Laura Marie - The SEAL's Stolen Child

Hands clasped, she said, “Daddy’s lawyer will be here soon. I find it easier to think out here than in my father’s office.”

“Agreed. Last time I was in there wasn’t good.”

“What did he say?”

Her question and overall fragility threw him off guard. How many times had he rehearsed what he’d do should their paths ever cross? Yet now, all of that escaped him. Her complexion pale, body rail thin, his sole thought was to wonder when she’d last had a decent meal.

Garrett cleared his throat. “Hal told me our baby died and that you’d chosen to complete your basic education in a Connecticut finishing school. Had Google been what it is now, I probably could’ve found you, but…” He shrugged. “Water under the bridge.”

She stared past him, deep into her own world. “I was so devastated over losing the baby, I just did what I was told. To go from feeling life growing inside you, to grueling hours of lonesome labor, only to come out on the other side with my arms empty, I…”

“For what it’s worth, I hurt, too. I used to have nightmares you’d died. I spent so much time moping my folks took me to a shrink. I know you loved your father, but I’ve gotta tell you, the man meant nothing but trouble to me.”

“Good. You’re both here.” Barry Stevens had been Hal’s personal attorney, friend and Coral Ridge bigwig for decades. Every edition of the Coral Ridge Gazette carried an ad for the guy’s law firm featuring the Scales of Justice, along with Barry’s meticulous swoop of white hair and supersize smile. Though they’d never formally met, the lawyer extended his hand and worked his trademark smile as if they were long-lost friends. “Garrett, good to see you. Each and every one of us here in town is darned proud of all you’ve accomplished.”

“Thank you, sir.” Garrett would’ve preferred a more flippant retort but, for Eve’s sake, kept his sarcasm to himself. If he’d been president, it wouldn’t have been good enough for Garrett to be with Hal’s little girl.

“Okay.” Barry set a few files on the table before taking his seat. “Eve has filled me in on her father’s deathbed confession and in doing so, I believe, given me just cause to break attorney-client privilege.”

“Wait…” The comprehension of this suit’s admission hit Garrett harder than any stray bullet. So it was true? He actually had a son? Mind spinning, chest tight, he found it hard to breathe. During the endless night, he’d convinced himself the whole thing was a cruel joke. That in the morning, Hal would pop out of bed with his pompous barrel laugh, bragging about how he’d gotten them good. “You knew about this from day one, yet did nothing to stop it?”

“Slow down there, partner.” Barry tidied his files. “My hands were tied.”

Eve started to cry.

“The only thing Hal told me—and this was only after a couple glasses of Macallan Scotch—was that your son hadn’t died. I pressed him for more, told him you both had a right to know, but he admitted neither of you had even wanted the baby, so this resolution was best. Absolved you both from any guilt, so you’d feel free to get on with your lives.”

Barry reached out to comfort Eve, but she pushed him away. “Don’t touch me.”

The lawyer held up his hands. “I’m sorry. I advised Hal he’d handled the whole situation poorly, but he was insistent no one ever know.”

“Where is our son now?” Garrett pressed clenched fists to his knees. There was so much he wanted—needed—to say, but what would going off on this guy solve?

“God’s honest truth?” Barry’s expression was sober. “I don’t have a clue.”

* * *

“HOW COULD HE DO THIS to me—us?” Seated in her father’s oversize leather desk chair, Eve felt lost. Barry and his crew had long since left and she’d learned Hal had preplanned his funeral down to which hymns he wanted sung and what he wanted to wear. She’d known her father liked to be in charge, but one more revelation about just how controlling he truly had been might send her over the edge.

Garrett glanced up from the file he sifted through. “Wish there was something I could say or do. Pretty much from day one, I didn’t hit it off with your old man, but I get how to you, he hung the moon. You’ve gotta feel like you’re losing him twice.”

“Yeah.” It was uncanny how even after all the years between them, Garrett still knew her thoughts. Much more time together and they’d be back to finishing each other’s sentences. “Find anything?”

He flashed her a half smile. “You own a cabin in Aspen.”

“Swell.” Covering her face with her hands, she sighed. “All this money, yet I’d trade every cent to turn back time.”

“What would you do different?” He moved on to the next folder in a cabinet filled with hundreds—none labeled.

What a loaded question.

Would she go back far enough just to claim their baby? Or further still so that they’d never shared their first joke, kiss or attempt at making love?

“More like what wouldn’t I do?” Cheeks superheated, she dived into her own file relating to the buying and selling of Exxon stock.

“You regret us ever being together?”

“I didn’t say that.” She moved on to the next file. “I just meant I’ve made a lot of mistakes.”

“One of them being me?”

“Seriously?”

He shrugged. “I wasn’t the one who for all practical purposes vanished. If you’d wanted, you could’ve found me a dozen different ways.”

“It wasn’t that easy,” she lied. So what if she had called him or written? What good would it have done?

“My point, exactly. Because from my way of thinking, if you’d have told me where you were, I’d have done anything in my power to get you back. Hell, steal a car if I’d had to. That’s how much you—” Suddenly he slapped his latest file to the finished stack and pushed himself up from the floor. “I’ve gotta get out of here. Clear my head.”

“Garrett…”

The look he shot over his shoulder was painfully cold. “What?”

“Nothing.” Coward. Tell him how your dreams had been filled with just such scenarios. Of him riding to your rescue and the two of you, with your sweet baby, all living happily ever after. “Are you coming back? We still have days’ worth of paperwork to sift through.”

“Yeah. I’m just going for a walk. Unlike you, I finish what I start.”

* * *

GARRETT KNEW HIS WORDS were a low blow. Maybe even cruel, but Eve acted as if she wasn’t even human. She might’ve shed a few polite tears over her father dying, but beyond that, she struck him as unflappable. Oh, her fragile appearance told him she possessed a full set of emotions, but she wasn’t giving them away for the mere price of asking.

He’d loved her more than his own life.

Not only had he lost his son, but her.

Such plans he’d made for the three of them. He couldn’t afford college—at least not right away, but their town had plenty of good factory jobs that would have allowed him to set them up in a starter apartment. Eve could’ve stayed home with the baby, or if she’d wanted, his mom probably would’ve watched their son to allow Eve to work at a part-time job. Sounded sappy, but while they might not have been living in a mansion, their little home would’ve been rich in love.

Gunmetal-gray sky threatened rain, and Garrett jogged back to Eve’s. The sooner they found their son the better. If there was one thing this unexpected reunion had taught him, it was that his instinct to never trust the fairer sex—with the exception of his mom—was right on target. Eve’s lack of communication hadn’t just hurt him all those years ago, but annihilated his old way of life. He’d abandoned plans for finding a job, instead opting for the navy in the hopes hard work and a little adventure might raze the girl from his head. Only after entering the SEAL BUD/S training program had he been pushed to the point that he’d been physically incapable of thinking about Eve or their son. Only then had his healing begun.