She headed back into Jonas’s bedroom. Spotting her suitcases on the other side of the room, she nodded, relieved that not only had the sheriff had the foresight to grab them for her, but that last night, Jonas hadn’t unpacked them while she slept.
Rachel sat down on the side of the bed and put Scott on the floor. He ran up to the suitcases and tugged at one of the luggage tags still attached to a handle while Rachel got her phone from the bedside table.
Annabeth answered on the first ring. “Happy extended holidays,” she joked. “Do you miss me?”
“I do,” admitted Rachel. “And I’m also calling to ask you a favor. A big favor.”
“Yes. I will be your maid of honor,” Annabeth said solemnly.
It almost made her burst into tears. “I don’t need one of those,” Rachel answered, her voice wavering. She swallowed hard and moved to get the bottle of pain medication. Half of one would get her back to Denver. She snapped the pill in her fingers and washed it down with the glass of water left on the nightstand. “What I need is a ride.”
A beat passed. “A ride from where?”
“From the Elk Lodge back to my apartment.” Scott crouched down on the floor and started playing with the zipper on the suitcase. Rachel was going to need help to get them down the stairs, but she didn’t want to think about that. “My mother showed up.”
“Wow. Do I want to know?” She and Annabeth had too much history for her friend not to recognize the importance of the words. “Is she still there?”
“I will tell you all about it on the ride, but yes, she’s still here. And I want to leave. Like yesterday.” She cleared her throat. “But I’ll settle for leaving as soon as you can get here. You could pick me up at the main entrance. I know it’ll take you some time to get here, but—”
“Don’t say another word. I’m on my way.”
17
“I can’t believe you’re letting her do this,” Rachel’s mother hissed, midway through the most excruciating hour of Jonas’s life. Rachel had insisted on leaving the house and waiting for her friend in the lobby. He’d followed her anyway, and so had Rachel’s mother. “That is your son. And you’re letting her get in a car with someone else and drive away?”
Christmas music played softly in the background of the Elk Lodge lobby, soft and gentle, and completely out of place. Why were they still playing it? Jonas made a note to tell the front desk to change the playlist. It wasn’t Christmas anymore. The holiday atmosphere made no sense, particularly now that everything was crashing down around him. Again.
“Mrs. Lincoln.” Thank god for the years of running the resort, which gave him a deep well of patience. “I can’t stop Rachel from leaving the resort if that’s what she wants to do.”
“Well, you should try.” Susan had planted herself in front of the Christmas tree in the lobby. The tree was scheduled to come down after the twelve days of Christmas. Jonas wanted to tear the decorations off. “You have a responsibility to Rachel and Scott. You need to convince her that staying here is her best option.”
“It’s not up to me to determine what her best option is.” He couldn’t try to control this situation. She’d taught him that.
“Don’t be obtuse.” Rachel’s mother scanned the lobby with a hawk-like gaze. “They need you to step up and lead the family. You should already be married, and you know that.”
“That’s not—”
“It’s what’s best for all of us,” Susan insisted. “It’s the truth, and I won’t be persuaded otherwise.”
“I’m not going to pressure Rachel,” he said lightly. “She’ll decide for herself what she wants out of our relationship.”
A flash of rage transformed Susan’s face, her cheeks going a hot red. “I can’t believe you.” Her raised voice echoed off the ceiling of the lobby. “I’ve been here for hours, trying to get you to see that Rachel should be your priority and you’re dead set on avoiding it. She is the mother of your child. You are supposed to be from a good family. I’m disgusted and refuse to stay another minute,” she declared, her raised voice drawing the glances of several nearby guests. Susan threw up her hands and stalked toward the door. “Scott is your child,” she added loudly over her shoulder right before the door closed behind her.
“Yes, he is,” Jonas said, mostly to himself.
“Jonas?” His grandmother’s voice sent cold shock skimming down his spine, a sick twist to his gut.
No. Not like this. The worst possible moment. Jonas turned to face his grandmother, who stood by the Christmas tree wearing a black cardigan edged in silver. She’d wrapped it tight around her thin frame.
All the hiding—was done. There was no vestige of pretense left, not with Susan Lincoln shouting about his son for all to hear. There was a certain relief to it, and then a wave of anxiety that made his stomach clench.
“Let’s sit down,” he suggested, pointing toward the sofa.
His grandmother sank down onto it, her demeanor one of exhaustion. The glow of tree lights reflected on her face, softening her expression.
“Jonas,” she said, continuing to look at the tree, “tell me what that woman meant.”
He hadn’t rehearsed what he was going to say. It was an odd departure from his usual habits, but he hadn’t. “The photographer, Rachel—I met her before. A few years ago, here at the resort and we spent a night together.” The words stuck in his throat, but he pushed on. “She got pregnant, and Scott is our son. I didn’t know. I only found out when she came to the resort to take the photos for your Christmas gift.”
His grandmother’s hand drifted to her throat, her gaze never leaving the tree. The Christmas music cut in between them, filling the silence. Say something. Please. This was the kind of situation he’d always hoped to avoid. With her—with all his family. Being a disappointment when so much was expected of him didn’t come easy.
“You’ve known,” she began, then paused as if for strength. “You’ve known all this time?”
“Since Christmas Day. Five days to be exact. Not before then.” Heat flared on the back of his neck. Maybe he should have announced it that first day, without waiting another second. It would have been better than this.
“Oh.” The breath had gone out of her, it seemed, “Oh, Jonas. I’m so disappointed,” she said, her voice quavering. In a flash Jonas saw how frail she had become. She was still confident, but the cancer had robbed her of the gentle peace she normally exuded, and now he’d only added to her troubles. “A child out of wedlock.” She shook her head. “I didn’t ever want that from you. For any of my grandsons. I thought I raised you better than that. And to not know. How old is he?”
“Two,” Jonas managed.
“He was growing up without you. Without a father.” An excuse rose and died on his lips—she didn’t have my phone number. “And more than anything else, it breaks my heart that you felt you had to hide the truth from me.”
“I didn’t want to,” he said quickly. “Only temporarily. I knew I had to tell you. It was a matter of timing, and with the holidays and all…”
His grandmother held up a hand. “I’m not feeling well,” she said, her voice soft and even, but enough to slice through Jonas’s heart.
“Is everything all right?” Chase asked as he and Gabe approached from the other side of the tree.
Numb from guilt at hurting his grandmother, Jonas didn’t answer. Gabe leaped forward, taking control of the situation. “Let me help you up, Grandmother.”
Jonas stood, his heart heavy. “She knows.” Judging by the expressions on their faces, they knew exactly what he meant.
“I need to go back to my room,” his grandmother told Gabe, patting his arm. “Would you walk with me?”
“Of course,” his brother said, taking her by the arm and leading her away.
Jonas found himself fixated on the tree, as if its decorations could offer him some sort of advice.
“It didn’t go so well, did it?” Chase asked, crossing his arms over his
chest. “Grandmother looked upset and rightly so.”
“The worst part was she didn’t hear it from me. It came from Rachel’s mother shouting it for all to hear across the lobby.” Jonas ran his hands through his hair trying to make sense of it all.
Chase had the grace to look abashed. “I’m sorry, Jonas. I wish it hadn’t turned out that way.”
“Please.” Acid rose in his throat. “You do wish that, deep down. You wanted Rachel to leave before.”
“Well, I don’t now.” Jonas met his brother’s eyes. “Not judging by the look on your face. You look…” He trailed off, not saying whatever it was he’d planned to say. Chase grimaced. “I was unfair before. I had a situation with Tana that wasn’t as complicated as yours, but I still didn’t do everything right.”
“That’s a far cry from breaking Grandmother’s heart,” he pointed out. Jonas’s heart had been flattened, beating with a kind of weakness that scared him. He sat back down on the sofa.
“I had things happen, too. With Tana.” Chase said, sitting down beside him, his mouth set in a thin line. “It took sacrifice to make things work with her.”
Gabe reappeared then, dropping into a nearby overstuffed chair. “She’s settled in her rooms and asked to be alone.”
“I really messed this up,” Jonas said, shaking his head.
Chase snorted. “I was trying to tell knucklehead here that the women we care about, change us—and it’s not a bad thing.” His expression went solemn again. “I wasn’t sure I wanted to stay here. In fact, I wanted to be anywhere, but here. Tana changed all that for me.”
“Same here. I didn’t ever want to come back. And it didn’t go well if you remember,” Gabe said.
Jonas’s face burned. They’d all taken a hand in embarrassing Gabe’s new girlfriend, Anna, and it had come from a place of deep fear on his brother’s behalf. Not something Jonas wanted to admit any more now than he had then.
“But we got through it all, and Anna and I are still here. Where we belong,” Gabe added.
“I don’t know if what I have is salvageable,” Jonas said. “I’ve really made a mess of it all.”
“Grandmother will forgive you,” Gabe said, his voice like a solemn promise. One Jonas wanted to hold on to.
“Maybe she will. But Rachel might not be so forgiving. Her past…” He outlined it for them in broad strokes, without giving away too many details. “How can I earn her trust a second time if she never really gave it to me in the first place?”
The brothers were silent. Across the lobby, a pair of guests laughed with the hostess at the check-in desk. The music had changed to a song about silver bells. Jonas felt the ghost of an old evening across his face, night air a long time ago. His parents’ voices in the back of a sleigh on the grounds of the Elk Lodge. He’d been trusting, then. Trusting they’d always be there, but it hadn’t worked out that way.
“You should go after her,” Gabe said softly. “I had to go after Anna. I flew to California with my heart in my throat, and so should you. Go after Rachel.”
Jonas stood, ready to end the discussion. “She doesn’t want me there,” he argued.
Chase let his head fall back on the sofa. “Are you kidding? Of course she does. If she didn’t want to be near you, she wouldn’t have come back to let you take care of her. You should go,” Chase added, seconding Gabe’s suggestion.
Maybe they were right. No, there was no maybe about it—they were right. Jonas needed to fight for what he wanted. For what he loved. For his family. He patted his pockets. Keys—he’d need keys. And her address. And—then what? He had no idea how to convince her that she could trust him, or that he would do anything to be with her and Scott.
Start by getting there.
His brothers rose from their seats, watching him. “Do you need anything before you leave?” Gabe asked. “Anything we can do here?”
It was on the tip of his tongue to say no, but... “If you can keep an eye on things for me at the lodge, that’d be great.” It was the first time he’d ever left his brothers in charge of the resort. “And more importantly, I need you to make sure Grandmother’s going to be okay. Tell her I’m sorry and trying to fix things.”
Suspicion grew in Chase’s eyes. “Are you coming back?”
“Yes.” Whether he convinced Rachel or not, he would be back. For most of Jonas’s life, the resort had been his one constant—the resort and his grandmother. Even the rest of his family had come and gone. But he wouldn’t abandon them, or this place. Never. It was only that he had someone else he couldn’t abandon, either. “I’ll be back. Keep the building standing, would you?”
Gabe and Chase shared a glance, and then Gabe looked back at Jonas. “Get out of here,” he said. “Rachel’s getting away.”
18
Rachel put her head back on the headrest of the passenger seat and sighed, her shoulder still aching even with the pain medication.
“Scott’s asleep,” Annabeth said, her gaze flicking to the rearview mirror and back. “Let me just—” She reached forward and adjusted the music down a few notches. Annabeth had turned on the local pop station back at the resort, and ten minutes into the trip, the beats had lulled Scott into a nap. “Okay. Tell me what happened.”
Rachel closed her eyes. “I told you most of it.” There wasn’t much more to the story. With each passing mile, everything seemed more and more simple, but it also more complicated. Like looking into a funhouse mirror. Running into Jonas, the father of her child, had been a surprise. The fact he was not the man of her dreams as she’d fantasized for years was a huge letdown. Except it hadn’t been simple realization. Instead, she’d fallen hard for him, making the truth hurt worse than she cared to admit.
“You did not tell me,” Annabeth said. “You told me how this started. You didn’t tell me what led us to this little road trip, and you said you’d fill me in. Spill it.”
“I like road trips,” Rachel pointed out, opening her eyes.
“I love road trips,” said Annabeth. “And you know I’d drive to the ends of the earth for you, but—”
“It was a dream,” Rachel said, the words bursting free. She whipped her head around to make sure she hadn’t woken Scott. He slept on, his arms curled around the stuffed elk Jonas had given him. Her shoulder protested as she turned back around. “I got close to Jonas, and I wanted to believe in the dream. That he could love me but still give me some space. That he could be a good dad. That he wouldn’t make decisions for me.”
“Ugh.” Annabeth’s eyes narrowed. “What kinds of decisions?”
“He wanted me to stay with him after I got out of the hospital,” she said. “And then, when my mother showed up, he let her know that he planned to marry me. He hadn’t bothered to even ask.”
“What an ass,” Annabeth said. “He proposed to your mom instead of you?”
“Well—” Regret tightened Rachel’s throat. “Yeah. He did. Basically, but he was right about staying with him. My shoulder isn’t a hundred percent. And my mom—” She shook her head. “She was in rare form. And he reacted the way he probably has for years about most things. He’s the head of his family. It’s natural for him to take charge when there’s something going on at his resort, and trust me, my mother was a problem.”
She’d never forget the sinking feeling when she’d seen her mother standing in the foyer of Jonas’s house. It had felt like all the worst parts of her past catching up with her. Right now, she was a step ahead of her mom—barely.
“So what?” Annabeth kept her eyes on the road. “That doesn’t mean what he did was okay. You don’t have to accept his childhood as an excuse for the way he acted. You’re not one of his relatives that he gets to keep tabs on. You’re your own woman. He doesn’t just get to say that he’s going to marry you. Did he really say that?”
“Yes. He just announced it. Like it was a done deal.”
“A person can’t do that,” Annabeth insisted. “That’s a discussion you have to have toget
her.”
“I know, Annabeth. I know.” She looked out the window, at the snow-covered hills rolling by them on the highway. Gray clouds hung low in the sky, and every so often the sun broke through, warming the air below.
They could have had a discussion, but Rachel hadn’t wanted to do that. She’d wanted him to prove his love by letting her go. And he had. She just hadn’t been prepared for him to let her go without a fight, without trying to persuade her to stay. She shifted uncomfortably in her seat.
Rachel had plenty of time to decide she didn’t want to leave after all, and yet ...here she was.
“Are you okay?” Annabeth asked softly.
“Not really,” she answered.
Rachel would have to be okay by the time they got back to her apartment. Scott would need her, and her life needed her, and that was the bottom line—she didn’t have time to wallow about Jonas. They’d had an interesting week together, but that was it. It was over. All that was left was to decide what to do about Jonas having visitation with his son. Not exactly an ideal situation.
You could have talked to him.
Annabeth shifted into the other lane and back again, remaining silent.
Rachel kept her gaze fixed on the snow—white like icing on a cake. Or white, like a wedding dress. She could almost see Jonas in a tux, looking devastatingly handsome and incandescently happy. None of which would happen because she hadn’t bothered to hash things out with him. Instead, she’d run away.
Just like she’d always done in the past. Life had taught her that sometimes it was the only way to cope, like when she’d turned away from the altar and run as fast as she could from her ex—looking for a safe haven.
The Elk Lodge. It had been her place of refuge and the place she found Jonas. It had been a fun one-night stand, sure, but she’d never have slept with him if she hadn’t felt he was part of the safe harbor.
The Billionaire’s Christmas Son: Elkin Brothers Christmas Book Three Page 11
