"You saw that?" Vicki's eyes watered fully now, but she saw through her soaked eyelashes. "I'm so grateful. Ever since that day, I've never been whole."
"Neither of you better think, for one second, my brother would steal Vicki's baby from her. That's insane," Alice added fast, and crossed her arms. "Colt is one of the best men I know, and I'm not saying that because he's my brother. He's moral and fair and awesome."
Vicki blushed. She shook her head, then wrung the edge of her blouse. Her heart still raced. "No. Dad would have, not Colt. The House of Morgan must always stand, or something like that. I was so stupid."
Vicki's spine was rigid, and she squirmed in her seat.
Alice sighed. "I don't understand. If you think that, why would you have not told my brother he was going to be a father? Just because you're the heirs of a fortune doesn't mean your family controls you."
"Our father controlled everything." John turned to her and placed his hand on her knee. "You say that because your parents love you, unconditionally. We never had that."
Alice shook her head, but said nothing else.
Vicki held her head in her hands and stared at the ground. Her stomach flipped like she was still the teenager whose father thought her the worst daughter. She'd not get sick. "I was eighteen and knocked up by a man with ties to government agencies that might threaten my father's business empire."
"We own a farm, though Dad had been in the service and my brother joined the Marines," Alice said. "Was your father selling to both sides of any war?"
"Probably, but the ties you have, it was enough."
"Look, you're my best friend, but Colt's my brother. I'm trying to understand. Let me put the dots together. Your brother Peter is still dating the horrible Jennifer, though he's been kind to all of us lately. John came to town on a mission to destroy your father, which is how we fell in love, and I know you faked your death, Vicki. I can believe all of this, but my mind is still trying to grasp what you said about Colt. He'd have protected you just as he watched out for Clara. Why didn't you go to him?"
"I couldn't. I stupidly wanted to be a good daughter, and then it was too late."
Alice smacked her lips, but said nothing.
"Colt was the perfect guy that I was forbidden to date." Vicki rubbed the back of her neck and hoped the heat vanished. "He was off limits because he was a Collins, but my heart told me he was so different than everyone else."
John added, "Alice thought I was a spoiled, rich brat, and until recently hated my guts."
"I didn't hate you. I just didn't like you." Alice smiled, and Vicki watched the engaged couple tighten their handholding. "Then you stole my heart."
Part of Vicki's heart soared. Love was supposed to be happy, like with these two. Her life was complicated.
She gave a closed-lip smile, then Vicki told them, "I found out as I packed my bags for college of my pregnancy, and Colt shipped out the next day for basic. He had his life planned to leave Miami for a while and never come back. I had my life planned with music that helped keep my sanity in my father's world. We were going our separate ways. So I thought my life changed with a baby. Then my dad promised to support me, and he's all I ever knew."
Alice narrowed her eyes. "Colt's had Clara since the day she was born. I didn't know you were the mother. He never said anything to me, and I never guessed you'd have had sex with him."
"The girl has my hair," Vicki argued fast, though she regretted the words.
"Lots of women are blondes. I didn't know you even liked Colt." Alice stood and twirled like she would go to the kitchen. Then she stopped and gazed at Vicki. "You're going to have to talk to him, but he had that look of a bear out to protect his baby just now."
"Where does he live?" Vicki asked. She had to pull herself together. She had to talk to Colt and make him understand. "I've not seen him since we came home from that summer trip to Europe."
Alice stood, walked over, and opened the refrigerator, and refused to stare at Vicki. Vicki gazed at her friend as she pulled out vegetables to chop. Alice found a large knife and went to the counter to dice. Finally Vicki followed and stood next to her. Alice wiped her face dry, shook her head, and finished. "He's staying at our family's ranch now, and our parents live in Palm Beach, near the beach, as a sort of retirement."
To see Clara, she'd face Colt. "So he's alone with Clara?"
Alice chopped the celery. "Until his new fiancée, Belle, gets out of the service and joins him here. She's never been to Florida, but the wedding is in two months. They planned to move north to the bigger ranch and tend to the planting up there, but now I don't know. I can call my dad, but I'd guess Colt's seen enough war. He wants to stick to his farm and not come off it."
Vicki closed her eyes and, despite having to face down Colt, fought back a fit of hysterical laughter. Her baby had lived. She'd been a fool, but she had a second chance. Motherhood meant she was necessary. She had risked her neck, but now giddiness rose in her. For the first time, it was enough. "I'll head there, then. My daughter will need her mother."
CHAPTER TWO
Colt rubbed his temples and closed his daughter's bedroom door. His heartbeat stayed fast and unsure. Tonight had been bad. He reopened the door to check on her one more time. His daughter was stubborn. Clara had cried herself to sleep because he'd not admitted Victoria Morgan was her mother. Now she slept like an angel, but a cold fury rose in his brain.
Vicki had acted surprised, but that was impossible. Women didn't forget that they bore a child. She'd left town.
The house was quiet now, and allowed him to think.
Colt turned on his feet, headed to the kitchen, held his head high, and went to get a beer out of the fridge. The second he popped it open and heard the fizzing sound, his nostrils flared. Even a small pleasure wasn't enough to block out Vicki's baby-blue eyes today. He closed the fridge, sat on his couch, and took a sip.
The cold brew calmed him for a second. But how dare Vicki just show up?
He should have known she would. Even reptile mothers raised their children to a point. She'd abandoned her daughter and hadn't told him about anything. He rubbed his eyes.
Of course, Victoria Morgan must have changed her mind and returned for their daughter, unannounced. Was that why she'd come back to life? The Morgans were notorious for lying, cheating, or stealing to get what they wanted. She must have learned that from her father, but she was years too late. Colt had raised his daughter the best he could, and no one would take her from him.
His skin prickled. It was one thing for her to lie, and use him, but she'd not do it to their baby girl. His job was to protect Clara.
Clara deserved better.
With his feet up on his coffee table, he settled deeper in on his couch, but the beer didn't slow his heartbeat. A cold unease pricked at his skin and left him itchy to go somewhere or hit something. But he couldn't.
He was stuck.
Finally, Colt picked up the phone and called his sister. Had she been a party to that ambush? He hadn't wanted to think so, but her last name was about to be Morgan too.
Had the family's influence dragged his sister down too?
On the second ring, Alice answered. "Colt. Thank goodness you called. I had no idea Vicki was Clara's mother. Why didn't you tell me?"
His sister had been Vicki's groupie in school and did whatever Vicki decided she'd do. Alice grew up, but he saw how she'd been then. He coughed. "I had just joined the Marines. You didn't wonder how I suddenly had a baby girl?"
"I thought the mother was someone in the Marines."
"That wouldn't have been allowed," Colt said. "And basic lasts six weeks, not nine months."
"You never said a word. If it was Vicki, you should have stayed home and kept Clara safe."
"I kept her safe." Another lie from her lips? Despite the headache, Colt couldn't believe that. Alice had never once betrayed him, and she was always a good sister. His voice held his spite, despite his love for her. "Men don't quit.
I worked out a deal that made our parents happy. And Clara is fine. What's not fine is what happened today."
Alice repeated herself: "I didn't know."
He closed his eyes and held the bottle to his head. He believed his sister, but all he could do was repeat himself. Vicki had to have known. "She told you to jump in school and you only asked how high. I have to ask this. Did you set me up?"
"No. I'd never do that to you."
His blood pressure calmed down a little. He trusted her.
His voice still had its edge as he asked her, "How did she show up at your place unannounced, then, asking for Clara? Have you turned into a Morgan that fast?"
"I'm not a Morgan until after the wedding and our baby is born."
A sigh escaped his lips, but he said nothing.
His sister's voice wavered. "John texted her."
His heartbeat raced again and he shook his head. Men didn't involve themselves in the affairs of others. The vein in Colt's neck thumped and the heat of the phone burned through him. Coldness swept through him as he told Alice, "Okay, I'm going to kill your husband-to-be."
"Please don't. John should have talked to me first. Vicki's his sister, and the Morgan family wasn't very loving to their children. At least you and I had family, but they had no one."
She'd abandoned their daughter. "Not an excuse, Alice."
"John said the past few years Vicki had been haunted by something. The moment he saw Clara, John did the math. He saw what I clearly missed. So let's get back to my question. Is she Clara's mother?"
He closed his eyes and sipped his beer to let the cold drink calm him down. Then he answered, "Yeah, I didn't sleep around knocking up every woman I met."
Alice breathed deeply and Colt sat straighter the second his sister said, "Colt, she didn't know. She thought her baby died."
"Morgans are all liars. She gave birth, so she was in the room the day Clara was born."
He pursed his lips. His sister had jumped ship already and defended the perfect Victoria Morgan. In high school, Alice had tried to be exactly like Victoria. And the beautiful blonde had adopted Alice into her little group, like she was a pet, despite their families' history of avoiding each other.
"You're being stubborn, Colt."
"The Collins of Miami all serve their country and do the right thing. The Morgans are unsavory."
"Mitch Morgan was horrible. He lied to his daughter, but his sins don't make his children guilty."
"Stop." Colt had stayed out of everything until that summer trip to Paris. He figured one day Alice would grow out of her Morgan infatuation. "You're about to marry one, but I never will."
"No, you're marrying this Belle, who you never once brought home to meet me or our parents."
"Belle's very busy in Washington, D.C. She has a job." Colt's mind stayed on Vicki and how her lips had once tasted like rose petals.
"It's still strange you intend to marry someone who's never come to Miami."
His head couldn't remember Belle at the moment. His mind shouted instead that Vicki had signed away all rights on adoption papers. He had the papers in his office. "Vicki was dead."
"On that she lied. I thought we were talking about Belle now."
He blinked and almost dropped his beer to the ground. He caught the glass and told his sister, "Or, like she always did, she lied to get you to believe whatever she wanted you to think."
"Vicki's under your skin." Alice's voice had a tsk sound in it. "She's not evil. She is not her father."
"And you're marrying one of the heirs to the house."
"John likes the word family. Peter, Vicki's brother, has taken the throne. You might like John or even Peter now."
With a roll of his eyes, memories he'd long ago buried rushed back. "Peter was a rebel without a cause. He always got whatever he wanted and never had to do one ounce of hard work in class."
"His father told him at age ten that he'd be thrown out of the family if he didn't earn a million dollars on the stock market by his next birthday." Alice sighed. "Our parents were nothing like that. Vicki disappeared. Give her a second chance."
All clues on why he should never get involved with self-absorbed socialites. "Victoria Morgan was always the princess. And I called her that to her face. She came home weeks ago, but I'd bet five dollars she never mentioned our baby to you."
"You were off with the Marines." Alice added, "Vicki helped me with John, and she's a sweetheart, Colt. She's the maid of honor at my wedding."
"Figures." Colt held his phone firmly and said, "Victoria always told you exactly what to do."
"Stop, Colt."
He laughed, but the bitterness in his throat scratched a bit. "Rich, spoiled brats, and Vicki proved it the day she tossed her child away because motherhood interfered with college parties."
Alice said, "Colt, you're repeating yourself because you're stuck. It's possible you were both victims in this."
"That shouldn't matter. Clara is all that matters."
"She should know her mom."
"Clara deserves parents who will raise her, and take care of her, like I've done since the day she was born." His shoulders dropped. Yelling at his sister wouldn't solve anything. "It's my job to protect my baby."
"You're doing a great job."
His muscles tensed despite the compliment. "Clara is all that matters."
His sister released a loud sigh then told him, "And you've always done right by her."
He rubbed his temples and closed his eyes while he told her the truth: "Alice, I never wanted to see her again."
"Not everything is black and white. This isn't war. You're all my family now, through Clara, through me."
His sister had a point. Fighting Vicki meant he'd need a battle plan to protect Clara. The Morgans were like gods, and they always got what they wanted. Alice must have guessed she'd scored a point with him, because she ran the next few sentences together in one breath. "Call me in the morning. I'm going to talk you into talking with her. Tonight, I listened to Vicki, and I believe her. The villain was her father. He signed both your names on those adoption papers."
He sucked in his breath. Vicki had to be involved in this too. She had been in the hospital and given birth. He shook his head. "It took me over a year to prove my name had been forged."
"I remember you talking to our dad, and bits and pieces of those whispered conversations make sense now. You all hushed up when I walked into the room." She added fast, "And if yours was a fake, hers could have been too."
"I knew you'd defend your friend. It's why I never wanted to talk about Victoria with you." He rolled his eyes. "Vicki's a good liar."
"Stop."
Colt held his breath and waited for the rest. Alice, like everyone else in his family, never took no for an answer.
She continued, "Please, you're angry right now. Tonight, just think about this."
She hadn't yelled. He told his sister, "Good night."
"Night." It sounded like she had more to say, but held it back.
Colt sipped his beer and hung up. The story was full of holes, and he'd prove it. Silence greeted his ears, yet he had too much energy coursing through him right now.
Heat flushed his body, and he stared at his phone. Belle's number was in his favorites. Perhaps he needed to have an adult conversation. He scrolled to his fiancée's number, but didn't hit the button to call her. Belle Jordan deserved his full attention, and he shouldn't stir up his anger. Belle never pushed him off a ledge. He clicked on her name to stare at her picture. Belle was probably busy. She was always on the go.
He scrolled through all his contacts. His neck heated. Belle had always respected his parental rights to call all the shots with Clara. The dark-haired woman he'd agreed to marry always agreed with him. He should call her. His mother's number passed through his scrolling. His parents had a big part in raising Clara whenever he couldn't, but they might be sleeping.
Without a thought either way, he scrolled down to Victoria M
organ's name. He kept all his contacts still, and her old number was there. Had Vicki changed her number? This one was from college. Their daughter was about to start first grade now. He rubbed the back of his neck and stared at her number. Without thinking, he hit "call" and the phone rang.
He assumed he'd talk to a stranger, but she answered two rings later, "Hello?"
One more reason he'd not trust her. If he had her number still, then she shouldn't have the high pitch of shock in her voice. One phone call would have changed his life. He hadn't changed his number. "Vicki. Had you lost my number?"
With a heavy sigh that sounded sad, she answered, "Colt. No, I knew it was you."
Then she could have called him years ago. "Why didn't you call?"
"I didn't know you'd answer."
He stood up and threw his beer bottle in the trash, then cracked his knuckles. "What did you plan to accomplish with that stunt you pulled today?"
"I'm sorry. Colt, I had no idea she was alive. My father—"
"Don't..." The sweat on his forehead grew, and he picked up another beer bottle, not that liquor helped. "Save the sob story for someone else. Clara's not a ball to win in a game. She's my baby girl, and I won't let anyone hurt her."
"Please, Colt." Her voice shook. "She's my baby too."
His nose was itchy. "You gave up all rights to her. I have the paperwork."
"That's not what happened." Vicki's voice had a singsong edge to it that burned his ears. "You left home and slept with Belle the first week of basic training."
"That's nonsense, and not an excuse for what happened."
"I couldn't live under my father's house, but if I knew you had Clara, I'd have come straight to you."
She could have come to him with or without their baby. He bit his lower lip, and the fury in his blood grew. "You abandoned her. I kept our daughter."
She took a deep breath, but then her voice had a melancholy sound to it. "You were once sweet and understanding, Colt. I was lied to. I never had a father like you. Mine demanded I do what he say."
Secret Baby (The House of Morgan, #2) Page 2