Mary Sullivan - Because of Audrey

And why wouldn’t he be shocked? How could he declare a man he loved and admired unfit, a father who’d done his absolute best for his son?

It would be like stabbing him in the back.

Et tu, Brute?

Like the worst betrayal.

Benches lined the sidewalk, and he sat on one, needing a minute to wrap his head around a difficult decision.

Declare Dad unfit.

Impossible.

What then? Was it better to have Mom learn that her husband had fathered an illegitimate child and then didn’t have the honor to admit to the affair or support the child?

But Dad wouldn’t do that.

It looked as though he had.

Gray didn’t know how much he could trust his father. He’d been hiding things. Was he hiding the truth about this? He’d seemed sincere, though. But that photo...

Circuitous thoughts boggled Gray’s mind.

Pain radiated from his hands and up through his arms. He glanced down. He’d been clenching his fists. He stretched tight fingers. His nails had left arched red welts in his palms.

He couldn’t betray Dad.

Before he would even consider deep-sixing his dad’s good standing, he needed to try a couple of things—first, attempt to buy back the land. If that didn’t work, then second, he had to go to Denver and meet with the woman. Maybe she was lying, and, in person, he’d be able to detect her lies, and the problem would be solved. He could call her bluff. He’d buy himself time to take care of issues at work without this woman’s demand.

Four hundred thousand dollars.

Did she think they were made of money? Ridiculous.

Across the street, Audrey’s tarted-up floral shop, The Last Dance, stood out like a peacock strutting on white sand. What on earth dancing had to do with flowers was beyond him.

He crossed Main and checked out the window display—a microcosm of who the woman was, quirky, boldly colorful, and even classy as Mom had suggested.

He didn’t know why the success of her creativity made him angry, but it did.

She had to sell that land to him, had to save him from betraying the father whose business decisions he might question, but whom he adored.

The sign on the front door said Closed, but he could see Audrey inside. He tested the doorknob. Unlocked. He stepped into a shop that smelled floral and felt cool.

A dog came out from behind the counter and sidled close to Gray, butting his hand with his head. Instinctively, Gray petted him, and the dog closed his eyes, leaning into the caress.

The lovely trust of this uncomplicated creature moved him, reminded him of his Bernese mountain dog, Sean, who’d died a month after the accident, compounding Gray’s already raw grief.

His chest hurt and his throat ached, locked as he was suddenly and inexplicably in that grief again. It happened too often, brought on by nothing and everything.

A movement to his right caught his eye, breaking the spell of pleasure/pain the dog brought out in him. Audrey turned from the flowers she was arranging and watched him silently. Beneath wariness, he could almost detect compassion in her eyes, but why? What was she thinking? What did she see in him?

He looked away from that knowing gaze and down at the long-haired brown-and-white beauty. “What’s his name?”

“Jerry.”

Gray thought about the dog’s name and did a double take. “Isn’t he a springer spaniel?”

“Yep.” She waited, watched, wondering whether he would get the joke. He got it all right. Jerry Springer Spaniel.

If he weren’t so pissed off at the woman, he’d laugh. Her sense of humor was every bit as quirky as her style.

“Yeah?” he asked, feeling the rare hint of a grin tug at the corners of his mouth. “Who are his parents?”

“We don’t know the father. We’ve done DNA tests, though. The results promise to be shocking. We think his mother slept around. It could get ugly.”

Audrey leaned her elbow on the counter and rested her chin on her fist. Her other hand sat on her cocked hip. She had good hips—ample and shapely. A smile tipped the corners of her lush red lips, pride in her own joke.

That tiny smile did a number on his equanimity, threatened to turn him soft, to treat her with tenderness when he couldn’t afford to. If he had any hope in hell of pulling his family out of the mess they were in, he had to hang tough.

He straightened and removed his hand from the dog’s head, denying both himself and the dog pleasure. These days, Gray was more at home with pain.

“Sell me the land.”

He’d shocked her. She stepped behind the counter, putting distance between them. “No.”

“I can move your plants to other greenhouses. At my cost.”

“Moving them at this stage would kill them. Besides, the nearest greenhouses are miles away. I don’t even know if there are any available.”

Damn. “I can research it.”

“No, I won’t risk killing my plants by disturbing them. I don’t have to. I own that land legally.”

“How much do you want for it?”

“Nothing. I’m keeping it.”

“I can give you far more than the plants you’re growing are worth.”

“No.”

His jaw, where all his tension centered, cramped. “What’s your problem? They’re only flowers.”

“What’s your problem?” she countered. “Is money all you think about?”

“These days? Yes.”

“Money is not all that matters in life,” she asserted.

It is if it saves my mother, my family, our business and all its employees. He would never say this to her or to anyone else in town. He would never show vulnerability to an opponent or give her ammunition to use against him.

As far as the business went, only Gray and his accountant knew how close to the edge they were. As far as Gray knew, he was the only one who’d received the letter. That could change, though, if the woman didn’t get what she wanted. I’ll go to the newspapers.

The thought of the tawdry truth splashed across newspaper headlines, the thought of his mother finding out about Dad in that way, in any way, left Gray chilled. Desperate.

He thought of how Mom had looked this morning, fragile yet perky, about as classy a woman as he’d ever known.

How could he let this destroy her?

How could he get Audrey to sell? Now? Today?

“Name your price,” he demanded, an incredibly stupid move for a smart businessman, but he needed that land.

“I don’t have one.”

“Everyone does. What’s yours?”

“Gray, leave my shop.”

“No. Not until you promise to sell to me.”

A frown formed between her dark arched eyebrows, and she edged her hand toward the telephone. “Seriously, Gray, go now or I’ll call the police.”

“No.” He couldn’t, not until she agreed.

She reached under the counter for...what?...a gun? For mace?

He was frightening her. He might be mad to get the land, and she might be the strangest woman he’d ever met, but scaring her was unconscionable. Intimidation to get her to sell? Yes. Outright frightening her? Dead wrong.

He backed away.

“Think about it,” he said, the slightest thread of recklessness seeping into his voice. As a businessman, he was making mistakes left, right and center.

She shook her head, and there was such implacability, such conviction in the movement he knew she would never sell, no matter how high his price.

When he turned and left, desperation wrapped around his throat like a noose. He was going to have to do the unthinkable and have Dad declared unfit.

No. Before he did that, he would drive into Denver and see this woman for himself.

He couldn’t wait—for DNA results, for the woman’s next move, for another damn day. On the heels of that thought, he swore. He couldn’t leave today. He had an appointment with Dad’s accountant that couldn’t be put off.