Secrets to Hide 2: Naughty Little Christmas (21 page)

“What?” Alex barked. “When? H-how?”

His friend’s consternation struck Damien as funny. His laugh, as it escaped, had a slightly hysterical edge that cut through the sound like Harley’s actions had cut through his heart. “Long story, brother.”

“No kidding. What the hell?”

Leaning forward, Damien settled his elbows on his thighs, stared down into his untouched coffee, and did his best to explain the story Harley had related to him. At this point he wasn’t even certain he had all the details straight, but at least the pertinent facts were clear: he’d had sex, someone got pregnant, baby resulted. A daughter. “Klio,” he told Alex. His daughter’s name was Klio—assuming she was, actually, his daughter.

“And Harley’s had her all this time?” Cailin asked. When Damien raised his head to answer, he noticed the green tinge to Cailin’s complexion had lessened a bit. That was good, at least.

“She’s had her all this time. Her twin died a couple of months ago.” He ran a hand across the stubble covering his jawline. “Of course, from what Harley says, Sonny abandoned the baby long before that. Harley told me originally that Sonny’s death was the reason she left Aftershock, but I suspect it’s because of the baby.”

“Do we know for certain she even had a twin?” Alex asked gruffly.

That much he could confirm. “Ryan included the obituary in his background check.” Because Damien had specifically asked about it. Looked like he should’ve specifically asked about a baby instead.

“How has she kept Klio a secret, though?” Cailin shifted to set her soda can on the table. “She’s been out of town with you for weeks, hasn’t she?”

Harley’s resistance to the trip that first morning rose in his mind. “I assume she has someone watching her, though I don’t know who. She doesn’t have any other family, and Jace made it clear the band had no clue. She kept it from everyone, apparently.” Another mystery. Why hide a child? Stigma over unwed motherhood was nonexistent nowadays save the religious pockets dotting the South, but the crowds Harley ran with—musicians, artists—none of them would have a problem with it. So why the secrecy?

And who the hell was taking care of his daughter?

As the thought echoed in his mind, Damien groaned. He was already thinking about this child as his. He couldn’t do that. God knew who the baby belonged to; he refused to take Harley’s lying word for it.

“Damien,” Alex said, pulling his attention out of his tangled thoughts. “Is this such a shock because the baby could be yours, or because of Harley’s involvement?”

Alex’s question shot right to his heart. He chuckled unhappily. Harley had begun to mean something to him, something far more than he’d allowed another woman to mean, ever. Alex knew that better than anyone. “I don’t know, Alex.” He groaned out his frustration. “Either. Both. I believed her. I wanted to believe she was different.”

“And she might be,” Cailin said quietly, cautiously. She reached out a hand, settling it on her fiancé’s arm. “We know, probably better than anyone, how secrets can seem necessary. Especially when you’re alone and scared like Harley seems to be.”

He didn’t want to accept that. He wanted to stay mad, wanted to tear himself away from the woman who’d deceived him. It would be so much easier than figuring out where to go from here. But then he thought about the child and realized he didn’t really have a choice, did he? One way or the other, he had to figure it out. But how?

“So, what now?” he asked, feeling helpless for the first time in his life. This wasn’t a business deal he could conquer, a mountain he could climb. This was a human being, a helpless human being. “What if it’s true? What if it’s not? How can I even know?”

Alex stroked Cailin’s hand as he considered Damien’s words. “Well, you can get a DNA test. It takes a while, I think, but it would be definitive.”

“If she’s got something to hide, she might refuse the test,” Damien pointed out.

“She might, but that’s what a court order’s for.” At Damien’s grimace, Alex assured him, “Only if it becomes necessary. If Harley is the kind of woman she’s shown herself to be all this time, the woman you came to care for, she won’t balk. She’ll have the baby’s interests at heart.”

“Yeah, maybe.”

Cailin hmphed. “Men!” When Damien and Alex looked at her like she’d lost it, she returned their looks with a roll of her eyes. “Don’t you have baby pictures, idiot?”

Umm… “I guess.” What did that have to do with anything?

Apparently Alex got it before Damien, because a smile broke across his face. “Well, pull them out,” he said.

Cailin nodded. “You can do the blood test, but if you want to know immediately, try looking for a resemblance. It’s not definitive, but”—her voice darkened with sympathy—“it could save you weeks of wondering, possibly bonding with a child that isn’t yours. If Klio doesn’t resemble anyone in your family, ask Harley for pictures of her and Sonny as little girls.” Cailin shrugged. “You might at least narrow things down a bit.”

“Either way,” Alex said gravely, “you have to meet the child.”

Damien nodded; he knew that much. He had a responsibility, one way or the other. If it weren’t for Harley’s involvement, he’d probably already be at the house having his first look at the baby that might be his. But Harley was involved; there was no getting around that fact. “And what about…?”

Alex’s sympathy was palpable. “That I can’t guide you on. But,” he said, his grip on Cailin tightening visibly, “I can tell you that sometimes things aren’t what they seem.”

Wasn’t that the truth? When Cailin met Alex, he’d been married to another woman. Cailin thought Alex was an adulterer, though the truth had been far different.

“Just…don’t close yourself off to the possibilities,” Cailin urged him.

Damien closed his eyes against the pain in his heart. He didn’t want to hope. He didn’t want any of this. But there was no going back to his life before Harley had come into it. He knew her body intimately; was it possible what he thought he knew about her personality was, in fact, true? Moving forward was his only choice; he just prayed the steps ahead of him didn’t lead to a trap from which he’d never retrieve his heart.

He’d trusted Harley once. Could he live with the outcome if he trusted her again?

* * * *

Harley startled at the knock on the door, sloshing hot coffee out of her cup and over the tender join of finger and thumb. She hissed at the pain. Thank God she hadn’t been holding Klio. The baby lay in the living room on her favorite quilt, gazing up at the Christmas tree in pure contentment. If only Harley could find the same peace. Unfortunately she had a feeling the person on the other side of her front door was about to make things worse, not better.

Taking the time to mop up the mess and rinse her hand was pure sadism. As she made her way out of the kitchen, a distinct, “Harley, open the damn door!” produced a mean little smirk. Damien could wait till hell froze over for all she cared, but it was either get the confrontation over with now or later. Might as well be now. If the butterflies in her gut disagreed, well, they couldn’t agree on everything.

Setting her cup on the coffee table, Harley threw a quick glance at Klio to be sure the baby continued her happy cooing. Then she took a deep breath and made her way over to open the heavy front door. “Hello, Damien.”

Damien closed his mouth on whatever he’d been about to yell, dropped his hand from its preparatory knock position, and scowled as he bullied his way into the tiny foyer of her house.

She turned to blast him for his rudeness and ran square into his back. Damien stood stock-still at the edge of the hardwood floor, foot poised over the plush carpet as if knowing that next step would change his life forever. Her fingers reached automatically, grabbing his jacket on either side of his hips, refusing to let go just long enough that the rigid muscles of his back and butt were imprinted on her body in a way she wished she could forget but knew was impossible. Releasing him was like releasing a part of herself. It hurt—hell, hurt was an inadequate frickin’ word for what she felt—but Damien had started them on this path, and only he could take them off it.

It was a good sign that he’d only waited twelve hours to come see them, though. Right?

Don’t fool yourself, Harley. The man makes snap judgments as easily as he selects ice cream; the fact that he’s here just proves he’s not a complete dickhead. Do you really want to pin your and Harley’s future on Mr. Fickle?

Her body said yes. Her mind screamed no. Telling them both to shut the hell up, she stepped around Damien and into the living room.

“Gonna stand there all day or come meet your daughter?”

Without looking back, she crossed the living room, zigzagging through the furniture to the far corner and the Christmas tree. Klio turned her head to watch as Harley settled onto the carpet near her blanket. She greeted her mama with a gurgling coo before turning her attention back to the tree. Harley batted a tiny bird ornament to set it swaying above Klio’s head, and sweet baby laughter filled the room.

Damien choked.

The sound filled her eyes with tears, but she resisted the urge to reach out, make this easier for him. Some mean little kernel thought this experience should be as hard as she could make it. The Fisher women had suffered enough; they didn’t need to deal with his shit on top of it. But the fairer part of her forced her to silence. She was partially to blame, she knew. Better to let him work it out at his own pace.

And then he opened his mouth and she really wanted to punch him.

“Well, that answers one question.”

She’d missed his advance, tied up in her own thoughts. Damien stood mere feet away, on the other side of the coffee table, face like granite, words just as hard. Eyes fixed on Klio. Tightening her lips barely kept a nasty retort inside. Did he think she hadn’t seen his resemblance to her daughter first thing? She wasn’t stupid, for goodness’ sake, though she was beginning to wonder if he was.

Klio looked to the side again at the sound of Damien’s voice. “Ah-yah,” she babbled. One plump baby hand stretched out to this strange new distraction, looking for a connection. Would Damien give it, or would he leave Klio hanging, just as Harley’s family had done to her?

Aching inside at the evidence of her daughter’s need, Harley reached for her.

“Let me.”

“Like hell,” she snarled. Handcuffs were about the only things that could hold her back right now, but she didn’t want to give him any ideas. She simply scooped Klio into her lap, cuddling her close. The baby wasn’t to be deterred, however. Her head turned unerringly toward Damien, that tiny hand stretching out again. In response, Damien slowly rounded the coffee table, closing the distance between himself and his daughter but not trying to grab her. Maybe he knew how ready Harley was to take off his hand if he tried it.

Kneeling near enough that his heat soaked into her side, he asked, “What’s her full name?”

“Klio Michael Fisher.”

“Michael.” Dismay filled the word.

Harley smirked. It was an odd choice for a girl, she knew, but hey, she’d lived with an odd name all her life. She kinda liked it, in fact. Hopefully Klio would too as she got older. “It was my father’s name.”

The explanation seemed to appease him, though he still didn’t move to take Klio. Harley wondered if he was steeling up his nerve. Klio, for her part, was doing her darnedest to reach him. She had both arms out now, a droolly little smile on her face. Harley had no idea how he resisted.

“Where did Sonny come up with Klio?”

Hurt sharpened Harley’s tongue. “She didn’t. I did. She left the hospital without even holding the baby.”

Damien’s shocked gaze met hers. “What a bitch.”

Perversely, Damien’s judgment made her want to lash out even more. God, her emotions were riding a roller coaster. He was right; Sonny had been cold, but many women didn’t want kids. Especially women with backgrounds like theirs. “She wasn’t always.” She’d just been…done. It hadn’t mattered that Klio was three weeks premature; it hadn’t mattered that the doctors were still evaluating her. It hadn’t even mattered when Harley called her to say Klio was fine. To Sonny, her role in the whole thing had been over, and her life waited outside the hospital walls. That was how she’d seen it.

“So if she wanted away so bad, why carry to term in the first place?”

“Would you rather she hadn’t? It would certainly make things easier for you.” Anger turned the little bit of coffee in Harley’s stomach into a would-be projectile. She clutched the baby close, only easing her grip at Klio’s whimper. “If that’s the way you feel”—she nodded toward the other side of the room—“you know the way out.” This was what had worried her sick from the moment she’d met Damien. The fear that he would reject Klio, wish she’d never been born.

“Harley, no! You know me better than that.”

“Do I? I thought I knew you very well, after…” A hot flush crept up her cheeks. “After everything. I certainly never thought you would fire me without even meeting her. How the hell should I know what you would think or do after that?”

Klio whimpered again at Harley’s sharp tone. Wanting to kick herself, Harley turned the baby to face her, starting up a rocking motion that soothed both of them. Klio laid her head on Harley’s shoulder and reached out for the bow on her pajama top, pulling the silky material to her mouth.

Damien sat in silence, watching the two of them with hooded eyes and a tight jaw. He finally sighed, his entire body slumping as if being released from a prison of tension. “I deserve that, I guess, but no, I don’t wish Klio had never been born. I’m just trying to understand what happened. Sonny doesn’t seem particularly altruistic. It would’ve been easier not to put herself through the pregnancy, childbirth. I don’t get it.”

Good luck
. Sonny had been her twin, and Harley still didn’t get her. “She didn’t know she was pregnant for quite a while. At about five months she came to me. She thought she was sick.” Harley had always taken care of her, been the mother even when their own mother was still around. Sonny hadn’t wanted to go to the doctor alone. “That first visit, the doctor did an ultrasound. I saw her…” Tears made it hard not to choke on the words. “And that was it. I convinced Sonny to let me handle everything. All she had to do was make it through the delivery.”