Rachel Bailey - Return of the Secret Heir

She swallowed. “I’m fine, but I have something to tell you. How soon can you meet me at your place?”

“I’ll leave now and meet you there,” he said without hesitation.

With a sick feeling in her belly, she hung up and went to meet the security in the foyer to take her to JT’s apartment.

JT arrived home in record time, body tense about what Pia would have to tell him. He’d immediately ruled out a miscarriage because she would have called him to the hospital or to wherever she was. But that still left a whole raft of possibilities: Maybe she’d had word from Dr. Crosby that one of the tests had found something wrong with their child. The media had pushed her too far and she was leaving town. As he considered each possibility, more jumped into his mind.

When he opened the door to her ten minutes later, he had trouble not leaping on her. “Are you all right?” he asked, taking her briefcase. “The baby?”

“We’re both safe. The news is about you.” She said the words slowly, watching him intently as she did. “How about we sit down?”

“How about you tell me here,” he said, putting her briefcase on the tiles and folding his arms over his chest. If the news was about him, he wasn’t prepared to waste time getting comfortable.

She nodded, her face pale. “I found something in Warner’s paperwork today.”

The air surrounding them seemed to still as he did the math-the news was about him plus a discovery in Warner’s paperwork. “He had papers about me.” He heard his voice as if from a distance, flat and hard.

Pia’s tongue darted out to moisten her lips. “Private investigator reports.”

“How many?” he asked as the room began to slowly revolve around them. Everything he knew about his life was changing, he could feel it deep in his bones.

“Starting when you were a baby-” she hesitated, swallowed “-filed every year, up until last year.”

“He was still having me followed last year?” Bitter rage rose and filled his chest to bursting point. That man had deliberately cut him and his mother off from financial support when he was alive and when he was dead, yet he’d paid some investigator to stalk them? His lungs labored but he still couldn’t get enough air.

Soft fingers intertwined with his and tugged him deeper into the apartment. He sank down into the couch and felt her sit beside him.

“I’m sorry about the claim,” she whispered, her voice gentle.

He frowned as the cogs in his brain turned to process her words. The claim. It had no legal standing and was over. That hardly rated right now. This slimy man who’d sired him had had him followed his entire life. Knew exactly what circumstances he and his mother lived in. Warner Bramson had known that the woman he’d impregnated was struggling. And he’d done nothing but use it as entertainment. Bile ate into his gut. He wished to hell Warner Bramson was still alive so he could confront him face to face. Or maybe fist to face.

“I’ve changed my mind,” he said through a jaw clenched tight. “I wouldn’t take a cent of that man’s tainted money.”

“JT-”

He cut her off and steered the subject away-his rage was too raw for her to take the brunt on that topic. “I assume you’ve told his sons?” he said, moderating his voice as much as he could.

“I rang Ryder and Seth, then came home here to tell you.”

He stood and stalked to the floor-to-ceiling window. His body trembled with the need to do something. To ride until he ran out of gas. To find a gym with a punching bag. But they weren’t options he could take up while Pia was here. He wouldn’t walk out on her. Calling on every ounce of his self-discipline, he reined in his anger and focused on Pia. This was no picnic in the park for her either and he wouldn’t lose sight of that. He turned to find her behind him, waiting, her arms wrapped around herself.

“I’m sorry, princess,” he said tightly.

Her eyes flared wide and her arms dropped to her sides. “Why are you sorry?”

“Your career is in tatters, everything is a mess.” He’d made it into a mess. “And it was all for nothing.”

“It wasn’t for nothing,” she said, her delicate hand reaching to cup his cheek. “You finally know who your father was. You’d always wanted to know that.”

He squeezed his eyes shut, unwilling to give in to the rage now that he had some control over it. “I preferred not knowing to finding out it was this monster.”

“There’s something else I should tell you,” she said tentatively.

His shoulders stiffened. What else could there possibly be? “Go on.”

She took a small step back and folded her arms under her breasts. “It wasn’t a coincidence I had this account.”

“Warner gave it to you?” He eyed her sharply. “Did he know of our involvement?” He wouldn’t put it past that twisted man to try and manipulate people from beyond the grave.

“I don’t think he knew.” Her forehead creased as she considered. “At least there was nothing in the reports about me.”

“So why do you have it?” he asked warily.

“I asked for it,” she said, and drew in a shaky breath. “Lobbied for it, actually.”

His jaw slackened as he put the pieces of the puzzle together. The betrayal slugged him right in the solar plexus. “You knew?”

“I suspected,” she said, wincing. “You mother slipped once over lunch and mentioned the name Warner. It’s not a common name and the first Warner who came to mind was powerful enough to keep Theresa on the run over the years. So I did a little digging.”

He shoved his fingers through his hair and forced himself to relax. Pia hadn’t known, merely suspected. Not a betrayal. “Did she know you were doing that?”

“I never said a word. But I found out she worked in the Bramson Holdings’ secretarial pool about the time you were conceived. It wasn’t much, and purely circumstantial, but enough to convince me I could be right.”

He sank his hands into his pockets. He had to be missing something here. “But still, why take on the case?”

“I thought…hoped, I could do something. For Theresa, and for you.” She drifted over to a framed photo of his mother on a shelf and picked it up, touching the glass with a finger.

He moved behind her and looked down at the photo she held. It was one of his favorite snapshots-his mother laughing at something he’d said. Even with everything she’d had to cope with, she always made sure he’d never felt the strain she’d been under. The woman deserved a medal.

He looked back at Pia-she’d also tried to help, but taking on his father’s will and estate was at best misguided. “What could you have done?”

Shrugging one shoulder, she replaced the photo but didn’t meet his eyes. “I nudged a few times on the question of heirs. Asked if there was the possibility of other children we needed to allow for when we drew up the will.”

He choked out a laugh. “He denied it, of course. Point-blank denied my existence.”

She nodded. Didn’t need to say the words. “I’m sorry,” she said, then chewed down on her bottom lip. “I know this seems like I was sticking my nose into your family business, but-”

“But you were trying to help my mother,” he finished for her. A week ago he might have been more upset about the interference. But between the media stalking them and discovering his father was a monster who’d tracked him through years of childhood and never lifted a finger to help, he couldn’t work up too much steam for this as well.

“Yes,” she said weakly.

He rubbed a hand across his chin, looking for his equilibrium. “I can’t fault your motives, but I wish you’d come to me instead of setting off on your own.”