Sullivan's Promise

by Joan Johnston

  If Darcie came into his life, he wouldn’t need the day-to-day demands of the Lucky 7—or his feud with King Grayhawk—to fill the hollow inside him. Loving her, making her happy, being parents and grandparents together, would be more than enough to give his life meaning.

  All Angus needed from Darcie was one word of encouragement, and he would be happy to move to Montana, so they could be together. And once he and Darcie were married, giving Aiden the ranch might provide a much-needed spur to his eldest son’s romance with Leah Grayhawk.

  Angus met Darcie’s gaze, wondering if she could tell how scared he was that she would send him away once he’d met his son.

  Darcie looked deep into his eyes and took his face between her hands. Her fingers were callused and surprisingly comforting. “I’m so glad you came.”

  He captured her hands with his, and said, “I would have come if I had to crawl on my knees. I love—”

  She moved her fingertips to cover his mouth, forbidding him to say the words. His feelings were there for her to see in his eyes. Protestations of undying love had been off-limits during their long phone conversations. She’d been willing to share the minutiae of her life and hear the trials and tribulations of his, but she’d told him it was too painful to be called “darling” and “sweetheart.” Not when he’d married another woman instead of her in a fit of pique. Not when he’d coaxed her into an affair that made her as responsible as he was for wounding his wife so badly.

  Angus had known from the moment he met Darcie at the University of Montana that she was the girl for him. He was a couple of years older and wanted her to marry him when he graduated. She wanted to finish college first. He’d tried rushing her to the altar, but she wouldn’t be pushed.

  Darcie had liked him all right, but she told him to his face that she wasn’t sure he’d make a good husband. He was far too arrogant, far too used to being able to buy anything he wanted with his money. She wasn’t for sale.

  Angus wasn’t used to hearing a woman tell him no. He’d been stung by the harsh criticism from a woman he loved. Licking his wounds, he’d gone off and found someone who adored him just as he was, someone who didn’t push back. When he got Fiona pregnant—something he couldn’t regret without regretting the birth of his eldest son—he’d married her.

  Angus bit back the excuses he hadn’t been allowed to express for his choices all those years ago. They might make him feel better, but they wouldn’t undo the damage he’d done to the two women he’d loved. He wouldn’t make the same mistake twice. Now that Darcie had invited him into her life, he was never going to leave her again.

  “I told Rye to meet me here,” she said, her worried gaze darting toward the door to the cafeteria and back. “He doesn’t know you’ll be here, too.”

  He felt his heart skip a beat. He didn’t like the idea of surprising the boy. The man. His son was almost thirty years old. “How soon will he be here?”

  “Any minute.”

  Angus wondered why she hadn’t tried to meet up with him sooner, so they would have had time alone before Rye showed up. One look in her fretful eyes told him the answer. She might want to be with him, but she was terrified of how Rye was going to react to finding him here, where her son wouldn’t have any choice except to confront his biological father. Not to mention the decision she was about to make, now that their secret was out, to perhaps include this stranger in her children’s lives.

  “It’s going to be all right, Darcie.” He wondered if he should tell her his own pulse was racing, that his lungs were struggling to draw breath, that he was equally apprehensive about being judged by their son for what he’d done, and even more fearful of how Rye might resent, and therefore interfere with, his plans for Darcie.

  “What the hell is this?”

  Darcie jerked herself from Angus’s embrace and turned to face the stiff-legged young man, hands fisted at his sides, whose suspicious gaze shifted from her to Angus and back.

  “Is this him?” he snarled.

  Darcie squared her shoulders as she faced Rye. She showed her son—their son—none of the anxiety and uneasiness she’d shared with Angus. Her voice was calm, although her chin quivered. “This is Angus Flynn. Your father.”

  “I had a father. This isn’t him,” Rye retorted.

  “I’m your biological father,” Angus said in a carefully modulated voice. “Your mother told me you wanted to meet me.”

  Rye shot a confused glance at his mother. “Why would you bring him here?”

  “I wanted to be with you when you met Angus, and I’m not ready to leave Mike alone at the hospital. I thought if Angus and I were both here, we could answer all your questions at one time.”

  “In a hospital cafeteria?” Rye said with a sneer. He yanked off his Stetson and rolled the brim in his hands. “I thought something had happened to Mike. My heart was in my throat all the way here, and it turns out it’s only him. Why are we doing this here, Mom?”

  “It’s neutral ground. And I thought meeting at the hospital might keep you from making a scene. Which you seem, at the moment, determined to do,” his mother replied in a steely voice.

  Angus remembered that voice. She’d used it on him when she’d shoved him out of her life. He gestured toward a nearby table. “Why don’t we all sit down?”

  “I’d rather stand,” Rye said belligerently. He focused his narrow-eyed gaze on his mother. “I don’t like being manipulated.”

  “Especially when it’s for your own good,” she retorted. “Now sit down.”

  Angus held his breath, not at all sure Rye would stay. His son threw his Stetson onto the table before scraping back a chair and slumping into it. Angus watched Ryan’s green eyes flare when his mother sat down across from him, next to her former lover.

  “We’ve met,” Ryan said sullenly, directing his gaze at Angus. “Now what?”

  Darcie leaned across the table, reaching out with both hands to her son.

  Rather than taking her hands, he folded his arms defensively—and defiantly—across his chest.

  “Please, Ryan,” she said in a faltering voice. “This isn’t any easier for us than it is for you.”

  Ryan shifted his annoyed gaze from his mother to Angus. “I do have one question,” he said at last.

  “Ask me anything,” Angus said.

  “I saw you holding my mother in your arms. What, exactly, are your intentions?”

  “THAT DIDN’T GO as well as I’d hoped,” Angus said after the few abrupt questions Rye had asked had been answered, mostly in ways that hadn’t pleased him, and he’d stalked out.

  “What did you expect?” Darcie asked, shoving her still-full cup of coffee away from her. Angus had gotten them each a cup after Rye left. “He loved Paddy. It’s going to take him a while to adjust to having another father in his life.”

  Angus’s heart gave an extra thump. “Am I going to be in his life?”

  Darcie sighed, then reached out and covered his hand, which lay on the table next to his coffee cup. “It’s bad enough wondering what Mike and Amy Beth will think when they find out you’re Rye’s father. I’m afraid to imagine what they might do if you and I become a couple.”

  “You’ve been a widow for seven years,” Angus said. “Aren’t you entitled to a little happiness?”

  “Not at the expense of my children’s well-being.”

  “If they love you, they’ll be happy for you.”

  “I’m realistic enough to expect some pushback, but I also believe they’ll be okay with our relationship in the long run. At least, I hope so,” she said, her eyes brimming with tears. “Because I do love you, Angus. I’ve always loved you. And I suppose I have to admit I’m not getting any younger.”

  Angus was surprised by the sudden knot in his throat. She’d been stingy with words of love. He couldn’t believe she’d spoken them
now. “Will you marry me, Darcie?”

  She looked adorably startled. “What?”

  He took her right hand in both of his and turned in his chair to face her. “I was an idiot all those years ago. I don’t want to make the same mistake twice. If I’m rushing you, tell me so. But I want you for my wife. I want the right to love you and cherish you for the rest of my life. I also want to make love to you till we’re both too tired to wiggle a toe—or any other body part.”

  Darcie giggled. It was a surprisingly girlish sound. The giggle faded as her face sobered. “I’m sure your intentions are honest, but you’ll understand if I don’t believe you’re willing to marry me just like that.” She snapped her fingers. She blushed as she added, “And this time around, a married relationship is the only one I’m willing to have with you.”

  “Try me,” he said.

  “What are you suggesting?”

  “Do your children love you?”

  “Of course they do.”

  “Do they want the best for you?”

  “Of course they do.”

  “Then let’s get married.”

  Her jaw dropped. “Isn’t this a little sudden?”

  “I’ve been sharing my thoughts and feelings with you on the phone for years, being patient, waiting for you, the way I was too foolish and proud to do all those years ago. But I’ve waited—we’ve waited—long enough for our happily ever after. Rye finally knows the truth. We can’t predict or control his response to that knowledge. We can only help him learn to live with the new reality—that he’s my son, and that I plan to spend the rest of my life loving his mother.”

  “This is all happening so fast,” she said breathlessly.

  “Do you trust me?”

  “Of course I do.”

  “Then marry me. Today. As soon as I can get it arranged.” He waited, his heart in his throat, for her to decide whether to leap off the proverbial cliff with him.

  At last she said, “All right.”

  Angus left Darcie sitting there with hope in her eyes and her lower lip gripped anxiously in her teeth and headed off to locate a justice of the peace and find out what paperwork they needed to get married.

  He got no farther than the exit to the parking lot before he literally ran into Rye, who was apparently on his way back into the hospital.

  “Did you forget something?” Angus asked.

  “I’m glad I caught you alone,” he said brusquely. “I have a few more questions I want answered.”

  “Let’s go outside, where we won’t be interrupted,” Angus said, heading out the door without waiting for Rye to agree.

  The sky was cloudy, threatening rain or snow, depending on whether the temperature went up or down later in the day. Angus felt cold and buttoned his shearling coat, as though that could stem the chill of fear inside him.

  Angus stopped far enough from the hospital doors that they wouldn’t be disturbed by other visitors and turned to face Rye. He’d always believed attack was the best defense, and he used it now. “You hurt your mother when you jumped up and marched out of the cafeteria without saying goodbye.”

  Rye reared back as though he’d been slapped. “I’ll apologize to her later. Right now, I have a few things I need to know from you.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “Did you continue your affair with my mother after she was married?”

  Angus let his disgust show on his face. “You should know your mother would never have allowed it.”

  “How do I know that? She was your lover when you were a married man.”

  “And it tore her up inside,” he replied. “I was the selfish one. I was the one who refused to let her walk away. When she got pregnant, there was no question of her priorities. She chose your future happiness, your well-being, over any considerations of mine—or her own.”

  “She loved my father!”

  “I believe she came to love him very much.” Angus let that comment sit there, with all its ramifications. That perhaps she hadn’t loved Paddy when she’d married him. That she’d sacrificed her relationship with Angus for the benefit of their unborn child. That she’d cared more for her son than for her own happiness.

  Angus saw the troubled look on Rye’s face. “I regret the pain I caused your mother, but I don’t regret loving her. I’ve never stopped.”

  “Have you been in contact with her over the years?”

  Angus shook his head. “She wouldn’t take my calls. Not until after Paddy died. Since then, we’ve spoken often.”

  Rye looked appalled. “You’ve been talking to her?”

  “Almost every night.”

  “For seven years?”

  Angus nodded. “She wouldn’t let me see her because she was afraid you would find out the truth about your birth. She didn’t want you hurt. She still doesn’t want you hurt.”

  “It’s a little late for that,” Rye muttered.

  “Explain that to me,” Angus said. “What is it that bothers you most? The fact that you have a different biological father or—”

  Rye cut him off. “The fact that she lied! To me. To my father.” He bit off a curse and said, “To the man who raised me. Paddy’s the only father I ever had, or ever will have, as far as I’m concerned.”

  “I hope you’re wrong,” Angus said quietly. “I hope you’ll give me a chance to get to know you.”

  “Why would I do that?” Rye snarled.

  “Because your mother’s going to be my wife.”

  “The hell she is!”

  “She loves me, and I love her. Are you going to deny her a second chance at happiness? Because you have that ability. If she believes you hate me, that you’re determined never to have anything to do with me, she’ll give me up again for your sake. You’ll win. I’ll be miserable and unhappy. But I guarantee you, so will she. You have a grown-up choice to make here, Rye.

  “Are you going to be the bigger man, and forgive her—and me—for loving each other enough to create you? Or are you going to be the bastard you might have been if she hadn’t married Paddy, and keep the two of us apart?”

  Two red blotches appeared on Rye’s cheeks. “You can’t put this on me. I’m not the bad guy here.”

  “Not yet, anyway,” Angus said in a hard voice. “You certainly have the power to ruin the rest of my life, and I believe hers as well. Think about it. Then decide if you can swallow your gorge and tolerate me enough to let your mom be happy again.”

  Angus found himself standing alone. Rye had stumbled away without a backward glance.

  “THE SONOFABITCH WANTS to marry her!” Rye raged to Lexie as he stalked back and forth in front of the fireplace. He stopped abruptly, turned to face her, and said, “Over my dead body. That’s how he’s going to marry her.”

  “Does your mother love him?” Lexie asked in an irritatingly calm voice from her seat in the rocker.

  “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “Everything. If they love each other, why shouldn’t they be together?”

  “She lied to my father. She never told him about her sordid affair—”

  “How do you know it was sordid?” Lexie interjected. “From what you’ve said, Darcie and Angus have waited a lot of years to be together because your mother was worried about how you might be affected when you learned the truth about your birth.”

  No matter when his mom had revealed that Paddy wasn’t his biological father it would have hurt, Rye thought. But worse than the lie he’d been told was the fact that she’d concealed it for so long. And it seemed a betrayal of his dad that she’d harbored this secret love for some other man, even if she hadn’t acted on it. Rye saw the reasons why his mom had behaved the way she had, but he felt angry and confused by it all.

  “I’m still in shock that Angus Flynn is your father,�
� Lexie said. “I mean, what are the chances? They must be infinitesimal. I’ve known Angus practically all my life. He and my father are mortal enemies. Omigod! What if he tells my father about Cody? Or tells my family before I have a chance to do it myself?”

  “That isn’t going to happen.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because Angus made a promise to my mother that he wouldn’t. And since he’s known about me and you and Cody for a while and hasn’t said anything, it seems he’s keeping his word.”

  Lexie let out a relieved sigh. “Thank goodness. I still can’t believe the ‘awful Flynn boys’ I mentioned in the stories I told you and Pete when we had dinner at Casey’s are your brothers.” She shook her head and laughed. “I probably know all the men you’re related to better than I know you, since every one of them is either married to or dating someone in my family. It’s surreal.”

  “ ‘Surreal’ describes the situation perfectly,” Rye muttered.

  “What did you think of Angus when you met him?” Lexie asked.

  Rye didn’t want to admit that when he’d first spied Flynn he’d had an impression of power. His father had stood ramrod straight, shoulders squared, and met Rye’s gaze unabashed and unashamed. And he’d been brutally honest about his intentions toward Rye’s mother.

  Rye had glanced at his mother, whose face had blanched—in fear of his reaction, he’d realized—before she twined her fingers with Angus’s, showing her willingness to go along with his plans. Rye had been too shocked by the turn of events to say much of anything. After a few brief questions, he’d grabbed his hat and fled.

  He’d gotten no farther than the hospital parking lot before he’d returned to confront them both and had that second, gut-wrenching conversation with Angus.