Inherited:OneChild(13)

"Oh." That single word spoke volumes. "And your mother? Would she have also considered it a waste of time?"

He hoped the darkness concealed his expression, but he could hear the   pain creep into his voice. "She was different than my father. Before   their divorce she tried not to show her emotions, since he'd use any   sign of weakness against her. She changed later on."

"How old were you when they broke up?"

"Eight. Nine, maybe. Joanne was two years older."

"And how did your mother change, afterward?"

"She softened, became more openly affectionate. Of course, it's hard to   say if she was like that all the time. I can only base it on the time I   saw her."                       
       
           



       

"What do you mean?" Annalise straightened, and he could feel her   attempting to penetrate the darkness in order to read his expression.   "Didn't your mother have custody of you?"

"No, only Joanne. My father took me."

He caught Annalise's soft gasp. "They split you up?"

"Yes." A wintry coldness settled over him. With that one single   decision, every scrap of love and kindness had been removed from his   life. He still felt the loss to this day. "My mother never spoke to me   about that time, but Joanne once explained that our father threatened to   take both of us and prevent our mother from ever seeing us again if  she  didn't agree to his terms."

A strobe of brilliance flashed across the screen, allowing him to see   that Annalise was visibly shaken. "Could he have done that?"

"Considering I didn't see either my mother or my sister again until I   turned thirteen, I'd say not only could he, but he did precisely that."

"How … ?" Her voice thickened, betraying her emotional reaction to his   response. "Why … ?" She shook her head, unable to formulate the questions   she clearly wanted to ask.

Jack leaned his head back against the couch cushion and stared blindly   at the old Star Trek movie that was Isabella's current favorite. "How?   With some of the most powerful lawyers money could buy. Why? Because he   was-and is-a total bastard who used me to hit out at my mother."

"But you did finally get to see her," Annalise said on a note of urgency.

A smile of satisfaction tugged at his mouth. "That I did."

"I assume he finally relented?" she asked tentatively.

"Not a chance in hell. The summer I turned thirteen, Dad took off   overseas on an extended honeymoon with his latest trophy wife. I was   supposed to go to camp. Instead, I hitchhiked to Colorado, where my   mother was living with her second husband."

"Dear God, Jack!" She reached for him, her hand clutching his arm. "Do   you have any idea how dangerous that was? Anything could have happened   to you."

He regarded her with a hint of amusement. "That's what my mother said.   It was worth it, though. I stayed with them for most of that summer." A   summer filled with magic and hope. A summer unlike anything he'd   experienced before or since. A summer that had ended in the death of   dreams. "Until my father found out, that is. But those couple of months   were quite eye-opening."

"In what way?"

His brows tugged together reflecting a hint of the bewilderment he'd   experienced during that time period. "They were all so happy. They   laughed almost all the time. And when they fought … " He struggled for the   right words to explain. "I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop,  but  it never did."

"You mean when they fought, you weren't worried that they were on the   verge of divorce." Her hand shifted, rubbing his arm in a soothing   motion. He doubted she was even conscious of her actions. "They were   never nasty toward each other."

"Exactly. They were-" he reflected on it for a moment "-casual. As   though the way they interacted-the laughter, the tears, the squabbling,   the open affection-was a normal, everyday occurrence."

"It probably was." She tilted her head to one side, sending a swath of   curls tumbling across her shoulder. "How often did you get to visit   after that?"

"I didn't. My disobedience that summer earned me a trip to military   school. I didn't see Joanne again until I turned eighteen and my father   no longer had any say in where I went or who I saw. Unfortunately, my   mother and her husband managed to drive themselves off an icy   mountainside a few months beforehand."

"Oh, Jack! How awful." He caught the betraying glitter of tears and felt   something shift inside him, something deep and powerful. Something he   wanted to protect himself from because it came from a wellspring of   emotions he preferred to deny. "What happened to Joanne? Did she move   back to Charleston to live with you and your father?"

"No. She was in college by then and flat out refused to have anything to do with our father."

"Or you?" she dared to ask.

He refused to acknowledge the hit. For years he'd believed just that,   until Joanne had finally set him straight. But by then he'd found a way   to insulate himself from the sort of emotional pain that came from   sentiment and familial attachment.

"We managed to revive our relationship, despite my father." His mouth   twisted. "Hell, Jo even found it in her heart to forgive him, not that   he ever believed he required forgiveness. Ironically, Dad helped her   find the lawyer who handled Isabella's adoption." Jack stood then,   careful not to wake his niece, while putting an unmistakable period to   the conversation. Annalise's hand fell away, leaving behind coldness   where once there was warmth. "Time I put our little one to bed. I'll be   back in a minute."                       
       
           



       

He took his time settling his niece, needing those handful of minutes to   rebuild his barriers. He'd told Annalise far more than he'd shared  with  any other woman, opening parts of himself that he'd sealed away  for  almost two full decades. He didn't ordinarily let people in, didn't   dare. That sort of closeness often became messy, risked creating   emotions like the ones that had sent his parents' relationship spiraling   into vicious arguments and acts of revenge.

He'd made up his mind at a very young age to avoid marriage at all   costs. Even when he'd witnessed firsthand his mother's loving   relationship with her second husband, he still hadn't trusted that their   marriage was anything other than pure dumb luck. The union       he   contemplated with Annalise wouldn't involve an emotional commitment.   When they married it would be carefully scripted with neat, tidy, legal   boundaries that specified every aspect of their wedded "bliss" right   down to the date of their future divorce. As for any potential romantic   entanglements …

That would be determined by contract, as well. He had no objection if   she chose to share his bed. But she would enter the affair with her eyes   wide open and all the cards on the table. He wouldn't trick her with   claims of affection. Theirs would be a mating of body and intellect. A   sensible blending rather than an emotional one.

Satisfied that he'd fully regained his self-control, he turned and found   Annalise watching him from the doorway. And that was when he realized   he had no self-control when it came to this woman.

None whatsoever.





Five




J ack had no memory of closing the door to Isabella's room. No memory of   striding toward Annalise. No memory of backing her against the wall.   But from the instant his mouth found hers, it was like a recorder   flicked on, burning every tantalizing moment into the pathways of his   brain.

He was overwhelmed by the distinctive fragrance of her skin and driven   insane by the low, soft moan that reverberated in her throat. The heat   of her hands and lips and flesh burned like wildfire, sweeping straight   through to the frozen core of him and melting away walls of ice that   he'd believed too tall and thick to ever be breached.

"I've tried, Annalise," he said between quick, biting kisses. "I've   tried to keep my hands off you. How many times have I promised I would?   And yet … "