"Yeah, I know. He's never spoken to me about it either. I wish he had. I hated Kane catching me off guard like that."
"Will you talk to your father about it?" Eileen asked.
I shook my head. "There's no point dredging up the past with him. He's not interested in talking to me about his failures. Perhaps I'll send him some of the newspaper articles when Kane's empire is toppled."
A look of concern crossed Eileen's face. She knew the collapse of my father's business was a difficult topic for me. It had changed him. We'd never been close, but at least before he lost everything, I'd admired him. Afterward I had to admit I'd been dismayed by the way he accepted his losses and never tried to rebuild. It made me determined to walk a different path.
Eileen got up from her seat and sat on the sofa beside me. She pulled me into her arms and hugged me. As I rested my head on her shoulder, she ran her fingers through my hair, the way she’d done when I was a little boy. We stayed like that for the longest time.
"You'll never be like him," she said eventually. As always, she'd seen right to the heart of what bothered me the most. "When you have a child, you'll give them your all."
"You think I'd be a good dad?"
"The best." Eileen kissed my forehead. "Now get upstairs to that lovely girl of yours."
Taking her advice, I headed upstairs.
Juliet was in my bed, the lamp on the nightstand casting a low light across the room. She'd let her hair down and removed her makeup and was sitting up against the headboard, her knees drawn up to her chest. Once again, she was wearing one of my shirts. I didn't mind her borrowing them. She looked far better in them than I did. She smiled softly at me when I came in and said nothing.
I undressed, got into bed beside her, and lay back, staring at the ceiling. After a moment, Juliet turned off the lamp and settled against my side, her head on my chest, a hand over my heart.
"I didn't know it was him," I said into the dark.
"I know," she said. "I saw how shocked you were."
We lay there quietly for a while. Outside the valley was still. I could feel the slight tension in Juliet's body. I'd learned that meant she had something to say and was choosing her moment.
"Scott will make sure he pays for all of it," she said eventually.
"Yes," I said.
She tilted her head up and looked at me in the dark. "Are you all right?"
"I will be," I said.
She held my gaze for a moment longer, then rested her head back on my chest. I pressed my lips to the top of her head and soothed by her presence, I slept.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Juliet
I'd been puttering about in the kitchen garden for about thirty minutes when my phone started pinging with notifications. Pushing to my feet, I dusted the dirt from my knees and grabbed the phone from where it sat on the low stone wall. As I read through the various messages, I slowly sank back onto the wall.
Nate emerged through the back door of the kitchen a few minutes later. He came and sat beside me.
"Have you seen all this?" I asked, referring to the breaking news articles about Garrett Kane's transgressions.
"I have," Nate confirmed. "I just got off the phone with Scott. The FBI took Kane into custody early this morning."
"The FBI, not the police?"
Nate shook his head. "His crimes crossed state lines. There might even be an international aspect to it. He's being investigated for insider trading, fraud, and who knows what else, as well as for what he did to all those women."
Relief flooded my veins. "Things could have been so much worse for me. If I hadn't come to you that night… ugh, I shudder to think where I'd be now."
"Don't think about it." Nate picked up a sprig of the rosemary I'd been cutting and rolled it between his fingers.
"That's easier said than done," I grumbled. "But I'll try."
