“I hate this,” she mumbled, pushing off the bed. “I hate games. And fights. And days without him.”
She was as much to blame as he was.
Giving in, she walked out to the kitchen, through the door to the garage, and snagged the rusty step stool leaning against the wall.
Back in her closet, she opened the squeaky steps and, careful to stay on the right-hand side of the unstable metal, she reached up and grabbed the top bin where she knew she’d put the envelope.
She brought it down to the ground and bent over to lift the lid. On top was the white envelope she’d refused to open. With a sigh, she ripped off the tape and reached in to slide out the documents. The first one was an autopsy report.
She shook her head and refused to look at the sad details.
Under it was a letter from a lawyer representing Mrs. Carole Cavanaugh and the estate of Jonathan B. Cavanaugh informing Endicott Development Corporation of their intention to file suit.
But there was no suit, Beth recalled. Was that because it was twenty-five years ago and personal injury law suits weren’t as common? There was defective machinery, so why wouldn’t they have sued?
Next was a letter from EDC to Mrs. Cavanaugh arranging a meeting to discuss details, as well as a copy of an official machinery inspection report.
The report looked legit, with long descriptions of cranes, hooks, and safety latches, and a county inspector’s seal in place.
Underneath that was a nondisclosure agreement and some paperwork finalizing the transfer of two million dollars to Carole’s account.
No wonder Ken was bitter. Dad had used his considerable cash to ward off a lawsuit that could have cost him much more than two million and probably had preyed on Carole Cavanaugh’s fears that she could lose, based on that inspection.
What did Dad want her to see in these files except that truth? She totally sided with Ken on this one. EDC paid his mom hush money to stave off a lawsuit that, frankly, the Cavanaughs might have won.
The whole thing made her feel sick. The truth was she hadn’t really believed that until now. She’d given her father the benefit of the doubt, not Ken or his family.
Still holding the paperwork, she walked out of her closet to grab the phone on her bed. The standoff was over. She was calling to—
It rang in her hand, startling her. But instead of the name she hoped to see, it was the very last one she wanted to see right then.
Ray Endicott.
She let it ring and ring, then go to voice mail. She didn’t need to hear how she was dredging up ancient history and Ken could have bad intentions.
She tapped the screen, but her finger hit the wrong button, and the voice mail started to play through the speaker.
“Beth, it’s Dad.”
She was about to delete the voice mail, but something in his tone stopped her.
“I’m sorry we didn’t get to finish our conversation today. Honey, I hate that you think I’m trying to run your life.”
And everyone else’s.
“Please open that envelope and look carefully at the contents.”
“I did, Dad,” she snapped at the phone.
“I paid a lot of money—”
“No shit.”
“—to keep the autopsy out of the hands of the press and John Cavanaugh’s children.”
The autopsy? She looked at the papers she still held.
“But John’s wife had to see it, and when she did, she had to back off her lawsuit. I paid her anyway, because it felt like the right thing to do. But if you pursue a relationship with this man’s son, the truth could come out along with the fact that it was John himself who attached the generator to the crane, and then happened to be under it while it was lifted two stories. And that could hurt a lot of people, especially Ken. I won’t be able to protect him anymore.”
What?
A wave of dizziness threatened. What was he talking about?
Her heart pounding, she tossed the phone on the bed and started to sift through the papers, getting to the autopsy she’d refused to read.
Her eyes skimmed the details of death, her face contorting as she read words that conjured up nothing but sadness. His lungs collapsed under the weight of the generator that fell off a crane and hook, and that was the official cause of death.
He’d suffocated to death.
Why would that “hurt a lot of people, especially Ken”? Ken knew how his father died.
Then she flipped to the second page.
Blood Alcohol Content: .15%
Her legs weakened as she stared at the words, trying to remember what was legal intoxication in Florida. .08 percent. She was sure of it. And this was…way higher than that.
Johnny Cavanaugh had been drunk on the job, and he’d been the one to attach the generator to the crane. He caused his own death and Dad knew it. He’d saved the Cavanaugh family from embarrassment and, surely, the loss of a costly lawsuit. And he’d given them two million dollars. The nondisclosure agreement was to protect them, not EDC.
She dropped onto the chair, quivering as it all processed.
If Ken knew this, he would know his father was drunk and caused the accident that killed him. And, he’d have to let go of believing that her father was covering up for his company’s negligence. He was covering up for John Cavanaugh’s negligence caused by being drunk on the job.
The worst barrier to their relationship would be removed, opening up the door to a possible future.
But at what cost? The memory of his father—the father he had high on a pedestal—would be ruined.
The truth would break his heart.
Yet if she didn’t tell him, they’d have no chance to be together. “Oh, Ken. What should I do?”
She closed her eyes, vaguely aware of a dog barking in the distance. Her head throbbed with indecision. What should she tell him? What would be best for them? For their child?
The barking got louder, along with a solid rap on her front door, pulling her out of her reverie.
Who was at her door? With a dog?
Wait, she recognized that bark.
Ken was here, with Sally. She leaped off the bed, still holding the paperwork. She couldn’t let him see this. Couldn’t let him know, at least not yet. She needed time to decide.
The barking, and knocking, intensified.
She darted into the closet and grabbed the bin, and all the papers fell to the floor.
“Shit.”
“Beth!”
He wasn’t going to give up. Not with her car in the driveway. She climbed up, shoved the bin back up on the shelf, and tossed the papers on top where they couldn’t be seen. Calming herself, she got down and folded the step stool, leaning it against her shoe rack.
She’d just hidden the truth from him, she thought sadly.
She walked briskly down the hall, anxious to see him, but a little scared, too. She unlocked the door and opened it slowly, her heart stuttering in her chest as she saw Ken Cavanaugh in a tight white T-shirt and jeans, the hint of a half-smile pulling at his lips, a spark in his dark eyes.
“Sally missed you,” he said.
She opened the screen door, and Sally marched in, barking at Beth, then lowering her head to beg for a scratch.
“And so did I,” Ken whispered, his voice rough.
She looked up at him, and that roller coaster she’d been on all day chugged to the top of a long, long drop. The free fall promised to be thrilling and wild, and she knew the ride could hurt when it hit bottom.
But she wanted to take it more than she’d ever wanted anything in her life.
She reached up to wrap her arms around his neck and pulled him in for a long, hard, soulful kiss that silenced the truth she knew she should tell him, but couldn’t bear to.
Chapter Eighteen
Beth melted into Ken the way he’d imagined all the way over here. He kissed her back with the same urgency, while Sally kept barking.
All the way inside the house, she br
oke the kiss and gazed up at him, her eyes already dark with arousal. “Hi,” she said softly.
“Hi.” He stroked her hair, his hand surprisingly shaky from the kiss. “Does this mean our fight is over?”
“It wasn’t a fight.” She sighed into him, laying her head on his shoulder.
“But I killed my own excellent seduction.”
She inched back. “What makes you so sure of that?”
He smiled and nodded at Sally, who gave up barking to lick at Beth’s legs. Smart dog. “She needs you to welcome her.”
“Oh, Sally.” Beth let go of him to bend down, and Sally instantly dropped and rolled to offer up her massive, spotted gut for a rubdown.
“She’s shameless,” Ken joked.
“I’m going to want the same thing when my stomach takes up fifty percent of my body.” Still rubbing Sally, Beth grinned up at him. “Will you rub my belly then?”
Emotion crushed him, pushing him down to crouch across from her. “I’ll rub anything of yours I can get my hands on.” With Sally flat on her back between them, Ken reached over to cup Beth’s face. “I can start any time. Now, even.”
She leaned in and kissed him again, and they stood. “But we need to talk,” she said. “I think I have a beer in that mini-fridge if you want one.”
“Water is fine,” he said.
“Go sit down and I’ll be right there.” She gave his arms a squeeze as if the little act of kindness made her feel good, so he nodded his thanks.
Watching Sally sniff around the place, Ken did the same, checking to see that everything was dry and mold-free. He waited on the sofa while Beth got two waters and joined him, snuggling close.
“What did you do all day?” she asked.
“Thought about you. Missed you. Considered calling you. Had lunch with Law and talked about you. Checked for phone messages from you.” He dropped his forehead so it touched the top of her head. “What about you?”
“Essentially the same—you.”
He pushed her hair back to get a better look at her. “I’m sorry I jumped down your throat. I know you were trying to figure out if someone had been here.”
“No, no.” She reached up and pressed her fingers to his face. “I am the one who owes you an apology. To even think that you would…no, I’m ashamed.”
They didn’t speak for a moment, but stared at each other like the lovestruck kids they once were. “I wasted the first twelve hours of this free day,” he said. “I should have been here taking down the rest of kitchen and starting the master bath. Can I spend the next twelve hours with you?”
Her smile was shaky, as if she still wasn’t sure.
“We only have to talk,” he added at her hesitation.
“I do want to talk,” she said, a little slowly. “There’s so much we still don’t know about each other.”
“All right,” he said. “What do you want to talk about?”
She swallowed. “The tough stuff.”
He stifled a grunt. “Maybe I’ll take that beer after all.”
“Let’s not talk about my father,” she said softly. “How about we talk about yours?”
“Okay. That’s never tough. I love talking about my dad.”
“You never took me to your house when we were dating,” she said. “So I don’t know what he was like.”
“I couldn’t take you there, Beth. It was small and…in Twin Palms. You lived in a mansion on the water.”
“You know I didn’t care about that stuff, and I still don’t. So, what was your dad like?”
He closed his eyes and dropped his head back, falling into the comfortable place of his memories. “Happy,” he said. “My dad was a guy who just loved life.”
“He never fought with your mom?”
“They fought sometimes.” He inched back to see her face. “Are you trying to determine if the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree?”
“I have all the proof I need to know you’re an amazing man. I want to know more about your life.”
He wanted to be as open and honest with her as possible, and his childhood home hadn’t always been rosy. “Actually, my parents argued their fair share, but, you know, I was a kid and ignored it most of the time. Sometimes Dad would have a few drinks and get testy.”
Next to him, he could have sworn she stiffened.
“It didn’t happen a lot,” he added quickly. “But that’s not what I remember most about him.”
“What do you remember most?”
“Laughing a lot. Learning from him. Fishing with him on Sunday afternoons or working in the garage on the muscle cars he loved. The best years were when I was about twelve or thirteen.” He paused for a moment, transported back to steamy summer nights working by the light of a few bare bulbs, the hood up on that Impala he loved so much, the smell of grease and the Juicy Fruit gum his dad constantly chewed. “We’d listen to rock bands at full blast, Queen and Bon Jovi, and he loved to sing. But when the music wasn’t playing, he talked to me.”
“What did you talk about?”
“Anything, everything. Girls, cars, sports. Mostly girls.” He grinned at her. “We never talked about one thing, though. Vietnam. He was a vet, you know, but he never, ever talked about the war. But girls? Oh yeah. Until you, of course. I couldn’t tell him about you because he’d have killed me for dating his boss’s daughter.”
“But you did tell him we were dating, didn’t you? Eventually?”
He took a sip of water, his mouth surprisingly dry. “Yeah, but it didn’t go well.”
She sat up a little, turning to see him. “Why? What did he say? Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“Because he died that day.” His voice was thick with the memory. “My sister had seen us holding hands at school, and she thought it would make a lovely breakfast topic. Oh man, he was pissed.”
“He was that upset you were dating the boss’s daughter?” Her voice rose, as if she were taking the whole thing personally, which he kind of understood. For a long time, he’d blamed their relationship for the fact that his last real talk with his father had been an ugly one.
“He had an issue with pride,” Ken said quietly. “Not a lot of faults, a heart of gold, and he could build, fix, or make anything. But he was so ashamed of living paycheck to paycheck, of the fact that his wife had to clean motel rooms and take in sewing to make the rent. He was…embarrassed, plain and simple. He assumed you’d look down on my family.”
“But I never did.”
“I know, and I told him that. Which pissed him off more.”
“And then…he went to work?”
“Mad as hell at me,” he said. “I went to the job site after lunch, figuring he’d have cooled off by then. They were hoisting that crane to carry the generator as I walked up. I remember stopping to watch because no boy ever gets old enough to not be fascinated by a crane on a construction site and…”
He saw that hook slip…
“I didn’t really know what I was looking at, you know?” He heard his voice crack, but didn’t care. It hurt like hell to remember.
She squeezed his hand, but Ken barely felt it.
“The moment that I realized that thing was falling, I looked to the ground and realized my dad was right there. I opened my mouth, but it happened so fast. Five hundred fucking pounds of steel fell like it was in slow motion…” The sob broke, along with the tears he hadn’t realized filled his eyes.
“Oh, Ken,” she whispered.
“It crushed him.” He blinked and swiped at his eyes. “I reached him first. But he already couldn’t breathe. He wasn’t even conscious when I reached him. There was nothing I could do to save him.”
“Oh, Ken.” She pulled on his hands and forced him to look at her. “You cannot blame yourself for not knowing how to save a dying man when you were eighteen.”
“I don’t blame myself.” He blamed Ray Endicott and some half-assed inspection, but he didn’t have the heart to say that now. Not while Beth was covering
him with comfort and sympathy. “But that was the moment I knew I wanted to be a medic and firefighter.”
“Your dad would be so proud of you.” She was so sincere, he melted into a sad smile.
“That’s what my mom says.”
She searched his face. “What else does she say…about what happened?”
“That Dad had himself to blame.”
“Really?” she asked, sounding surprised or even hopeful. “She blames him?”
“For fighting with me on his last day on earth,” he said. “For not treating every day like it could be your last.”
“Are you sure that’s what she meant?”
He drew back, frowning. “Yeah. Why?”
“I don’t know.” She took a long, slow inhale, looking away, thinking. “Blame and guilt,” she finally said. “They are two very debilitating emotions.”
“They are.”
“They could ruin us if we let them,” she said. “We could wallow around in blaming one person or ourselves for something that can’t be changed and cost us everything we have.”
“Well, listen to you.” He put his finger on her chin and turned her face toward him. “Three we’s and a few us’s in there. I thought you ran away from those words.”
She didn’t answer, her own eyes as misty as his still felt. “I don’t want to run away from us anymore,” she whispered. “I want to be a we, but I’m so scared.”
“Only one thing should scare you,” he said, easing her body against his.
“What?”
He placed a kiss on the top of her head. “Missing the opportunity for us to have something amazing.”
She looked up at him. “You really think we could?”
“I know we could.” He kissed her forehead. “I know we will.” He kissed her nose. “And we should start….” He kissed her lips. “Right now.”
“Another excellent seduction.” She whispered into his mouth.
“Did it work?”
“Like a charm.” Slowly, she stood, holding her hand out in invitation. “Come to bed with me, Kenny Cavanaugh.”
* * *
As Ken kissed them both back into the bedroom, Beth could feel herself letting go of all the fear and tension and secrets and guilt and blame. It fell to the floor along with the tank top he dispensed with somewhere in the hall.