Sweet Laurel Falls. RaeAnne Thayne
His lecture had gone well, especially as he focused on one of his passions, sustainable design. He was fairly certain he hadn’t come across as a pompous iconoclast. Among the students who had pressed toward the dais to talk to him afterward had been this young woman with dark wavy hair and green eyes.
She told him she had studied his work, that she had always felt a bond to him because she was also from Hope’s Crossing, where she knew he had grown up, and that while she hadn’t met him, she saw his father around town often.
He studied her features as she spoke to him about her dreams and their shared passion for architecture, and he had been aware of an odd sense of the familiar but with a twist, as if he were looking at someone he knew through a wavy, distorted mirror.
When she told him her name—Sage McKnight—he had stared at her for a full thirty seconds before he had asked, “Who are your parents?”
“I don’t know my father. He took off before I was born. But my mother’s name is Maura McKnight. I think she might be around your age or maybe a little younger.”
Younger, he remembered thinking as everything inside him froze. She had been a year younger.
“She’s thirty-seven now, if that helps you place her,” Sage had offered helpfully. “She graduated from high school nineteen years ago. I know, because it was about a month before I was born.”
Just like that, he had pieced the dates and the times together, and he had known. He didn’t need to bother with DNA tests. He could do the damn math. Anyone with a brain could clearly see she was his child. They had the same nose, the same dark, wavy hair, the same dimple in their chins.
His daughter. After three days, he still couldn’t believe it.
And neither, apparently, could all those gaping women back there. Hadn’t she told anyone who had fathered her child?
Now he followed Maura through the bookstore, noting almost subconsciously certain architectural details of the historic building, like the walls that had been peeled back to bare brick and the windows with their almost Gothic arches. With jewel-toned hanging fixtures on track lights and plush furniture set around in conversation nooks, Maura had created a cozy, warm space that encouraged people to stop and ponder, sip a coffee, maybe grab a book off a shelf at random and discover something new.
Under ordinary circumstances, he would have found the place appealing, clever and bright and comfortable, but he could only focus on haphazard details as he followed her through a doorway to a long, barren stockroom, and a cluttered office dominated by a wide oak desk and a small window that overlooked Main Street.
Inside her office, Maura turned on both of them. “First of all, Sage, what are you doing here today? What about your biology final tomorrow morning?”
Her daughter—their daughter—shrugged. “I talked Professor Johnson into letting me take it this morning. She was fine with that, especially after I explained I had extenuating circumstances.”
Maura’s gaze darted to him, then quickly away again. “How do you think you did? Did you even have time to study after your chemistry final? You needed a solid A on the final to bring your grade above a C.”
“Really, Mom? Is that what you want to talk about right now? My grades?”
A hint of color soaked Maura’s cheeks, and she compressed her lips into a thin line as if to clamp back more academic interrogation. Even with the sour expression, she still looked beautiful. Looking at her now, he couldn’t fathom that she was old enough to have a daughter who was a college sophomore, but then she must have been barely eighteen when Sage was born. She was seventeen when he’d left, still six months before her eighteenth birthday.
Maura released a heavy breath and finally sat on the edge of her desk, which put her slightly above him and Sage, who had taken the two guest chairs in her office.
“You’re right. We can talk about school later. I just…this was all unexpected. I didn’t think you would be here until tomorrow, and then I never expected you to bring…”
“My father?”
Maura’s hands flexed on her thighs even as she made a scoffing sort of sound. “I don’t know where you possibly came up with that crazy idea,” she began, but Sage cut her off.
“Please don’t lie to me. You’ve been lying for twenty years. Can we just stop now?” Though the words were angry, the tone was soft and almost gentle. “You’ve known who he is and where he was all this time, haven’t you? Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
Maura looked at him quickly and then away again. She hadn’t looked at him for longer than a few seconds at a time, as if she were trying to pretend he wasn’t really there. “Does it really matter?”
“Yes. Of course it matters! I could have had a father all this time.”
“You’ve had your stepfather from the time you were just a little girl. Chris has always been great to you.”
“True. He’s still great to me. Even after the divorce, he never treated me any differently than he did L-Layla.” Sage’s voice wobbled a little at the name. Her sister, who had died earlier this year, he remembered, and felt like an ass again for showing up out of the blue like this, dredging up the past. What would happen if he left town right now and went back to his real life in the Bay Area and pretended none of this had ever happened?
He couldn’t do that, as tempting as he suddenly found the idea. To a man who had spent his adult life trying to clear through the clutter in his personal and professional lives, this was all so messy and complicated. But like it or not, Sage was his daughter. He was here now, and had been given the chance after all these years to come to know this young woman who bore half his DNA and who reminded him with almost painful intensity of an innocent part of himself he had left behind a long time ago.
“A child can never have too many people who love her, Mom. You taught me that. Why did you keep my father out of our lives all this time? He didn’t have any idea I even existed. If he hadn’t come to campus to give a lecture, both of us would still be in the dark.”
“A lecture?”
“Right. On sustainable design, one of my own passions. It was wonderful, really inspiring. I went up afterward to talk to him and mentioned I was from Hope’s Crossing. It only took us a minute to figure things out.”
Maura frowned. “Figure what out? That the two of us dated when I was barely seventeen? How could you both instantly jump from that to thinking he’s your…your sperm donor?”
The term annoyed the hell out of him. “Because neither of us is stupid. She told me who her mother was. When I asked how old she was, I could figure out the math. I knew exactly who you were with nine months before her birthday.”
And ten months before and eleven months and every spare moment they could get their hands on each other that summer.
“That doesn’t prove a thing. You took off. You weren’t here, Jack. How do you know I didn’t pick up with the whole basketball team after you left?” Defiance and something that looked suspiciously like fear flashed in her eyes.
She had been a virgin their first time together. They both had been, fumbling and awkward and embarrassed but certain they were deeply in love. Even if not for the proof sitting beside him, he wouldn’t have believed the smart and loving girl she had been would suddenly turn into the kind of girl who would sleep around with just anybody.
“Look at her,” he said, gentling his tone. “She has my mother’s nose and my mouth and chin. We can run the DNA, but I don’t need to. Sage is my daughter. For three days, I’ve just been trying to figure out why the hell you didn’t tell me.”
For the first time, she met his gaze for longer than a few seconds. “Think about it, Jack,” she finally said. “What difference would it have made? Would you have come back?”
He