thinking blush and cream.”
“I’m thinking you’ve lost your mind.” She took her grandmother’s hand. “If for some reason, this insanity happens, it will be just a signing of papers in Emma’s office. No dress, no vows, no—”
“Why would you deny an old woman her last wish?”
Gina snorted. “You’re far from dying, Grams.” She said it more to reassure herself than anyone else.
“You don’t know that. I could get hit by a bus. Or choke on—”
“Then I should never get married so you don’t ever leave us.” Gina hated how close to the truth that really was and her nose prickled.
“Hush with that.” Maudine’s thin arm came around her and pulled her close. She smelled like lavender and home. “Come on, now. Everything will be well. I know these things.”
After the judge left, Gina wanted to do anything but be in the same room with Reed. She was afraid he’d speak to her; she was afraid he wouldn’t. She didn’t know how to act.
When she’d been thinking about taking him to court for child support, this part of it had never figured into the equation. This hadn’t been real to her. It had been some fey idea in her head. When Emma asked her if she was sure about taking him to court, she’d been so steadfast. So sure. Now? She was drowning.
She didn’t think she’d have to see him, hear him. She certainly hadn’t thought she’d have to marry him.
As if that would happen, anyway. Not in a million years. The idea was preposterous.
But then what would she do if he wanted sole custody? Gina needed Amanda Jane as much as her niece needed her. She was her touchstone, her reason for fighting as hard as she had. She might have given up on med school last semester if not for her.
For a moment, Gina wondered if maybe that might be the best thing for Amanda Jane. Reed had all the advantages and she’d never want for anything.
But Reed didn’t know how to be a family. His own had been more lacking than hers. She’d at least had her grandmother.
Now wasn’t the time for self-doubt. It was the time to be decisive, to charge ahead with confidence, bravery and to never ever look back.
REED’S FIRST REACTION to the news that he was a father had been anger. Anger that he’d been denied the chance to really be a father. Anger that Crystal and Gina had taken that away from him. Anger that they didn’t want anything from him except his money. Because he hadn’t known he was a father until he’d been served with suit for child support.
Then under that anger, all the old pain, the old doubt—all the baggage associated with the old Reed— surfaced. He was very much that same kid again who wanted so desperately to be enough.
But something akin to longing vied for top tier when he saw Gina sitting there next to her grandmother.
Beautiful, innocent Gina with her ethereal pale skin, her cloud of dark hair and her soft pink lips that always had a smile for him.
He remembered how smooth and soft her hands were on his forehead, the way she’d tenderly pushed his hair out of his face when he’d been racked with fever and chills the first time he’d tried to get clean. There had been no pity in her eyes, only her kindness to ease his suffering.
One of his darkest secrets was that single time he’d slept with Crystal. He’d thought it was Gina, and that made him all kinds of a bastard. Especially when once he’d realized it wasn’t, it had been too good to stop. Something that finally felt good in a hazy world of pain and numbness.
He’d allow that he was still a bastard, but he wasn’t that kid anymore. That kid who’d do anything to feel good, anything to belong, anything to feel like someone gave a damn about him.
He gave a damn about himself and no one, not even Gina Townsend, was going to take that away from him.
Reed had come a long way since then and Gina obviously knew that. She and Crystal hadn’t wanted anything to do with him, hadn’t cared about Amanda Jane’s paternity until that article about him had appeared in Finance Today touting his net worth.
Marriage. What the hell was Gina thinking?
Besides wanting his money?
“I’m on it, Reed. If this is just a money grab on her part, I’ll get you custody of the child, and have her paying you child support before this is over. Parental alienation. It’s a crime.” Gray sounded almost cheerful.
That didn’t make him feel any better. His ego may have wanted Gina and Crystal to suffer, but his heart didn’t. No, he didn’t want that for Gina and Crystal. Crystal’s suffering was over. She’d died and Gina was trying to raise his daughter all on her own.
He was still all twisted up. It was like standing there naked. He’d built this persona around himself, made himself believe he was this successful billionaire, but inside, he was still that guy from a trailer park.
There were days he felt as if any minute someone was going to come tell him that it had all been a mistake and he had to give it back.
And sitting in court next to his lawyer in the town that only knew him as poor white trash kept reminding him that it was a possibility.
“I think we should go to the Bullhorn for lunch.”
“Isn’t that where she works? What are you doing?” Gray shoved his papers in his briefcase.
“I just... I need to see her.” Reed wanted to assure himself that despite all of this, everything they’d both been through, that she was still Gina. Gina of the soft eyes, the tender hands, Gina who would be a good mother.
“You just saw her.”
“No. I need to see her.” He hoped that Gray would understand.
He didn’t. Gray was made of steel and granite. Everything was very simple for him. “That’s what the meeting is for that I’m arranging with her lawyer.”
“Are you coming or what?” Well, he’d drag him along, anyway.
“That’s what I like about you, Hollingsworth. You live to make my job harder.” But Grayson smiled. “How do you know she’s going to work, anyway?”
“She’ll go to work. That’s what she does. A tornado couldn’t keep her away.” That was, if she was still the Gina he knew. Maybe she wasn’t. People were allowed to change. After all, hadn’t he?
Half an hour later Reed found himself sitting alone in a corner at Bullhorn BBQ, Gray having opted to have lunch elsewhere to keep plausible deniability. The place hadn’t changed at all. It still had that rustic mom-and-pop feel to the place—all the meat was smoked out back in a smoker. You could smell this place for miles.
The tables were covered in plastic red-and-white-checkered cloths, the chairs all
