Dylan’s Redemption(68)

He cupped her cheek in his palm. “Rest, honey. I’ll get rid of them.”

“Do that.” She allowed him to take the lead when normally she’d have put her foot down and thrown his parents out herself. A take-charge person, it spoke volumes she was too tired to deal with his parents herself.

Dylan turned from Jessie and fixed his mother in his hard gaze. His father’s eyes narrowed when Dylan didn’t greet them with his usual smile. “Get out. I told you days ago you weren’t to come here again. Jessie needs her rest, and I don’t want to see you.”

Will ran to him, raising his arms to be picked up.

“Son, we need to talk,” his father said in that controlled tone he’d used to discipline Dylan when he was young. “Your mother told me what happened. In her attempt to protect you, I can see she’s hurt you. We need to find a way to work this out.”

Dylan pinned his father with his gaze. “It’s too late to work it out. Did she tell you what she did? Did she tell you my daughter is dead, and she kept her existence from me?”

“She told me Jessie contacted her many years ago, but never said she was pregnant with your child,” his father said, ever the diplomat.

Dylan couldn’t believe his father’s words. He took his mother’s side. On one level he understood. His father loved her, and they’d spent over thirty years together. That kind of loyalty was admirable, even expected. However, Dylan didn’t have to listen to him defend his mother’s lies.

“Stop right there. If you came here to defend her for the lies she told you and make it seem like Jessie was anything less than up-front and truthful, then leave now and don’t ever contact me again. If you take her side”—he pointed at his mother with an accusing finger—“or condone her behavior, we have nothing to discuss.”

“Dylan, you’re my son, and I don’t want to lose you. Don’t turn your back on us without even a discussion about what happened.”

“Let me tell you what happened.” He released Will into Greg’s outstretched arms. They sat at the end of Jessie’s bed. For his son’s sake, Dylan tried to hold on to his temper. “Jessie sent me an email after I left, asking to talk. Mom sent her a scathing response that basically told Jessie I didn’t want her, never cared about her, and never wanted to hear from her again. Jessie had no choice but to email me.” He used air quotes, because she’d actually been responding to his mother, thinking it was him. “She wrote that she was pregnant and even if I didn’t want her, I needed to know about my child. Mom sent her an email back, making it look like the email Jessie sent never got delivered and my email got shut down. Undeterred and determined to tell me about the baby, she called the house and got Mom. She was so rude and unbelievably callous to Jessie, telling her that it was Jessie’s fault I left because I wanted to get away from her, that Jessie had no choice but to believe those words came from me. Me. The man who got her pregnant and left her without a word of goodbye, so why wouldn’t she believe it.” Dylan turned his gaze on his mother. “You knew exactly what to say to get her to back off and never try to contact me again. This, after everything she’d been through with her father. Everyone suspected she was dead. You knew something bad must have happened to her, but you did nothing. You didn’t even ask if she was okay, did she need anything? Nothing. Not even a kind word. Hell, all you had to do is rattle off a few numbers for my cell.” He turned back to his father. “When I asked her about Jessie’s disappearance, she didn’t tell me Jessie called looking for me. She led me to believe the ugly rumors that Jessie was dead.”

He had to swallow hard. He’d grieved for Jessie, pined for her for years. Now, he grieved for his daughter.

The look on his father’s face told Dylan he’d heard this part of the story a little differently. More half truths and lies from his mother.

“Your mother didn’t believe the baby was yours. I have to say, I would have been skeptical myself.”

“Then, I’d expect you to ask me if it was possible. I’ll tell you, not only was it possible, it was the truth. Hope was mine. Jessie was fifteen and went through her pregnancy alone.” He felt Greg’s eyes on him and decided credit was due. “Well, not alone. She had two very good friends to help her out, but not the father of her child.

“I can’t imagine what she went through. Sixteen years old, lying in a bed about to give birth, hurting and scared, and thinking the father of her baby doesn’t want anything to do with her, that I’ve gone out of my way, shutting off my email and changing my cell number, so she can’t contact me.” He shook his head at his mother. “The more times I think about it, or discuss it . . . it makes my stomach turn and my heart bleed.”