A Forever Love (2 page)

Aubrey was an awesome businesswoman, and she could make changes and run numbers, but damn, she wasn’t a magician. Where the hell could she come up with another ten grand? “I’ll see what I can do.”

Nina nodded. Her anger gone now that she’d been heard, like a porcupine after the danger had passed, she tucked her sharp quills back up against her body. “Thanks.” She placed her hands on her hips. A clean dish towel hung from the pocket of her checkered chef’s pants. “You and Max coming in tonight? I’m making fresh ravioli.”

A small smile lifted the corner of Aubrey’s mouth. “We’ll come by the chef’s table early. Can’t stay out too late.”

“Don’t look so glum. He’s going to love Camp Willow. We did.”

“No,
you
loved Camp Willow. I hated it. And Max is a whole lot more like me when it comes to social skills than he is you.”

“Come on.” Nina grinned. “You put on a good show. No one would ever suspect you’d rather be holed up in the barn mucking stalls than walking the floor of The Red Barn at Rockwater.”

Aubrey stood. “And it took a whole lot of years to get comfortable with all that social interaction. Max isn’t there yet. What if he hates it? What if they tease him?”

“Then they’ll call you and you’ll go get him. Besides, give him some credit. He’s got some of his dad in him.”

Aubrey’s eyes sharpened and she instinctively looked toward her office door, which was thankfully shut. “Don’t.” She shook her head. “You’ve gotten awfully free talking about Max and his father lately, and I don’t want that … I don’t want him to know—”

“He knows.”

Aubrey’s heart thudded to a stop. Her fingertips tingled and her office started to spin.

“He knows about Justin?” Aubrey’s voice rose three octaves. “
You
told Max about his father?”

“Nope.” Nina’s eyes fixed on Aubrey, and she crossed her arms over her chef’s jacket. “Although I think you should’ve told him by now.”

“What does he know? Why do you think he knows anything?” Aubrey had done everything possible to prevent Max from learning about his father. She didn’t want Max to become a Travati. To carry the burden of everything it meant to be part of that infamous family.

“Wasn’t me.”

“Then who?” Aubrey asked. She’d skin them alive and hang them high. Any mention of Max’s father was strictly forbidden in the Hayes family. They did not discuss Justin Travati, didn’t mention his name. Just the thought of Max knowing, of anyone knowing, of Justin and his army of lawyers ever finding out about Max, caused fear to freeze Aubrey’s blood.

“After you order me that new freezing mechanism, looks like you better go talk to Dad.”

*

There were a handful of places Dad could be located at Rockwater Farms. The barn, the fields, the Kaw River that ran through their property, maybe on a certain type of day when he wanted to take a high lonesome deep in the rare timber property they owned that had never been touched, tilled, or grazed. But nearly always with dark coming on and the cool summer-evening air, even as a child, she’d found Dad in the woodshop next to the house. Scout, her lab, shadowed her as she walked toward the workshop. Dad’s carving and crafting and building had once upon a time been a hobby, but through sheer talent and hard work, he’d turned it into artist-craftsman’s work.

Dad hunched over his middle worktable, the longest of the three, a piece of wood in one hand and a sharp, short whittling knife in the other. He worked on a small piece tonight. Whatever sculpture Dad brought forth would be intricate and delicate and worth thousands of dollars to the collectors who sought out Roy Hayes’s work.

“You’re coming after me about Max.” Dad didn’t look up. His eyes never left the white wood or the sharp knife in his hand. To indulge his desire to look over at her could mean a cut that went all the way to the bone.

“What did you tell him, Dad?”

A shaving of wood fell through air. Featherlight, like a fairy’s wing, the wood drifted slowly to the floor. Electric light silvered the edges as it settled beside her father’s booted foot.

“The truthful answers to the questions he asked.” Dad stopped his knife and set it on the workbench. Only then did he raise his gaze. Old eyes, keen with knowledge gleaned from a lifetime, settled on her features. Dad’s gaze was like a spotlight from which she’d spent most of her childhood hiding. She felt small and unworthy when he looked upon her. Occasionally there was love in his eyes, but more often there was judgment. “Which is more than his mother give him.”

Anger blossomed in her chest. Heat tore through her limbs. She wouldn’t say the words that stung her tongue and brushed against her lips. She’d been raised on the cornerstones of duty, perseverance, honesty, and respect for one’s parents. Talking back to her father, even at her age, a grown woman with a semi-successful business, a former career, and an MBA, wasn’t a luxury she indulged.

Perhaps she needed more luxury in her life.

“Then what were Max’s questions?”

His gaze lingered on her eyes. “Same ones he’s been asking you for near a decade.” He stood and walked toward the wall and hung the knife from the rack. Turned back to Aubrey. “Guess he got tired of getting the runaround, so he finally asked me.”

A deep breath filled Aubrey’s lungs but did little to clear her head or quell the heat that vibrated through her body. “This is my business, you don’t have the right—”

“It is your business, Aubrey Lynn, and I kept it your business. Never did say anything to you about it. Never said a word to Max. But when the boy comes knocking on my door, asking me questions, then it becomes my business. Mine and his.” Dad walked toward her and now stood just by her side. He was a half inch shorter than she, but she wore heels. He’d been such a big man in her childhood, but how he’d shrunk in his old age.

“Dad, you should have come to me—”

“You made a choice every time that boy asked you about his father. You made a choice to do what was easier for you and harder for him. Well, this time he decided to take the choice away from you. This time he came to me.”

“Telling Max about his father is much more complex than just my son asking his grandfather about a person who has no meaning in Max’s life.”

“No meaning? Aubrey, do I have no meaning to you? I think that fancy therapist you go see every week would say different. Wouldn’t she say that me and your mama left the biggest imprints on your soul? That we’re the ones molded whatever clay we got? I know what a parent can and can’t do for their child. So how in the hell can you possibly imagine that Justin Travati means nothing to your son?”

Aubrey stepped back. Dad’s words were a punch to her chest. Her breathing shortened and her lips opened and closed and she was unable to form words. “Oh my God.” She pressed her fingertips to her lips and shook her head. “Please, Dad, you didn’t tell Max his father’s name?”

“Every man’s got a right to know his own last name, Aubrey, whether it’s the same as his mama’s or not.”

The beautiful people of Manhattan circled and mingled as evening turned to night and the music inside Prayer thumped out a cacophonous beat. Justin walked upstairs and around the corner to a balcony reserved for VIPs and the owners of Prayer, of which he was one. Devon entertained financiers still in their suits with their ties askew. Justin greeted each one, remembering tennis with two and golf with the third. Spotting potential female companionship, the three drifted downstairs to capture their quarry. Instead, Devon had what he wanted brought to him.

“Now that they’re gone for a while,
where
are you going?” Devon leaned back into the black leather banquette and wrapped one arm around the blonde on his left and his other arm around the brunette on his right.

“I’m going to Hudson, Kansas. I leave tomorrow.”

“What the hell is in bum-fuck Kansas?”

“Business,” Justin said. “Personal business. Anthony is in China, and Leo isn’t expected back from Dubai for at least another ten days, which puts you in charge.”

“Me?” A cat-that-caught-the-canary grin surfaced on Devon’s face. “Must be important business if you’re willing to leave
me
in charge of Travati Finance.”

The muscle in Justin’s jaw tightened. The business in Kansas might be the most important business he’d encountered in his career.

“What kind of business does Travati Finance have in Kansas?”

“It’s not the right time”—Justin’s gaze slipped over the women who accessorized his brother—“or the right place.”

“Gotcha.” Devon leaned back. He rubbed his hand over the brunette’s shoulder, and she curled closer like a kitten getting pet. He leaned toward her and whispered in her ear. A wicked smile crossed her face and her hand stroked Devon’s thigh. Yes, Justin’s little brother wouldn’t soon end his hard-partying ways. Therefore Devon had been the perfect brother to put in charge of the hospitality division at TF.

Devon’s gaze returned to Justin. “I can’t promise that I’ll be in the office by six a.m. like you, but I can promise that TF will be safe while all the big brothers are gone.”

Devon might seem to be the irresponsible younger brother, but his division at Travati Financial was one of the most profitable. He did a helluva job spotting businesses to buy.

“I’ll be reachable the entire time.” Justin stood. While his little brother seemed to exist on booze and sex, Justin still needed sleep to function. “Text me, or you can go through Liza. I don’t suspect this will take longer than a few days.”

“Got it, big bro.”

Justin turned toward the exit. He wasn’t worried about leaving Devon in charge of TF; he wasn’t even worried about what he’d find at Rockwater Farms in Hudson, Kansas. What concerned Justin was that either someone knew about his affair with Aubrey and was attempting to use his mistaken night of lust for their own personal gain, or that he was just now discovering—nearly fifteen years later—that he had a son.

His blood chilled. A boy. A son. An adolescent that he’d never met, that he’d never known. The key to a future he’d been told he could never have.

Anger thickened after the cold. Should he find the e-mail to be true, nothing would keep him away from this boy, this Max, this one Travati heir. Nothing. Not distance, not time, not lawyers or judges or laws, and most definitely not Miss Aubrey Hayes.

*

The final table of four had just been served their dessert course and coffee. Aubrey turned the corner toward the kitchen and cut down the hall toward her office and the doorway that led across the path of limestone that stretched from the famous Red Barn at Rockwater to the old farmhouse that she now shared with Max, Nina, and Dad. The house had been remodeled, and Dad had the main part of the house while Nina had taken the west side with a bedroom, sitting room, and small kitchenette. Aubrey and Max were on the east side of the house with their two bedrooms, family room, a small kitchen, and a bathroom. Of course they all congregated in the main part of the house the majority of the time, with Max spending most evenings with his grandfather once dinner service began at The Red Barn.

Tonight Aubrey found Dad sacked out in his brown La-Z-Boy chair with a rerun of
The Carol Burnett Show
blasting from the TV. Max was asleep on the couch beneath a wedding ring quilt made by Mom. Scout lay on his round doggie bed next to the couch. He had one here and in Max’s room. Aubrey touched Dad’s shoulder. He woke and silently shuffled off to bed, barely opening his eyes. She leaned over to lift Max and carry him to bed, but he was too heavy.

When had that happened? Her eyes traveled over her son’s face, noting his skin the olive color of his father’s, his jet-black hair that was lush with waves, his cherub smile. Gone was the tiny hint of baby that had lingered on his cheeks and around his lips at seven, eight, nine and even ten, replaced by the imminent change to sharp-edged cheekbones and a well-defined chin. He’d gotten her green eyes. Or eyes that resembled green—not quite as emerald-colored as her own—from her. But they also held flecks of golden brown from his father.

His father.

Aubrey pressed her fingers along Max’s forehead and brushed his black hair back from his face. He looked very similar to his father. She could already see Max’s face taking on the same shape, the same contours, the same hints of those Travati good looks. Good looks that had ruined her good judgment and caused her to make what she’d thought at the time was the worst decision of her life, but in retrospect had turned out to be the biggest gift of her existence.

“Max,” she whispered. She leaned forward and gently stroked the back of her finger down his cheek. “Max, you need to wake up, sweet boy. You have to go to bed.”

His thick black eyelashes fluttered and his eyes opened.

Her heart jolted.

There staring at her, from her son’s face, were Justin Travati’s eyes.

“Mom? Are you okay?”

“Fine, fine.” Aubrey cleared her throat and forced a small smile onto her face. “It’s late, baby, you need to get to bed. We’ve got a lot to get packed up tomorrow.”

Max’s brows crinkled over his father’s eyes. “Right.” A pause hovered around him. He had more to say; a question hovered near the corners of his mouth.

“What is it?”

“What if I don’t like camp?”

Aubrey smiled. She had to smile. Max had begged to attend Camp Willow with his friends this summer after hearing of their exploits last summer and then hearing from his very own Aunt Nina how much fun she’d had at Camp Willow.

“Then you’ll come home. If you don’t like it, then I’ll come get you.”

He turned his head away and then looked back. Again she knew there was a question, a worry, something he needed to say, to tell her.

She brushed her fingertips along the edge of his hair. They had much to discuss, but now wasn’t the time. “You okay?”

He nodded, sat up, and stood. She stood beside him. Max’s head would soon be even with hers if she were in her bare feet. Soon, very soon, way too soon for her, he would surpass her height. He had just finished middle school, with high school beginning in the fall. He was no longer her little boy.