Secrets of Paternity

“Some woman driver hit you?” Bronco asked when he ran out of steam.

“As a matter of fact.” He was glad the woman in question couldn’t hear the sexist statement.

One more curse blasted the airwaves. “What’s the damage?”

“Same as before.”

“Drivable?”

“Not until it’s fixed.”

“I’ll come take a look in a while,” he said with a sigh.

He turned his back on the woman responsible and massaged his forehead. “Got a loaner?” he asked quietly.

“You on a job?”

“Yeah.”

“I can scrounge up something. Won’t be an Eagle. It’ll have some muscle, though.”

“Works for me. Thanks. I’ll see you later.” He snapped the phone shut and tucked it in his pocket before he turned back to face the woman and gave her an amount. “That’s if there’s no structural damage.”

She swallowed. “Plus you won’t have it as transportation.”

“Right.”

She looked at his house as if assessing his net worth. She also seemed to have calmed down. “You don’t have a car?” she asked.

“That’s not the point.”

A small fire flared in her eyes. “Look, I’m not denying my responsibility. I’m sorry you’ll be inconvenienced. I’ll go to the bank right now and bring the cash back to you, then I’ll stop by again in a few days to see if there are further costs. Will that be okay?”

“No.”

She gave him a long, cool look, which interested him as much as the heated one had.

“You said you were okay with my paying cash.”

“I am. But I’m going with you to the bank.” James wasn’t about to let her out of his sight yet. He wasn’t worried about finding her again, since he had her license plate number, but, well, frankly, she intrigued him—from her red lipstick, to her ringless finger that she continued to use as a touchstone, to her modest skirt and blouse.

“I don’t give rides to strangers.”

Implied in her tone was the fact he looked like part of a biker gang, which was his job at the moment—but she wouldn’t know that unless he chose to tell her. Not yet, he decided.

“You’re welcome to follow me,” she said primly.

He almost laughed. Damn, she was cute with her hackles up. “You won’t give me the slip?”

She went rigid. “I keep my word.”

He’d already figured that out, which is why he found it mystifying that she wouldn’t give him her name and phone number, at least, if not her address and insurance information. She was a contradiction. He liked contradictions.

“I’ll get my car out of the garage and follow you,” he said, backing away. “Don’t leave without me.”

“You’d better hurry. They close in twenty minutes.”

James deliberately chose his BMW convertible instead of the Taurus he kept for surveillance work. Okay, so he was grandstanding a little. He liked the contradiction he was showing her, as well.

Think I’m some kind of gang member, do you? Someone to be afraid to give your phone number to? Well, here’s another side of me. What would you have done if you’d hit the BMW instead, and I’d been wearing a suit and tie, and was clean shaven?

Knowing the answer—or figuring he did—he followed her up the street, uncharacteristically enjoying the fact she was nervous around him, he who usually made the effort to put people at ease.

A little intrigue. Maybe it was just what he needed while he waited to hear from the child he’d never met.

Somehow Caryn had prevented herself from hyperventilating. Had she written down his address wrong? She couldn’t imagine making that kind of mistake, but how else could she have been watching the house across the street? The wrong house.

On top of that confusion, however, James Paladin was a puzzle, she thought as she pulled into the parking lot of her bank. A contradiction. A…big problem, frankly. Obviously he was a risk taker, like her late husband, Paul. And a man used to taking charge and giving orders, also Paul’s MO. Paul had ridden a motorcycle—and he’d died in an accident on the bike he cherished a year ago.

She was beginning to see why Paul had chosen James to provide the sperm for Caryn’s artificial insemination almost nineteen years ago. She’d never met him, had only learned of his existence last week, and now they were about to turn each others’ lives upside down. And Kevin’s.

Was he married? Did he have children? She hadn’t noticed a wedding ring on his finger, but he also seemed the type to shun public displays of, well, possession, for lack of a better word. He seemed…unpossessable.

She parked the car and turned off the engine, saw him pull in a few spaces away. She wished she could tell him who she was, what their connection was. She couldn’t. If Kevin decided he didn’t want to meet the man responsible for his existence, it was his choice, as per a written agreement between Paul and James made all those years ago. Caryn had found it only last week while cleaning out the paperwork she’d dumped from Paul’s desk into boxes for her move back to San Francisco. Then she’d discovered a letter James had sent last year with his current address—the wrong address, apparently—and his phone number, nothing more.

That note had been mailed a week before Paul’s death to a private mailbox of Paul’s that Caryn hadn’t known existed. That hurt still lingered. How many other secrets had he kept that she hadn’t uncovered yet?

As for the potential relationship between James and her son, she couldn’t intrude. Kevin alone held that key.

She didn’t know whether she wanted James in her life or not. Everything was finally settling down for her. She’d been prepared to have Kevin’s biological father become part of his life—assumed that he wanted to be part of Kevin’s life—but that was before she met the man, when he’d been just words on paper, not a flesh-and-blood person. A man in full biker regalia. A man who made her hormones come out of a long hibernation.

He came up beside her, his sheer size in his boots and leathers making her feel like a background singer to a rock star.

“You don’t need to go inside with me,” she said.

“I have nothing else to do.”

She met his innocent gaze. Up close he was even more attractive, his eyes a lighter green than she’d first thought, his hair not just dark brown but thick and shiny. Only the scruffy beard detracted.

“I won’t walk up to the teller with you,” he added.

He seemed to be enjoying the moment. She didn’t know why she thought that, because he wasn’t smiling, but something lurked in his eyes, some sense of mischief at the absurdity of what they were doing. Cloak-and-dagger stuff. She smiled. She couldn’t help it. Oh, the irony. The first man she’d been even the slightest bit attracted to since Paul died, and he happened to be…well, who he was.

“What’s so funny?” he asked, as they entered the bank just before closing.

The security guard locked the door behind them then stood at his post, letting each person out as they finished their business.

“Just in the nick of time,” she said.