Catherine Mann - For the Sake of Their Son

Conrad clapped him on the back. “You’ll see soon enough.”

Elliot angled out of the car, hard as hell with his hands cuffed in front of him. His loafers hit the dirt road, rocks and dust shifting under his feet as he stood in the middle of nowhere in a dense forest of pines and oaks. “You’ll tell me now or I’ll beat the crap out of both of you.”

Malcolm lounged against the side of the black stretch limo. “Good luck trying with your hands cuffed. Keep talking like that and we’ll hang on to the key for a good long while.”

“Ha—funny—not.” Elliot ground his teeth in frustration. “Isn’t it supposed to be the groom who gets pranked?”

Conrad grinned. “Oh, don’t worry. Rowan should be waking up and finding his new tattoo right about now.”

Extending his cuffed wrists, Elliot asked, “And the reason for this? I’m not the one getting married.”

Ever.

Malcolm pushed away, jerking his head to the side, gesturing toward the path leading into the dense cluster of more pine trees with an occasional magnolia reaching for the sun. “Instead of telling you why, we’ll just let you look. Walk with us.”

As if he had any choice. His friends clearly had some kind of game planned and they intended to see it through regardless. Sure, he’d been in a bear of a mood since his breakup with Gianna. Hell, even before that. Since Lucy Ann had quit her job as his assistant and walked out of his life for good.

God, he really needed to pour out some frustration behind the wheel, full out, racing to...anywhere.

A few steps deeper into the woods, his blood hummed with recognition. The land was more mature than the last time he’d been here, but he knew the area well enough. Home. Or rather it used to be home, back when he was a poor kid with a drunken father. This small South Carolina farm town outside of Columbia had been called God’s land.

Elliot considered it a corner of hell.

Although hell was brimming with sunshine today.

He stepped toward a clearing and onto a familiar dirt driveway, with a ranch-style cabin and a fat oak at least a hundred years old in the middle. A tree he’d played under as a kid, wishing he could stay here forever because this little haven in hell was a lot safer than his home.

He’d hidden with Lucy Ann Joyner here at her aunt’s farmhouse. Both of them enjoying the sanctuary of this place, even if only for a few hours. Why were his buds taking him down this memory lane detour?

Branches rustled, a creaking sound carrying on the breeze, drawing his gaze. A swing dangled from a thick branch, moving back and forth as a woman swayed, her back to them. He stopped cold. Suddenly the meaning of this journey was crystal clear. His friends were forcing a confrontation eleven months in the making since he and Lucy Ann were both too stubborn to take the first step.

Did she know he was coming? He swallowed hard at the notion that maybe she wanted him here after all. That her decision to slice him out of her life had changed. But if she had, then why not just drive up to the house?

He wasn’t sure the past year could be that easily forgotten, but his gut twisted tight over just the thought of talking to her again.

His eyes soaked in the sight of her, taking her in like parched earth with water. He stared at the slim feminine back, the light brown hair swishing just past her shoulders. Damn, but it had been a long eleven months without her. His lifelong pal had bolted after one reckless— incredible—night that had ruined their friendship forever.

He’d given her space and still hadn’t heard from her. In the span of a day, the one person he’d trusted above everyone else had cut him off. He’d never let anyone get that close to him—not even his friends from the military reform school. He and Lucy Ann had a history, a shared link that went beyond a regular friendship.

Or so he’d thought.

As if drawn by a magnet, he walked closer to the swing, to the woman. His hands still linked in front of him, he moved silently, watching her. The bared lines of her throat evoked memories of her jasmine scent. The way her dress slipped ever so slightly off one shoulder reminded him of years past when she’d worn hand-me-downs from neighbors.

The rope tugged at the branch as she toe-tapped, back and forth. A gust of wind turned the swing spinning to face him.

His feet stumbled to a halt.

Yes, it was Lucy Ann, but not just her. Lucy Ann stared back at him with wide eyes, shocked eyes. She’d clearly been kept every bit as much in the dark as he had. Before he could finish processing his disappointment that she hadn’t helped arrange this, his eyes took in the biggest shocker of all.

Lucy Ann’s arms were curved around an infant swaddled in a blue plaid blanket as she breast-fed him.

* * *

Lucy Ann clutched her baby boy to her chest and stared in shock at Elliot Starc, her childhood friend, her former boss. Her onetime lover.

The father of her child.

She’d scripted the moment she would tell him about their son a million times in her mind, but never had it played out like this, with him showing up out of the blue. Handcuffed? Clearly, he hadn’t planned on coming to see her. She’d tempted fate in waiting so long to tell him, then he’d pulled one of his disappearing acts and she couldn’t find him.

Now there was no avoiding him.

Part of her ached to run to Elliot and trust in the friendship they’d once shared, a friendship built here, in the wooded farmland outside Columbia, South Carolina. But another part of her—the part that saw his two friends lurking and the handcuffs on her old pal—told her all she needed to know. Elliot hadn’t suddenly seen the light and come running to apologize for being a first-class jerk. He’d been dragged kicking and screaming.

Well, screw him. She had her pride, too.

Only the baby in her arms kept her from bolting altogether into her aunt’s cabin up the hill. Lucy Ann eased Eli from her breast and adjusted her clothes in place. Shifting her son to her shoulder, she patted his back, her eyes staying locked on Elliot, trying to gauge his mood.

The way his eyes narrowed told her loud and clear that she couldn’t delay her explanation any longer. She should have told him about Eli sooner. In the early days of her pregnancy, she’d tried and chickened out. Then she’d gotten angry over his speedy rebound engagement to the goddess Gianna, and that made it easier to keep her distance a while longer. She wouldn’t be the cause of breaking up his engagement—rat bastard. She would tell him once he was married and wouldn’t feel obligated to offer her anything. Even though the thought of him marrying that too-perfect bombshell heiress made her vaguely nauseous.

Now, Elliot was here, so damn tall and muscular, his sandy brown hair closely shorn. His shoulders filled out the black button-down shirt, his jeans slung low on his hips. His five o’clock shadow and narrowed green eyes gave him a bad-boy air he’d worked his whole life to live up to.

She knew every inch of him, down to a scar on his elbow he’d told everyone he got from falling off his bike but he’d really gotten from the buckle on his father’s belt during a beating. They shared so much history, and now they shared a child.

Standing, she pulled her gaze from him and focused on his old boarding school friends behind him, brooding Conrad Hughes and charmer Malcolm Douglas. Of course they’d dragged him here. These days both of them had sunk so deep into a pool of marital bliss, they seemed to think everyone else wanted to plunge in headfirst. No doubt they’d brought Elliot here with just that in mind.

Not a freakin’ chance.

She wasn’t even interested in dipping her toes into those waters and certainly not with Elliot, the biggest playboy in the free world.