Almost a Bravo

by Christine Rimmer

  Aislinn felt kind of nauseated. She drew in a careful breath through her nose. “Sorry. Go ahead.”

  With a nod and another quick adjustment of his glasses, Anders went on, “‘Such a simple thing you did, Aislinn, to turn my whole life upside down. You took a summer job working at my ranch. And that is how I came face-to-face with the result of the crime I had committed in a split second of opportunity the night of your birth, a crime I’ve kept hidden for all these years...’”

  The night I was born?

  She couldn’t not speak. “I don’t get it. Whatever he did, it’s got zero to do with me. I was nowhere near Wild River on the night I was born.” They were all frowning at her—and okay, yeah. She needed to stop interrupting.

  But no. Just no.

  Durand had it all wrong. Aislinn had been born in Europe, in a tiny principality called Montedoro, where her mother and father and four of her five brothers had traveled when her mom was pregnant with her.

  “That right there,” she insisted, “what you just read? How could whatever he did involve me? It couldn’t. I was born in Montedoro, which is on the Côte d’Azur, in case you didn’t know. No way Martin Durand was there when I was born.”

  Down the table, Burt glared at her. Erma sat silent, her expression unreadable. And Jaxon? He looked like he couldn’t wait for this to be through.

  Well, neither could she.

  And hold on a minute. The letter hadn’t actually said that this “crime” of Durand’s involved her, had it? So maybe this had nothing to do with her at all. She gulped. “I just don’t understand. Why am I here?”

  Again, Kip Anders suggested, “If I might just finish...?”

  “But it’s all wrong.”

  Anders didn’t argue, he simply waited.

  With a hard sigh, she gave in. “All right. Fine. Finish it, then.”

  Anders granted her a nod. “Martin Durand writes, ‘The morning of the night you were born, Aislinn, George Bravo and his very pregnant wife, Marie, had driven out to Wild River from Valentine Bay to discuss the possibility of their investing in an expansion of our horse breeding and training operation.

  “‘The investment never happened. But during George and Marie’s visit, there was a storm, a bad one. The roads were washed out. Marie went into labor—and so did our then-foreman’s wife, Paula Delaney.

  “‘You see, Aislinn, I had cheated on my wife, Claudia, with Paula. I make no excuse for that. It was wrong. I did it anyway, with the classic result.’”

  “What a complete SOB,” Aislinn cried. All eyes swung her way. “Sorry. Really.” She shot Anders a desperate glance. “And honestly, none of this can be true.” They all continued to stare at her. “All right.” She waved a hand. “Fine. Just go ahead.”

  Anders read on, “‘When she realized she was pregnant, Paula had come to me. She swore that the baby was mine. She wanted to leave her husband and make a life with me and the child. I wanted none of that. I was happy with Claudia, for the most part. I loved my wife and I liked our life together—and Claudia owned Wild River.

  “‘Jaxon, you were eight at the time. You’d been with us for four years by then. As I’ve explained to you many times, in honor of the long line of Winters who had owned and worked Wild River for generations, we had you keep your last name when we formally adopted you. But in all the ways that really count, you were our son. We were a family—you, Claudia and I. I told Paula no. I urged her to forget about me. Use your head, I said, stay with Lloyd where you belong. Paula wouldn’t listen. She said she loved me. I was sure there would be trouble, that she would come after me, demand a test that would prove her baby was mine. I would lose everything that mattered to me.

  “‘I didn’t know what to do to get that woman to leave me alone. And then Marie Bravo showed up and went into labor at the same time Paula did. The perfect moment presented itself, both babies in makeshift cribs made of storage boxes, sharing the same room while Claudia, acting as emergency midwife, tended to the new mothers in rooms on either side.’”

  Aislinn felt light-headed. Her stomach roiled.

  Anders read on, each word painfully slow and clear. “‘I entered the babies’ room when no one was looking and discovered that the infants were similar in size, both with eyes of that same newborn blue. The hair color was different, one darker, one lighter. But there was so little of it on either tiny head, I dared to hope that no one would notice the difference. I saw my moment and I took it, switching the babies and their blankets, too.’”

  Aislinn sat very still, her hands pressed to her churning stomach. She knew if she moved or even dared to breathe, she was going to be sick—just hack up her breakfast, spew it across the unblemished oval of the conference table.

  It was all a lie. It had to be. Martin Durand couldn’t be her father. Her father was George Bravo, a good man, a loving husband and a doting dad, a man who made each of his sons and daughters feel wanted and secure.

  She was a Bravo, born, bred and raised. Her parents had been deeply in love, wonderfully brave and adventurous—and more than a little bit foolish.

  They’d had a passion for traveling the world, her mom and dad. They’d lost one son on a trip to Siberia. Finn, eight at the time, had simply vanished—kidnapped for ransom, they all assumed. But the ransom demand never came and Finn had not been seen or heard from again. And then her parents were lost, too, a few years later, on a romantic getaway to Thailand, where they were caught in a tsunami.

  Her family had suffered. But they had gotten through it, together. Her oldest brother, Daniel, eighteen when their parents died, had won custody of all of them. He’d raised them the rest of the way, Aislinn and the six other remaining Bravo siblings. Their road hadn’t been smooth or easy, but they’d made it work. Together. And she loved them.

  And they were hers, damn it. Her people. Not some unknown woman named Paula who’d cheated on her husband. Not crazy, bad-tempered old Martin Durand.

  She wanted to scream at them—at Jaxon and Burt, at Erma and the lawyer. She wanted to shout at them, Stop this! Stop these lies! Stop right now!

  But her voice had deserted her and her throat felt constricted, like brutal hands were squeezing it.

  And Kip Anders just kept reading the lying words of Martin Durand.

  “‘I left those babies, each in the wrong storage-box crib. I ran from that room and I didn’t look back—until later, of course, when it was too late, when I realized that if Paula did demand a paternity test, she would find out that not only was the baby not mine, it wasn’t hers or Lloyd’s, either. She would remember the night of the birth and the other woman’s child in the same room with her child. She would figure it out and I would be caught anyway, proved not only a cheater, but also a criminal.

  “‘As it turned out, though, the crime I’d committed was completely unnecessary. Paula never came after me to take a father’s responsibility. Instead, she took my advice and let Lloyd think the child was his. And then a few months later, Lloyd got another job out of state and we hired Burt. I never saw Paula or Lloyd or the child who was really Marie Bravo’s daughter again.

  “‘I told myself there was no harm done. Each woman had a baby—yes, all right, the wrong baby. But they didn’t know that, so what did it matter? Everyone was happy. I tried to forget.

  “‘To Claudia, I was a faithful husband from then on. Twelve years later, when Claudia died, I missed her. I mourned her. She left everything to me with the understanding between us that it would all go to you, Jaxon, at my death. I steered clear of Valentine Bay and any chance I might see you, Aislinn, and know you as mine.

  “‘But then you showed up at Wild River that summer, looking just like my mother, who had died before I ever set foot in Oregon. At first, I was certain you must somehow have found out who you were to me, that you’d come to make me pay for cheating on Claudia, for switching you with Marie Bra
vo’s child and then just walking away. I watched you, waiting, wondering how you planned to exact your revenge. But all I saw was a girl with my mother’s haunting dark eyes, a girl in love with Jaxon.’”

  In love with Jaxon...

  Aislinn stifled a groan.

  Because, dear God in heaven, why?

  Why that, too?

  Martin Durand had no pity at all. He’d died determined to strip her of every last scrap of herself—to steal her identity, take away her family and then go blithely on to out her most shameful secret, that she’d once fallen so hard for a married man, she’d had to run away to keep from throwing herself at him.

  Aislinn closed her eyes so she wouldn’t have to look at any of them, closed her eyes, braced her elbows on the table and pressed her hands to the crown of her head. Another groan tried to escape her. She swallowed it down.

  Anders made a throat-clearing sound.

  “Aislinn,” Jaxon asked cautiously, “are you all right? Do you need a break?”

  She ground her teeth together and refused to open her eyes. “Finish, damn you all. Get it over with.”

  For a moment, there was silence.

  Then at last she heard papers rustling and Anders finally got on with it. “Ahem. Let’s see—ah. Here we go. ‘And then one day, Aislinn, you simply quit. You vanished without claiming your last paycheck, leaving nothing but a brief note for Jaxon citing some vague emergency. The months went by and I began to accept the truth that you were innocent. You knew nothing. I began to see that I would have to do what I could to make things right.

  “‘I hired an investigator to find Paula and the missing child who should have been Marie Bravo’s daughter. The Delaneys had named the child Madison.’”

  At the sound of that name, Aislinn dropped both hands off her head and slapped them, palms flat, onto the table, causing Erma to let out a small squeak of alarm.

  Madison Delaney?

  No. Uh-uh. Not the Madison Delaney. Pure coincidence, it had to be.

  Anders went right on. “‘My investigator reported that ten years after the Delaney family left Wild River, Lloyd Delaney died. Paula and her daughter then moved to Los Angeles, where Madison pursued a career as an actress—to great success, as it turned out.’”

  “This has to be a joke, right?” The question escaped Aislinn without any help from her conscious mind. “This is all a prank. I’m being punked. I’m actually supposed to believe that Martin Durand switched me with the baby who grew up to be Madison Delaney? Do you know who Madison Delaney is? She’s won an Oscar. She’s America’s darling.”

  And, dear God, she looks way too much like my sisters.

  How had she never noticed that before? Madison Delaney had big blue eyes, like all three of her sisters. And the cutest dimples when she smiled, like both Harper and Hailey. The actress had worn her hair in a variety of colors and styles, but she was naturally blond, wasn’t she? Like Aislinn’s sisters. And she had a nose that turned up ever so slightly at the tip, just like her youngest sister, Grace.

  The others were openly staring at her now.

  “What?” she demanded. “Don’t you even try to tell me you’ve never heard of Madison Delaney.”

  “Of course we’ve heard of her,” said Jax. He spoke gently, as though talking to a crazy person—and maybe she was crazy. Maybe she’d completely lost her mind.

  Kip Anders made a throat-clearing sound. “May I go on?”

  “Please.” Aislinn poured on the sarcasm. “Be my guest.”

  With a dignified nod, Anders continued, “‘The sad news, Aislinn, is that Paula Delaney died not long after that summer you worked at Wild River. I’m sorry you will never have an opportunity to get to know the woman who gave you life. I haven’t tried to contact Madison Delaney, just as I never told you the truth during my lifetime. I have no idea how everyone will take this news. I’m an old man now. Forgive me, but I can’t predict what the fallout from these particular revelations will be. And I don’t have the energy to find out. So, I’m leaving all that to you and the Bravo family. The investigator’s full report will be available to you immediately.’”

  Coward, she thought. He’d left all the tough work for others to do. She wished he hadn’t died—so she could kill him herself.

  Anders kept reading, “‘And as for you specifically, Aislinn, I’ve had my eye on you since the summer you came to work at Wild River. You haven’t married or gotten seriously involved with a man. I wanted to know if you still held out hope that Jaxon might be yours. That’s why I called you recently to remind you that Jaxon is free now. I heard the longing in your voice when you demanded that I never try to call you again.’”

  It was too much. Of a ridiculousness beyond all insanity. Aislinn straightened and announced, “Come on. As if that crazy old man could tell anything from one phone call, a very brief phone call, a phone call that he openly admits ended with me demanding that he leave me alone.”

  They all just stared at her—as they’d been staring at her almost from the moment Kip Anders began to read Durand’s last letter.

  Another sound of pure misery escaped her. She ducked her head once more and laced her fingers on top of it. “Sorry. Go on. Just...get it over with, please.”

  Kip Anders did just that. “‘After that phone call, I knew I had to leave you what you want most of all—a chance at a life with my adopted son.’”

  “What the hell, Martin?” It was Jax, his voice a rough whisper.

  Kip Anders didn’t even pause. “‘Aislinn, you and Jax are to marry within a week from the date of the reading of this letter. You are then to remain married for at least the next three months. After three months of marriage, you, Aislinn, will receive fifty thousand dollars from my estate. And, Jaxon, you will get the deed to Wild River and all the rest of it, as you should, as I always promised you and Claudia. Once the three months pass, it’s up to the two of you whether you choose to stay together or not.

  “‘You must mutually agree to these terms and carry through with them. Aislinn, if you do not marry Jaxon and live as his wife for three full months, you will get nothing.’”

  Nothing. She wanted to throw back her head and laugh.

  As if fifty thousand dollars meant squat to her right now.

  As if all the money in the world could ever stack up against what Martin Durand had just stolen from her—her pride, her family, her very identity.

  Anders droned on, “‘Jaxon, if you refuse to marry Aislinn for three months, Wild River Ranch and everything on it will be sold at auction. You will get the proceeds from the sale as well as everything else that belonged to me, minus any other bequests mentioned in my will. Jaxon, you are the son of my heart, and it has been an honor to be a father to you. I want you to have Wild River, but if that doesn’t happen, you will at least have plenty of capital with which to start over. I realize that will be little consolation to you, as we both know very well that you love Wild River more than your life. But believe it or not, I am doing this for you—for both of you. I think you will make a good match, that you will be good for each other. So I am giving you the opportunity you otherwise never would have had. I wish you both love and happiness and a successful future together. With all my deepest affection and my highest regard, Martin Durand.’”

  Dropping her hands from their ludicrous protective position over her head, Aislinn popped up straight in her chair. “That’s it? That’s all?”

  Anders blinked behind his glasses. “The, erm, end of the letter, yes. But we have yet to cover several specific conditions and particulars that you’ll both need to—”

  “Stop.” She shoved back the chair and leaped to her feet. “As if I care about your so-called conditions. As if I care about that old man’s money. As if I care about any of this crap. I am...not that person. Not somebody who was supposed to be named Madison Delaney. I’m Aislinn Bravo.
I was born in Montedoro at the villa of Tristan Bouchard, Count of Della Torre. You ask my brothers. They were there, they remember. They...” She lost track of her words as her gaze skittered around the table. They all looked at her as though she’d lost her mind—all of them, Jax most of all.

  She could read his thoughts in that look on his face. She’s a nutjob, his expression said, and I am so screwed...

  She went ahead and put it right out there, right in his face. “You think I’m crazy.”

  Jax jerked back. “No. No, I...”

  That made her laugh, a bizarre, deranged sort of sound. “Hey, come on. Be honest, Jax. You think I’ve lost my ever-loving mind. And maybe I have. Because who wouldn’t go crazy, after all I’ve just heard?”

  “Aislinn, really, nobody thinks you’re—”

  “Oh, yes, you do. And to be perfectly honest, you might be right. I’ve come unhinged. This is all too much and I just can’t take any more. I mean, it’s simply not possible, that my family isn’t my family, that my birth mother and the real Aislinn Bravo moved to Los Angeles, where she became a superstar named Madison Delaney. That all I know to be true about myself and my life is really just a big, fat lie.”

  The lawyer suggested mildly, “How about if we take a few minutes and—”

  “How ’bout if we don’t?” Aislinn pinned the lawyer with a hard glare.

  It was all so far beyond too much.

  Jax tried once more, “Aislinn, if you would just—”

  “No.” She cut him off cold as she snatched her purse off the chair. “Uh-uh. I need a minute. I need a thousand minutes. I need a lifetime out of this room.” She turned for the door.

  “Aislinn, wait!” Jax called after her.

  She kept walking, not once glancing back, grabbing the door handle, flinging it wide and escaping down the hallway that led to the waiting room.

  As she flew by the front desk, the pretty receptionist jumped up. “Ms., er, are you all right?”

  “Not really.”

  “Is there something I can—?”

  “Thanks, but no.” Aislinn shoved open the entry door and went through it.