Claiming Juliet (Evergreen Heights Alpha Daddies #3)

1. Chapter One

Chapter One

Leo

S even years ago, I left Evergreen Heights with no intention of ever seeing this town again.

Instead of towering high rises and sidewalks packed with speedwalking people, I’m surrounded by small, local shops and a handful of people wandering around like they’ve got all the time in the world.

That’s how Evergreen Heights is.

Quiet. Slow. Small.

It was the best decision of my life trading this middle of nowhere town for New York City. New York gave me exactly what I needed, money, power, distance. It just never stopped feeling empty. But I would’ve stayed far away if I didn’t get the phone call that I received yesterday .

I drive out of the little downtown area to the far edge of town that borders the miles of forest between here and the Rocky Mountains. A familiar paved driveway stretches out ahead of me, taking me past a set of black steel gates that guard a huge estate.

My family’s estate.

“Push the meeting with Reliant Steel to the 14th and have Murphy run the all hands meeting this Friday,” I say into my phone as I follow the driveway all the way down to the three-story, brick, ranch-style mansion that I grew up in.

“Just keep everything afloat until I get back. I shouldn’t be here long. ”

“Yes, sir,” my assistant back in New York City replies. She then hesitates for a second before speaking again. “And I’m sorry again about your dad.”

The weight already on my chest sinks down on me even more. I don’t want to talk about this. I don’t even want to be here.

“Email me any updates,” I tell her before hanging up the phone.

I park in front of the mansion’s entryway and shut off the BMW that I rented, silence filling the car as I stare at the double door entrance bordered by brick columns.

I remember throwing open those doors after coming home from school.

I remember sneaking Juliet through the side gate after midnight.

Kissing her where my father would never see.

I remember a lot of things about this place. Good and devastatingly bad.

“Shit,” I mutter as my head thumps against the leather seat.

Every cell in my body yearns for me to turn the car back on and leave, but I have to be here. I’m just taking care of business and then getting the hell out of here.

My jaw tightens as I push open my door and step out, sunlight washing over me as the smell of fresh, cold air and pine fills my nose. Much different from the congested air in the city.

The mountains loom in the near distance behind the estate. I used to see the most incredible sunrises and sunsets here. It’s a beautiful place, but it doesn’t make up for all the pitfalls.

I don’t even bother knocking when I reach the front door. I stick in the key that I haven’t used in seven years and walk inside, jarring silence greeting me .

My brows furrow as I make my way toward the spiral staircase leading up to the second floor. I’m used to seeing houseworkers and the occasional employee of the family business roaming around, but I don’t hear or see a soul.

The wooden floor is still sleek and clean, so this place hasn’t been completely abandoned.

A faint thud over my head sends me past the doorways leading to the kitchen, dining room, and living room.

I head up the staircase to the second floor where the six bedrooms, three bathrooms, and two half bathrooms are located.

Weak coughing sounds down the hallway where my parents’ bedroom is, and cold dread spreads throughout my entire body as I walk to the open doorway. My eyes remain on the floor for a few seconds.

I don’t want to see him, especially like this.

But I look anyway.

Frank Galloway, my father and the owner of Galloway Logging, lays in the bed that he once shared with my mother before her death. Now, he’s the one dying.

He has always been a broad man who towered over others, but I can see how frail he has become just from looking at the prominent bones showing in his hands.

An IV is inserted into the top of one of them, hooking him up to a nearby hanging bag of fluids, and there’s a clip on his forefinger that’s connected to a heart rate monitor next to the bed.

A white t-shirt seems to swallow him, and he has an oxygen mask fixed onto his pale face. He has always had a mustache, but it looks like someone shaved him recently. I barely recognize him.

“He returns,” Dad wheezes out as he pulls his oxygen mask down from his face, his hand slightly shaking.

Even in this state, he still has that abrasive attitude of his.

I remain in the doorway, my feet feeling like stone. “Why did you wait this long to tell me you were sick?”

His dark eyes, a stark difference from my blue ones, narrow slightly. “It didn’t matter until now.”

I scoff. “Didn’t matter? How does stage IV lung cancer not matter?”

It was probably all those damn cigars he smoked at the end of a long workday.

Running a logging empire wasn’t easy work .

“Nothing mattered to you,” he tells me, his voice cold and hard. “You left years ago to start your own company and never looked back. Never so much as sent a message.”

I take a few steps closer to the end of the bed, familiar anger rattling along my bones. “You forced my hand.”

Dad shakes his head at me as he does so many damn times. “I didn’t force you to do anything, Leo. I was trying to look out for you, and you still made the wrong decision.”

Heat rises to my skin, but it’s hard to shout at him when he’s in this state. Like raising my voice will somehow hurt him.

“I run the most successful construction and development company in the city. Obviously, I chose correctly,” I state in a level voice. “Whether you agree or not.”

“I don’t,” he assures me. “I was ready to hand you the company with a bow on top, and you ran for the damn hills.”

He knows that the situation was deeper than that. I didn’t run because I was scared. I ran because he gave me an impossible choice, and I decided not to entertain his bullshit any longer .

I spared myself.

I spared her .

“I didn’t come back here to argue with you,” I tell him, running my hand over my face as I fight the urge to drive back to the airport. “We need to get your affairs in order.”

“I have my affairs in order,” he says. “You didn’t have to come back here.”

“Well, I did.”

“I’m sure you didn’t want to.”

I don’t say anything at first. I’m not going to lie and tell him that I was dying to come home.

“Where’s all your paperwork? In the study?” I ask him.

“Don’t worry about it,” he mutters before letting out a weak cough that shakes his entire body. He grimaces in pain for a split second before his face hardens.

While helping out at the logging facility when I was a teenager, I saw the trunk of a fir tree roll onto his foot and a saw blade slice open his palm among a bunch of other injuries. He barely ever showed pain on his face, and he rarely ever took time off work because of an injury .

Seeing him like this fills me with unease.

“I need to worry about it. Things need to be taken care of,” I tell him, impatience edging into my voice.

“I will take care of things like usual,” he says, gritting his teeth. “I will make the decisions necessary for our family.”

A dry laugh breaks from me. What family is left?

“Like making me choose between the woman I loved and the company?”

My voice punches out fiercely, silencing him for a few seconds as we stare at each other. He has done a lot of unfair shit to me, but that really set me off.

He was cruel , and I won’t forgive him for the words he spoke that day seven years ago.

He draws in a sharp breath before speaking. “Now, you just—”

Harsh coughs interrupt him, making his entire body jolt under the blankets. He pulls the mask up over his nose and mouth, breathing in the oxygen that his damaged lungs desperately need .

The glare on my face wavers as he continues coughing to the point of wheezing, my heart rate climbing. Did I push him too far? Why am I arguing with a man on his death bed?

“What can I do? Who takes care of you?” I question him as I cross over to his bedside, ignoring him waving me off. “Dad, come on. Who do I call?”

Before he can say anything, footsteps sound behind me. I turn around just as a woman in scrubs appears in the doorway, her chocolate brown hair twisted in a loose braid over her shoulder. She looks older. Sharper. Beautiful in a way that hits like a fist to the ribs.

A woman I never expected to see again. A woman who my father once called a phase and disapproved of my relationship with her. My entire body locks up before my brain even catches up.

“Juliet.”

Disbelief fills my voice as the pieces fall into place, creating the most confusing picture.

“What are you doing here? ”

The surprise on her face shifts into something colder. Stonier.

“I could ask you the same thing,” Juliet replies before looking over at my father. “Keep the mask on, Frank.”

My eyes nearly pop out of my head. My father employed her mother as the housekeeper for years. He was the boss. He was “Mr. Galloway,” not “Frank.”

Dad obeys without arguing, lowering his hand from the mask.

What the hell is going on?

“Can I talk to you? Alone?” I ask Juliet.

Juliet purses her lips for a moment before nodding. She turns on her heel and leaves the room, striding away with a level of confidence that doesn’t match the quiet, shy girl that I fell in love with as a teenager.

I don’t know who this woman is or why she’s taking care of the same man who saw her as less than.

But I’m about to find out.