Momentary Marriage(95)

He’d never said that he loved her, just that he didn’t think she was capable of loving anyone. That she couldn’t trust anyone. So where did that leave him?

There was no denying that she loved him, no matter that he thought her incapable of it, no matter that he’d never claimed to love her. No matter how much he’d lied to her. Manipulated her. She couldn’t trust him, but she loved him.

Still, much as it hurt to admit it, he was right about several things. Her behavior with Doug, for instance. She’d been blind for too many years. Could Jared be right about the rest of it? About love being able to last and her just not giving it a chance?

Compelled, she walked through the brass-framed doors, determined to find the nearest Manhattan area phone book.

As a teenager, she’d had dreams about confronting her father. In them, she was always beautiful and witty, smiling at a faceless man and running away from him, laughing.

The same dream over and over. The same father she’d thought she’d forgotten as thoroughly as he seemed to have forgotten her.

Maybe it was time to stop kidding herself about that.

***

“I don’t care what she said to you,” Amy told him calmly. “She loves you and you two have to work it out.”

Jared smiled at his sister-in-law. It was a tired version as facial expressions go, but the it was the best he could offer. “Maybe you should go tell her that.”

Amy had come by his office after having had lunch with her fiancé to reassure him about Kelsey. Jared appreciated the effort, but he couldn’t get too excited about the romantic predictions of a woman whose own wedding was only days ahead. She was bound to have a rosy outlook on things.

“I will tell her,” Amy insisted. “I refuse to accept that you guys aren’t going to be as happy as Doug and I.”

“I’m glad you’re happy together,” Jared said, giving her a hug. “You deserve it. Both of you, but you particularly because you put up with him for so long.”

“He was worth the wait,” she said softly.

“Doug’s a good man.” Jared couldn’t help contrasting Amy’s love-drenched eyes with her sister’s furious gaze the day before. Bitterness welled up in him. One small, shapely woman had taken his comfortable life and sent it to hell.

“You’re coming to the wedding, aren’t you?” Amy asked, getting ready to leave. “I won’t take no for an answer.”

“Has anyone mentioned how bossy you’re getting now that your love life is in order,” he asked mildly.

“Yes,” Amy retorted. “Kelsey pointed that out just the other day. Goes to show how perfectly suited the two of you are.”

“I just hope you’re giving her as much grief as you’re giving me,” Jared said. “Maybe you’ll have more luck with her than I have.”

Amy’s face softened. “Kelsey’s just confused.”

“Kelsey hates my guts,” he corrected grimly. “And I don’t see that changing anytime soon.”





CHAPTER NINETEEN

Kelsey smoothed the navy blue material of her dress with a nervous hand. Now that she was here, riding the elevator up to her father’s office, she couldn’t remember the point of this meeting.

It had something to do with Jared, with the welter of emotion still between them. For some reason, she had to see her father, had to examine the accusations Jared had thrown at her. Had she really been determined not to love any man? And had her father’s desertion anything to do with her behavior today?

She’d gained a quick appointment with John Layton by using her married name. Given Jared’s net worth most financial advisors would clear some time to speak with her, she knew. Some part of her cringed back from giving him the chance to brush her off and if she’d given her own name, he might have easily refused to see her.

The ploy had worked with her father. She almost wished it hadn’t. All these years she’d dreamed and fantasized about meeting him, but the reality was different. Her legs felt jittery beneath her, her palms damp with anxiety.

She’d tried on three different outfits before going to work that day. Nothing seemed right. Settling for a slim, fitted dress of navy linen, she’d decided she looked conservative and reasonable.

Of course, she felt anything but. What did one say to the father who’d abandoned she and her sister twenty-five years before? Hi, Dad, I’m here to punch you in the nose.

She was determined not to cry, not to snivel or beg for his attention. But anxiety sat pooled in her midsection like a fifty pound weight.

Try as she would, she couldn’t get rid of the thought that he might brush her off. Might even deny she was his child. All these years, he’d never tried to see them, never sent any acknowledgement of their existence.