Shameless (15 page)

P
IPPA COULDN'T BELIEVE
it had been four weeks since she'd left Kingdom Come. She'd missed her father, but she was more than a little anxious about seeing him again. She knew he wasn't happy about her decision to spend the past month at Devon's cabin. He was going to be even less happy when he found out she had no intention of returning to her grandfather's ranch. She loved her father, and it was hard to go against his wishes, but she was determined to hold her ground if he tried to talk her out of staying where she was.

She was seated at a picnic table with a red-checked tablecloth drinking iced tea and waiting to eat barbecue from an entire steer being roasted on an outdoor spit. A country band on a raised dais played raucous tunes that encouraged skirts to fly and boots to stomp on the dance floor in front of them.

Despite the calamity that might be right around the corner—or maybe because of it—Pippa was itching to jump up and join the dancers. She was wearing a pretty red dress, and Devon had surprised her this morning with a brand-new pair of American cowboy boots, one of which was keeping time with the music under the table.

It was a good thing the front lawn at Kingdom Come was so immense, because Pippa estimated that three hundred people had shown up for the First Annual Safe Haven Country Barbecue and Dance. She was counting on the fact that she was sitting at a table in the center of the crowd with Angus and his sons to keep her father from making a scene.

Almost as soon as she'd arrived, she'd spied her father at a table on the other side of the lawn with her brother. Nathan had come running to her, and they'd shared a big hug. Then she'd pulled him onto her lap and they'd talked, something they'd only done on the phone since she'd been gone. But she'd remained on tenterhooks, because she knew it was just a matter of time before her father sought her out.

Pippa had encouraged Devon to go dance with one of the women who'd approached him, so he wouldn't be sitting there when her father confronted her. But he'd refused each of the women with a friendly smile, saying he was keeping Pippa company. “Come dance with me,” he said when another woman had come and gone. “I don't want to leave you sitting here alone to go dance with someone else, and besides, I can see your toe tapping under the table.”

Pippa laughed at being caught out. She'd watched couples dancing on television and had mimicked the steps, but those dances were nothing like what she saw people doing here. She dearly wanted to accept his offer but was forced to admit, “I don't know how to do those western steps.”

“They're playing a waltz,” he countered with a charming smile that made her insides dance, even though she was still sitting down.

“I've never done this with a partner,” she confessed, her face flushing with embarrassment.

“I'll teach you.” He took both of her hands in his, drawing her to her feet before leading her to the dance floor.

She'd seen the waltz performed in movies, and she'd secretly wished to be held in a man's arms and elegantly twirled around a dance floor. But dancing hadn't been a part of her life on a cattle station. She leaned close and said, “I don't want to make a fool of myself.”

“You won't,” he replied confidently.

“You seem very sure I'll be able to keep up with you.”

He grinned. “Can you count to three?”

“Of course!” she said, surprised to find herself breathless before they'd even started.

“Then you can waltz.” Without saying more, he placed one of her hands on his shoulder, put his hand at her waist, and took her opposite hand in his. “Now, count with me as you step—one two three, one two three.”

Pippa realized Devon was using both his secure hold on her waist and his firm grip on her hand to guide her in the direction he wanted her to go. Before she knew it, she was following him—or he was leading her—gracefully around the dance floor. The full skirt of her empire-waisted sundress—the one she'd figured would hide her four-months-pregnant belly best—flared as he let go of his hold on her waist and twirled her under his upraised hand. She laughed, exhilarated by the music and the dance, as he caught her up again and took them on another turn around the floor.

Their eyes locked, and everything fell away except the warmth she felt in Devon's gaze and the strength she felt in his arms. When the music ended, he pulled her close for a hug. She hugged him back—until she remembered that her father might be watching her. She stepped aside, searching the crowd, and sure enough, spied him frowning in her direction. She wanted to postpone her conversation with him as long as she could, so she turned away and said, “I'm a little hungry. Why don't we see if that barbecue's done?”

She obviously hadn't fooled Devon. He glanced at her father and said, “Let's get you situated back at the table. Then I'll bring us both something to eat.”

Pippa worried that her father might decide to get to her through Devon, and she didn't want him blaming Devon for something that was entirely her choice. It made sense to keep Devon by her side. That way she could head off her father if he tried that tactic. “I can wait to eat. Come back to the table with me.”

When they got back to the table, they discovered someone had already brought prepared plates of food—barbecue, baked beans, coleslaw, and rolls—for everyone. Devon was just seating himself after adjusting her chair, when she realized her father had finally made his move. A moment later, he was standing right behind her.

“Hello, Pippa.”

She turned in her chair so she was facing him, gripping the back of it as though she expected him to try to bodily remove her. His brow was furrowed, and she saw dark shadows under his eyes that hadn't been there before she'd left home. She felt her gut clench with concern for him. “Hi, Daddy.”

“How are you?”

She tried to speak, but nothing came out.

“She's fine,” Devon said.

To her dismay, her father's gaze shifted to Devon. “Pippa doesn't belong at some remote ranch in the mountains, especially with that wolf you keep as a pet in the house at night. She needs—” He cut himself off and refocused his gaze on Pippa.

She paled as she realized how close her father had come to inadvertently revealing her secret to everyone within hearing, including her aunt Eve, who'd come running—apparently to act as peacemaker—when her father approached the table. Pippa could guess what he'd started to say but hadn't.

She needs…to be taking better care of herself and her baby. She needs…to be closer to a doctor.

Her cheeks were hot, and she felt sick to her stomach. Without thinking, she put a protective hand over her baby. She was taking good care of both of them, but there was no way to say that to her father in such a public setting. She'd visited a doctor in town the week past, when she'd gone into Jackson for groceries while Devon was busy on the range. She'd learned that both she and the baby were healthy, and she'd started taking prenatal vitamins. If her father had drawn her aside, she would have told him as much.

She looked up at him, beseeching him for understanding. “Please, Daddy. I'm where I want to be.”

Her father lowered his voice, but his tone was even harsher. “Come home, Pippa. You need to be with your family.”

“She
is
with family,” Devon said in a quiet voice. He laid a possessive hand on Pippa's shoulder and said to her father, “Sit down and stop making an ass of yourself, Matt. Pippa's old enough to decide what she wants to do with her life.”

Pippa barely managed to keep her jaw from dropping. No one spoke to her father like that! Except, Devon just had.

Her father snarled, “Get your hands off her.”

“Daddy, please don't do this!” Pippa cried.

She knew her father well enough to see that he was at the end of his rope. His eyes had narrowed and his fists were clenched. She'd known he was upset with her, but because he hadn't come after her, she'd assumed he'd reconciled himself to what she'd done. It was clear from his behavior toward Devon that she'd been very, very wrong. He'd bottled up his worry, and now it was about to spill out.

“Devon had nothing to do with this, Daddy. It was entirely my idea. I needed some time on my own. Devon just gave me a place to stay.”

“He should have known better. He should have brought you home. He should have minded his own damn business!”

Devon's hand fell away as he rose. “Whoa, there, Matt. I only offered her—”

Her father suddenly took a swing at Devon.

Pippa cried a warning, but Devon had already dodged sideways, so the blow never struck him. Her father was gathering himself for another try when her grandfather arrived at the table and said, “That's enough.”

Her father turned to King, his eyes tortured, his voice as rough as gravel, and said, “Butt out, old man! You've done enough damage to my life, don't you think?”

There it was again, the suggestion that her grandfather was responsible for her father's long-ago disappearance. She was still cringing from her father's attack on her grandfather when Angus said, “Don't worry, Matt. King won't be around much longer to bother you. He's about to go down for the third time.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” King snapped.

“Even the
Titanic
can sink,” Angus said with a smug smile. “Which is to say, you've invested in one risky venture too many.” His voice turned nasty as he added, “I've been waiting twenty years for what's coming. I hope you suffer as much as my sister did when you drown in the shit that's coming your way.”

Pippa's stomach was threatening to erupt, and she swallowed hard to force the bile back down. Angus was going to destroy King? And King had no way to stop him? She'd heard about the animosity between Angus and King, but she'd never imagined the looks of hatred she saw on the two men's faces or the venom in their voices. She wanted to be gone from here, to escape to someplace where people didn't hate each other or hurt each other.

Devon's brother Connor suddenly appeared at Eve's side, put a reassuring arm around his wife's waist, and said, “What seems to be the problem, Matt?”

“Nothing that concerns you,” her father retorted, his eyes darting from Connor to King to Angus to Devon and back again like a baited bear.

“You're all disturbing my guests,” Connor said. “Folks are here to enjoy some barbecue and beer, so let's skip the fracas. You two old bulls—and you two young ones—can settle this another time.”

Pippa grabbed at Connor's suggestion as though it were a tangled rope in a raging river. “Please, Daddy,” she begged.

To her relief, her father's fists unclenched. “Fine,” he said to Connor through tight jaws. But he turned to Devon and added, “If I find out you've touched so much as a hair on my daughter's head, I'll—”

“They're related, for Christ's sake!” Connor interrupted.

Her father looked straight at Devon and said, “No, they're not.”

Pippa registered the stark look in Devon's green eyes as his brother Brian leapt up and said, “What the hell are you talking about?”

“Figure it out for yourselves,” her father said.

Pippa had never made much of the blood connection between herself and Devon because they were only second cousins—his father was her father's uncle. But her father's comment made no sense, because that link did, in fact, make them related.

Pippa saw the malicious look King shot Angus—which seemed to confirm that the accusation her father had thrown out was going to create havoc for his rival—before both her father and her grandfather turned and stalked away.

Pippa realized that every male at the table had immediately jumped to the conclusion that Devon was the one without a connection to her, rather than the other way around. While no one had bothered to ask, Pippa knew for a fact that she was her father's daughter. That issue had been resolved when she was thirteen and had needed a transfusion. Her father had provided the blood.

Devon was looking to his father for an explanation, his face completely leached of color.

Angus's gaze remained focused on his hands, which were picking at the label on his ice-cold beer.

“Dad?” Devon said. “What did he mean?”

“He's just making trouble, stirring the pot to see what boils over,” Angus said. But he never lifted his gaze from his bottle of beer.

Pippa could see that Devon was troubled by Angus's refusal to deny her father's statement, which suggested that he wasn't Angus's son.

She tried to meet Devon's gaze, but it was still focused on his father. She felt her breath catch in her throat as she drew the only conclusion that seemed possible from Angus's continued refusal to refute her father's accusation.

Angus isn't Devon's father.

I'm not his
son.

Devon was still reeling from Matt's revelation, which his father had refused to deny. All his life he'd feared the truth. Now he knew for certain that he was no relation to Angus Flynn. Which meant that his mother, the one he'd killed with his birth, had slept with another man. That certainly explained why his father had treated him differently all his life.

I'm some other man's bastard son.

Devon saw the looks of surprise and horror and disgust as each of his brothers reacted to the suggestion that their mother might have cheated on their father—and that Angus had apparently known about her betrayal. He felt only relief. Now he no longer had to live a lie.

And yet, with this new knowledge, his life had been irrevocably altered. His heart was pounding and his ears were ringing as though someone had just shot off a gun next to his head. His eyes were watering and his nose stung and he wasn't sure how much longer he could stand here without losing it completely.

Leah suddenly arrived at Eve's side—apparently unaware of the wreckage Matt had left in his wake—and said to her, “It's time you stopped playing peacemaker and started enjoying the party.”

She took the beer out of Connor's hand, set Eve's hand in its place, and said, “Go dance with your wife.”

Connor seemed willing to comply, but he paused long enough to say to Devon, “We'll discuss this later.”

“No,” Devon rasped. “We won't.” His throat ached, and he was afraid that in another moment he wouldn't be able to speak at all. He reached out and grasped Pippa's hand, needing something to hang on to so he wouldn't fly into a million pieces. It was one thing to
think
he'd grown up with a father who wasn't related to him. It was another thing to
know
it.

He gritted his teeth to stop his chin from quivering, then focused his gaze on Angus and said, “As far as I'm concerned, the subject is closed.” He turned to Pippa and, in a voice that revealed nothing of the turmoil he felt inside, said, “Would you like to dance?”

She quickly rose, as though she could see the cliff edge on which he was poised, and said, “Yes, I would. Thank you, Devon.”

Without another word, he and Pippa left his slack-jawed brothers behind at the table. But they never reached the dance floor. Devon knew there was no way he could keep pretending in front of all these people that everything was fine when, in fact, he'd just been struck by a million volts of lightning. He reversed course and headed straight for his truck.

“Devon, slow down!” Pippa said, tugging against his grasp on her hand. “I can't keep up with you.”

He realized he was almost running and forced himself to relax his pace.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

“Hunky-dory,” he said through tight jaws.

“What if my father made it all up? What if he doesn't know what he's talking about?”

“He knows, all right.”

She frowned up at him. “You believed him? What makes you so sure he's right?”

Devon avoided the question, just kept moving toward his truck, pulling her along behind him.

“Devon, talk to me!”

He stopped and released his grasp on her hand, then balled his hands into fists because he didn't want her to see how badly they were shaking. “How did your father find out I'm not Angus's son?”

“I have no idea. I wouldn't be surprised if it's something he made up to piss you off so you'd throw me out.”

“My father didn't contradict him.”

“He shouldn't have to,” Pippa said. “Why would you even consider such an outlandish suggestion?”

Devon met her gaze and said in a harsh voice, “I've told you why. I'm not like the rest of them. Angus doesn't treat me the same way as he does my brothers.” He swallowed over the painful knot in his throat as he realized that Aiden and Brian and Connor were actually his
half
brothers. “I've never felt like I belonged.”

“Maybe it's because you're the youngest, and you never knew your mother.”

“Maybe it's because I had a different father,” he replied curtly.

Pippa's eyes looked as troubled as he felt. She didn't speak, just unballed one of his fists so she could take his hand in hers again. “Let's go home. Wulf will be hungry.”

Devon huffed out a breath, then glanced over his shoulders at the table where the rest of his family sat. He didn't want to discuss his mother's affair with his brothers. He wasn't particularly interested in discussing it with his “father,” either, except to force Angus to admit that that he'd been prejudiced against Devon all his life.

He was aware of Pippa's firm grip on his hand, keeping him grounded, keeping him in the here and now, but his mind was a jumble of thoughts. Who was his father? How had his mother met the man? Why had she engaged in an affair with him?

His mother had always been a mysterious figure in his life, but he was realizing just how little he really knew about her. Why had she stayed with Angus when she knew she was going to bear another man's child? Had she, perhaps, not known?

And why had Angus raised him, if he'd been so sure that Devon was another man's child. Did his biological father know of his existence? Was he out there somewhere? Might he want to meet Devon if he knew he had a grown son?

More importantly, do I want to meet him? I don't know. He's nothing to me. He just provided the seed. What kind of man was he to have an affair with a married woman and then walk away without looking back?

Devon wondered just how much Angus knew, and whether he would tell Devon everything he did know if he asked. Was Angus certain who Devon's biological father was? If so, what had kept Angus from divorcing Devon's mother? And then Devon realized that divorce might have come later—if she'd lived.

Devon wasn't sure he wanted to know the answers to all of his questions. That didn't keep them from replaying endlessly in his mind, crashing around like an avalanche of boulders and causing his head to ache.

Devon realized that having Pippa stay with him—now that they weren't even distantly related—had become infinitely more complicated. But his feelings for her hadn't changed. Now, more than ever, he wanted someone in his life who loved him for who he was, someone whom he could love in return, someone he could rely on in his suddenly tumultuous life.

“Do you still want to stay at my place after what happened between me and your dad today?”

She shot him a curious look. “Do you mean because we're not technically second cousins anymore? I liked you before my father's revelation—and I like you now.”

“But who is it you like?” he said bitterly. “Who am I now?”

She put her fingertips on his lips to silence him. “You're the same kind, stong man you've always been. Having a different biological father doesn't change who you are.”

She caressed his cheek as she looked deep into his eyes. “I can't imagine how I'd feel in your shoes. It must be…” She paused, frowned as she apparently searched for the right word, and finally said, “Upsetting, to say the least.”

“Upsetting? Try life altering.”

“You're missing the point,” she said. “This revelation doesn't have to change how you live your life.”

He made a sound in his throat but didn't contradict her.

“To prove my point, if you're willing for me to stay—in spite of how badly my dad acted toward you—I'd like to hang around a little longer.”

“That sounds good to me,” Devon said, kissing her fingertips and then taking her hand in his. “You're the one person in my life I can trust to be straight with me.”

Devon watched a shadow cross Pippa's eyes. She opened her mouth to speak and then clamped it shut again. He wondered what it was she'd wanted to say. Something sympathetic? He didn't want her sympathy. Or her pity. He wanted her love. It was a relief to know she was going to be around so he could earn it.

Pippa sighed.

“Are you all right?” he asked, his lips quirking.

“I wish…” She let the words hang in the air.

“Yeah,” Devon said, understanding how she could have second thoughts and regrets and wish she'd done things in her life differently, because he felt the same way himself. “So do I.”

Pippa smiled and reached out to brush his forearm with her other hand in a gesture of friendship. “Thanks, Devon.”

“For what?”

“For being you. And for putting up with me.”

They'd reached his pickup, and he opened her door for her and helped her inside before crossing around the front of the truck and getting behind the wheel. “Believe it or not,” he said as he buckled up, “once upon a time, I had to run away from home, too.”

“Really?”

He surprised himself by smiling at the memory. “Angus had a fit when he found out I'd bought my ranch in the mountains. He told me I was crazy to live so isolated from other people. Told me I was just like—” He paused, struck suddenly by what his father's speech had revealed, something he hadn't understood at the time. “Angus cut himself off before he finished that sentence. He never said who I was just like.” Devon's mouth flattened. “It must be
him
I'm like. My biological father.”

He pounded the steering wheel. “Damn it! If Angus thinks I'm like
him,
it's because he knew my father. How could my mother have done something like that? She had Aiden and Brian and Connor one after the other and then, two years later, she had me. What the hell happened between my parents in those two years?”

“Maybe you should find your father—your biological father—and ask him.”

Devon rejected the idea with a disgusted sound. “That man is nothing to me.”

“Except it seems you're a great deal like him.”

“How did we get on this subject?” Devon said irritably.

“We were wishing things could be different.”

The silence between them grew oppressive. Pippa broke it by asking, “Do you think Angus has really figured out a way to ruin King?”

“How the hell should I know?”

Rather than snapping back at him, Pippa pressed her lips flat and turned to stare out the window.

Devon realized she had a very good reason for wanting to know whether King's empire was about to go belly-up. He chuffed out a breath of air and said, “Yeah, Angus might have figured out a way to do it. If he felt confident enough to talk about the trap he's set, it's a pretty good bet there's no way King can wriggle out of it. You're right to worry. Your dad might have come all this way for nothing. King might end up losing everything—including the ranch he promised to your father.”

Pippa's head snapped back around. “You're kidding, right?”

Devon shot her a sideways look. “Angus has been pretty closemouthed about when the ax will fall, but he's been gloating that the day is coming when he'll finally have his revenge for his sister's death.”

“Isn't there something King can do, or my father, to stop him?”

Devon shook his head. “I doubt it.”

“What about my dad? He left everything behind to come here. What's he supposed to do?”

“I don't have an answer for that.”

Pippa laid a beseeching hand on Devon's arm. “Is there any way we can find out exactly what Angus is planning?”

“What would you do with the information?”

“Tell my father, of course. So he can stop him.”

He arched a brow. “You've run away from your dad, but you still want to help him?”

“He's my father. Despite…everything…I love him.”

Devon dropped his hat on the bench seat between them and shoved a hand through his hair, leaving it askew. “I don't know, Pippa. I don't agree with what Angus is doing, but he's my father and—” Devon cut himself off. A muscle worked in his jaw. Angus wasn't his father. He'd made that clear all Devon's life. He didn't owe Angus Flynn a damned thing.

“All right,” he said. “Let's do it. I've never supported Angus's desire for revenge. Let me see what I can find out.”