The Right Thing

by McDonald, Donna

  It occurred to Morgan to wait until the end of the night for the painful discussion. Then he thought of the amount of emotional reaction Thea would probably have at being found out. A fair amount of acceptance would be needed to move her into dealing logically with it, so he decided putting it off would only delay getting to a solution.

  Plus, Morgan was practically ill himself and just wanted to get the confrontation over with and done.

  “We used these props for weddings when we used to do them. I figured setting the tables would be a nice way to kick off a special dinner offering,” Thea said, chewing her lip as she looked around. “Is this too much?”

  “No—it was a good idea and it looks nice,” Morgan agreed. “Look, Thea, before we open the doors tonight I need to ask you something.”

  “Sure,” Thea said, coming to stand in front of him.

  “Look, I need to know this or I wouldn’t ask it. What are you doing with the seven hundred dollars my father gives you every month?” Morgan demanded.

  First Thea looked shocked, and then she closed her eyes as she shook her head. Morgan’s heart fell. He braced himself to hear her answer.

  “I honestly try to never take the money, but Gerald keeps insisting,” she said. “Your father is an amazing man, Morgan.”

  “I know. But you can’t keep taking the money, Thea. It takes Dad to the edge of his income every month,” Morgan said harshly, her confession breaking his heart. “If you need money so badly, I’m sure you could come up with a better way to get it than taking it from an elderly man on a fixed income.”

  “What?” The question came out of Thea in a squeak, the shock of his accusation flash freezing her solid as a ice cube. “What do you mean? You think I’m using Gerald’s money for myself?”

  “Look, I investigate fraud for a living. I know even good people like you can act a little crazy when it comes to money. I like you Thea. If you give back the money Dad gave you today, I won’t report you to the authorities. You’ll just have to promise me that you will never do it again,” Morgan told her, his voice firm. It was his best offer, and he hoped Thea was willing to take it.

  “Report me to the authorities,” Thea repeated dully, looking at Morgan Reed as if he were a stranger, which indeed he was she realized.

  It was nearly impossible to believe that the man staring at her with such disappointment was the same man who climbed out of her bed that morning and chased her into the shower.

  “The authorities,” Thea repeated again, because it was still hard to believe that Morgan was actually accusing her of a potential crime. “You’re planning to turn me in to the authorities for taking money from your father. How exactly do you know about the money Gerald gave me today?”

  Shock, Thea decided. She was in medical shock because her mind literally couldn’t take it in. It was a surreal situation to think Morgan could believe her capable of such a thing.

  “I saw you through the front door of the restaurant when Dad was handing the envelope to you. I left before either of you saw me. Then I found the envelope on top of your purse in the drawer of your office,” Morgan said, not really feeling much sympathy for her even though she was turning the color of the table cloths. “I looked inside the envelope to validate it was cash.”

  Everyone panicked when they were found out, Morgan knew.

  When they were good people, the panic was usually followed swiftly by a remorse that drained the fight and denial right out of most of them. If they weren’t so good, they would run. Thea was behaving so true to form that Morgan was wishing now he had waited until the end of the evening to confront her.

  His idea had been to give her time to think about it—and maybe give him time too.

  Morgan had been hoping at the end of the evening he could see his way clear to helping her, instead of being angry and hurt. He couldn’t let himself think yet about the fact that he was never going home with her again. Or the fact that he was never going to feel her hands on him or her kissing his face. That was a loss to deal with another day.

  Thea turned her back to Morgan and made herself breathe, no matter how hard it was to keep doing so.

  Think, she ordered herself. Think hard.

  She looked at the bar, studying the flickering candles in the mirror backdrop. The soft romantic glow bounced off the glasses lined up on neatly ordered shelves. She would deal with this—had to deal with this. She had survived big losses before and she would survive this loss as well.

  What had it been like when Angus died? Yes, she’d felt like this then. When her husband had died, she’d felt betrayed and left alone to fend for herself in an unfriendly world where people more often than not just used each other—the way Morgan had used her in the last couple of weeks.

  The man she had been falling in love with thought she was scamming his father for money. How much more wrong could a woman ever be about a man? No telling what he really thought about her.

  And oh God, how many times had she left him alone in her house? Stupid. So stupid to have done that with a man she barely knew.

  “You went through my office. Did you search my house too?” she asked, not turning around.

  “Yes. Not at first, but I was trying to rule you out. Until I saw you take the envelope today, I had decided it couldn’t be you,” Morgan said sincerely, letting his obvious disappointment come through in his tone and words.

  Harsh laughter was her reaction. The pain was too deep for tears yet.

  “I suppose if you hadn’t caught me and Gerald red-handed, you would have investigated Aunt Lydia, too,” Thea stated, turning back to Morgan as she realized what she feared was indeed a very real possibility.

  Lydia would be so embarrassed. Her unconventional sexual relationship with Gerald was about all the scandal her aunt could face in a lifetime.

  “Actually, I investigated all the other women before I even met you. They all came out completely clean financially,” Morgan told her, used to laying out all the facts for people. “Now I’ve told you what I know. Tell me what you’re using the money for, Thea.”

  And please have a heart-wrenching reason that lets me like you again, Morgan thought desperately. There was a full two minutes of silence as Morgan’s question hung in the air between them.

  “No,” Thea finally said, her voice clear, her tone hard and uncompromising. “You want to know why Gerald gave me the money? Ask him. Ask your father. I’m not telling you a damn thing.”

  “Thea, I’m asking you for an explanation, and I expect you to answer,” Morgan insisted, his voice demanding and without compromise on the matter. “Tell me. You already have an advantage because of our relationship. I want to believe your side of the story.”

  Thea snorted. “No you don’t. If you wanted to believe me, you wouldn’t be thinking as you do. The truth is so far outside your horrible paradigm about life that you’ll think it’s a lie just because it’s so good. You’re a heartless, unfeeling bastard, Morgan Reed. I can’t believe I let you into my life.”

  Morgan flinched at her words and the hurt radiating from her back. It was the only time in his entire career that he wished he hadn’t learned the truth about a situation. His need to go to her, to tell her it would be okay was strong—almost stronger than his need to know what was really going on.

  “I’m really sorry things turned out this way. I really liked you too, Thea,” Morgan told her, words sticking in his throat because he really had.

  In fact, he’d probably been falling in love with her. Or at least he’d never had feelings for anyone else like he had for Thea.

  “You liked me too?” Thea asked in disbelief, turning around to glare at him. “Do you always investigate the women you like, Morgan? I’d hate to see how you treat the ones that you end up not liking.”

  “You don’t have to be sarcastic. I hate this situation as much as you do,” Morgan told her, hurt making him defensive.

  All he wanted was to know the truth and deal with that.

&
nbsp; “Someone is going to knock the smug right out of you one day,” Thea told him. “Get out of my restaurant, or I might just do it myself.”

  “You know I’m not leaving until I get to the bottom of this. I’ll stick around until the evening is over, and we’ll talk after you close about what to do to fix this. I’m sure when your emotions are calmer, and you’ve thought this through, that you’ll see telling me the whole unvarnished truth is the best thing in this situation,” Morgan told her. “I don’t want to hurt you any more than is necessary to clear this up.”

  Thea walked up to him, fist clinched, drew back, and punched Morgan hard enough in the stomach to double him over. Heat flooded her. Anger won out over the hurt.

  “That was for Gerald Reed. You don’t deserve to call yourself his son. But this is for sleeping with me under false pretenses. I wish to God I had never let you put your hands on me,” she said, pulling her fist back again and bringing it up hard into Morgan’s face.

  Blood squirted instantly from his nose when she made contact.

  Thea jumped back avoiding the blood, shaking her hand because it hurt like hell. She checked her knuckles for damage, thinking that Morgan Reed’s head was every bit as hard as she had concluded it was.

  “Damn it! You hit me. That hurt, Thea,” Morgan said, holding his nose as blood ran into his hand. “And a bloody nose. Great. Now I’ll get to add assaulting the investigating officer to the other charges.”

  Thea was still shaking her hand. “Investigating officer? You’ll lose your damn badge if I have anything to say about it. I should be the one pressing charges, but there’s no legal penalty for the worst thing you’ve done to me. You’ve broken my heart, Morgan Reed, and I didn’t even see it coming.”

  Morgan grabbed the hand she was shaking and twisted Thea around with it before she knew what was happening to her. Sweeping a foot to the bend of her knees, Morgan put her easily on the floor face down. Since he didn’t have cuffs to restrain her, he was sitting on top of her bucking rear end when Amy came rushing through the kitchen doors.

  “There’s a crowd. . .” Amy began, stopping when she saw the two of them locked in a physical struggle on the floor together.

  “Amy, hand me a bar towel. Thea bloodied my damn nose,” Morgan told her.

  “If you give this stupid jackass anything, you’re fired,” Thea said angrily, trying to move Morgan’s body off hers but he was too heavy and too determined to pin her down.

  Amy walked over with a bar towel and handed it to Morgan with eyes wide as saucers. The blood was nauseating. The shock of them physically fighting was sickening, too.

  “I don’t know what’s going on with you two, but there are at least ten families outside waiting to get in here for dinner. It’s five after already,” she said, voice trembling.

  “Shit,” Morgan said, standing with the bar towel pressed to his nose. “We’ll talk about this later, Althea. If you try to run, I’ll call this in tonight. If you stay and cooperate, I’ll help with your customers and we’ll talk later about—options.” Morgan chose his words carefully, not wanting Amy to know what was going on.

  Without his weight, Thea stood and dusted herself off.

  “I ought to make you call. I ought to force you to get this farce over with right now. I’m just worried about how Gerald is going to react. The last thing he needs is to deal with your stupidity on top of everything else going on.”

  “Dad is going to have to know anyway. It’s only a matter of time,” Morgan told her, sad that it was true.

  Thea looked at the restaurant with its romantic white table clothes and softly burning candles. Why had she even bothered with romance? She was too old and tired to deal with this drama, Thea thought. All she wanted was a moderately happy, peaceful life, but she had no clue how to achieve it.

  Thea looked at Morgan, holding a bar towel to his face and glaring.

  Men were nothing but trouble most of the time, she thought viciously. Morgan Reed had done a damn good job of ruining her for other men because it would be a long damn time before she would trust another one, in bed or out. In fact, abstinence had never looked more appealing than it did at that moment.

  “You win for tonight, Morgan Reed. But if you get within three feet of me for the next five hours, you’ll have to call the police to save your own ass, so stay the hell out of my way. Amy—open the doors and seat the customers. I’m going to go wash up,” she said.

  Thea walked away, and Morgan followed her through the swinging kitchen doors. He wet the bar towel in the kitchen sink and held it to his sore face. The blood was slowing to a tiny drip, which was a hopeful sign that maybe Thea hadn’t broken his nose after all. He knew Thea had strong hands, but the mean right hook had been an unwelcome surprise.

  In his line of work, Morgan had found people didn’t usually punch an investigator when they were upset. They feared the repercussions too much. Thea either didn’t know or didn’t fear what could happen.

  She had gone from looking remorseful and mildly guilty, to incredibly furious and righteously indignant in the blink of an eye. Morgan hadn’t really processed the change completely before Thea hit him the first time. He had expected Thea to get weepy on him when she found out, not mad.

  “Put on an apron and cover up that blood,” Thea demanded on her way back to the main room.

  Morgan snorted at the nerve of her command, but went to retrieve the apron that Pete wore for grilling. Fortunately, it covered almost all of his bloody shirt.

  As he prepped the food for the first customers, Morgan found it hard to believe he’d been so wrong about her reaction. Thea didn’t look like she was going to shed a damn tear over any of it. Instead, the woman was angry and totally lacking in remorse.

  In a way, Morgan decided, Thea not crying bothered him the most because he had wanted to believe she had a kind and caring heart. He didn’t like being so wrong about her.

  *** *** ***

  For the next four and a half hours, the restaurant served salad and pasta. When they flipped the sign to closed at nine-thirty, there were only two servings left.

  Amy dashed off as soon as her tables were clean, citing a late date.

  Thea nodded, saying goodnight and nothing more as the girl fled. Amy obviously wanted to escape what was about to happen between her and Morgan, Thea thought sourly, feeling abandoned and betrayed by yet another person.

  And she knew Amy was too upset not to talk about it with someone. Word would get out quickly about her fight with Morgan, which made her even more angry about the situation. Now she would have to deal with uncomfortable questions even after Morgan Reed was long gone from her life.

  It was just one more reason, Thea reasoned, one more reason she would never trust another man.

  And she for damn sure would never take one home with her again, she vowed. Every time she thought about Morgan searching her house, she was torn between the urge to throw something at his head and wanting to die of shame that she’d slept with a man who was investigating her.

  Thea cleaned up the remaining dishes and stripped the tablecloths, thinking about how she could explain her altercation with Morgan to people who didn’t know what he was really like. Gerald would be mortified to learn Thea had felt the need to physically attack his son, but that couldn’t be helped now.

  Thea certainly didn’t regret the two punches she’d gotten in on the man before he’d stopped her. If Morgan had fallen to the floor, she would damn well have kicked him, too.

  If she kept thinking about it—Hell, she might still find a way to make it happen.

  *** *** ***

  Morgan watched Thea make countless trips in and out of the kitchen, stopping only to run loads of dishes through the dish washer. She had sent Pete home shortly after Amy left, which had left only the two of them cleaning up.

  Morgan had tried all evening to reconcile what he had learned with what he knew about Thea. Now, at the end of his contemplation, he realized the columns of his fac
t sheet just didn’t add up. There was something missing, and he needed to know what it was. If Thea would just tell him what she was using the money for, Morgan was sure it would explain the unease in his gut.

  “There are two servings of ziti left. You need to eat one. That way you’ll know what you served your customers tonight. Sit and eat with me,” Morgan ordered, wanting to establish some measure of control over both her and the situation again.

  Thea stopped and looked at him. The food smelled good, but the idea of sitting and eating with Morgan was gut-twisting. She was still finding it hard to believe a man that sensitive in bed could be such an unfeeling, cold-hearted, stupid bastard outside of it.

  In fact, the only way she could explain it to herself was to accept that Gerald had been right. Morgan’s job had done a real number on him.

  While blaming his job wasn’t forgiveness, it at least gave her a way to call a truce until the truth came out. For Gerald’s sake, she needed to deal as well as possible with his son. She had no wish to cause Gerald any further emotional problems just because his son had deeply disappointed her. Cursing her sense of loyal to the elder Reed, she swallowed as much of the bitterness as she could to be civil and answer him.

  “Dish it up then,” Thea agreed finally, resigned to her fate, but definitely not willing to play nice yet. “I’ll be right back.”

  Thea used the restroom, and then went to her office. When she walked back to kitchen, Thea tossed the envelope full of cash between the two plates on the stainless steel prep counter. She climbed up on a counter stool and pulled the closest plate to her, digging right in to the food without even acknowledging Morgan’s presence on the other side.

  “The pasta is very good, Morgan, and it explains all the empty plates tonight. You could probably do this for a living,” Thea said flatly, her natural fairness forcing her to speak the truth.

  “Thanks,” Morgan said, wondering if Thea was ever going to look at him, hating that she wouldn’t even though he well understood the reason.