Honest Betrayal

by Girard, Dara

  “Enlighten me,” Hunter said without interest.

  “Your notebook is an attempt to rationalize a very basic reality. In other words, you want to sleep with her.”

  Hunter stared at him stunned then clapped his hands together. “Perfect.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “If I’m able to convince you of this, then I’ll have no problem activating my plan to introduce her as my fiancée.”

  Miles frowned, shaking his head. “No, I think this is the real thing. Infatuation at its most destructive.”

  He rubbed his chin. “I wonder if Ruby will be as easily fooled.”

  “Mothers aren’t easily fooled and neither am I. Hunter, you like her.”

  Hunter shrugged, finding no reason to deny it. He hadn’t felt this good in years. “I admit that I find her attractive, fascinating.”

  “The last thing you found fascinating was a gastroscope. She must be some woman. Be careful my friend, many a stronger man has fallen victim to the disease.”

  “What disease?”

  “It starts out as infatuation then turns into lust then if you’re not careful you’ll become infected with it.”

  “What?”

  “Commitment. It’s something women call love. It has the same affect. A state when all rational thought disappears. You’ll sleep with her and it won’t be enough.”

  Hunter ignored him. He routinely blocked out information he deemed illogical. He opened his notebook and tore out the page, staring at it a moment. Yes, she definitely fit all his qualifications. Now he’d have to convince her that he fit hers.

  “Code red,” Miles warned in a loud whisper. “Here comes the golden boy.”

  The golden boy, Daron Randolph, sauntered into the room dressed in gray trousers and a tan shirt. He held a manila folder tucked under his arm. He flashed a grin as welcoming as a shark’s. “Hello, ladies.”

  Hunter crumbled the paper in his fist, glaring at his cousin and nemesis. They both wanted the Director position for Marketing and R&D that would be announced after the banquet. Daron seemed to be the first choice since he met all of the company’s requirements. He’d married well, risen quickly in his division and possessed all the external qualities of good leadership. He was physically striking, polished and ruthless.

  Daron shook his head as he stood between the two desks. “It’s unfortunate you won’t be able to attend the banquet, Hunter, but I realize public humiliations are not your forte.”

  “I’ll be attending,” Hunter said in a quiet tone.

  “Without a fiancée to present? You are bold.”

  “My fiancée will be with me.”

  “No, she won’t. Janice is marrying Michael Peterson. Someone she met through some dating service. Hadn’t you heard? I was sure you’d received an invitation.”

  Hunter’s tone hardened. “Since Janice is to be married, obviously it’s not her. I thought you would have made that simple deduction yourself.”

  “It won’t work, you know.”

  Hunter tossed the crumpled paper in the trash bin.

  Daron leaned on the desk looking down at him. “I know you. You’ll plan something, but it won’t work. Producing a fiancée conveniently for one night is so cliché, it’s ridiculous. Do you honestly think we won’t see through the smoke screen when things don’t work out in a couple of days? Face it, your little two-year plan failed. Concede. You’re second best.” He shrugged. “But that’s nothing new. You’ve always been one step behind me.”

  Hunter rubbed his hands together, his gaze never wavering. “No. Not always.”

  Daron straightened, his voice turning to ice. “I have a wife and child now. Uncle Curtis has invited us to the ranch and will hold a party to celebrate my ten year wedding anniversary.” He grabbed the folder from under his arm and flipped through its contents. “He may be your father.” He lifted his eyes. “But everyone knows who’s his favorite.”

  Hunter tapped his fingers against the desk, bored.

  Daron tossed the folder on the table. “Sales are up thanks to my introduction of the Wells walker. Don’t worry. When I’m promoted, I’ll let you move into my old office. You two look a little cramped in here.”

  Miles spoke up. “I wouldn’t be so sure about your promotion. Hunter’s record is as impressive as yours, plus he developed the Trandor cane.”

  “And what do you call something that nobody ever uses?” Daron stopped, his eyes darting between them. “Oh, that’s right. Useless. Nearly a year later and the thing still hasn’t sold.”

  “And I’ve met his fiancée,” Miles added.

  Daron paused. “What’s her name?”

  “Brenna Garrett.”

  “How long have you known her?”

  “A few months.”

  He began to smile certain he’d catch them in a lie. “What does she look like?”

  Miles glanced up at the ceiling as though lost in thought. “Very attractive. When I met her she had on a blue power suit that complimented her light, brown hair and eyes. You’ll agree when you meet her.”

  “That’s a little too vague. Tell me something specific.”

  Miles glanced at Hunter. “She’s the one who fixed Janice up with Michael. She took one look at Hunter and wanted him for herself.”

  Daron stood momentarily speechless. “I don’t believe you.”

  “You don’t have to believe me, but do you think I’m clever enough to make up a story like that?”

  “I think you’re clever enough to make it up. So the real question becomes is Hunter clever enough to pull it off?”

  Miles nodded. “True. We’ll see. Fortunately, your mouth is big enough for you foot.”

  “I will be looking forward to meeting her.”

  “We’ll make sure she gets her rabies shots first.”

  Daron snatched his folder and left.

  Miles swayed back and forth in his chair. “He’d be quite likable if he didn’t have the habit of being a jackass.”

  Hunter shut the door. “We wouldn’t recognize him otherwise.”

  “Well, my friend. I’ve set the stage. Brenna Garrett is your fiancée. Now you have to convince her.”

  Hunter sat on the desk and grabbed a paperweight. “You shouldn’t have added the last part.”

  “Sounded more dramatic, plus it’s partially true. The more unusual, but credible something sounds, the more people will suspend disbelief.”

  “He didn’t believe you.”

  “Giving you more reason to prove him wrong.”

  Hunter tossed the paperweight up in the air. “Thanks for your help, anyway.”

  Miles suddenly frowned. “I hope you say the same thing if this scheme blows up in our faces.”

  He set the paperweight down. “It won’t.”

  “How do you know?”

  “How else would I know?” A devilish look entered his eyes. “I have a plan.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  Brenna groaned at the sight of bright lights coming from her second story apartment window. She lived alone, it should have been dark. She leaned against her cane then headed inside.

  “Your mother is here,” her neighbor and friend Tima Rees said as Brenna checked her mailbox.

  Brenna looked at the tall, stately woman with dismay. “Yes, I know.”

  Tima put her mail in the large purple handbag she carried. It matched the scarf around her short curly hair. “Would you like to stop by my place before heading to yours?” She closed her box and headed for the stairs. “I doubt she saw your car.”

  “No, I might as well get it over with,” Brenna said following her.

  “Whatever she’s cooking smells good.”

  “Would you like to come over?”

  Tima grasped her chest in mock horror. “And interrupt a mother-daughter argument, I mean, moment? I wouldn’t dare.”

  Brenna laughed. “I wouldn’t mind.”

  “Maybe next time,” she said then disappeared into her apart
ment.

  When Brenna opened the door, the sound of a gun battle from a police show boomed from the TV. She lowered the volume. “Hi, Mom.”

  Diane Garrett poked her head out of the kitchen where rich smells of a tomato based stew permeated the air with spices.

  “Oh, you’re here.”

  “Yes, this is where I live,” she muttered as her mother disappeared into the kitchen. Brenna raised her fists to the ceiling in a silent plea of mercy from her mother’s meddling. She quickly hid the action when Diane came out of the kitchen with a pitcher of freshly squeezed lemonade. She set it on the table.

  Brenna saw herself twenty some years from now, still round with wisps of gray hair and fine laugh lines. Unfortunately, she hadn’t inherited her mother’s beguiling smile. It made you forgive her anything. She could torch your house, demolish your car then flash a smile that would make you forgive her. She flashed one now. “It’s so good to see you.”

  Brenna’s grin was more forced. “Yes.” She set her briefcase down as her mother returned to the kitchen. The phone rang. She waited a moment then picked it up. “Hello?”

  “Hi,” her brother Stephen said. “I just wanted to warn you that Mom’s thinking of stopping by.”

  “Too late.”

  His voice rose in surprise. “She’s already there?”

  “Yes.”

  “That woman moves at the speed of light.”

  “Or you’re just too slow.”

  “At least I tried.”

  Brenna drummed her fingers on the couch. “You could have called me at work. You always wait until the last minute. No wonder I was born before you.”

  “Did she cook something?”

  “Doesn’t she always?” She rested her elbow on the couch. “Do you want to stop by?”

  He hesitated. “What face is she wearing?”

  “Her ‘I’m here because I care’ face.”

  “Hmm. I think I’ll pass.”

  “Coward.”

  He laughed and hung up.

  When her mother came out of the kitchen again, Brenna said, “Now how do I ask this delicately?”

  “You’ve never been delicate. Always blunt and straight to the point. That’s probably why—”

  “I don’t have a boyfriend.” Brenna sighed, finishing the familiar phrase. “I suggest that every couple of months you change that statement.”

  Diane untied her apron. “What do you want to know?”

  She kissed her mother on the cheek to soften her words then whispered, “What are you doing here?”

  “Visiting you of course. I have a key.”

  “I know that. I didn’t envision you picking the locks.” She tossed her mail on the table.

  “You’re limping.”

  Brenna headed for the kitchen, raising her eyes instead of her fists to the ceiling. “I always limp, Mom. I have a bad leg.”

  “Yes, but some days you limp more than others. How can you expect to get a man when you look like a ...”

  Brenna stopped and began to smile. “Like a what? A broken horse, a maimed giraffe? A cripple? Don’t leave me hanging.”

  Diane waved the comment away. “You know. Have you been doing your exercises?”

  “Every day. Why do you think I live on the second floor? I’m forced to climb stairs.” She rested a hand on her hip. “So why are you here?”

  “You already asked me that.”

  Brenna grabbed a plate. “Yes, and if I ask enough times you might tell me the truth.”

  “Fine. Today I went to the grocery store and met a man in produce—”

  Brenna held the plate to her chest like a shield. Horror crawled up her skin. “Tell me you didn’t give him my number.” The look on her face said everything. “Oh Mom!”

  “Your grandparents are coming for your cousin Trina’s wedding next month. She’s three years younger than you.”

  “That’s because she was born later.”

  Diane didn’t smile. “Do you know how hard it is for me to say you’re still unmarried? That you’re still unattached? You’re thirty. There’s no reason why you should still be single. My generation, the women of the 70’s, made it easy for you. You can meet men on the same playing ground.”

  “Field,” she corrected.

  “You don't have to perform all the schemes we had to. You don’t have to wait for a man to come to you. You need to be more proactive. Instead you spend your time fixing other people’s lives.”

  Brenna briefly thought of the handsome bully who had interrupted her lunch break. “And in some cases ruining them,” she muttered.

  “And not your own,” Diane finished.

  Brenna ladled some stew into a deep bowl. “If it ain’t broke...”

  Her mother rested a hand on her shoulder. “I worry about you. Ever since—”

  Brenna sat at the dinning table and shook her head. “Don’t mention his name. I warned you that your tongue might shrivel up one day.”

  “He was a wonderful man. He cared about you.”

  Yes, he did. Her mind whispered his name, although her heart wanted to forget it. Byron Suncliff. Her true love. Her first everything. Byron was a considerate and kind man. Hunter’s complete opposite. He’d always been attentive to her needs, easy going, generous.

  Yes, he was a wonderful man. He didn’t exactly love her, but he was devoted. Nevertheless, she hated his pity. No matter how he looked at her she always saw that emotion in his gaze. He imagined her as a damsel in distress that he could rescue, but she didn’t need rescuing; she’d lived with her deformed leg all her life. She’d endured ridicule in elementary school through high school and had attended parties where she stood by the wall all night because no one would ask her to dance.

  She had survived with a sense of humor and confidence that should be applauded not pitied. But his pity was such a tiny flaw for an almost perfect man that she forgave him. He had rescued her from a life buried in books and music. She’d met him in the college library her junior year. A man as beautiful and romantic as the poet with the clubbed foot whose name he shared. She didn’t remember what he said or what he did just that he’d spoken to her when no one else would. She’d looked straight into his eyes and thought she’d found her soul mate. They’d talked about a number of subjects and soon became inseparable.

  “I don’t know what went wrong,” Diane said.

  “We just grew apart.”

  “I still don’t understand.”

  Brenna would never explain it to her. It was a private pain she couldn’t share with her mother, although she remembered it clearly. Remembered how startled he’d looked as they sat in the dining room of his condo. “You want to marry me?”

  She bit her lip. “Yes.”

  His gaze slid away. She wasn’t worried about the hesitant expression. If he needed time to think she’d give him plenty. She’d wait for him as long as he needed.

  “Brenna, I’d love to really—”

  She gripped his hand. “Then there’s no reason to worry. Just say yes.”

  “But I want to have kids.”

  She sighed relieved that he wanted the same thing. “Don’t worry, so do I.”

  He met her eyes. “It’s genetic though, isn’t it?”

  Her smiled dimmed. “What are you talking about?”

  “Your leg. It was a birth defect, right? A gene passed down from your father. So you could pass it to your child.”

  She swallowed as she tasted the bitter crumbs of rejection. She finally understood the point he was trying to make. She didn’t want to hear it. She wanted to pretend that it wasn’t a problem. But she could tell by his look that he considered it a big problem. “There’s only a small possibility.”

  “Of course we could adopt, but I’d really like to have a kid of my own.”

  She lowered her gaze, trying to keep her voice steady although she knew she was losing him. “My brother was born okay.”

  “And you weren’t. I don’t want to take that ris
k. And I don’t think you should either. It isn’t fair to bring a child into this world with a mark already against it.”

  “So only perfect babies should be born?” She fought not to sound angry although inside her heart both broke and burned. “Was I a mistake?”

  His voice was patient, indulgent as though he were trying to calm a child. “No, your parents decided to take a chance.”

  She lowered her voice and stared at the ring she’d bought for him. One that held all her dreams. “So you’re ashamed of everything that I am?”

  He came around the table and rested his hands on her shoulders. “I’ve always been honest with you and you with yourself. Your life hasn’t been easy because of how you were born. I don’t think it’s fair to bring a deformed child into this world.”

  Deformed. It was the first time he’d used that word with her. The first time a hint of disdain tinged his tone. She didn’t blame him, she’d always admired his honesty even though at that moment his words crushed her.

  She wished he’d see beyond that. Didn’t he see that she was still very much a woman? Didn’t he know that her leg was only a part of her existence? That she had worked her entire life not to be the disappointment her father had expected? That in one day he’d shattered her with his honesty? That he’d made her feel foolish?

  “I have the same needs and desires as any other woman.” Her words sounded feeble, selfish. She knew he couldn’t understand the choice he was taking away from her.

  He kissed her cheek and gave her shoulders a squeeze. “Of course you do, but you’re not like other women and the reality is no man is going to want to take the risk that his heir will be deformed. I care about you.” He held her close but inside she felt hollow. “But I can’t marry you.”

  They managed to part as friends and he went on to become a top criminal lawyer. From that day, Brenna promised herself never to be that vulnerable or foolish again. She was resigned to her decision and had no regrets. She’d buried herself in her work and made it very successful. She found no need for a man’s company.

  Brenna sighed, pushing the memory away. “It just wasn’t the right match.”

  Diane looked sad. “You’re not in the position to be picky.”