“I’ve known about it for years, Mom,” Mina said. “Uncle Dennis was drunk once, and I heard him talk about it during one of our family get-togethers. I just never told you.”
“Oh, Mina.” She stroked her daughter’s hair again.
“It’s no big tragedy. I mean, I grew up fine.”
“But it’s something no child should hear.” Her smile was soft, like a mother’s should be. “Your father and I weren’t sure that we could afford to have any other children at that time. But there you were, in spite of any precautions we took.”
She’d already known the circumstances, but she touched her belly, anyway, as if her baby could hear. As if shielding him or her from all of this.
“We started celebrating you right away, Mina,” her mom added. “And it kills me to think that we might not have had you at all but for an ‘accident.’” She touched Mina’s cheek. “Accident. What a word for it when, really, it was as if someone or something out there was telling us that you needed a home, and we were the lucky ones who were chosen to bring you in to one. And there hasn’t been a moment when we haven’t thanked our stars for you.”
Did you hear that? Mina asked her child. That’s exactly how I feel about you.
“I could just throttle Uncle Dennis,” her mom said, narrowing her eyes. “He had no business talking about that when we told him in confidence.”
“It’s okay,” Mina said.
Because it was.
It really was.
It’d been a long time in coming, but hearing her mother say this with tears in her eyes made all the difference.
And it caused Mina to realize that she was going to be a mother. Really and truly a mother. She genuinely felt just how devastating it would be to not have been blessed with someone who was going to bring such joy into her life.
She understood so much now.
But what about the father of her baby?
Would he still consider Mina an accident…
…or was he thinking about her as much as she was pining away for him?
Chapter Twelve
Hours later that same day, Chet sat in the stables at Florence Ranch, holding a copy of Mina’s resignation letter in his hands while sitting on a bale of hay. He’d cut out early from the office for some peace and quiet, because his mind sure wasn’t giving him any rest.
He still couldn’t forget the look that had been on Mina’s face when he’d left her. It was as if he’d pulled the floor out from under her, and gradually, realization—and betrayal—had taken over her expression. Then he’d stupidly left her alone, just to do that cooling off thing of his, only to come back and find everything gone—her luggage, her clothing…
Her.
Then, even more foolishly, he’d told himself that she just needed a little space, so he hadn’t called her, believing that he would see her this morning when he reported for work on a rare late day at the office, where they could find some time alone together to smooth things over.
And that was when he’d found the letter under his door.
A remote, polite, businesslike resignation from his life.
That was when he realized that a mere phone call wasn’t going to erase the words they’d said to each other.
Unless he proved otherwise, was she always going to think he was too troubled?
He needed some advice on this, so he had come back here to the ranch to…
Hell, he might as well admit it. For the first time, he needed his brothers, and he’d left word back at the mansion asking them to meet him here.
He folded the letter while next to him in a stall, an Arabian mare stomped her hoof and nickered. Chet stood, just about ready to put the paper into his business suit pocket when someone walked through the entrance to the stables.
Scratch that—it was two people. Tyler and Jeremiah, who hadn’t left on his honeymoon with Ally to Lake Arrowhead in California yet.
“Saddling up?” Jeremiah asked Chet, eyeing his business suit.
“I didn’t want to go in the mansion, so that’s why I’m here instead.”
Since Eli hadn’t gone back to rehab yet, Chet had wanted to avoid the big house and any talk about Mina with his father. Besides, he’d already said goodbye to Eli this morning, before he’d headed out for the office.
It looked as if Jeremiah and Tyler were ready to ride themselves, with their jeans and hats. They were watching him expectantly. Everyone on the ranch knew that Mina had left already—Chet had only told them she’d scheduled an early day at the Group—and his hangdog expression was probably causing his brothers to wonder just what was going on.
Might as well get this over with.