by Susan Meier
The Montgomerys had been wealthy when she’d been married to Max, and she knew their business had grown. But actually seeing the results of that growth was a staggering reminder of the different stations in the lives of the Montgomerys and the Hunters.
Fear shivered through her. She’d kept wealthy Max Montgomery’s daughter away from him for seven years—nearly eight if she counted the pregnancy. Though she’d almost called him a hundred times over the years to tell him about Trisha, to give him a chance to be part of her life, every time she’d picked up the phone she remembered that night. The smashed television. The shattered glasses from the bar shelf. The broken front window. And she’d been afraid. Not just for herself, but for their daughter. He’d made her afraid. Why should she be the one cowering now, when he’d given her no choice but to leave?
She straightened her shoulders. She would not cower. She would not back down. He’d made this bed. And she would remind him of that. Maybe even ask him if he’d like those details coming out in court if he argued with her over custody or visitation.
Dark brown travertine tile led to the reception desk. The pretty twenty-something redhead manning the station greeted her with a smile. “Can I help you?”
“Yes. I’d like to see Mr. Montgomery.”
She glanced down at a small computer screen. “Do you have an appointment?”
“No. But if you’ll tell him Kate Hunter Montgomery is here, I’m sure he’ll see me.”
The young woman glanced over at Kate with raised eyebrows. Kate stood perfectly still under her scrutiny, knowing exactly what the receptionist saw. A small woman with big green eyes and hair just a little bit too thick to tame. Not exactly the woman everyone would expect to be married to a mogul—a ridiculously handsome one at that. With his black hair, blue eyes and tall, lean body, Max had always been a magnet for women. Beautiful women. And he’d chosen her.
It sometimes still puzzled her. Other times it made her realize that having your wishes come true might be the worst thing that could happen.
The receptionist pressed two buttons on her phone, then turned away.
Kate heard only muffled words. Her name. Her description.
Then a wait.
She’d probably called Max’s secretary, who had taken the information to Max.
Ten seconds. Twenty seconds. Thirty seconds.
Her face grew warm, her hands clammy. Surely he wasn’t so angry that he’d refuse to see her?
Memories of being married to a wealthy man came flooding back. His job was important. His place in the community was even more important. Fundraisers. Ribbon-cuttings. Balls. Parties.
Always worried she’d say or do the wrong thing.
Never feeling good enough.
Righteous indignation surged in her blood. She was the star project manager at her job in Tennessee. She raised a daughter on her own. If she went to a fundraiser, she contributed. If she went to a ribbon-cutting it was for a building she’d helped build.
Good enough?
Hell, yeah. She was good enough. And if Max thought he and his money were going to push her around, he was sadly mistaken.
The receptionist faced her. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Montgomery. You may go up.”
“Actually, it’s Ms. Hunter now.”
The receptionist nodded in acknowledgment. “Take the third elevator in the back of that hall.” She pointed to the left. “By the time you get there, a security guard will be there to punch in the code.”
She walked to the last elevator with her head high. The security guard said, “Good morning, Ms. Hunter.” Proof the receptionist was very good at her job. Punching a few numbers into a keypad, he opened the elevator, motioned her inside and stepped back as the doors closed.
The ride to the fourth floor took seconds. The door swooshed open. More potted trees accented a low, ultra-modern green sofa and chair. A green print rug sat on the yellow hardwood floor.
Sitting at the desk in front of a wall of windows, Max looked up.
Catching him off guard, Kate didn’t see the angry father of her child or the rich mogul. She saw Max. Real Max. Max with his thick, unruly black hair. Max with his easy smile and pretty blue eyes. The first time she’d laid eyes on him, he’d stolen her breath and her heart.
Which was another reason she’d moved away rather than simply move out when she’d gotten pregnant. No matter how bad their life, she’d always loved him and he’d always been able to charm her.
She swallowed. Her bravado from the reception area began to fade. But she forced it back to life. She wasn’t here to argue for herself, but for Trisha. To protect Trisha.
He rose from his tall-backed, golden-brown leather chair. “Kate. I have to say I’m kind of surprised.”
“Yeah. Well, I’m not the wimpy girl you married.” There. Best to get that out in the open before they went any further. “We have something to discuss. We’re going to discuss it.”
“Big talk from a woman who ran away.”
“From a drunk,” she said, not mincing words. She knew she’d done the right thing and she wasn’t going to let his good looks and charm suck her in again. Too much was at stake.
“And hitting below the belt, I see.”
“Saying the truth isn’t hitting below the belt. Unless you can’t handle the truth.”
His breath poured out in a long hiss as he motioned toward the green sofa and chair. “I know who and what I am.”
She headed for the chair, not wanting to risk that he’d sit beside her on the couch. “Then this conversation should go very easily. We have a daughter. You’re sober now. And I’m willing to let you spend time with Trisha as long as I’m with you.”
Max lowered himself to the sofa. “With me? I don’t get to see my child alone?”
Her chin rose again. “No. Not until I trust you.”
Max stared at her. Just as he’d changed over the past eight years, she had, too. Gone was his sweet Kate, replaced by somebody he didn’t know. Maybe somebody he didn’t want to know. Maybe even somebody who deserved the burst of fury he longed to release.
He rubbed his hands down his face. No matter how much he wanted to rant and rail, he couldn’t give in to it. Not only had he been at fault for her leaving, but just as drinking didn’t solve anything, neither did losing his temper. Another lesson he’d learned while she was gone.
His voice was perfectly controlled as he said, “I don’t think you’re in a position to dictate terms.”
“I think I am.”
“And I have two lawyers who say you aren’t.”
Her eyes widened with incredulity. “You’ve already called your lawyers?”
“A smart businessman knows when he needs advice.”
“So you think you’re going to ride roughshod over me with lawyers?”
“I think I’m going to do what I have to do.”
She shook her head. “Do you want me to leave tomorrow? Do you want me to hide so far away and so deeply that you’ll never, ever see your daughter?”
Control be damned. “Are you threatening me?”
“I’m protecting my daughter. We play by my rules or no rules at all. I won’t put Trisha at risk.”
“Risk? You have no reason to fear for her. I never hurt you!”
“No, you just smashed TVs and broke windows. You were escalating, Max, and you scared me.”
Guilt pummeled him enough that he scrubbed his hand over his mouth to give himself a few seconds to collect himself. Finally he said, “You could have talked to me.”
Her face scrunched in disbelief. “Really? Talk to a guy so drunk he could barely stand? And how was that supposed to work?”
“I might have come home drunk, but I was sober every morning.”
“And hungover.”
He sighed. “No matter how I felt, I would have listened to you.”
“That’s not how I remember it. I remember living with a man who was either stone-cold drunk or hungover. Three years of silence
or lies and broken promises. Three years of living with a man who barely noticed I was there. I won’t sit back and watch our little girl stare out the window waiting for you the way I used to. Or lie in bed worrying that you’d wrecked your car because you were too drunk to drive and too stubborn to admit it. Or spend the day alone, waiting for you to wake up because you’d been out all night.”
Fury rattled through him. “I’m sober now!”
“I see that. And I honestly hope it lasts. But even you can’t tell me with absolute certainty that it will. And since you can’t, I stand between you and Trisha. I protect her. She will not go through what I went through.”
Her voice wobbled, and the anger that had been pulsing through his brain, feeding his replies, stopped dead in its tracks. She wasn’t just mad at him. She was still hurting.
She rose and paced to his desk. “Do you know what it’s like to live with someone who tells you they love you but then doesn’t have ten minutes in a day for you?”
Max went stock-still. This was usually what happened when he apologized. The person he’d wronged had a grievance. It had been so long since he’d had one of these sessions that he’d forgotten. But when Kate turned, her green eyes wary, her voice soft, filled with repressed pain, remorse flooded him. She had a right to be angry.
“I’ll tell you what it’s like. It’s painful, but most of all it’s bone-shatteringly lonely.”
Guilt tightened his stomach. He’d always known he’d hurt her, but he’d never been sober enough to hear the pain in her voice, see it shimmer in her eyes.
And she wanted to save Trisha from that. So did he. But the way he’d protect her would be to stay sober. “I won’t hurt her.”
“You know, you always told me the same thing. That you wouldn’t hurt me. But you did. Every day.” Her voice softened to a faint whisper. “Every damned day.”
He squeezed his eyes shut. “I’m sorry. Really sorry.”
“Right.”
Righteous indignation rose up in him. He hated his past as much as she hated his past. But this time she wasn’t innocent.
“Did you ever stop to think that maybe I’d have gotten sober sooner if I’d known I was having a child? Did you ever stop to think that if you’d stayed, I might have turned around an entire year sooner?”
“No.” She caught his gaze. “You loved me, Max. I always knew it. But I wasn’t a good enough reason for you to get sober. I wasn’t taking a chance with our child.”
“You could have at least told me you were pregnant before you left.”
“And have you show up drunk at the hospital while I was struggling through labor? Or drunk on Christmas Day to ruin Trisha’s first holiday? Or maybe have you stagger into her dance recital so she could be embarrassed in front of her friends?” She shook her head. “I don’t think so.”
The picture she painted shamed him. Things he’d done drunk now embarrassed him as much as they had his friends and family. And he suddenly understood. Making amends with Kate wouldn’t be as simple as saying he was sorry. He was going to have to prove himself to her.
He blew his breath out on a sigh, accepted it, because accepting who he was, who he had been, was part of his recovery. “So maybe it would be good for you to be around when I see her.”
Her reply was soft, solemn. “Maybe it would.”
“Can I come over tonight and meet her?”
“I was thinking tomorrow afternoon might be a better idea. I take my mom to the hospital every day, but lately Trisha’s been bored. So I thought I’d start bringing her home in the afternoon.”
“And I can come over?”
“Yes. Until my dad is released from the hospital, we’ll have some privacy.”
With that she turned and headed for the elevator. Prickling with guilt, he leaned back on the sofa. But when the elevator doors swished closed behind her, he thought about how different things might have been if she’d told him about her pregnancy, and his anger returned. She hadn’t given him a chance to try to sober up. She hadn’t even given him a chance to be a dad.
Still, could he blame her?
A tiny voice deep down inside him said yes. He could blame her. He might see her perspective, but he’d also had a right to know his child.
He rose from the sofa and headed for his desk again. That’s exactly what his father had told him the night he’d confronted him about being his adopted brother Chance’s biological father. About bringing his illegitimate son into their home with a lie. A sham. An adoption used to cover an affair.
I had a right to know my child.
He ran his hand across his forehead as nerves and more anger surged through him. He hadn’t thought about that part of his life in years. His brother had run away the night Max had confronted their dad. Which was part of why Max drank. At AA he’d learned to put those troubles behind him, but now, suddenly, here he was again, wondering. Missing his brother with a great ache that gnawed at his belly. Because Kate was home and Kate was part of that time in his life.
Losing Chance might have been the event that pushed him over the edge with his alcoholism, but he wasn’t that guy anymore. He hadn’t been for seven long years. He only hoped seeing Kate, fighting with Kate, meeting a daughter he hadn’t known he had, didn’t tempt that guy out of hiding.
He grabbed his cell phone from his desk and hit the speed-dial number for his sponsor.
CHAPTER TWO
THE FOLLOWING AFTERNOON, Max left the office at noon and raced home to put on jeans and a T-shirt. Something more comfortable, more casual, than a black suit and white shirt, so he didn’t intimidate his daughter. Or Kate.
Like it or not, he had things to make up to her. His sponsor, Joe Zubek, had reminded him of that. He had to take responsibility for everything he’d done while drunk, and he’d hurt Kate—mistreated her enough that she didn’t want their daughter to suffer the same fate.
He had to take responsibility.
He chose the Range Rover over the Mercedes and drove past the expensive houses and estates in the lush part of the city in which he lived. Once off the hill, he headed across the bridge, through Pine Ward’s business district to the blue-collar section of town where little Cape Cods mixed and mingled with older two-story homes and a few newer ranch houses.
He made three turns to get to Elm Street and there it was. The redbrick, two-story house he’d loved. Not just because Kate had lived there, but because it had a wide front porch and a swing.
He stopped his vehicle and simply stared at the porch, the swing. He couldn’t count the number of times he and Kate had made out on that swing.
His eyes drifted shut at the memory. She’d been eighteen to his twenty-four. Not necessarily a huge age difference but Kate had been sheltered. So he’d had to go slow with her, be cautious. But when they’d finally made love—in a room sprinkled with rose petals and filled with soft candlelight—oh, Lord. He’d known—he’d absolutely known—she was the only woman in the world for him. They were together for nine years. Four years of dating until she graduated university, and five years of marriage. When she’d left him, he’d missed her so much he sometimes thought his heart would wither and die.
And now she was back.
He popped open his eyes and yanked the key from the Rover’s ignition. It didn’t matter. He’d screwed up their relationship permanently and there was no going back. Besides, his current time with Kate wouldn’t be about them. It would be about their daughter. And he wouldn’t lose the chance to know Trisha by foolishly wanting to rekindle a romance that was dead. He’d killed it. He had to remember that.
He strode up the sidewalk and across the plank porch without as much as a glance in the direction of the swing.
When he rang the bell, Kate instantly opened the door, as if she’d been waiting for him. Wearing a short white shirt that didn’t quite reach her low-riding jeans, with bare feet and toenails painted a bright blue, she looked closer to twenty than thirty-five. Her thick dark hair swirled arou
nd her.
His racing heart stuttered. She wasn’t what anyone would call conventionally beautiful, but she had an innate sexuality that stopped most men in their tracks. Including him. After his thoughts in the car, thoughts of making out on a porch swing and making love to her in a hotel room filled with candles, he couldn’t keep his gaze from taking a second trip down her trim body to her sexy toes and back up again.
He had to swallow before he could say, “Hey.”
“Come in, Max.”
He stepped inside the simple foyer. Pale beige floor tiles led to hardwood floors in both the dining room on the right and the living room on the left.
She motioned to the peach-and-beige sofa and matching chairs—the same furniture that had been in the room when they were married. “Let’s sit.”
As he turned to go into the living room, he caught a glimpse of Trisha peeking out of the kitchen. She smiled shyly at him. His heart began to thrum in his chest. She had Kate’s pretty pixie face, his blue eyes. She was an adorable little image of both of them.
Kate also saw Trisha and she laughed. “Come on, sweetie. Don’t be shy. Come into the living room with Mommy.” Then she walked to the sofa, motioning for him to sit on one of the two club chairs across from her.
Trisha entered slowly, shyly, sidling up beside the arm of the sofa where her mom sat, as Max lowered himself to a club chair.
Kate didn’t waste any time. “Trisha, this is the man I told you about.” She paused just for a second. “Your father.”
Trisha glanced at the floor. “Hi.”
“Hi.” He’d never felt so much so fast. Fear and wonder filled him simultaneously, along with a fresh burst of anger. He was clumsy right now, tongued-tied with his own child because Kate had kept her from him. “I…um…it’s nice to meet you.”
Trish nodded.