Shattered. Joan Johnston
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Название: Shattered
Автор: Joan Johnston
Издательство: HarperCollins
Жанр: Приключения: прочее
isbn: 9781472045911
isbn:
“You’d all be safer if you came to live with me in Houston until J.D. is found,” Shaw said.
“That’s out of the question.”
“My compound is surrounded by high stone walls. I have twenty-four-hour security cameras and guards with dogs that patrol the perimeter.”
“That sounds more like a prison than a home,” Kate snapped.
“Lucky and Chance…”
When he paused, Kate saw his throat working. It was the first time he’d said his sons’ names since he’d shoved his way into her home. Apparently, it had affected him deeply.
But Kate couldn’t afford to sympathize, couldn’t afford to glamorize or glorify his appearance on her doorstep. She didn’t dare feel anything for Wyatt Shaw. She was fighting for her children’s lives. If Shaw had his way, she and her sons would be imprisoned behind high stone walls. She wasn’t about to let that happen.
“Legally, J.D. Pendleton is my sons’ father. You provided the seed. That was all. You have no legal rights where Lucky and Chance are concerned. None. I don’t need your help. I don’t want your help. My sons—yes, my sons,” she repeated in a fierce voice, “have managed fine without you in their lives for eight years. And they’re far more likely to grow into fine young men if you never come anywhere near them.”
Shaw’s face blanched.
Kate felt a pang of remorse for hurting him. And ruthlessly quelled it. What did he expect? His reputation had preceded him. No mother would willingly expose her children to a man like Wyatt Shaw. He was the antithesis of Jack McKinley. One man was an outlaw, the other a lawman. There was no question in her mind who would make the better father.
She took a deep breath and said, “I’d like you to leave.”
Kate expected Shaw to argue. Expected him to threaten. Expected him to point out all the reasons why his suggestion was the best way, the only way, to keep her children safe. But he did none of those things.
He simply said, “Goodbye, Kate.” Then he turned and walked to the door. He opened it, glanced back over his shoulder, and said, “I’ll be in touch.”
Kate hurried across the living room to close and lock the door behind him. But she didn’t feel the least bit safe.
I’ll be in touch.
What did that mean? Kate’s stomach cramped as she realized how vulnerable her sons were. All Shaw had to do was intercept them at school. Or after they got off the bus.
Kate’s heart was lodged in her throat. She had to call the boys’ school. She had to warn them that her sons weren’t safe. She had to retrieve Lucky and Chance before Wyatt Shaw made his move. Because she was certain that once Shaw had her sons behind high stone walls, he would never give them back.
3
Jack McKinley had a knot in his belly. He wasn’t looking forward to the next half hour. He had a confession to make that was going to break Kate Pendleton’s heart.
He sat in his SUV, parked on the curb in front of her house, trying to put a smile on his face before he headed for her door. His mouth wouldn’t cooperate. She was going to see the truth in his eyes, so why pretend everything was all right? Nothing was going to be right for a very long time.
Well, not for the next four months, anyway. In four months his not-quite-ex-wife Holly would give birth to an unplanned baby. Unplanned because the sex between them had been unplanned.
Last November, Jack had traveled to Holly’s home in Kansas to have Thanksgiving dinner with his six-year-old son, Ryan. After Ryan had gone to bed, he’d had a terrible row with Holly over visitation rights.
The sharp blows they’d exchanged had all been verbal, but Holly knew exactly where to strike to hurt him most. He was equally adept at hitting below the belt and got in a few good licks of his own. They’d both been furious, hissing and snarling insults because Ryan was asleep down the hall.
They’d ended up having sex.
She’d scratched and bit. He’d left bruises. Neither had minded.
It was how they’d resolved most of the quarrels during their fractious nine-year marriage. There had been a lot less sex—and a lot less trust—toward the end. But he’d never imagined Holly could, or would, keep something as important as a child they’d created a secret from him.
But she had.
Jack had met Holly Gayle Tanner when he was fifteen and she was thirteen. She’d been on the junior cheerleading squad. He’d been the high school football quarterback. He’d already had sex with more than one girl when he’d met Holly, but he’d never been in love.
He’d taken one look at Holly, with her long, curly auburn hair and leaf-green eyes, her freckled nose and wide, friendly smile, and fallen hard and fast.
They’d been inseparable from the day they’d met. Until Holly had broken up with him at Christmas his senior year. He’d still been deeply in love with her, sifting his football scholarship offers as he planned their future together, when she’d told him, “I want a chance to date other guys. I want to see what else is out there. You’re going off to college, so we’ll be separated anyway.”
He’d been devastated.
Once he’d left the small town in the piney woods northeast of Houston where they’d grown up and headed to the University of Texas at Austin, they hadn’t crossed paths again until his 15th high school reunion. Holly was in town for the birth of her youngest sister’s first child and had come to the reunion with a friend from the cheerleading squad.
He’d felt his heart jump when he’d seen her stroll into the Kountze High School gymnasium. Felt it thump hard in his chest when he realized that she’d never married. And that he still loved her.
Holly had become a renowned pediatric oncologist. He was a pro football quarterback who’d been driven from the game, accused, but never tried and convicted, of shaving points in the Super Bowl. He’d lost the restaurant he’d opened in Austin, the Longhorn Grille, to the IRS for unpaid taxes.
Because of his suspected involvement in a national gambling scandal, he’d been offered the chance to work undercover as a Texas Ranger to bring down a mob-controlled gambling syndicate. Jack was proud of his work with the Rangers and had struggled, mostly successfully, to put his checkered past behind him.
He and Holly had both been in a good place in their lives, happy to see each other, eager to share old memories.
To his surprise, they’d ended up in bed that night. He remembered how shy she’d been with him. How tender he’d felt toward her. His heart in his throat, he’d proposed the next morning. And she’d accepted.
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