скачать книгу бесплатно
She took a quick, shallow breath and forged ahead. “I meant what I said earlier. Sarah has a good life at Charity House, safe and respectable. With me living there as well and teaching at the school, she’s not on her own. She’s...”
Her words trailed off, as though she wasn’t sure how much more to reveal.
Hunter smiled at her, the gesture inviting her to continue.
She did not.
He waited her out, taking note of how the soft glow from the streetlamp brushed her dark hair with golden light. For a long, tense moment, her eyes flickered over him, too, her expression unreadable. She wasn’t frightened of him, that much was evident, but she was wary.
For the first time since she’d barged into Mattie’s private rooms unannounced Hunter considered what his presence meant to Annabeth. How involved was she in Sarah’s day-to-day life?
With me living there and teaching at the school...
“How long have you been at Charity House?”
“Almost a year.”
She had more to say, but he saw her hesitation as she pulled her bottom lip between her teeth.
“Go on, Annabeth.” He gentled his voice to a mere whisper. “Say your piece.”
“About tomorrow. I...don’t want you upsetting Sarah. I...” Not quite meeting his gaze, she drew to her full height before continuing. “What I mean to say is that she isn’t expecting you.”
Easy enough to put right. “Then you’ll tell her I’m coming.”
“No, you don’t understand.” Her chin shot up, her gaze full of challenge, the pose reminiscent of her notorious mother. “The situation is more complicated than that.”
At a loss for a reason behind her hostile tone, he eyed her closely. “Then maybe you should explain the situation to me.”
She braided her fingers together at her waist, a gesture Hunter was coming to recognize as a nervous habit, one that reared whenever she had something unpleasant to say.
He braced himself.
“Sarah doesn’t know she has a father.”
“You haven’t told her about me?” His voice was raw in his own ears. He hadn’t expected this, wasn’t sure how he felt about this new bit of information. Angry?
No. Disappointed.
“Try to understand. I didn’t want to disrupt her life, or give her false hope, in case you didn’t—” she spread her hands in a helpless gesture “—you know, want her.”
Now he was angry. The hot burst of emotion made his breath come in fast, hard spurts. He forced himself to speak slowly, to remember Annabeth didn’t know anything about the man he’d become since the judge had sentenced him to prison. “What made you think I wouldn’t want her?”
She looked pained and stressed. “It wouldn’t be the first time a father didn’t claim responsibility for a child living at Charity House.”
Was she speaking only for the children now, or was she thinking of herself, as well? Her own father had been a Mexican outlaw that hadn’t been known to stick in one place, or remain loyal to one woman, for long.
Hunter’s anger dissipated, turning into something close to sympathy. Considering her past, Annabeth’s reasoning made sense. But this wasn’t about her father. This was about Hunter, and whether or not he would make the moral choice. “Would you have told me about Sarah if Mattie hadn’t done so?”
“I don’t know.” Annabeth lowered her head. “I’m sorry, Hunter. I’d like to think that I would have, eventually, but I just don’t know for certain.”
Appreciating her honesty, Hunter absorbed her words. For all intents and purposes, Annabeth had conspired to keep his daughter a secret from him and would have done so indefinitely if not for her mother’s interference. Did he blame her?
No, he didn’t. He knew countless men who’d walked away from far less responsibility than a child. At one point in his life, Hunter had been one of them.
That was then. This was now.
A swell of emotion spread through him, seeping into the darkest corners of his soul. After all he’d lost, dare he hope for this new beginning, this second chance to get it right?
He had to try, had to go at this logically, rationally. Anything was possible with God. Or as his mother was fond of saying: We can’t out-sin the Lord’s grace, or His forgiveness.
A good reminder.
Hunter needed to be alone, to think, to plan, to work through the particulars of what came next. “I’ll call at Charity House first thing in the morning.”
“Better make it after school,” she said. “Say, four o’clock?”
“Good enough.”
He turned to go.
“Hunter, wait.”
He stopped, but didn’t pivot back around.
“I think it best we don’t tell Sarah who you are, at least not at first.”
It was a good idea, a wise suggestion, all things considered. However, a part of him rebelled. He’d spent the past two years being told when to wake, when to work, when to eat. He’d had enough. “I’ll make that decision when I see the child for myself.”
“Hunter, please.” She hurried around him. “You can’t just show up out of the blue, claim a daughter you never knew you had and then make promises you can’t be sure to keep.”
He bristled at her unwarranted accusation. Hunter never made promises he couldn’t keep. Except once. Two people had ended up dead, one an innocent, one a very bad man.
Beneath his calm exterior, Hunter burned with remembered rage.
This time would be different, he told himself. Because he was different.
No more death, no more loss, no more bad decisions. “I didn’t say anything about making promises.”
“But—”
“One step at a time, Annabeth.” He flexed his fingers, stopped short of making a fist. “We’ll take this one step at a time.”
“One step at a time.” She repeated his words through tight lips. “Yes, that sounds like a good plan.”
He moved a fraction closer, inexplicably drawn to her despite the tension flowing between them.
Chin high, she held her ground. For three long seconds. Then, she scrambled backward. One step. Two.
Hunter had seen that same look in many gazes through the years, some he’d deliberately cultivated. Annabeth thought him a threat.
She was right.
If Sarah was his daughter, no one—not even her devoted aunt—would keep him from claiming her as his own.
* * *
Heart in her throat, pulse beating wildly through her veins, Annabeth watched Hunter disappear around the corner of her mother’s brothel. Nothing had prepared her for her first encounter with the man after all these years. She’d expected to meet a hardened criminal, an outlaw who’d earned his place in prison.
Annabeth had been wrong.
Ice-cold dread shivered across her skin. Hunter Mitchell was a man full of remorse. And hope. Yes, she’d seen the hope in him. It was that particular emotion that made her the most troubled. Ruthless and cruel, she could handle.
But a man with a desire to do the right thing?
How did she fight against that?
Was she supposed to even try?
She shivered, and not merely because Hunter could take Sarah away from her. In the depth of his eyes Annabeth had seen an aching loneliness that had called to her, one human to another, two lost souls searching for their place in a world that had dealt them cruel blows.
Now she was being fanciful.
Annabeth was never fanciful. She was practical, down to the bone. In that, at least, she was her mother’s daughter.
Speaking of Mattie...
Annabeth spun on her heel. Retracing her steps, she paced through the darkened corridors of the brothel, back into Mattie’s private suite of rooms. She drew in a soothing pull of air and then shut the door behind her with a controlled snap.
One more calming breath and Annabeth turned to face her mother.
Mattie had moved from her earlier position by the bookshelves. She now stood next to the fireplace. Her stance was deceptively casual, while her gaze remained sharp and unwavering. She had the attitude of a woman whose high opinion of herself far outweighed her place in the community. That regal bearing, along with her business acumen, had kept her at the top of her chosen profession for thirty years.
Annabeth resisted the urge to sigh. If only Mattie had used her many talents for legitimate purposes, maybe then Annabeth’s shame at having a madam for a mother would not exist. Nor, perhaps, would she crave respectability so desperately, to the point of setting aside all her other hopes and dreams.
A familiar ache tugged at her heart.
Oh, she knew Mattie loved her, without question or reservation. It was that knowledge that turned Annabeth’s shame back on herself.
The Bible taught that she should be sympathetic and love as Christ loved, to be compassionate and think of others before herself. That included her mother.
“Did Hunter get off all right?”
“Yes, fine.” And not at all the point. “How could you have contacted him, when I specifically asked you not to do so?”
“He’s the child’s father.” Mattie lifted her chin in defiance. “He deserved to know of her existence.”
Another bout of shame took hold. She’d been willing to keep a man’s own daughter from him, never mind the reason. “Maria didn’t want him to know about Sarah.”
“She didn’t want you to know about her, either.”
True. Annabeth had found out quite by accident. She’d been home from Miss Lindsey’s less than a week, humiliated and at a loss about what to do with her life after her expulsion from her position at the school. Mattie had insisted she return to Boston and make her fresh start there, going so far as to threaten to cut off financial support if Annabeth didn’t abide by her wishes.
At the time, Annabeth hadn’t seen the point. One city was as good as another to start over, and who needed Mattie’s money, anyway?
She’d been so naive, so headstrong.
Following that initial argument, there’d been many more heated discussions on the subject. A slip of the tongue on Mattie’s part, a bit of investigation on Annabeth’s part, and she’d discovered Sarah’s existence. One look at the child had been enough to give her a new purpose in life. And so she’d set out to provide a stable home for her niece.
Unfortunately, Mattie had followed through with her threat and had pulled all financial support. Annabeth had been forced to take a job teaching at Charity House. Neither of them had expected Annabeth to fall in love with her new life.
But now, with Hunter’s appearance, all her hard work of the past year stood on the precipice of collapsing.
Fear swept through her. “You should not have interfered,” she said again, more forceful than before.
“I stand by my decision.”
“He might take her away with him.”
Mattie dismissed the comment with a sniff. “It would be within his rights.”
Yes. It would. Hunter was Sarah’s father; Annabeth merely her aunt. Her half aunt, as Mattie constantly reminded her.
Giving into despair, Annabeth pressed her back against the shut door, slid to the ground and hugged her knees to her chest.
“I can’t lose her.” She tangled her fingers in her skirts. “I just can’t.”
“I understand, far better than you realize. But listen to me, Annabeth.” Mattie tried to smile, but her blue eyes, the same color and shape as Annabeth’s, had turned earnest, anxious, a little desperate. “I did not send you to Boston for an education alone. I sent you there to provide you with a better life than the one I could offer you here in Denver. No one knows me there, who I am, what I am. It was supposed to be your chance for a clean break.”
Sighing, Annabeth lowered her forehead to her knees. “I know all that. But things didn’t turn out so well, did they?”
“That doesn’t mean you can’t still go back and—”
“Mother, please.”
In a move completely out of character, Mattie joined her on floor. “You’re my daughter, Annabeth.” She squeezed her arm. “You know I love you.”
Annabeth swiveled her head to look at her bossy, annoying, pigheaded mother and a roll of affection spun in her stomach. Why did their relationship have to be so complicated? “I know you do. I...love you, too.”
The words were far easier to say than she’d expected. Regardless of what Mattie did for a living, she was Annabeth’s mother. Flawed and the source of much embarrassment, she’d done her best. What more could a daughter ask from a mother?
“I sent for Hunter for your protection. You’ll ruin your life over that child if you don’t have a care.”
Annabeth knew that, too. “I’m twenty-three years old.” Long past the first blush of youth. “I’m quite capable of knowing what’s best for me. And contrary to what you think, I’m happy.”
“You’re wasting your education.”
“How can you, of all people, say such a thing? I’m helping break the cycle of sin in those children’s lives.”
