“Give him a chance to explain.” Stuart leaned over to whisper.
My jaw ticked in response as I picked up my purse and slung it over my shoulder. “How long have you known about the calls?”
Stuart held up his hands. “I just learned it was a possibility on Saturday. Hunter had a hunch that they were from Eleanor so he had me pull the records. We didn’t know for sure until late last night. You were so freaked this morning, I made a judgment call not to tell you. I didn’t need you trying to claw Eleanor’s eyes out in front of the judge.”
My head fell. “That was probably a good call.”
Annoyed as I was with the secrets, I couldn’t be upset with the outcome of the case. Eleanor had been likely to get some time with Coby no matter what, but at least now that time was under my control.
“Please let me know if there is anything else I need to do to wrap this up,” I told Stuart.
“I will. The ball is in Eleanor’s court now. If she makes contact, you can set the terms for her to see Coby.”
I nodded. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me.” Stuart collected his papers and briefcase. “Thank Hunter.”
I would.
For Coby.
Stuart shook my hand and left, nudging through the blockade of bodies. His vacant space at my side was immediately filled with Gigi.
“I’m guessing this was all news to you today?” she asked.
“Yep.” Though in all fairness, it was only new because I’d refused to listen to Hunter’s pleas. Major fail on my part for not hearing him out. Major fail on his part for hiding this secret way too long.
She looked toward the back and frowned. “What are you going to do?”
“I have no flipping clue. For now, I’m going to go to the inn and catch up on the weekend checkouts. Then I’m going to pick up Coby and take him out for a celebration tonight, just the two of us. He won’t know that we’re celebrating but I don’t care.”
“And Hunter? You can’t avoid him forever, sweetie.”
I sighed, the exhaustion of the last hour settling heavily on my shoulders. “I don’t even know how to feel right now. I can’t talk to him until I figure that out first.”
She gave me a sad smile and squeezed my hand.
“Thanks for being here today. Even if you didn’t have to say anything.”
“I’m always here. Whenever you need.”
“Maze?” Beau called from over his shoulder.
“Yeah?”
He nodded to the back of the room where Mom had walked up to Hunter.
“Uh-oh,” Gigi muttered.
I braced, waiting for Mom to either slap Hunter or start scolding him, but she did neither. She just wrapped her arms around his tense body. “Thank you.” As quickly as she’d hugged him, she let him go, immediately walking to the door. “Brock, time to go.”
Dad didn’t say a word as he followed. He nodded at Hunter, opened the door for Mom and escorted her out.
They both knew I’d catch them up later. And they both knew that their place was not in the middle of my relationship.
“Your parents are the best,” Sabrina said, joining me and Gigi.
“Yes, they are,” Gigi and I agreed in unison.
“Do you need anything?” Sabrina asked.
“No. Thank you for coming today.”
“No problem.” She smiled at me, then announced, “Beau, it’s time to go.” She walked up to his back and laced her hand with his. When he didn’t budge, she jerked on his arm, but he still didn’t budge. “Beau.” Sabrina’s tone had sharpened. “We need to leave. This is not your business.”
He huffed. “Not my bus—”
She held up a hand and cut him off. Her movements were firm but her voice a gentle whisper. “This one isn’t your fight. Maisy can do it on her own.”
Beau’s shoulders deflated as he stared at his wife, then looked to me. “Call me if you need anything?”
I nodded. “I will. Thanks for being here today.”
“Okay. See you soon.” He turned and slapped Michael on the back, then pushed him down the aisle after Sabrina. Without a word, they passed Hunter and left the room.
Gigi hugged me good-bye, then threaded her hand with Jess’s. “Let’s go, Sheriff.”
When the door closed behind them, Hunter and I stayed in our places, separated by two rows of uncomfortable wooden chairs. After a few moments, the silence became too much and we both spoke at the same time.
“I need to go to work.”
“I’m sorry.”
I took a step toward the aisle and repeated, “I need to go to work.”
“Can we talk?”
I shook my head and started walking toward the door.
“Maisy?” he whispered when my hand hit the door handle.
I stopped but didn’t turn to look at him. “I need some time to think.”
“Please let me explain.”
My eyes teared as I stared at the wooden door. “Thank you for speaking for Coby today.” Before I started to cry, I tugged on the handle and opened the door.
“Maisy, please. Let me explain.”
“I should have listened to you, but Hunter, you had months before all this.” I pushed the door shut but kept my hand tightly wrapped on the handle. “Months to explain. Why did you wait so long?” A tear fell and I swiped it away with my free hand.
“I didn’t want to lose you. The second I told you who I was, you would have slammed the door in my face.”
“That’s not —”
“It is. You know it is.”
“Then you should have made me listen.”
“I fucked up,” he whispered. “I should have tried harder, and I’m sorry.”
I nodded. He should have tried harder. He should have pinned me to the bed, taped my mouth shut and forced an explanation on me. A courtroom was not the place for me and my family to learn he was related to Everett.
“I’m going to go.” I cracked the door again.
“Maisy, I love you.”
I loved him too. Despite my confused and frustrated head, my heart loved Hunter. Another tear fell and I knew more were about to follow. “I can’t do this here. Just . . . give me some time.”
“Okay.” He surprised me by not arguing. “Go to work. Lose yourself in a to-do list, but can I come over tonight? Please?”
I nodded and yanked the door open all the way, making my escape.
And then, just like Hunter had known, I went to the inn and lost myself in work.
Sitting on the landing of the staircase to the loft, my back was to the wall and my legs were stretched across the top step. A wineglass rested on my thigh and my head was tipped back so I could study the sky. Even after nine o’clock and well past Coby’s bedtime, it was still light this time of year. I rarely sat and appreciated the summer sunsets, usually too busy with motel chores, but tonight I had run out of steam so I’d retreated to the stairs.
“Hey.”
I dropped my head from the fading sky. Hunter stood on the bottom step. “Hi.”
He started up the stairs. “What are you doing out here?”
“I just wanted some air.” And some peace. Gigi watched the sunsets almost every night because she said they gave her peace, and since work hadn’t helped me today, I was willing to try just about anything.
“Do you want to go inside to talk?” Hunter asked when he was three steps away from the landing.
I shook my head.
“Okay.” Hunter came up the last few steps, sitting down on the top step too. With my legs stretched out between us, my feet were at his hip and I had the perfect view of his handsome profile.
I took a sip from my glass. “Do you want some wine?”
“No, I need to drive home.”
It was a relief that he had already planned to go home. After Hunter gave me his explanation, I would need space. My bed was officially a Hunter-free zone until further notice.
“Where do you want me to start?”
I took a deep breath and drained the last of my wine. “Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”
“Remember the day you got Nell’s papers? I had planned on telling you that night.”
That was the night he’d arranged for Coby to spend the night with my parents. I’d been so excited that day, thinking Hunter had something special planned for just the two of us, but the moment I’d gotten Eleanor’s petition, all of that had fallen to the wayside.
“Why not before then?” I asked. “Why not right after we met?”
“I didn’t want to lose you. I was scared you’d tell me to leave. I knew I should have told you, but I didn’t want you to shut me out. From the moment you started babbling to me in the motel lobby that first day, I just wanted to be a part of your life.”
I had wanted him in my life too. So much. “Was it real?”
“It is real. I love you, Maisy. The only thing I kept from you was the past but everything else was real.”
The lump in the back of my throat swelled. I loved him too. Despite the lies and the omissions, I loved him too. “You should have told me right away,” I whispered. “That was too much to keep secret.”
He hung his head. “I know. I was a coward and you don’t owe me anything, but can I explain?”
I took a breath. It was time to get my questions answered. “Start at the beginning.”
He ran a hand over his hair, brushing back some of the strands that had fallen out from his bun. “A few years after my mom died, Dad started dating. He was a doctor too so most of his dates were with women who worked with him at the hospital. That’s where he met Nell. She was working in the cafeteria, Dad met her at lunch one day, and four months later, they got married.”
I reached for my wineglass, frowning when I remembered it was empty.
“They got married fast, mostly because I think Dad was desperate to fill the hole Mom had left when she died. So I inherited a stepmom who was more than happy to quit her shitty job and spend Dad’s money along with a stepbrother who didn’t like having a younger brother.”
“You and Everett didn’t get along?”
“No,” he scoffed. “We hated each other. At first, I thought we could be friends. Dad worked so much, I thought maybe Everett could keep me company, but instead we fought.”
“About what?”
“Everything. He picked on me relentlessly and I fought back. I was young, pissed that Dad had brought them into my life. I wanted to go back to the days of just me and Dad. Mostly, I wanted my mom back. I took a lot of my aggression out on Everett. He did the same to me.”
“And Nell?”
“Nell treated me like a burden. Everett too. I meant what I said in court today. She doesn’t have a motherly bone in her body. As soon as she got Dad’s paychecks, she hired a nanny, not that we needed one. I was ten and Everett was fourteen when they moved in, but a nanny on staff meant she could ignore us.”
“And your dad?”
“Dad took Nell being home as an excuse to spend more time at the hospital. He got a promotion, worked his way up to chief of surgery. He’d make it home once, maybe twice a week before I was asleep. It was only when we took our fishing trips that he really paid me much attention.”
Which meant Hunter had grown up angry, sad and alone. “Why didn’t you ever tell your dad how you were feeling? From what you’ve told me, he loved you. Wouldn’t he have tried to make things better?”
Hunter sighed. “Yeah. He would have. But for all her faults, Dad loved Nell. Just not as much as my mother. Nell put in zero effort with me and Everett, but she was all about Dad. Trying to make him love her more than he did a dead woman’s memory.”
I felt a small twinge of sympathy for Nell but it faded fast. “And she was so focused on your dad, she neglected her own son?”
“Pretty much. Honestly, I don’t know how close they were before they ever moved in. They were both so greedy and selfish. I think it just became easier for Nell to ignore Everett once she got set up as a rich doctor’s wife.”
My insides twisted with mixed emotion. On the one hand, it was Everett. I loathed his memory. But on the other, I felt bad that he’d never had a loving and proud mother. “Should I feel sorry for Everett?”
“Fuck no.” He turned to look me right in the eye. “Everett was a rotten kid and grew into a rotten adult. He made his choices, not Nell. She wasn’t responsible for turning him into a drug-dealing psychopath. That was all him, the greedy motherfucker.”
Clearly, even as grown men, they had still hated each other. “So I’m guessing you and Everett never became friends?”
“No. Things between us just got worse and worse. He’d come back from college and try and seduce my high-school girlfriends. He’d buy beer for my friends but only if they didn’t tell me where they were partying. I am convinced that the only reason Everett became a doctor was because he knew I wanted to follow in Dad’s footsteps and it would piss me off.”
The more Hunter talked, the more I pitied his childhood. I couldn’t imagine the stress of having that kind of animosity in my home. Of living in a house without love. I’d grown up with parents and brothers that had adored me.
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. Everett was an asshole, but I grew up and got to the point where I just ignored him. Once I started college, I distanced myself, and then, thank fuck, he moved.”
I wasn’t as grateful about Everett’s move to Prescott. The only good thing that had come from his time here was Coby. “Why did Everett come to Montana to smuggle pills from the county hospitals? If he was a big-city doctor, wouldn’t he have made more money just working? Doctors in Chicago make good money, right?”
Everett had scammed his way into three different Montana hospitals, recruiting nurses to steal prescription pills that he later resold. I knew pills could bring in a lot of money, but enough to compete with a doctor’s salary? It didn’t add up.
“He made good money in Chicago but probably not as much as you’d think. Those pills set him up. But I think it was more than just the money. I think it was about power. He wanted to prove he was smarter than us all. And I think it was a big ‘Fuck You’ to me and Dad.”
“Why is that?”
“When Dad died, Nell inherited his insurance payout. She got the insurance. I got everything else. His money. The house. Everything. Everett didn’t get a dime. We got into a big fight after Dad’s funeral and he took off. He said he wasn’t going to work his whole life. That he would get rich faster than me or Dad ever could.”
“And that’s when he came here to Prescott?”
Hunter nodded. “For all his intelligence, he was a dumbass. He had so much fucking brainpower, but instead of using it, he was always plotting for a shortcut.”
Everett’s last shortcut had cost him his life.
“Okay,” I said. “So fast forward to now. It’s been years since Everett’s death. Why did Nell come for Coby after all this time? Why did she wait so many years to file the custody petition?”
Hunter ran a hand over his hair again and when he looked up, I didn’t like the tortured look on his face. “It wasn’t just now.”
My muscles tensed. “What do you mean?”
“The first time I saw you was the day you had Coby. I was sitting in the waiting room when Beau brought you to the hospital in Bozeman.”
“What?” My chin fell. “Why?”
“Nell sent me to ask you for Coby. She wanted you to give him over to her. She was grieving. She wanted that piece of Everett but didn’t want to be around you so I went in her place. The only reason I agreed to come to the hospital and ask you was because she said you’d sent her a letter and you were considering giving Coby up for adoption.”
“That’s a lie!” I shouted. “I would never give up my son.”
“I know that,” he said calmly. “I took one look at you and knew you’d never give him up, so I left.”
“Why would you even think about letting her take a baby if she was such a horrible mother?”
He placed a gentle hand on my knee. “I told Nell I was coming to ask you, but really, I was coming to talk you out of it.”
“Oh.” I slumped against the door.
“After that, I told Nell to leave you alone and that I wouldn’t support her case if she tried to get custody of Coby. Miraculously, she dropped it for a while and moved to Grand Rapids to get out of Chicago. I finished up my residency and took an attending position at the hospital where Dad had worked. I thought that was the end of it.”
“But it wasn’t.”
He shook his head. “No. Nell decided to go after Coby again. I just happened to catch wind of it when I ran into one of her old friends at the hospital. I went to Grand Rapids to confront Nell that night.”
“And you convinced her to drop it. Otherwise I would have heard from her, right?”
“Not exactly,” he said. “She wasn’t going to drop it so I moved here the first time. I wanted to be close in case she came to Prescott. And it was my silent threat that if she pushed a custody fight, I’d expose her secret.”
More secrets? This was exhausting. Would we ever get through them all? “What secret?”
“That Nell had already blown through my dad’s insurance money and was living on Everett’s drug money.”
Shocked, I blinked a few times as I replayed his last statement. “She knew about Everett’s drug dealing?”
“No. Maybe. I’m not sure.”
“I’m confused. How was she living off his drug money if she didn’t know about it?”
“Everett only had one checking account when he died and the balance matched up to his hospital salary perfectly.”
That made sense. He wouldn’t have been able to hide his pill mill if he’d been keeping his money in plain sight. “So where was he putting his drug money?”
“In an account in Nell’s name.”
“So he’d hidden his money with his mom.”
Hunter nodded. “That’s right. Now, I’m not sure if Nell knew it was from drugs or if she just thought he was taking care of her since Dad was gone. Regardless, after he died, she would have been able to do the math and figure out where that money had come from.”
“How did you find out?” If I were Nell, I would have kept all that information to myself.
“By accident. You see, when Dad died, I got our house but I didn’t kick out Nell. I figured it had been her home too and Dad would have expected me to help take care of her. So she stayed in the house and I stayed in the pool house. I’d been living there during my residency because I hadn’t felt like buying my own place until I knew where my career was going to land me.”
“Okay.” I was still following, but just barely. “So you’re living next to Nell after your dad dies. Everett leaves for Montana, then he dies.”
“Right. And how does Nell deal with her grief? Two days after Everett’s funeral, she takes a three-month vacation to Mexico. She just up and leaves, leaving nothing but a note for me to find days later in the kitchen. Since I’m living there, I’m getting the mail. After a month, it was piled everywhere so I decided I’d better go through it all in case there’s something important. I find these bank statements and get curious. Then I find one last envelope of cash and get really curious since it has a Montana postmark.”
“Everett’s last donation to his mom’s secret account?”
“He must have mailed it the day he died. I started putting two and two together and realized where all that money had been coming from.”
I tipped my head back to the now-dark sky and studied the stars while I let everything sink in. “Why didn’t you turn in that money? Then Nell would have been broke.”
“Because of you.”
My head snapped straight. “Me?”
He nodded. “All I ever had to protect you and Coby was my knowledge about that money. You’re right, if I’d turned that money over to the authorities, they would have cleaned Nell out. But that money is the one thing she wants more than anything else. Without it as leverage, I had nothing to keep her from harassing you. I’d have played all my cards.”
“I guess they weren’t very good cards to begin with. She still came after Coby.”
“Yep,” Hunter muttered. “I thought she’d stay away with me living here again, but I guess not.”
“Why this time?”
“I don’t know. Maybe the money’s gone? Maybe she doesn’t care anymore? I’m not sure.”
“Are you going to turn her in now?”
He shook his head. “If she tries to take Coby again, I will. But I’m hoping she’ll just disappear once and for all.”
“Why didn’t you tell the judge about any of the money stuff?”
“Stuart said it wouldn’t matter. He figured the judge would still have ruled for some visitation in her favor. He agreed I should keep this quiet unless it was vitally necessary. Just in case I need to use it later.”
I inspected my empty wineglass as I thought everything through. “No matter what you did, Nell had always planned to get back at me, huh? This was her way of punishing me for killing Everett. Which means you moved out here for nothing.”
“No.” Hunter’s hand still on my knee gripped tighter. “Not nothing. I might not have realized it at the time, but I moved here for you. I was a different man when I sat waiting in that maternity ward all those years ago. I was focused on my career and didn’t want anything more than to step into my father’s shoes. But that all changed when I saw you. It took me a while, but I realized that I wanted different things for my life. I came here thinking I was looking out for you, when really, I was looking for you.”
“Then why didn’t you come find me the first time you lived here? And why did you move away only to come back?”
His thumb drew a circle on my bare skin. “I was still tied to Chicago. I only took a sabbatical from my job and the hospital here only hired me on a temporary basis. I didn’t come and find you because I knew I’d be leaving again. Mostly, I didn’t want to bring all this shit to your life.”
“Why was it different this time around? What changed?”
“I hadn’t planned on seeing you. I had planned to come back temporarily until Nell backed off, just like the last time. But the day I got to Prescott, I saw you downtown. From that moment forward, I couldn’t stay away. Then you kicked me in the balls and I knew I was in love with you.”
I smiled at his joke. If I hadn’t felt that strong pull between us, I might have doubted his reasons, but as it was, I knew exactly how he’d felt.
“I need you, Maisy.” He scooted closer. “Please believe that. I know I fucked this all up, but please know, I did it all for you. And I’d do it again.”
“This is fucked up, Hunter,” I whispered. “You’re Everett’s stepbrother. You’re Coby’s uncle. I just . . . I can’t do all this crazy. I can’t do all the secrets.”
He took my hands. “I told you once, I’d only leave if you made me. I mean that still. I’m not going anywhere, but this is your call. I’ll fight, don’t get me wrong. I’m not giving you up easily, but if you really can’t get past it, I’ll go.”
“I love you, Hunter,” I admitted. “But I don’t trust you.”
“I’ll win it back. I’ll prove I am the only man you’ll ever need and I’ll never, ever keep anything from you again.”
I didn’t doubt his determination. I did doubt my ability to trust him again. “I need time.”
“Take as much as you want. I’ll be here when you’re ready.”
I nodded. “Okay.”
He stood from the step, bending down to kiss my temple. “Good night.”
I looked up at the stars as his footsteps echoed down the staircase and crunched on the gravel when he hit the last step.
“I love you, Maisy. Tell me you believe that.”
I didn’t break my gaze away from the sky. “I believe that, Hunter. I just don’t know if I can believe anything else.”