Because she was pregnant—and he’d gotten hard for her.
Behind the old Catholic church, his body had stirred like Rip Van Winkle, awakening and stretching, coming to life. For someone who wasn’t his wife.
Still hadn’t stopped him from staring. From fucking throbbing in want.
And the guilt. Jesus, the guilt...and the fear. He might have been able to escape Sydney today, but he couldn’t outrun the crushing weight of shame or the visceral terror that tore at him. Guilt over his betrayal of his wife’s memory, of the love they’d shared. And fear for Sydney. For the childbirth that could snuff out her life as it’d done Tonia’s. Fear for himself, if he ever let himself get attached to another woman who could be stolen away so easily.
Yes, he was a coward. He had every right to be.
“I don’t care,” he lied to Wolf, turning away on the pretense of downing the remaining water in the bottle and throwing it away. “Just that you’ll most likely see Leo before I do, and you can let her know. I figure Sydney could use a friend about now.”
Wolf remained silent for several seconds, and when Cole turned back to him, his brother’s gaze snagged his, as if he’d just been waiting for Cole to look at him.
“All that lying must get exhausting,” Wolf murmured. “When you’re ready to be honest with me and yourself, I’ll be here. I’m always here.”
With that parting shot, Wolf pushed himself off the counter and strode out of the room. Leaving Cole alone.
Always alone.
Just like he preferred.
CHAPTER THREE
THERE WERE ALL kinds of disasters in life.
Like coming down with mono right before the senior prom.
Or going on vacation to a tropical island only for a tsunami to hit.
Another season of Keeping Up with the Kardashians.
So many more cataclysmic events than sitting down and sharing dinner with one’s parents.
But for the life of her, at this moment, Sydney might risk all those other disasters rather than this hell.
Because this. Was. Hell.
“So, tell me again why you packed up, left your husband and returned here with no plans, no means of support?” her father demanded, setting down his knife and fork on either side of his plate and apparently forgetting about his perfectly cooked, medium-rare steak.
“And pregnant,” her mother added, her silverware clutched in tight fists. Her gaze dropped down Sydney’s torso to the table that blocked her stomach. Then, as if she couldn’t bear the evidence of Sydney’s transgression—divorce, single motherhood, she didn’t know—her mother jerked her scrutiny back to Sydney’s face. “Sydney...”
Okay, here we go...
In spite of the circumstances, and her doubts, when she’d first arrived at her childhood home, Sydney had been happy to see her parents. It’d been three years since they’d last visited North Carolina. And that had been because her father had been on his way to Charleston, South Carolina, for a medical conference. As strained as their relationship was, she loved them. And until setting eyes on them again, she hadn’t realized that she’d missed them.
Initially, her parents had been shocked to see her on their doorstep. That shock had quickly melted into confusion and then the expected disappointment when Sydney informed them of her divorce and her pregnancy.
Yes, she’d anticipated their displeasure, but witnessing it had still been a strike to the chest. She should be used to it by now, letting them down. And not because of her rebellious behavior as a teen. No, she’d failed them years before then.
When she’d refused to save her sister’s life.
“God, I could use wine right now,” she muttered, staring a resentful hole through the water glass in front of her plate.
“This isn’t a laughing matter, Sydney.” Dr. Luke Collins scolded her in the same tone he’d used when he’d caught her sneaking back in the house after curfew. Most times, she’d felt like a difficult patient for whom her father had struggled to determine the correct diagnosis. Instead of what was causing her cough, though, he couldn’t figure out why she wouldn’t just act right. “That’s always been a problem with you. Everything’s not some careless joke. People are hurt by your rash decisions. Daniel, his parents, not to mention your child.”
God, there was so much to tackle in those few sentences. But she focused on the last part first. “Trust me, Dad.” Hah! her brain crowed. Trust me. Good one. “My decisions about filing for divorce and having this baby weren’t rash. I understand your shock because you’re just finding out about Daniel and me, but we’ve been done for six months. If I’m being truthful, a while before that. Some marriages don’t work out. And unfortunately, ours was one of them.”
“Then why are you having a baby with him?” Patricia Collins demanded, an eyebrow arched high.
Because of a self-sabotaging mixture of loneliness, why-the-fuck-not sex and Moscato. Somehow, she doubted her mother would appreciate that answer or consider it a good excuse.
“It just happened,” she said, inwardly cringing at the cliché reply. Dammit, she sounded like the irresponsible teen they’d known rather than the capable woman she’d become.
“It just happened,” her mother repeated, that eyebrow arching higher. “Not rash at all.”
“What do you want me to say, Mom?” Sydney leaned back in her chair. “That one night my ex-husband and I had ‘one for the road’ sex that resulted in an unplanned child?”
“Sydney,” Luke snapped.
She sighed, briefly closing her eyes. How quickly they’d fallen back into old patterns—the stern, censorious parents and the recalcitrant child. This...dysfunctional dynamic was part of the reason she hadn’t returned to Rose Bend in eight years. And why her parents’ visits to North Carolina had been sporadic at best. The middle ground they’d once shared no longer existed. So, they constantly fought over the scraps. She’d come back here with hopes that the unconditional acceptance and love they withheld from her, they could give to her baby.
