Lisa Jackson - Confessions

“It wasn’t a scam.”

“Like hell!” Ben said, standing and kicking the table.

“Ben!” Donna’s back stiffened, but he didn’t listen to his mother.

He whirled, and planting his flat hands on the table, glared at Nadine. “Now you know what the Monroes are like, little sister,” he snarled. “All of them. Cut from the same cloth. And your precious Hayden is no different than his old man.”

“Oh, God,” Donna whispered. “Nadine. Not Hayden Monroe!” The lines of her face carved deep into her once beautiful skin, and Ben, realizing what he’d done, gritted his teeth.

Nadine’s spine stiffened, and though her eyes burned hot with unshed tears, she wouldn’t break down. She cared for Hayden, probably even loved him. And, deep down, he felt the same for her. She knew it.

“He’s the boy you were sneaking out with?” Donna demanded.

“Oh, hell,” Ben grumbled, apparently sick with himself.

“Who’s been sneaking out?” Kevin wanted to know as he shoved open the screen door.

“Nadine. With Hayden Monroe.” Donna’s condemning stare landed full force on her daughter. Her fingers curled around the edge of the table. “There’s just one thing I want to know,” she said, her voice trembling, and Nadine braced herself for the blow. “Tell me the truth, Nadine. If you lie I’ll find out anyway.”

Nadine lifted her gaze to meet her mother’s. “What?”

“Are you pregnant?”

“Pregnant?” Kevin repeated, shaking his head. “What’s going on here?”

Their father eyed his firstborn. “What’re you doing home so early?”

“I’m home for good, Dad,” Kevin replied as he flopped into a chair. “I got laid off today.”

“Laid off?” Donna said, and Nadine hated the disappointment in her parents’ eyes.

“Don’t you know? They’re cutting back shifts. The newest guys like me got pink slips.”

Nadine felt the doom settle over the roof of the little frame house.

“If you ask me,” Kevin said, “old man Monroe has lost it. And it’s probably because of his son. The kid’s gone ’round the bend, I guess.”

“Hayden?” Nadine whispered.

“You don’t know?” Kevin’s eyes scanned everyone in the room. “Hayden Monroe is in the hospital. He wrecked the old man’s boat this afternoon and the girl he was with, his fiancée, she’s been life-flighted to San Francisco. There’s a question whether she’ll make it or not.”

Nadine’s life splintered into a million pieces. “And Hayden...is he...?”

“Oh, he’ll be all right. Those Monroes are lucky bastards. The way I hear it, he broke a couple of ribs and tore up his leg, but he’ll survive.”

Donna was already reaching for the telephone, no doubt to confirm the story. Nadine crouched lower in her chair, her eyes hot with unshed tears.

The kitchen seemed to disappear, but she could still hear her mother’s quick questions to a friend of hers who worked at County Hospital. It was true enough; Hayden was lying in the hospital emergency room, in pain, perhaps more seriously hurt than Kevin knew.

She heard the receiver click and slowly raised her eyes to meet her mother’s. Donna nodded. “The Galveston girl is critical—crushed pelvis, possible internal injuries, but Hayden Monroe will be fine. There’s a question about him ever walking without a limp, but he’ll survive.”

“He’s at County?” Nadine asked, involuntarily reaching for her purse.

“That’s right.”

She felt her father’s hand on her shoulder. “I hate to do this, missy,” he said, his voice rasping with regret, “but you’re not going anywhere.”

“I’ve got to go....” She felt everyone’s eyes on her.

“You’re grounded,” her father said. “Don’t even ask me for how long ’cause I can’t begin to tell you. Now you listen hear, young lady. There’ll be no more sneaking out. Until Hayden Monroe is transferred to a hospital in San Francisco to be with his own doctors, you aren’t going anywhere.”

“But—”

“Don’t argue with me, Nadine. Believe me, I know best.” His faded eyes held hers. “I’ve learned my lesson about the Monroes the hard way, and I’m not going to stand by and see you get hurt.”

Panic surged through her. “I won’t—”

“You heard me. That’s it. We won’t speak of it again. As far as I’m concerned, you’re to forget you ever met Hayden Monroe.”

BOOK TWO

San Francisco, California

The Present

Chapter Five

MIST GATHERED OVER the tombstone, and the sod, recently turned, smelled fresh and earthy. Chilled to the bone, Hayden shoved his hands in his pockets. Sleet drizzled past the upturned collar of his old leather jacket and dripped from his bare head and nose.

He stared at the final resting place of his father, strewn with roses and carnations and lilies, and he whispered under his breath, “I hope you got what you deserved, you miserable bastard.”

A lump filled his throat and his eyes burned with tears he refused to shed. Hayden Garreth Monroe III had been a pathetic excuse of a father. He’d shown his son no love, nor kind words—only strict discipline and upper-crust values.

From his pocket, Hayden withdrew a leather baseball, autographed by Reggie Jackson, and hurled it into the soil. The ball wedged deeply, nearly buried with the old man. Fitting, Hayden thought bitterly. His father had paid a fortune for that baseball, given it to Hayden and never once played catch with his only son. He’d never had the time, nor the inclination.

“Rest in peace,” Hayden muttered, before turning and never once looking over his shoulder.

His old Jeep was idling at the curb, and Hayden slid into the torn driver’s seat, wrenching the wheel and gunning the accelerator. Leo, a battle-scarred Lab and his best friend in the world—perhaps his only friend—was seated in the backseat. “One more stop,” Hayden informed the dog. “Then we’re history around here.”

Driving through the gates of the cemetery, he headed into the city for yet another ordeal—a meeting with William Bradworth, of Smythe, Mills and Bradworth, his father’s attorneys.

* * *

BRADWORTH’S PRIVATE SUITE fairly reeked of blue blood and big bucks. From the mahogany walls to the leather club chairs situated stiffly around a massive desk, the rooms were meant to invite conversation about money, money and more money. Even the view of San Francisco Bay didn’t disturb the Wall Street atmosphere that some high-priced decorator had tried to transfer from East Coast to West.

The phony ambience made Hayden sick.

Shifting restlessly in his chair, he glanced from the balding pate of William Bradworth to the window where sleet was sluicing down the glass and the sky was the color of steel.

Bradworth’s voice was a monotone droning on and on. “...so you see, Mr. Monroe, except for the money that’s been set aside for your mother, her house, her car and jewelry, you’ve inherited virtually everything your father owned.”

“I thought he cut me out a few years back.”

Bradworth cleared his throat. “He did. Later, however, Garreth had a change of heart.”

“Big of him,” Hayden muttered.

“I think so, yes.”

“Well, I don’t want it. Not one damned piece of rough-cut lumber, not one red cent of the old man’s money, not one stinking oil well. You got that?”

“But you’ve just been left a fortune—”

“What I’ve been left, Bradworth, is a ball and chain, a reminder that my father wanted to control me when he was alive and is still trying to run my life from the grave.” Hayden gave a cursory glance to his copy of the last will and testament of Hayden Garreth Monroe III, lying open on the polished desk. He slid the damned document toward his father’s arrogant son-of-a-bitch of an attorney. “It won’t work.”