“No. Losing Jackson doesn’t excuse my father from not being a father to his other children. Do I wish I’d have tried to get to know him? Yeah, maybe a little. But I wouldn’t have changed my course. I’m a marine. And I still don’t want to be like him. He was a cold man. Unhappy. Lonely. And it was all self-inflicted. He might have convinced himself that building AdAir Corp gave him all the joy he needed, but did he really have to shut everyone out?”
Carson was bitter about many things when it came to his father, and all centered around Jackson’s disappearance. It had shaped the man he was now, whether he realized that or not. Even knowing about Jackson all along wouldn’t have changed that. Reginald would have still been heartbroken and he’d have still shut everyone out. Carson would have still rebelled and joined the military. The only difference now was that Carson was torn over following his father to run AdAir Corp. A career in the military had been taken from him. Would choosing to run the corporation mean he’d follow his father? And would he be all right with that?
I’m a marine.
No. No way. Carson would not be happy feeling as though he’d followed his father, done as his father had wished. But where was his choice in the matter? His brother wanted to resign from AdAir Corp and Carson’s leg would keep him from staying in the Marines. What else would he do?
She saw Carson rubbing his lame leg under the table. He was thinking what she was thinking, only much more in depth—and with a lot more turmoil.
“What will you miss most about the Marines?” she asked. What once had been a way to distance himself from his father had turned into something he loved. It defined him. Now he didn’t have an identity. And if he didn’t find one, he wouldn’t find happiness.
“The camaraderie. The exotic places. The excitement.”
He liked the adrenaline. Being good at what he did in a dangerous situation. Fighting terrorism and conquering evil. She pushed back her awe and attraction. “You can still keep in touch with the friends you made.” And he could travel whenever and wherever he pleased.
With that, his face grew much more somber and he turned away. “Not all of them.”
All the fun was gone from this ice-cream excursion. She’d hit a sore spot.
“Was one of your teammates killed on your last mission?”
His head bowed, and she could feel him go back to that day, relive it in horrible detail. “He was my best friend. Leif Louis.”
He said it so quietly that she almost hadn’t heard him. His best friend. Oh, that was terrible.
Given his relationship with his father, the few friendships he’d acquired in his life must have meant a lot to him. He didn’t get that kind of closeness from his family. He did from his siblings, but his siblings had been neglected as much as he had. A best friend would have given him camaraderie he didn’t get from anywhere else. And that best friend had been killed.
“Why do you want to be back in the Marines if your best friend was killed?” she asked.
“I wasn’t the one who killed him.”
And a man like him would want to avenge his death. Being forced out of the military would prevent him from doing that.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“You didn’t kill him, either.”
“I mean for your loss. That must be so hard for you.”
He nodded a few times, going into thought. “He was a good man. He had a wife and a three-year-old child. Unlike me, he was going to serve his time and get out. He was only in for the experience. And the schooling. He was trying to make a better life for his family.”
“Why did he choose the Marines, then?”
He grunted as though he couldn’t believe his friend had. “I asked him that same question. His dad was a marine. He joined to make his dad proud. And to be a hero for his son because he grew up idolizing his dad. But it was with his family where he wanted to be. He used to talk about them all the time. How much he loved them. I knew them even though I had never met them.”
Carson had gotten a glimpse of what it was like to have a father who loved his son.
“He was like a brother to me,” Carson said.
The emotion in his voice touched her. The relationships Carson had in his life meant everything to him. His brother. His sister. His best friend. He didn’t have many, but the ones he had were the most important. She wondered if that would ever extend to loving a woman. A wife.
“Didn’t you want to have a family, too?” she asked. “You sound as though you didn’t agree with your friend’s decision to join the Marines. He did it for his dad.”
It took him a while to respond. She’d gotten him thinking about it. “I don’t know. It wasn’t important. Besides, I have a family.”
Did he mean his brother and sister were his family and that was enough?
“When I’m ready to have one of my own, I suppose I will.” He wasn’t like Whit, who’d decided to stay and work with their dad. Carson had gone to make his own way. Getting married would have tied him down, maybe chained him here, too close to Reginald. Part of the reason he’d joined the Marines was that it took him far away from that. Marriage and family was difficult when you were never home.
“What about you?” he startled her by asking. “Why haven’t you started a family?”
Everything in her tensed. This wasn’t something she relished sharing. But she had brought it upon herself.
“No reason,” she said, hoping that would suffice.
Carson didn’t say more, but she caught how he observed her. He’d picked up on something, and if she was lucky, he wouldn’t try to pry the truth out of her.
Chapter 5
Evita Marrero worked in a street-corner bar in a dangerous section of Raleigh. Georgia and Carson had gone to her trailer, and her husband told them where they could find her. The place had dim lights, a concrete floor, twenty-year-old wooden tables and red-cushioned chairs with torn upholstery. The bar itself was cluttered and the rear shelf of liquor was crammed. Most of the activity was at the bar. A couple of tables had groups of two and four.
Her hair messily pulled back in a clip, Evita wiped the bar in front of the silent drinkers. These were loners with sad pasts. Georgia felt it just with one glimpse. And Evita was one of them. It seemed to Georgia that many who had a connection to Reginald’s life ended up like this or with some other type of scar.
Evita came over to them when they each took a bar stool. “What can I get you?”
“We’re not here to drink. We’re here to talk to you about Jackson Adair,” Carson said.
The woman’s head drew back a bit. “Jackson Adair...now, there’s a name I haven’t heard in decades.”
“You were a housekeeper for the Adairs,” Carson said.
“An unfortunate fact.” She looked back and forth between Carson and Georgia. “Who are you two? What do you want?”
“Reginald Adair is dead,” Carson said.
It took a while for that to sink in. And then she smiled. “You don’t say. How did he go? Was it painful?”
“I imagine so. He was murdered. We just now discovered he had another son. Jackson Adair?”
“How was he murdered?”
“He was shot. The police are investigating. Did you know he had a son?”
Evita took out three shot glasses and filled them with Scotch. Setting them down in front of Georgia and Carson, she said, “Anybody that comes by with good news like that gets a drink on the house.”
“Nothing for me, thanks,” Georgia said.
“No, thanks,” Carson said. “Did you know Reginald had a son?”
The housekeeper tipped the shot glass and sipped, going against Georgia’s initial impression. She’d picture this woman downing the entire drink in one gulp, not savoring it as if she was sitting with Winston Churchill.
“Yes, I knew they had a son.”
Having drifted off into memory, she shook her head. “Poor little Jackson. Innocent child. It was having a father like Reginald that got him
kidnapped.” Then her attention returned to the present. “What are you trying to find out about him after all this time?”
“I’m Reginald’s son,” Carson said. “He was conducting his own investigation when he was killed. We suspect his death may be related to the kidnapping, that maybe he was getting close to finding the person who took Jackson. I found some of his notes that suggested he was planning to talk to you.”
“Reginald’s son, huh?” After grunting over that revelation, she studied him. “You resemble him.”
Georgia saw Carson blink and quickly recover from what must feel like an insult to him. That wasn’t a compliment to him.
“When your father was young, he was a handsome man,” the ex-housekeeper said. “Like you are.”
Georgia had to agree. Carson was a very good-looking man.
“Had a good head on his shoulders, too,” the woman continued. “Didn’t fall in line with his parents, not in the early days. He did his own thing. And then...”
And then Jackson had been kidnapped.
“You tried to steal a necklace?” Carson said.
Evita sighed. “If I could go back and do it over, I’d have never done that. I realized I made a big mistake, stealing from him and Ruby. Even though it wasn’t an expensive necklace, just a few hundred dollars’ worth, it was wrong. I was going into bad debt and was trying everything to get out. I was caught, of course, before I could even get the necklace out of the house. Ruby caught me. I gave the necklace back and tried to explain, to make amends. I told them why I did it. I pleaded with them to forgive me. Ruby did, but Reginald wasn’t having it. He didn’t fire me or press charges, but things changed. After Jackson was taken, a mean streak came out of him. Working for that family became pure hell, I tell you. Pure hell. I ended up quitting.”
“I’m sorry for that,” Carson said.
Georgia saw that he was sincere and wondered how many times he’d had to apologize for his dad and stepmother’s behavior. Maybe he’d only just begun, after being gone for so long. He knew how his father was, the kind of man he’d become. In that regard, he related to the ex-housekeeper.
“Why would Reginald want to talk to me?” Evita asked. “I told the police all I knew, which wasn’t much. I didn’t see anyone take the child.”
“How long did you work for him and Ruby?” Carson asked.
“Just a few months. From just before they were married and Jackson was born until...” Her voice trailed off as she was reminded of the stolen necklace. “Anyway, he was a different man before Jackson was kidnapped.”
“He never told any of us about Jackson or the kidnapping,” Carson said.
Evita nodded, still taken back in time. “He was so full of love for Ruby and that baby. I don’t think either one of them planned to have a child, much less get married, but I do think they were meant for each other. It was awkward at first, the two of them so young and barely knowing each other. I said it was hell working for them, but not until after the kidnapping. Reginald doted on them both. I’ve never seen a happier couple in my life. Then the child was taken and a dark cloud passed over them both. They started fighting. Reginald stayed away from home a lot. He turned into an awful man, someone unbearable to be around. He had it all and then his whole world changed.”
Georgia noticed how Carson sobered, his gaze falling to the shot in front of him. He hadn’t known Reginald like that. Ruby had told her what their relationship had been like. Good. And then with Jackson gone, it had been exactly as the housekeeper said. It must have bothered Carson to realize his father had once been a good person. Full of love that he shared with Ruby. Something Carson had never seen in his entire life. Now he was hearing of it, and had only his mind to imagine what his father had been like, what the man beneath the sorrow had been like.
“I remember when I accidentally broke a family heirloom, one of the few things Reginald cared about that had come from his parents. It was an old statue.” She swatted her hand through the air. “An ugly, dreadful thing, but he kept it proudly displayed. He was upset when I broke it, but he reassured me and told me it was okay and he knew I didn’t mean to break it. I felt horrible, but he was a true gentleman about it. Attempting to steal the necklace tried his patience. And then after Jackson...” She shook her head. “Lord, he was a completely different man. He became a bitter, bitter man. I wasn’t there when he and Ruby divorced, but I bet he was the one to end it. Poor Ruby was so distraught and full of guilt. Reginald never comforted her. Just blamed her.”
“Ruby is my stepmother,” Georgia said. “It would mean a lot to her to find Jackson.”
“Oh, honey, you don’t have to tell me that. I feel her pain. There was nothing anyone could do. Just sit back and watch Jackson’s disappearance tear them apart.”
Georgia thought she might be dramatizing a bit too much.
“What happened after Jackson was kidnapped?” Carson asked.
“I couldn’t take it anymore. One day Reginald yelled at me for not being able to find a hat of his. I had put it away in the closet. He was so unreasonable. I yelled back at him and quit. When another client of mine called for a reference, he gave me a scathing one. I wasn’t hired. No other opportunities came up. That’s how I ended up here. All I have to be grateful for is that I’ll never have to live for the whims of the wealthy. I live for myself.”
Georgia could sympathize with this woman. She felt the same about wealthy people—certain wealthy people. The ones like Reginald, who let greed take control of their morals, who blamed, who expected average people to bow down to him as though he were a god. Bow or be ruined. That was Reginald’s mentality, at least from her vantage point.
“Are you sure there’s nothing you remember that you haven’t told the police?” Carson asked. “Anything you may have seen?”
She shook her head. “No. If I did, I would have said something. Jackson was an innocent child and I had nothing against Ruby.”
Only Reginald.
“Did you ever meet Reginald and Ruby’s neighbor?” Georgia asked.
“I saw her a few times. I never spoke to her, though. She kept to herself. Came and went from whatever job she had and went into her house. I saw her get the mail and take care of her yard and that’s it. She was a real recluse.”
Georgia glanced at Carson, who shared her sense that the ex-housekeeper would be of no help. Why Reginald had thought she would be remained a mystery. Maybe it was a desperate reach.
“I feel sorry for her,” Georgia said as they walked to the limo that pulled out from the curb, the driver having seen them. “She had nothing but good intentions toward Reginald.” Except when she stole the necklace.
“By then, he was a changed man.”
Tortured by the disappearance of his child. Yes. Georgia could understand that, but... “He didn’t have to give her a bad reference.”
“That was the father I grew up knowing.”
Georgia could see how that troubled him. He had a father he’d never known. The real Reginald had been the man Ruby married.
Feeling a strengthening connection between them, she stopped attraction from taking over. He was nothing like his father. The only resemblances were physical and his nature to get in and get a job done. He made things happen as his father had. His father had done it in a corporate setting. Carson had done it in the military. They were both doers. She’d argue that Carson would also be a doer in a corporate setting. He’d gotten Patsy’s attorney to back off. She didn’t know how, but he had. If he’d used ruthless tactics the way his father would have, then he’d done it with a heart. He believed Ruby deserved the inheritance and had done what he had to ensure the right thing was done.
But allowing feelings to grow for him disconcerted her. She wasn’t sure how to handle this.
* * *
They had to wait for Ruby’s old neighbor to come home. Georgia sat in a rental car with Carson, parked along the side of a dirty street. Three teenagers with tattoos and backward hats and
chains hanging down their pants had walked by, adopting the swagger of gangsters as they walked down the sidewalk. This was the reason they hadn’t taken the limo. The limo would have drawn too much attention. Maybe they wouldn’t have a limo by the time they finished.
A little unnerved by the elements of the neighborhood, Georgia dug into her orange purse and pulled out one of many clothes catalogs she received by mail. She also had her electronic reader with her. There was always something in her purse for moments like these.
Putting the thin catalog on her lap, she began to look through it.
“Shopping?” Carson asked.
She slid a look his way, not having thought ahead to what he’d perceive of this. “Just looking.”
“You bring that with you?”
“For something to do, yes.” Her eyes caught on a cute vintage blue dress. She had lots of accessories that would make it really pop.
“If you find something, I’ll buy it for you. Pick out what you want.”
She shut the catalog. “No.”
“Come on. I dare you to find three outfits in there and let me buy them for you.”
She laughed lightly. “I can buy them myself. I’m not poor.”
“Okay, then I’ll take you somewhere you can’t afford.”
“Carson...”
“Seriously. It will be fun. Let’s do that after we talk to Ruby’s neighbor.”
He did not strike her as a shopper, not even a little bit.
He chuckled at what must be her wary look. “What does your house look like?”
Why was he asking her that? She could tell he was setting her up for another money talk. “Like a house.”
He chuckled again, deep and warm. “I bet it’s really nice.”
Yep, he was digging for material items she loved and wouldn’t admit to loving. “It’s nothing like your ranch.”
“Not as big. But just as nice.”
“I didn’t spend what you probably spent.” Not even close.
“I didn’t spend anything. Patsy and my dad did.”
She wished he’d stop being a normal man, a normal, sexy, hot man. Special Forces man. Oh, how that turned her on. He wasn’t just in the military. A man could be in the military and never train for special warfare, never risk his life on top-secret missions, fight the enemy in small, deadly teams. Carson was exceptional.
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