Broken: The MISTAKEN Series Complete Second Season (23 page)

P
resent Day

A
nother problem
. There was nothing else that could surprise me tonight, and it was almost a relief that the shock and disgust that I had been feeling since Brandon and I had sat down was giving way to something much more comforting—numbness. Numbness was a safe feeling, and one I had embraced all too often in the past eighteen months or so. Before I met Brandon, anyway.

I turned to look at him. His gaze was still glued to his hands—I don’t think he had looked up since we sat down. The color had drained from his face and it looked like he might be having just as much trouble breathing as I was.

The realization that he had been lying to me—probably the entire time we had known each other—was only just starting to sink in. All the flowery words, the promises that the universe wanted us to be together—it was all bullshit. And I should have known.

My father interrupted my thoughts. “Daniel has something he would like to say to you.” He turned to the tall man sitting next to him. “Don’t you, Daniel?”

Daniel’s gaze was still fixed on me. I thought for sure it had been since I
had sat down—Brandon couldn’t look away from his hands, and Daniel couldn’t look away from
me
. I didn’t even want to think about what that meant.

Daniel nodded, never looking away. “I do.” He took a sip from the glass that was in front of him. “I need to apologize, Jenna.”

I felt heat rise in my cheeks. I could hear my pulse pounding in my ears and it took every bit of strength I had not to dive over the table and strangle the man.

I knew my father sensed the rage I was feeling when he reached his hand across the table to pat my arm. “Jenna. Let him explain.” The calmness in his voice almost made me want to turn my anger to him—at that moment, I could have strangled either of them.

Daniel licked his lips, almost suggestively, his eyes narrowing. “We have a long history together, Jenna. I don’t want you to turn your back on that.”

I wanted to slap that look from his face—that look he had that said I should just sit back and shut up because I was too dumb to know any better. Too spineless to do anything about what he had done to me. I shook my head, looking between Daniel and my father. “You raped me. You
raped
me. And now you think an apology…”

It was almost a smirk that came to Daniel’s lips. Almost a smug look that told me he didn’t give a fuck what I thought about him.

But my father was the one who interrupted. “Jenna, I think you’re overreacting a bit. From what Daniel tells me…”

Daniel interrupted. “You wanted it.”

The look my father shot him when he spoke shut him up again, but his words were still out there. Mocking me.

I wanted it.
I wanted it?
I looked over at Brandon. His eyes were squeezed shut and his hands were balled into fists. He may have been almost as pissed off as I was at Daniel’s words, but it was clear he wasn’t about to do a thing about it.

My father pressed his palms to the table. “You’re not pregnant, right? So the whole he-said-she-said aspect of this spat isn’t important. What’s important,
Jenna
…” I could tell the pause was for dramatic effect, not to mention the need for him to punctuate the fact that he saw the entire incident as
my
fault. “What’s important is that you forgive your fiancé. Because the press is going to have a field day with the news that Daniel is alive, and I’m going to need you to stand by him. Krystal is working on it now…”

“No.” I stood up from the table. “No.”

If daggers could have actually flown from my father’s eyes, I would have been a dead woman. Not that death would have necessarily been a bad thing, especially at the thought of having to be engaged to
him
. Even for a second. Even if it was temporary. There was no way I was going allow myself to be anywhere near him—never, ever again.

“I’m not doing it. This … this family is beyond twisted. I’m done. I just want a normal life. I’m going back to San Francisco. I’ll get a job. I’ll…”

“Sit down, Jenna.” If it had been my father who had said the words, I might have run. If it had been Daniel, I might have flown over the table to strangle the bastard. But it wasn’t either of them who said it. It was Brandon. “Sit.” He patted his hand on the seat I had vacated only a moment before.

I looked back at the table—at Brandon. He finally made eye contact with me, but I couldn’t read what was in his gaze. But there was something—
something
that said he wasn’t really going to let this happen. Something that said none of this would really happen if I could just make it through the next few minutes. And so I sat.

He called me Jenna
. My head began to spin again and I felt tears stinging at my eyes. Maybe I shouldn’t have trusted that look in his eyes. I probably shouldn’t have trusted anything, but I was out of options, out of choices.

“Thank you, Brandon.” My father blew out an exasperated sigh. “As I was saying, it is going to be important for you to uphold your end of this agreement, Jenna.”

“I never agreed to anything.” I couldn’t believe I still had the ability to speak, considering how badly my chest was aching.

My father set his jaw and I saw one of his hands ball into a fist. “You agreed to marry Daniel. Now, as I was saying, until this dies down in the press, I’ll need to you stand by him. Support him. Krystal is going to come up with a mutually acceptable story…”

“Mutually acceptable to whom? To me?” I looked again between my father and Daniel. I was so sick of being treated as though I was an afterthought in their stories. As long as it made my father look good, it didn’t really matter who else was hurt. It didn’t matter if anyone else had their life ruined. The only important thing was protecting his golden image.

I just wanted out. I could live in Montana, in some rustic cabin that probably didn’t have running water or electricity. I could do it, and it would be so much better than having to live the lies that these men kept trying to get me to support. Anything would be better than trying to figure out what was real and what wasn’t real.

I turned my gaze to Brandon, who was now glaring across at Daniel. It was just too bad Daniel hadn’t seemed to notice at all, because Daniel’s gaze was still permanently fixed on me. I still had no idea what had transpired. What the whole kidnapping thing was about. What
any
of this was about. But I could feel myself slowly beginning to lose my sanity. And maybe it really wasn’t all that slow. I was
definitely
losing it, and spending some time at Shady Shores seemed like it might just be a better option than trying to figure out what in the hell was going on here. Hell, just telling the staff at an insane asylum about this twisted mess would probably get me admitted there for life. And to be honest, playing in the sand forever didn’t seem like too bad of an option given the choices I had in front of me. Or lack of choices.

“Jenna. You
will
support him. That isn’t an option. You were promised to him some time ago—promised to his family. Daniel made some mistakes, and he has apologized for them. It is important to both your mother and I, and also to my career, that you do
exactly
as I say.” He folded his hands together, his voice now almost painfully calm. “Monday morning, you, Daniel and his father will be at a press conference in Washington, D.C. You will stand by his side and hold his hand.
And you will not say a word
. Is that clear, young lady?”

It was like a bad dream—almost like the moment I found out he was dead. I knew it was happening, but something about the situation seemed surreal. It was almost like a cloudy vision—it wasn’t quite within my grasp. All I could do was shake my head, my jaw slackened. This couldn’t really be happening. My father wanted me to stand next to the man who had kidnapped me less than two months ago. He wanted me to support a man who had pretty much admitted he
raped
me two months ago. And my father was supporting
him
and not me? It just couldn’t be real. I almost wanted to pinch myself, sure I would wake up from a nightmare.
Maybe I’ll be back in the hotel room with Brandon…

I looked over at Brandon. He was back to staring at his folded hands again, no real expression on his face. He was hard to read when weird shit
wasn’t
happening all around us, but his face now was just completely blank.

My father continued. “You’ll fly out Sunday.” He looked down at his watch. “Considering that is almost tomorrow, you should get home and get some rest. I don’t want to see a single tear on Monday morning unless it’s a tear of joy. Are we understood?”

All I could do was shake my head again. There was nothing I understood about this. And not a damned thing I was about to agree to.

My father let out another sigh. “Good. Brandon, I trust that you can get my daughter … my
engaged
daughter home safely tonight?”

My gaze darted to him and I saw him give my father a single nod.

“Good. You two end this fiasco once and for all now. I don’t want to hear another word about the two of you together after tonight.” He looked between the two of us. “Both of you understand?”

I shook my head again and watched as Brandon nodded again. How he was able to agree with anything my father said was beyond me. It was so unfathomable that I couldn’t really believe it.

“Very good. And Brandon, you’ll have that job completed no later than Sunday evening. You can let your sister know the results.” My father turned his gaze back to me. “Get some rest, Jenna. It’s going to be a long week.” He slid out of his seat and Daniel followed close behind.

I cringed as Daniel bent down and kissed the top of my head as he walked past my seat. He dipped his head lower and trailed his tongue across the top of my ear.

I winced and had to force down the bile I felt in my throat.

He leaned in closer and whispered into my ear. “Tell Brandon I won.” He turned and planted a kiss on my cheek, stood up and walked toward the door with my father. He turned back before they exited. “And Jenna, make sure your hair is blonde again before you come home.”

I looked over at Brandon, who still had his eyes downcast, staring at his hands still folded neatly on the table. The way his eyes were almost hooded told me everything I needed to know.

He’d lost.

S
even Months
Earlier

I
looked
at the number on the cell phone and thought for a moment about whether I should even answer. The area code was San Francisco, but it definitely wasn’t my grandmother’s number. I decided to answer, praying it wasn’t someone who might actually ask me to come back to that hell hole of a city.

“Mr. Richardson? This is Carrie from Hospice of San Francisco. Your grandmother asked me to call…”

I closed my eyes. I knew this day would come, just not this soon. My heart felt heavy in my chest when the woman on the other end of the line told me that my grandmother had just been admitted to their facility. She said the doctors had given her three months, but with this type of cancer, no one could ever be sure. She could have more time than that, she said, or maybe she would have less. Three months’ time was the average.

I hung up the phone. I leaned back in my chair, closing my eyes to let the information sink in. My grandmother had raised me from the time I was four—she was the only parent I had really ever known. And even with her crazy vendetta against the Davis family, she was the only family I really had aside from my sister. I knew I had to go back—had to see her at least one more time before she died. I owed her that much.

I finished up the paperwork I had been working on. I had originally thought that buying this company in Osaka a few months ago was going to be a pain in my ass—especially after Senator Davis had paid me to keep Daniel busy here. To keep him the hell away from his daughter, anyway. Christ, I hadn’t let myself think about Jenna Davis in years. I wondered if she looked the same—her long brown hair and deep blue eyes that could cut into a man’s soul…
Stop.
I couldn’t let myself go back to those thoughts. I wouldn’t allow myself to think about her ever again, not after I knew she had made an actual
choice
to be with the douche bag that was Daniel Sato. Any woman who could choose
that
was one I wanted to stay as far away from as possible.

Keeping Daniel busy had been easy. I hadn’t even had to see the asshole since I brought him here a year ago. God, had it already been a year? Time was flying, and I really needed to think about what in the hell I was going to do about that. My grandmother would be asking as soon as I flew in to see her, anyway. She would want to know what I planned to do to keep the Richardson family name alive—not that there was much of a Richardson name left to keep alive. She wanted great-grandchildren, and it was something she’d been giving me grief about for the past few years. I felt a little pang of guilt in my stomach, knowing she wouldn’t live to see her first.

When my office door swung open without a knock, I was sure it was going to be my secretary—she was the only one who ever came in here, but she was also polite—she would have knocked. My skin began to crawl in an all-too-familiar way when I looked up to see Daniel standing in front of my desk. There was something about this guy that made me sick—physically ill. My stomach began to sour as soon as he was in my presence.

He dropped two photos and a backpack on my desk without as much as a word.

I looked down at the photos, both of the same woman. She was beautiful—shoulder-length blonde hair and striking blue eyes. I looked back up at the man standing in front of my desk. This was pretty typical for the type of business I did now—finding people and getting them to do this or that. At least it wasn’t all politics anymore, but I had to admit, doing any favors for Daniel was about the last thing I wanted to do. “Who is it?”

He looked down at the pictures, and I could have almost sworn he had a tear in his eye. If I hadn’t known Daniel was incapable of actually
feeling
, I would have been sure of it. “That’s Jenna.”

That’s Jenna?
She looked different. Older, more mature. But different, too. Like something was missing. I had to remind myself again that I didn’t really
know
the woman. Anything I thought was missing or not missing was all in my imagination. And she had to be different than I remembered her anyway. I remembered her as an eighteen-year-old woman who gave up a career doing something she was amazingly talented at for the man standing in front of me.

I slid the photos back toward him. “Ancient history, Daniel.”

He shook his head and pushed the backpack toward me. “All I want is to get her here. That’s all you have to do. I built her a house—a house with a piano in the living room that overlooks the ocean. Exactly what she always wanted. Just get her here and I’ll take care of everything else.” He looked at me again, his eyes almost pleading with me. “Please, Brandon. I’m a changed man. I just
need
her. I need her here.”

I shook my head. “First of all, there is no way her father would go for this. We both know that.”

“I don’t care. I’ll deal with him. You just get her here…”

I rolled my eyes. “Second of all, it’s been a year, Daniel. She’s moved on.”

“She hasn’t. She wouldn’t. You don’t understand, man. We were in love…”

I remembered the non-stop dialog on the plane when I’d brought him here. How much he loved her. How sorry he was for treating her the way he had. How he had to get her back. How she’d want him if she knew what was going on. I shook my head again. “Loving a woman like this makes you weak. Feeling like there is
one
woman out there for you—only
one
who can make you happy—makes you a weak man.” I walked to the window and looked out at the city. “Pick any other woman you want out there. There are millions of women here who don’t think you’re already dead.”

“You don’t understand.” He started unloading stacks of cash from the backpack onto my desk. “This is just a deposit. Get her here, and I’ll pay you whatever you want. Anything you want.”

I had to admit, it was a lot of money. I didn’t really need it, but it was a lot. And it would allow me to find another babysitter for Daniel. I wouldn’t even have to see her or meet her to get this job done. It wouldn’t be that hard to make a few calls, bribe a co-worker of hers to get her to a fake meeting here. It would almost be
too
easy, especially for that much money. And while taking advantage of a lovesick man wasn’t usually in my taste—this was
Daniel
we were talking about. Daniel, the asshole who treated people so poorly he had found himself banished here by his own father. Daniel, who had fucked his life up so badly that he was not only banished to his father’s home country—he was banished here without the love of his life. He deserved not to have her after the shit he had pulled. He deserved a lot of things, but the best thing of all would be to bankrupt him.

“Ten million.”

His eyes widened and his mouth dropped open. “Brandon, that would be everything. I mean…”

I shrugged. “Ten million or I’m not doing it.” I shrugged again. “You can do it yourself.”

“I’d be dead for real if I tried to do it myself. I mean, there are people watching everything I do…”

“Exactly. Ten million or no deal.”

His mouth opened, but he didn’t make a sound. He looked … broken. He was a broken man and now he would also be broke. He’d get to feel exactly what it was like to be taken advantage of—to have someone you trust take everything away, just like he had done.

But he’ll find comfort in the arms of his beloved Jenna…
Shit. He didn’t deserve her. He didn’t deserve anyone.

He extended his hand. “Deal. Ten million. I’ll get you half now—the other half when she gets here.”

I couldn’t even force a smile to my face. There was nothing good about this transaction. Nothing in it for me but money. The fact that it felt so
wrong
didn’t help, either. “Great. Give me a couple weeks. I have to go to San Francisco anyway for some family business.”

I
was right
—it had almost been
too
easy. It was pure coincidence that Jenna Davis also lived in San Francisco now. I didn’t need to see her, though. I definitely didn’t need to feed that youthful obsession I’d once had with her. I hadn’t even thought about her, anyway. Well, except for the times that Daniel talked my ear off about her. And if the photos he had shown me in Japan were any indication, the woman wasn’t my type, anyway. Blondes had never really been my type, and blondes who could fall in love with some asshole like Daniel … definitely not my type. The fact that she had given up the one thing she loved—music—for a man like Daniel … I
knew
she wasn’t my type. Not anymore.

My grandmother was losing it. Seeing her like this was heartbreaking and the crazy shit she was saying wasn’t even funny or cute anymore. I wasn’t going to go pick up some woman tonight just because she’d had some kind of “vision.” My grandmother wasn’t like that—she loved San Francisco for some unknown reason, but she sure as hell wasn’t one of those hippy-dippy types who had “visions.”

I had rented an apartment for three months. I figured if she made it longer, I could always extend the lease, but I sure as hell didn’t want to live in a hotel for that long. And the place was nice and only a few blocks from the hospice. It was an easy walk and there was plenty to do nearby.

I had already made the calls to set up Daniel’s fiancée—to get her back to him. Ex-fiancée. Whatever the hell she was. The spineless woman who had agreed to marry him for some reason I would never understand. I didn’t know what
anyone
could ever see in that man. Calling him a douche bag—my favorite term for him—was almost too kind. He was a dirt bag of the worst kind, and the way he treated women…

But I was sure she deserved him. She was a Davis, after all. A Hennessey. She had evil blood in her veins, at least according to my grandmother. Evil blood and an evil father who had killed my parents, at least as far as my grandmother was concerned.

I turned the corner to go back to my temporary apartment. My grandmother had told me I needed to go out tonight. That I would meet
her. The One.
The one who would give her the great-grandchildren she so desperately wanted. I breathed out a long sigh. There was no way I was going to meet “her,” whoever “she” was. Not tonight, anyway. Not with my grandmother dying in a hospital bed a few blocks away. And I didn’t want to pick up any more women in bars. Women in bars were desperate. Desperate for different things, sure, but
desperate.
And desperation was the last thing I needed.

I walked past a sign and then turned around to look at it again.
Watercolor Classes Tonight
. I had always loved to paint when I was younger. I thought I was even pretty good at it for a while, but then life got in the way. But painting sounded a hell of a lot better than drinking tonight.

And grandma never said
where
I’d meet
The One.

I signed up for the class and walked up the stairs to find a seat. I was one of the last people there and I had to sit in the back corner. I scanned the room—there was definitely not anyone here who wasn’t at least twice my age. My grandmother was wrong. I wasn’t going to meet “The One” tonight, but I was at least going to come out of this class with a painting to hang in her hospital room. I knew she would love it, even if she had been wrong about me meeting the woman I would spend the rest of my life with.

And then
she
walked in the room. And when she sat down next to me—the last seat in the class—I thought I was going to lose it. My heart was beating out of my chest and I hadn’t even really seen her face. I knew it, though. I could feel it. I
knew
it the second she walked in the door, and it didn’t matter what she looked like or who she was. She was the woman my grandmother was talking about. There wasn’t even a question in my mind. It was her. She was The One.