Claiming His Secret Heir

Assuming the connection hadn’t been faked the first time.

She ached for the deep love she’d seen in those photos. But as she opened her eyes to meet Damon’s frosty blue glare, she wondered if she could ever find it again. He rose from the dining table in the breakfast nook, leaving his phone and laptop abandoned on the sleek hardwood surface as he stalked toward her. He stood on the opposite end of the island from her, almost as if that was as close as he could bear to be.

“My father doesn’t even know I’m here,” she told him when she felt steady enough to respond to his accusation. She was walking a thin line here, being truthful about her father, but being dishonest about her amnesia and not sharing about the baby. “I’ve been struggling to remember what happened this past year and I have reason to believe Dad was thwarting my efforts more than helping them.”

Damon’s head tipped back, the subtlest evidence that her words hit him like a blow. “So you don’t deny it? You ran to your father when you left me?”

“I was abducted from this house ten and a half months ago, Damon. I was upstairs in the spare bedroom I planned to make into my office when someone came in.” She hadn’t set foot in that room on this visit, afraid she would have a panic attack if she recalled what happened next. The day was blurry in her mind, but she recalled suffocating fear. “That’s why I need to make a statement to the police. I was kidnapped, and yet the police never believed I was in any danger.”

He laid his broad palms on the island’s granite countertop. Once upon a time, he’d put his hands on her, as often as possible. Now, he’d rather keep them splayed on cold stone than touch her.

One more hurt among so many others.

“You just spoke to the police, so you know that’s not true. I called them the same day. I came home and when you weren’t here—” He stopped himself and shook his head. “It was your father who said you had been in contact with him. He convinced the cops you were fine.”

“And that’s why I’m going to the police and making a formal statement.” She still held the notepaper in her hand with the dates, times and names of law enforcement officials Damon said he’d spoken to about her whereabouts. “Someone came into this house, put a hood over my head and drugged me. I ended up in Mexico and after being captive in various places, I was abandoned in a house on the Baja Peninsula in Mexico. By then, I’d been drugged multiple times, and I could no longer tell what month it was, let alone what day.”

She had been so frightened. All the more so when she’d discovered she was pregnant, since her worries were twice as big for the baby she carried. She’d been terrified the drugs were hurting the precious life inside her. Even through the amnesia, fear for her child’s health was the one coherent thought she’d retained. She’d asked her father for multiple pediatricians to assess Lucas’s health and make sure he was okay.

Damon’s hands flexed against the granite. “I’ll take you to the police station myself. They said the ransom note was a hoax, but maybe now they’ll see things differently.”

Could she trust him? She wanted to, which made her all the more cautious. “The guards told me you didn’t give them the money.” She’d been deflated that day. It had been a turning point in those lonely weeks of captivity. Because even though she knew to be skeptical of what they told her, she believed they would have released her if Damon had given them the exorbitant sum they’d requested.

“They lied to you. I wired the full amount to an overseas account as requested.” He slid his hands off the counter and walked slowly toward her in his socks. He still wore the same clothes as the night before, a black tee and cargoes, tipping her off he’d never been to bed. “I would have paid it twice over to get you back, Caroline, but I didn’t trust the cops when they said it was a hoax since you had been in touch with your father and you were still paying your bills—the mortgage on your New York apartment, a car payment on the Mercedes, a few things you kept in your own name after the wedding.”

“You paid the ransom?” She swallowed hard, her thoughts shifting again as she discovered yet another new piece to the puzzle that kept changing.

Damon stopped a foot away from her, his strong shoulders too enticing in the morning light slanting into the kitchen. How easy it would be to lean on him. To share the burdens and the confusion. To let him sort out the mess that she couldn’t figure out no matter how hard she tried.

“I have proof. I kept meticulous records. I hired private investigators to follow leads.” His blue eyes bored into hers, and she had the sense that he was seeking holes in her story. After all, he had just accused her of deceiving him with her father’s blessing. “The police can have everything my team discovered.”