Six
Branwen
Trying to stay in the moment with Stevie while tossing small pieces of bread out to the ducks was a struggle. My mind was on the results of the test. What would I do if Linc fought me for custody? He wouldn’t do that. He hadn’t wanted a kid. It was my biggest fear, yet I knew that it was very unlikely. I was a good mom. There was no reason for the courts to take my daughter from me. But this was Linc Shephard. He had pull and power in places that unsettled me. That wouldn’t be an issue though because he did not want a child.
Stevie’s laughter made my heart clench tightly. He might not have wanted a kid, but he’d been taken by her. I’d seen it, and part of me wanted to wail because what if I had kept her father from her and he’d have been a good one? The other part of me had wanted to grab her and dash out the door. She was mine. I was terrified at the thought of sharing her. It was incredibly selfish, and I knew that, but it was still there. I couldn’t help it. Trusting him to not break her heart would be hard. How would I be able to do that?
Hudson had called, and I’d sent it to voice mail. I just couldn’t talk to him right now. Not until I knew what Linc intended to do about the fact that he had a daughter. There was no longer a chance that I could keep this from Hudson. Stevie would tell him all about it. If I asked her to not tell him, then that would be asking her to lie for me. There were many things I could rationalize away, but that wasn’t one of them. This wasn’t her fault.
I was going to have to tell Hudson something, even if Linc sent us back to Tennessee with my signed papers. I would have to admit to my lies and hope he could forgive me. Not only could he call off the wedding, but he could also fire me. I’d be without a job. My hand went to my chest, and I rubbed. Panic was growing by the second, and it hurt to breathe deeply. I could not black out in a full-blown attack. I’d not had one in years. I was stronger than I had once been.
“Hey! He’s back!” Stevie’s voice called out, and my head snapped up to look at her as she waved her hand excitedly.
Linc was here. He’d come looking for us. He knew.
Slowly, I stood up from the patch of grass I had been sitting on and dusted off my bottom before turning to face him. All I could hear was the pounding of my heart and the rush of blood as it pumped in my veins. This was it. I sucked in a breath, but it was a sharp pang instead of relief.
I couldn’t see his eyes behind the sunglasses he was wearing. But the firm line of his mouth wasn’t happy. That almost spurred my anger enough to overcome the terror rising in me. I hadn’t come here, asking for anything other than a divorce. What was he angry about? Not knowing he had a daughter? Well, he hadn’t exactly left me with a way to get in touch with him. Just a note and a freaking pill.
“There’s no need to tell you the results. You knew.”
The accusation in his tone only fueled my temper.
I lifted my chin and glared at the dark lenses covering his eyes. “You didn’t leave me a way to contact you. Not even a name. Just a pill.” I tossed out that reminder before he could start in with the you kept er from me thing.
“Which you didn’t take.”
My eyes flared, and I was so close to slapping his face. How dare he! She was standing feet away from us, feeding the ducks.
“I did take the pill,” I hissed at him, hating to even admit it. That pill could have robbed me of the little girl who owned my heart. “It isn’t one hundred percent effective.” Thank God.
His jaw worked back and forth. He knew I was right. Arguing with me about it and throwing out blame were pointless. The marriage we hadn’t known was legal was the only reason I had come to find him—again. The first time he never needed to know about. That was my secret to keep.
“I’ll follow you back to the motel to get your things. Then, you’re coming to my house. We have things to discuss. My lawyer will meet us there at my office.”
His house? Lawyer? I didn’t like that idea. It sounded threatening. He hadn’t wanted a child. He didn’t get to want her now.
“Why?” The franticness in my tone made me wince.
I was trying to act calm, but I was afraid that I was failing.
He cocked an eyebrow. “What did you think would happen? I’d find out I have a four-year-old daughter and sign the papers, then let you leave with her?”
“OH! I’m fowah too!” Stevie said, rushing up to us. “Can I meet huwah? She can come feed the ducks with us.”
My sweet baby girl. The path I had set up for her had just taken a turn I’d never expected. One I had never wanted.
I stared at him for a brief second, then bent down to look at her perfect little face. “Honey, we need to go to Mr. Shephard’s house so Mommy can go to a meeting there. Let’s get our things together, and we will go to the car. You can ask me questions on our way.”
Her eyes sparked with excitement for going back to the house she’d thought was a villain’s castle. I was afraid her description might be accurate after all.
“Yay!” she squealed and bounced on the balls of her feet.
Standing back up, I held my hand out for her to take. More so for my reassurance than hers. She was perfectly happy, and that was as it should be. The weight on my shoulders wasn’t hers to bear. My gaze went back to Linc.
“Our things are already in the car,” I told him.
We didn’t have much, seeing as I hadn’t been planning on the overnight trip. I always kept a change of clothing for both of us in the trunk. It was a habit I’d started when she was a baby and always messing up both our outfits.
“I’ll follow you,” he repeated in a clipped tone.
What did he think, that if he didn’t follow me, I would take off back to Nashville and have the Southern Mafia showing up at my front door? Um, no thanks. But then he didn’t know that I was aware of his ranking inside the Mafia. I’d honestly thought when he read my first and last name on that marriage certificate, it would have dawned on him. The realization of who I was and how he would respond was something I’d played out many ways in my head. None of those things had happened though, seeing as he didn’t remember me at all.
With my hand wrapped protectively around Stevie’s, I walked to the car and unlocked it. She climbed inside and sat in her car seat. The anticipation of going back to the black mansion and getting to see the inside making her bouncy. Taking my time, I buckled her in, then kissed the top of her head.
This would be okay. It had to be. Linc wasn’t a monster. He had questionable morals, and I didn’t trust him, but he wouldn’t want to do anything that would hurt Stevie. I had to believe that much.
Even when he had been a young man, I remembered his struggle at being a father. I’d overheard him talking to Garrett and Creed more than once about how he was failing his son. How he wasn’t cut out to be a dad. He would agree that the best thing for Stevie was Hudson. He wanted to be her father. He wanted children of his own too. His house even had a white picket fence.
Twenty-Eight Years Ago
I huffed with frustration at my dad’s refusal to let me ride the new two-year-old colt that had arrived yesterday from the family in Georgia. Dad thought I didn’t know about the family or who the Hughes were, but I did. It was hard not to hear things, always being here. Adults would talk around me, thinking I was just a kid and didn’t understand. I probably knew more than Daddy did.
Picking up the saddle and placing it on the bench, I scowled at the other tack around me. I wanted a saddle like these. Mine was used and beat up. Garrett’s wife had a saddle with turquoise-blue leather and crystal beads outlining it. I loved that saddle. I’d asked for one this past Christmas, but Daddy had said that was out of his budget. That pretty saddle was never used. It just sat there, making me envious.
“Hey, Ringlets,” the voice I loved above all others said, wiping away my foul mood.
I snapped my head around to see Linc walking into the room. His head tilted, and his eyes narrowed slightly as he studied me. “That was some serious scowling you were doing. Which one of these saddles offended you?”
My heart fluttered, and the giddiness that came from seeing him bubbled up inside me. He had been gone all week. Normally, he stopped by once or twice. I’d missed seeing him. The hand that was behind his back came around to the front, holding a bright yellow daisy.
He stopped in front of me and tucked it behind my right ear. “All right, my wild gypsy girl, tell me what has you in a mood.”
“My dad,” I grumbled.
He looked surprised. “Your dad? You got a great dad. One of the best.”
I knew that. But sometimes, he wasn’t fair. Like today, when I’d wanted to ride the colt.
I shrugged. “He’s being unfair.”
Linc threw his leg over the bench and sat down, straddling it so that he was closer to my eye level. “That’s a parent’s job. To be unfair. But he has a reason. I’m sure of it. Hell, I wish I could be the kind of dad yours is. I happen to suck at it, Ringlets. Parenting is hard.”
I hated the reminder that he had a family. A wife and son. People that he belonged to when my heart believed that he belonged to me. I was his Ringlets.
I bit my bottom lip and dropped my eyes to the ground. “I bet you don’t boss Levi around all the time. Tell him no when he really wants to do something.”
I didn’t see him with Levi that much, but I did see Garrett with his son, Blaise, who was the same age. Garrett never corrected the kid, and he was a hellion.
Linc chuckled. The deep rumble always gave me goose bumps.
“Levi is a six-year-old boy. All I do is tell him no. You’ve seen him. Last time I brought him here, what did he do?”
The corner of my mouth drew up, even when I didn’t want to smile. The memory of it was funny. I’d wanted to hate Levi because Linc loved him so much. I was jealous. I didn’t like seeing him with another kid. One he seemed to care about more than me. But Levi had been cute and hard not to like.
“He let out Wolfgang after breaking the railing on the south pen, walking on it like he was on a tightrope in the circus,” I replied.
Wolfgang was one of Garrett’s champion horses. He’d won more races than any other horse at the stables.
Linc reached out and tugged on one of my curls. “That last part he did was to impress you,” he told me. “Couldn’t really blame the kid. He might be young, but he isn’t blind. But what did I do to him after all that?”
I thought back. “Um, you tossed him over your shoulder like a sack of potatoes and hauled him to your truck while he screamed and pounded his fists on your back.”
Linc nodded. “Yep. He wanted to stay and ride, like I’d promised him, but he didn’t listen, and I took him home without getting to ride. Reckon he thought I was unfair then too. Like I said, being a dad is hard work, but whatever your dad did, it was for your own good.”
I crossed my arms over my chest, not liking the fact that he was taking my dad’s side. Linc was supposed to always side with me.
“I just want to ride the new colt. Garrett let Blaise ride him, and he’s only six. I’m ten, and I’ve been riding longer than that.”
Blaise Hughes was a terror. Levi might have broken a railing, but Blaise did much worse than that on a regular basis. His mom might never come to the stables, but Blaise was here too often. Daddy never corrected him either. He just let Blaise do what he wanted.
Linc studied me as I fought off the tears welling in my eyes. I didn’t want to cry in front of him and look like a baby. I liked it when he called me fearless. He let out a sigh, then stood up. Disappointment that he was leaving had me scrambling to think of anything to keep him with me for a little longer.
“Why don’t you get your saddle ready?” he said. “I’ll go see if I can talk to Demeter.”
I blinked, my heart soaring as I stared up at him. When he glanced down at me, his blue eyes twinkled, and he winked before heading toward the door. I watched him go, sure that I would love Linc Shephard with all my heart forever.