Finding Her Dad
Page 22
He gave her a smile. Crooked but real. “You’re right. I still want to win. If you’ll support me, I’ll go back to campaigning tomorrow. But I won’t compromise myself again. You’ve made me understand a lot of things I didn’t know about myself. I always believed I was driven solely by Cassia’s murder. And yeah, that was part of it, but not all. I don’t think I’d acknowledged how angry I still was at my father.” He was silent for a moment. “And at my mother. Maybe I didn’t want to hear you because if you could forgive yours, why was it that I couldn’t forgive mine? And yeah, I changed my career path from business to law enforcement, but I suspect my ambition had as much to do with proving my father wrong as it did with needing to save other innocents. I hated the son of a bitch. He told me often enough I wouldn’t amount to anything. I had to be more noble, smarter, more successful than he was. Even after he died, that need never left me.” His laugh was gruff. “That’s pretty damned pathetic, letting your life be all about Daddy.”
Lucy’s heart felt lighter than it had in weeks. She smiled at him. “You’re asking me? The woman whose life has been all about Mommy?”
“No.” Now both his big hands framed her face. “You triumphed over a tough childhood. You must have felt abandoned, over and over. Unloved. So how did you end up able to take chances like you did giving up one career to start a small business? You had to know how risky that was. And how did you end up a woman who could unhesitatingly give so much to a girl you couldn’t have known that well?”
Her eyes burned again. She tilted her face to press a kiss against his broad palm. “You make me sound a lot more special than I am. I like my life, but it’s not brave, and nothing I do has a lot of impact on anyone else.” Making him understand was important. She couldn’t let him see her as something she wasn’t. “I’m not like you, Jon,” she tried to explain. “Opening the store is the only brave thing I’ve ever done. And that was scary beyond belief.”
He was smiling now, his thumbs catching the tears that escaped. “Lucy, I’m pretty sure I started falling in love with you the first time I saw you, glowering so suspiciously at me. Not that I had a clue then. But I’ll tell you this. Stunned as I was by Sierra’s claim, I’d made up my mind before you left after one last glare that I’d be calling you whether I was Sierra’s father or not.”
“Really?” She despised herself for sounding so needy and…doubting. Hopeful.
“Oh, yeah.” He bent his head and brushed his mouth over hers. Gently bumping his nose against hers, he murmured, “I wanted you. I imagined you naked, with all that glorious hair tumbling loose. And I wanted, just as much, to know why you were so sure I was a jackass. What man had let you down so badly, you suspected all of us. Or if it was me, who it was I reminded you of.”
“I— It was only that—”
“I was a man who had a daughter I’d never had any idea existed. I know.” He kissed her again, his lips lingering on hers. His tenderness was palpable, healing the damage he’d done when he’d told her she wasn’t to be trusted. “Will you give me another chance, Lucy? Even if I don’t deserve it?”
For a long moment she simply drank in the sight of his face, not looking guarded, but instead revealing emotions that made her heart take a long, slow tumble that shouldn’t have been physically possible. I love him so much. Every small part of him. The lines on his face that deepened when he was serious, as he too often was. The mouth that could kiss her so passionately, could curl with wicked humor, or smile so gently. The nose that was too big but still somehow just right. And those pale eyes that could rivet her with a glance, eyes she’d seen as cold as Arctic ice, and as warm as sunlight glinting on water. The man who had used his grief for good, who had—despite what he said—always put his principles ahead of his ambitions, giving a lonely girl her dream of a real father.
He was waiting, a shadow of fear in his eyes. “Lucy?”
“I love you.” She smiled, but it trembled on her lips. “I think I fell in love with you that first day, too, when I walked into your office. I looked at you and I thought, He’s perfect. Except then I was mad at myself because you couldn’t possibly be.” She made a face. “And maybe you aren’t. I mean, you did screw up.”
He gave a choked laugh.
“But you redeemed yourself today. What you said out there was…right. You’re the man I believed you were. And I’d really like it if we could be a family. You and me and Sierra.”
He kissed her. Lifted his mouth long enough to say, “Lucy…marry me.” Then he didn’t let her answer because he was kissing her again.
But the words didn’t seem to be needed. Of course she’d marry him! Of course they were a family. It felt predestined. Sierra hadn’t only set out to find her dad, she’d set out to find…everything. The place to belong she’d lost.
“I love you,” Lucy managed to whisper again.
He lifted her higher, backed her against the door. “I need you.” His voice had gone hoarse again. “Just us. Do you think your mother would mind?”
“Not for a second.” She let her head fall back so that his teeth could graze her throat. “Do you suppose all those reporters are gone?”
“Damn.” Jon went still. Finally he settled her on her feet, gave her a hot, hungry look, then went as far as the window. “Yep,” he said with satisfaction. “They know when they’re beaten.”
“Are they? They’ll find out about Mom, won’t they?”
“She’s your mother. You love her.” He smiled. “I was an idiot.”
“Yes, you were.”
“Now that we’ve settled that, can we run away?”
“Absolutely. We just have to tell—”
“The rest of our family where we’re going?”
Her “Yes” came out shaky.
Jon’s expression held astonishing tenderness, understanding and all the love she’d been afraid to believe anyone would ever feel for her. He tugged her to him for a kiss that was soft and sweet. “Then let’s run away,” he said huskily.
Lucy said only “Yes.”
EPILOGUE
JON LOOKED OUT over the dozen reporters, photographers and cameramen forming a small audience for today’s press conference. He’d been surprised so many had shown up, since all he was doing was naming the officers he’d promoted or placed in new positions in the Emmons County Sheriff’s Department since he had been sworn in as sheriff.
Ignoring the rest of his prepared statement, he concluded simply, “I have full confidence in the men and women who have accepted the challenge of helping make this a stronger police department.” He gripped the sides of the podium. “Questions?”
A man in the back stood up. “Some of your more conservative constituents have to be wondering. What do you think of the color your daughter dyes her hair?”
There was laughter. Jon grinned, too. “Well, it’s bright.” More laughter. He waited until it had died, and let them see that now he was serious. “I look at the color of her hair as optimistic, and I find that to be pretty miraculous for a girl who lost her mother so recently.” After a moment he smiled again. “The truth? I love it.” He looked around with raised eyebrows, then inclined his head. “Thanks for coming.” He started to turn from the podium.
“Sheriff Brenner, care to comment on your mother-in-law’s troubled past? I understand she’s a drug addict and convicted felon who’s served time for armed robbery, among other crimes.”
Jon glanced at Lucy, who stood to one side of the dais with his two captains. The plan was for them to go to lunch when he was finished here. With amusement he was careful not to show, he saw that she wasn’t looking at him. Instead, she was glaring at the woman reporter whose voice had rung out.
That was his Lucy.
The question didn’t bother him anywhere near as much as it apparently did her. He’d been expecting it for several months now. But election day had come and gone, with Jon winning by a comfortable margin. He’d gotten married. He and Lucy had, just yesterday, put money down
on an old house with a big yard in Kanaskat. Sierra could keep a bedroom even after she left for college, and there were a couple more to spare for the family Lucy and Jon intended to start soon.
In all that time, with all those life-changing events, no one had thought to investigate the background of one Terry Malone.
All good things had to end.
Jon turned to the podium. He knew exactly what to say and had almost been looking forward to saying it.
“People make mistakes. They get in trouble. They struggle with their own weaknesses. Sometimes they overcome them. I’ve only known Terry Malone for a short while. A few months ago, I was cynical enough that I would have told you she was bound to stumble and fall. But I’ve come to believe she’s stronger than she ever knew she was. Having family willing to forgive makes a difference. My wife’s love has made a difference.” He looked over the small crowd, smiled slightly, then turned a wider smile on his Lucy, who had given up glowering to listen to him. Her eyes were warm, milk-chocolate instead of bitter. Her love did make all the difference. Once again he focused on his audience. In finishing, Jon suspected he didn’t sound like a cop. He didn’t care. “You asked for my comment, and this is what I have to say. My daughter and any children Lucy and I have will be lucky. They’ll have two grandmothers.”
If there were any more questions, he didn’t hear them. His wife was waiting.
ISBN: 978-1-4592-0611-3
FINDING HER DAD
Copyright © 2011 by Janice Kay Johnson
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*Lost…But Not Forgotten
† The Russell Twins