The High Price of Secrets

“The address Mom’s checks are sent to—can you give that to me again?”

“Sure, just give me a minute to find the email,” her brother replied.

In the background she could hear him using his usual hunt-and-peck keyboard skills to pull up the information. She smiled to herself. Computers were a necessary evil in Ethan’s book—he’d much rather be blending his world-famous wines and watching over their production as if they were his children heading out to a first day at school. While he was busy, Tamsyn scrabbled in her handbag for a pen and notebook.

“Found it,” he said a moment later. He rattled off the address.

“That’s weird,” Tamsyn replied, chewing on the end of her pen. “That’s the address I went to on Saturday, but the man there said he hadn’t heard of Mom.”

“Let me check with Dad’s solicitor and get back to you. Could be someone made a mistake somewhere.”

Or it could be that someone was lying to her. The thought echoed around in her mind. Could Finn be deliberately keeping information about her mother from her? Surely not. What would be the point? It’s not as if he stood to gain anything by it.

“Okay, thanks. Send me a text or email when you know, okay? In the meantime, I’ve decided to take a short-term lease on a cottage here. I want to spend more time poking around, see if I can bump into anyone who might know her and how I can find her.”

“Tam, are you sure you’re doing the right thing? Maybe if she’s hard to find it’s because she doesn’t want to be.”

“It’s not about what she wants anymore,” Tamsyn said with uncharacteristic firmness. “This time it’s about what she owes me. I deserve to know why she left us, Ethan. I need to know.”

She heard her brother sigh in frustration. “By the way,” Ethan said, “I talked to Trent. He told me what happened.”

Tamsyn felt as if a fist had closed around her heart and her lungs burned, reminding her to draw in a breath.

“R-really? Ev-everything?” she stuttered.

“With a little coaxing.” The steel in Ethan’s voice left her in no doubt that her brother had not been his usual urbane self when approaching her ex-fiancé. He continued before she could gather her thoughts together. “I don’t blame you for needing some time out. He duped us all, Tam. Led us all to believe he’d love you the way you deserved to be loved. He was promising something he couldn’t deliver. No matter his orientation, what he did to you was wrong on every level. You deserved better than that and you still do. Isobel’s so mad I had to physically restrain her from heading into town to deal with him. I just wanted you to know, we’re in your corner. Whatever you need from us right now, it’s yours.”

Tears throbbed at the back of Tamsyn’s eyes and she stared up at the ceiling in a vain attempt to force them back. If she let go now, she didn’t know if she’d be able to stop, and if Ethan heard her crying he’d be here faster than she could blink. This was her mission, her goal. She had to do it for herself. For once in her life she wasn’t doing something to please someone else, this was all about her.

She focused, instead, on the idea of Ethan’s fiancée, Isobel, and the very idea of the tiny blonde going head to head with Trent in a fight. It was enough to calm her—to almost make her smile.

“Thank you,” she managed to whisper then drew in a steadying breath, one that made her voice stronger. “I’ll be in touch when I learn anything, okay?”

“It’ll have to be okay,” Ethan conceded. “And I’ll check that address and get back to you later today.”

Tamsyn said goodbye and severed the connection, feeling a little as if she’d cut off a lifeline. She was grateful for the distraction when the sound of tires on the graveled driveway drew her attention out the window. She watched as a now-familiar SUV pulled in next to her rental. An all new tightness replaced the pain that had been in her chest only moments ago as Finn stepped down from the vehicle and started toward the house.

Ignoring her body’s sudden and unsettling awareness of him, she examined the question that now hovered foremost in her mind. Did some of the answers she sought lie with Finn Gallager?

Six

Finn approached the open front door not entirely sure what he was doing here. Lorenzo had asked for updates, but even that wasn’t enough of a reason to be virtually stalking Tamsyn Masters the way he was.

She moved into the doorway just as he raised his hand to the frame to knock. Today she was dressed simply in strategically faded, snug blue jeans and a deep V-necked white T-shirt that hinted at the shell-pink bra she wore beneath. The soft swells of her breasts pushed against the fine cotton above the cups of her bra.

Finn forced his eyes upward to her face. With her hair pulled back into a ponytail she looked younger, the dark marks under her eyes were a little more faded than they’d been the day before.

“Hi,” he said. “I was just passing and thought I’d see if you needed anything in town.”

A slow sweet smile pulled at Tamsyn’s lips.

“That was thoughtful of you, but Penny’s actually given me quite a few things to take care of me for the next few days.”

“Okay, great. That was good of her.” He searched for something else he could say to prolong the conversation. “Oh, and I thought I’d give you my number in case you need any help with anything around the house.”