Chapter 20
Jesse stared at Parker Moreau with his halo of honey brown curls and painfully beautiful face, telling herself she should be ravaged by his betrayal.
This was the man who’d shared her bed for months. The man she had once thought was the love of her life. The man she’d been prepared to trust with her father’s worldly possessions.
But oddly, there was more a sense of resignation. As if she’d already accepted that he wasn’t the person he pretended to be. What was the old saying? A wolf in lamb’s clothing.
Still, she struggled to connect Parker to what had been happening in Canton. Maybe because in the past twenty-four hours, she’d been drugged and then smacked with a branch. Her brain felt sluggish.
“It wasn’t destiny that brought you to the same nightclub where I was working,” she finally managed to mutter. “Or for us to fall in love.”
Parker shuddered, as if horrified at the mere thought.
“Not hardly. Actually, I can’t believe you swallowed that bullshit so easily.
” He deliberately paused, his head tilted back and his shoulders squared, as if he were striking a pose in front of a mirror.
“Well, maybe I can believe it. I am a professional actor, and you were so pathetically desperate to be swept off your feet by a Prince Charming.”
Jesse shook her head. The creep had obviously practiced that speech. Gross. How the hell had she ever been fooled by him?
Maybe he was right. Maybe she was desperate to be swept off her feet. But was that so awful? Wasn’t it better to long for love than to cut herself off from the world?
Squashing the bitter anger at the knowledge she’d been so easily manipulated, Jesse forced herself to meet Parker’s mocking gaze. She wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of knowing she’d been hurt.
“You know what? I’m not embarrassed to be a regular human being with regular human needs.
At least I’m not such a failure I have to lie and cheat to get what I want.
” She flicked a dismissive glance over her ex-lover before turning her attention to Tegan.
“You hired this second-rate actor to what … seduce me?”
Tegan narrowed her eyes, clearly disappointed by Jesse’s reaction to Parker’s betrayal. No doubt she’d hoped Jesse would be devastated. With a hint of the petulance that Jesse remembered from her childhood, she moved to thread her arm through Parker’s, as if claiming him.
Good, Jesse bitterly acknowledged. She could have the worthless jackass.
“I didn’t hire him,” Tegan purred. “Unlike you, Parker tumbled madly in love with me.”
Jesse shrugged. “If you say so.”
“I do.”
“If you’re so much in love, then why was he in my bed?”
“Because I sent him there.”
Jesse grimaced. “Quite the fairy-tale romance. You’re just like your mom.”
“I’m nothing like her,” Tegan snapped, the anger that smoldered inside her glowing in the blue eyes. “I will never put myself in a position where I have to depend on a man.”
“No?” Jesse arched a brow. “Then what is Parker?”
“A useful tool.”
Despite the gnawing fear and sickening sense of disillusionment, Jesse felt a burst of satisfaction as Parker sent Tegan a glare of annoyance. They were both selfish narcissists who would eventually destroy each other. The knowledge helped to ease a portion of her resentment.
“Agreed. He’s definitely a tool,” Jesse drawled. “I’ll have to take your word he’s in any way useful.”
Tegan ignored Parker’s hiss of outrage at the insult. “He was the easiest means to get what should have been mine from the beginning.”
“What’s that?”
“My inheritance.”
“What inheritance?”
“The one Mac would have given me if you hadn’t been such a bitch.”
Jesse stared at the younger woman in confusion. “You were his stepdaughter for what? Less than two years? You can’t possibly think that gives you a claim to his inheritance.”
“It would have been longer. He would have fought for me to stay with him if you’d given us a chance to get to know each other. But no. You had to make him feel guilty every time we spent a few moments together.”
Jesse refused to feel guilty. She wasn’t the bad guy. She hadn’t lied, and tormented, and kidnapped someone because they were a sulky child who didn’t get enough love.
“You talk about my dad like he threw you out of our house. It was Victoria’s decision to leave.”
“Not by choice.”
“I was there, remember?” Jesse clenched her hands as the image of her father on his knees with his head bowed in pain seared through her mind.
“I saw her pack her bags and storm out of the bar.” She abruptly laughed, nearly forgetting Victoria’s final act of treachery before leaving.
“Oh wait, first she stole my college fund and then she drove away.”
“Because she was running from my father.”
Just for a second, Jesse thought she was talking about Mac, and she parted her lips in outrage. Then, she abruptly recalled that Tegan had revealed the truth about her father.
“You mean Buzz?”
Tegan’s jaw hardened, as if she was clenching her teeth. “Why do you think she kept changing our identities each time we moved?”
“Because she was a serial killer?”
“My father was a total loser. He drank, he did drugs, and he slept with any sleazy whore who happened to be around.”
“Your mom had strange taste in men,” Jesse pointed out dryly.
Tegan wasn’t amused. In fact, she looked like she was barely resisting the urge to give Jesse another slap.
“She was an idiot, but at least she had enough brains to get away from Buzz,” she instead retorted in cold tones.
“Unfortunately, he wasn’t the kind of guy who appreciated being abandoned by his pregnant wife.
Especially when he knew my mom had upgraded to a more prosperous lifestyle, leaving him to wallow in his squalor. ”
“What did he do?” Jesse asked, determined to keep Tegan talking.
Not only because she was genuinely curious, but she was clinging to the hope that she’d managed to contact emergency services and someone was on the way to save her.
Tegan shrugged. “At first he was content to be paid off for keeping my paternity a secret. Eventually, however, he wanted to have his cake and eat it too.”
Jesse tried to imagine how a low-level druggie named Buzz could have any cake, let alone some left over to eat. He sounded like the sort of dude who was always scrambling for money. Then she recalled exactly what had happened to Victoria’s husband.
“He was the one who shot Maitland in the head, not your mother,” she breathed.
“Yes. I assume he thought it would scare my mom into going back with him to the trailer park. Along with the money she’d embezzled from his company.”
Jesse snorted. The man obviously had fried every brain cell if he thought he could force Victoria to return to the trailer park.
“Instead, she took the cash and disappeared.”
“Exactly. That’s why we never settled down in one place.”
Jesse had briefly considered the possibility that Victoria had hidden her identity to escape an abusive ex, but once she’d concluded that her stepmother was some sort of black widow, she’d dismissed the theory. A stark reminder that things weren’t always as black-and-white as she wanted to believe.
Her father wasn’t perfect. Victoria fought tooth and nail to crawl out of poverty. Even Tegan had battled a few demons. That didn’t erase their sins, but it did give an insight into their motivations. Probably even Parker had some sort of sob story.
“Did Buzz kill Liam Tanner?” she asked, once again keeping Tegan talking.
“No, my mom drugged him and staged the fire along with the explosion after she overheard Liam telling his stripper that he was getting rid of us so she could move into his mansion.”
It was said without emotion. Clearly, Tegan wasn’t grieving that particular stepfather.
“That’s when you came to Canton?”
“Eventually. When the money started to run low.” Tegan curled her lips. “It was a cheaper place to live. Unfortunately, it didn’t have the easy meal ticket my mom was hoping for. In the end, she was forced to marry Mac.”
Jesse blinked, glaring at the woman who’d been the driving force in creating the tragedies in Jesse’s life.
“You forced her. You were the one who wanted Mac as your stepfather. If you’d let her leave town, none of this would have happened.”
“Shut up.” Tegan looked annoyed. Jesse didn’t know whether it was because Jesse had interrupted her story or because she didn’t want to take the blame.
“My mom was willing to endure the marriage for a few years, just to get back on her feet and start looking for her next husband. Unfortunately, she waited too long. Dear ol’ Dad showed up. ”
“In Canton?”
Tegan nodded. “The day before we tried to leave town. He cornered her in the park, insisting that she leave with him.”
So it hadn’t been Adam Tillman threatening Victoria. Yet another mistake that Jesse had made. No wonder she ended up kidnapped in a decrepit boathouse. She’d been so stupid.
Her bout of self-pity was interrupted as she was struck by a sudden thought. “How did he find her? Canton isn’t exactly the first place you would look for a missing wife.”
“I have no idea. She was always careful to stay off the radar. No social media or large public gatherings where a picture might end up in the newspaper.”
The mention of a picture jogged Jesse’s memory. “It must have been Dix.”
“Who?”
“A college kid who worked for Bea. He recognized Victoria from her days in the trailer park, when she was still Sylvie Fulton.”
Tegan waved away the explanation, clearly not interested. “She didn’t say anything about him. All I know is that she convinced my dad that she could get her hands on a large chunk of cash if he’d wait twenty-four hours.”
“Yeah, my large chunk of cash.”
Another dismissive wave of her hand. “Whatever. Mom had no intention of becoming a hostage to her ex, so we snuck off early.”
“Snuck off ?” Jesse rolled her eyes. “She staged a raging fight with my dad before storming off with my money.”