Another Man's Son

by Glenys O'Connell

  “Mrs. Morgan, good morning,” Cynthia Warren, Ket’s housekeeper, greeted her. Cynthia, tall, slim and dignified, had been the only warm spot in the big house, taking Kathryn on as a protégé and teaching her the rudiments of social behavior she needed to survive in Lobster Cove high society.

  “Is my husband in, Cynthia?” Even now the words left a dusty feel on her tongue. She tried not to see the flicker of sympathy in the housekeeper’s eyes.

  “No, madam, Mr. Morgan took Alex out with him, early this morning.” Cynthia didn’t meet her eyes as she delivered this news.

  Kathryn tried to keep the anxiety out of her voice. Ket never took Alex out. “Did he say where they were going?”

  “No, madam. Actually, he wasn’t in a very talkative mood.”

  Kathryn shuddered. Poor little Alex, having to cope alone with Ket in one of his moods. Seeing her employer flinch, Cynthia said gently: “I’m sure he’ll be just fine.”

  But a finger of anxiety scratched at Kathryn’s mind throughout the rest of the morning.

  ****

  Ben sat with his feet up on the scarred top of the sheriff’s desk, a mug of coffee in one big hand, a report from the traffic duty cops in the other. He was having difficulty focusing his attention on the report of the night’s list of highway offenses. No matter how hard he tried to shut it out, his mind kept returning to the scenes with Kathryn last night and he heard again her low murmured question. Are all men bastards?

  Lobster Cove wasn’t exactly a hot bed of crime. At least, not on the surface. The only out-of-the-ordinary item was a report of a driver who was stopped by an officer about 5:30 that morning and issued with a warning because a young boy in the back seat was leaning out of the window far enough for it to be dangerous. The officer had issued an on-the-spot fine for lack of seatbelts and warned the man to watch his nephew’s behavior in future. Ben sighed. Hardly likely to set the law enforcement world on fire.

  Other than that, it had been quiet in Lobster Cove. No break-ins, drive-by shootings, not even a rowdy domestic or a bunch of late-night revelers to be quelled. Nothing interesting or urgent enough to take his mind off Kathryn Fitzgerald. Who was now Kathryn Morgan and far from his grasp.

  Had it really been almost seven years since he’d last seen her? Less than a year before that he’d wiped away the tears on her cheeks and tried to shield himself from the pain of his betrayal in her eyes. He’d been on his way to enlist, the only way he could see to pull himself out of the poverty he’d been born into in Lobster Cove. He’d told Kathryn he’d serve his time, learn a trade, and then he’d be able to give her all the things a man wants to give the woman he loves.

  But his country was at war and the months of training turned into three tours of duty in Afghanistan and an undercover assignment in Iraq that had left him hardened and cynical. His superiors noted he had a talent for undercover security operations. One had led to another. Secret operations, life and death matters that meant he couldn’t call home but his thoughts always turned to the sweetheart who waited for him.

  But while he was gone, Kathryn had found another, easier way to a life of luxury beyond anything he could ever offer.

  His work had kept him out of the country, bound in a world of secrecy where contact with anyone back home was forbidden. When he did get a chance to call Kathryn, her number was out of service, leaving him with a worm of worry in his gut. But then he was in deep cover in Afghanistan’s cocaine producing areas to root out drug dealers raising money to fund the Taliban by sending their deadly product to the States.

  That assignment had gone horribly wrong when a drug addict had ripped a knife through a muscle in his leg and left him to bleed to death in a filthy alleyway.

  Giving up on the paperwork, Ben pushed to his feet and stretched his cramped muscles. He pulled open his office door and walked into the outer office where his civilian secretary, Tess Highland, reigned supreme over reports, administration, and police department communications.

  “I’ll be out for half an hour, getting lunch. You can find me at the diner or call me on my cell if it’s urgent. Otherwise just tell anyone looking for me that I’ll be back soon.”

  Tess had worked for Lynn Lawton, the current sheriff, and for Lynn’s father, the now retired Sheriff Amos Lawton, and knew just about every process in the office. She had taken Ben under her wing as acting replacement for her boss. Before Lynn Lawton had stood against him and won the election to sheriff, the older Lawton had been the law’s representative in Lobster Cove for more years than most people could remember.

  Ben guessed few people would remember the youth he had been when last in town, or wonder how he came to be back in Lobster Cove. Most would simply accept he was a returning soldier, a war hero, and not question his rise to the position of acting sheriff. Even so, he had his story and cover all ready—a career in the military followed by the police academy. When the leg wound had ended his active service days in the military, the academy was the natural choice since he knew little else. The part of his history that wasn’t in the cover story was that following his graduation he was head-hunted by the FBI. His knowledge of the drug trade got him a desk job in forensics, tracing drug shipments and the money that paid for them.

  His experience undercover was the only thing that took him out of the office these days and only because there were certain facts he just couldn’t get behind a desk. None of these were things he could share. So if asked, he planned to joke with whoever was listening that he’d been put out to pasture with the state police, acting as ‘filler-in’ for departments short-staffed due to holidays and sick leave.

  ****

  One of the few people who did remember him was Maggie, the middle-aged proprietor of the Maggie’s Diner. She greeted him warmly as he slipped onto a stool at the counter, her smile transporting Ben back to the day he’d finally returned on leave to find Kathryn, almost a year after he’d left her standing at the bus station watching as he rode away.

  Except there’d been nobody home in the ramshackle cottage Kathryn and her town-drunk father had called home, so he’d gone into the diner on the off-chance she’d be there. Maggie had recognized and filled him in on all the gossip from his time away.

  “You’ve missed such goings on,” she had said, plopping a cup of coffee down in front of him and settling across from him for a chat. “That Kathryn Fitzgerald—you knew her, didn’t you? Worked at the bank. Well, she finally grabbed the brass ring. Married Ketler Morgan, Junior, soon after you left, it would have been. Seems he’d gotten her pregnant and he did the right thing by her, I’ll say that much for him. But it was against his father’s wishes—I heard the old man nearly had a coronary when he heard his new daughter-in-law and the mother-to-be of his grandchild was the daughter of that old drunk Fitzgerald.”

  Maggie obviously relished the details as she poured Ben another cup of coffee, blissfully unaware of the impact the information had on him. He had wanted to dash from the café, obliterate her words as if he’d never heard them. Instead, he sat rooted to the seat, forced by the devil on his shoulder to hear her out.

  “Can’t say I blame the girl, though, coming from the family background she comes from.” Maggie went on, “You could say she’s done well for herself—they’ve even put that father of hers in a fancy nursing home. Not that there’s much chance of drying that old drunk out without killing him. Ketler Morgan was her boss, and she worked hard to get the job as a teller in the bank, probably plotting this all along. Anyway, she’s set for life. Little Kathryn Fitzgerald gave the Morgan dynasty a son and heir about three months or so ago. Even the old man will have to accept her now. She’s given him what he’s wanted for years.

  “Funny thing, though—all the Morgan firstborn boys have had the name Ketler—but this baby’s called Alexander Fitzgerald Morgan, after Kathryn’s daddy. In fact, I believe they’re christening the baby today.”

  So, even though he swore he never wanted to set eyes on her again, Ben had
driven by the church on his way to shake the dust of Lobster Cove off his boots. He drove by slowly, just as they were taking photographs after the christening.

  He remembered as clearly as if he’d had a snapshot, the picture of Kathryn on the church steps, expensively dressed, with another man’s son in her arms. Standing beside her was a satisfied looking Ketler Morgan, Junior. The image was burned forever onto his heart.

  “Are you all settled in over at the sheriff’s office now, Ben?” Maggie asked as she placed his meal before him. Ben thanked her, wondering if Maggie remembered that conversation seven years ago. Now Ben was back in Lobster Cove and knew that time had not dimmed that wave of pain when he’d seen Kathryn with the Morgans.

  ****

  “Where’s my daddy? I don’t see him here.” Alex bit his lip. Being out with Daddy was scary enough, without him sending for this strange old man to pick him up and bring him to the weekend-empty Morgan Quality Shoe Factory.

  “It’s okay, he’ll be here soon; he said for you to wait for him down here.” The man, who smelled of tobacco and bad teeth, led the boy down a rickety flight of iron stairs and then another, right into the bowels of the factory. Alex had never been here before and the dank smell, the raw brick, and rusty heavy machinery frightened him. He remembered how angry Daddy got when he cried, so he sniffed back his fears and followed the creepy old man into a small room.

  That funny feeling that something was wrong intensified as he looked around. In the dim light from the man’s flashlight, he saw a camping cot, a bucket, and a tiny table in the room with no windows. He turned, fear making him want to run away even if it did make Daddy angry. Then a smelly cloth went over his face and he was left struggling to breathe before falling into darkness.

  Chapter Three

  Up on the hill overlooking town, Kathryn paced back and forth on the richly carpeted floors of the house the locals called the Morgan Mausoleum. Building had begun on the Morgan family mansion when Ket’s grandfather’s wife, Alice, was pregnant with his son. No expense was spared—the finest building materials, exceptional craftsmanship, and a billion-dollar view over the distant Atlantic Ocean. An added bonus was the inhabitants of the house were able to look down on the town and the people who lived there.

  That first Mrs. Morgan had not lived to move into the mansion. She had died of injuries after a fall down the stairs at the more modest family home in town when her son—Ket’s father—was less than a year old. Rumours had flown around the town that her husband, known for his bad temper, had pushed his wife during an argument. At the inquest into her death, Mrs. Morgan’s housekeeper, dressmaker, masseuse, and hairdresser had all chimed in with tales of the woman’s clumsiness—how she had often fallen, bumped into doors, tripped over the cat, all with resulting bruises.

  In any other jurisdiction, these stories in themselves would have sounded a domestic violence alarm, but in Lobster Cove, the Morgans were the equivalent of royalty and no-one voiced such thoughts. The coroner, a local doctor, registered a verdict of accidental death.

  Thinking these thoughts, Kathryn shivered. The sad and shameful story could, to her mind, account for the cold and unwelcoming feel of the house. No wonder the locals called it the Morgan Mausoleum.

  She knew firsthand the terrible Morgan temper. Fury could erupt in both Ket and his father at the slightest thing, and usually, the most vulnerable felt their wrath. Kathryn had experienced pinches and occasional ‘friendly’ slaps to her behind that left fingermark bruises for days. These relatively minor physical assaults were bad enough, but the psychological abuse was unbearable.

  Like now, for example. Ket had taken little Alex out with him, without leaving any message or a time they would be back. Her husband knew it would be sheer torture for her to not know where the boy was or how he was being treated. Ket often belittled the boy for being a baby.

  One more glance at the clock; it was past ten o’clock. They’d been gone more than five hours. Kathryn ran into the hallway to collect her coat, bag, and car keys. She would go looking for Alex and Ket. She was just scribbling a note for the housekeeper when the door opened and she whirled around to see her husband crossing the threshold.

  ****

  Ben spent the afternoon browsing through old files, ostensibly familiarizing himself with the police activities in the town. Tess, who’d taken quite a liking to her temporary new boss, was perfectly happy to fetch and carry files, coffee, and exchange local gossip with him.

  His real target was anything that was remotely connected to the Morgan family, anything at all about their financial affairs or the behavior of their employees and ex-employees, that would point to a tiny tear in the non-stick Teflon suits Ket Morgan and his father seemed to wear.

  That tear is there. He knew it and was determined to find it and rip it wide to reveal the festering mess that lay beneath. Two years ago, the FBI had sent agents to Lobster Cove to investigate allegations that had come to light against the Morgan family. The Agency suspected the Morgans were using their business enterprises, including the Morgan Bank and the Morgan Quality Shoe Factory, to launder money for organised crime gangs.

  The agents had met with a wall of silence so thick it seemed impenetrable. When Ben’s boss at the FBI heard he was from the town, he mused that maybe a home boy would be able to penetrate the wall. Investigations had shown the town sheriff, Lynn Lawton, was a straight arrow type who most likely was frustrated in dealing with the powerful family who owned the town. In true serendipity style, Lawton had announced wedding plans and was easily persuaded to take an extended honeymoon while Ben went undercover to investigate.

  Ben cursed silently. He told himself there was no vengeful side to his determination to prove that Ketler Morgan, Senior and Junior were crooks who deserved to be behind bars for their orchestration of human misery in drugs and other forms of organized crime. He tried to convince himself that his judgement wasn’t colored by the way his own family, and many others, had been treated by the arrogant Morgans over the years. And he told himself that his hurt over Kathryn had nothing to do with the depth of his desire to see the Ket Morgan punished. But he knew he was lying.

  These thoughts brought him back to Kathryn, back to the tidal wave of desire that had almost undone him when she had glided so familiarly into his arms. He’d been shocked by the ease with which the old need had risen up, reminding him of the heat when he’d held her that first time so long ago, and later when they’d made love and he couldn’t seem to get enough of her. He’d thought her a virgin when they first came together, and he’d thought he’d die of his hunger for her—wrong on both counts. Seven years later he was alive and well—and if his calculations were correct, innocent little Kathryn had already been carrying another man’s child when she’d lain in his arms.

  The buzzer on his desk phone sounded, jolting him out of these thoughts.

  “Mrs. Morgan is here to see you, Sheriff,” Tess’s disembodied voice floated up to him from the intercom.

  “Does she have an appointment?” The question was only to give him a few moments to banish his earlier thoughts and to don the mask of acting sheriff before facing the woman who’d broken his heart without a second thought.

  He could hear a quick conference going on in the next office, and then Tess’s voice came through the intercom: “She doesn’t have an appointment but she says it’s important she see you.”

  Ben debated. He could refuse to see her, saying he was busy. But that would no doubt cause gossip in the town. Refusing to see the wife of one of the most influential men in Lobster Cove would certainly set tongues wagging.

  “Give me a few minutes, then send her in. And, Tess, maybe you could rustle up some coffee.”

  He should have known she’d come to see him. Women like her treated men like something they’d wipe off the soles of their shoes. Once a man got them out from under his skin, they ran back to try and get that old itch scratched again.

  He schooled his expression to show
none of these thoughts as five minutes later one of the deputies, Roy Webb, showed a pale-faced Kathryn into the office. Ben thanked the deputy, then silently indicated that Kathryn should sit on one of the hard, uncomfortable visitor chairs before returning to the file he was reading. Or pretending to read—the sight of her took his breath away, and he watched her covertly from under his brows. Dark rings under her eyes accentuated her paleness. She was thinner than he remembered, dressed in an expensive designer suit in a pale oyster color that accentuated her pale skin and luminous green eyes. Her features had matured and she had developed a poise that suited her. The pretty girl he had known had become a stunningly beautiful woman.

  Finally, when he could put it off no longer, Ben signed his name with a flourish, placed the paperwork back into its file, and dropped it in his out basket. He leaned back in his chair, met her direct gaze, and asked, “What can I do for you, Mrs. Morgan?”

  Something flickered across her face at his tone, at the slight emphasis on her married title. She pushed back a stray lock of hair with fingers that shook a little, but her voice was even as she replied. “I’ve come to you because I need help, Ben.”

  It wasn’t quite what he’d expected; he had thought she’d have a more seductive approach. Studying her, he became aware of the tightly controlled emotions emanating from her, but still he didn’t speak.

  She bit her lip, a habit he remembered but which seemed at such odds with her sophisticated rich lady image. So she was anxious. Good.

  “Ben, when you left…”

  He raised a hand to cut her off. “That’s all in the past. You’ve done well for yourself, and now you’ve got everything a woman could ask for. Certainly a hell of a lot more than I could have given you, so good for you. Marrying the boss is a lot better than a pension plan, eh?” He hadn’t intended to let her see the pain she’d caused him, but it spilled out in his words.