Total pages in book: 117
Estimated words: 110694 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 553(@200wpm)___ 443(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 110694 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 553(@200wpm)___ 443(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
The door opened behind me, but I didn’t turn back to see who it was. I already knew. Only Luther would open my office door without knocking—that, and he was the only other person here. We shared the six-thousand-square-foot home. He kept to the west wing, and I stayed to the east. Neither of us planned on having another family. We’d both failed at the first attempt. He hadn’t even married the mother of his child. She’d refused, and he hadn’t loved her enough to demand it.
“You think the kid is yours?” Luther asked, the humor gone from his voice.
He had enjoyed the marriage shit, but the instant the little girl had stepped out of the car, things had taken a turn. The threat that she could be mine wasn’t funny.
Hell, I had fucked up, being a father to my son. Staying with his mother for his benefit all those years had done him more harm than good. All he saw was the toxic relationship Maggie and I had. Whatever love I’d thought I had for her was long gone by the time he was old enough to truly remember things. She’d held him over my head, and because he loved her, I’d allowed it. I shouldn’t have.
“Fucking hope not,” I replied.
Once I had the background information on her, along with the marriage certificate, then I’d know if a paternity test was needed.
“You sure know how to pick ’em,” he drawled.
Scowling, I turned around to look at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
He lifted the shoulder not leaning against the doorframe. “No need to get pissy. I was just pointing out, when you decide to fuck one raw, you pick stunners. Hell, you took Maggie right from under Garrett’s nose back in the day. He’d had his eye on her, and you managed to charm her within minutes. But this one?” He let out a whistle. “Damn, man. If she fucks as good as she looks, then this might not be a bad thing. When she stepped out of her car outside the gate, I was struck speechless.”
I shot him a disgusted look. I didn’t need the fact that she was so goddamn beautiful shoved down my throat. I was aware. It was the reason I had run like hell five years ago. Beautiful women made me stupid at times, and she was a level above beautiful.
“Garrett was already engaged to wife number one. Maggie was never going to be his sidepiece,” I replied.
“What’s her name?” Luther asked me.
I shrugged as if I didn’t care, although until I had read the marriage certificate, I hadn’t known it. All I had called her that night was Dollface. I hadn’t wanted her to know my name, so I never asked for hers.
“Which one?” I asked because I hadn’t gotten the kid’s name. I was hoping it wasn’t Vivi Lu, or whatever she’d called her. The poor kid would be bullied over a name like that.
He chuckled. “God, you’re an ass. You have the fucking marriage certificate. Did you not read her name on there?”
“Branwen, I think it said. I don’t know how she pronounces it. I never asked her name. We fucked. It was one drunken night in Vegas. Knowing her name wasn’t important.”
He shook his head, still grinning at me. “Not so sure about that. I’ve seen you drink a fifth of Jack many times in our past, and never did you think that taking some cunt to a wedding chapel was a good idea.”
“It wasn’t a fucking chapel! It was some pretend Elvis shit. And I wasn’t just drunk. I’d smoked some opium before I saw her.”
He threw back his head and laughed. I was done with this conversation. He could go now.
“That makes much more sense,” he said when he stopped his annoying cackling.
My phone started to ring, and my eyes dropped to where it lay on the desk. I stared at the number. I hadn’t wanted to get Levi involved in this, just in case there was no need for him to ever know about it. So, I’d called Wilder Jones. He was the family’s computer genius and could find more information than Levi could anyway.
Wilder’s name on my screen had me lowering my cigar to the tray. I could hear the phantom rattler waiting there, taunting me with its bite. My gut was something I trusted. Right now, I wished it were a liar.
Three
Branwen
Five Years Ago
The bottle of Tito’s sitting on the mirrored shelving behind the bar might be enough to make this bearable. I would rather be literally anywhere but here. A dentist chair, getting three cavities filled; listening to my aunt preach at me about virtue; or, hell, even at my yearly gynecologist checkup. But I wasn’t so lucky.
I had to be here. In Vegas, celebrating my best friend’s last days as a bachelorette. Next weekend, she would be walking down the aisle to marry not only the man she claimed was the love of her life, but also my ex-boyfriend. Oh, and not just any ex-boyfriend. The one who had told me he loved me, convinced me to spread my legs for the first time, and had our future planned out for us. That was the problem—his planning.