by Unknown
He snuggled her closer to him. “I want you to stay. Bring your cell phone in here. If she can’t get you at home, won’t she call you?”
Brijette ran her hands over her arms. “Yes, she will.”
“Besides, if she calls and can’t find you, who do you think she’ll call next?”
She elbowed him softly in the ribs. “You’re right. How does it feel to know you’ve got my daughter completely wrapped around your finger?”
Cade pressed his lips against her neck. He’d never before considered what it would be like to have a child or have one love him. Dylan wasn’t his, but he couldn’t imagine loving her any more than he did. “It’s like nothing I’ve ever known before, and I can’t begin to describe it. Though it’s completely mutual because she’s got me totally wrapped around her finger, too. And she knows it.”
Next to him Brijette went still. He combed his fingers through her hair, letting it fan across his shoulder. Whatever happened, he didn’t want to spoil what was between them right now. A thousand more nights wouldn’t be enough for him. Squeezing her tight against him, he decided he’d said enough. Everything else he needed to let her know would have to be done without words. A smile flitted across his lips. He liked that idea better.
BRIJETTE CAST THE FIRST and last vote for herself as the most horrible person in the world. She was cruel and selfish. Worst of all, she realized it and knew that she wasn’t going to do a thing about it. Not tonight. It was time. Time to tell Cade the truth about Dylan. In her mind she could see him stalk angrily across the room. This night would end, and there’d be no more. She couldn’t blame him if he never forgave her when he found out how she’d lied. Maybe right after Dylan was born and even when he first came here, she’d had a plausible excuse, but not now. The only excuse she had was to save herself from the hurt she knew would come. But if she could love Cade a bit longer, maybe he wouldn’t take it so hard, maybe he’d understand why, even after she realized he hadn’t wanted the child aborted, she’d still hesitated to tell him. Of course, they’d have to tell Dylan. The response from her was even too frightening to imagine. She could lose her daughter’s trust forever. She ran her palms on top of Cade’s arms, the hairs tickling her skin. Give her a day or two more of this perfect life—the three of them together, happy—then she’d ruin it. She’d have to.
“I’ll stay,” she whispered, staring at the silvery water of the creek as Cade kissed her shoulder.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“WHERE THE HECK did Cade run off to this afternoon?” Brijette shouted from the exam room where she was putting away supplies. She’d just seen the last patient for the day and she hadn’t seen Cade since midmorning.
Andy poked his head in the door. “He had to go pick his mother up at the airport.”
Brijette’s hand paused midway to the cabinet and she took a deep breath.
“I imagine that’s how he thought you’d feel, which is probably why he didn’t tell you.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Andy thumbed through a chart, shaking his head. “I saw you freeze up at the mention of his mother’s name.”
“I was just wondering why she flew. It’s not that long of a drive.”
Andy ignored her excuse. “Cade told me his mother isn’t very happy that he’s here working with you. Something from the past, he said.” Andy waited for her to fill him in, but she didn’t. If Cade hadn’t enlightened him, she certainly wasn’t going to.
He shrugged when she didn’t answer. “Well, if it makes you feel any better, she hasn’t enjoyed getting the cold shoulder from the Dallas society crowd. She’s much more used to giving it than being on the receiving end.”
“Why’s she been getting the cold shoulder?” Brijette asked, hoping she didn’t appear too interested.
“You can imagine how the country club set acted after the clinic paid off that woman’s family.”
Brijette didn’t have a clue what he was talking about, but she was afraid if she let on he wouldn’t finish and she really wanted to know where this story was going. “You think they’re treating Cade’s mom unfairly?”
“I can talk about them because I grew up in that world. They’re treating her how they’d treat anyone whose son had been in the middle of a scandal. I don’t think it would have mattered if Cade had taken the case to court and proved he wasn’t at fault in the woman’s death, those people still would’ve cut his mother out of their circle. But when Cade and the clinic paid the family off, and the clinic asked Cade to leave, they might as well have hung a guilty sign over his head. I guess the saddest thing is his mother really thought those ladies were her friends. Too bad she had to find out that they don’t know the meaning of the word.”
She pushed past him as Andy rambled on about his parents and their so-called friends and how glad he was to have left all of that behind. Andy could go on for hours, which was probably why he was such a hit with the old men who gathered at Main Street Coffee Shop for breakfast or with the group who played dominoes every morning at Haney’s store. He was so busy talking that he didn’t notice she was rushing to get out the door.
“I’ve got to go now, Andy.”
He nodded. “I’ll lock up when I finish these charts.”
In her car, Brijette turned on the ignition, then sat for a while. What had happened at the clinic in Dallas? Had Cade been responsible for someone’s death, then used his and the clinic’s money to avoid a lawsuit? Had the rich boy bailed himself out of trouble? She didn’t want to believe it, but that’s exactly how it sounded. Had everything been a lie?
The past three days since she’d spent the night with Cade had been better than she could ever have imagined her life being. Even Dylan was ecstatic at the way their relationship had evolved. But why hadn’t he told her about this thing in Dallas?
Slowly her hands tightened on the steering wheel. Why hadn’t she told him Dylan was his daughter? How could she be angry at Cade for not telling her something when she’d been withholding the truth from him? Every day she opened her mouth to do it, and every day she stopped herself, because she didn’t want her happiness to end. She’d gone beyond selfish. Today was the day. She’d go to his house. He could tell her what happened in Dallas and she’d finally tell him about Dylan. It was the right thing to do, and wasn’t that the way she’d been brought up? Hadn’t she been trying to teach her daughter the same lessons?
She shifted the vehicle into Drive and started in the direction of Cade’s house. On the outskirts of town she slowed. Cade had gone to pick up his mother, which meant either he wouldn’t be home or she would be there. Just then her cell phone rang.
“Where are you?”
It was Cade on the other end, with no hello or anything.
“I’m actually on my way to your house if your mother isn’t there.”
“Good. Get over here right now. My mother won’t be around when you get here. I’ve explained to her that this is something you and I need to discuss. And don’t worry about Dylan. I’ve already called Norma and asked her to let Dylan stay late.”
“Okay.” She found herself talking to a dead phone. The woman had found something, she was certain of that. Any thoughts of confronting Cade about what happened in Dallas were gone.
In only a few minutes the phone rang again.
“Well, you’ve really done it this time.” Cade’s mother’s voice was shrill in her ear.
“Mrs. Wheeler, I don’t know what you’ve told Cade, but…”
“I’ve shown Cade, not just told him. But I want you to know that I didn’t tell him about giving you the money for the abortion, which you so obviously didn’t have. If he finds out about that, I promise I will do everything in my power to make sure Cade gets custody of that child.”
“Mrs. Wheeler, I haven’t done anything that would make the courts take my daughter from me.”
“We’ll see. You remember that when you’re talking to Cade.”
B
rijette ended the call. In a matter of minutes, she arrived at Cade’s house. Lights glared from the kitchen window and she wondered how things had gotten so messed up. Lies. That was it, of course, but she’d always felt she had a necessary reason for everything she’d done.
He must have been waiting at the door because her feet had barely touched the ground when Cade appeared on his front porch. She stopped at the bottom of the steps. She didn’t have to hear him say it to know what his mother had found. Only one thing would put that much pure anger and disgust on his face. He knew about Dylan.
She hesitated on the top stair and, without a word, he grabbed her arm and dragged her inside. They’d made it no farther than the entry hall when he slammed a piece of paper onto the antique library table. The silver candlesticks and floral arrangement decorating the table rocked.
“What the hell is this?”
She fingered the edge of the document. “It’s Dylan’s birth certificate.” As much as she wanted to look at him she couldn’t bring herself to do it, so she stared at the smudged evidence under his hand. “How did you get it?”
“My mother got it and I don’t want to guess how. She knew someone in the right place, I’m sure! I’m just wondering if you want to explain this date. It’s not exactly the time frame you led me to believe that first night I asked you about Dylan.”
She let her hand drop. “No, it’s not. I had a fake birth certificate made up when Dylan was born.”
His fingers dug into her arm. “Why would you do that?”
“Because I didn’t want you and your family to one day decide you wanted her.”
“Like I had a choice to not want her in the first place? How could you not tell me you were pregnant with my child? I don’t for one minute believe that it’s anyone else’s.”
Her hair fell in her face as she bent her head. “She’s yours, but you don’t know the whole story. Your mother doesn’t want me to tell you this, and I’m sure she’s going to make more trouble for me when she finds out I did, but you need to know.”
His hold on her arm relaxed a bit and he shoved the birth certificate to the center of the table. “So tell me the story, not that I think it will make a difference.”
“When I got caught with the drugs in my backpack, I’d just found out I was pregnant. I didn’t know how to tell you, but I was going to. Then you left as soon as I got into trouble, and never said a word, but your mother came to see me.”
“Because you had your lawyer call her.”
She finally lifted her head. “That’s not true, Cade, and you can go ask the man himself if you like. He’s retired but he still lives here. She came on her own and offered me money to never see you again and to tell you I didn’t care for you anymore if you tried to contact me. But I told her I couldn’t, that I was going to have your baby. So she left, but the next day she came again.” Brijette stopped to get her breath and shove her hair away from her face. Angry lights still danced in Cade’s eyes.
“This time she said she had talked to you and that you had decided you couldn’t raise a child, not while trying to go to medical school, so you thought I should get an abortion. I didn’t want to believe her, but she was your mother. Then once you came back here, I began to see I had been right to doubt her. I know now she lied to both of us.”
His hand dropped from her arm. “What? That’s absurd. You’re lying. My mother never did that.”
“She may deny it, but you can go ask my lawyer. He knew what was happening. Your mother offered me much more money to have the abortion and stay away from you.”
“How could you have agreed? How could you ever think I would say something like that? Hell, I loved you, Brijette.”
She pressed the heel of her hand against her forehead. “What was I supposed to think, Cade? I was seventeen and locked up. You left town before I had the chance to see you. You never tried to contact me, then your mother came saying all this. Why would I have thought she was lying?”
“I didn’t contact you because you’d asked my mother for a payoff to disappear from my life. It sounded to me like you were using our relationship, hell, using me, for money. You weren’t someone I wanted to see again. Now you expect me to believe my mother made all that up? That you never asked for money? That she gave you money to abort a child when I didn’t even know you were pregnant?”
“She did, Cade.”
He spun away from her. “But you didn’t have the abortion.”
“Of course not, and I never intended to. My lawyer didn’t tell me not to have the abortion but he made it pretty clear that if you and your mother were willing to do such a thing, then I shouldn’t care if I didn’t totally fulfill my end of the bargain, unless it was what I wanted. And it wasn’t. Later, my aunt helped me find someone to make the fake birth certificate.”
“So, from the beginning you thought I didn’t want Dylan, that I wanted you to have an abortion.”
Brijette struggled with the lump in her throat. “Until after you arrived and were angry at me for taking money to end our relationship, but never once mentioned telling me to get an abortion.”
He faced her again, and this time the anger had dissipated, but this was worse because his hurt was evident and she had caused it. “But after everything…the last few weeks, you still didn’t tell me.”
She reached to take his hand but he avoided her. “I wanted to. I was going to, but I knew you’d be angry and I hated for things to change. Dylan…” She put her hands to her throat. “How will I ever tell her? I just didn’t have the words for either of you.”
He stiffened. “Well, you’d better start thinking of some. I can’t believe you didn’t call me, even after you’d had the baby, to see if I still felt the same.”
“I was afraid you and your mother would change your minds once I’d had her and you’d try to take her away from me. You had money to swing the system in your favor.”
“Damn it, Brijette, this isn’t about having money. This is about you not trusting me enough, believing in me enough, to tell me I had a child. You sold your daughter into a single-parent family because of your own petty beliefs. My family has money—therefore I’m evil. You don’t have money, so to my mother you’re a gold digger and thus evil, also. You and my mother both make me sick.”
He picked up the phone on the end table in the living room and punched in some numbers. “Uncle Arthur, it’s Cade.” He was quiet while his uncle talked. “That’s right. But I need a favor. I want my mother to stay with you for the rest of her visit. She’s not welcome in my house right now and I’m sure she knows why. She can come get her things in a bit. I’ll be at Brijette’s.” He was quiet a moment longer then said goodbye.
“What are you doing?”
He picked up his keys. “You’re going home to get your speech together. I’m going to get Dylan. We’ll be at your house in ten minutes.”
Panic clogged every nerve in her body. Panic and fear. “God no, Cade. Give me a day or two. Let me figure out what to say so I can break it to her slowly.”
He stopped in front of her, his feet spread and his fist tight around his keys. “I’ve missed out on being her father for nearly ten years. I’m putting a stop to that now.”
“She’ll hate me.”
“You should’ve thought about that while you were spinning all these lies.” He brushed past her and out the door.
Brijette ran to her car. She had no idea what words to say. She only knew that in the end it wouldn’t matter. Dylan would be hurt, confused and most of all, angry. Her relationship with her daughter was about to change forever, and she wasn’t prepared for it.
CADE COULD TELL Dylan knew something was up the instant she got into his truck.
“Where’s my mom?” she asked while fastening her seat belt.
“She’s at your house. We’re on our way there.”
She had no more questions, which told him how worried she was. Normally, Dylan would have pounded him with fifteen questions before
they got out of Norma’s drive. But tonight she stared through the window wordlessly. He hated to upset her life, but she needed a father. Hadn’t she been doing everything she could to get him and her mother together? But he wouldn’t marry Brijette, he might not even stay in Cypress Landing anymore. How many people knew the truth? How many people in this little town had been lying to him about his own daughter? He sucked his breath in between his teeth. Of course, Uncle Arthur knew. Damn them. He’d take his daughter and leave. At least he could tell when his country-club bunch was lying. Here, everyone acted oh-so nice just as long as it suited them.
He stopped the car in front of Brijette’s house. She was standing in the doorway, but Dylan didn’t move right away.
“Something bad is happening, isn’t it?”
He reached over and smoothed his daughter’s blond hair. “In a way it will be bad, but it’s good, too.”
She sat for a few seconds longer before pushing open the car door.
In the living room, Dylan took a seat on the couch and he sat beside her. Brijette perched on the small coffee table facing both of them.
Cade rubbed his hand up and down Dylan’s thin spine. “Your mother has something to tell you.” The girl’s eyes glistened with tears already, and he felt awful. “It’s going to be all right, I promise.”
She nodded and turned to her mother. He kept his hand on her, wanting to hold her, to help her. She was about to find out he was her father, and it would be painful. It wasn’t exactly how he’d dreamed of becoming a parent.
“I HATE YOU! You lied to me my whole life!” Dylan jumped up and scurried behind the couch. She couldn’t be close to her mother. She didn’t even know who that woman was. The mother she’d always known would never have made up stories about her father. She’d have told her the truth. She’d grown up wondering why she didn’t have a dad and Cade had been there all along, in another city, not knowing she was his little girl. Her mother was mean. She’d tried to keep her away from her father.