Lovers' Lies (20 page)

Her hands clenched, knuckles gleamed white.

"What's wrong?"

"Connor's had a nasty fall. He's been taken to hospital by ambulance and he's undergoing surgery."

"No! Oh no.
No-ooo!
" Anguish ripped through her as she fought to stay upright. "What? Why?"

"He climbed on the sink and fell. They're operating to remove a piece of bone depressing on his brain. Can you come?"

The phone dropped from nerveless fingers. Her hands covered her mouth.

Logan snatched up the phone, talking rapidly into the receiver.
 

Panic and pain jostled for supremacy.
 

Not Connor! Not my baby!
 

She gripped the edge of the desk, fighting blackness and hysteria. Her knees buckled and her mouth twisted in a soundless scream.

"Tori?" Logan moved toward her.

Keir elbowed him out of the way, his strong arms supporting her. "What's happened? Is it your father?"

"No, it's Connor. He fell. They're operating on him now," she managed to gasp out, even as she fought to escape Keir’s grip. "Let me go."

She needed to get to her baby.
Now
.
 

Logan snapped the phone shut. "Your father's at Waikato Hospital, Tori. I'll take you."

Chapter Thirteen

K
eir’s grasp of the situation faltered.

Stunned he stared at Victoria, distantly aware of the soothing murmur of Logan’s voice. "I'll drive you, love. Don't panic. Connor will be okay."

"Connor?" Keir echoed confused.

Flailing for balance, he lost his grip as he saw Victoria's face contort in undisguised agony. This hit him harder than a fist in the solar plexus.
 

Who the hell was Connor?

What hold did he have to cause her such anguish?

He shook his head, his whole being recoiling in denial. Victoria had another lover?

She's lied to me?

Anger and betrayal unlike anything he'd ever known seeped under his skin. He'd honestly believed Victoria was different. Would he never learn that all women were liars and cheats, out to look after their own interests first?

The blinders were well and truly off.

"Who in hell is Connor?"

"Not now, Keir, please," Logan said quietly.

What did Logan know he didn’t? Jealousy roiled in Keir’s gut.

"The missing link," Caine said quietly. "Get your car, Logan. We’ll come with you. Which hospital? Waikato?"

"Yes," she managed. "Hurry, Connor might die."

Keir clenched his fist.

Logan sprinted for the door, and that was all that prevented Keir from slugging him.

"Help Victoria, Keir, before she falls!"

Keir instinctively obeyed his father’s abrupt command, even as he struggled to make sense of the situation.

He glanced at the woman he held. She was ashen, trembling as if afflicted by the ague and he tightened his grip.

Whoever this
Connor
was, there was no disguising her distress. And a few miserable hours ago she’d been warm, wanton and giving
in his arms
.

Jealousy, dread and disbelief formed great bloody boulders in his gut. He wanted answers. And by hell, he intended to get them.

Half carrying her, Keir followed Logan, his father at his heels. In the corridor, Muriel cornered them.

"Where do you think you’re going?" she demanded in a furious undertone. Her face ugly in her anger, she dug her fingers into his father’s arm.

Caine pulled her hand off his arm, glaring at her with a look of pure contempt. "Victoria needs to get to the hospital, Muriel, now."

"And that slut needs all of you?"

Eyes narrowed, brows drawn together in a dark frown, Keir watched his father and stepmother. His father's expression one Keir didn’t recognize.

"Mum, please don’t." Logan laid a hand on Muriel’s arm, his distress clear. "Tori’s my friend."

"You're a fool, Logan Sinclair. You can do without friends who lay it out for your brother."

"Logan, get the car. Enough Muriel! Not another word." Caine faced off with his wife.

Frowning, Keir glanced from his father to his stepmother. Here too, he had the sensation of walking on quicksand.

In all the years, he'd never heard his father speak to Muriel like this. And since his return, he’d avoided them whenever possible, but now there was no way he could mistake the vicious undercurrents.

What was going on here?

Far more than he realized, that was for sure.

"Keir needs me, Muriel," Caine said cuttingly. "My son and Victoria are more important than your petty gripes. Pass on my apologies to our guests. I'm sure they'll understand."

Almost spitting with fury, Muriel rounded on Keir and Victoria.
 

Keir moved to shield Victoria. In her distressed state, she wasn't capable of dealing with Muriel.

But to his surprise, his dad stepped in front of Muriel, leaned very close, and said, "One more word, Muriel, and I'll blow all your dirty secrets clean out of the water. Understand?"

Muriel backed off, gave Caine a look of pure loathing, turned on her heel and walked away.

Keir was still trying to make sense of that scene as he helped Victoria into the back seat of Logan’s car.

As Caine settled into the passenger seat, Keir studied his father's face. With a sense of shock, he realized the father he'd always thought tough and invincible suddenly looked old and beaten.

And guilt reared its ugly head.

So often Caine had tried to make amends for the past, and heal the breach between them. And acutely uncomfortable, Keir remembered how often
he'd
repudiated every attempt.

Instead he'd nursed his wounded pride.

Keir dismissed these uncomfortable thoughts, turning his attention to the woman in his arms.
 

Logan drove competently and fast, negotiating the long winding drive and then onto the highway toward Hamilton. The twenty kilometers between Cambridge and Hamilton were covered swiftly.

Victoria was white faced and trembling, her hands twisted and writhed in her lap, tension radiated off her in waves.

"He'll be okay," he murmured, driven to offer her some comfort.

Victoria looked up at him, her whisky color eyes almost black with desperation.

"I should never have left him," she said in a harsh whisper, gripping his arm, so hard he would probably have cuts where her nails dug in. "I knew Daphne couldn't cope with him."

Keir was still trying to make sense of this as Logan pulled into the hospital. The gateman waved them through to emergency parking.

Keir supported Victoria while Logan strode across to the desk and asked directions. They went along a corridor to a bank of lifts. When one arrived, they all stepped inside. Logan pressed buttons that sent it flying upwards to the operating suite.
 

They stepped out into a small enclosed reception area.

Logan approached the desk and asked for Andrew Scanlan.
 

The woman ushered them along the corridor, opened a door into a small waiting room where the lone occupant sat hunched, bowed head resting in his hands.

He looked up as the door opened.

And Keir knew this was Victoria’s father, the likeness between them, unmistakable.

The man stood and held out his arms. With a small cry, Victoria pulled free from Keir and ran to her father, burying her face in his shoulder.

"Hush," he murmured soothingly. "He'll be okay."

"What happened?" Victoria brushed away anxious tears.

"He tripped and fell. His head hit the steel corner of the workbench in the stable. He has a decompression skull fracture."

Keir tried to follow a conversation that made little sense. He intended to rectify that.

Now.

Who was this
Connor
who’d thrown Victoria, her father, Logan and now his father into panic? What was he to Victoria?

"Mr. Scanlan?" He stepped forward, hand outstretched. "Keir Donovan."

Andrew put Victoria aside and stepped forward.

"Are you now?" he asked, savagely sarcastic.

Before Keir could anticipate his intent, Andrew Scanlan drew back his fist and landed a cracking blow to Keir's jaw.

Stunned by the unexpectedness of it, he rocked back on his feet, almost knocked off balance.

"I've waited nearly six years to give you that, you bastard."

Keir felt as if he'd been slugged by a runaway train. In a peripheral part of his brain, he registered his father and Logan sucking harsh breaths.

"Dad! No! How could you?" Victoria cried out, clinging to her father's arm preventing the man throwing another punch.

Keir glanced at her, afraid she’d fall.

His father stepped forward, put an arm around her shoulders and guided her into a chair.

Keir shook his head like a dog coming out of water, and faced Victoria’s father. He took a step backward, rubbing a hand across his jaw in angry bewilderment.

"I don’t hit men older than myself," he gritted out from between clenched teeth, "but take another swing at me
old man
and I'll forget my scruples. What the hell was that for?"

Logan stepped forward and faced Keir, "Andrew’s done nothing I haven’t wanted to since Thursday night."

Keir shook his head in an effort to clear the fog of confusion. He turned to Victoria. "And you'd better tell me pronto what the hell's going on, here?"

"Leave my daughter alone, Donovan." Andrew said drawing himself up to his full height, his fists clenched, eyes snapping with belligerence.

Logan, always the peacemaker, stepped forward and did the introductions. "Andrew, my stepfather, Caine Donovan."

His even words diffused the tension, and Caine stepped forward, shaking hands with Victoria’s father. "I'm sorry we have to meet under such circumstances. Is the child seriously hurt?"

"Child?" Keir rasped hoarsely, looking from one face to the next. "What child?"

Logan’s hand settled on Victoria's shoulder, and Keir fought the urge to knock it off.

She was his, secrets notwithstanding!

"Your son, Keir," Victoria said, her voice a harsh whisper.

Chapter Fourteen

"Y
ou had my child?" Keir's furious rasp eroded the stunned silence. "
Connor
is my son?"

There was no way Victoria could mistake his shock or his outrage.
 

"Yes." She faced Keir, filled with trepidation.
 

This is not how I ever intended him to learn he's a father
.

But with Connor's accident, the situation had spiraled beyond her control. She trembled with reaction as he crossed to stand in front of her, ignoring everyone else.

He gripped her shoulders so hard, she winced. His jaw where her father had slugged him was already an angry red.
 

"My son is in there? Facing life threatening surgery? And you never even let me know he'd even been conceived?
What sort of woman are you?
"

Each furious question was punctuated with a small shake.

Shock and disbelief rendered Victoria speechless, jaw slack, she stared at him. Her grip on the situation dissolved. His reaction was totally beyond her comprehension.

He’d thought, and considered, the likelihood she could become pregnant? Expected her to let him know about Connor?

How?

God knows, I tried hard enough to find him
.

"Now look here, Donovan," her father blustered as he crossed to stand at her side. "Stop trying to intimidate my daughter."

"Keep out of this." Keir's gaze flicked from her to her father, eyes narrowing dangerously before he added unpleasantly, "Unless you’re responsible for Victoria not contacting me?"

Bewildered, Victoria's glance veered in her father's direction, shocked to the core to surprise an unmistakable expression of guilt.

My father knew Seth’s identity? Did he lie to me?

Then he must have been aware of Keir's return to New Zealand? And he never told me?

How could he do this to me?