by Addison Cole
“You definitely are,” she snapped. “My mom’s gone, Grayson. And I hope Sarah’s daughter isn’t.”
He reached for her again, and she let him hold her this time. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to upset you, but what if the dots connect? What if your birth mother was Miriam Stein? A genetic reconstruction DNA test could give you the answer.”
“What? No. Absolutely not. My mother was Sherry Collins, not Miriam Stein. You’re grasping at straws. Do you know how big of an area the west is? She could have been anywhere out there, not just in California. I just…I don’t want that for her. I don’t want that for me. What if I get my hopes up, and then it’s not her?”
He softened his tone. “But what if it is? It would mean you have a grandmother you could get to know. You’d have your family.”
“No.” She shook her head. “It would mean my mother ran away from parents who didn’t love her enough. It would mean she was killed because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time, all because her father was too self-centered to love her or incapable—”
She was shaking all over, and he realized just how big of a mistake he’d made.
“I’m sorry. Shh. It’s okay.” He couldn’t put her through this. He could be way off base, and she didn’t need another thing to worry about. But what if this was the link she’d always hoped for? How could he turn his back on that possibility?
Parker exhaled loudly. “I trust your judgment, Grayson, but I think you’re way off on this. I can’t even begin to give it serious consideration. I don’t want her daughter to be dead. I want her to be off somewhere living her life, angry or confused or whatever, but alive.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
PARKER SAT ON the stoop beside Grayson and rested her head on his shoulder. It had been twenty minutes since he’d mentioned the similarities between the picture of Miriam and her younger self and the coincidence of the dates of Miriam’s call and her mother’s death. Now it was all she could think about—and she didn’t want to think about it for another second.
“I’m sorry I pushed the issue about Miriam,” he said for the tenth time. “I probably saw something that wasn’t there.”
She wasn’t sure if he’d seen similarities that didn’t exist, or if she didn’t want to see whatever he claimed to—and she didn’t really want to know.
“I’m sorry I got so upset. It’s been a stressful afternoon, but you didn’t deserve that.” She leaned into him, and he put his arm around her, which settled some of her anxiety.
“I don’t know what’s taking Matt so long. He’s never late, and he’s not the kind of guy to blow us off without a phone call.”
She was thankful for the change in subject, but she knew he was still thinking about the picture, wondering if there was a connection and keeping those thoughts to himself. He loved her enough to suffer through his questions in silence, and she loved him even more for it.
“I’m sure he’ll be here when he can. Maybe he got hung up with a student or something. At least it’s nice out and we’re together. Thank you for being here. It means a lot to me.”
“Always, baby.” He pulled her onto his lap and kissed her.
She pushed away all the troubling thoughts and surrendered to the blissful feeling that always accompanied their kisses. A car door closed, startling Parker. She jumped from Grayson’s lap.
“Matt’s seen people kiss before.” Grayson rose to greet his brother.
Parker had seen pictures of Matt in Grayson’s house, but she barely recognized him in the disheveled man stepping around the car. His hair was going every which way, as if he’d been stuck in a crosswind. His button-down shirt was untucked, torn at the shoulder seam and across the chest. Smears of what looked like blood stained his arm and streaked his face.
Grayson embraced him. “Missed you,” he said, as if this were Matt’s everyday appearance, which was unfitting of a Princeton professor.
“You too. Sorry I’m late.” Matt flashed a crooked smile at Parker, which softened his chiseled features. “It’s nice to finally meet the woman who’s got my brother’s head in the clouds.” He embraced Parker.
“Nice to meet you, too.” She followed him to the door, stunned by their lack of conversation about Matt’s torn and bloody clothes. She mouthed, What happened? to Grayson. He lifted his shoulder in a casual shrug. This was a great distraction from her worries about Miriam, but now she had all sorts of new concerns racing through her mind.
“Come on in.” Matt tossed his keys on a table by the door and began unbuttoning the few remaining buttons on his shirt. He nodded to the living room. Cardboard boxes were stacked two and three high. The framed picture of Parker and Grayson kissing sat atop one of the boxes, and two couches sat at odd angles near the back wall.
“Did you just move in?” Parker asked.
“No.” Matt wrinkled his brow like she’d asked a ridiculous question. “Make yourselves at home.” He hiked his thumb over his shoulder toward the staircase. “I’m going to shower and change, and then we can head out to dinner.”
“Sounds good,” Grayson said to his brother’s back as Matt ascended the stairs. “Sweetheart,” he said to Parker. “I’m going to grab our stuff.”
She followed him out. “What do you think happened to him?”
“Who knows.” He pulled their suitcase from the trunk and headed back toward the house.
“Grayson? He was bloody and his clothes were torn. Aren’t you worried?”
“About him?” He laughed. “Matt’s like Clark Kent. Clean-cut professor by day, superhero by night.”
She stopped cold. “What does that mean? He beats up bad guys? Flies through the air with a cape?”
He reached for her hand, bringing her into the house with him. “Not usually.”
“How can you be so nonchalant about this?”
He shrugged again, and she followed him downstairs to a bedroom, where he set their things down and wrapped her in his arms again.
“Sweetheart, he’s not a dangerous guy. Matt’s as straitlaced as they come. But if there’s trouble—a car accident, an unfair fight, an old lady needing help crossing the street—Matt jumps in. Always has. No big deal.”
She could easily imagine Grayson doing every one of those things and coming out of the fight with the same calm demeanor he’d possessed since she’d known him.
“It’s not a big deal. Don’t overthink it.” Grayson stripped down to his briefs to change for dinner, making it easy for her to stop thinking about Matt.
Matt joined them a little while later, freshly showered and dressed in a neatly pressed white button-down and a pair of dark slacks, looking very professorial. Now that Parker wasn’t focused on his torn clothing, she saw that where Grayson was broad and thick chested with muscles that rivaled that of a bodybuilder, Matt was athletically built, but leaner and slimmer at the waist. His features were more angular than Grayson’s. He was handsome, as all the Lacrouxs were, but he didn’t hold a candle to her man, who took her breath away in a pair of low-slung jeans and a black button-down rolled up to his elbows, exposing the muscular forearms she loved to touch.
Matt jiggled the keys hanging from his finger. “Dinner?”
Parker wondered what type of spell their parents had cast that enabled them to remain calm in the face of any storm—and how she could get some of that potion.
LATER THAT EVENING Grayson sat on the edge of the bed in Matt’s guest room, rationalizing the calls he’d made to Hunter and Caden when Parker had been on the phone with Luce. No matter how hard he tried not to think about the possible connection between Parker and Miriam Stein, it was right there, refusing to be ignored. He loved Parker too much to let even a remote possibility of finding her family go and he loved her too much to cause her the anguish of false hope.
He looked across the room at her now, sorting through her toiletries, still wearing the little black dress she’d worn to dinner, and he hoped he’d done the right thing.
“I had a nice time tonight,” Parker said. “That was crazy about the cat in the sewer.”
“Leave it to Matt to get tangled up in something.” Matt had told Parker he’d rescued a cat that had been stuck in a sewer after work, calming her concerns about his roughed-up appearance. Grayson had seen a shadowed look in his brother’s eyes, and when Parker had gone to the ladies’ room, Grayson had called him on it. Matt admitted to stopping a carjacking and not wanting to worry Parker, which made him appreciate his brother’s careful thought process even more.
Grayson had taken advantage of their brief moment alone to tell Matt about the similarities in the photos and the dates surrounding Miriam’s last call and Parker’s mother’s death. Matt’s response mirrored Grayson’s thoughts. They have DNA tests for that. It sounded so easy, but Parker had been vehement in wanting no part of it, taking easy out of the equation.
They’d had a nice evening despite the rocky beginning. After dinner Matt had given them a tour of Princeton’s campus. Grayson had almost forgotten how being with Matt was like spending time with both their mother and father. Matt possessed their father’s innate ability to remember everything he’d ever read or heard and their mother’s ability to get to the heart of any issue with just a few words. In the first few minutes of their walk, Matt had learned about Bert, Abe, and Christmas. Grayson had to admit he was a little jealous, considering it had taken him ten months to learn as much, but he took that as a good sign. Parker had been on such an emotional roller coaster lately, he hadn’t expected her to share much of herself with Matt. The fact that she had proved just how strong she was.
Parker put her toiletries in the bathroom and glanced at him over her shoulder. “I’m going to take a quick shower.”
She was so beautiful, standing inside the open bathroom doorway with her back to him. She stepped from her dress, purposely giving Grayson an eyeful—and wiping his brain clean of anything but thoughts of loving her, body, mind, and soul. She unhooked her bra and let it fall to the floor, hooked her fingers in the sliver-like sides of her thong, and wiggled her butt as she stepped out of it. Then she moved out of sight and turned on the shower.
Grayson undressed as he walked toward the bathroom. He drank in her gorgeous silhouette through the foggy glass doors before stepping in beside her.
“I was wondering when you were going to join me.”
“I’ll make up for taking so long.”
He lowered his mouth to her shoulder, biting just hard enough to cause her to gasp with pleasure. She turned toward him, and he held her beneath the warm shower spray. He loved that she trusted him enough to give herself over completely to him when they made love, but nothing touched him more deeply than when she went soft in his arms, knowing he’d take care of her.
She was leaving for California in four days, and he wouldn’t be there to take care of her. He had three more nights to hold her in his arms. Four mornings to wake up with her by his side. The timeline felt more like a time bomb. He’d worried about living on opposite sides of the country, but their intimacy ran beyond sex and secrets, and when he looked into their future, he knew there was no distance vast enough to keep them apart.
Chapter Twenty-Four
“WALK WITH ME.” Parker reached for Grayson’s hand, and they walked to the end of the bluff with Christmas by their side. They’d returned to pack Parker’s things for her flight home and were due to leave for the airport in twenty minutes.
It had been four days since they’d met Sarah. Four days since he’d made the phone call that set his secret plan into action. Four days since guilt had begun eating him alive. He’d tried to bring up the DNA test every day since he’d made the arrangements, and again last night after their friends had thrown Parker a goodbye party on Cahoon Hollow Beach. They’d had a bonfire. Sawyer had played his guitar. They’d laughed and danced, and Parker had hugged the girls so many times, he’d half expected her not to leave.
He’d tried to bring up the test again yesterday evening, but it was their last night together for a few weeks, and he couldn’t do it. If the results were negative, she’d never have to know, and telling her would only make her worry. But if they were positive, she’d have the family she’d always wished for. He was doing the right thing, or at least he thought he was, but the guilt of keeping a secret from Parker was killing him.
“This is where you first kissed me.” Parker turned to face him. Her smile reached her eyes, radiating in the reflection of the sun. She was dressed to the nines, in a classy skirt and top with sky-high heels. Beyond gorgeous, she was back to the Parker Collins the world knew and loved. But he saw more than what everyone else saw, and he’d fallen in love with all of her—the Parker Collins that was just as much a down-to-earth woman as she was a famous actress. The way she could morph into her public persona in the blink of an eye or cuddle beside him on a sandy beach in a pair of shorts, with her hair in a ponytail and no makeup. He loved hearing her on the phone with directors and actors and her agent and Luce, moving between personalities with the grace and expertise she’d used to build her fabulous career.
The sound of the bay floated up from below, and behind her, Christmas bounded across the grass after a bird. They were his life now. In just a few weeks they’d become the most important parts of his life. How could they be leaving?
He drew her against him. “Sweetheart, was the kiss in the elevator that forgettable?”
She shook her head. “But I meant really kissed me, like I was yours.”
She had him there. In the elevator, he was still hoping. Now he knew.
“Christmas will miss you,” she said softly.
“You won’t?” He fought against the claws of guilt trying to pull him away.
She held up her finger and thumb less than an inch apart, laughing as his mouth descended on hers, and he kissed that laugh right out of her, reveling in her warmth, her taste, her eagerness. When they parted, she had the look of love in her eyes he saw in his dreams. And it was that look that brought guilt so crushing he could barely breathe.
“I already miss you,” she said.
Tell her. Just tell her. “Hm?”
“I already miss you. Are you okay? You look a little green.”
“Yes. No.” He couldn’t let her leave until he came clean, no matter how good his intentions were and regardless of the results not being in yet. He was beginning to think he’d made the biggest mistake of his life.
“No?” Her brows knitted.
He extracted his hands from hers and scrubbed a hand down his face, wishing he’d never made the call—and in the next breath, knowing that if the results were positive, he’d definitely done the right thing.
“Grayson, you’re worrying me.”
Conflicted didn’t begin to describe the way he felt, and now the worry on Parker’s face made him feel like he’d swallowed a pound of lead.
“I’m sorry, baby.” He reached for her hand, and she trustingly took it, which made this even harder. “I have to tell you something, and I should have told you days ago, but I couldn’t. I know you didn’t want to pursue the idea of Miriam being related to you.”
“Grayson?” She shook her head.
He tightened his hold on it. “I know you didn’t want to pursue it because you were scared of having false hope and you want Sarah’s daughter to be alive. But, baby, sweetheart, all you’ve ever wanted was to have a family, and no matter how remote the chance, I couldn’t let it go.”
She tore her hand from his and crossed her arms. Her eyes narrowed with fear and anger and hurt that cut like a knife. “What did you do?”
He held her gaze, owning the pain and accepting her anger, and gave her the truth. “When we got back from Jersey I gave Caden your blue hairbrush, and he sent it in for a DNA test.”
“You…?” She stumbled backward, shaking her head. “I don’t understand. Why would you do that?”
He stepped forward, but she held up a hand, warding him off, and he reluctantly s
topped. “I couldn’t let it go.”
“I told you to let it go. It wasn’t your decision to make.” Tears streamed down her cheeks, piercing his heart even deeper. “Did you…? Does she know? Sarah? Oh, poor Sarah.”
“No. Parker—”
“No, Grayson!” she shouted. Christmas sprinted over and stood between them, his big head moving back and forth, as if he didn’t know where his loyalty should lie. “I trusted you. I trusted you wholly and completely and you—”
He closed the distance between them. “I messed up big time, Parker, and I’m sorry. I wasn’t even going to tell you if the results were negative. You wouldn’t have had to worry at all.”
“Like that’s any better? Lying to me forever?” She spun around and stormed toward the house.
He kept pace beside her. “It’s not better, but I’m telling you now. I couldn’t live with the guilt.”
“Apparently you lived with it pretty well for the last few days.”
“No, it was killing me. But if the results are positive, then you have a family, Parker. You have a grandmother.”
She stopped cold and turned a lethal gaze on him. “I trusted you,” she seethed. “I told you I didn’t want this.”
“I know, and I’m sorry. I should have told you sooner. I should have gotten your permission.” In his head, he had done it for all the right reasons. Couldn’t she see that? “I hoped to find a family connection. Maybe I went about it the wrong way.”
“Maybe?” She scoffed and grabbed her phone from the patio table. “You should have told me sooner? I can’t deal with this right now. I need space. Time. You’re…” She shook her head. “You’re unbelievable.”
“Unbelievable?” Anger and confusion whirled inside him. This couldn’t be happening. He had to stop this fight, to make her understand, but he could tell she was way past understanding. He’d done this to them—to her. Something inside him snapped, and he was powerless to stop the words from coming out.