“You’re shot for the day. Anyway, I don’t care what was on your agenda, we’re going to have a chat. Now, sit down.”
She dropped down onto the sofa, covering her face with her hands, capitulating more from emotional distress than blind obedience.
“Can I get you something to drink?”
She shook her head. Dillon drew up a metal folding chair, placed it only inches beyond her knees and straddled it backward, propping his arms on the back of it. “Okay, let’s have it.”
“Have what?”
“Jesus,” he swore irritably. “Are we going to play more guessing games?”
“This is your game, not mine. I want to go home.”
“A minute ago you wanted to work.”
“Stop bullying me!”
“Then start talking.”
“What do you want to know?”
“For starters you can explain why two men are claiming Graham as their son.”
“Either would have a lot to gain if Graham was his child. Hutch would get a kidney. And Neal would have an heir.” When Dillon raised his eyebrows inquisitively, she added, “He’s sterile as a result of the accident that took off Ivan’s legs.”
Dillon digested that, but he was dissatisfied with her explanation. “It still doesn’t make sense, Jade. Men don’t ordinarily leap forward claiming paternity. Usually it’s the other way around.”
“Their circumstances are unusual.”
“Did you sleep with both of them?”
“No.”
“So their claims to Graham are totally unfounded?”
She said nothing.
“Who is his father, Jade?”
“I don’t know!”
“Then you did sleep with both of them.”
“No!”
“Goddammit,” he shouted, “come clean with me.”
“They raped me!”
The words echoed loudly off the walls of the small room.
They reverberated inside Dillon’s skull as he stared at Jade, shocked speechless. Once again she covered her face with her hands.
“They raped me,” she repeated softly. “They raped me.”
Dillon shoved all ten fingers through his hair and held it off his face for several moments. When he lowered his hands, he rubbed his palms up and down his thighs. He had wanted to know. He had hounded her to tell him. But he hadn’t counted on this.
He had expected to hear the confessions of a reformed wayward teenage girl, or of a shy introvert who had sought attention by being easy, or of a rebel out to torment strict parents. He hadn’t expected rape.