If I Trust You (Mills & Boon Spice)

by BETH KERY

  “And...and Nick agrees with you about this?”

  John blinked at her question. “Agrees?” he asked blankly. “Nick is the one who originally expressed those concerns to me when he showed me the letter. He was incredulous that Lincoln could do something so impulsive and naive.” John leaned closer, examining her expression. “I thought Nick had showed you the letter. He hasn’t?”

  Deidre shook her head.

  John looked patently uncomfortable. “I’m sorry, I’d only assumed...” He glanced at her, hesitating. “You do understand that if it can be proven in court that Lincoln was of unsound mind, it will negate the will where he named you as coheir? The old will—the one where Nick is the sole heir—will become solvent again.”

  Deidre felt the blood rush out of her head. She seemed to be seeing John Kellerman through a haze. She tried to troll through her memories in regard to what Nick had told her in regard to contesting the will, but it was difficult with John staring at her like a hawk. Besides, Nick had told her those things before they’d began to trust each other, before they’d become involved...

  ...before Deidre had fallen in love with him.

  It felt like the invisible hand gripping at her heart transferred to her throat.

  “Yes, Nick told me as much...I think so...” she muttered hoarsely, hazily recalling some of the things Nick had said in the car on those first nights he’d come to Harbor Town.

  This time, John’s relieved expression did strike her as contrived. “Good. I know Nick too well to believe he’d ever do anything underhanded when it came to his...association with you,” the older man said delicately.

  Deidre went still. She searched John’s face, quite sure she was being paranoid. “Nick told you that he and I are involved?” she asked, her voice near a whisper.

  John smiled. “There isn’t much he doesn’t tell me. I’m not only his chief legal officer, we’ve been friends for years.”

  Anger bubbled through her numb disbelief. It hurt, knowing Nick had shared the details of their unlikely romance with a business associate. It hurt worse—much worse—hearing about this letter and knowing that all along, Nick had thought Lincoln was mad for considering Deidre his daughter and heir.

  She wasn’t going to sit here and listen to John while he toyed with her emotions like a cat playing with a mouse before it pounced. She stood abruptly.

  “I think you’d better go.”

  John looked taken aback. He stood slowly. “Of course, if you wish. I didn’t mean to insult you in any way—”

  “Yes, you did,” Deidre replied. Her voice sounded cool and steely to her own ears, but on the inside, she was wilting. She just wanted John Kellerman out of the house so she could try and untangle her chaotic thoughts and emotions about Nick and the letter. Could Nick really have kept such a thing from her? He’d admitted that he possessed a letter from Lincoln and had definitely refused to let her see it—

  Her cell phone started to ring. She didn’t really think about it, just walked over to the kitchen counter and picked it up instinctively.

  “Hello,” she said distractedly.

  “Ms. Kavanaugh?” a woman on the other end said. “Deidre Kavanaugh?”

  “Yes.”

  “My name is Evelyn Mendez, from GenLabs. We spoke several weeks back?”

  Deidre froze. She glanced at John Kellerman. She didn’t know precisely what he’d seen on her face, but he’d gone suddenly still and alert.

  “Yes, I remember,” Deidre managed to get out through numb lips.

  “I’m calling with the results of the paternity test, Ms. Kavanaugh.”

  Time seemed to stretch.

  A knock resounded in the silent kitchen. When she just stared at the door blankly, John started and opened it himself.

  “What’s going on?” Nick asked, glancing from John to Deidre and back to John again.

  * * *

  “Deidre?” Nick repeated when neither John nor she answered his question. Deidre just stood there clutching the phone to her ear. Her face was pale as chalk. What the hell had John been saying to her? He walked toward her, recalling all too well what had happened the last time he’d seen her that pale. Much to his confusion, instead of accepting his support, she backed away from him several steps, her gaze narrowed like she couldn’t quite bring him into focus.

  “Ms. Mendez, can you hold on for just a moment?” Deidre spoke in a strained tone into the phone, her large eyes trained on Nick. Then, much to Nick’s growing concern, she stepped past him, opened the oven and removed a pan of cookies.

  “You two will have to excuse me,” she said briskly over her shoulder before she left the kitchen. A few seconds later, Nick heard the door to the bedroom close down the hall. He spun around to face John, his mouth open in amazement.

  “What the hell did you say to her?” he accused.

  “It wasn’t me that got her upset,” John defended. “It was that phone call. Every bit of color washed out of her face when she got it.”

  Something flickered in John’s blue eyes. An alarm started going off in Nick’s head.

  “You don’t suppose...” John began before he faded off, his alert gaze now trained on the hallway. Nick did suppose, and that’s what had him worried.

  “Didn’t I tell you back in San Francisco to mind your own business when it came to Deidre?” Nick asked.

  John straightened his tie in a nervous gesture. “DuBois Enterprises is my business. It used to be your sole focus as well, Nick.”

  “Get out of here,” Nick growled through clenched teeth. He was mad enough to bite through steel. John must have noticed, because he blanched.

  “If you have the right to wait and find out if that’s the phone call we’ve been waiting for, then I certainly—”

  “Have no right whatsoever,” Nick finished. He stalked over to the coat tree and grabbed John’s coat. John started back when he shoved it in the vicinity of his chest. “You’re an employee of DuBois Enterprises, and even that’s an uncertainty at the moment.”

  “Are you threatening to fire me?” John asked furiously. “I have a contract!”

  “Contracts can be broken. Besides, I doubt I’m the only one you’ve insulted by coming here. Are you so shortsighted—so dense—to alienate Deidre, when she’s your new employer?”

  “You don’t know that she’s my new employer for sure. You don’t know that I insulted her,” John hissed as he put on his coat. “Maybe it’s you that she was insulted by.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Nick demanded, narrowing the distance between them in a split second, but he was talking to the older man’s back. Apparently, John was remembering all too clearly what Nick had graphically told him he’d do to him if he continued with his subtle threats and innuendos in regard to Deidre.

  He slammed the door after the fleeing man, stifling a nearly overwhelming aggressive urge to go after him. He didn’t want to leave Deidre.

  He couldn’t believe John had come to Harbor Town to confront her without Nick’s knowledge or approval.

  He left the kitchen, meeting Deidre as she entered the living room. She came to a halt when she saw him.

  “I heard the door slam. Did John leave?” she asked.

  His nerves seemed to prickle beneath his skin when he noticed the tightness of her mouth when she spoke, the unusual pallor of her face, the way her usually soulful eyes were shuttered.

  “He’s gone,” Nick said, stepping toward her. She didn’t back away from him this time, but he sensed her wariness. “What is it? What’s happened? What did John say to you? Deidre?” he prodded when she didn’t immediately reply. He didn’t care for the way she was detailing his features as if she were seeing him for the first time.

  “He told me about the letter.”

  Her whispe
r in the silent room struck him like a slashing razor.

  “He told me that you believe Lincoln was demented when he made me his heir. He told me that you suspected he was of unsound mind...that the Lincoln you knew would never have done such a foolhardy thing as change his will because of a crazy wish that I was his daughter. Is that true?” she asked softly.

  “No. I mean...yes, it is partly true.” He made a sound of frustration when he saw her shocked expression. “You haven’t seen the letter, Deidre.”

  “Because you wouldn’t let me,” she said, her subdued voice now vibrating with anger. “I asked to see it. I wanted to see it.”

  “I know,” he said in a pressured tone. “But I thought it might upset you.”

  “So you did it all for my benefit. Is that right, Nick?” she asked, taking a step toward him, her rigid stance portraying her emotional distress.

  “Not in the beginning, no,” he admitted.

  “That letter is apparently crucial potential evidence in a court of law—evidence that Lincoln was of unsound mind when he changed his will. Do you deny it?”

  “It is...potentially.”

  “That’s why you didn’t want me to see it.”

  Nick clenched his eyes shut, feeling the situation spinning out of control. Damn John Kellerman’s conniving interference. He opened his eyes and held Deidre’s stare, trying to will her to understand.

  “That may have been true in the beginning, when I first came here.”

  Something flashed in her eyes that looked like hope. “So you don’t believe Lincoln was of unsound mind? You’ve changed your opinion?”

  Regret spiked through him. “I meant I don’t plan to contest the will anymore.”

  Her crestfallen expression told him she’d noticed he’d sidestepped her question. The silence that followed weighed on him.

  “You mean you don’t plan to contest the will, but you still think that Lincoln wasn’t of sound mind when he named me his heir and co-owner of DuBois Enterprises—when he claimed me as his daughter?”

  The tremor in her voice made every muscle in his body clench tight. He approached her, grasping her shoulders.

  “Listen to me,” he said with quiet intensity. “I’ve told you how much Lincoln wanted a family. Am I surprised that he latched on to you as his daughter—the child of the one woman he’d always loved, Brigit Kavanaugh? A beautiful, smart, vibrant woman? No. That makes perfect sense to me.”

  “But you still think he was demented for believing I was his daughter and leaving me half his company?”

  He clamped his eyes shut and then opened them, having trouble meeting her gaze. “When I first read that letter? Yes. Maybe I still do a little, to be honest. You haven’t seen the letter—it’s barely intelligible, disorganized...touching, but in a completely unrealistic, childlike way.”

  “Unrealistic?” Deidre repeated flatly.

  “I thought he was letting wishful thinking rule him instead of rationality. He had no proof you were his daughter but your story. You have no business experience. What’s more, you’d told him point-blank you didn’t want to run DuBois Enterprises,” he said, desperate to make her understand.

  “That was very convenient for you, wasn’t it?” she asked. Through her narrowed lids, Nick saw the glassiness of her eyes. “I said I know nothing about business and am literally blown away by the news that I’m Lincoln’s coheir, and you establish that without a doubt, I shouldn’t have been given controlling interest in Lincoln’s company because I said a few times—as a consequence of shock and sheer ignorance—that I didn’t want the job.”

  “Your saying you didn’t want the responsibility wasn’t the only thing I was thinking about,” Nick rasped. “Lincoln knew you had no business experience whatsoever. He also didn’t know you were his daughter. But that’s not the point.”

  Her eyes flashed in anger. “What is the point then, Nick? You seem so clear on the whole matter. Please, grant me some of your infinite wisdom,” she bit out sarcastically. “Why can’t you just admit that you planned to contest the will all along?”

  “Because it’s not true! That’s not how I viewed things, Deidre. I was ruling things out as I went along. I only planned to make decisions once I had crucial information. I needed to know if you truly were Lincoln’s daughter, I needed to be sure of the fact that you hadn’t coerced him in any way—”

  “And if you established that both of those things were true, you could always fall back on the allegation that Lincoln wasn’t of sound mind,” Deidre shouted, startling him. She twisted out of his hold and walked toward the fireplace, abruptly turning to face him. His heart seized in his chest. Her expression was shattered. “You never wanted Lincoln to accept me as his daughter. You never did,” she cried out.

  “That’s not true—”

  “It is true,” she said, sounding slightly hysterical. “What must have gone through your mind when I showed up at The Pines, saying I was Lincoln’s natural daughter? All those years you spent proving yourself to Lincoln and everyone in his company, all those years being everything to Lincoln. And you were everything...everything but...” she bit out emphatically, her eyes a little wild.

  He knew she was fighting instinctively, like a wounded animal, but anger pierced through his anxiety that she’d chosen that particular insult to throw in his face.

  Another glance at her and his fury was gone. Tears were rushing down her cheeks now, but Nick felt helpless to stop or comfort her. Her hurt and confusion seemed too thick to breach.

  “Everything but Lincoln’s natural child,” Deidre finished in a hoarse whisper. She tilted her chin up defiantly, but her eyes were wells of pain. “You considered Lincoln to be demented for believing I was his daughter...a wishful old fool.”

  “Listen to me,” he spoke quietly, trying desperately to penetrate her distress. “You didn’t read the letter. It was odd...disjointed. He insinuated in it that you and I could have the future that Brigit and he never had.”

  Dread filled him when her expression turned incredulous.

  “Deidre, wait—”

  “That was your proof that he was a madman? That you and I might find something together?” she asked, wide-eyed with shock.

  “No! That’s not what I meant at all.” He cursed under his breath in profound frustration.

  “You did think it!” she accused.

  “What if I did, in the beginning?” he boomed, frustration overwhelming him. “You probably would have thought something similar if you read that letter soon after he’d died. It doesn’t matter what I thought then. I’m not going to contest the will. I don’t give a damn whose daughter you are or aren’t. Deidre? Are you listening to me?” he asked when she continued to stare at him like he was invisible.

  “Lincoln wasn’t a fool,” she said as if he hadn’t spoken. She wiped her cheek with the back of her hand. Her chin fell to her chest and she took a long inhale. “I may have been one for getting involved with you in these...absurd circumstances, but Lincoln wasn’t a fool,” she repeated under her breath. Her shoulders slumped as if in sudden fatigue.

  “Deidre?” he prompted, concern swamping him. “I’ve told you from the beginning that what’s between us is separate from the legalities of Lincoln’s will.”

  She looked up slowly, the anguished defiance he saw in her eyes cutting him to the quick. “How can you stand there and say that to me with a straight face?”

  “Because it’s true. Lincoln has nothing to do with how we feel about each other. DuBois Enterprises doesn’t have anything to do with how we feel about each other. Deidre?” he prompted sharply. He had the strangest feeling he was talking to her across an enormous, mile-deep canyon and that she was only hearing the echo of every third word he spoke.

  “That call earlier was from GenLabs,” she said quietly. “Lincoln
was right. I am his biological daughter. I’ll make sure you get a copy of the formal report.”

  Nick watched, frozen to the spot, as she walked past him toward the hallway. A moment later, he heard the latch on her bedroom door shut with a click of finality.

  Chapter Eleven

  Deidre arrived in Chicago early the next afternoon. It was a gray, blustery winter day that perfectly matched her mood. Marc and Mari lived in a brownstone on a quiet, residential street in the Lincoln Park neighborhood. The cheery Christmas lights and festive decorations on the attractive, affluent homes only seemed to amplify Deidre’s numb misery.

  Mari stood on the sidewalk while Deidre parked in front of the house, a coat draped haphazardly over her shoulders. She took one look at Deidre’s face when she got out of the car and rushed to give her a hug.

  “Don’t say a word,” Mari said. She opened the back door of the sedan and withdrew Deidre’s suitcase. “Let’s get you inside and make you something hot to drink. Marc is at work and Riley went to Gymboree with her nanny, so we’ll have an opportunity to talk.”

  She hustled Deidre into the elegant brownstone and deposited her bag in the guest bedroom. It wasn’t long before the two women sat together before the fireplace with hot mugs of tea warming their hands. Deidre was hesitant to get started with her confession, but once she began, the words seemed to roll out of her of their own volition. Mari listened, her expression becoming increasingly concerned and sober as time passed.

  “...I was so confused after Nick left last night that I couldn’t think. Thank God I was able to sleep a couple hours. When I woke up today, I only wanted to do one thing—escape,” Deidre told Mari in conclusion. “And...well, here I am.”

  Mari patted her knee, her expression tight with compassion and worry. “You did the right thing, coming here. You know we’re always ecstatic to have you. I just wish the circumstances could be different,” she said, slumping back in her chair. She glanced at Deidre and shook her head. “I don’t know how anyone can be expected to balance so many stressful situations in such a short period of time.”