Not Without You

by Taylor, Janelle

  He punched the button for the elevator. Sarah looked ready to scream but she clamped her mouth shut and stalked away. Exhaustion filled Jarred inside and out. She was the soulless one. And she was going to bear Will’s child.

  “Dad?” Will said gently as he entered the hospital room. Kelsey followed behind.

  Nola stood by the bed, holding Jonathan’s hand. Seeing Will caused her mouth to tighten into a thin line. “Where’s Jarred?”

  “On his way,” Will said and Kelsey saw fit to let the lie stand.

  Jonathan’s lips moved, but he couldn’t seem to project words. Will bent to listen.

  “What is it?” Nola demanded.

  “He says he’s sorry,” Will repeated, shaking his head.

  Nola looked at her husband, gazing down at him in that penetrating way that had wilted men of more stature. “For what?” she asked in frustration.

  And clearly, though it cost him dearly for the effort, he answered, “For all the Gwens and Janices.”

  The phone rang imperatively in her small apartment. She could hear it, and therefore she knew she was past the three-day drug-induced stupor that meant she was coming down. But she didn’t want to answer the phone.

  Still, it rang and rang and rang until her head swam with noise. She reached for it, then she demanded crankily, “Who’s calling?”

  “It’s me,” the feminine voice on the other end said around a mouthful of tears. “I just had a fight with Jarred. He fired me.”

  “What?” Wake up. Wake up. Wake up!

  “He says there’s no inheritance. Will gets nothing. The baby gets nothing! Do you hear me? It’s all for nothing!’’’

  “No.” Gwen’s voice was steel. Nothing was what she’d had for too long. Only Sarah’s friends from college had given her anything more. A taste of drugs. A way to float away from her small, miserable life.

  “He saw the picture of us. He knows.’“

  “Where is he now? What time is it?”

  “About one o’clock. He’s on his way home, but I don’t know. Jonathan’s in the hospital. They might all be there. “

  She collapsed back on the bed. Think. I called them. I told them. They know he has to be removed. “If Jarred’s out of the way, it all goes to Will.”

  “Out of the way?” Sarah asked, sounding fearful.

  “It’s all taken care of anyway. Stop worrying so much! Sweetie, you’ve got a baby to think about now.”

  “But Will doesn’t want to get married!”

  “You’re carrying the only Bryant heir, so it doesn’t really matter, does it?”

  “Unless Jarred has one,” Sarah said, rubbing salt in the wound that never quite seemed to close.

  For a moment Gwen really resented her daughter. If only she’d been Jonathan Bryant’s child! Then everything would have been right. But, no. She had been sired by that sick, torturing psychopath. Luckily he’d run his car off the road in a drunken haze. At least Gwen knew better than to get behind the wheel when she was high. Asshole.

  “Mom?”

  “He won’t have one. He won’t be able to.” With that, she slammed down the receiver. The phone rang again instantly, so she yanked the cord from the wall.

  She had friends who took care of these things.

  Chapter Sixteen

  If there had ever been a longer day, Jarred wasn’t aware of it. He drove through the drifting fog toward his home, stayed just long enough to read Kelsey’s note, then turned the Porsche toward Bryant Park Hospital. Just as well. He needed to be near his father and he wanted to be with Kelsey.

  He expected Nola, Will, and Kelsey to all be in attendance, but when he entered his father’s hospital room, Kelsey was the only visitor inside. She was seated in a chair, thumbing through a magazine, her gaze straight ahead instead of on the slick pages. When she glanced up, her face lightened and Jarred’s chest constricted with the bright beauty of her expression. The curve of her lips and soft sweep of her hair were an enticement he couldn’t resist. He crossed the room and swept her into his arms, the magazine fluttering to the floor, forgotten before it touched the carpet.

  “How is he?” Jarred asked.

  “Better,” was the surprising reply.

  He pulled back to gaze into her thick-lashed eyes. “Really?”

  “He had some things to say, and as soon as they were out, he wanted the reverend. We all left the room. Your mother and Will are down the hall in a small conference room.”

  “Just the two of them?” Jarred’s brows rose.

  “I’m sure they’re waiting for you. I wanted to stay here.”

  Jarred regarded his father with mixed feelings. He loved him, wanted him to live, was desperate to forge a new relationship, but the revelations of the evening had left him considering the true nature of the man who’d fathered him. It wasn’t a tidy picture. Jonathan’s weaknesses had divided him from his family in so many ways.

  Still, he could see that Jonathan was resting more easily. Breathing deeper. Lines bracketing his mouth and sketched across his forehead somehow diffused.

  “What did he say?” Jarred asked.

  Kelsey drew him into the outer hallway. The strong lighting caught the shadows of her face, turning it into beautiful planes and angles. Jarred mentally shook himself. He was so worried, so scared for her. She epitomized everything good in his life, and he had this terrible sense of losing her.

  “He said he was sorry for having affairs,” she said. “He was sorry for the Gwens and Janices.”

  Jarred gave her a long look. “He mentioned Gwen.”

  “Jarred, Nola looked crushed. I don’t think it ever occurred to her that Gwen was one of his lovers. None of us knew. Gwen and Jonathan hardly even speak to each other. I mean, there’s no need, I guess, but it was kind of a shock. Your father was really agitated. Nola walked out and Will calmed him down.” Kelsey hesitated. “You don’t seem surprised.”

  “I had a run-in with Sarah at the office.”

  “At the office? But didn’t you go see her at her place?”

  “She wasn’t there.” Quickly Jarred brought Kelsey up-to-date on what he’d learned, finishing with, “That’s how I found out about Gwen.”

  Kelsey grappled with this new information. “Sarah is Gwen’s daughter? And she thinks she deserves to inherit?”

  “Will was right when he called her sociopathic. I saw that tonight. She just doesn’t respond normally. There’s nothing there.” Glancing back toward the room, he added, “I’m going to check with Will and Nola. Coming?”

  Kelsey nodded. “Jarred, Will told Jonathan about the baby. I think it comforted him.”

  “Did Nola hear about the baby, too?” Jarred asked, wishing he’d kept his own mouth shut. He still didn’t feel right about the world knowing. Some basic need to protect, he supposed, but with Sarah’s strange designs on the Bryant fortune, he could believe there were goblins out there ready to pounce on his wife, steal her child, and ruin all their lives.

  He must have made some sound because she asked, “What is it?”

  “Nothing.”

  Will and Nola sat on opposite ends of a long table. Nola stared at the blank, dark window; Will stared at Nola. He glanced up at Kelsey and Jarred. “There you are!” he said with relief, jumping to his feet.

  “Dad’s better?” Jarred said.

  “Might even be up and around by your birthday,” Nola murmured in a flat voice. Then, as if hearing herself, she drew a deep breath. “Good news, darling. About the baby, I mean. I can’t tell you how happy I am.” She meant it, even though she was too tired to truly inject her voice with her feelings. A dream fulfilled.

  “I don’t want to publicize that yet,” he told her. “I just don’t trust people.”

  “What people?” Nola frowned.

  Ignoring her, Jarred said, “So dad’s doing better. We don’t know what that means yet.”

  “Confession’s good for the soul,” Will said, making a face. “He’s just been resting b
etter since he talked to us and the reverend. He’s worried about you though.”

  “I’ll stay here in case he wakes up again,” Jarred revealed.

  “And I’ll stay with you,” Kelsey said.

  Will glanced over at Nola, who looked ready to collapse herself. “I’ll take you home if you’ll let me.”

  “Well, of course I will! Whatever do you mean?”

  Will gave Kelsey and Jarred a dry look, but they could tell he was pleased nonetheless. “See you tomorrow.”

  With that, Kelsey and Jarred walked back to Jonathan’s room together, settled into chairs, and leaned on each other throughout the rest of the night.

  Dreams. They crept in and wound themselves inside your mind and created all kinds of emotional havoc for no better reason than to wake you up. Kelsey’s head rested on Jarred’s shoulder, but inside her brain, images flashed bright and terrifying. Chance, pleading with her: “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” Sarah, standing back and silently surveying her with a remote look, as if to say, “You are not a part of this family. You don’t belong. I will see that you never get ahead of me.” Connor, breathing in her ear, touching her, not saying anything, but behind him, stacks and stacks of guns lined along dirty walls and a pan rattling ominously on the stove. And Gwen blaming Will: “I overheard him on the phone. Will’s the one. Will’s the one.”

  Kelsey jerked awake. It was just before dawn. The sky was still black outside the windows but fog had descended, making it seem slightly lighter, grayer. She glanced at the bed. Jonathan breathed deeply and normally. She’d always heard about the effects of lightening one’s load with the truth, but she’d never truly believed it could make such a difference.

  And as if feeling the weight of her gaze, his eyes opened and he blinked several times, a coma victim awakening after a long sleep, a dead man given a reprieve. He met her eyes, took in Jarred’s still sleeping form, and smiled at her.

  Kelsey gently stirred. Carefully, she extricated herself from her husband and tiptoed toward Jonathan’s bed.

  “It’s going to be all right now,” Jonathan said, his face glowing. “I’ve talked to God, and He’s given you a child.”

  Kelsey smiled in return. She supposed this was not the right time to debate who’d actually given whom a child, and anyway, she understood the sentiment and was just grateful that Jonathan was better. He’d miraculously halted his own steep decline, and if that was God’s doing, all the better.

  Jarred drew in a breath and woke suddenly. He was on his feet in an instant, looking for danger.

  Kelsey winked at him and he came to stand by his father. Jonathan reached for his son’s hand. “I should have got her treatment long ago, but she wouldn’t let go of it. “ His eyes pleaded for understanding. “I didn’t know how far she would go, but it’s the drugs, you know. They got hold of your friend Chance,” he said. “And they got hold of Gwen.”

  “It wasn’t ever migraines,” Jarred stated.

  “Oh, I’m sure she had them, too.” Jonathan lifted a feeble hand. “But they were brought on by other things. Sarah introduced Gwen to Chance long ago, and it wasn’t a good thing. I knew about it. I should have done something.”

  Kelsey swallowed, feeling as if she ought to say something positive but not knowing what.

  “She was a good woman,” Jonathan said as if trying to convince them all. “A good employee. But she always wanted more. Nola knew she wanted more, but she really didn’t want to believe it was because of me. Where is she now?”

  “Mother?”

  “No, Gwen.”

  Jarred drew a hand through his hair. “Probably getting ready for work. Unless she’s talked to Sarah, which is a strong possibility.” He told his father about his face-off with Sarah the night before. Jonathan visibly paled.

  Alarmed, Jarred asked, “Dad?” in a worried voice.

  “I’m okay.” He blinked several times. “What a mess I’ve made.” His voice broke as if he couldn’t continue.

  Kelsey stepped in. Gently, she said, “But Sarah’s not your daughter. Any expectations she has are just desperate fantasies inside her own head. And you know what the shame of it is? She’s an excellent worker. She could be whatever she wanted to be.”

  “She wanted to be a Bryant,” Jonathan said. “Gwen did that to her. Filled her head with it from the time she was a baby. Be careful of her,” Jonathan said suddenly, his gaze turning from Kelsey to Jarred and back again.

  “We will,” Jarred responded solemnly.

  Friday arrived with a thicker blanket of fog and a sense of shifting seasons. Nola’s bitter prediction had turned out to be beautifully, unexpectedly true: Jonathan would be home by Jarred’s thirty-ninth birthday. For that event, she wanted her family at their house on Mercer Island, and Kelsey and Jarred and Will were the only ones invited.

  Neither Sarah nor Gwen had appeared at Bryant Industries since the night Sarah and Jarred had faced off. An attempt to reach Gwen had not been successful; she was either not at home or not answering her door or phone. Sarah was also missing in action. The two of them were like ghosts, gone in the fog.

  Meghan sat at Gwen’s desk, doing double- and tripletime work. She shrugged off the extra load without a complaint. Will and Jarred divided Sarah’s work, tackling those deals that needed an immediate steering hand with barely a blip of interruption.

  It almost seemed as if neither woman had ever been there. Especially since Danielle suddenly arrived on the scene, met with Will, and asked if they could sit down Over dinner together one evening and reassess their relationship. Even when he explained about his and Sarah’s child’s impending birth, Danielle took the news surprising well. She was through with her angry fling, she said, sick of fighting and depressed by the thought of a future without anyone who truly loved her and whom she could love in return. She admitted that she’d embarked on her affair only as a means to retaliate against Sarah and Will’s growing interest in each other. This was completely to Will’s astonishment since he’d always believed Danielle had embarked on her affair before his and Sarah’s. He learned, subsequently, and to no one’s real surprise, that Sarah had fed Danielle’s insecurities when it came to their marriage. She’d led Danielle to believe the affair was in force long before the actual events became true.

  As far as Kelsey was concerned, it just showed how quickly a relationship could unravel if it wasn’t based on trust. Sarah had nearly managed the same thing for her and Jarred. As it turned out, fate had intervened in the form of a plane crash and a new awakening to the possibilities of their future.

  The night of the dinner, Kelsey examined her reflection in the mirror of her bathroom. Then she clipped on the lovely sapphire pendant. She’d pinned her auburn locks loosely atop her head. Instead of a dress, she wore a black silk camisole top and black slacks. It wasn’t a huge party, just a gathering of family partly to toast the end of a long, bad season and the beginning of a bright new one.

  Gathering up the tiny box she’d hidden beneath their bed, Kelsey headed downstairs, catching her husband on the phone with Detective Newcastle.

  ”…don’t even know if it’s relevant,” he was saying. “It’s been four days and they’re both missing. It’s embarrassment or fear of criminal involvement…. I don’t know.” A pause. “No, I’m not worried. Sarah’s pregnant. The baby’s Will’s, and she might be concerned about all the trouble that’s been caused, but she’s smart. She’ll make it work for her somehow. Gwen’s involvement… once again… she had some friends. Those loosely organized gang types you described?” Another pause. “Who’s to say? I just want my life back.” He slipped an arm around Kelsey’s shoulders and dragged her near, inhaling her scent. “Kelsey,” he mouthed. She kissed him on the lips, a loud smack that stopped Newcastle in the middle of a long diatribe. “Nothing,” Jarred assured him, his blue eyes simmering with humor. “So case closed? You can talk to Gwen about who her sources were, or are, when she turns up.”

  A few moments later he hung
up the phone. Then he dragged Kelsey close and groaned at the thought of having to go over to his mother’s again. “Let’s just blow them off.”

  “Oh, sure. After your father narrowly survived the week! That would go over well.”

  “You look great, and you smell delicious.”

  “You don’t look too bad yourself.”

  He wore tan chinos and a black shirt and a lighter expression than he’d worn in the last few weeks. “No gifts,” he admonished her when she handed him the package.

  “To hell with Nola.”

  He grinned. Turning the white box with its sky blue bow around in his hands for several moments, Jarred said, “Cuff links?”

  “Oh, come on. You hate getting dressed up, and I doubt anything could coax you into a shirt without buttons at the cuffs.”

  “Tie clasp.”

  Kelsey sighed. “This is a birthday gift. I was thinking what I would like most for a birthday gift and so…”

  With no more ado heopened the box. Inside lay a piece of white paper folded up and tied with another, tinier sky blue bow. Mystified, he unwound the bit of silk and read the missive. While Kelsey’s eyes danced, he glanced out to the silhouette of December’s Wish and then back to the paper.

  Your December’s Wish is my command.

  “Nothing fancy. Just a little personal party set up for later.”

  “Set up?”

  “Uh-huh. I had some outside help. Although Mary insisted on adding her own special dishes as well. Whatever did you do to that woman? I swear, you’re her favorite man of all men.” •

  He grinned. “Showed her my best side.”

  They both laughed.

  Half an hour later Kelsey escorted her husband up the drive to his parents’ house. Caterers swarmed the brick pathways and cars lined the drive. In the glow of a fogshrouded evening, the outdoor lights looked like halos. Groups of people strolled toward the front door, and by the looks of the womens dresses, this was supposed to be a formal affair.