The Tycoon's Secret Daughter

“I’ll make time.”

She smiled tentatively. “That’s great.”

He could see her in the green bikini. Remember the sun shimmering off her hair. Remember her giggle.

“Is one o’clock too early tomorrow?”

“No. I’ll drive Mom to the hospital around noon. Trish and I will be back by one.”

He nodded.

She gestured vaguely toward the driveway. “Guess I’ll go.”

Don’t let her go!

Yearning surged up in him. Not for a kiss or sex or even a chance to flirt. Just the opportunity to be with her. To see how she’d been. See who she was now that eight years had gone by. Just to be in her company again. “Or you could stay and we could talk about some things.”

She shielded her eyes from the sun. “We do have some things to resolve.”

“Like child support. I haven’t paid a cent in eight years. I’m guessing I owe you a bundle.”

“I think I forfeited that when I left.”

“I don’t.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“I’m not worried. I just … I just …” He combed his fingers through his hair. “I want to know things about Trisha.” And hear the sound of your voice while you talk. “Things like her favorite foods. Her favorite teacher. What she doesn’t like.” And hear the lilt in your voice when you talk about her.

“She’s a normal little girl. There’s not much to say.”

He directed her to the French doors that led to the family room. “You can tell me about her first tooth. Her first words.”

Guilt tightened Kate’s stomach again. Without being accusatory, he’d reminded her that he’d missed some important milestones in their child’s life.

Could she blame him for wanting to know?

Could she deny him?

No. Not only was telling him about their daughter fair, but it might also ease some of the tension of the next day’s visit and maybe even prevent him from running to his lawyers. She didn’t want to make friends with him, but she did have to deal with him. A good conversation might go a long way to fixing their awkwardness. “Sure.”

He opened the door and motioned for her to enter first. When she saw the family room was the same as she’d decorated it, a symphony of butterflies took flight in her stomach. He might not have wanted to do the work required to change the green granite fireplace and hardwood floors. But why keep a sofa and chairs that could have been replaced long ago? Why keep her knickknacks? The art she’d chosen?

He walked toward the kitchen of the open-floor-plan downstairs. “Iced tea?”

“Yes. Thanks.” She’d need something to swallow the lump of emotion clogging her throat. She remembered the first time they’d stepped into this house, when it was little more than framework and plywood. They’d bought it new, not yet complete, so they could put their stamp on it.

She brushed her hand along a white wood chair rail, lovingly caressed the drum shade of a lamp.

He handed her a glass of iced tea.

“Thanks.” She looked up, caught his gaze, and her stomach plummeted to the floor. It was like thirteen years ago, when he was young and sweet and not pressured by the business or his family. Her chest tingled. Her already weak knees liquefied.

Oh, surely she wasn’t going to let herself be attracted to him?

He motioned for her to sit on the chair and he sat on the sofa in his wet trunks. “So start with her birthday.” He grimaced. “I guess I’d like to know what day she was born. Were there any complications?” He caught her gaze. “Were you okay?”

The concern in his voice brought back her feeling of connection to him, the younger him, the guy who’d loved her. She swallowed, fighting it. “I was fine. It was a normal pregnancy.” She smiled wistfully. “She was born on July 27 after about eighteen hours of labor.”

He sat back. “Ouch.”

She batted a hand. “It was normal. Nothing every other woman in the world doesn’t go through.” A thought struck her. “I have pictures.”

He sat up. “You do?”

“What mother doesn’t?”

With a laugh, she flipped through her wallet to find the pictures she carried of Trisha. Luckily, she was packrat enough to have kept every special-event picture she had, even the infant photo from the hospital.

Sitting beside him on the sofa, she presented the wallet displaying the pictures. “Here’s her first picture.”

He laughed. “She looks like a prune.”

“That’s from floating around in amniotic fluid for nine months.” She flipped to the next picture, the one taken at a studio when Trisha was three months old. “This one’s better.”

He sighed an “Ah,” and said, “She was adorable.”

Hearing the emotion in his voice, she slid the picture from its wallet slot. “You can have this one.”

His gaze shot to hers. “I can?”

She quickly looked away. “Sure. I have lots of photos that I can send you.”

“I—” He swallowed. “Thanks.”

She felt the weird vibe again. She’d hated this man, feared him for so long that she’d kept his child from him. And now here they were sitting together, talking like normal people, when inside he probably disliked her as much for keeping Trisha from him as she disliked him for ruining their marriage.

She handed him her wallet and rose from the sofa, getting away from him. “The next six or eight pictures are Trisha. Just go ahead and flip through.”

He did as she asked, pausing over every picture in the wallet, intensifying her guilt. Especially since she was standing in the house where she’d loved him. Where they’d been so happy.

But a quick glance at the window sliced through all her good memories and brought her back to reality. He’d broken that window the night she’d left. She hadn’t been wrong to run. She might have been able to stay if she’d only had herself to think about. But she’d had a baby. An unborn bundle of joy. And he had been escalating. His behavior got worse every day. She’d done the right thing.

After a minute, he handed the wallet back to her. “Those are—” He sucked in a breath. “I can’t even describe what I feel.”

She brusquely took the wallet. Shoved it into her purse. Ready to head for the door, she said, “I’ll send you my extra photos. I’ll make sure I get one from every stage of her life so far.”

Before she could even turn to make her escape, he said, “How about her teeth? I notice two of them are missing.”