Still, despite his eagerness to confront Robert, Daegan was leery of leaving Jon unguarded. Daegan's Boston PI, Sandy Kavenaugh, had confirmed that Neils VanHorn had left town, so Daegan had stuck around here wondering if old Neils would show his face. Was he in Hopewell or somewhere else barking up the wrong tree? That was the part that bothered Daegan. He couldn't stay here and protect Kate and square off with Robert at the same time. According to Sandy, VanHorn was a little on the shady side, but he'd never been involved in anything overtly illegal. VanHorn might try to persuade Kate that she had to give up custody, but she would stand firm and he wouldn't force the issue. Or so Daegan hoped. He was counting on Neils's integrity and that worried him.

So Daegan would cut his trip to Boston short. Once he'd dealt with Robert, he'd be back and this mess would be straightened out. Robert and the rest of the Sullivans would back off, VanHorn would return to Boston, Kate would have full never-to-be-doubted custody of her boy, and Daegan would move to Montana and never see them again.

That was the part that was the most difficult. "h.e.l.l," he muttered under his breath. The first order of the day would be the toughest, saying good-bye to Kate and Jon. He couldn't leave them without ending it once and for all. He had no choice but to turn his back on them in order to ensure that they would be safe from the Sullivans forever.

A sour taste filled the back of his mouth, and a deep rendering, a pain like none he'd ever imagined, tore at his soul. Never in his life had he wanted home and hearth-a wife and kid. No, he'd believed himself to be a loner. He had shunned the family who hadn't wanted him in the first place and become a man who needed no one-not even his own mother. Now, after meeting Kate and Jon, he doubted his deepest convictions.

He finished his coffee in one gulp and refused to dwell on everything he found fascinating about Kate-her whiskey-colored eyes, her soft little smile, or the sheen of her hair when the sun's rays set it on fire. He'd make a point of forgetting how beautiful her b.r.e.a.s.t.s were, forgetting the soft contented sighs deep in her throat when he kissed her.

Nor would he allow himself to remember how easy his relationship had become with Jon, how natural, how he looked forward to spending hours with the boy teaching him everything from shoeing a horse to shoring up a sagging fence post. "Idiot," he muttered as he kicked back his chair and tossed the remains of his coffee into the stained sink.

Snow piled against the windows, and the lack of insulation was evident in the drafty kitchen. It was amazing old Eli had lasted as long as he had living in these conditions.

Turning his collar against the wind, Daegan dashed through the drifts to his pickup and hoped that he could catch Jon before the boy took off for school. It was best to get this over with. Now or never. He was going to say good-bye to a son who would never know him.

Chapter 21.

The images came on so quickly, biting into Jon's consciousness as he worked the bar of soap into a lather in the shower.

Soaping up one arm, he felt an odd tenderness around his wrist, and suddenly both forearms were bruised and raw, encased in unforgiving steel bands.

Handcuffs.

The soap dropped to the shower floor as he held his arms up to the warm spray and studied his skin. Nope, normal. All a trick of his mind, which was the last thing he needed this morning, his first day back at school.

He reached for the shampoo bottle and leaned against the shower wall, trying to relax as hot beads of water pelted his skin. How could his mother think it would be good for him to get back to school? Despite his protests, she and McPherson had cooked up this morning's plan, clueless to the dangers that awaited him there. Maybe the halls were safe for a normal kid, but he was no normal kid. Hard to believe that after all this time, his mom still didn't get it.

His fingers raked through his hair, sc.r.a.ping lather over his scalp. A glob of foam ran down over one eye. When he quickly swiped it away and opened his eyes, he was staring out through bars-some sort of metallic cage. Staring out through dark gla.s.s windows as a blur of landscape raced past the speeding vehicle that propelled him forward against his will.

What the h.e.l.l...? Panic surged through him as he flattened his palms against one window and banged in desperation. He had to get out! Why couldn't anyone see him, hear his cries? His hands coiled into fists that pounded the gla.s.s in desperation.

And just as suddenly, the dark window beneath his hands became the white fibergla.s.s wall of the shower stall. The roar of the vehicle's engine was now the sizzle of the water as it sprayed over him.

It was all in his head. Another freakin' vision.

Quickly, he rinsed himself and cut the shower off. His heart was still pounding as he threw the curtain aside and stepped out into billowing clouds of steam. What the h.e.l.l did it all mean, handcuffs and a cage inside a car? Was Todd planning some kind of kinky torture for him now?

He toweled off, trying to shake off the weird vision. When he wiped the layer of moisture from the mirror over the sink, he was surprised by his own reflection: the curve of the muscles in his arms and shoulders. Biceps. Working out with Daegan was beginning to pay off. Another few weeks and he'd actually be buff.

If, of course, Daegan was going to stay another few weeks, which he wasn't. Wrapping a towel around his waist, Jon decided he shouldn't let his new pumped-up body go to waste. Sign-ups for track were going on at school, and Jon knew he was a fast runner. He would sign up today, but Mom didn't have to know until after the tryouts. The last thing he needed was her pushing him to get out there and make some friends. Yeah, right.

He pulled on jeans, a T-shirt, and a flannel shirt, then hearing his mother downstairs in the kitchen, crept into her bedroom. The top drawer of her dresser was where she kept loose change, old bills, photographs, and family doc.u.ments. Somewhere in these stacks of folders and envelopes was his birth certificate, which he'd need to sign up for the track team. Reaching into the drawer, he sifted through papers, thumbing the corner of files marked: BILLS BILLS, TAXES TAXES, and MEDICAL MEDICAL.

His birth certificate was in a folder on the bottom, its embossed seal from the Commonwealth of Ma.s.sachusetts catching his eye as he slid it out. Did his mom ever wish she'd stayed in Boston? He wondered about it sometimes, but always figured she'd needed to get away from the memory of his dad.

The crystal paperweight on the dresser glimmered in the dim lamplight as he slid the drawer closed. Mom had always loved this thing, a gla.s.s porcupine. He picked it up in one palm and immediately felt seared by the energy encapsulated in the gla.s.s.

A name flashed before him: Tyrell Clark.

He wasn't familiar with the name, but it had popped quickly into his mind along with a vision of a dark-haired man in a fancy suit. Tall, dark, handsome, and a little cheesy. Jon didn't know who the man was, but he sensed his mother's strong disdain for him.

And his mom...she was so much younger, like a college kid, her brown eyes outlined in makeup.

"I'm offering you a son," Tyrell says as he tosses the gla.s.s paperweight into the air and catches it. "No strings attached." Tyrell says as he tosses the gla.s.s paperweight into the air and catches it. "No strings attached."

He can feel his mother's shock and fear. "You-you want me to adopt him?" "You-you want me to adopt him?"

Adoption...

Stunned, Jon fell back onto her bed and let the crystal paperweight drop from his hands to the thick comforter. Adoption? It couldn't be true. His father was Jim Summers, the man who was killed when he was...

He stared at the birth certificate in his hand, the sharp pain in his gut telling him to put the facts together. It was true. Undeniable. Hadn't he always wondered why he didn't resemble his mother? He was adopted, and she'd been lying to him all along...all his life.

Fifteen years old, and so far, his entire life was a lie.

Kate hung up the phone, but the sound of Don McPherson's voice rang in her head. True, he was giving Jon another chance but there had been a hint of doubt in his words. She knew that deep down the vice princ.i.p.al was hoping that Jon would transfer to a different school and become one less problem for Don McPherson.

"Jon," she called up the stairs. "Hurry up. The bus'll be here in less than ten minutes."

"I know," he said and thundered down the stairs, his hair still wet, his expression unforgiving. He blamed her for forcing him to go back to school.

She had his breakfast, toaster waffles and orange juice, on the counter. He ignored the food and snagged his backpack and jacket from pegs mounted near the back door.

"I'll be home late," he said, reaching for the doork.n.o.b.

"Late? Why?"

He stared at her and his expression didn't soften. "Group project." It was a lie and they both knew it.

"Can't you do it here?"

"No, Ma, we can't." He opened the door and she reached forward, not wanting him to leave with such bad feelings-hoping to mend fences.

"If you want, I could drive you," she offered, but he just stared at her hand, touching his bare arm, and he swallowed hard. Drawing away from her, he took a step back. "Jesus."

"Jon?"

Running his tongue around his teeth, he shook his head. "No," he whispered, his voice strange and unfamiliar. "I-I don't believe it."

"What?"

"You...you've lied to me."

"About what?" she asked, but his eyes, wide and serious, glared at her, and he swallowed as if there wasn't a drop of spit in his mouth.

"Who's Tyrell Clark?"

"Oh, G.o.d." Her knees nearly buckled. Somehow he'd broken through and seen her thoughts.

"Who is he?" Jon demanded, his voice rough, his expression still as death.

"A man-he's dead now," she admitted, her throat barely working, her insides trembling. Why hadn't she told him before? Why did she let it go so long so that he had to find out this way?

"You're not my real mother," he accused her, backing away from her as if being in the same room was against everything in which he believed. "Oh, G.o.d, you're not my mother!"

"Of course I am."

"But I'm adopted!" he accused her. "Adopted!"

There it was, hanging in the air between them. The lie. The one they'd lived with for fifteen years. "Yes," she admitted, her voice catching. There was no reason to keep up pretenses any longer. All the lies she'd so carefully constructed over the years were falling around her feet in ruin and dust. "I-I adopted you. Soon after Jim and Erin died," she said, her voice empty. "And I wouldn't have loved you any more if I'd carried you in my body and-"

"Don't!" he said, nearly frantic, his hands on either side of his head. "This Tyrell guy-was he my father?"

"No-I don't think so."

"This is so weird," he said, eyes blazing with accusations. "Were you ever going to tell me?"

"Of course."

"When?"

"When the time was right," she said, trying to stay calm though her heart was thundering and her throat was tight.

"And when was that going to be?"

Tell the truth, Kate. Don't back down now. No matter how much it hurts. "I don't know. I-I wanted to, but you were too young to understand, and then, once you were older, I was afraid." "I don't know. I-I wanted to, but you were too young to understand, and then, once you were older, I was afraid."

"Of what?"

"That I'd lose you," she admitted.

"I can't believe this." He looked at her as if she were the embodiment of evil, as if everything she'd ever taught him wasn't to be trusted, as if his entire life was a lie.

"Jon-" She reached forward, but he stepped away, as if afraid to let her touch him again. "I think we should talk this out."

"No way! I don't want to talk about it. You lied to me. Daegan lied to me. Everyone lied to me."

"No! Oh, baby, no."

"Don't call me that ever again. I'm not and never will be your your baby." Angrily he shoved his arms into the sleeves of his jacket. baby." Angrily he shoved his arms into the sleeves of his jacket.

"If you don't want to go to school, if you want to ask me any questions-"

"Why? So you can lie to me again?" he said, nearly tripping over Houndog as he backed to the door, and for the first time since he'd been in the fight with Todd, he seemed anxious to return to Hopewell High. His fingers scrabbled for the k.n.o.b.

"We'll talk about this tonight, when you get home. I'll explain everything."

"You bet you will," he said, his lips white with fury.

"Jon, trust me-"

He made a sound of disgust deep in his throat. "I think it's only fair that I know who I really am."

"You're my son," she called after him, but he was already off the porch and running through the blanket of snow, his head ducked against the wind. "You always will be." But her words bounced off the walls of the little house and echoed around her, mocking her-calling her every kind of fool, letting her know that she'd lost her boy forever.

"d.a.m.n it," she muttered, fighting tears, her fists curled into b.a.l.l.s of frustration. She couldn't lose him! No way. No how. Jon was her son and he was only fifteen, not old enough to make any life-altering decisions. He might be hurt or angry, but he was still her boy and she'd fight tooth and nail to prove it.

She was still trying to pull herself together when she heard the rumble of a truck's engine, and her heart, in eager antic.i.p.ation, kicked into high gear. Houndog began barking, and through the window she saw Daegan's ugly green pickup and the cowboy himself, stretching out of the cab. Her breath caught somewhere deep in her lungs at the sight of him, tall and lean, his features as rough-hewn as the mountains to the west. A stranger and yet intimate, a man she didn't dare trust but to whom she'd already carelessly given her heart. Before his boots stopped ringing on the steps of the porch, she flung open the door.

"Hi, I-Something's wrong," he guessed, his eyes narrowing on her face. "Jon?"

"He's...he's fine, I think," she said, drawing on some inner reserve of strength she didn't know she had. "Or he will be."

"Neider used him for a punching bag?"

"That's part of the problem." How much did she dare tell him? He was leaving soon anyway; what could he possibly care about her or her son? Yet the glint of anger in his eyes convinced her that in his own way he was concerned.

"What's the other part?"

"It's personal."

He waited, kicking the door closed with his foot.

"I don't suppose it matters anymore," she allowed. Now that Jon knew the truth, there was no reason to protect him any longer. "Jon and I got into an argument this morning," she admitted, watching Daegan's reaction. "And...and he found out that he's adopted."

A jolt, like a ragged bolt of lightning, pa.s.sed behind Daegan's eyes. "I thought-"

Waving away his arguments, she said, "I told everyone he was mine, including Jon, and there just never seemed the right moment to explain that he was adopted." Tears burned behind her eyes but she wouldn't give in to them. "It doesn't matter to me that someone else gave him life. I love him as much as if I'd carried him for nine months. Oh, I don't know why I'm telling you all this. Jon will come home after school, we'll hash this out and then, I suppose, if he wants to, I'll help him try to locate his birth parents."

"Who are?" he prodded, an edge to his voice.

"I don't know." How much should she confide? How much could she? She let out a sigh. "But you didn't come here to listen to me go on and on." Her heart tugged as she met his gaze. "I thought you were leaving."

"Tonight."

Oh, G.o.d. Her world was crumbling apart. "So soon?" Her world was crumbling apart. "So soon?"

"I'll be back to move the animals, but I've got some business I've got to take care of and it won't wait."