Linda Lael - McKettrick's Heart

Keegan was relentless. “I’ll stop you any way I can,” he said. “You may pull off this—adoption—but I’m the executor of Psyche’s estate, and you won’t get a plugged nickel of that kid’s money, so if you’ve got a boyfriend waiting in some tropical hideaway for your ship to come in, honey, you’d better just write this con game off as a loss and get on the next bus out of town!”

That did it. Molly drew back her hand, and she would have slapped him, except that he caught her wrist in a hold that was just short of painful.

Tears of dizzying anger and frustration rushed to her eyes. “You—don’t—understand,” she said, and it was as if someone else had spoken the words, from a distance.

“I understand plenty,” Keegan snapped, flinging her hand free. “You’re the one who doesn’t get it, sugarplum. You’re in way over your head here. Go find another gravy train.”

Molly rallied. “You listen to me, you obnoxious bastard!” she choked out in a whisper that scraped at her throat like a wad of steel wool. “I’m not a crook, and I’m not some airheaded little bimbo you can bully onto a bus, either!”

He glared at her.

She glared back.

Both of them took deep breaths.

“This isn’t over,” he said.

“It sure as hell isn’t,” she replied.

He turned and stormed down the hall to the top of the stairs.

Molly just stood there, leaning against the wall, afraid her legs wouldn’t support her if she tried to walk.

When she felt able, she made her way back into the nursery.

Lucas slept, curled into a plump little ball in the middle of his crib, one thumb in his mouth. The windows were closed and latched, but a breeze ruffled his fine spun-gold hair just the same.

Wild thoughts rushed through Molly’s head, an onslaught, sweeping all logic and reason before them.

She could snatch him up in her arms, make a run for it.

Disappear.

Empty her bank accounts.

Start over somewhere, with a new name. Dye her hair, and Lucas’s, too. Call him Tommy or Johnny…

Stop, she thought.

She couldn’t do that to Lucas, or to Psyche.

She couldn’t do it to herself.

She moved to the windows, looked down at the street just in time to see Keegan standing beside his car, staring upward. She could have sworn their gazes collided—she actually felt the impact—but of course that was impossible. He’d have no way of knowing which room she was in.

She was certain of one thing, though.

He was going to make trouble.

Molly folded her arms and dug in her heels.

“Bring it on, Mr. McKettrick,” she said softly.

In the next moment, with a decisive, angry grace, he got into the Jag, slammed the door and drove away.

Molly waited a few moments, then slipped out of Lucas’s room and into her own. Her cell phone was on the dresser, charging.

She unplugged it, punched in a number.

“It’s about time you called,” her assistant, Joanie Barnes, said. “Where are you?”

“Indian Rock, Arizona,” Molly answered, suddenly weary, sagging onto the side of her bed. She’d told Joanie, and everyone else who inquired, that she was attending a writers’ conference in Sedona, trolling for promising new authors. Only one person in L.A. knew the truth, and that was her dad.

“You didn’t make plane or hotel reservations,” Joanie accused. “I know, because I checked. And Fred Ettington said he drove you to the bus station.”

Molly sighed, pushed back her hair. Fred ran a car service, and she kept him on retainer to ferry important clients and editors to and fro when they were in L.A. on business. Desperate to get to Arizona and see Lucas, she’d called Fred out of habit, never thinking that he might blab.

Given a do-over, she’d take a taxi.

“Atmosphere,” she said brightly.

“What?” Joanie asked.

“The bus. I rode it for atmosphere.”

“You can’t beat a bus for that,” Joanie remarked sarcastically. “And what the hell are you talking about?”

“I’m writing a book,” Molly lied.

“Oh,” Joanie said, patently unconvinced and making no effort to disguise the fact. “Right.”

“How are things going at the office? Any messages?”

“Only about a thousand,” Joanie retorted. “Godridge didn’t make the bestseller lists, and he’s threatening to sign with some New York agent. And then there’s Davis. He’s called about fifty times, frantic because he keeps getting your voice mail.”

Molly closed her eyes. Denby Godridge—“God” for short, at least around the office—was a grizzled old Pulitzer Prize winner with a major attitude and steadily declining book sales. She could handle him, though she didn’t relish the prospect. Davis Jerritt was another client—and another matter. His horror-suspense novels were runaway bestsellers, and the work in progress featured a psychotic stalker. A former actor, Dave liked to get into character when he was writing, and Molly had been selected to play the stalkee.

“Tell him I’m dead,” she said.

“Davis or God?” Joanie quipped.

Molly sighed again. “Look—I can’t explain right now, but there are some things I have to handle, so I’m going to be out of the loop for a while.” Like, forever. She paused, searching for words, and finally settled on a partial truth, strictly as a last resort. “I think I might need a lawyer.”

Chapter 3

UNTIL HE DROVE INTO TOWN the next morning and saw the carnival setting up in the vacant lot behind the supermarket, Keegan had forgotten, first, that it was Saturday and, second, that it was the Fourth of July. Later there would be a community picnic and barbecue at the park, and when it got dark enough, the fireworks would begin.

Muttering, he reached for his cell phone and speed-dialed Shelley’s number in Flagstaff. He’d promised to call Devon the night before, so they could make plans to spend the weekend together in the Triple M, but because of the situation with Psyche and Molly Shields, he’d neglected to do it.

“Hi, Dad,” Devon said eagerly.

“Hi, babe,” Keegan replied, pulling over to the side of the road, across from Echo’s Books and Gifts and the Curl and Twirl, so he could concentrate on the conversation with his daughter. “Got your bags packed? I can be there in forty-five minutes.”

There was short, pulsing silence. Then, “Mom said you forgot me. That’s why you didn’t call.”

Keegan grasped the steering wheel tightly with his free hand. “I blew it big-time, Devon,” he replied, “and I’m sorry. But you’re my best girl, and I could never forget you. I’ll explain on the drive down here from Flag, okay?”

“Okay,” Devon answered, brightening a little.

“On my way,” Keegan said.

“I’ll be waiting,” Devon promised.

And she was. Long-legged and gangly, with blondish-brown hair reaching to the middle of her back and huge brown eyes, she sat on the steps in the portico at Shelley’s, an overnight bag and a giant pink teddy bear beside her.

Seeing Keegan pull up, she leaped to her feet and snatched up the bag and the bear to hustle toward his car.

Behind her the front door opened, and Shelley stepped out. She was a beautiful woman, and someday Devon would look just like her. A one-time flight attendant for an upscale charter jet outfit, as well as a former Playboy centerfold, Shelley had a face and body that were categorically perfect. Unfortunately, her personality wasn’t.

Shit, Keegan thought. He’d hoped to avoid his ex-wife.

Hell, he’d been trying to do that since about an hour after he married her.

He got out of the car, came around to meet Shelley while Devon stowed her gear in the backseat of the Jag, then jumped in on the passenger side up front to buckle her seat belt.