He released me, his nostrils flaring as his full name echoed around the office. No one called him Mackennon, and it sounded strangely intimate falling from my lips.
I liked it.
Mac searched my face for a second while I stared into his ever-changing eyes. Their color was technically hazel, but they changed dramatically with the light. Under the stark illumination of his office, they looked a dark blue-gray. “No. I just recognize guilt when I see it. I guess we’re two guilty people tonight.”
“What do you have to feel guilty about?”
He sighed heavily. “If I tell you, you’ll think less of me, and I don’t think I can cope with that.”
I reached out to touch his arm. “I would never think less of you.”
The muscle in his jaw twitched before he turned and downed his whisky at the same time. I watched warily as he crossed the room to pour another. His mood was so mercurial, so unpredictable. It wasn’t like him, and I was sure I didn’t like it.
“Mackennon, please tell me what’s going on?”
He cut me a dangerous look over his shoulder. “Why are you calling me Mackennon?”
“Because it’s a beautiful name and I enjoy saying it.”
I waited for a response and got none. Instead, he poured himself another drink and leaned back against the sideboard. As if he was deliberately putting distance between us.
“You should go out and join the party, Arro.”
I slipped off the desk but didn’t make a move toward him. “Not until you tell me what’s wrong.”
“I have a daughter,” he blurted out.
I froze in shock.
Mac smirked unhappily. “Oh, aye, you weren’t expecting that.”
“What?” I huffed out, taking a step closer. “I mean … when? What? How?” Was this recent? I panicked at the thought of some woman coming into his life and taking him from me. Selfish, but true!
“I got a girl pregnant when I was fifteen.”
Oh my God.
“I’d not long moved to the States to work with my uncle.”
I knew his grandmother had sent him to live with his uncle in Boston to work as a mechanic, and that when he was old enough, he’d joined the Boston Police Department and from there went on to work in security.
But a daughter … “Mac?”
“Her name is Robyn. She’s twenty-three.”
Holy … Mac was only thirty-eight, but he looked like he was still in his early thirties, for Christ’s sake, and he had a daughter who was twenty-three? “How did I not know about this?”
“I haven’t had a relationship with her since she was fourteen. Her mum made it difficult.” Mac ran a hand over his face. “And I didn’t fight hard enough. All my letters, my gifts, were returned to me. Now she’s a grown woman, a police officer.” He shrugged despondently. “Her dad is her stepfather. I’m just the sperm donor.” He threw back the rest of his whisky. “The arsehole who abandoned her, just like my mum abandoned me.” Tears glittered in his eyes, shocking me. “She doesn’t know how much I love her, and honestly, I don’t deserve to love her. I don’t deserve for her to know.”
“Oh, Mac.” I crossed the room to him, set my glass down on the table behind him, and hugged him.
He buried his head in my neck, and his arms tightened around me. Feeling him shudder with his emotions, tears thickened my throat.
I had no idea.
Squeezing him close, I held on as tightly as I could.
Finally, he eased, relaxing against me, and he lifted his head from my neck to meet my gaze. The torment in his eyes had softened around the edges. I pressed my palms to his chest, feeling his heart beat fast against my touch. I was so aware of him as a man, of his heat, his strength, his scent … I tried to force away my awareness because it seemed so inappropriate, but every inch of me tingled and hummed with his proximity.