Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Evander
Present day…
A raccoon-eyed Violet sat huddled on the couch I’d bought when I moved in six months ago. Whatever light makeup she’d had around her eyes had smeared in the wake of the tears and shaking that had come after her vomiting.
My mind reeled.
I’m pregnant. It’s yours.
I didn’t know this woman, and she said she was having my kid.
She took a drink from the glass of water I gave her. Her hand trembled, and she hadn’t looked at me since she’d tossed her cookies in my yard. Afterward, she’d sobbed her apologies and asked where the bathroom was. When she’d emerged from the bathroom, her face had been wan, and she’d drooped like she was ready to tip over.
She was still cute, though.
She set the glass on the coffee table. She hadn’t learned a thing from what little talking we’d done the one night we’d been together. I knew I was trustworthy. She didn’t. And I didn’t know if she was full of shit or not, but I knew what the odds were.
I brushed a hand down my face. I had spent the whole morning in the field, checking on my goddamn pumpkin patch for Isla and weeding through the raspberries and the giant fucking mosquitoes who thought I was breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
Pumpkins and raspberries. What would my former soldiers say? At least pumpkins wouldn’t call me in the middle of the night because they’d gotten thrown in jail. I’d just come inside to clean up and be ready to give a pumpkin tour to Isla later this evening, and then Violet had happened.
Violet had happened once before. A nice goddamn way to spend a night, then I’d gone on my way. She’d gone hers. I had assumed. I sure as fuck didn’t expect to see her again.
I might’ve hoped. A little. But not like this. Never like this. Never again.
A shudder racked Violet’s lush body. Her curves hadn’t been my imagination, and that fucker was vivid when it came to her. How’d she find me?
Coal Haven was a small damn town, and I was a Barron. My arrival had been, and still was, the highlight of gossip hour. Even after being back for six months, no one was used to seeing me around. Likewise, I wasn’t familiar with much around Coal Haven anymore .
I should’ve asked her what “just passing through” meant when we hooked up. Did she live close by? Have a second family somewhere? I knew fuck all about this woman claiming to be carrying my baby.
“Care to tell me why you think the baby’s mine?” I asked to get a move on things. My tone came out harsher than intended. I doubled down and crossed my arms. I stayed on the far side of the living room, close to the kitchen.
She flinched and swallowed. Shit. Was she going to puke again? “Uh… I know we used condoms.” Some color returned to her face. Was she embarrassed to bring up that night? “But, um, I’m not on birth control. My ex had a vasectomy he didn’t tell me about until right before I broke up with him, even though he knew I wanted a family.”
What an asshole, but I couldn’t look like I was on her side. Had her ex been an ex when we hooked up? Was he even an ex? I’d been taken by that schtick before.
I shrugged. “Okay? And the vasectomy was for sure effective, and I’m the only guy you’ve been with otherwise?” Derision crept into my voice. I’d heard all these excuses over the years. Whether it was my exes spewing lies or other soldiers’ experiences—been there and done that.
To be fair, a lot of those instances had turned out to be true. Not mine.
She nodded. “Yeah, that’s pretty much it.”
Her nervous gaze flicked over the room, from my slate gray furniture to the generic pictures I bought to keep the walls from being bare. Then her attention fell to the maple hardwood floor.
This was the homiest place I’d ever had, but it wasn’t mine. The house was old. The bones were good, but the flesh needed a major upgrade. I had started on this room. My landlord told me it wasn’t necessary, but I was bored spitless. I needed something to do until I figured out what my next phase in life was.
Which brought me to my next question. “How’d you find me?”
I’d been targeted during my time in the army. Girls outside the gate looking for a naive soldier with a steady paycheck and benefits. Bonus points if he was deployed several times so she could collect the paychecks and do what she wanted.
Cynical? Hell yes.
“I own this place,” she said, unable to meet my eyes.
I let out a laugh. “And Linda is pretending?”
“She’s my aunt.”
I sobered. A little too much truth for my liking resonated from Violet. Her captivating eyes were dull today, and that didn’t sit well with me. I also didn’t care for the way her shoulders sagged, like she’d given up. The uninhibited passion she’d unleashed the night we spent together was nowhere to be seen.
“I should clarify,” she said hoarsely. “Linda manages the properties my grandma left behind. Grandma split them all up between me and my siblings. This house and the section it’s on are mine.”
Yet I was renting it. “So you want me out?”
She winced. “Yes and no.”
I wasn’t prepared for her honesty. A small part of me softened toward her. No, I couldn’t. This was the Kandi situation all over again. My ex had stripped my blinders right off to women like her—and Violet.
She picked at her nails. “I’m in a transition period in my life.”
Because she was pregnant. “The baby could be your fiancé’s.”
Thank fuck for my religious use of protection.
But there was always a chance…
I pushed the thought out of my head.
“It’s not.” She closed those beautiful eyes and inhaled. “He had the procedure done two years before we were together. Apparently.” Bitterness dripped off the last word. “And between the breakup and you, I had a cycle, so…” Pink tinted her cheeks.
Didn’t mean she hadn’t been with anyone else right before or right after. I’d buy stock in paternity tests before I believed her.
She waved her hands. “Don’t worry, we can do a paternity test and all that,” she said as if reading my mind. “I’m well past seven weeks, and that’s the minimum for the test. All I’d need from you is a cheek swab. I’m actually relieved to run into you. I wasn’t looking forward to calling the brewery and asking if anyone happened to know an Evan.”
“Evander,” I said gruffly.
“Hmm?”
“My name. I said Evan because I’m…I’ve been gone for a long time. I wanted to stay under the radar.”
She closed her eyes, looking more dejected than before. “Right. Linda said you’re a Barron.” Just when I was about to ask why that mattered, she pinned me with that bright gaze. “I don’t remember you. You’re, like, ten years older than me.”
“Why would you remember me? You said you were just passing through town.” How much had she lied? We didn’t talk enough for her to tell that many fibs.
“I was,” she said. “My family lived here when I was a kid. We moved to Billings when I was in high school. My sister moved to our grandma’s old house last year.”
Her phone buzzed. She dug it out of the linen shorts she wore that could be a few inches shorter if I had my way, but when she checked the screen, she deflated. She rested it on her lap, face down. “I’m in between homes. Right before I met you, I quit my job in San Diego and broke up with my long-term boyfriend. I moved to Montana, and I’ve been job hunting. I always liked Coal Haven.”
I hadn’t ever liked this town. I wasn’t sure I could. “What’s your last name?”
“Duke.”
Violet Duke. Sisters are all named after flowers and her brothers are plants. I had little more than a vague recollection of the Dukes. “Do you have older siblings?”
“Alder’s two years older than me.”
No wonder I didn’t know them. I had been in my own world, trying to break out. Now, I was in my midforties with roots and nowhere to put them.
She was homeless and jobless, and she claimed I was her baby daddy, and, oh, by the way, this house was hers too.
Was I in that different of a position? I wasn’t exactly homeless. Nor was I jobless. I was growing goddamn pumpkins. “Let me get this straight. You want to move to Coal Haven. Ideally, you’d like to move in here. And now you’re pregnant. But you think it’s mine?”
“There’s only been you. ”
A possessive fuck yeah, there’s only me went through my mind.
“But like I said, we can do a paternity test. I don’t mind. I would want to if I was in your place.”
“And what place is that?” I had to hear her say it in her matter-of-fact way. Make this sound less crazy.
I couldn’t be a fucking dad.
I was too damn old.
And I didn’t know what the hell to do about my own dad.
Violet rubbed her temples, and the pallor from when I’d opened the door returned to her face. She groaned.
I pushed off the wall but ordered my feet to stay planted. The urge to sit next to her, tug her to my lap, and let her nap against me grew until my muscles twitched.
Holding her wasn’t all I wanted to do. My dick knew exactly what she felt like, those little needy noises she made, and how fucking responsive she was.
I searched her face. This had to be a scam. I couldn’t figure my way around the rules, but I would. The routine was usually the same. Baby trap the guy, then get his money and benefits. Only Coal Haven wasn’t by an army post. Did the guys who worked at the plants and mines in the nearby area have issues like soldiers often did?
I didn’t know. I’d followed Violet to the little motel because I couldn’t not follow her. I went against my better judgment for the first time in years and had a one-nighter.
A night I hadn’t wanted to end.
But it did. And she was pregnant.
Oh, and she wanted me to move out of the place I was renting.
Surprise, surprise .
Fuck. What if the baby was mine? All these years, despite all my best efforts, I had a kid.
My mom would…
She’d fucking love it. I’d have to see the joy of the news on her face and the crestfallen disappointment when I told her I was going to have nothing to do with seemingly sweet, clever Violet.
“You need to go.” I felt like shit as soon as I said it. What kind of monster kicks a sick, pregnant lady out? “I’ve got six months left on my lease. You might want to live here, but then you shouldn’t have rented it to me.”
She closed her eyes, and all the air leaked out of her. Didn’t she get enough sleep? Under that runny mascara, how much of the dark smudges were from the shadows under her eyes?
She inhaled and squared her shoulders. “Yeah. Okay.” She opened her eyelids and listed to the side like she was ready to drop. “I’ll order the test when I get back to Billings. It’ll be late, but I’ll get online tomorrow. We’ll need a sample from you, but I can drive back from Billings to?—”
“Billings is a six-hour drive.” It was already late afternoon. She’d be driving until late, and she already looked haggard as fuck. Cute but ragged.
She nodded, uncaring of the trip. “Long drive, but it’s peaceful.”
She shrugged the blanket off. Did the fabric smell like a pasture full of wildflowers in the middle of summer like she did?
The woman had been worse than a ghost. Her scent had haunted me for three months. Too bad she’d turned out like the others.
The phone on her lap buzzed again. She went stiff and dropped her gaze to it, only to immediately lift her focus back to me. “I need to get back to keep up the job hunt.”
She’d driven that far just to kick me out? Why wouldn’t a phone call do?
Would I have recognized her curt voice? Would she have figured out it was me? She might’ve eventually tracked me down with the help of Reservoir Barrel. A crusty guy named Evan? I would’ve been hunted down. Especially if she needed money.
“How long have you been out of a job?” Didn’t she say she quit before she met me? Three months ago?
“The whole employment thing has been taking longer than I anticipated.” She waved at her stomach. Her phone continued to vibrate. Without looking, she silenced it. “I can’t get through an interview without puking, so I might have to find something part-time. I think it’s the stress amping up the morning sickness. I used to be good at interviews, but that was before I had to ambush a future employer with maternity leave.”
A pang of sympathy hit me in the middle of my stomach. No, I could not fall for it. My kid or not, she was most likely a user.
Been there; done that.
She hadn’t known my last name, and she hadn’t known I was fully retired. I wouldn’t become a millionaire from my benefits, but I did okay. Well enough to do whatever the fuck I wanted.
Unless I had a kid.
Goddammit.
She jumped when her phone started buzzing again. Again, without looking, like she’d done it a zillion times, she pushed the button to silence it. “I’ll just need your phone number.” Only then did she look at her screen. Her right eye twitched.
My curiosity got the better of me. “You sure you can program my digits in between whoever keeps calling you?”
Her jaw went tight. “Yes. That’ll work.”
So she was cagey about the calls? Interesting. I rattled off my number. She was midpunching it in when her damn phone vibrated again.
She punched the screen, and then her eyes widened. “Shit.”
She fumbled the device and pressed a red button. Red colored her cheeks deeper, thanks to the fucknut who wouldn’t leave her alone.
After abandoning the phone on her thigh again, she wiped under her eyes. When she saw the makeup remnants on her fingertips, she blanched and continued swiping at the smudges. “So. Yeah. I’ll call you. We’ll do the test. You can figure out what you want to do with your rights when the results come back. As for the house, you’re right. You’re renting. Uh…” She sucked in another breath, and her gaze jumped away. “The lease won’t be up for renewal.”
Six months. At least I’d get those goddamn pumpkins harvested.
She rose and primly straightened her skirt and the blouse that was the light blue of a winter sky. Did she dress up to try to kick me out of the house and tell me I’d be a daddy?
I’d see her to the door and that’d be the end of it until I had to prove her right or wrong about the baby.
She trudged to the door. “So, um. Thanks.”
I yanked my gaze off her round ass. Dammit, I’d been staring. And what the hell was she thanking me for? For kicking her out or for being the dumbass who couldn’t resist going to her motel room that night?
I could at least make sure she got to her car without vomiting. I wasn’t heartless, and while I might be tossing her out for good reason, my mom would hate how I treated her. Mom would hate how ruthlessly I shot down a lot of women over the years.
And I detested how I didn’t want Violet to leave when that was absolutely what she had to do.
“I’ll walk you out.”
Violet opened the screen door and stopped. “You have company.”
I looked over her head, her wildflower scent floating up around me. My gut fell to my feet. I had missed the sound of the engine coming down the drive. All my focus had been on the wan pixie on my couch.
My cousin Isla and her brother Stetson were coming up the steps. They were near the stairs, looking at the gorgeous land around the house.
How was I going to explain Violet’s presence? Hey, I just learned her last name, and she says she’s having my kid? Speaking of kids, how are yours who I’ve never met?
Isla’s eyes went wide when her gaze landed on Violet. A grin spread across her face.
Shit. With Violet’s arrival, I’d forgotten Isla said she’d stop by with official contracts I told her I didn’t give a crap about. She could screw me over. Growing goddamn pumpkins kept me busy while I figured out what the hell I should do about my aging parents.
How the hell was I going to explain Violet?