Hannah felt cold.
Griffin lapsed into another bout of silence, his eyes seeing something off in the distance. She was seeing something, too. That flicker of a man’s face—the one who looked like Griffin—it was solidifying, becoming more than a flicker now. Almost a memory and she had flashes of him smiling down at her. Music playing—Brown Eyed Girl—and they were dancing.
“The FBI agent I talked to, he’s retired now, but he suspects the guys were dealers. The deal went south and then our dads showed up—they were dead from the moment that other vessel saw them,” Griffin said. One hand clenched into a fist, while his eyes turned hard and flat. “There was only one guy alive at the end of it all and he wasn’t about to come clean.”
Griffin skimmed a hand back over his short hair, his expression grim. “That’s probably the only reason we even know anything at all about what happened. The Coast Guard was pretty close—got there fast. Your dad … Uncle Sean held on for a few minutes, but they couldn’t save him.”
Hannah buried her face in her hands. Then, while the grief dug holes into her heart, she pushed upright and moved to the wrought-iron railing. “And they don’t know what happened?”
“They know the basics. There were two people on board—well, two people and a corpse. One of the guys shot our dads—yours first, then mine. They were pulling up alongside the other boat when it happened. My father was soaking wet according to the report. They speculated that he saw enough of what was happening to know there was trouble, so he dove into the water. Stupid bastard—there were sharks in the water, but if your dad was in trouble … anyway, he swam around and came up behind, grabbed one of them as they came aboard Uncle Sean’s boat. Most likely, my dad hamstringed him with the knife, but the other guy shot him. The Coast Guard was right on top of them by that time, but my dad was already dead. The stupid fucks tried to shoot it out with the Coast Guard, but that didn’t go over well. One guy died right away, the other surrendered, was taken in for questioning, but he was killed in jail within a week. All that much more reason to think it was drug-related.”
Hannah closed her eyes and wrapped her hands around the metal railing. Too much. It was all too much to process.
She couldn’t think about a man she barely remembered lying dead on the deck of a boat.
All because he and his brother tried to help some strangers.
She squeezed her eyes shut, tried to pull up some memory of him.
You’re my … brown eyed girl. Do you remember when … we used to say.…
That bit of song spun around and around in her head and she sucked in a breath, grabbing at her skull as though it was going to fly apart. One sliver, one tiny fraction fell free.
A woman.
Hannah gasped.
Mom.
Smiling.
Her round face—Hannah’s face—smiling at her from across a darkened yard, lit by the smile and the dancing flames of a fire. She was watching them, Hannah realized.
Watching Hannah dancing with her dad.
“We were happy.” Slowly, she looked up at Griffin. “Mama, Daddy and me. We were happy, weren’t we? Before he died?”
He pushed off the railing and knelt down in front of her. “Yeah,” he said, a smile crooking up the corners of his mouth. He caught her hand and squeezed. “You were. All of us were. Mom … she … um, well. She tried to get you and your mama to move to Baton Rouge and stay with us, but Aunt Lily didn’t want to leave Treasure. Said she’d grown up here, wanted you to grow up here. Didn’t want to leave the house that she and your dad had bought.”
Hannah nodded and then looked away, tucking that scrap of memory away. She’d write it down, she decided. These bits and pieces that were real, that were solid, she’d buy a journal and write everything down. Sooner or later, she’d have enough to believe that she really did have a life—something more than the Swiss cheese experiment that was her brain these days.
But that one, bittersweet memory of her mother led to another one.
One of her mother crying. Begging.
“She was happy. Here.” She looked back at the apartment where she lived but shook her head. “Not in this apartment, I know that. I didn’t grow up here. I don’t know where that place is, or what it looks like, but it was here. But instead of moving to Baton Rouge, she let that miserable fuck move in and knock her around for the rest of her life instead,” Hannah said, frustration bubbling inside her.
“You remember him.”
“Some.” She managed not to flinch at one particularly clear memory. She didn’t want to think about that, or the guilt. Rage threatened to steal the air from her lungs and she sucked in a deep breath. “His name. What was his name, Griffin?”
“Omar.” Griffin’s lip curled as he said it, as though the very mention of the man left a bad taste in his mouth. “Omar Lovett.”
“Omar.” She clenched both of her hands into fists and wished she had something in front of her that she could hit. “I remember his face. He was this big, ugly, lazy pig of a man. I wasn’t a skinny girl, I know that, but he would sit there at the table, stuffing his face and then he’d take half the food my mother gave me and throw it away, telling me that I was too fat already and I had to quit being such a lazy pig—he sure as hell wasn’t going to let me hang around his house forever.”
A low noise escaped Griffin, but she didn’t look at him. “It was our house, mine and Mama’s. Insurance … I can remember that. Mama paid it all off with my dad’s life insurance policy, put some in the bank for me for college.”
It was weird the way those memories were just there, as if all she had to do was reach for them.
“I remember him hurting her—I can’t remember all of it, but there are these … flashes.” She waved a hand back and forth in front of her head. She reached for another memory but there was nothing else.
“What else do you remember?”
She laughed sourly and glanced over at him. “It would be better to explain what I don’t remember. Almost everything is vague impressions. Him hurting my mom, but I don’t remember her name.” Her voice broke and she had to press a hand to her mouth to keep from sobbing. “Griffin…”
He caught her in a tight embrace. “Lily. Your mama’s name was Lily.”
“Lily.” She clung tight to her cousin and tried not to cry.
She tried not to scream, too, because she was angry.
“It’s okay, Hannah.”
She let him tell her that and she let him think it helped.
But it wasn’t okay. Had she been this angry before? She didn’t know.
Moments passed as she calmed herself and when she thought she could look at him without him seeing the storm that still raged inside, she broke away.
He made her look at him for a moment and she was able to give him a tight smile.
She couldn’t tell if he bought it or not, but it didn’t matter.
She had herself back under control and that was what counted.
“Lily,” she murmured, nodding. That felt … right. Yet another thing that fit.
“I can remember some foods I like and I know I love magnolia trees.”
“You hate eggs and you can’t stand tuna fish,” Griffin offered.
She could believe it because even the mention of either made her want to gag. “You should make me a list.”
He smiled.
Turning her head, she found herself staring down the road toward the river. She could see it from here, the way it rolled lazily along and the sun reflected off it, sending a sliver of diamond bright light dancing across its surface. “I love the river, too. That’s why I got this place, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. That’s why you won’t sell me your houseboat, either.”
“My…” She stopped, a smile forming on her face. “A houseboat. I have to see it.”
“You remember that?”
“No.” She shook her head. “But I don’t have to.”
Absently, she glanced around and
found her gaze lingering on the balcony across from her.
Her heart tugged. Ached.
A knot settled in her throat.
“What else do you remember?” Griffin asked, unaware of the quicksilver change in her emotions.
Softly, she murmured, “Brannon.” She opened her eyes and went back to staring at the balcony opposite hers. It was connected to a stately brick building, one that looked elegant and old, yet somehow, she suspected it hadn’t always looked that way. And she knew without a doubt who lived there.
“I remember Brannon. Not a lot … but he’s up here,” she said, touching her brow.
And in here. She had to fight the urge to rub the heel of her hand over her heart.
“He treated you like shit,” Griffin said, sounding disgusted. “Do you remember that?”
Lifting her head up, she met her cousin’s eyes. A muscle pulsed in his jaw as he stared at her and she saw the anger he couldn’t seem to hide. “Well?” he demanded when she didn’t answer.
“I know,” she said quietly. “He told me we’d fought—that we had just recently gotten involved. We’d had a fight and then … well, that day. He came to see me the day I wrecked. We were going to try and make things work out.”
“He what?”
Griffin gaped at her, the expression on his face as baffled as if she’d told him that she’d woken up from the coma and discovered that she had turned into a man overnight.
She turned back to the street. “You heard me. We’re involved.” Then she slid a hand down to cup her belly. “We’re having a baby, Griffin. I don’t think we can get much more involved anyway.”
“Having a baby with some prick doesn’t mean you have to … hell. Look, the guy is loaded. He can uphold his end of the bargain without you getting trapped up in him.”
For the first few seconds, the insult didn’t register. Then she spun on him and stalked up to him, driving her index finger into his chest. “You jackass. I’m not about to dog some guy for money—I can take care of a baby on my own. I’m getting trapped up by him because…”
Hannah floundered then. Because … because why?
“Why?” Griffin stared at her.
The anger drained away. She felt so very tired in that moment. Sinking down onto the edge of the chair, she crossed her arms over her middle and leaned forward, staring down at the cars that rolled by on the street below them. “I looked at him in the hospital, Griffin. He barged in and I knew him. I knew his name and more … some part of me knew him. I can’t explain it but there’s something big inside me, something that’s all his.”
* * *
It was a hot, windy summer morning, creeping up on noon and had it been just a few short weeks ago, Brannon would have been quite happy to be out there in the fields, talking with the crew, or hassling his manager, or even just taking a moment to stare out over what he was building.
Treasure Winery—nothing fancy—just a nice little southern winery that had been ten years in the making, and she was almost ready.
This place was his baby.
Nobody knew how much this place meant. Nobody knew how much time and effort and heart he’d poured into it.
They didn’t know how much work he’d put into it, how many hours—weeks—months, years of his life he’d dedicated to this.
He’d buried himself in research, had visited hundreds of wineries—if not more—across the country and beyond. There had been years devoted to scouting for the perfect piece of land. It had to be in the area. He wasn’t leaving home and when luck had smiled on him and given him the ideal spot just fifteen miles from the home where he’d lived for half of his life … well, Brannon had been one smug, pleased bastard.
That had been nine years ago and he’d been working to this point ever since.
As time got closer and closer and as the wines he was trying to develop got better and better, he’d lost time in his life for anything else that wasn’t crucial.
He’d been working on other projects in town—like the bookstore and the hardware store, a few other places that not too many knew about—but he didn’t have as much hands-on work there. Most of that was all about him investing money in return for learning more about the business of running of a business.
Then there was the pub. Treasure Island. That had come about because the owner had wanted to retire and Brannon had heard the man talking about just closing the bar. Beyond the diner, Treasure didn’t have any place decent to get a meal and while there were a few places to get a drink, there had been a decided gap.
Brannon had just made the decision to fill it.
Then he’d acted on impulse and called an old friend, Ian. Ian had been managing a pub over in Edinburgh—or was it Glasgow—for years, but Brannon had offered him something he knew the other man wanted; a chance to have a place of his own. Right now, Brannon owned it, but in a few years, he’d make Ian an offer. They’d already discussed it and Ian, being a smart, cagey bastard, was likely already setting aside money to pay for the place.
So now the Island was Ian’s baby.
All of that had given Brannon more insight into the business aspect of things. Now with experience under his belt and his wine list all but ready, he should be dying to open the door to his winery.
If anybody really knew how much this place meant to him, they’d … well, they wouldn’t believe it, because Brannon McKay was known for not caring about much of anything that didn’t involve his sisters or cars.
It probably shouldn’t be such a surprise that this place was about ready to get shoved to the back burner, too. Because instead of dealing with the myriad of things that needed to be done—the emails, the marketing plan, one of a dozen meetings he knew he had to take of—he was heading toward his car and he had absolutely no plans to be back for the rest of the day.
He was taking his laptop, though. He needed to look at the resumes that had come in.
“Brannon. Brannon!”
He looked up as Marc Norton came running down the path toward him, dust flying up from his shoes, his face flushed, and a hole in the knee of his jeans.
Marc Norton was the vintner he’d hired a couple of years ago to help him with Treasure Winery. Eight years ago, five years ago, two years ago … hell, two months ago, this place had been the thing that dominated his thoughts, morning, noon, and night and if Marc had been hollering for him in that tone, then he would have been dropping just about everything to see what the problem was.
But he had other thoughts dominating his mind.
Hannah.
He checked the time as Marc came stumbling to a halt in front of him.
It was just now eleven. He had a few minutes.
“We need to talk about the marketing for the muscadine. You’re still wanting to call it Riverboat Queen, right? We need to get moving on this.” Marc held up a hand, panted for a few seconds, gulped in air and then carried on. “We have a meeting with the tourism board in three days and we haven’t prepared anything. We’re supposed to be opening in six weeks. We need to make sure everything is order and we need—”
“You,” Brannon cut in.
Marc frowned, clearly not following.
“You and Tag need to do it. You’re the vintner, he’s the manager. This is up to the two of you. Find him and get to it.” He checked his laptop bag, made sure the charging cord was in there. He had to get somebody else out here—yesterday would have been good. Probably a couple of somebodys and an assistant for Marc.
“But … I … Brannon, this is your deal. You’ve got your fingerprints all over it. We need you on board with it.”
Brannon opened the door of the Bugatti and put his laptop bag inside it. It struck him then how damned cramped the thing was. Hannah would be miserable riding around in it in a few months. And the baby—
His mouth went dry thinking of that.
The baby.
“Shit,” he muttered as he straightened and stared down at the custom-built car. The Bugatti was litera
lly a work of art. Yet another thing that had his hands all over it. Driving it was like driving a dream—it handled like nothing he could even describe. It was almost better than sex. Well, unless he was talking sex with Hannah and then it didn’t even compare. But aside from Hannah, there had been plenty of times when he would have much rather had been behind the wheel of the car, wind whipping through his air, music blasting, and nothing around him but the road. No women, no worries, nothing.
And now he was brooding because his pregnant …
“Brannon!”
Turning away from the car, he stared at Marc’s red face. He looked like a pissed-off ferret, shifting restlessly from one foot to another, his eyes shining behind the lenses of his glasses and his hands moving restlessly as though it was impossible for him to be still.
“You’ll have to manage without me,” Brannon said levelly.
“We’ve been doing that for almost two weeks.” Frustrated, Marc shoved his hands through his hair, adding to the irate ferret image. “I get that life is exploding around you, but do you want this to happen or not? For the past six months or more, it’s been like the winery doesn’t even matter.”
Brannon stared him down.
Marc glared at him. “I gave up a career in California and a chance to buy into my own place to come out here. You told me you’d make it worth my while. And now…” Marc shook his head. “You’re leaving me hanging. Do you want this place to succeed or not?”
“Yeah.” That much, at least, hadn’t changed. Planting his hands on his hips, Brannon pinned a hard stare on Marc.
The man’s nerves jacked up to the next level.
Marc was a great winemaker. Despite the fact that Brannon had been working for this for the past ten years, he still didn’t know a quarter of what Marc knew—the man was brilliant and finding him had been a gift from winemaker heaven. Brannon knew that.
The Trouble with Temptation Page 6