Margaret Way - Dreaming Of You - Bachelor Dad on Her Doorstep / Outback Bachelor / The Hometown Hero Returns

He ground his teeth together. ‘Thank you.’

‘It was nothing.’

She tried to shrug his words off, but her eyes were wide and blue. It wasn’t nothing and they both knew it.

He unclenched his jaw. ‘Do you have any idea why Mel didn’t want to confide in me?’

Jaz hesitated again. ‘I…’

She did! She knew more about what was going through his daughter’s head than he did.

She eyed him warily. ‘Will you promise not to shout any more?’

Did she think he’d lash out at her in his anger? He recalled the way he’d stormed in here, and dragged a hand down his face. ‘I’ll do my best,’ he ground out.

‘It seems that because you’re working so hard, your mother is concerned about your…welfare.’

He frowned. ‘I don’t get what you’re driving at.’

She moistened her lips. He tried to ignore their shine, their fullness…and the hunger that suddenly seized him.

‘It seems your mother has been lecturing Melly not to bother you with her troubles when you’re so obviously busy with work.’

He gaped at her. No! He snapped his jaw shut. ‘You never did like my mother, did you?’

‘No, Connor, that’s not true, but she never liked me. And in hindsight I can’t really blame her. She could hardly have been thrilled that the rebellious Goth girl was going out with her son now, could she?’

His mother had always been…overprotective.

‘Look, I’m not making this up.’

He didn’t want to believe her…but he did.

She grimaced. ‘And, for what it’s worth, I think your mother is well-intentioned. She is your mother, after all. It’s natural for her to have your best interests at heart.’

‘She should have Mel’s best interests at heart.’ He collapsed onto one of the leatherette cubes. Mel needed a woman in her life, but the two he’d chosen had let her down badly.

And so she’d latched onto Jaz?

What a mess.

This wasn’t his mother’s fault. It wasn’t even Mrs Benedict’s fault, though he’d still have some choice words for her when he saw her tomorrow. This was his fault. He hadn’t wanted to acknowledge it before and he didn’t want to acknowledge it now, but Mel needed a younger woman in her life. Not two women who were at least fifty years older than her.

But Jaz?

‘Don’t look like that,’ Jaz chided. ‘This isn’t the end of the world. So you knock off from here in time to collect Melly from school for the rest of the week. That’s no big deal.’

‘It’ll put work on the flat back by a day.’

She shrugged again. ‘Like I said—no big deal.’

‘She didn’t confide in me!’ The words burst from him, but he couldn’t hold them back. Mel had refused to confide in him, but she’d confided in Jaz?

Jaz!

‘So you work on winning back her trust. On Saturday you take her out on the skyway. Tell her she looks so pretty you’re going to call her Princess Melly for the day and that her every wish is your command.’

He stared at her and he couldn’t help it—a grin built up inside him at the image she’d planted in his mind…and at how alive her face had become as she described it. Who called Jaz Princess Jaz? Who tried to make her dreams come true?

He wondered if she’d like to come out on the skyway with him and Mel on Saturday? He wondered if—

Whoa! He pulled back. No way. He was grateful for the insights she’d given him, but not that grateful. Mel might need a younger woman in her life, but Jaz Harper wasn’t that woman.

Jaz’s smile faltered. ‘You want me to butt out now, don’t you?’

‘Yes.’ There was no sense in trying to soften his intentions.

‘I see.’

He felt like a heel. He didn’t want to hurt her feelings, but he would not—could not—let her hurt Mel. He hardened his heart. ‘I don’t want you involved in my daughter’s life.’

‘Good!’ Her eyes flashed. ‘Because I don’t want to be involved in any part of your life either.’

He didn’t want what had happened to Frieda happening to Jaz either, though. The thought had him breaking out in a cold sweat. ‘I didn’t mean that to sound as rotten as it did. It’s just…you tell me you’re only here for twelve months.’

She folded her arms. ‘That’s right.’

He swore he glimpsed tears in her eyes. ‘Bloody hell, Jaz. If you’re only here for twelve months, I don’t want Mel getting attached to you. She’ll only be hurt when you leave. She won’t understand.’

‘I hear you, all right!’

Yep, definitely tears. ‘Look, I didn’t understand when you left eight years ago and I was eighteen. What hope does a seven-year-old have?’

Her jaw dropped and that old anger, the old pain, reared up through him. ‘Hell, Jaz! You left and you didn’t even tell me why!’

She’d hurt him. Eight years ago, she’d hurt him. She could tell by his pallor, in the way his eyes glittered. In the way the tiredness had invaded the skin around his mouth.

But he’d married Faye so quickly that she’d thought…

She gulped. ‘Darn it all, Connor, I was only going to be gone for three months.’

‘Three months!’ His jaw went slack. His Adam’s apple worked. ‘Three months?’ he repeated before he tensed up again. ‘Where the hell did you go? And why didn’t you tell me?’

His pain wrapped around her with tentacles that tried to squeeze the air out of her body. She had to drag in a breath before she could speak. ‘You have to understand, I was seriously cut up that you thought I could ever cheat on you.’

He hadn’t given her a chance to explain at the time. He’d hurled his accusations with all the ferocity of a cornered, injured animal—even then she’d known it was his shock and pain talking, the unexpectedness of finding her at the Hancocks’ house, because she had lied about that.

‘Stop playing games, Jaz.’ He spoke quietly. ‘I know you were cheating on me with Sam Hancock.’

A spurt of anger rippled through her, followed closely by grim satisfaction. She wanted—no, needed —him to keep his distance. If he thought she was the kind of woman who’d cheat on him and still lie about it eight years later, he’d definitely keep his distance.

She was not travelling to hell again with Connor Reed. It had taken too long to get over the last time. He hadn’t trusted her then and he didn’t trust her now. He’d jumped to conclusions back then and, on this evening’s evidence, he still jumped to conclusions now. So much for older and wiser!

‘Does it even matter now?’ she managed in as frigid a tone as she could muster.

‘Not in the slightest. I understand why people cheat. That’s not the issue.’

She didn’t bother calling him a liar. There didn’t seem to be any point. Perhaps it didn’t make an ounce of difference to him now anyway.

‘What I don’t understand is why people run.’ He stabbed a finger at her. ‘What I don’t get is why you left the way you did.’

The flesh on her arms grew cold. If Faye had deserted him too without an explanation…

Was an overdue explanation better than no explanation at all? One glance into his face told her the answer. She pulled in a breath and did what she could to ignore the sudden tiredness that made her limbs heavy. ‘Let’s just take it as a given that I was in a right state by the time I got home that night, okay?’ It made her sick to the stomach just remembering it.

‘Fine.’ The word emerged clipped and short.

‘My mother calmed me down.’ Eventually. ‘And, bit by bit, got the story out of me.’

‘And?’ he said when she stopped.

‘Did you know that my mother didn’t approve of our relationship?’

He blinked and she laughed. Not a mirthful laugh. Definitely not a joyful one. ‘I know—funny, isn’t it? The rest of the town thought it was me—the rebel Goth girl—leading clean-cut Connor Reed astray.’