Surprised by Love

by Julie Lessman

  Logan’s smile twisted. “No, an uncle of his a few generations back. You see, he let go and gave it to God, Cait, because it was the right thing to do.” He patted her hand, his smile at odds with the regret in his eyes. “But don’t let the mood fool you, Mrs. McClare, because sometimes it’s nothing more than a front.” He inclined his head toward the foyer. “Shall we?”

  She nodded, her respect for Logan McClare soaring as high as her love.

  The right thing to do.

  It was, she knew it, for Jamie and him and maybe even her down the road. Even so, a dull ache throbbed as a question remained.

  Then why did it feel so wrong?

  31

  She’ll be right down, Bram. Would you like coffee or tea?”

  Hunched on the sofa with head in his hands, Bram glanced up as Caitlyn McClare entered the parlour, the dark circles under her eyes not much better than his. He rose, sliding sweaty palms against his charcoal suit pants despite the cooler temperatures that prevailed. “No, thank you, Mrs. McClare—I can’t stay long, but I need to see Meg.” He searched her face for any sign of a problem. “How is she?”

  “Well, she’s still pretty shaken, a little sore, and sporting a few bruises, of course, and certainly not willing to step foot in a sailboat anytime soon . . .” She issued an unsteady sigh, offering a half smile as she gave him a hug. “But Doc Miller claims she’ll make a full recovery.”

  Bram’s eyelids shuttered closed. Well, that makes one of us . . .

  Pulling back, she held his arms, affection brimming along with a few tears. “You have always been a godsend to our family, Bram, but never more so than now.”

  Heat circled his collar at the discomfort of her praise. Not with what he was about to do. “I assure you, Mrs. McClare, the feeling is more than mutual. I love M-Meg too,” he said in a halting manner, heat blasting his cheeks at the way it had sounded.

  Like a man in love.

  He plunged his hands in his pockets, desperately wanting to see Meg, but wishing with everything in him that it was already over. “As a big brother and mentor, of course.”

  She paused, the almond shape of her eyes thinning a hair, slight enough most people mightn’t have noticed. But Bram was so gun-shy about Meg right now, heat tracked up the back of his neck. Her eyes softened with a shy grin. “Of course. I just wish your positive influence had rubbed off on Blake as well, but I suppose there’s always hope with you as his friend.”

  That brought a smile to his face as he scratched at his temple, grateful for the humor that helped loosen his nerves. “Well, not much, Mrs. McClare, but I am a prayerful man.”

  Her grin mellowed into a quiet smile. “I know,” she said softly, “and therein lies one of my greatest comforts.”

  “Bram!” Meg was little more than a blur as she dashed into the parlour and flung herself toward him. With a tiny gasp, she lunged back, fingers clenched to his arms. “Wait—you’re not hurt anywhere, are you? You know, too sore to hug?”

  He managed a chuckle, the sound muffled in her hair as he drew her close. “No, Bug, the only thing sore on me is my pride.” The familiar scent of violets caused his heart to stutter, followed by a keen stab of regret. Desperate to return to big-brother mode, he patted her shoulder and pulled away, grateful Mrs. McClare had left them alone. “I should have never put you at risk like that, sailing during questionable weather.”

  “It wasn’t questionable when we left,” she said, her green eyes probing his. “So you can’t blame yourself, especially when I coerced you to stay out against your will, remember?”

  Against my will. A theme of late.

  He expelled a heavy blast of air, his tone laced with regret. “Bug . . . we need to tal—”

  “No . . .” She backed away before he could even loose the word from his tongue, shaking her head. “Don’t do this, Bram,” she whispered, voice hoarse as she rushed to close the double burlwood doors. Whirling around, she hurried back to tug him down on the sofa, panic flaring her eyes. She crushed his hands in hers. “Don’t push me away . . .”

  Body stiffening, he carefully untangled his fingers from hers and palmed her cheek instead, like the near brother he intended to be. “I’m not pushing you away, Bug,” he said in the soothing tone he’d always reserved for skinned knees and hurt feelings.

  “You are!” she cried, shocking him when she wrenched his hand from her face to clutch it to her chest. Panic swam in her eyes. “You kissed me, Bram—deeply—when you thought you’d lost me.”

  His face flamed hotter than the fire in the hearth. “Yes, but with ‘deep’ gratitude only—”

  “Horse apples!” she bellowed, borrowing a pet phrase from Cassie. She leaned in, tears sparking her eyes. “I knew this would happen, I knew you’d deny the attraction—”

  He shot to his feet. “We are not having this conversation, Bug—” He made a move for Logan’s favorite chair a few feet away.

  “Oh, yes we are!” she said loudly, seizing his arm to jerk him back around. She caught her breath, brows rising in shock when she realized what she’d done. “I . . . I . . . m-mean, we are, Bram,” she stuttered, obviously as startled as he at a volatile outburst more indicative of Alli than her. Her lower lip trembled, and Bram knew he was a goner when more tears welled in her eyes. “You have never lied to me once, Abraham Hughes, so please tell me you’re not going to start now . . .”

  Stifling a groan, he pinched the bridge of his nose before meeting her gaze. “All right, Meg,” he said quietly, “you win.” With a gentle hook of her arm, he seated her on the sofa and perched beside her, head in his hands. “Yes, I did kiss you deeply, but I wasn’t lying about my deep gratitude as a primary motivator because it was. But then . . .” He tunneled fingers through his hair, unable to muzzle the groan this time. “I . . . suddenly realized if I lost you, my life would never be the same and my . . . gratitude . . . got the best of me.”

  “Your ‘gratitude,’ ” she whispered, a hint of sarcasm threading her tone.

  He opted for a show of authority, tone firm as he kneaded his temples. “Yes, my gratitude, young lady. A deluge of humble thanksgiving that may have possibly had a drop or two of . . .” He exhaled a shaky sigh. “Attraction.”

  Her soft giggle melted his heart. “A drop or two?”

  He forced a sober tone, determined to nip this in the bud. “It doesn’t matter, Bug, I was a fool for letting my emotions get away from me when we both know it can never be.”

  “Why?” It was a frail question, posed by a woman he no longer saw as a little girl.

  “You know why,” he said softly, finally meeting her gaze. “I told you when you came home from Paris that attraction is not the problem, Meg—it’s simply a matter of what’s meant to be.” He eased away, straightening his coat to give his hands something to do. “Which means you and I can never be—that way—together.”

  “Because of Amelia,” she whispered. She paused to swallow hard. “Do you . . . love her?”

  “I love my father,” he emphasized with a dip of his head, eyeing her with a pointed gaze. “Amelia’s a wonderful girl, but I’m not in love with her.” His inhale was shaky. “It’s simply a debt that I owe.”

  She peered up with troubled eyes. “What debt?”

  The oxygen stalled in his lungs before it finally escaped in one long surrender of air. It was time, he realized. Time to confess to someone other than God just what a failure he’d been as a son. Mauling his face with his hand, he finally rested his head on the back of the sofa, gaze lagging into a cold stare. “I’m not the noble and good person you think I am,” he said quietly. “At least not when I was a young man.”

  “I don’t understand—what do you mean?”

  His eyelids clamped shut, all the memories whooshing back like those turbulent waves that had splintered his sloop into hundreds of jagged pieces. Shattering all hope and promise.

  Just like he’d done to his father.

  “I mean,” he said in a halting
tone riddled with grief, “it’s because of me”—he squeezed his eyelids tighter, as if he could somehow block out the horrific guilt that lived in his mind—“my father is in poor health and . . . almost blind.”

  Her gasp was like a physical blow, driving the shame that much deeper into his soul. Avoiding her eyes for fear of the revulsion he might see, he forged on, unyielding in his quest to unveil the truth for the woman who needed it most. “You see, before I became a part of your family, Meg, I was a lost soul, destroyed by bitterness over the death of my sister.”

  “Yes, Ruthy—I remember,” she whispered. “She died of bronchitis at the age of six—”

  A harsh laugh broke from his lips that sounded nothing like him at all. “Or so the death certificate said.”

  “I . . . don’t understand . . .”

  He turned to her, face sculpted in stone so no tears could escape. “She didn’t die of bronchitis, Meg—she died of an overdose.”

  Her breath caught in a harsh inhale. “Wh-what? What do you mean?”

  There was no turning back. No cushioning the blow. Meg—more than anyone now—needed to know. He steeled his jaw, but it did nothing to quell the quiver of his voice. “I mean I killed my sister when I gave her too much medicine while she was in my care.” His head listed forward, heavy with the weight of his grief as he labored on. “I was only eleven, but my parents trusted me—‘a responsible boy,’ they always said, wise beyond my years.” His glossy gaze trailed into the past, seeing his tiny sister deathly pale in the bed, crying because her throat hurt, raw from coughing up blood. “Pop was at work and Mom went to bed with a migraine, and I only wanted to help.” An involuntary shudder twitched his body as he bit back a heave, water welling until he could see nothing but his guilt. “We gave her cough medicine to help ease the pain of her cough, only I didn’t know it was an opiate,” he whispered in a broken voice, “didn’t know it could kill her . . .” His eyes glazed into the past, to where a boy sobbed as he rocked his baby sister, limp in his arms.

  “Oh, Bram . . .” Meg tried to hug him, but he warded her off.

  “No, let me finish—you need to understand the debt that I owe.” Rising to collect himself, he paced several feet away to blot a handkerchief to his face, only returning to the sofa when he was composed enough to continue. “My parents were devastated, of course, and our close-knit family, destroyed. My father treated me differently after that—critical, harsh, riding me hard—so I knew he was angry at me.” Bram laughed, his voice brittle. “Dash it all, Meg, I was angry too—at myself, at my parents for leaving an eleven-year-old with a sick little sister, even at the blasted Doctor’s Best Company for marketing their confounded cough syrup.”

  He jumped up, too restless to sit. His facial muscles ached from the strain of reliving this nightmare while he continued to pace. “So I stayed away from home as much as I could from age eleven to fifteen. Fell in with a group of older boys—hoodlums all.” He paused midstride, mouth thinning into a caustic smile. “And believe me, they gladly welcomed an angry rich kid with pockets deep enough to buy them booze and smokes and a brothel or two.” He hung his head, dazed at the memory, his diatribe trailing into a lifeless whisper. “Especially a kid who would steal from his parents.”

  The soft catch of her breath made him feel like the lowest of low. He put a hand to his eyes, guilt racking his soul. And I was.

  “Oh, Bram . . . I’m so sor—”

  His head jerked up as he pierced her with tragic eyes. “I know, Meg, but please—just listen and let me get this all out.” Needing his space, he moved to the front window, welcoming the cool sea air on his face. Beyond the billowing sheers, seagulls screeched and cable cars clanged as children’s laughter sailed high on the breeze. Outside all was at peace with the world while inside the horror remained in his mind.

  But not for long.

  He turned, his glossy gaze meeting Meg’s from across the room. “I’m responsible for my father being robbed that night,” he whispered, almost hoping she hadn’t heard.

  But the proof came in a feeble cry as her hand flew to her mouth.

  And yet—somehow—his shoulders felt lighter, his guilt less cumbersome than before, and moisture swelled beneath his lids. Because he knew, in God’s eyes if no one else’s, he was a man redeemed by a humble carpenter from Nazareth who had given His all. A man who had lain His life down so Bram could be free. A Son who’d sacrificed His will for His Father’s.

  Just like Bram hoped to do for his.

  And the woman I love.

  His voice droned on. “One might argue I was no more than a child, embittered and broken by life, exploited and coerced, and I suppose I was. But I was also completely aware. You see, my father had cut off my funds, forbidding me to see my so-called friends. But I knew where the safe was hidden in my father’s study, knew my father kept payroll there on Thursday evenings.” He swallowed the bile that rose in his throat. “Knew where he’d hidden the combination should Mother and I ever need to know.” Bram sank down on the love seat across from the sofa, his father’s image filling his thoughts. An image of a man he thought he hated, but one who had earned his respect that awful day. He hung his head.

  And every day since.

  “I’d been particularly angry that night, drinking more than I could handle.” Bram squeezed his eyes shut. “Enough to rail against my father to the others, threatening to steal the allowance he owed. And enough to unwittingly divulge about the safe, apparently.” His laugh was acidic, his words as painful as a deathbed confession. “An angry boy, too stupid and too drunk to know my hooligan friends had wheedled the hiding place from me before I passed out.”

  A shudder spasmed through his body, rattling his soul. “They woke me when the deed was done,” he whispered, “telling me to go home . . .” His voice broke, along with the grief in his heart. “That’s when I . . . f-found him . . . in a p-pool of blood.” He put a trembling hand to his face while repentance flowed from his eyes. “A brave man, a good man, who—unlike his son at the time—battled injustice no matter the cost. And he did, paying the price with his sight and his health.”

  “H-how . . . ?” The shocked disbelief in Meg’s voice seemed no more than a distant echo, but he heard it nonetheless, the same word he’d asked himself over and over since he’d discovered his father facedown on the crimson-stained floor.

  How could a son do this to his father?

  How could a man fight no matter the cost?

  How could a father forgive in the face of evil?

  Bram’s throat worked hard, fighting the shame that threatened to strangle his words. “In the . . . fight that ensued, my father sustained a blunt trauma to the back of the head, resulting in cortical blindness . . .” His voice choked. “And then a . . . knife w-wound to the upper chest, which j-just missed his heart.” He exhaled and bowed his head. “He’s been diagnosed with what the doctors call secondary spontaneous pneumothoraces—decreased lung reserve, shortness of breath, and chest pain.”

  “Oh, Bram . . .”

  He looked up then, craving to hold Meg in his arms, to allow her sweet balm to heal his heart like he’d tried to do for her over the years. But that wasn’t to be. Not when he had a debt to pay. He recharged with another intake of air. “My father’s an astute businessman, Meg, so despite his blindness and increasingly frail health, his shipping business hadn’t suffered. Not until he lost several ships in a typhoon a few years back.” His heart twisted as always over the tragedies his father had faced. And survived.

  “But I had no idea the true extent of his debts—that bankruptcy loomed—not until I had lunch with an old friend who works at my father’s bank.” He girded himself against a shiver. “Because you see, Meg, my parents would never tell me, would never inflict guilt on a son who’d chosen his own path as a lawyer. A selfish son who had no interest in joining ranks with his father in a business where he was desperately needed.”

  There. It was finally out.

&nb
sp; The reason he could never love Meg the way that he longed.

  For the first time since she’d entered the room, Bram felt a pinprick of peace. A tiny fleck of hope. A resolve that he and the woman before him could someday soon be nothing more than friends. “I asked Amelia to marry me this morning before I came over here,” he whispered, his eyes fused to hers. “Not because I love her, Meg, but because I love my father. Because you see—his health, his fortune—ride on this marriage, and I simply cannot let him down once again.”

  From across the room, he saw those green eyes crest with tears, but even so, he held his ground, keeping his distance. The season for comfort and open arms had ended. At least until they both could put these feelings behind. Before “the kiss” had been difficult enough, but now, it’d be excruciating, and Bram had no desire to inflict further pain on Meg or himself. To his logical, legal mind, he saw only one recourse, and somewhere in the vile gloom of night, he’d decided to take it. “I plan to stay away for a while, not because I want to, but because I need to.”

  Her body flinched as if he had struck her, but he pressed on. “It’s for the best, Meg, trust me, and it won’t be forever. Amelia and I need time to get on with our lives, and you need time to get on with yours.” He paused, ignoring the wrench of his gut when two tiny tears slithered down her cheeks. “Andrew seems to think highly of Devin, and I think highly of Andrew—he’s a godly man and pillar of our community—so I think you can trust his judgment. I’d like to think he and Devin are cut from the same cloth, so I hope you give him a chance.” He leaned in, his gaze bonded to hers. “Court him, Meg, get to know him, and see where it takes you, but one way or another, I believe God has a wonderful man who’ll love and cherish you all the days of your life.”

  ———

  Meg furiously blinked back her tears, suddenly unable to breathe. Yes, I know . . . but he plans to marry somebody else. Panic struck, whether from the heartbreak that fisted in her chest or the emotions that swelled in her throat—either way, neither air nor sound could pass.