Page 46 of The Convict Gets His Girl

Then, almost as an afterthought, a strategic card she'd been holding close, Jewel added, "Besides, don't you want to meet your dad?"

The words hung in the air, charged and electric. Destini froze, her breath catching as her eyes went wild. The conversation shifted, transformed from an argument about moving to something far more profound—a potential connection to a father she'd asked about a few times a year her whole life.

ChapterSeventeen

Destini jumped up, her nervous energy propelling her across the room. She began to pace, her sneakers leaving faint prints on the soft carpet. Her hands moved restlessly, fingers twisting and untwisting, a physical manifestation of her internal turmoil.

"I'm just… so nervous," she blurted out, her voice a mix of anxiety and uncertainty. "Aunt Gemma told me all about him, but what if—" She stopped, biting her lower lip. "What if we have nothing in common?"

The room seemed to shrink around her, the walls closing in with the weight of dread. Jewel's mind raced with the upcoming awkward conversation and the possibility of disappointing her daughter hung like a heavy curtain in her soul.

The time had come to bare her heart and soul to her daughter, and she just hoped and prayed she didn't hate her for her past mistakes.

Jewel watched her daughter, seeing the familiar nervous gesture—the lip bite, the restless pacing—that was so uniquely Destini. Yet there was something else there. A vulnerability that made her look younger than her almost-sixteen years.

"When did you ask Aunt Gemma about him?" Jewel's question cut through Destini's pacing.

Destini stopped mid-pace, biting her lip. Her eyes darted away, then back to her mother's face, a complex dance of emotions playing across her features.

"I don't know," Destini said softly, her fingers tracing an absent pattern on the windowsill. "A few Christmases ago. You got sad when I asked about him, so I stopped asking you and went to Aunt Gemma instead. She was telling me stories, you know? About how you two used to run around the ranch, playing and hiding from other kids." A small, wistful smile flickered across her face. "She said he loved poetry and astronomy and mythology. His name is Hunter, and he's a good guy but just doesn't know I exist."

Something shifted in Jewel's expression. Her breath caught, a sudden recognition sparking behind her eyes. The astronomy. The mythology. The way Destini had become obsessed with NASA, with star charts, with ancient stories about constellations—it wasn't just coincidence. It was a desperate attempt to draw closer to a father she'd never known.

Jewel swallowed hard, the realization settling like a stone in her stomach. The man Aunt Gemma had been describing, painting with such romantic, adventurous strokes—might not actually be her daughter's father.

Her hand trembled slightly where it rested on the bed, a barely perceptible movement that betrayed her inner turmoil.

"Sweetie," Jewel's voice was quiet, weighted with an emotion she couldn't quite name. "The man Aunt Gemma told you about… might not be your dad."

Destini froze by the window, her silhouette stark against the fading light filtering through the blinds. When she turned, her eyes—a piercing hazel so achingly familiar—locked onto Jewel's face.

Jewel's hand shook as she spoke, the words dragging like broken glass. "There was an incident with my boyfriend's brother."

The silence stretched, thick and heavy with unspoken implications. Destini's breath caught, her body going rigid. "Did he…" Her voice cracked. "Did he force you?"

The question hung between them, a razor's edge of potential violence and vulnerability. Jewel could see the protective rage building in her daughter's eyes—that same fierce intensity she'd seen in herself, in her sister Gemma, a generations-old flame of maternal protection that burned bright and dangerous.

"What—no," Jewel said quickly, her hands instinctively reaching out, palms open. "Hunter and I had drifted apart. We both had different ideas for what to do after high school."

She watched Destini's posture soften slightly, but her daughter's eyes remained sharp, analytical. Jewel felt like she was being dissected, her past laid bare under a microscope of teenage scrutiny.

"I was determined to go to A&M," Jewel continued, her voice finding its rhythm. "But Hunter wanted to stay home and continue ranching."

A bitter edge crept into her tone. "I despised him for being so content with his life when I had so many dreams and goals. He was just so at peace being who he was and doing what he loved."

The words tumbled out, a mixture of old frustration and remembered ambition. Jewel remembered those days—how suffocating the ranch had felt, how small her world seemed compared to the expansive dreams she'd cultivated. Hunter had been—still was—a good man, but he'd represented everything she was desperate to escape.

Destini's eyebrow arched, a gesture so reminiscent of Jewel herself that it momentarily stunned her. "So you slept with his brother?"

The question hung in the air, direct and uncompromising.

Jewel hung her head, her cheeks burning with a sudden flush of shame and remembered confusion. The memory flooded back—a night blurred by exhaustion from a full day of haying, dim lights from the sale barn, the scent of cedar and leather so familiar she'd thought he was Hunter.

"The first time was an accident," she whispered, her fingers twisting the bedspread. "I thought he was Hunter."

The silence stretched between them, charged and electric. Destini's gaze felt like a physical weight, pressing against Jewel's carefully constructed defenses. She could see her daughter processing, analyzing—those sharp hazel eyes inherited from a father Jewel had not yet identified.

Destini sank onto a chair, rubbing her temples in a gesture so adult, so weary, that it made Jewel's heart clench. "So what's his name?" she asked, her voice flat. "What's he like? And why didn't you contact him before now?"

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