Kimberly Cates - The Gazebo

“Don’t even go there, Cade.” A lifetime’s bitterness spilled through Deirdre. “She loved you. That’s why she stayed. She never loved me. At least now I know why.”

“Deirdre, you don’t know that,” Finn said. “People make mistakes. Do things they regret. You disappeared from Emma’s life for nine months, but that didn’t mean you’d stopped loving her. How do you know your mother—”

“Nice, Finn,” Deirdre said. “Real nice. Throw that up in my face.”

Tears welled in Finn’s eyes. “You’re my best friend. The sister I never had. I don’t want to hurt you, but I love you enough to tell you the truth.”

“The truth…” Deirdre echoed, Finn’s words lancing through her. “Yeah. Maybe it is time I faced the truth. My mother and I never could be anything like you. You’re so damned easy to love I could almost hate you for it. You even got three hardcases like the McDaniels to adore you. I mean, two McDaniels,” she corrected. “The Captain and…and Cade.”

Cade glowered. “Deirdre, none of this changes the fact that you’re my sister.”

“Don’t even try to tell me you felt the same way about me after you heard the truth!” Deirdre exclaimed. “You could hardly look at me after I came home from the hospital. It was like…like someone ripped all the joy right out of you. You were a stranger.”

“Dee, it was my fault you got hurt! I felt guilty as hell. Mom told me you came to the hangar because you missed me. All I did was yell at you, try to drag you off that plane. All I cared about was my damned job and the flying lessons it bought me. You almost died! And then to find out about Mom and—Hell, yes, it shook me up! But I didn’t stop loving you! I was just a kid myself, hurting, mixed up…”

“Deirdre,” Finn interrupted, desperate, “I wish you could have heard Cade when he told me how much he regretted the distance between you. It tore him apart.”

“No wonder he thought I wasn’t a fit mother for Emma,” Deirdre said. “I was the product of some sleazy affair.”

“You abandoned the kid on my goddamned doorstep without a word of explanation! I didn’t know where you were for nine months! It had nothing to do with who the hell your father is!”

“Tell yourself that, if it makes you feel better,” Deirdre said, drawing in a shuddering breath.

“Okay, you want the truth? I would have given my right arm to keep you from finding that letter. To keep you and the Captain from finding out about a piece of ancient history that could only hurt you. But when it comes right down to it, you’re still my kid sister. The Captain’s still your father. That letter doesn’t change a damn thing.”

“You’re wrong,” Deirdre said, her chin bumping up a notch. “It changes everything.”

“Don’t go off half-cocked and do something we’re all going to regret. I know you’ve got a hell of a mad on, but the truth is you’re hurt. Hurting people back isn’t going to make you feel any better.”

“Maybe not. But finding my real father might.”

“The Captain is your real father,” Cade roared in exasperation. “He’s the one who taught you how to throw a baseball, who ran all over town looking for orange pop when you were sick!”

“Yeah, well, the military trained him to fall on a grenade if necessary,” Deirdre said. “Duty, honor, country and all that crap. When it comes right down to it, we should all be relieved! None of us have to pretend to be a big happy family anymore.”

She snatched the letter. Cade swore. He grabbed for her arm.

She wheeled on him, flames all but shooting from her eyes. “Leave me the hell alone!” she roared.

“Damn it, Dee, I’m sorry. Tell me…tell me what to do. How to fix things.”

Fix things…that’s what Cade had always been good at. But all the magic in the world couldn’t erase the letter’s contents from Deirdre’s mind.

“You want to know what hurts most of all?” Deirdre said. “You lied to me, all this time. Cade, I trusted you.” Tears pushed against her lashes. She turned, fled.

She could hear Cade start after her, heard Finn’s insistent voice. “Let her go. She needs time to sort this through.”

Finn probably thought once Deirdre calmed down everything would be all right. Finn and Cade would try to put the broken pieces of the family together again. They didn’t know it would never work.

The hurt of a lifetime finally made sense. She wasn’t a McDaniel. It was time to find out exactly who she was.

She raced across the garden that separated Cade’s cabin from March Winds, slipped around to the back door to avoid the newlyweds mooning over each other in the porch swing. She rushed into the private living quarters she and Emma called home and stumbled to the small office that was her haven, a room devoid of the antiques and Victorian furbelows that gave the rest of the old house its old-world aura.

Deirdre slammed the door and leaned against it as if a wolf were chasing a few feet behind her. She sucked in a deep breath, the tears finally falling free. Disgusted with herself, she scrubbed them from her cheeks with the back of her hand. She wasn’t going to waste any time crying. She was going to do something. But what?

How was she supposed to find this Jimmy Rivermont so many years later? Considering the letter was returned to sender it was obvious her mother hadn’t been able to find the man. And at least she’d known who she was looking for.

Deirdre didn’t have a clue how to begin. How did you find someone who’d disappeared?

She closed her eyes, her memory suddenly filling with a tall man in a long outback-style coat, a black cowboy hat on his head, his steel-gray gaze dangerous, ruthless. Six years had passed since she’d opened the door to find Jake Stone on the other side—the private investigator tracking down the small fortune Finn’s ne’er-do-well father had stolen. Obliterating the inheritance Finn had believed was proof her father had loved her enough to provide her with the home he’d never given her as a child.

Stone had shattered Finn’s illusions, all but destroyed Cade and Finn’s chance at happiness, then gone, leaving ugly scars in his wake. Finn had made peace with it as best as she could, she and Cade working hard to repay every penny, but her father’s betrayal still haunted her. Deirdre could sense it when no one else was looking.

She hated Stone for what he’d done. Let him know she thought he was lower than pond scum. What else could he be, digging into people’s lives, destroying them for a fee?

She recoiled inwardly from the man, what he did for a living. The ruthlessness in his eyes. He was a son of a bitch. But he was a talented son of a bitch. If anyone could find her real father, he could.

Deirdre grabbed the phone book from its perch on her desk, leafed through it and found the entry. “Jake Stone, P.I. By appointment only…”

Ripping the page out, she grabbed her purse and keys and headed out the back door. Forget making an appointment. It had been loathing at first sight between her and Stone. Face-to-face it would be harder for him to turn her down.

Considering what he’d done to Finn, it was obvious the man was willing to do anything for the almighty dollar. She’d pay him what he wanted. She wasn’t going to take no for an answer.

DEIRDRE DID A DOUBLE TAKE as she pulled up to Stone’s office. She’d expected an anonymous-looking brick building where people could slink in to ask Stone to unravel secrets. Something from an old detective movie, not the immaculately kept Arts-and-Crafts-style bungalow, its fresh coat of café au lait paint with splashes of hunter green and deep red trim gleaming amid other, more down-at-the-heels houses nearby.