by Lexi Blake
Her uncle stopped, his face clearing and becoming calm again. “That’s right, sweetheart. You lived. You saved us all. You were a miracle.”
What had Mary said? Sometimes you have to take control of fate.
She’d also said she loved her like a daughter. You are my own.
Mary had blue eyes. Her hair was gray now, but at one time it had been a honey blond. It was all about DNA. Brie had started out trying to discover if Trevor might be heir to half of the Hughes fortune. She’d attempted to prove that Trevor was Win’s half brother. How surprised had Brie been to discover Win shared no DNA at all with either Trevor or Bellamy Hughes? Was that when she’d gone to Mary and made the first threat?
“How did you find me?” The words felt dumb on her lips, like she couldn’t believe she was saying them, but still they came. “Did Mary sell me to you?”
Her uncle’s jaw tightened. “Don’t open this up, Win. It’s done and everyone who could hurt us is gone. We’re going to be fine now.”
“Did she sell me to you?” She had to know.
“Your mother knew a good deal. We made a bargain. Mary lost her husband in that wreck. I gave her a way to have a good life for her daughter and herself,” he said, the words harsh out of his mouth. “She came to me when she couldn’t reach him on the radio, and we knew we had to have a plan in place.”
A plan in place. She’d been the plan. “So Mary was married to the captain of the yacht. She knew it had gone down before anyone else.”
“Yes. She came to me, but I was the one who knew what to do. She didn’t want to put you in the water, but we had to make it look good. I was surprised the papers couldn’t see the truth, but they didn’t even question it. You were a miracle and everyone wanted that.”
“I’m not Taylor Winston-Hughes.” Her whole life had flipped.
“You are. No one will question it now.” He moved toward her. “All you have to do is keep your mouth shut.”
“The company isn’t mine. Now I know why you kept Mary away from Henry. Mary knew Brie had run a test on me and she knew what the results were. I know when Brie did it. She took my brush a month ago, and when I asked for it back she said she couldn’t find it. She tested me to see if I was Trevor’s half sister, and guess what she found out. You think keeping my mouth shut will fix things? Have you thought about Henry? Henry is waiting for the last of the DNA tests to come in. According to him, Brie had multiples done from different labs. I don’t know what happened to the others, but he will get those final results and he will open them.”
“He’s your lawyer. Garrison can’t talk,” her uncle said with confidence. “He’ll be disbarred if he talks.”
“Not if he knows his client is committing an ongoing crime. It’s fraud. Billions of dollars’ worth of fraud.” How had he gotten away with it for all those years? How had he managed to keep this secret?
She wasn’t Taylor Winston-Hughes. She was someone else. Her mother was alive and had spent her whole life lying to her.
She didn’t own the company. She didn’t own anything. Her whole life was a scam.
Her uncle stared at her like they were in some kind of standoff. “Win, put that down and we’ll go talk to Mary.”
“You mean my mother.” Mary was her mom.
“You can’t call her that. We have to keep everything the same. No slipups. And I’ll handle the lawyers. Don’t worry about that.”
“Like you handled Brie?” Her uncle had killed Brie. That was hard to imagine. Her urbane, sophisticated uncle had taken a letter opener and stabbed Brie. Then he’d gone back to the party, even found Margarita so he would have an ironclad alibi.
“She left me no choice.”
“You had a choice. You have one now. Come clean. Make things right.”
“Right? You think it was right to let that company slip out of my fingers? You’re an ungrateful little bitch, you know that? You should be kissing my feet, not standing there looking at me like I’m some kind of monster.” He stepped closer, causing Win to take a step back. “If I hadn’t come along, you would be living in some crap hole with a mother who would have worked all day for a pittance. She was an uneducated immigrant when I made my deal with her. She would have had nothing. You would be nothing without me, so you start paying me a little respect.”
For the first time, it occurred to her that she was truly standing in the same room with a man who had killed before.
She backed up toward the door.
The whole shop shook with the force of thunder.
“Where are you going, Win? You can’t go out in a storm like this,” he said, sounding so reasonable. “We’ll run back to the house together and sit down and talk this out like the family we are now. Blood isn’t important, Win. Family is about who you can depend on when times get tough.”
“You don’t care about any of us.” She wasn’t going to be fooled by his words ever again. “All you ever cared about was that company. What are you going to do, Uncle Bell? If I die, you lose it all. You could kill Brie. You could set up Trevor to take the fall. There’s nothing you can do to me. If I die, you lose. If I tell, you lose.”
His face fell. “Yes, I’m afraid I had to plan for that, too. I’ve always known something like this could happen. You seemed so reasonable, but I’ve always been ready. It’s funny that it’s going down here, where I keep all my secrets. I suppose it really is meant to be.”
“Ready?” She felt her back come up against the door as her uncle turned and reached out, grabbing a leather bag.
He reached in and pulled out a gun. It was black with a wood-paneled handle. “Don’t worry, dear. It’s not filled with bullets. Just tranquilizer darts. I don’t intend to kill you. You’ll spend the rest of your life in a very nice mental facility.”
Win pulled back the metal tool in her hand and hit him with all the force she had. She caught him in the side and the gun dropped to the floor. Bellamy cursed and reached for the gun. He brought it up, but Win was already running.
Something sizzled against her leg, fire brushing her skin. She ran for the main house, rain pelting down on her.
“You can’t hide, Win,” he shouted. “I’ll have a dozen men looking for you within the hour. There’s nowhere to go.”
Her feet pounding against the sand, she ran even as the sky above her flashed with lightning.
She did have somewhere to go. Home wasn’t an option. Her mother was there and she couldn’t be sure Mary wouldn’t go along with Bellamy Hughes’s plan. After all, she’d sold her daughter once before.
But she had another home.
If she could make it across. The rain had only just started. It might not be flooded yet. If she could get across to Chappaquiddick and into Henry’s old house, she knew where he kept a rifle. He’d sold the whole place as is.
What he didn’t know was that he’d sold it to her.
She had to get there. The path was up ahead, the way illuminated by flashes of lightning. She had to make it. Her lungs burned as she ran, the rain nearly blinding her.
And then she saw the lights across the beach. She’d set the lights to come on at night as a security measure. She could see them glowing in the darkness, like a beacon to guide her.
She stepped out into the water. The beach was starting to flood, but she could make it. It would be one more barrier between her and her insane uncle.
The water reached her calf. It was impossible to tell how deep it went. Hands shaking, she moved into it.
“Win!”
She started running again because he was still behind her. It couldn’t be too deep. She had to make it.
She had to see Henry again. She had to tell him she loved him again. This time she would say it until he knew she meant it. This time she wouldn’t let him go.
Something hit her back, a stinging, burning sensation.
&n
bsp; She reached around, finding the dart and pulling it out.
It was too late. The world was going hazy and she couldn’t seem to make her feet work. She hit her knees, heard someone shouting in the background, but it was far away. The rain kept coming but she couldn’t feel it anymore. There was only cold.
She slipped into the water. How odd to go out as she’d come in. She thought of that poor baby, drowning and never found. Taylor Winston-Hughes.
She didn’t even know her real name.
The water was all around her and Win floated away.
* * *
Henry was happy Noah was apparently a paranoid bastard, or came from a paranoid family, because the airplane had come equipped with more than a gourmet kitchen. Noah had handed him a .45 after asking if he knew how to use it.
“I’m not paranoid,” Noah said as they turned down the long drive that led to Win’s house. The rain was starting, a fine mist across the windshield. “My brothers and sisters are from Texas. They don’t feel comfortable unless there are a couple of guns stashed around. Given the fact that at one point every single one of them has been shot at, it’s more like self-preservation than paranoia. Speaking of paranoia, we’re not going in guns a-blazing, right?”
He’d thought about it. “Of course not. We’re going to walk in, casually get Win out to the car, and then we leave as quickly as possible. I’ll let the cops deal with Bellamy Hughes. He’s obviously far more dangerous than I gave him credit for. That’s it, up ahead. But I don’t see Win’s Jeep.”
His heart wasn’t going to stop pounding until she was safely away from here. He was going to walk in, sweep her off her feet, and before Bellamy or Mary knew what he was really doing, she would be well on her way to . . .
“Where are we taking her? We can’t fly back to the city in this.” The sky didn’t look bad now, but Henry had been through enough storms to know it would get worse very quickly.
“I’ve got a hotel room,” Noah assured him. “I like to cover all my bases. In case the date goes bad, I want a place to go. Also, I don’t sleep well with others.”
“Women don’t like it when you sneak out of bed.” He needed something to take his mind off the fact that Win was likely sitting down to dinner with a man who had killed to protect his secret before.
“That’s probably why I don’t have a girlfriend.” Noah parked in front of the gorgeous beach house. It had to be three times the size of the one Henry had grown up in. This was one of the historic houses Martha’s Vineyard was known for. It had beach access and several outer buildings.
“Well, let’s try to save mine.” Girlfriend. It was a silly thing to call Win. Girlfriends were things for high school kids who held hands, not for a man who held on to a woman like she was a lifeline. Not for a man who couldn’t think of spending another minute without one particular woman at his side. There was only one word for that: wife.
The minute Noah parked the car, Henry was out and rushing to the front door. The weight of the gun in his pocket was calming.
He wouldn’t need it. He would get Win out and explain everything to her. God, he was going to have to rip her world out from under her, but he would be there to pick up the pieces. She was strong. She could handle all of it as long as she had someone beside her, someone who never betrayed her. Someone who would never leave her again.
She was about to find out she didn’t have a name. He would give her his.
He would give her his everything, including his struggle. That was what he’d realized. People in love didn’t merely share the good times. They shared it all. The good, the bad, the horrific. The joy. The sorrow.
He wanted to share it all with her. He could have it all because of her.
He knocked on the door and hoped he didn’t look like a crazy person.
“Smile,” Noah said, stepping up next to him. He brushed the rain off his suit coat. It was starting to come down a bit heavier, but not too badly yet. “Be charming.”
The door came open and Mary Hannigan stood there, leaning on her walker.
Damn but she looked like Win. Her hair had grayed, but it was right there in her smile and the way her eyes crinkled. It was in the line of her jaw and the petite shape of her body.
There was no doubt in his mind that this was Win’s mother.
He wasn’t sure how to feel about that because she’d been willing to let Win be used. Had she done it out of desperation? Had she known she would likely be sent back to Poland without a dime to her name and a baby to take care of?
What would he have done if it had been his child?
“Mr. Garrison?”
He’d thought it would be hard to deal with her. He needed to view her through the filter of a woman desperate to save her baby. Without a husband, without money or a place in society, how would she have raised her daughter? He knew, perhaps more than many, that desperate people did desperate things. They did them out of self-preservation, but often they also did them out of love.
It was easy to soften his tone. “Hello, Ms. Hannigan. It’s good to meet you. Yes. I’m Henry Garrison and I’ve come to see Win.”
Her face brightened and she opened the door wide. “I knew you were a smart one. No one can resist my Win. She’s entirely too sweet. Come in. Come in. She should be back momentarily.”
He followed her inside, Noah on his heels. He took a deep breath, smelling a familiar scent. “Ah, that’s where she got the stew recipe. It smells delicious.”
Mary moved with her walker. “She learned how to cook from me. She liked to spend time in the kitchen when she was home. I think it’s part of her personality to want to please those around her. Cooking is the purest form of showing you care.”
Even when one couldn’t express her love, a mother could cook for her daughter. “It must have been hard for you when she wouldn’t eat.”
Her eyes closed briefly and tears shone there when she opened them again. “It was horrible. She got so small and I thought I would lose her. I don’t want her ever in that position again. How could she not see how beautiful she was?”
“I won’t let her see herself as anything less than beautiful again.” No matter what happened, he could see she loved her daughter. “I promise you I will take care of Win from now on. I love her very much.”
Mary stopped, her face falling as she looked them both over. “This feels far more serious than it should.”
“I’m very serious about Win.” He smiled to try to throw her off. “Where is she? We decided to take a little time, but I’m through with that. I know what I want and I want her.”
Mary looked back and forth between him and Noah. “That’s good because she deserves someone who loves her. I meant to thank you for all your help with the recent problems. Both of you. Actually, the whole firm. Expect a shipment of my special cookies very soon.”
Noah gave her a smooth smile. “It was our pleasure.”
Where’s Win? Where’s Win? Where the fuck is Win? The question pounded through his brain, but he needed to stay calm. He had no idea what Bellamy Hughes would do if he knew they’d figured out his secret. “I was more than happy to help her, obviously. But I also was very foolish to think we needed time apart. I’ve come here tonight to see her because I want to spend my life with her.”
He was saying the right words. Mary calmed considerably, her face flushing with obvious pleasure. All the while his brain was whirling, going through all the options. How would he handle Bellamy if he knew Henry had learned the truth? He could tell Bellamy he would play along. Of course he would never tell. Why would he? He loved Win. He meant to marry Win and he would never betray his future family.
Lies, but he could be convincing when he wanted to be.
“So you’ve got good intentions toward my girl, have you?” Mary asked with a smile.
“Only the best.” He glanced around. “I d
idn’t see her Jeep. Is she out? The storm coming in is supposed to be bad.”
Mary wheeled her walker back toward the kitchen. “She got home a few minutes ago. The Jeep should be in the garage. She went out to the shop to bring her uncle in for supper. He gets lost out there sometimes. I swear he’s been working on that boat for years. One of these days he has to finish it, though I don’t like the thought of anyone being out on the water.”
Because she’d lost her husband on the water. “Point me in the right direction and I’ll go meet her.”
Mary waved that off. “Oh, she’ll be along. I’m sure Bellamy is simply finishing up, and they probably only have the one umbrella out there. You don’t want to get wet, do you? I’ve been through many of these storms. But then you grew up here. You know how it goes.”
“Yes, storms can be very dangerous this time of year.” Which was precisely why he needed to get her back to the hotel as soon as possible. “How much rain have you had in the last few weeks? I know Norton Point can flood quite easily.”
Which would mean sticking to the main roads when he was getting away.
“Oh, it’s been bad this season,” she admitted. “I’m sure that beach is several inches underwater. I should warn Win about that. She likes to hike through there. She’s been sticking close to home because of what happened with her cousin. Such a bad business, but then that’s what happens when you get involved with people like Brie.” Her shoulders stiffened with her disdain. “I’m not sad that one is gone. I won’t admit it to Win, but the world is a better place without her. But I did have a question. If Win was Brie’s heir, does that mean she needs to go through her things? I don’t think that’s such a good idea. We should just have it all thrown out.”
“We can’t do that. There are a lot of procedures and paperwork that go along with an estate. I don’t think there’s a ton of money left in Brie’s, but there was property and that will have to be dealt with,” Noah explained. “We can advise Win on all of that.”
