Chapter Thirteen
“This isn’t happening.” Sarah reread the text on her phone, struggling to even see the words because her hands were shaking so badly.
Emily and I are on the island. Just arrived at your house. And Ian’s here, interestingly enough. We’ll come down to the wharf shortly.
“We need to go.” Shoving her phone back in her purse, she scrambled up from her seat. “Now.”
“Why? What’s up?” Kenzie grabbed her coffee and followed suit.
Her mom was messing with her, right? Only her mom wasn’t a prankster by any means. Which meant Emily and her mother really were at Gran’s house just up the road. And, apparently, Ian was with them.
She increased her stride, her stomach churning as she practically ran out of the building and back down the wharf.
“Hold on already?” Kenzie struggled to keep up. “Sarah, you look like you’re about to puke. What is it? Emily? Is she hurt?”
“No. She’s here.”
“Oh. Really?” Confusion clouded her friend’s tone. “Is that such a bad thing? I mean I know you didn’t plan on her coming out, but Whidbey is a fun place for kids.”
Kenzie had no idea. Was completely clueless of the potential damage control Sarah was facing.
They were just blocks from the house when she spotted them. Ian, Emily and her mother were walking side by side down the street toward them.
Her stomach heaved as she noted the way Emily seemed to be chatting a mile a minute. The closer they got, more nauseous Sarah became. Her mother looked almost stunned, and Ian…
Oh. Fuck.
He knew.
Outwardly, Ian didn’t look too upset, but she knew him well enough to read the signs. The tension in his shoulders and the way he stared her down. If his gaze could shoot bullets she’d be bleeding to death right now.
“Mom!” Emily broke free from her grandma and ran the short distance that separated them, throwing herself into Sarah’s arms.
“Hey, baby.” She clung to her, squeezing probably much tighter than she should’ve.
“Grandma said we were going to come out here and surprise you. Make it a mini vacation.”
“I’m…surprised.” She lifted her head and stared at her mom. How could you? she asked silently.
The guilt on her mother’s face showed she’d known exactly what she was doing. What she’d risked.
“So, you’re Emily?” Kenzie asked brightly, as oblivious to the tension among the group as Emily was. “You must be Sarah’s daughter who I’ve heard so much about.”
“Yeah.” Emily nodded and pulled away from Sarah, but still gripped her hand. She stared up at Kenzie curiously.
“Well aren’t you pretty?” Kenzie grinned. “You’ve got that long pretty hair, just like your mom. And those green eyes… Wow, you almost could pass for a McLaughlin…” Her voice trailed off and her brows knit. “Wait. How old are you?”
“She’s ten,” Ian said flatly.
Kenzie’s gaze darted from Emily and then up to Ian, before finally moving back to Sarah.
“Sarah?” There was accusation in Kenzie’s tone. Disbelief.
The world spun around Sarah. Bile rose sharply in her stomach as panic clawed at every inch of her being. Instinct had her trying to step around Ian, to rush to the house with Emily, but he stepped in front of her.
His green eyes—the same eyes as Emily—shimmered with a thin layer of shock, but more than that there was such a fierce rage that had her trembling.
“Kenzie, do me a favor and take Emily and Ana down to the ice cream shop for a cone.” Ian’s words were remarkably calm. Soft even. “I need to have a chat with Sarah for a bit.”
Kenzie was quiet for a moment, still completely flummoxed. “I…ugh, yeah. I can do that. Do you like ice cream, Emily?”
“Do fish like water? Ugh, yeah, I do. Bring it on!” Emily tugged on Ana’s hand. “Come on, Grandma.”
Ana gave a slight nod and moved to take Emily’s hand again.
“Mom, are you sure you don’t want to come?” Emily asked.
More than anything. Actually, she wanted to grab her daughter and run like hell for the next ferry off the island.
She tried to speak past the lump in her throat. “You go and have fun. I’ll spend time with you soon, Em.”
“Okay.”
Sarah didn’t move. Likely couldn’t have, as she watched the three trudge back down the street toward the ice cream shop.
Ian didn’t say a word, but she could feel his stare. She nearly quaked under it.
“Ian—”
“Back to the house. We’re not going to do this here.”
He turned and strode back to the house, leaving her no choice but to follow.
Do this. She didn’t even want to imagine what do this entailed. She’d feared this moment. Had gone almost eleven years without having to face it, and had naïvely assumed it would never occur.
And then one trip back to the island unraveled everything.
She wondered if being left the house, and its stipulation, had been part of a bigger plan of Gran’s. That maybe it had very little to do with being left property, and everything to do with tying up loose ends between Sarah and Ian.
Gran, tell me this wasn’t your plan all along.
Ian opened the door and let her walk in first before closing it behind him.
She wasn’t sure what she expected. Not violence toward her. Not from Ian. But she didn’t doubt he wanted to throw his fist through a wall or something.
“Why?” It was just one question, so heavy with disbelief and pain. A hard shrug accompanied it as he stared down at her.
She wasn’t even sure how to answer. Struggled to find an acceptable one.
“You didn’t tell me about my own child,” he ground out. “She is my daughter, isn’t she? I will hear the truth from your lips.”
“Yes,” she whispered. “Emily is your daughter.”
“Fuck.” His curse was a roar that resonated through the house, and she cringed instinctively.
There was silence for a moment, heavy and swelling, as he paced the room and shook his head.
“You were so damn calculating. You flat-out told me she was eight the other day. ‘She’s eight, almost nine.’ You said it so casually, as if you weren’t blatantly lying. You planned that, didn’t you? If I asked.”
“Yes.” She couldn’t deny it. That had been her plan for anyone on the island who asked.
It was why she didn’t post pictures of her daughter online. Why she didn’t even carry them in her wallet here. Emily had her frame, and she was on the smaller side. She could pass for eight, but those McLaughlin green eyes were a dead giveaway that he was her father.
“Did you feel no guilt at all for withholding the fact that the child in front of me was mine? That for eleven years you’d never bothered to tell me you got pregnant?”
“I couldn’t tell you.”
“Why? Because I was nothing? Because I was a pathetic excuse for a human? Because there would never be anyone more important in my life than myself?”
He threw all the words back at her with the same violence she’d once used to fling them at him. And they hit their mark. Shame sizzled through her again and she dropped her gaze.
Please, oh, please, she couldn’t throw up. Even if her stomach was madly tossing around the dinner she’d eaten.
Those words were pretty awful. How had she ever said them that day, no matter how furious or hurt she’d been?
“Tell me. Did you know you were pregnant when you left the island?”
“No. I didn’t find out until shortly after arriving in Japan.”
“And it never occurred to you that I might want to know?” he snarled. “All this time. I had so much guilt for being an arsehole. For having a fling with our friend that I can’t even remember.” He shook his head. “But this is so much worse. This is my child.”
The horror and devastation on his face were hard to see, and the guilt rising in her throat threatened to choke her.
“I hated you when I left.” It was a shitty explanation, but it was the only one she had. “My dad kept telling me I couldn’t trust you, and that you wouldn’t have been able to handle being a father.”
“Your dad would tell you anything to turn you against me. He hated me!”
“He was trying to do what was best for me and Emily. You would’ve resented having a child thrust on you.”
“No. Don’t speak for me, Sarah. Don’t be my voice.” He strode forward, the look on his face so savage she stumbled backward against the wall. “Fucking hell, you already made a choice for me that you had to no right to make. I would never have turned my back on my kid. If you knew me at all, you would’ve realized that.”
Yes. She did know that. Now. She hadn’t been in the emotional place to process it at the time. But after Emily was born and life had settled down a bit, it had sunk in.
Family was everything to the McLaughlins. Of course Ian would have wanted to know. And she’d nearly told him at one point.
She trembled at his proximity. Her lashes fluttered closed—which only made it worse as she breathed in the familiar scent of him. He consumed her with his fury.
“I almost called you,” she choked out. “Emily had just turned one, and I had started to regret not telling you. Not giving you the chance to see how amazing our little girl was. I wanted you to at least decide if you wanted to be a part of her life.”
His hand closed over her shoulder and then he trailed his fingers toward her neck.
“You’re killing me. Every word out of your mouth is killing me,” he muttered raggedly, his thumb sweeping over the rapid pulse in her neck. “What stopped you from calling me?”
He wouldn’t hurt her. Still, she knew, even though she could sense the violence barely leashed inside him.
The lump in her throat grew. “My dad. He discovered I was going to contact you, and handed me a printout of a background check on you.”
She opened her eyes and watched realization flicker on his face, and then the dejection.
“Ah. So you knew I had a felony on my record before I told you the other day.”
“Yes. And when I learned…I had to think of Emily, not just myself. Maybe it sounds horrible, but it reaffirmed I’d made the right choice by deciding to raise Emily by myself.”
“But you didn’t raise her by yourself, did you?” He laughed harshly and thrust away from her, as if he couldn’t stand to be near her anymore. “You married some other sucker and told Emily he was her dad.”
Some other sucker. Ouch. The blows kept coming. And you deserve them.
“No. I mean, yes to part of it. I married someone else my dad introduced me to. But I never led Emily to believe he was her dad.”
“Ah. Which would be why she refers to him as Neil. How convenient.”
She blinked away the tears that burned, because she would not cry right now. Though, oh Lord, she was so close to it. He had no idea what she’d been through.
“My life was anything but convenient,” she said quietly, reaching the threshold for his verbal attack. Whether it was deserved or not. “Whether you believe me or not, my life was a personal hell.”
*
Ian couldn’t hide another laugh of dismay.
Oh that was just grand. Sarah was trying to make herself into a victim. What a surprise. Or not really.
Nothing could surprise him much at this point.
It really didn’t get much worse than discovering you’d been chatting to a ten-year-old child who turned about to be the daughter you’d never known about.
He couldn’t even bring himself to reply to what could only be Sarah’s attempt at getting his pity. Right about now pity was the last emotion he felt for her.
His emotions toward her ran the gauntlet. Something so close to hate vibrated through him, but beneath it, barely breathing, was the ember of that hopeless ache for her that linked them.
Even vulnerable, distraught and visibly close to tears she was lovely. And so delicate.
Despite his rage, there was still that confounding gut-level instinct to want to comfort her. To pull her into his arms and hold her. To do what he could to take away the distress and guilt from her face. To forgive her.
Which is how you know you’ve drunk the Kool-Aid, mate.
Sarah didn’t deserve his pity. She didn’t deserve anything from him but disgust.
Had he ever really known her? How could he have loved—and thought he was falling in love with again—a woman who could keep such a massive, life-changing secret from him?
“Ian, you were never supposed to know.” Her words sounded half-arsed now. As if she just wanted him to say it was okay and that he could understand why she’d done what she had.
He doubted he would ever be okay, but as much as he hated to admit it, he could almost understand her choices. Could see her how she’d rationalized it.
Who wanted their kid to have a felon for a father?
“It’s why I didn’t bring her to the island when I came. Why I’ve never come back until now,” she continued. “If you’d never found out, you’d be oblivious.”
“Oblivious through your doing. And unfortunately, I’m not oblivious anymore. I’m—” he shook his head, thrusting his fingers through his hair “—not even sure what the hell I am. Or who I am. Though, apparently, I’m a father.”
Fuck it all. A manic laugh exploded from his throat and again he had to curl his hands into fists.
She shook her head and her voice was low as she said, “Listen, you don’t have to keep saying that. I don’t expect anything from you. I know you don’t want kids.”
“Now how the hell would you know that?”
Dismay flickered across her face. “Are you serious? You told me just this morning you didn’t want any.”
He dismissed her words with a wave of his hand. “It’s habitual. I’ve said it for so long, it’s just what I say.”
That seemed to really take the wind from her sail. She reared back, fear flashing in her eyes now.
“I don’t understand. What do you want from us, Ian? What do you want me to do?”
That was a loaded question. Christ, he didn’t even know himself.
“I don’t know, honestly. I need to think.”
She nodded. “Me too.”
This time he bit back the snort of disdain. “No. What could you possibly have to think about now? The ball is in my court, doll. You have no right to try and call the shots from here on out. Got it?”
The fear amplified in her eyes. “You’re not going to take my daughter from me.”
She moved quickly toward the front door, but he intercepted her—suspecting she was going to find Emily. He caught her arm and swung her back around with more momentum than needed and her body crushed against his.
Sarah tried to shove at his chest to get away, but he caught her wrists to keep her still. Her words still resounded in his head.
“Your daughter? Try our daughter. It’s a reality you’d better bloody well start getting used to.”
The fight left her in an instant and she gave a strangled sob. Instead of pulling away, her weight crumpled against him and her head brushed against his chest.
Instinct had him releasing a wrist and sliding a hand up her back. It was an unintended gesture of comfort as he struggled with his thoughts. Having her in his arms—broken and afraid—he was all too aware of himself as a man against her small, feminine frame.
It was too easy to remember them in bed together. To envision her surrender and cries of pleasure as she lay beneath him.
No. He clenched his jaw at the way his blood immediately began to heat. He needed to remember the circumstances. This wasn’t just about him and Sarah. There was Emily now.
A sudden thought sent tension spiraling through him and he eased his hand up to the back of her neck. His fingers stroked in a gentle warning.
“Don’t even think about leaving the island again, Sarah—of taking Emily and leaving.”
She hesitated a bit too long for his liking, before she answered with a husky, “No, I wasn’t going to.”
“Because if you do,” he continued, his tone soft and dark with warning, “I will track you down. And I promise I won’t be happy.”
Sarah lifted her head and met his gaze. Her eyes held a hint of despondency. “I won’t leave. Besides, I can’t break the conditions of inheriting the house. I’m here for the month.”
Three more weeks? It was suddenly like sand slipping through an hourglass. A ticking clock before she planned to take Emily and leave him again.
That wouldn’t happen. He’d drag her through every court if needed before he let that happen.
Caught in the crystalline blue of her eyes—and realizing he wouldn’t find any answers there—he released her abruptly and strode toward the door.
“I can’t be near you right now, Sarah, but we’re nowhere near done discussing this.”