The Secret Son's Homecoming

by Helen Lacey

  “And you know this from experience?”

  She nodded, feeling a heavy ache deep in her chest. Sometimes the memories of that awful day were acute. And other days it was as though it had happened to someone else and she felt almost...normal. “Just because I don’t express every emotion I’m feeling every time I feel it, don’t dismiss my opinion.”

  “I’m not. In fact, I respect your opinion a great deal, Connie. And I respect you.”

  She knew that about him. Jonah wasn’t the kind of man to waste energy on saying things he didn’t mean. “That still doesn’t let you off the hook—you have to be civil to J.D. For everyone’s sake, including your own.”

  “I’ll try,” he said and shrugged and then gently laid a sleeping Jack back into his crib.

  He also got the chance to see his father, because at that moment, the man himself appeared in the doorway. J.D. looked ruddier in the face than usual, and Connie experienced a pang of concern for the older man. Since his family had imploded, Connie had seen a significant change in him. He looked old. Tired. She was becoming genuinely concerned for his health.

  “Can I have a word with you, son?” J.D. asked as he hovered in the doorway.

  Connie saw Jonah scowl at the son reference and lightly jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow, ignoring the way a shot of electricity raced up her arm at the connection. “I’ll just leave you two alone so you can—”

  “Stay,” Jonah urged quietly. “I insist.”

  Connie sighed, stepped back and crossed her arms. “Okay.”

  “What do you want?” he asked J.D. coolly.

  His father took a few steps into the room. “I wanted your advice on something,” he said and moved around the table.

  “What kind of advice?”

  “Business. There’s an old warehouse down by the river that’s been empty for a few years,” J.D. said quickly. “I’ve never really known what to do with the place. I was hoping you’d have some time to take a look at it. It needs some renovation work before it goes on the market. Or, alternatively, we could pull the place down and build something new.”

  “Something new?”

  J.D. nodded. “I’d like to get your professional opinion, you know, if you think it’s worth a remodel.”

  “I don’t have time to—”

  “He’d love to,” Connie said, cutting through Jonah’s refusal. “Wouldn’t you?”

  To his credit he didn’t scowl. But she knew he was mad. The tiny pulse in his check throbbed wildly. But she wasn’t put off. Connie cared about J.D.—and she cared about Jonah, too. Someone, she realized, needed to act as envoy between the two men. And since she was in the middle of them, it might as well be her.

  “Sure,” he said, his expression telling her she was going to have to explain her blatant interference at some point. “I’ll catch up with you Monday morning before I fly back to Portland.”

  The older man nodded and winked at Connie. “Thank you.”

  “What are you doing here anyway?” Jonah asked bluntly. “I can’t imagine Gwen wants you here.”

  “Just picking up the last of my things,” he replied and then sighed. “My ex-wife and I can at least be civil with each other now.”

  “So the divorce is final?”

  J.D. nodded. “It was uncontested, and both Gwen and I agreed on the terms.”

  “I’m sorry,” Jonah said unexpectedly, and Connie saw J.D.’s eyes brighten a fraction. “I guess it’s not easy to say goodbye to a thirty-five-year marriage.”

  “Easy?” J.D. shook his head. “No. But for best, considering.” He glanced toward the crib and smiled wearily. “Gwen and I share grandchildren—for that reason alone, there’s no point in being at war with one another. Family should stick together.”

  Connie didn’t miss the point of J.D.’s words. Neither, she suspected, did Jonah. But he remained silent until his father said goodbye and then left the room.

  “You really shouldn’t have done that,” he said quietly.

  “Done what?” she shot back. “Force you to spend time with your dad?”

  “Stop calling him that.”

  “Why?” she queried. “It’s who he is. J.D. is your father. You are his son. Stop being a horse’s ass and just accept it.”

  “I can’t,” he said with more vulnerability than she expected.

  Connie placed a hand on his arm, digging in, feeling him tense beneath her fingertips. “Sure you can. Take small steps and meet him halfway.”

  “It’s not that simple,” he said, looking to where her hand lay. “You don’t understand how—”

  “I understand that J.D. has tried over and over,” she said, cutting him off. “I understand that he wants desperately to be a part of your life and you’re too stubborn and selfish to let him in.”

  “I’m selfish?” he echoed incredulously and brushed off her hand. “Are you kidding? He’s the one who had to have everything his own way. If he’d stopped coming around and trying to insinuate himself into our lives, then my mother might have met someone else. She might have had a chance at happiness.”

  Connie’s insides suddenly ached for him. It was simplistic logic, a leftover remnant from a childhood filled with resentment and hurt. Feelings she knew well. But if the O’Sullivans were ever going to be a real family, with Jonah a part of that, then wounds had to be healed.

  “She looks happy to me,” Connie remarked, watching as he took a couple of strides around the room, suddenly restless and clearly not interested in continuing the conversation.

  He jerked around and glared at her, keeping his voice low. “You weren’t there. You weren’t around when I could hear her crying at night after J.D. turned up for a visit. He’d give us a couple of days’ notice that he was coming and she’d be on edge the whole time.”

  “That’s to be expected, considering the circumstances,” she said gently. “But he clearly wanted to spend time with you. Why do you hate him for that?”

  “Because it wasn’t enough,” he admitted rawly. “And at the same time, it was too much. He’d make some weak effort at bonding, and all the time I was thinking, Why can’t he just stay the hell away from me and let Mom get on with her life? And she never complained. She never asked for more. Every time she tried to explain to me how things were, how he had other responsibilities and another life far away, but how he was good to us and cared about us, I knew it hurt her deeply. And there was nothing I could do about it. Nothing I could say to make her stop hurting. I hated him for that. I still do.”

  Connie chose her words carefully. “I understand what you’re saying, but if your mother chose not to move on because of her feelings for J.D., then that probably wouldn’t have changed if he’d stopped coming to see you. In fact, maybe seeing him every now and then was all she needed.”

  “She wasn’t happy,” he shot back. “It wasn’t all she needed. She needed someone who was there for her full-time. Not someone who was committed to another woman and his real family.”

  And there, she thought sadly, was his hurt. “I’m sure J.D. did the best he could, considering the circumstances. Sometimes all we can do is our best.”

  “Like your parents did?” he asked cynically. “Why are you so eager to let people off the hook, Connie?”

  “Because I think forgiveness is more powerful than anger and hatred.”

  “That’s a naive view of things,” he said and shook his head. “And although I admire your blind loyalty to the O’Sullivans, I’m not wired that way.”

  “It’s not blind loyalty, Jonah. I care about them. And I care about...I care about...” Her words trailed off uncomfortably. Admitting she had fledgling feelings for him hadn’t been in her plans when she’d agreed for him to come with her to the ranch. “I’ll stay here with the baby if you want to get back to helping unload the truck.”

  He frowne
d. “This conversation isn’t over, Connie.”

  “Until you can start behaving nicer toward J.D., then it is over,” she said flatly. “And so are we.”

  His chest puffed out instantly. “Blackmail?”

  “An incentive,” she replied and sat down on a chair by the window. “For you to become a better son.”

  He didn’t look happy. Not one bit. “Not going to happen.”

  She shrugged loosely, ignoring the way her heart raced. “Suit yourself. But I don’t imagine you enjoy being thought of as a grumpy, unforgiving jerk.”

  “And I thought we were past this,” he said impatiently. “Obviously not.” He began to walk away.

  Connie got to her feet in a microsecond. “Seriously,” she demanded. “You’re giving up that easily?”

  He stilled instantly and turned back to face her. “You’re impossible.”

  “So are you,” she said and a took a few steps closer, staring at him. “What are you afraid of, Jonah? That you’ll figure out that your father and brothers are good people and you might actually like them? Would that be so terrible?”

  “Yes.”

  The rawness in his voice undid her, and without thinking she reached for him, wrapping her arms around his waist and resting her head against his chest, feeling the rapid beat of his heart through his shirt. It took a couple of seconds, but then his arms came around her, settling on her hips, drawing her closer, and she sighed, feeling him relax a fraction.

  “I’m not your enemy,” she said softly. “And I’d like to be your friend.”

  “Why?” he said into her hair. “I’m a grumpy jerk.”

  Connie chuckled. “Seems that I like grumpy jerks.”

  She felt him smile. “Nobody ever accused you of having good taste.”

  She gripped him harder. “Promise me something? As difficult as it might get, remember what’s at stake.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “Family,” she said simply. “Your family. And they’re good people...the best I’ve ever known. Don’t throw that away because you’re angry.”

  “I can’t change who I am.”

  “Yes, you can,” she assured him. “You can change. And you can forgive.”

  She looked up, met his gaze, felt the searing heat of their connection through to the marrow in her bones. There was rawness in his expression, and a startling vulnerability she suspected he never showed to anyone. The fact that he was showing it to her filled Connie with an inexplicable ache. The feelings she had for him amplified in that moment, and she was confused and more aware of him than she had ever been of anyone in her life. She had no idea why Jonah stirred her so deeply. For a decade she’d steered clear of powerful emotions. But her feelings for Jonah intensified every time they were together.

  He kissed her softly, drawing a response that she gave without hesitation.

  Because she was halfway in love with Jonah Rickard.

  And at risk of falling the rest of the way.

  Chapter Seven

  “When you two are done canoodling,” a deep voice said from behind them, “I’d like to remind you that there are still boxes waiting to be unloaded from the truck.”

  Connie felt, rather than heard, Jonah groan low in his throat. But he released her immediately and she stepped back. Liam stood a few feet away, arms crossed, and Kieran was beside him, smiling.

  Embarrassed, she straightened her shirt and ran a clumsy hand down her hair. She spotted Kayla and Nicola a few feet behind their husbands and suspected she was in for an inquisition once the men left the room. Of course, they had already queried her when she’d first arrived with Jonah. She’d fobbed them off with a casual remark about helping unload boxes, but she knew her friends weren’t fooled.

  It took precisely half a minute for Jonah and his brothers to leave, and she quickly muttered something about making tea when the two other women stopped her from making an escape.

  “Oh, no,” Nicola said and grinned. “We want details.”

  “There’s nothing to tell,” she said and stepped back into the room, watching as Kayla made her way toward the crib to check on Jack.

  “That was nothing?” Nicola inquired, brows up. “You were just making out with Jonah.”

  Connie colored from head to heels. “I was not.”

  Kayla turned and grinned. “Sure you were.”

  “We kissed,” she explained hotly. “That’s all.”

  “There’s a difference?” Nicola asked.

  Connie knew her friends weren’t going to let her off the hook. “A big difference. We’ve become friends and I—”

  “The only man I kiss like that,” Nicola said, grinning, “is my husband.”

  “Ditto,” Kayla said and smiled.

  “That was not a friendly kind of kiss, Connie,” Nicola said and rested against the table. “So, spill.”

  Connie took a long breath. “Okay... I kissed him. And yes, we’re something. I’m not sure what. And before you ask, because I know you will,” she said and held up a hand, “no, I haven’t slept with him.”

  “Are you going to?” Nicola asked.

  “I don’t know,” she replied honestly. “Maybe. Probably. I’m not sure what I’m doing. I don’t really know much of anything when it comes to Jonah. I only know that I like him.”

  “Why?” Nicola queried and then shrugged. “I mean, I know he’s attractive and successful and all that. But he’s also...”

  “I think what Nic is trying to say,” Kayla put in when Nicola’s words trailed off, “is that Jonah is hard work. I know he’s my cousin and also my brother-in-law and I should be telling you I think it’s great and wish you the best, but I wouldn’t be your friend if I didn’t also say you need to be careful. Jonah is—”

  “Not what people think,” Connie said, cutting her off. “Look, I know everyone thinks he’s arrogant and moody and plain old unpleasant most of the time, but he’s actually quite funny and nice and very sweet.”

  “Sweet?” Kayla echoed incredulously.

  “Okay,” she agreed, irritation suddenly seeping through her blood when she realized how quick everyone was to paint Jonah as some kind of ogre. “Maybe sweet isn’t the right word. But he’s much more agreeable than everyone seems to think. Didn’t he help Kieran out with the pond at your old place?” she asked Nicola. “And I know he’s drawing up the plans for the museum extension at way below his usual fee. And if you must know, he’s working on something with J.D. next week. So, he’s not as bad you all seem to think he is.”

  “I didn’t mean to suggest he was,” Kayla said gently. “I know Liam is trying to—”

  “Perhaps that’s the problem,” Connie said, cutting through Kayla’s words. “Everyone is so busy trying to get him to fit in, he’s suffocated. Maybe Liam and Kieran should let him work it out in his own time and in his own way. I’m sure that if the roles were reversed, they’d be just as cautious about getting too close too soon.”

  She stared at her friends, realizing how impassioned she sounded. But she wasn’t going to stand idly by and allow Jonah to be maligned.

  “We didn’t mean to upset you,” Nicola said gently.

  Connie sighed. “I know.”

  “We just care about you and don’t want to see you get hurt.”

  “Jonah would never hurt me,” she said candidly. “At least, not intentionally.”

  Nicola didn’t look convinced. “Will you at least promise to tread carefully? After everything you’ve been through, I just think—”

  “I’m not made of glass,” she said and pushed back her shoulders. “I know a lot of people think I’m fragile. But I’m not. I’m going to make tea,” she said and left the room, leaving the two other women staring after her.

  When she entered the kitchen, Gwen was by the counter, stacking up a pile of cookb
ooks.

  “Everything all right, Connie?” she asked.

  She nodded. “Fine. I was going to make tea.”

  “I’ve already put water in the kettle,” Gwen remarked. “We have some time if you need to talk.”

  She ignored the offer. “It must be hard for you to leave this house.”

  “Not really,” Gwen replied. “I have made countless wonderful memories here, but now it’s time for new memories, for a new family to move in and fill the place with happiness. I know Kieran and Nicola and her nephews will do that. And I’m looking forward to having my own place in town. I’ll be closer to the hospital where I volunteer, and I have many friends who live close by. It’s certainly going to be an adjustment, but I’m looking forward to it. I’ve been rattling around in this big house on my own for way too long.”

  Connie knew Gwen had kicked J.D. out the day she’d found out about her husband’s affair with Kathleen and his secret family. And through it all, the older woman had shown grace and humility and kindness, particularly toward Jonah.

  Connie plopped into a chair, figuring she needed a friend in that moment. “Why do you think everyone is so eager to think badly of Jonah?” she asked and sighed.

  Gwen stopped what she was doing and turned. “Because he’s the interloper,” the older woman replied and then waved a hand. “And of course that’s not true. But he clearly sees himself that way. He grew up an only child, quite possibly a loner, and now he’s determined to play the role of the outsider looking in from the fringes of this family. I can’t deny that learning about his existence was a shock for us all. Everything imploded when Liam and Kayla fell in love, and now Jonah is very much a part of our lives no matter how much he tries to keep us at a distance. Thinking badly of someone is often the easy option.”

  “But you don’t,” Connie said simply. “And you have more reason to resent his existence than anyone.”

  Gwen sighed. “You can’t put an old head on young shoulders.”

  Connie understood the platitude and nodded. “He’s not what people think.”