Deceived Read online

  His face screwed up in a scowl. “You don’t know shit.”

  I remained silent, weighing the best way to move forward. “I want Flanagan. I know I’ve screwed everything up, but I’ve never wanted to make something work, the way I want this relationship with her to work. Pax, if you would just talk to Jessica….”

  “Not going to happen.”

  “Pax….”

  “No. You’re right. You’ve screwed everything up, so you can fix it the best way you can. But leave me out of it.”

  “Fine, brother,” I spat the word from my mouth. I couldn’t pinpoint why I was so angry with Pax. Even though he could be an asshole, he was right. I was the one who screwed up. I could still hear my mother’s angry accusations after everyone had cleared the dining room, screaming that I couldn’t keep it in my pants—just like my father. No doubt she thought I had stolen her son’s girlfriend all those years ago.

  I gave him one last glare before storming out and slamming the door behind me. I felt as if I had strung Jessica along, but I had wanted to help her and the baby. I just hadn’t planned on Flanagan rolling back into Creekview and turning my world upside down. And now to top things off, my mother dropped the knowledge on me that I wasn’t her child with all the gentleness of an anvil.

  I briefly thought about calling Hawk or Mason. Either of them would have taken time to meet up with me today, but at the last minute, I decided that I needed time alone. I needed to sort through this monumental disaster that was my life.

  Seren

  It had been two days since things had blown up at Cade’s birthday dinner. We’d went an entire day without speaking to each other, and on top of all the doubt that had been swirling in my head, I was worried about other things, too, things that had nothing to do with Cade’s current predicament.

  My phone beeped with a text from Cade. Taking a deep breath, I opened it.

  Cade: I want to talk to you.

  Me: I want to talk to you, too.

  Cade: Can I pick you up?

  Me: I have a doctor’s appointment. Can I come to your place afterwards?

  Cade: Yeah, I’ll be waiting.

  Something about knowing that he would be waiting on me made me both nervous and giddy at the same time. Even though it hadn’t been long since I’d seen him, I missed him. I was worried about what had happened between his parents and him, and I wanted to get to the bottom of the issue with Jessica and clear the air. If he was going to tell me that he did want to be with Jessica, then at least I would know where he stood. But I knew he cared about me. I could tell, and surely that wasn’t something that could be faked.

  A nagging thought nibbled at my peace. I thought about all the women who truly believed a man cared about them but later found out that wasn’t the case.

  I wanted to think I was too intelligent to be fooled that easily, but I was also smart enough to know that love made people do foolish things.

  Like allowing oneself to be deceived because believing lies was less painful than realizing the truth.

  Chapter 20

  Banjaxed

  Cade

  To burn nervous energy, I curled the dumbbells I kept in the corner of the living room. By the time my doorbell rang, I was a freaking wreck. I didn’t know when I had handed Flanagan my balls, but based on the fact that I was terrified she wouldn’t show, it was painfully obvious that I had. Of course, I wasn’t the only guy in Creekview who had succumbed to the fairer sex. In the last few months, I’d watched Mason and Hawk both trade their freedom in for a ball and chain, and damn if I wasn’t tripping over the shackle on my way to the front door.

  The sight of her nearly took my breath despite the fact that her eyes were narrowed as if she was unsure of my trustworthiness. “Hey, Flanagan.” I opened the door wider and motioned her to come in. Relieved that she had come, I felt as if I could breathe a little easier.

  Closing the door, I approached her as she stopped in the middle of the living room and turned her gaze back on me.

  “You okay?” I asked, remembering how upset she was the last time I’d seen her. I’d been defensive when she kept asking me to tell her that I wasn’t with Jessica. If the tables had been turned, I would have been asking the same questions. Hell, I’d probably be demanding the answers. The thought of Flanagan with anyone other than me made my fists twitch.

  She pushed the strap to her tank top back into place on her shoulder. “I’m okay. You?”

  “Hell, no.” I rubbed my palms across my face as I thought about everything that had happened. Our relationship was banjaxed, ruined, maybe forever. “How can I be okay when things have turned to shit between the two of us?”

  “Now I know how Hawk felt.”

  “Bullshit,” I spat, pointing at her. “This is nothing like Hawk and Amber’s situation. I never loved Jessica, and the only proposal that she and I ever discussed was before you came back to Creekview. It had been an open-ended conversation, an option. We had no real plans, no commitments. At first, I thought I could do it if that’s what she wanted after the baby was born, but I can’t. It was hard enough keeping everything platonic between us before, but after spending time with you in Ireland, I know that marrying Jessica would be a mistake…for me and for her. Hell, I told her everything had changed.” I paused a moment, trying to collect the thoughts that were tumbling through my mind. “My life is in total disarray.” I closed my eyes and took a deep breath before I opened them again and studied her face. She watched me with a mixture of sympathy and unease. I reached out to her, but she took a step back.

  “Cade,” she whispered, her voice soft, pleading, “I need to know whether she had your son.”

  “I already told you.”

  “So he’s not yours?”

  “No.”

  She swallowed and pursed her lips, and for a moment, I thought perhaps she was fighting back tears. “It’s okay if he is. I just want you to trust me enough to tell me the truth. In some ways, it could even make things easier.”

  “How the hell would that make things easier?”

  She parted her lips to speak, but as if she had changed her mind, she clasped them together again.

  Reaching out, I cupped her bare shoulders with my palms, noticing how soft and feminine everything about her was, her skin, her voice, her hair. My eyes fell to her lips as I wondered what I could say to make everything right again, to be able to hold her in my arms, to stroke the length of her back, to feel her touch me in return.

  I thought maybe I hadn’t realized until this moment just how much our night in Ireland had affected me. Now that I’d had her, now that I’d experienced life with her, I couldn’t turn my back on any of it.

  I wanted her with me, but when I thought back to her question, I wondered why she would tell me that it would make things easier if he was my son. Make what easier? For her to walk away?

  “Flanagan, tell me what I can do to convince you that I’m telling you the truth.” I reached out and stroked her hair. “I need you to believe me. Hell, I have enough shit to deal with without you being pissed at me, too.”

  “What else are you dealing with?”

  “Didn’t Pax explain it to you?”

  She shook her head. “I haven’t seen him since your birthday dinner, and he didn’t say anything then.”

  “Before I get into all that, I want you to tell me what you want from me. Are we over? Because I’m warning you right now that it won’t be that easy to get rid of me. I have no intentions of watching you walk out of my life. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not ever.”

  “Ever’s a mighty long time, Cade. There’re still a lot of things that we don’t know about each other.”

  “Then ask me what you want to know. I promise you that I’ll answer honestly. And I’ll tell you right now, that I am not in love with Jessica. I’ve never had sex with Jessica. Not ever. And even though, I have a soft spot in my heart for her son, he is not my biological child. I need to know that you believe me.”

>   Seren

  I knew he was telling me the truth. I could see it in his eyes, the way they pleaded to my soul. I could hear the desperation in his voice.

  Or was I deceiving myself? Only hearing what I wanted to hear? “I want to believe you.”

  He pulled me to him, leaning his forehead against mine. I wanted to take his face in my hands, but I didn’t. Doubts nibbled at my mind, not just doubts about Jessica and her baby, but doubts about whether he would want me if he knew everything about me.

  I was so self-assured in my pursuit of Cade that my current state of mind surprised me. It was funny how one’s emotions could change in a moment of time, how self-doubt could burrow its way into the most resolute confidence and crumble it.

  “Then believe me,” he whispered, his breath warm against my face.

  “Maybe we should slow things down. Just be friends until everything is sorted out between you and Jessica.”

  He released me. “There’s nothing to sort out.” He exhaled loudly. “If I could just get Pax to talk to her…. I know he still loves her. They should be together.”

  “If that’s true, then maybe with a little time, this whole issue will resolve itself,” I suggested.

  “Have you ever done anything that when you think back on it, you wonder what the hell was going through your head?” he asked, running his hands through his hair, leaving it disheveled.

  I gave him a small smile. “I think everyone’s been in that boat at one time or another.”

  He walked to the couch and collapsed as if he were exhausted. “I am going to get this all worked out, Flanagan.”

  I believed him. And then I would have to tell him the truth about me. I wanted to because my secret was crushing my chest, making it hard for me to breathe. Fear wound its deep cold tendrils around my heart, leaving me terrified that he wouldn’t want me if he knew the truth.

  And while the confident side of me screamed that if the truth made him not want me, then he didn’t deserve me, the frightened self-doubting side quietly taunted me, making me feel inadequate.

  For now, I found it better to forget my insecurities and focus on Cade. I knew our relationship wasn’t the only thing that was bothering him. I walked to the couch and sat beside him, patiently waiting to see if he wanted to talk.

  “You know how I told you my parents treated me differently from my brothers?” he asked.

  I nodded.

  “Now I know why.”

  I waited for him to continue.

  He laughed without humor. “I guess you heard my mother tell me that I wasn’t her child. Turns out that she really did mean it—literally.”

  I couldn’t stop my bafflement from showing on my face.

  “You heard me right. No wonder she hates me.”

  “Why would she hate you?” I asked.

  A solemn expression settled on his handsome features. “My father had an affair, and guess who the love child was?”

  “An affair?”

  “Yep.”

  “Wait a minute. Are you saying that your father had a baby with another woman and you’re that baby?”

  “That’s what they tell me. Explains a lot, doesn’t it? Like why my mother is such a witch to me, but not to Pax or Evan.”

  “That doesn’t make sense. The three of you look so much alike.”

  “Yeah, but we all look like our father.” He sat up, digging in a box on the coffee table. He pulled out a photo and handed it to me. “Here’s a photo of my birth mother. My dad was going to tell me about my birth mother and give me this box of stuff that belonged to her. I guess that’s why my mom was so angry that day.”

  I took the picture from him and examined the woman in the photo. Her dark hair was long and sleek. She was dressed in dark slacks and a red blouse. “She’s very pretty.” I looked back at Cade. “Where is she now?”

  “Apparently, she died shortly after giving birth to me. She hemorrhaged to death.” He jumped to his feet, grabbed an empty glass from the coffee table, and flung it against the wall, sending it splintering into a thousand shards that danced across the hardwood floor. “Shit! No wonder my mother hated me. Every time she looks at me, she sees my mother.”

  I stood and placed my hand on his arm, not really knowing what to say but wanting him to know that I was there for him. I thought about my own parents, how much they had gone through just so they could have me, how they doted on me. My heart broke for Cade.

  A strangled noise escaped him, and I could tell he was fighting for control of his emotions. I’d had no idea that he was going through this, and all my frustration with him melted away as I realized how much he had needed someone to be on his side the last couple of days.

  “Do you have any idea how that makes me feel?” he whispered. “To know that my mother can’t stand the sight of me and that my birth mother, the one person who might have actually loved me, died giving birth to me.”

  I had no words to take away the pain he was feeling. It was difficult to watch such a strong, virile man suffer and know there was nothing I could do to save him.

  It reminded me of the first time I had seen my father cry. It was at my grandmother’s funeral. His shoulders shook with grief as his garbled voice had called out for her. I remembered feeling helpless. I had been used to him soothing me, and the sight of him racked with such potent emotional pain caused a myriad of emotions to rush to the surface.

  Hot tears blurred my vision. No matter how old a man may age, the bond between him and his mother would forever have the ability to affect him deeply.

  I knew Cade was struggling with his relationship with his mother.

  I pulled Cade into my embrace, and he bent down and pressed his face into my neck. He hugged me so tightly I struggled to breathe, but I clung to him, hoping that my presence could offer him a modicum of comfort.

  His breath was warm against my skin, his words demanding. “Damn it, Flanagan, I need you. Do you hear me? I can’t let you go. I won’t let you go.”

  Chapter 21

  Wean

  Seren

  I plunged back onto my bed, the mattress gently shaking beneath my weight. “Why does life have to be so complicated?”

  As usual, Lexi was wearing her favorite shade of red lipstick, and her lips curved into a sympathetic smile. “Why do I have the feeling most of the complication started once you and Cade became more than friends?”

  “Ugh! How can one man turn an educated, confident woman into a puddle of self-doubt? Theoretically, I’ve known what I wanted from the start, but now I’m more confused than I’ve ever been in my life.”

  “You want to talk about it?” she asked, sitting on the bed beside me. She smoothed a wrinkle out of the soft white comforter and turned her gaze on me.

  Lifting myself back into a sitting position, I crossed my legs and smoothed my long tresses away from my face. “Not right now. I’ll get everything worked out in my head eventually.”

  The corners of Lexi’s mouth lifted, and she placed her hand over mine. “You know I’m here for you if you need me.”

  “I know. I’m not sure exactly what’s going to happen between us. I haven’t even told him about….”

  Her brows furrowed. “About what?”

  I pasted on a smile. “Nothing. I’m just being…hell, I don’t know what I’m being.”

  Lexi stood. “I’ve got to go. Mason and I are meeting with a billboard advertising rep this morning. Will you be by the bar later?”

  “Maybe. I really feel like going back to bed and falling into a deep sleep. Would you wake me up in a week or two?”

  “Your problems will still be there.”

  “I know it.”

  “Call me later if you need to talk.” She gave me a brief hug.

  “I will.”

  When she walked out the door, I collapsed back onto my bed again.

  I had known Cade Mayfield virtually all my life, and I had wanted him on and off since high school. I was so close to having everyth
ing I ever wanted, but even if we worked out this Jessica fiasco, there was still something I needed to tell him. And I was torn.

  I didn’t know whether I should tell him now or wait. The only thing I knew for sure was that I had to tell him at some point.

  Tears crept into my eyes, and I could feel their heat as they rolled down the side of my face and pooled at my ear. I wiped them away, knowing they were useless. I hated feeling weak, but emotions were filling my heart, my brain, and like an evil fog, they were clouding my convictions, paralyzing me with confusion. I preferred to be confident, to know my plan of action.

  So why had I become such a mess?

  It was a silly question. I knew why.

  Until now, I had only focused on getting his attention. Now that I had it, I was terrified that I wouldn’t hold up under a microscope, that if he knew everything there was to know about me, he wouldn’t want me.

  I was afraid of rejection.

  My cell phone rang, startling me as it snatched me out of my depressing reflections.

  I smiled as my hand groped for it on the bed beside me. It didn’t take Lexi long to call back and check on me.

  When I pulled my phone up and held it above my face, I frowned. An unknown caller. I almost laid my phone back down until I thought perhaps it was in response to my résumé or Cade calling me from someone else’s phone.

  “Hello?”

  “Seren?” The voice was soft, unsure.

  “This is she.”

  “Please don’t hang up.”

  That got my attention as I waited for the caller to continue.

  “It’s Jessica.”

  I froze, my curiosity piqued. I was so taken off-guard that I remained silent as my mind raced with questions of why she would be calling me.

  She sniffled, and I wondered if she’d been crying.

  She continued, “Do you think you could meet me?”

  I could hear the rawness in her voice. She had definitely been crying. What could she possibly have to say to me?