting his lie? It’s not a lie. The test proved it. And from what I’ve gathered so far, Nick doesn’t scare easily. So just stop.”
“He’s proof of it,” Tess said. “I knew it the second I looked at him, and so did you. Come on, Dad.”
“Here’s a good question,” Nick said. He shifted into his power stance, spreading his legs a bit and crossing his arms over his chest as he lifted his chin, something that was effective as a cop. “Charles told you that my mother worked for you, right?”
Charles II’s lips pursed again, and he gave a staccato nod.
“Well . . . then you should know exactly who she is.” Nick arched a brow, drawing it out. “Unless you were sleeping with more than one of your household employees.” He let a smirk play on his mouth. “Of course, I’m sure such an upstanding gentleman like yourself wouldn’t have done that, though. Right?”
Charles II’s face got even redder as Tess gasped hard. Dane and Charles both went very still.
But Pierce barked out a laugh. “Oh my God, he’s right! That’s . . . that’s priceless.” He laughed again and said to his father, “You fucking hypocrite. Raking all of us over the coals . . . You gave Charles hell because Lisette was his nanny. Someone who worked for him in his home, a middle-class girl, and so beneath him.”
“Stop,” Charles said, but he’d paled a bit. He knocked back half of his drink.
“How many maids did you nail over the years, Dad?” Pierce grinned with malicious glee. “Two? Three? More? You randy son of a—”
“Stop it!” Tess demanded. “Pierce. Stop.”
Charles II looked apoplectic. His obvious discomfort and rage pleased Nick more than it should have, but it did. “That’s not true,” the old man finally spat, but his voice seemed a little strangled.
“Know what? I don’t really care.” Nick shrugged. “Really, I should be thanking you for not being able to keep away from the hired help. I mean . . . I’m here. So thanks, you horny bastard who abused your position of power over my naïve mother, and God knows who else. Thanks to that, I exist.”
“Well,” Dane quipped from the couch. “This is going well, huh?”
Tess slumped, dropping her face into her hands.
“I’m sure you suspect who she is,” Nick said, “but I’ll indulge you, since you seem so . . . kind. Open. Since you’ve given me such a warm welcome, not at all wanting me to feel threatened or anything.”
Pierce laughed again. “Man, you’re good.”
Nick stood up straight, tall, and proud. “My full name is Nicolas Esteban Martell. But before I was adopted by the best man on earth, for the first five years of my life, my last name was Sanchez.” He made sure Charles II was looking into his eyes as he said, “My mother is Maria Sanchez. You got her pregnant in 1988. Do you even remember her?”
Charles Harrison II went stone-cold still. His face, which had been dark and mottled with growing rage, started to pale a bit as the blood drained. His mouth went slack, falling open for a few seconds. Nick watched him, fascinated, as the room went dead silent.
“Yes, I remember her,” Charles II finally said. “Of course I remember her.” He licked his lips, ran a hand along the back of his neck. “We were . . . involved . . . for a short time. Then she disappeared without a word.”
“Did you try to find her when she left?” Nick asked. “I mean . . . if the woman I’ve been involved with totally disappears, I know I’d be curious to know what happened to her. But hey, maybe that’s just me.”
“We’d stopped the affair,” Charles II said, “a few weeks before she left.” He drew a deep breath, recomposing himself. The other four were quiet now, transfixed. “She stopped sleeping with me, and she stopped talking to me. Soon after that, she was gone. Never heard from her again. Why would I go searching after her?” His eyes turned ice cold. “Fact was, I didn’t care. We didn’t have some big love affair, if that’s what she told you. No, it was just a few months of sex. And she was more than willing. A consenting adult. She was more than happy to get in my bed. Your mother’s no saint, Mr. Martell.”
Nick hadn’t expected the sickening gut punch from those words, but it was like a boot in his solar plexus. His heart rate accelerated in thick, heavy beats.
“But now that I know what she did? I’m going to find her, all right.” Charles II’s voice was menacing, each word deliberate. “I’m going to find her, and I’m going to destroy her for keeping my child from me. The law can’t do anything about it after all this time, but I sure can. She won’t get away with what she did to me.”
The whirring noise filled Nick’s head. Red rage, hot and consuming, rushed through him. Without thought, he flew forward, closing the few feet between him and the old man in seconds. With both hands, he gripped the lapels of Charles II’s jacket and yanked him close, taking pleasure in watching the old man’s gray eyes bulge with shock and a bit of fear. Through gritted teeth, Nick growled low in his face, “Hear me.” He gave the man a quick shake to make sure he had his full attention. “You lift a finger to hurt my mother in any way? I won’t just make
you regret that I was ever born, but that you were.”
Chapter Twelve
“This man is threatening me!” Charles II yelled, looking around at his other children. “You’re going to just sit there and let him manhandle me? Threaten my life?”
“I didn’t hear any threats,” Pierce said offhandedly. He shot Dane a mock-confused look. “You hear anything?”
But Dane moved to Nick’s side and said calmly, “Let him go.”
Nick didn’t even budge. He kept his grip on the jacket, bunching it in his fingers as he glared at Charles II. At his father. God, his father.
The old man didn’t give a shit about Nick; he just cared that he’d been duped. He just wanted revenge for being kept in the dark, being made to look foolish, not having any control. He was as awful as she’d said, as rancid as Pierce had warned . . . and they shared DNA. It made his stomach flip with nausea. His heart pounded hard. He wanted to hurt this man. Make him bleed. He wanted to pound him into the floor and make him beg for mercy.
“Nick,” Dane tried again.
“Let go of me this instant,” Charles II seethed at Nick, “or I’ll press charges.”
“You’d need witnesses to corroborate your story,” Dane said. “You won’t have any here. Not one of us. Understand?”
Charles II looked stunned.
Nick could barely breathe. It was as if everything he’d heard and seen and felt over the past week rose up in his core, an emotional tsunami, and swept him away. His body pulsed with energy, and his mind was focused on one thing: Charles Harrison II.
Charles came to stand behind Nick. “We won’t let him hurt her,” he said, and it sounded like a promise. He put a hand on Nick’s back and spoke to him quietly, as if he sensed Nick was about to lose it. “Let him go. This won’t accomplish anything.”
Nick drew a shaky breath and swallowed hard. He knew Charles was right, and that he’d be in serious trouble if he hurt a civilian, but he couldn’t help it. He took another deep breath. The thought of this powerful, hateful bastard going after his mom . . . “You stay away from her,” he growled, his fingers clenching tighter in the old man’s jacket. “You hear me? She wants nothing from you. She never did. You leave her alone, or so help me—”
“Nick.” Tess’s voice was soft, her big blue eyes pleading as she looked up at him from the sofa. “Please let go of him. We’ll all make sure she’s left in peace. I swear it.”
Something about her words, the tone of her voice, broke through the throbbing haze in his head. He released Charles II but gave him a bit of a shove as he did, sending him staggering backward to fall clumsily into the armchair.
“I’ll have your badge by the end of the day,” Charles II vowed.
“You’ll do no such thing,” Charles III said harshly. “Shut up already, for God’s sake. This is all even worse than I’d imagined it, solely because of you. I haven’t seen you like this since the day of your heart attack. You should be ashamed of yourself.”
“He’d have to have shame to be able to do that,” Pierce remarked. “Or a soul.”
“You stop too,” Charles said to his brother. “It’s not helping. I asked you to be here as a core member of the family and to support Nick, not to toss gasoline onto the fire. Please hold back somehow.”
Pierce nodded and grumbled, “Sorry.”
“Now.” Charles looked from their father to Nick and back again. “Dad, he’s your biological son. What you choose to do with that information in the future is up to you, but it’s the truth. Maybe you two will come to some kind of understanding, maybe you won’t. I think with some time to process all this, both of you might find you feel differently than you do right now.
“But as for Maria . . .” Charles’s tone hardened as he held his father’s eyes. “You won’t go near her. Leave her be. This is official notice: if anything negative happens to Maria—or her husband, or her family—in any way, and it can be traced back to you? None of us—and I mean none of us—will ever speak to you again. And, on top of that, I’ll personally help Nick pursue any means of retaliation that fit the action.” He peered down at his father over the rims of his glasses. “I hope I’m making myself clear.”
Charles II opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again as he glanced at his children, who all nodded in solid agreement with Charles’s statement. Seeing their unified front, his jaw set and he sat up stiffly in his chair. “Fine.”
“She’s never asked for your money,” Tess pointed out. “She isn’t now. She wants nothing to do with you, or our family. You’d be the one dragging her back into this if you go after her, and that could make her change her mind. If she did, she’d have a case. She could sue you for all those years of child support, a whole list of things. Make this public, and make it ugly. You realize that?”
“I said fine,” Charles II growled, pure malevolence radiating from him. “I won’t pursue it. I’ll leave her be.” The old man glared at each of them, wanting them to make sure they felt his rage, but clamped his lips tightly together.
Nick felt a surge of emotion, a combination of gratitude toward his siblings, hatred for this man, and ambivalence about what would happen next. “How do I know he won’t do something anyway?”
“He has too much to lose if he does,” Dane said. “His entire family. Which he will, I promise you that.”
“Assuming he cares more about the family than vengeance,” Pierce said dryly. With a shrug, he added, “He doesn’t give a fuck about me, Abby, or my kids, but he cares about all of them, so Maria’s likely safe.”
“Well, while we’re all making things clear, this goes both ways,” Charles II said, rising again to look into Nick’s face. “What guarantee do I have that she, or you, won’t try to sue me for anything in the future? Decide you want a few bucks after all?”
Nick snorted and shook his head. “Huh. Good point.” He wanted to make this man twist. He grinned callously. “You know what? There is no guarantee, I guess. Funny how that works.”
The old man turned purple. “Then why should I listen to any of you?” he said. “Why should I—”
“He’s here to save my son’s life!” Charles shouted, and the room went still. “That’s why we found him at all—that’s why he’s here. You drive him away before the surgery, I’ll spend the rest of my life making you pay for that. So just stop this!” His eyes were wild, and his breath came in short, hard gasps. “Myles. That’s why he’s here. For Myles. Your fucking grandson. Can you ever think of anyone other than yourself, for just a few minutes?”
“Hey.” Nick turned to Charles and placed both hands on his shoulders. Jesus, the guy was trembling. Clearly he’d been pushed to the brink. “I won’t leave. I’m committed to this. I’ll do my part. Nothing could stop me. Okay? Take a breath.”
Charles looked at him, blinked and nodded, and took a deep breath.
“I know you’re on edge,” Nick said. “I’m sorry if this fight made you snap. I’m sorry for my part. But you’re right, gotta keep our eyes on the prize: getting Myles better.” He gave a little squeeze, then dropped his hands. “We’re all here for him. It’s going to happen. He’s going to kick ass and get better. It’s all going to be all right.”
“Thank you,” Charles said, and drew another long breath.
“Spoken like a true Harrison,” Tess murmured.
“I’m no Harrison,” Nick said, stepping back from Charles and looking around. “I’m just me. And right now, frankly . . . I’m not sure what to do with all this. But I’ll think about it later. Right now, my focus is doing my part for Myles. That keeps me on track. Gives me purpose in the middle of all this insanity.”
His siblings all looked at him with things like respect, gratitude, support.... The old man looked stymied and sour. Nick’s adrenaline ebbed, leaving him suddenly tired. He wanted to go back to his hotel room, lie in the dark and quiet. “I think we’re done here for tonight, right? I’m gonna go now.”
“Wait, stay a while,” Tes
s said, getting to her feet as Dane voiced the same.
“We’ll bring in something to eat,” Charles said.
“Or at least have some drinks,” Pierce added.
“No, not now, but thanks. I just need some air.” Nick shot a look at Charles II. What a loathsome piece of shit he was. All Nick wanted was to get away from him. “You’re on notice. Leave my mother alone.”
“And what about you?” Charles II asked. “Leave you alone too?”
Nick paused for a second. “What?”
“Merely an inquiry,” Charles II said. “Another talk is in order. You are my son. . . .”
“No, I’m not,” Nick snapped. “Lew Martell is my father. You were the sperm donor. I don’t want to know you any more than you want to know me.”
“You haven’t even given me a chance to know you,” Charles II said.
“Oh, please. Think tonight pretty much closed the door on that,” Nick said. “I’m not interested. So at least on that note, you were successful. I want nothing to do with you.” He walked to the door and said over his shoulder, “I’ll see Myles tomorrow, Charles.” He stopped in the doorway to add to the older man, “Stay away from my mother or I’ll hunt you down, Dad. I swear that on my life. Good night, everyone.”
* * *
Nick lay in the semi-dark for a while as he channel surfed. Nothing held his interest or could distract him; it was all like white noise, adding more static to what was already in his head. Finally, he muted the sound, leaving only the ghostly flickering light to play along the walls of the bedroom.
What a shit show that meeting had been. His biological father was every bit as awful as he’d been warned. As much as Nick wanted to know more, get answers to some burning questions, he knew he had to put as much space between himself and Charles II as possible. Asking things like “what drew you to my mother?” or “why did you pursue her at all?” or “what the hell were you thinking, hitting on the help, much less a woman twenty years younger than you?” would have to be stowed away.
It Might Be You Page 14