Page 53 of Where Secrets Lie

He gave her his full attention at that news. “I’m sorry, babe. As more of the truth comes out, I hope she’ll come around.”

“Me too.” She slipped a piece of fish to Cody, who had been watching her hopefully, and he gobbled it down. Should she just jump into what she’d found out this afternoon? She set her fork on her plate and reached across the table to take his hand. “Hez, I-I’m sorry for doubting you about the drinking. I shouldhave known you wouldn’t lie to me. We’ve had our problems, but lack of truthfulness was never one of them.”

A questioning frown settled on his forehead, but she rushed on before he could say anything. “This afternoon I found Jess in your kitchen, and there was another wine bottle in your trash bin. The cabinet door was open. I’m pretty sure she planted it.”

His eyes widened. “Wow. I... I didn’t even consider the possibility that she could be the culprit—though I should have.”

“I know her better than anyone, and I never dreamed she might do something like this.”

His hand tightened around hers, and his expression sharpened. “Jess has had her own agenda all this time, Savannah. She’s duped us both. I did something I should have done in the first place and read the fine print on that loan more closely. I couldn’t believe what it contained.”

Savannah listened to what her sister had done. “Are you sure, Hez? I can’t believe she would do something that would hurt me. Anything Jess has done has been because she thought she knew best.”

He hesitated and his eyes filled with compassion. “She admitted it.”

Savannah bit back a gasp. “But why? I don’t understand. I need to talk to her.”

Hez ran his thumb over her hand in a soothing motion. “Don’t do anything until I can figure out a strategy that has a chance of success. She said this was about family.”

That could only mean one thing—Jess’s deep-seated hatred of Pierre Legare.

“She hates Dad so much she’s willing to destroy the Legare name and legacy? And what about me? If TGU is gone, so ismy job. I can’t believe she would be willing to hurt me in the process of taking down Dad.” Her voice wobbled, and she swallowed down the pain before her eyes welled up with tears.

“We’ve never talked about her parentage, and maybe we should.”

Savannah exhaled and clung tighter to Hez’s hand. “It’s an ugly story, Hez, very ugly. I can barely stand to think about it, which is why I’ve never told you. Michael Willard is Jess’s biological father. I was a child, so I may not have all the details right, but the way I heard it was that Dad stole money from Michael’s mother, Helen. Michael decided if Dad took something from his family, he’d take something from Dad. So he took Mom.”

Hez’s thumb stopped its soothing rhythm. “He took her? Kidnapped her, you mean?”

“No, no. He seduced her, and she left Dad. She took me with her, but I was just a baby so I don’t remember anything until later. I always sort of knew Mom was miserable and Dad never let her forget something she’d done, but I didn’t really understand until I got older. Mom never talked about it, but I put the pieces together from what Dad had said and rumors I’d heard. When Jess was born, Dad knew she wasn’t his daughter and Michael knew too. He sent Jess gifts for birthdays and Christmases, but he didn’t have visitation rights and kept his distance.”

“And all this time Jess never felt like she belonged anywhere.”

“Exactly. I felt so sorry for her—the only true innocent in the whole sordid saga. None of this was her fault, but she suffered so much.” Savannah bit down hard on her lower lip. “Maybe my pity blinded me to some hard truths about Jess.”

“I don’t want to ruin our special night, but once the dinner is over tomorrow, we need to have a hard conversation with Jess. I know how much you love your sister, so I’ll take the lead on this.”

Savannah sat up straighter and lifted her chin. “I love you for trying to spare me the pain, but I’ve avoided dealing with difficult family situations all my life. They’re layered and convoluted, and it always seemed impossible to navigate them, but this is my problem, Hez. My avoidance of facing this kind of thing was one of the reasons our marriage failed the first time. Jess is my sister. I’ll make her tell me to my face what she’s done and why.”

Until today she’d assumed Jess reciprocated her fierce love, but Savannah had clearly been wrong. And that opened a wound inside so deep that she didn’t know if it would ever heal.

Chapter 30

The sky outside was bright and cloudless, but Jess could feel the storm coming. It had been building ever since she left Hez’s condo yesterday. The air felt more charged and breathless with every hour that passed. Everything was coming to a head.

Savannah and Hez had hardly spoken to Jess, but their body language was eloquent. Neither of them made eye contact when they passed her in the hall. They stopped talking whenever she was near. The few times today she had to go into one of their offices, they wore tight little smiles and practically held their breath until she left.

When would the storm break? Jess half expected to be called into Savannah’s office at any moment and summarily fired, with that old security guard escorting her out. Or maybe Savannah would have Hez do the dirty work for her. And what would happen tonight? Would Savannah still introduce Jess as her maid of honor? Or would she pull her aside before dinner started to tell her there had been a change of plans?

Not knowing was agony. Jess couldn’t even be sure Savannah had found the bottle and realized that her sister planted it or that Hez had told her about the loan. Hez also hadn’t given anyhint of whether he would listen to Jess about taking Savannah away and not fighting Hornbrook. If he didn’t, wedding plans would be the least of their concerns.

By four o’clock, Jess couldn’t take it anymore. She needed to leave soon to get herself and Simon ready for the dinner, and she wasn’t going to walk into that engagement party at Jesse’s Restaurant with no idea what was going on. Hez wasn’t in his office, so she walked over to the Justice Chamber in Connor Hall.

Fortunately, he was there and he was alone. He sat behind that ancient little desk with the plaque hanging on the wall behind him:“But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!”She shivered, probably from the draft leaking through the Gothic window.

She shut the door. “Are you going to take my advice about the loan and Savannah?”

His eyes were hard. “I don’t see why I should. You don’t exactly have the university’s best interests at heart.”

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