Too set in his view of his father.
Living by his own inflexible code.
Her thought about Aaron flashed through her mind again as she thought about Jason’s feelings about his father. Were they more alike than she had even realized?
Aaron’s code had had many facets, and one of the most basic had been that no one cheated him and got away with it. They had disagreed over his tactics for enforcing that more than once, because Aaron’s reaction to being cheated was usually a fury so great he lost sight of anything except retribution, and sometimes innocent people got hurt in the process, something Kendall had never been able to write off as simply “the cost of doing business,” as Aaron had.
If Jason was like his father in so many other ways, perhaps they were alike in this as well, she thought. Perhaps Hawk pride ran as strongly in his veins as it had in Aaron’s. It was as good a place to start as any. And she was still furious enough herself that she didn’t mince any words.
“Alice Hawk is trying to cheat you, Jason.”
She didn’t know what he’d been expecting to hear, but she could tell from the look that flashed across his face that it hadn’t been what she’d said.
He looked at her for a long, silent moment, eyes narrowed. She could almost feel his mind racing, assessing, and knew she hadn’t underestimated the intelligence here. When he finally spoke, she was surprised; he asked the last thing she’d expected.
“What happened to ‘Mr. West’?”
She hesitated, trying to guess why he’d asked that particular question. No logical reason came to her, so she gave him the simple truth.
“I’ve always thought of you as Jason Hawk. It’s hard for me not to call you that, but it obviously upsets you. So I thought I’d compromise. But if that upsets you as well, I suppose I’ll just have to stick to ‘Mr. West’.”
He gave her a level look. “The name Hawk doesn’t upset me. Offend me, yes. I don’t like it, and like even less it being hung on me. Jason will do.”
She didn’t argue with him on this relatively pointless issue. “Fine. So will Kendall. I find you have a knack of saying ‘Ms. Chase’ as if you’d bitten into a lemon. If I have to feel the bite, I’d prefer it to at least be my first name.”
“Think that will make it sweeter?”
“No. Just easier to ignore.”
He lifted a dark brow at her, and something flashed in his eyes that was almost a salute. But he said only, “All right . . . Kendall. You’re running out of time.”
“Which, I’m sure, was your intent,” she said, only realizing it now. He merely looked at her. She sighed. “Don’t you care that someone is trying to cheat you out of what’s rightfully yours?”
“I don’t want anything from the Hawks. Why are you telling me this? You work for the Hawks.”
“Not any longer. And I never worked for Alice.”
Both dark brows rose this time. “I wondered why your car looked like you’d taken up living on the road. Or were going to check in here.”
“I probably will,” she said dryly.
“Get fired?”
She didn’t bother to deny it. “Yes. I’ve been living at the house since Aaron got sick. I had to pack my things in a hurry.”
“I’ll bet.” He leaned back against the cushion of the coffee-shop booth, raising one arm to rest it along the back of the seat. “So your job died along with the meal ticket, huh?”
“I no longer work for Hawk,” she said carefully, “because I refused to go along with Alice on this. That’s why she fired me.”
His eyes shifted then, downward, to stare into his now half-empty cup. When he looked back up at her, she heard him let out a compressed breath.
“All right, Ms. . . . Kendall. Let’s get this over with. But make it fast.”
He wanted it fast? Fine, Kendall thought. And delivered it with rapid precision.
“Two weeks before he died, Aaron added a codicil to his will, leaving you a sizable bequest. Alice found out. She located or intercepted all but one copy of that codicil. She plans to deny its existence and file Aaron’s original will as the official one. She swears you’ll never see any of Aaron’s money.”
She could have just conversationally mentioned that it was cold out, for all the reaction she got. And she had the sudden feeling that nothing, not the air, not even the lingering pockets of snow outside, was as cold as this man was capable of being.
“Is that it?” His voice was as cool as the things she’d just been thinking about.
“Not quite.”
“Finish it.”
“They’ve set me up. And you.” She related the story quickly, in brusque, businesslike terms, ending with Whitewood’s promise to provide the necessary witnesses.
“Convenient,” Jason said.
He seemed completely calm, utterly uninvolved. She envied him his control; just thinking about Alice made her furious.
He gave her a look she couldn’t read. “Why didn’t you just take the money and shut up?”
She looked at him over the rim of her mug. If she was the kind of woman he seemed to think she was, that would no doubt be exactly what she would do. She wished he would see that, but she didn’t hold out much hope.
“A very good question. Why do you suppose?”
He seemed to consider that for a moment, and she shrugged. “Maybe you figure you’ll get more in the long run out of me than you will out of my father’s widow. I don’t imagine she feels particularly munificent to her late husband’s—”
“Tell me something,” she began, stopping him before he again repeated his assessment of her relationship to Aaron. “Do you always make assumptions about people without knowing the first thing about them?”
He never blinked at the interruption. “I assume my father was a cold, ruthless bastard who wouldn’t marry my mother or acknowledge his own son. And that his widow is equally coldhearted and would perjure herself to keep me from seeing a dime from my father. And that the Hawks use crooked lawyers or whatever is necessary to make sure things go their way. Anything you’d like to deny so far?”
She sighed. “No.”
“So I’m batting a thousand. Why the hell should I believe I’m wrong about you?”
“It doesn’t matter,” she said wearily. She could live with his assumptions, she thought, if he’d just listen. “What matters is that Alice is trying to steal what’s rightfully yours, what your father wanted you to have. And she’s willing to send us both to jail to do it, if she has to.”
He laughed. “She’s too late. I’ve already been to jail.”
Kendall blinked in surprise. She didn’t remember any of the Jason Wests they’d found so far having a criminal record. So apparently they hadn’t hit the right one yet. “You have? For what?”
“A youthful indiscretion, isn’t that what they say? I borrowed a car. Except I forgot to ask permission. Hey, it wasn’t my fault, I was a victim of my rotten childhood.” His mouth quirked sardonically. “I didn’t say that, the county shrink did.”
So that was it. A juvenile record might be sealed, and even Alton would have trouble getting to that. Maybe they had really found him, and just not known it.
“Was it rotten? Your childhood?”
He shrugged. “No worse than a lot of others.”
“So why did you borrow the car?”
He gave her a look she could only describe as wary. She wondered if it was because he’d already told her more than he’d intended to. It seemed Aaron had been right in his fears; Jason had apparently not done much with his life, if he’d already been in jail even before adulthood.
“You’re about out of time. You sure you want to waste it discussing my misspent youth?”
Reluctantly, although she wasn’t sure why she f
elt that way, she agreed. “What are you going to do about the will? You can’t let her get away with this.”
“Why not?”
She gaped at him; she couldn’t help it. “Jason, we’re talking about a huge sum of money—”
“I figured that. If they’re willing to sacrifice a hundred thousand to keep it, it can’t be pocket change, even for the Hawks.”
“Try two hundred and fifty times that.”
“Sounds about right.”
My God, Kendall thought, could nothing shake this man’s cool? She threw out a number like twenty-five million dollars, that would make most people gasp, and he didn’t turn a hair. He just sat there nodding, as if it were nothing more complex than a simple multiplication problem.
“So what did my charming father leave you, Kendall?”
She shivered when he said her name. And she resented the fact that she had. Wonderful, she muttered silently, chastising herself. He doesn’t even blink at the mention of twenty-five million, and you get chills at the sound of your own name. Or him saying it. You’re supposed to be the cool one, the level head; why are you letting him get to you?
“Your father paid well and advised me on some investments. He didn’t need to leave me anything.”
“But he did, didn’t he?”
“What makes you say that?”
“I get the feeling you use words very precisely, Ms. . . . Kendall. You didn’t say he didn’t leave you anything, just that he didn’t need to.”
For a moment she was back in front of Aaron, when she’d first come to work for him. “Say what you mean and mean what you say, girl. Save the obfuscation for when I tell you it’s necessary.” He’d taught her so much, given her so much, and denied it every time she tried to thank him—
“Kendall?”
Her gaze shot to Jason’s face, and only when she saw his image was a bit blurry did she realize her eyes had begun to brim with tears. She looked away, swiping at them hastily.
“Damn.” She heard Jason swear quietly, but couldn’t meet his eyes. “You really loved that old man, didn’t you?”
She did look at him then; she wouldn’t deny Aaron, not now, not to his own son.
“Not in the way I’m sure you’ll assume, but yes, I loved him. He gave me my first job, when I hadn’t an ounce of experience to justify his faith. He challenged me at every turn, forced me to grow, to find my full potential. And in the end he trusted me with his soul.”
Jason stared at her for a long, silent moment. “You think he had a soul?”
“I know he did. Because I know it was a tortured one, at the end. When he learned your mother had been killed, even though it was twenty years ago, it nearly destroyed him.” She took a deep breath to steady her voice. “Your father was everything you’ve said, Jason. But he was so much more, besides. There was a part of him he never let the world see, a gentler side, a side that laughed, and was generous, and told wonderful stories . . .”
Her words faded away, and because she couldn’t stop herself, she gathered her nerve to ask him something, more in the hopes of making him think than actually expecting an answer.
“Was your mother the kind of woman who would fall in love with an awful man, and stay with him for seven years? Despite the fact that he wouldn’t get a divorce, would never marry her?”
For the first time she saw his jaw tighten. Perhaps Jason West wasn’t frozen solid, not quite.
“My mother,” he said tightly, “was a . . . kind, gentle woman. She worked harder to take care of me than anyone should have to. All because she was foolish enough to love Aaron Hawk.”
He nearly spat out the word, as if it were something so unpalatable he hated the taste of it.
“You wanted to know why I took that car?” he went on, his voice suddenly fierce. “It was our neighbor’s. I took it one day when it was so cold the rain had turned to sleet, and I knew she was walking home from work in it. Because our car was broken down, and she couldn’t afford to fix it. And she shouldn’t have been out anyway; she was sick, but she had to pay the rent on that dive we lived in. And my father never gave a damn.”
Kendall felt a choking tightness in her throat. She wanted to explain, to say that Aaron had tried, but her instincts told her Jason was in no mood to hear it. It was a moment before she was able to say quietly, “But she loved him.”
“Yes.” Jason’s tone was almost acid. “She did. She never, ever said a word against him. Never once did she blame him. She said he never lied to her. Like that makes it all right.”
Kendall looked at him for a long moment. “Who are you angry at, Jason? Aaron? Or your mother?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Just that it must have been hard, for you to hate him so much when your mother never stopped loving him. You must have been . . . upset with her, that she still cared.”
“It wasn’t her fault. She was a smart woman. She just had this . . . blind spot.”
“About Aaron?”
His mouth twisted. He sipped the last of his coffee, set down the cup, and stared into it. “And about love. She believed in it. I think she believed up until she died that someday he’d come for her. Falling in love was the only foolish thing she ever did.” He let out a breath. “Except maybe for having me.”
Kendall nearly gasped at this betrayal of pained emotion in a man she would never have expected it from. Anger, yes, but never this kind of pain. Her voice was barely above a whisper when she finally managed to speak.
“You don’t really think she regretted that, do you?”
His head came up abruptly. He glared at her, looking as furious now as he ever had, when just moments ago she had thought she was really making progress with him.
“Damn, you are good, aren’t you? Maybe you really were what you said you were. Did the old man teach you that?”
“Teach me . . . what?” she asked carefully.
“How to find the weak spot and go for it. How to lull with those big eyes, coax people into spilling their guts for you—”
“All I did was listen, Jason. If that’s all it took, then perhaps you needed to . . . spill your guts, as you so charmingly put it. Although if it’s any comfort, you didn’t let slip much I hadn’t already guessed.”
It didn’t seem to comfort him. The silence spun out, strained and somehow bleak.
“More coffee?”
The waitress’s chipper voice increased the tension between them rather than breaking it.
“No,” Jason said flatly. “I’m leaving.”
He ignored the woman’s rather blatant pout as she walked away, and stood up. He pulled a crumpled bill out of his pocket and tossed it on the table.
“Jason, please—”
“I should let you pay for it,” he said, his voice as cool as if that momentary break in his composure had never occurred. “But I don’t want a damn thing from the Hawks. Not twenty-five cents, not twenty-five million. Now are you going to move that fancy car of yours, or do I move it myself?”
HE MISSED HIS plane. Not only that, but the reservations clerk had practically broken down in tears when he’d snapped at her because the soonest she could manage to get him back to Seattle was for him to take the last small commuter flight to L.A., which didn’t leave for another hour and a half, and then he’d have to literally run for a connecting flight that left there for SeaTac twenty minutes later.
He’d tried to apologize, but he was reasonably sure he’d only made things worse. So he’d accepted the ticket she’d handed him with unsteady hands in silence, then felt like a complete ass when he overheard the older woman who relieved her at the desk tell her to hurry home to her sick daughter.
He walked over to an isolated pair of seats near the boarding gate, dropped his coat and bag on one, and sat hea
vily down in the other.
Great, West, he muttered to himself. You miss your plane, make a woman with a sick kid cry, and now you get to spend an hour and a half sitting here doing nothing.
Nothing except what he’d been doing ever since he’d left the motel, after Kendall Chase had moved her car, saying nothing more to him, as if she’d finally given up.
Nothing except thinking of question after question that he wanted to ask her, even though he resented his own curiosity. Questions like did she really believe Alice Hawk would go to such lengths to make sure her husband’s illegitimate son never saw a penny of Hawks’ money? And just what exactly did this supposed codicil say? And where was the one copy she’d said Alice hadn’t found?
But even those were questions he could live with. He could understand why his mind kept turning to them. They didn’t matter, because he didn’t really believe the whole preposterous story in the first place. It was the other persistent questions that really bothered him. The things he shouldn’t even be wondering about at all. Things like why she really hadn’t taken the hundred thousand and just gone on her merry—and considerably richer—way? What had Aaron Hawk really left her? And what had her relationship with the old man really been? What had she seen in him that no one else had?
If, of course, any of it was true.
Even if it was, what was her real motive? He couldn’t believe it was simply to carry out an old man’s last wish; he didn’t even believe this was the old man’s last wish. No, there was something else going on here, something he couldn’t see yet.
But he would. Nobody went to all this trouble for nothing. Perhaps she got a bonus or something if she pulled this off. But that would have to mean that Aaron really had left him something, which was even harder to believe. The man hadn’t given a damn about him or his mother for thirty years; there was no reason to believe he’d changed simply because he’d run out of time.
Wild Hawk Page 8