by Nic Saint
As she opened one eye, Anna blinked against the light filtering in through the slatted window. She found herself unable to open her second eye, and when she reached for it, discovered her hand prevented by a large bandage. Gently pressing against the gauze, a dull pain shot through her skull. What the hell? But then she remembered. The blows the men had landed must have done even more damage than she thought. Her whole body felt sore and stiff, and when she tried to get up from the bed, shoots of pain had her gasping for breath.
She became aware of a needle sticking into her arm, and saw that it was attached to an IV drip. Wow, she must be worse off than she thought.
She finally managed, with some effort, to throw off the sheet and blanket, and sit up on the side of the bed. Then, with a grunt, she rose to her feet, and swayed back and forth before losing her balance and tumbling back onto the soft mattress.
The second time brought more success, and she was able to hobble over to the window, leaning on the IV stand. Staring out, she was surprised to find herself gazing upon a long patch of rolling parkland, dotted with trees, small statues and in the distance, a large gazebo of some kind. Beyond it, if she wasn’t mistaken, she saw a strip of blue. The ocean?
Where was she? Where had Scott taken her? She remembered the boat, the hospital, and then darkness.
She looked around the room. Expecting a hospital room, she was surprised to find it was a regular bedroom. And an ornate one at that. Antique furniture, a four poster bed, and a set of hunting prints adorning the walls.
Shuffling toward the door, she decided to take her journey of discovery beyond these four walls, and just when she reached the door, it swung opened and Scott walked in.
His face lit up when he saw her. “Anna! You’re up!”
She returned his smile, but quickly regretted this. A searing pain shot through her lip. She touched a hand to it, and found her lower lip rough and… in stitches?
“You better don’t smile for a couple of days, honey,” Scott said softly, and took her hand in his. “Do you remember anything of what happened?”
God, did she remember. She nodded quickly, not wanting to go there. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I don’t know what came over me.”
“No need to go into all that,” he said. “Let me just—”
“Where am I?”
“The Hamptons.”
“The Hamptons? You—you live here?”
“I do, actually,” he said sheepishly.
She wanted to plant her hands on her hips, but her whole body hurt so much all she could do was give him a stern gaze. With one eye. “Scott Harris! What haven’t you told me?”
“Let’s go outside for a moment. The weather is great and some fresh air will do you good.”
“Not until you tell me—”
He gave her arm a gentle squeeze. “I’ll tell you everything you want to know and a lot more, but not here. Outside.”
Obediently, she followed him out into the hallway. She was pleasantly surprised when she found a wheelchair waiting for her. She gratefully lowered herself into the chair, and allowed Scott to attach her IV to a hook on the chair. He wheeled her to a small elevator at the end of the corridor. A grizzled bespectacled man with a cheerful face popped his head from one of the rooms and gave her a happy wave. She waved back, and the head disappeared again.
“Did you see that?” she said as the elevator door closed.
“Did I see what?”
“There was a man.”
Scott eyed her for a moment, then he smiled. “Oh, that must be uncle Harold. He likes to spend his time holed up in his room.”
Uncle Harold? So this wasn’t Scott’s place? “Who’s Uncle Harold?”
He chuckled. “He’s… Uncle Harold.”
Right. She started to bite her lip before remembering this hurt like hell, so she licked across the stitches instead. Those guys had really done a number on her.
The elevator came to a halt with a jerk, and Scott wheeled her out. They were in a hallway as ornate as anything she’d ever seen. Statues lined the walls, along with suits of armor and display cases with ancient coins. As they rolled over a sumptuous carpet, she admired her surroundings, and when she discovered the ceiling was one elaborate painting of angels and demons, she cried out in delight.
“Don’t tell me,” she whispered, awed by her surroundings. “Did you take me to Versailles?”
He merely chuckled, and kept up a brisk pace. Moments later, they passed through a set of French windows, and were out on the terrace. Beyond a hedge, she thought she could detect an older man and woman having breakfast, a man looking a lot like an English butler hovering over them.
“Who—”
“Mom and Dad,” Scott said quickly, and then they were out of sight, and she was surprised to find herself on a dirt path aimed straight for a babbling brook, a small bridge leading to the other side.
As they were crossing the bridge, Scott said, “I haven’t been completely honest with you, Anna. For one thing, my name isn’t Scott Harris. It’s Scott Thornton.”
She jerked her head around. “Ouch!”
“Don’t do that, honey.”
“Thornton! You don’t mean… Jack Thornton?”
“That’s Dad.”
“The richest man in America Jack Thornton?”
“Well, I don’t know if he’s exactly the richest man but—”
She eyed him curiously. “Scott Thornton. I know about you. Notorious playboy. Ladies’ man extraordinaire. Upper East Side’s most eligible bachelor?” She pointed an accusing finger at him. “You’re in the tabloids like all the time!”
He winced at these words but didn’t deny them. They’d reached a limestone fountain consisting of two angels spouting water into a shell-shaped bowl. A bench had been placed alongside, and Scott, after maneuvering her wheelchair next to it, lowered himself onto it.
She simply couldn’t get over the fact that her goofy colleague from Thornton’s was, in fact, a Thornton himself!
“But what were you doing at Thornton’s? I mean, you own the place, right? Along with the rest of Manhattan.”
“We don’t own all of it,” he said defensively. “The rest belongs to HdM.” When she raised her eyebrows questioningly, he clarified, “Harlan de Montesquieu. Ty’s dad.”
At the mention of that name, Anna felt a pang of fear. “Ty de Montesquieu,” she murmured, staring before her with non-seeing eyes for a moment. “I desperately hope never to hear that name or see that man ever again.”
“You won’t,” Scott was quick to assure her. “You’re safe here. The Montesquieus would never dare touch you. This place is off-limits.”
“You still haven’t answered my question,” she said, returning her gaze to him. “Why did you pretend to be someone you’re not?”
Scott leaned back. “It’s a long story,” he began.
She offered him a smile, but that made her lips hurt again, so she merely grimaced. “I have time.”
Chapter 18
It took Scott all of ten minutes to explain his deception, but from the look on Anna’s face, he knew it wasn’t enough, so he went on. The thing was, he was all she said he was. Ladies’ man. Most eligible bachelor. Playboy par excellence… Only, he wasn’t. Not anymore. Ever since he met her, his old life had lost most of its appeal, and now he couldn’t even remember the man he used to be.
For the sake of the story, he left that last part out, focusing on the conversation that had turned his life around. Willy-nilly, he might add. As Jack Thornton’s youngest, life had always been easy for Scott. Private nanny, private school, Harvard… And of course more money than he could ever know what to do with. He’d discovered his interest in and knack with the other sex at an early age, and pursuing women had become a full-time job by the time he turned eighteen. The family business was going to transfer to Roland anyway—Jack’s eldest—so what else was there to do but enjoy life to the fullest?
Only Jack hadn’t seen it t
hat way. Having built up Thornton single-handedly from the ground up, he’d be damned if he let his sons ruin it by besmirching the Thornton name, which was also their main brand. Thornton department stores had a reputation to keep up, and Scott’s philandering ways were tarnishing that reputation faster than Dad had built it.
And then there was that on-again, off-again thing with Valerie de Montesquieu. The story had been all over the tabloids, and when Valerie had finally dumped Scott for an even bigger player, Jack had had enough.
He’d summoned Scott and offered him an ultimatum: either face being disinherited and forced to make his own way in life from now on, or change his life around and start at the bottom. The choice hadn’t been a difficult one, and so one day Scott Harris had shown up for work at Thornton Fifth Avenue, minus the rock star attitude and plus a horrible little mustache, and barely two weeks later, he’d crossed paths with Anna.
“I’m not the person I used to be, Anna,” he declared passionately. “I’m a changed man.”
“And all that because of that little lip ornament?” she joked.
He touched the mustache, a thing he’d hated from the first. “My father’s idea. He said it would protect me from the kind of female attention that was destroying me.”
Anna snorted. “Didn’t work. You managed to seduce me, didn’t you?”
“Well…” He gave her a pained look. The night they’d spent together had not been his finest hour.
“I told you already, Scott. Sometimes it takes more than one night for a couple to find common ground. I was willing to try again, but then you suddenly took off like the wind.”
He hung his head in shame. “I’m sorry. I…” He met her eyes. “I was an idiot to walk out on you. It’s just that…”
“Just what?”
She looked so lovely. In spite of her damaged lip, the bruises on her face and her bandaged eye, she was the most beautiful girl he’d ever met. He reached out a hand and placed it tenderly on her undamaged cheek. “Remember what you told me about your father? About the tattoo?”
She nodded, placing her hand on his in a tender gesture.
“My father has a tattoo of a fish on his lower back. And for a moment there, I feared you might be…”
Her eyes widened in shock. “Your father… is my father?”
He shook his head vehemently. “No. He isn’t. But that’s what I thought. And that’s why I ran. I just couldn’t imagine making love to you if you were my sister.”
Suddenly, her face fell. “Ty has a tattoo of a fish on his upper buttock. And I overheard a girl call him Petit Filou!”
The image of Anna being naked with Ty sent a jolt of rage and jealousy through Scott, but he bit it down. He nodded slowly. “I think you need to talk to your mother. Find out where she worked. I think there’s a good chance it was at the HdM flagship store.”
“But that would mean…”
He swallowed away a lump in his throat. “That Ty de Montesquieu is your brother.”
“Nooo!” she cried, rocking back in her chair. “Oh, dear God, no!”
Chapter 19
The thought of having had sex with her very own brother disgusted Anna. She immediately put in a phone call to her mother, and this time refused to take no for an answer.
“But, honey,” Jackie lamented. “Why do you insist on dredging up the dead past? This is all ancient history!”
“Mom. I need to know, all right? It’s very important to me. Did you meet my father at the HdM flagship store on Fifth Avenue?”
There was a long sigh, and then an even longer silence, but finally her mother said in a low voice, “Yes. That’s where we met.”
The phone fell from her nerveless grasp and clattered onto the ground beneath. She could still hear her mother’s voice call out, “Hello? Hello, honey?” but she ignored it. She turned to look at Scott, and saw that he, too, looked pole-axed by this sudden turn of events.
She’d had sex with her own brother. And Harlan de Montesquieu was her father…
How much worse could things get?
Scott picked up the phone and handed it back to her. Automatically, she picked it up, and intoned, “I’ll call you back, Mom. Bye.”
She buried her head in her hands, and burst into tears, Scott’s arm sneaking around her shoulders and gently holding her.
***
The news didn’t surprise Scott. He’d had an inkling that HdM might be Anna’s dad. With the kind of luck she had, it was to expected. It also gave him another clue to her complex personality. He’d been racking his brains trying to figure out what made her go back to the club last night, even though she knew Ty was bad news. What was it that made her run into the arms of men who used and abused her over and over again? Now he felt he had the first piece of the puzzle. Her father had abandoned her even before she was born. Perhaps she felt that she deserved to be treated badly? That she deserved to be deserted by abusive men who took advantage of her?
He stared down at her heaving back and felt helpless. He loved this woman, but it was obvious that she would never be able to love him. He was too sweet. Too kind. He loved her, and therefore she could never love him. Unless he would treat her like a dog. He knew he would never be able to do that. He could never mistreat her. And that’s why they could never be together… Unless…
***
The next couple of weeks, Anna slowly recovered from her ordeal. Her wounds healed nicely, and each time Doctor Reid dropped by to check up on her, he was gratified with her swift recovery. As the pain subsided day by day, and she regained her full strength and health, she felt more and more love for the man who’d made all this possible.
Scott Thornton was an honorable man. The kindest and gentlest man she’d ever met. And each time he looked at her, she felt the love he held for her.
But even though her body was healing, the emotional wounds Ty had inflicted kept on festering in her bosom.
Scott’s brother Roland had done a little more digging, and had finally confirmed her worst suspicions. Yes, HdM was her father. And yes, Ty was her brother.
Now she had to learn to put this horrible chapter of her life behind her, and look to the future.
Roland suggested she might gain from this. It wasn’t difficult to prove that HdM was her father. A DNA test would do as much. And if she played her cards right, she could walk away from this a very wealthy woman. Harlan would most definitely want to keep this off the books—away from the media and the public. He’d pay through the nose to make this potential scandal go away.
But Anna refused to go that route. All she wanted was to forget this sordid chapter. To forget HdM or TdM even existed. She’d found her father, and now she wished she hadn’t.
What had proven balm to her broken heart and soul, was the way the Thorntons had taken her in. Jack Thornton and his wife Fay were the most wonderful people she could have imagined. They were both charming and sweet in a way she hadn’t expected. And then there was Uncle Harold, Jack’s older brother, who was the trickster of the family. The old guy simply loved to play pranks on the rest of them.
Roland, of course, was the rock the Thorntons could build on, and then there were the twins, Tony and Tom, and Will. And finally Chloe, Scott’s baby sister. She and Chloe had become fast friends.
One evening, many weeks after that horrible night, she and Scott were seated around the family barbecue, languidly enjoying the last rays of sunlight. Suddenly, Scott turned to her.
“Anna?”
“Mh?” she said lazily.
“Do you love me?”
Her eyes flashed open at the words she’d come to dread. She didn’t know how to answer that question. Had given it so much thought her head hurt from just pondering it. She hesitated, and Scott turned away. But not before she saw the hurt in his eyes.
“It’s all right,” he murmured. “You don’t have to answer me right now.”
“Yes, I do,” she said.
She did love him, but if she was totally
honest with herself, the kind of love she felt was more the love of a sister for a brother. Or a daughter to a father. She loved him, but not in the way that he loved her. The situation reminded her a lot of what she’d gone through with Brad. He’d been nice to her, and courteous, and sex with him had been an ordeal. For some twisted reason, sweet guys simply turned her off.
She hated to admit it, but lately she found herself thinking back to Ty. The first time he’d taken her, she’d been so hot she was ready to explode. Even the fact that he was her own brother, didn’t diminish the fire burning in her tummy thinking back to the way he’d had his way with her. She knew it was sick. And twisted. And just plain wrong! But she couldn’t help how she felt. And Scott was simply too sweet.
Even if she agreed to become his girlfriend, it just wouldn’t be fair to him. Sooner or later, she’d be unable to hide her discontent.
“I can wait,” he added. “Just… forget I asked.”
He looked pained, and she knew that this situation was eating away at him.
She also knew that in spite of the wonderful time she was having, her life in the bosom of the Thornton family was quickly coming to an end.
They’d nursed her back to health, and now it was time for her to go. If she and Scott weren’t going to be together, there was no reason for her to stay here. No reason at all.
She knew they would never ask her to leave, but she also felt terrible about overstaying her welcome. She’d come to regard the entire Thornton clan as her extended family, and she knew she’d made friends for life. But the sooner she got back on her feet, the better.
“I’ve been thinking,” she said.
“Yes?”
He sounded hopeful.
“I… I think I’ll return home at the end of the summer. No sense in hanging around.”
“You can stay here for as long as you want,” he said emphatically.
She shook her head. “I… love you, Scott. It’s just that you love me more, and…”
