The Negotiator (35 page)

His voice broke and Cally was starkly reminded of how much he’d lost, too. Her parents had always had a close and loving relationship. It couldn’t have been easy on her father to lose his beloved wife way before her time.

He’d loved Cally once like that, too: totally, irrevocably, unconditionally. It was why his reaction to her pregnancy had been so utterly shocking. It had never occurred to her before she became pregnant that he could ever react that way. It wasn’t as if a teenage pregnancy was so far beyond what was acceptable in society that it warranted never speaking to her again. At least, that’s the way she’d seen it.

She looked at him sadly, determined not to feel guilty. “Because of you, my son doesn’t know his grandfather and he was never given the chance to know his grandmother. Aunt Mary, the only person kind enough to love both of us unreservedly and the only relative Jack ever knew, is also dead. Jack’s the one who’s missed out.”

She shook her head. “Please don’t tell me how sorry you are. If it weren’t for you, none of this would have ever happened!”

To her horror, hot tears welled up in her eyes. She swiped at them furiously. “I could have raised Jack with your love and support—who knows, maybe even Stewart would have been a part of his life. But you made sure that was never going to happen. Once it was all around town that even my
father
couldn’t bear the sight of me, a young man like Stewart was never going to hang around.”

“Stewart Brady didn’t deserve you,” her father scoffed. “You might have thought I was happy to have you going out with him, but the truth is, I felt sick with worry every time you went out the door. It was clear he was only looking for someone to dally with during his college break. I was hoping you’d forget about him when he left. I hadn’t counted on you sleeping with him and getting pregnant.”

“Dad, you say it like it was the worst thing that could have happened to me! I didn’t do anything illegal. Life didn’t turn out quite as I planned. So what? Having a baby wasn’t the end of the world.”

His face collapsed with grief. “You were
sixteen!
You had your whole life ahead of you!” He sighed heavily and made an effort to calm down. When he spoke again, his voice was quieter.

“You were my little girl. I had such big dreams for you. You were smart and sassy and beautiful. You had the world at your feet. And then you got pregnant.”

She opened her mouth to protest, but he held up his hand. “Cally, just hear me out.” His tone brooked no argument and all of a sudden, she felt like a teenager again. As he picked up his coffee cup and took a sip, she threw herself back into her chair and crossed her arms defensively, tamping down her irritation.

“I couldn’t bear the thought of you ending up as a single mother, working at the local supermarket. After all my dreams for you… That was all I could think of that night you came to me and told me you were having a baby.”

He lifted his arms in defeat and let them fall. “I’m not excusing my behavior, but you have to understand. I’d seen it all before. I’d been a high school principal for many years, remember? There’d been other girls, bright girls with promising futures, who’d thrown it all away over a boy and an unplanned pregnancy. I didn’t want that happening to you. I couldn’t bear the thought. Not to my little girl. Not to my Cally.”

She watched him and tried to remain unmoved. He still hadn’t admitted he was wrong. He still hadn’t asked for her forgiveness.

As if reading her thoughts, he continued. “I behaved so badly, then and in the years that followed. If I could take back those careless words, I would. I was in shock, Cally. It was the last thing I expected to hear you say. As soon as you walked out of my study, I wanted to call you back. But I didn’t. I was angry—devastated even. All I’d planned for you, all my dreams, the future I had mapped out—it crashed down around my ears.”

He gave her a sad smile. “I kept hoping you’d phone and ask if you could come back. I was going to let you, of course, after you’d agreed to an abortion.”

Her gasp of outrage went unnoticed. He didn’t appear to notice. “But you didn’t. You didn’t call and you kept the baby. The longer things went on like that, the more impossible it became to change it.”

He took another sip of coffee. “Your mother would come to me every once in a while and beg me to call you. ‘Just pick up the phone and talk to her,’ she’d say. ‘We have a grandson we’ve never met,’ she’d remind me.”

Shaking his head, he placed the cup back on the table. “I wanted to, I really did. But I was concerned by then that
you
wouldn’t want to come home; that even if I asked you back, you wouldn’t want to come. I couldn’t bear the thought of you rejecting me. It was selfish beyond belief, but it was how I was. I’m not proud of it and I’ve lived to regret it every day since.”

Cally stared at him in shock and disbelief at the enormity of his revelation. She could only wonder how things might have been different if he hadn’t let pride get in his way. Her shoulders slumped and all at once, she felt weary beyond belief.

“I wasn’t throwing away my life, Dad, as you so eloquently put it. I was going to have a
baby
. I had plans, big plans, even with the baby. You could have been a part of them, but you didn’t
ask
! You didn’t even ask, not
once
, what those plans were.”

Unable to sit still, she pushed away from the table and began pacing again. “With Aunt Mary’s love and support, I went back and finished high school and graduated from university with a teaching degree. Huh! Fancy that!” She laughed without humor. “I’m a teacher, Dad, just like you.”

His gaze dropped to the table. “I never dreamed you’d do so well,” he admitted. “I guess that’s where I made my mistake. I underestimated you, and I shouldn’t have. There’s nothing else I can say. I loved you too much.”

Her face hardened. “That wasn’t
love
, Dad. That was
control
and it bordered on the obsessive. If you’d
really
loved me, you would never have been able to treat me the way you did. And as for Stewart,” she shrugged, “we’ll never know, will we? He was young too, and scared and in shock—all the things I was. We never gave ourselves a chance. Who knows what might have happened had we been given the love and support from our families when we needed it most?”

“I wouldn’t waste time worrying about Brady. He moved on pretty quickly, let me assure you.”

Even though she told herself she didn’t care, the words tumbled out of her mouth. “What do you mean?”

“Exactly that. It was only a couple of months after he went back to college that we heard he’d gotten another girl pregnant. Tiffany something or other. They met at a frat house party. I heard he actually married her a few months after the baby was born.”

Cally reeled back in shock. All the nights she’d cried herself to sleep in Aunt Mary’s spare room, praying that Stewart would defy his parents and come and see her, come and declare his love for her, cry over the fact she’d had an abortion and then be elated when he realized she hadn’t. And now she discovered he’d already moved on. Long before his son was even born, he’d moved on and fathered another child.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.
She couldn’t believe how many tears she’d wasted on him. She forced a grim smile, unwilling to let her father see how much his news upset her.

“Well, good for him,” she murmured.

“Not really. His wife and child were killed in a car accident about six months ago. He hasn’t been quite right ever since. In fact, he’s been brought up on serious assault charges. He got into a fight at a gym downtown. Smashed someone over the head with a barbell. The bloke nearly died. The trial started over a month ago, but it was adjourned. Everyone knows he’s guilty. Despite his daddy’s influence, the talk around town is that he’ll do substantial jail time.”

Her mouth fell open. A kaleidoscope of memories and images spun crazily through her head. “W-when did you last see him?”

“About a week ago, outside the courthouse. It was just before I got the call from Donaldson to say you wanted to see me.”

“I wanted to see
Stewart!
I thought it was
Stewart
who’d gone to Harvey Donaldson. I had no idea it was
you!”

Hurt flooded her father’s face. Gradually, it was replaced with curiosity. “Are you trying to tell me, after all this time, you’re still holding a candle for Brady?”

“No!”
She grabbed at her hair in frustration. Taking a deep breath, she fought to regain some control. Deciding to leave Andy out of it, she said, “Jack has been asking questions about his father. I thought it was time he met him.”

Her father choked on humorless laughter. “Let me get this straight. You never wanted to talk to me at all. It was that no-hoper loser, Stewart Brady, the man who got you pregnant and dumped you and within a couple of months was screwing someone else—it was
this
prime example of manhood you wanted to see again?”

His voice caught on his distress. Cally couldn’t help the surge of guilt that went through her at the hurt that had returned to his eyes. She sighed and the fight went out of her. It was possible, over time, she’d come to forgive him and she’d reach out to him for both her sake and her son’s, but right at that moment, she couldn’t take any more. She’d had enough.

“Think what you will, Dad, but next time you’re talking to Stewart, give him my regards. No matter what he may have done to me, no one deserves to lose their family like that.”

Her father shook his head in disbelief. “After all these years, I wouldn’t have believed it. You still have a soft spot for him.”

“I wouldn’t call it a soft spot. It’s called kindness and compassion—something you forgot about a long time ago.” Heading toward the front door, she opened it and looked back at him, her intentions clear. “I think it’s time you left.”

“B-but what about us? What about Jack? I thought—”

“Not this time, Dad. I need time to come to terms with what you’ve told me. I need time to adjust. For ten years, I’ve lived with the knowledge that you didn’t love me enough to be there for me when I needed you most.”

She shrugged. “I have my beautiful son and I have a new man in my life. A man who loves me for who I am, warts and all. One day, you might get to meet your grandson. We’ll have to wait and see. Right now, I’d like you to leave.”

“But—”

“Please, Dad. I want you to go.”

“But I love you, Cally. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I should never have kicked you out. I should have stood by you and helped you, like any decent father would have. It’s all my fault. I should have listened to your mother. She begged me to talk to you. She begged me to ask you to come home.” Tears streamed down his wrinkled cheeks and Cally bit her lip against the emotion that threatened to undo her.

She wanted so badly to believe him, to go to him and receive comfort, like she had so many years ago, but at that moment, she simply didn’t have the strength.

She stood by the door in silence and tried to suppress the trembling in her limbs. With a last, tortured look in her direction, her father made his way out through the doorway.

She locked the solid wooden door behind him. Moments later, she slid down the wall and crumpled on the floor. With a cry of anguish, she let the hot flood of pain and disillusionment fall.

* * *

Cally heard the sound of a key turning in the lock and straightened. She didn’t know how long she’d been on the floor, but a quick glance through the side window showed Andy’s shiny silver Audi parked behind her faithful old Toyota in the driveway.

Swiping at the tears on her face, she hoped she didn’t look as big a mess as she felt. Her eyes felt puffy and swollen and her nose dripped. So much for the two-hundred-and-fifty-dollar nightdress she’d bought to impress him.

Moving unsteadily into the kitchen, she pulled a handful of tissues out of the box on the shelf near the window and blew her nose vigorously. The back door opened and Andy walked in looking tired but as gorgeous as ever.

His eyes zoomed in on her and his face filled with concern. “Cally! What the hell happened? Are you okay?” He ran to her and took hold of both her arms.

Fresh salty tears welled up in her eyes. She looked up at him, trying to get the words out. “I-it was m-my father.” Her words caught on hiccups and half sobs.

He looked confused. “What are you talking about? Your father?”

“M-my father. H-Harvey Don-Donaldson. It was my f-father who hired him.” She wanted Andy to understand.

His gaze moved over her, searching her face. “It was your
father
who contacted the investigator? Is that what you’re trying to tell me?”

She could only nod, relieved that he finally understood. He was still holding her at arm’s length, his eyes intent on her face. “How did you find out?”

She drew in a deep, shuddering breath. “H-he came here.”

His eyes widened in shock. “Your father was
here
? In your house?”

She nodded.

“You contacted Donaldson’s office, right?”

Cally nodded again, taking comfort from the warmth and strength of his broad chest. Winding her arms about his waist, she breathed deeply of his unique scent and sighed. After a few moments, she spoke again.

“I called his office on Sunday afternoon, after you left for work. I thought about what you said about meeting up with Stewart—and I knew it was something I had to do—for my sake and for Jack’s.” Her voice was soft and muffled against the cotton of his shirt.

“So I telephoned Donaldson and left a message. I told him to get his client to contact me.” She looked up at him. “Of course, I thought it was Stewart. I never imagined it was my
father
.”

Andy stroked her back, while his other arm tightened around her. “I take it the meeting didn’t go too well?” he murmured against her hair.

She sniffed and leaned away so she could swipe at the tears in her eyes with the back of her hand. “You could say that.” She took a shaky breath. “He came here to apologize and he did, eventually. But it’s going to take time for me to forgive him. And I’m never going to feel the same way I did about him again.”