by Robyn Grady
Hux paused. “I know that name.”
“Of Hunter Enterprises,” Lanie supplied. “Broadcasting in Australia, movies in LA. Print media in New York. Very influential. Money coming out of their—”
“Are you sure you don’t want some pie, Lanie?” Susan asked.
Lanie smiled. “I’m good. Thanks.”
Teagan finished her final mouthful before responding. “I don’t have anything to do with that.”
Lanie looked taken aback. “You don’t have anything to do with your family?”
Jacob spoke up. “Teagan didn’t say that.”
“I remember catching something on a feed a few months ago,” Lanie went on. “A little before Christmas. Is it true?”
Teagan looked calm. Unperturbed. “Is what true?”
“A bomb went off in your father’s Sydney mansion.”
Hux’s head went back and Susan’s eyebrows shot up.
Even Ajax’s gaze snapped up from his plate. “A bomb?”
Lanie was nodding. “I hope no one was hurt.”
Jacob found Teagan’s hand under the table and squeezed. He wanted to give Lanie the benefit of the doubt. She was curious. But it wasn’t so much the topic as the tone.
If Griff and Ajax were his best friends, Lanie was a confidante. Like he’d told Teagan earlier, this brother and sister had a special relationship. But now Lanie needed to back off.
Teagan was responding. “It was a difficult time. Thanks for asking.”
“And there was something else,” Lanie added, “about death threats against your father...”
Before Jacob could intervene, Susan pushed to her feet and cut in. “I’m going to put the ice cream back in the freezer before it melts.”
Jacob was looking at Lanie. What was the deal? It was like she was sixteen again—awkward, overly sensitive. Was there something she needed to get off her chest? Maybe to do with her horses. Maybe to do with a boy. Or should he say man? She wasn’t a kid anymore, even with her arms folded tight on the table looking like she wanted to break loose.
Like he must’ve looked fifteen years ago.
Ajax was answering a text he’d just received. “Sorry, guys. I need to head out.”
Hux sat straighter. “The mare’s foaling?”
Ajax pushed back his chair. “Her water just broke.” About to dash out the door, he stopped to study Teagan. Beneath the light, his blue eyes twinkled. “Would you like to see a foal being born?”
Teagan blinked several times before an uncertain smile caught her lips. “The mare won’t mind?”
“We’ll be quiet.”
Ajax wasn’t joking.
Jacob took Teagan’s hand and was following Hux and Ajax out the door—the foaling stalls were within walking distance—when he remembered Lanie. Glancing back, he narrowed his eyes at her in warning. She had some serious explaining to do.
Ignoring his look, Lanie got to her feet to help Susan clear the table. She had seen her fair share of mares giving birth, but if you hadn’t witnessed it before, the experience was something to remember.
But, of course, there were times when something went wrong.
Heading down the porch steps, Ajax’s smile was a little strained. “Shake a leg, guys. We don’t have much time.”
Eight
Teagan hadn’t bargained for this. Lanie Rawson’s barrage of questions and put-downs at the dinner table was pressure enough. Now she was about to see a mother give birth?
As Jacob took her hand and they followed Hux and Ajax to a large foaling barn, Teagan hoped no one could tell that her stomach was tied up in knots. She shouldn’t be so nervous about a natural process. How many births were there every day, every year? But as those barn doors drew closer and she squeezed Jacob’s hand harder, Teagan was well aware that things didn’t always go according to plan.
Whenever she remembered her miscarriage, every minute played out seamlessly in her mind. More than anything, she remembered the aching sense of loss. Entering the barn now, with the vet quietly waving them over, those memories resurfaced with a vengeance.
She took in the scent of fresh hay and spread of gentle light as they approached a middle stall that was free of clutter—just a clean bed of straw. Her coat shining with sweat, a pregnant mare was plodding around the enclosure, constantly swishing her tail. While Teagan and Jacob sat on a bench that gave a clear view into the stall, Hux and Ajax waited near the railing.
Eventually the mare stopped pacing and lay down.
Sitting forward, Teagan concentrated on the mare’s movements—rolling around then sitting up to look at her stomach while Tea continued to hold onto hers.
“She must want this over.”
“As long as the foal is in position,” Jacob said, “front legs forward, nose in between—it should be relatively fast.”
Teagan frowned. “If the foal’s in position?”
“The vet would have checked.”
When Teagan blew out a shaky breath, Jacob put his arm around her and pulled her close. As the mare began to breathe more heavily, she lay flat on her side. When the vet crouched down and shifted her tail, Teagan saw the foal—its front legs, at least—wrapped in an opaque bag, the amniotic sac.
Soon the mare’s snorting became more like groans, almost human. Rhythmic, laboring, like she needed this done. The vet was holding—maybe pulling—the foal’s front legs while repeating, “Good girl, good girl.” But nothing more seemed to be happening.
Finally, there was a rush. The foal’s head emerged, followed by the body. Teagan and Jacob got to their feet as the foal’s front hooves broke through the sac and its two hind legs were delivered. Teagan could see the new baby’s heart beating while the mare lay spent. Happy. Relieved.
She wasn’t the only one.
* * *
Jacob watched her sleep.
Stroking Teagan’s hair, listening to her breathe...this “morning after the night before” was even better than the first time. And not because of the sex. After witnessing the birth of that foal, they had returned to this room, shed their clothes and, aside from cuddling, that was it.
In a week he’d gone from being smitten with Teagan to feeling different...feeling so much more, and to the point of now asking himself a serious question.
Could this really go somewhere?
Could this be it?
She stirred, an unconscious lifting of her chin and rounding of a bare shoulder. As he smiled and waited, her eyelids fluttered, then opened. There was the moment of “Where am I?” before she focused and hit him with a croaky question.
“The foal...?”
“Is doing great. I just got back from speaking with Ajax and Hux.”
She pushed hair from her brow and looked toward the window. “What time is it?”
“Time for this.”
When his mouth lowered over hers, she hummed in her throat, stretched and then arched in against him, curving a languid arm around his neck.
Of course Jacob had been with women before. Only one had come close to stealing his heart. The end of that relationship had left him feeling like he’d been kicked in the teeth. It had put him off wanting that kind of connection again.
Then he’d gone to that wedding in LA.
When he gradually broke the kiss, Teagan gave him a dreamy I want you, too smile.
“Can we see them today?”
Jacob recalibrated his thoughts. She meant the mare and her colt. “You bet. The little guy’s walking around. The star on his head’s really showing up now.”
“Has he got a name?”
“Not yet.”
“And when does the father get to meet his boy?”
The question took Jacob by surprise. “Not anytime soon, I’m afraid.”
“You mean like in a couple of weeks when he’s stronger?”
>
“A stallion is very much an instinctive, territorial creature. Even when a horse is definitely the father of a foal, sometimes, for whatever reason, he isn’t sure.”
Teagan looked confused. How could he put this delicately?
“Let’s just say that studs don’t like competition. It’s best not to introduce a stallion to any foal, including their own.”
Teagan’s expression deepened, and then twisted. “You’re saying he might try to hurt his own blood?”
“It can happen. And when it does—when a stallion isn’t sure—it’s purely about looking after the gene pool. It happens among other species, too. Zebras...well, they’re closely related to horses, of course. Some monkeys, bears, bats, lions—”
“Panthers?”
“I’m not sure about that.”
It hurt to think about, but there were cases of humans doing it, too.
Hell, maybe that was why the old man hadn’t lifted a finger to help him grow up. Jacob remembered Stanley calling him a bastard more than once. Maybe the insults had a more primitive motivation. Maybe he was some other man’s biological son.
Just fine by him.
Jacob edged the conversation onto a more pleasant and imminent topic. “I’m going to whip us up some pancakes.”
She obviously was ready to drop the subject, too. “Pancakes sound great. Lots of syrup.”
“Maybe I should bring breakfast back up here.” Leaning in, he brushed his lips over hers. “Including the syrup.”
“That might be awkward.”
“I won’t spill a drop.” His lips lingered on hers. “And if I do—”
“I mean your family will think we’re up to something.”
“Like kissing and stuff? Heaven forbid.”
She grinned. “You remind me of Dex.”
“Your brother?”
“He likes to think he’s funny. And he’s a bit of a charmer, too.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“You should. You two would get along.” She winced and added, “Or maybe not.”
He read between the lines. “Because of the lawsuit against Wynn. That’s not happening now, remember?”
“You’re sure about that?”
“My client said to drop the whole bloody thing, quote, unquote. No one ever needs to know.”
“My family is very well connected, Jacob. My father and brothers have people who keep them informed about all kinds of things, including potential legal threats.”
He got that. And perhaps news of Howcroft’s shelved defamation case against Hunter Enterprises would leak. Hell, the fighter in him almost prayed that it would. Give them something to worry about other than how to spend their billions.
His tone was dry. “Being part of the elite does have its drawbacks, I suppose.”
“Like constantly needing to watch your back.”
He hesitated.
“You’re talking about physical threats now.” The assassination attempts on her father’s life.
“Not fun,” she concluded. “Particularly for the little ones.”
Meaning Teagan’s two much younger siblings.
“What your family is going through on that front... I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. But my beef with your brother was professional, not personal.”
“Somehow I don’t think Wynn would see it that way.”
He shifted up onto an elbow. “And how do you see it, Tea? Do you really think I’m a greedy predator or someone trying to keep the scales of justice aligned? A person simply believing in and doing their job.”
“I think I’d like to see you perform in front of a jury. You’re very persuasive.” Her lips twitched. “But you already know that.”
That was a cue if ever he’d heard one.
He was about to kiss her again, and to hell with dead lawsuits or pancakes, when his phone beeped. He’d check the message later. But the sound shifted Teagan out of her playful mood. Next time they were alone, he’d turn the damn phone off.
She pulled away. “We aren’t going to get sidetracked.”
When she got to her feet, his gaze swept over her naked body and he groaned. “That’s not helping.”
She grabbed a pillow and hid what she could. “Better?”
“It would be better if you came back here.”
When he scrambled to grab her, Teagan trotted off toward the bathroom. The pillow might have covered her front, but her bare behind was in full heart-stopping view. Then the door closed and Jacob let out a breath.
He could really use a distraction about now.
He found his phone. A voice mail was waiting. When he recognized the number, he shut his eyes and growled.
What the hell did Ivy Schluter want? Not that he cared. Especially this weekend. Especially now. He ought to delete the message without listening.
Except he was a cross all the Ts type of guy. He’d listen, then he’d delete.
Only the message wasn’t anything he could have expected. It might as well have been that a meteor had crash landed at his feet. Or a brick wall was falling on his head.
“We need to meet,” the message said. “It’s about us, Jacob. About our child.”
Nine
Jacob scribbled a note for Teagan and left it on the coffee table.
Back soon.
J. XO.
Then he strode out the door knowing exactly where he was headed and whom he needed to see. Not Hux. Yes, his adoptive father would absolutely sit and listen. He always did. Undoubtedly he would offer advice and Jacob knew it would be sound.
But at this stage he only wanted to vent. Get it out. Quite possibly hit something. Ivy leaving a message that referred to “our child” was beyond insane. It had to be the biggest crock ever.
Had to be.
Jacob found Ajax in the stud farm office going over contracts.
“Hey, bro. Your girl ready to pay that new colt a visit?” Ajax put down the papers and sauntered over, a satisfied grin on his face. “She was pretty blown away by it all. I remember the first time I saw a foal come into the world—” Ajax’s brow pinched together. “Man, you look pissed. Did you two have a fight?”
“No fight. And I don’t know what I’m feeling, but anger would have to be up there.”
“You want a coffee?”
“Only if it’s too early for Scotch.”
Ajax was already pouring two cups, setting them up in the sitting area near a set of sliding-glass doors that overlooked the biggest arena. A gray was having trouble settling down—shaking his head, rearing up, hitting back.
“I heard from Ivy this morning.”
Ajax’s eyes rounded. “Did you tell her to have a nice life and leave you the hell alone?”
“It’s more complicated than that.”
Ajax finished swallowing a big mouthful of coffee. “Look, no one wants bad karma. Couples split up. It’s so much better if there’re no hard feelings. No...clinging. But you don’t need to play games with that woman. Do not reply. That breakup was utterly—”
He ended with a nasty expletive with which Jacob wholeheartedly agreed.
The breakup. Jacob remembered it well.
First, Ivy’s Lhasa apso had come down with a fungal complaint, which, she said, would take up every available speck of her time and emotional energy. A couple of weeks after that, she’d sent a CD with the song that had been playing when they’d first met at a fancy charity do. The handcrafted CD cover read “Let’s Press Replay.”
There were three months of “getting better all the time” and then, right before a planned vacation to Sweden’s archipelagos, because that was Ivy’s favorite place in June, she’d sent a friend over to his office to say she was pulling out. When she wouldn’t pick up her phone, he’d gone straight to her apartment. She’d
spoken to him via the intercom. The general gist was, “Why are you bothering me? Goodbye for good.” He’d punched the panel a couple of times before getting himself together. There had been no further contact until now. Until this.
Jacob put his head in his hands and took a few deep breaths. He felt his brother’s hand patting and rubbing his back.
“It’s really shaken you up.”
“Jax, apparently I’m a father.”
His brother frowned and then blinked. When comprehension finally hit, he jolted and slopped coffee all over the place.
“A father? Since when? You guys broke up a freaking year ago.”
“The baby would have to be three or four months old. Or more.”
“How do you feel about it? Other than being livid knowing that she should have told you way sooner than this.”
“I feel... I don’t know. Numb? Surreal?” Jacob cupped his hands around his mouth and breathed in and out. He’d never had a panic attack but now seemed the perfect time to start.
“I can’t believe it, you know. We always used protection. I understand that nothing is one hundred percent safe...”
“Have you stopped to think that it might not be yours?”
“Of course I have. Then I thought, why the hell would anybody do that? Even Ivy.”
Ajax’s shoulders squared. “Straight off the bat, you need to have that checked out, not only for your sake but for the child’s.”
“Absolutely.”
And if he was this baby’s daddy, of course he would step up. If he wasn’t... He’d have dodged a mighty big bullet. He pitied anyone who had to coparent with someone like Ivy Schluter.
But right now...
“How do I tell Teagan?”
Ajax’s grin was lopsided. “You like her a lot.”
“A lot a lot.”
“Hold back. Ivy could be playing another one of her games.” He pulled a face like he’d sucked a rotten grapefruit. “That woman is so superficial. I have no problem with people coming from money, but it grates when they need to let everyone know. I’m pretty sure Ivy’s the type to have her own professional picture hanger and kidnap insurance.” Ajax put his boots up on the end of the table and threaded his fingers behind his head, his favorite thinking posture. “She never asked you to meet her folks, did she? We all met her.”