He turned fully to face her “What?”
She swiped at the stupid tears starting to fall. “He’s never going to stop. He’s never going to leave us alone. I’m not going to give him La Malinche when we find it because it won’t stop him. I realized that when he hit me. I thought it would. For so long I thought that’s all he was after, but it’s not.”
She brushed away the tears so they wouldn’t fall. “She’s with Candace. I trust her implicitly. She adores Isabel. They have a special relationship. In two weeks, I’ll wire-transfer money into an account in the Caymans. They’ll take it and go. And Declan will never know where they went.”
“You can’t do that.” Raw incredulity rushed through his words. He took a step toward her, the determination in his eyes making her tremble. “She’s my daughter too, and I’m not going to let you send her away. Not when I finally found out about her.”
He was right. But she couldn’t see a way out of it at this point. She’d been over it from every angle.
“Don’t you think this is killing me?” A tear slid down her cheek. “I’d cut off my right arm to protect her. Hell, I’d even marry Declan if I thought that would do any good, but it won’t. I don’t care what he does to me, but I won’t have him touch her. And I’ll do anything I can to keep that from happening, even send her away and never see her again.”
“You’re not sending her now. You obviously don’t want to do it.”
“Only because I need time to gather the funds.” She swiped at her cheeks again and told herself to stay strong. In a few minutes, this would all be over. Thad would be gone, and she could wallow in her misery. “And because Candace made me promise I’d give myself time to change my mind. But I’m not going to change my mind. This is the only way to keep Isabel safe. You can’t protect her. Neither can I anymore. He’s got more money than God and eyes everywhere. This is the only way.”
“Son of a bitch.” He turned back to the painting. “This is a friggin’ mess.”
A nightmare, actually. One Maren wished she’d wake up from. But she knew she wouldn’t.
“That’s all there is,” she said, lifting her arms and dropping them in her lap again. “Now you know everything.”
When he didn’t respond, only continued to stare at that stupid painting as if she weren’t even in the room, her heart cracked into a million pieces in the pit of her stomach.
She couldn’t stand to look at him anymore. She wiped her wet cheeks and pushed to her feet. “I...I need a few minutes.”
He didn’t stop her. Didn’t call her back. And as she closed the bathroom door and sank to the ground, the floodgates finally opened.
It didn’t matter what he thought of her anymore. It didn’t even matter that he no longer cared about her. All that mattered was that Isabel was safe.
Someday, maybe her heart would agree.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
A gentle breeze blew the palms in the waning Cancun light. Dusk settled across the city, bathing the stucco buildings in shades of crimson and orange. The scent of sea and salt wafted on the air.
At any other time, on any other day, Thad might have noticed the beauty in his surroundings. He might have relished the fact he was working in a tropical paradise instead of a frigid ocean or torrential downpour. But today was different, and the only thoughts racing through his mind were images he didn’t want to see—Maren’s curvy body wrapped around Declan, her bruised and battered face, and a daughter who didn’t know him and probably didn’t want to.
He rubbed a hand over his throbbing forehead as he wandered down the street, no destination in mind, no idea what the hell he was going to do.
A neon sign advertised cheap cocktails. He stopped outside the hole-in-the-wall bar and figured, why the fuck not? Pulling the door open, he was instantly enveloped by smoke and dim light. As his eyes adjusted, he focused on an empty booth in the corner.
Anonymity, solace, a drug to wipe away the misery.
He slid into the cracked plastic seat, barely glancing up when the waitress bopped over in a tropical pink sarong and coconut shell bra.
“¡Hola! What can I get ya?” She was American, her East Coast accent thick, her sarong a little too short even in Cancun.
“Tequila. Double.”
“Sure thing. You waiting for someone?”
“No.”
She shrugged, then moved back toward the bar, smacking her gum.
Thad rested his elbow on the table and rubbed his forehead. This wasn’t what he’d envisioned when he’d gone looking for Maren. Not the nightmare she’d just relayed.
Holy hell… He had a daughter. An eight-year-old girl who, until minutes before, hadn’t even existed in his mind. He was so fucking pissed he could barely see straight. They’d been together for nearly two weeks, and she hadn’t uttered a single word about Isabel.
How could he care for someone who could be so vindictive?
The waitress returned and set two glasses in front of him. “I also brought you water. You look pale. Need to hydrate in this heat.”
Like he cared. “Thanks.”
He lifted the tequila.
“I don’t need you. I wanted you. There’s a big difference.”
His words to her, the last day they’d been together on that Mexican beach years ago, ran back through his mind, and his hand froze halfway to his mouth.
A knot formed in his stomach as he watched the golden liquid swish against the side of the glass. If the roles had been reversed, if she’d said those words to him, would he have swallowed his pride and tried to contact her again? Would he have turned to her for help when things got tough? Would he have ever trusted her?
“You look like you could use a friend.” Without waiting for an answer, the waitress slid into the booth opposite him and dropped her notepad on the table. “You have an argument with the little woman?”
Dazed, Thad looked up. “What?”
She frowned. “Your girlfriend. You have a fight?”
He glanced back at the tequila, hoping she’d get the hint to leave him the hell alone. “Yeah, something like that.”
“Well, I don’t see a ring.” She flipped long brown hair over her shoulder. “Good-lookin’ guy like you shouldn’t let some girl get you down. This is Cancun, after all. Party central.” She leaned forward and flashed a smile that was pure invitation. “I know a few places we could go to take your mind off her.”
Her words barely registered. He focused on her face across the table. She was pretty enough. Big brown eyes, small nose. Freckles. And he had zero interest. The only woman he wanted…the one who would forever be lodged in his heart regardless of how much he hated her right now…wasn’t in this run-down bar. And a solution wasn’t going to be found in the bottom of this glass.
He had no idea what would happen between them, but he sure as hell wasn’t going to let Maren take away the daughter he’d just discovered. And he wasn’t running again.
He set the drink down with a crack, pushed out of the booth, and tossed bills on the table. “Thanks, but I gotta go.”
“Wait!” the waitress called after him as he headed for the door. “You didn’t even taste your tequila!”
The phone on Evan Declan’s desk shrilled, cutting through the peaceful afternoon silence. Glancing up from the research he’d been entrenched in, he narrowed his eyes. Only a handful of prime contacts had his private yacht number. Few had reason to use it.
He reached for the phone. “Declan.”
“You’re playing with fire on this one, buddy.”
A wry smile slid across his mouth at the irritation in his caller’s voice. “I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about, Drummer.”
“Yeah, you do,” Drummer said. “Maren shot out of here like a cannon blast the other day. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out where she went.”
Evan glanced at the manicure he’d had done only an hour ago. “I’ll admit she was here, but now she’s not. Has she not ret
urned to the dig yet?”
“We agreed I would keep an eye on her,” Drummer said in a clipped tone. “She’s nervous, but she’s doing the work, and she’s keeping her distance from members of the group, which leads me to believe she’s still on the straight and narrow with us. You go pushing her, though, and there’s no telling what she’ll do.”
Anger simmered under Evan’s skin. No one told him what to do. “Are you threatening me, Drummer? You and I both know we want the same thing. I’m just helping the process along, lighting a fire under Dr. Hudson so she’ll get busy.”
“Be careful how you go about it. We found the cargo hold today, but we need Maren’s research skills if we want to find our lady. We’re close. You don’t want anything to get in the way of that now, do you?”
Evan fought back the desire to show Drummer just how far reaching his power ran. One phone call would shut the man up. “I know how to handle Maren Hudson, don’t worry, Drummer. You just leave her to me. You keep the elder Hudson and that rat Leighton in line. That’s your job now on this endeavor. You’re getting paid a fortune to do so.”
“I haven’t forgotten. I’ll do my part.”
“Good.” The tension drifted from Declan’s shoulders. “I’ll be looking forward to your next call. If Maren doesn’t return to the dig in two days’ time, you know what to do.”
He replaced the receiver before Drummer could respond. Nate Drummer was an idiot if he thought he could threaten him.
He swiveled his chair and looked out across the water through the vast array of windows in his onboard office. Rising quickly, he walked out into the main salon, his eyes immediately drawn to the glass cabinet and the golden cross resting on a velvet drape of fabric. He opened the case and carefully removed the artifact from its home. The weight of the cross caused his fingers to tingle and sent a shiver of power through his limbs, straight to his heart.
No one could deny him his birthright. He could feel the power radiating from it, drawing him toward La Malinche. And Maren Hudson was as instrumental in his quest as was Marina’s cross. He’d been patient with her over the past few years, but his patience was draining.
Drawing in a deep breath that calmed him, he slowly set the cross back in the case, then closed and locked the door.
Within a matter of days, he’d have both things he wanted most. The statue, his ultimate birthright, and the woman, his essential possession. Five hundred years of destiny were finally converging, and he was the key.
The sound of sheets rustling tore Thad from the discombobulated thoughts running through his mind. He turned from the dark windows he’d been staring out and looked toward the bed in the middle of the room.
Maren rolled and squinted through the darkness, then froze when she focused on him.
Whatever she was thinking, she checked before he could see it. Slowly, she pushed herself up and winced as she eased back against the pillows. “I thought you’d left. How did you get in?”
“I took your key card.”
She frowned. “I guess I deserve that.”
Hands tucked in the front pockets of his jeans, he stopped at the end of the bed and took a closer look at her. Her face was drawn and somber, her eyes slightly puffy from crying.
He gestured toward her shoulder. “Does that hurt?”
“It’s okay.”
“Do you have pain pills for it?”
“Yeah, I took some earlier.”
He nodded, and an uncomfortable silence settled between them, one he wasn’t sure how to fill. “How many stitches?”
“Fourteen.”
He grimaced, and she pushed her hair behind her ears. “Don’t look at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like that.” Her eyes slid closed. “With disappointment and…revulsion.”
“You think that’s what I see when I look at you?”
“It’s what I see. I know it’s what you see. Just go, Thad,” she whispered.
“No,” he said quietly. “I’m not going to.”
Her eyes shot open, and he caught a glimpse of the feisty girl he’d fallen for so long ago. “Didn’t you hear anything I told you before? I don’t need you here tormenting me. I feel bad enough as it is.”
A mixture of fury and utter helplessness whipped through him, and he threw his arms out to the sides. “What do you want from me, Maren? Do you want me to be pissed you kept my daughter from me? Well, I am. Do you want me to be repulsed you slept with Declan? I’m that too. I’ve been standing here, staring out at the city, thinking about the ten thousand ways I’d like to murder the bastard for what he’s done to us. And every time I think about his hands on you…” He closed his eyes and willed back the rage. “I want to plow my fist through the wall.”
She didn’t say anything, and in the silence, he dropped his hands on a wave of defeat. “I wish to God I could hate you for all this, but I can’t. I can’t, because in some sick way, it makes sense to me. I know you did what you thought you had to. And I know if I’d handled things differently years ago, you wouldn’t have been in this position to begin with. I’d give anything to change it, but I can’t.”
He drew in a breath. “Maren, the day Colin died—”
“Thad, don’t.” Her voice hitched.
“No.” Even if it killed him, he was going to get it out. “You had your turn. It’s mine now. That last day, when Patrick told us he was stepping up the dives, I wasn’t focused. He’d hired me to lead the dives, but all I could think about was you. I was young and cocky and completely unsure what I wanted out of life, and there you were. Everything I’d always told myself I didn’t need. Your father was right to be wary of me. I was a player, and I was using you. But that day, I knew I was falling for you, and it scared the shit out of me.”
He looked at her hand resting against the sheet, her long, slender fingers he knew felt like heaven sliding across his skin. “When Declan’s crew came into that cavern all I could think about was making sure you were safe. My kid brother, who hadn’t wanted to even be on that dig, wasn’t even the slightest concern to me. He’d gone to Mexico because I talked him into it. He’d postponed finishing his thesis all for me, and I’d been so wrapped up in you, I didn’t even think twice about him.”
“What happened to Colin wasn’t your fault,” she said quietly.
He knew that in his head. But his heart felt differently.
He closed his eyes, remembering Colin’s dorky grin, the way his shaggy hair had always been falling in his eyes. Those stupid jokes he used to tell.
“I blamed you.” He forced himself to look at her again. Knew he didn’t deserve to hide from her. “I was so angry, and I didn’t have anyone to take it out on except you. It was wrong of me, but I didn’t know how to deal with losing him.”
She looked down at her hands and didn’t answer, not that he expected her to. But he saw the heartache in her eyes and knew she’d loved his brother too. Everyone had.
He shoved his hands back in his pockets. “I didn’t go home for the funeral. I wasn’t exactly in the best frame of mind then. I was drinking—a lot. I got dumped from the next few projects I’d lined up before the accident, but I really didn’t care. The only thing I could think about was finding Declan and settling the score.” Revenge trickled through his veins, for a moment dousing the guilt. “The bastard must have known I’d come for him, because he dropped off the radar, and I had trouble tracking him down.”
He focused on her hand and willed the rage back. “I finally did, though. Found him at his estate outside Puerto Vallarta. I don’t even think I had a plan when I went to see him. I just knew I was going to kill him.”
“Wh-what happened?” she asked, for the first time looking up.
Her eyes were so mesmerizing, so fathomless, and so concerned, for a moment he got lost in them before refocusing on the past. “I’d been tipping back the bottle pretty heavy but found him through a few of the locals. I’m pretty sure word had spread and that he was
expecting me.” He winced at the memory. “He dropped me on my ass with one blow, then had me arrested for breaking and entering. Federales picked me up and threw me in the clink. I ended up spending two and a half weeks in a Mexican cell. It’s not a place I ever want to visit again, but it was enough to make me rethink my priorities, and it showed me I was on the verge of spiraling out of control.”
She looked back down at her hands, and he couldn’t tell what she was thinking, so he went on. “They didn’t have enough to make the charges stick, and holding me was obviously a favor someone was doing for Declan. In the end, they let me go. Declan was long gone at that point, and when I stepped out into the sunlight with nobody waiting for me, I knew I needed to get my shit together. So I quit the bottle, found a crap job on a salvage boat in the north Atlantic, and when I’d worked my body to the brink, I finally went to see my parents. That’s when I found out you’d called.”
She looked toward the windows, and emotions slid across her features. A mixture of pain and regret and misery he knew so well.
“I spent three days with my folks,” he said more softly. “And then I got on a plane, flew to Seattle, and hopped a ferry across the Sound.”
Her gaze snapped to his, wide, surprised eyes that told him she’d never known. He’d guessed that much already.
“It was March then,” he went on. “I talked to your mother. She said you were on another dig somewhere in Australia and that she didn’t know when you’d be back or how to get in touch with you. I believed her.”
“I was there.” Tears filled her eyes, and she looked toward the ceiling. “Isabel would have only been a month old then.”
He nodded. He’d figured that out the last few hours too. “Your mother wasn’t happy to see me.”
“It wasn’t you,” she said, shaking her head. “My mother didn’t even know you. She never wanted me to have Isabel. She was furious when I told her I was pregnant. Told me I was making the same mistakes she’d made—falling for someone like my father who would always be more interested in the chase than the find. I think she was afraid I’d end up like her.”