Buch lesen: «The Seal's Secret Daughter»

Chapter One

Getting out of bed was usually the easiest part of Ethan Renault’s day. It wasn’t only a promise of a fresh start, it was also a reminder that he was alive and healthy and had made it through the previous day without a single drop of booze.

The real struggle didn’t begin until he padded barefoot to his kitchen and flipped on the switch of the coffee maker. That was when he started to think of how much he would prefer a swig of Jim Beam over a double dose of the strongest, darkest brew available in the coffee aisle at Duncan’s Market.

Ethan had bought himself a top-of-the-line Keurig the same day he’d signed his discharge papers. Listening to the expensive machine gurgle water as it heated was his reward for all the times he’d had to endure the trumpet blast of “Reveille” to make him spring from his rack during boot camp and then again in BUD/S training.

It had been six months since Ethan had officially left the United States Navy and landed in the small town of Sugar Falls, Idaho, to restart his life. Yet, except for the gourmet coffee maker sitting on the counter, the tiny kitchen in the apartment he’d rented above a downtown storefront was still just as sparse as the day he’d moved in.

The place had come furnished with only the basics and every once in a while, Ethan might pick up a few things at the market to add to the fridge. But it wasn’t as though he enjoyed many meals at home. For some recovering alcoholics, socializing and eating at local restaurants with full-service bars might prove to be too much of a temptation. With Ethan, though, dining out provided him with more accountability—more eyes watching to keep him in line.

Besides, when he was alone, he had too much time to think.

As the coffee brewed, he made his way back to the bathroom and cranked the shower faucet to the highest setting. He was barely under the steaming spray long enough to get wet when he heard a pounding knock.

It wasn’t even 0700 yet, so the chances of someone paying him a social call this early were pretty slim. They probably have the wrong apartment, he thought as he washed the shampoo from his hair. Yet, the knocking continued. Ethan debated staying in the shower and just ignoring whomever was banging on his front door. But what if it was a neighbor who needed a favor? Or a friend from one of his meetings who needed some encouragement?

Stepping out on the cold tile floor, he grabbed a towel and made his way toward the hall as he dried himself.

“Hold on a sec!” he yelled, crossing to his bedroom and grabbing a pair of jeans off the top of his dresser. The knocking paused briefly, but resumed before he could get his fly buttoned. Geez, what was this person’s major emergency?

He tugged one of the thermal shirts off the hanger so quickly, the plastic triangle flew off the nearly empty closet rod. Ethan barely had his arms shoved through the sleeves when he finally yanked open the front door.

A woman he didn’t recognize stood outside on the narrow landing, a lit cigarette hanging from the tight, thin line that was her mouth. She flicked the cigarette over the railing, not bothering to see where it landed below, and exhaled a cloud of smoke. “Ethan Renault?”

“Can I help you?” he replied without confirming his identity.

“You the same Ethan Renault who went to Sam Houston High?”

He narrowed his gaze, studying the woman before him. There were dark circles under her eyes and a permanent crease between her brows, as though she wore a constant frown. Had he gone to school with her?

When he didn’t immediately respond, she continued. “Yep, it’s you all right. Your hair might be shorter, but you still do that twitching thing with your fingers that makes you look like you’re about to run off at the drop of a hat.”

Ethan shoved his hands in his pockets and rocked forward on the balls of his bare feet. “Do I know you?”

The woman gave a snort, as though she expected quite a different response when she showed up unannounced on a stranger’s doorstep this early in the middle of February. But Ethan patiently waited her out.

It was then that he noticed someone else standing on the stairs behind her. A young girl with dark, tangled hair holding a plastic grocery store bag kept her head down, fixated at the hole on her canvas sneaker where her big toe was popping through.

“I’m Chantal DeVecchio,” the woman finally said, her added eye roll conveying her annoyance at not having been recognized right away. “And this,” she said, gesturing to the girl, “is your daughter, Trina.”

* * *

“But I don’t have a daughter,” Ethan told the woman who no longer looked anything like the eighteen-year-old cheerleader he’d once taken to the prom. His chest felt as though it was caving inward and he had to straighten his back and brace a hand against the door frame.

“She’s yours,” Chantal said. “And it’s about time you man up and take care of your responsibilities.”

Ethan’s spine stiffened even more at the insult to his masculinity and the implication of his negligence. His eyes darted between his former high school girlfriend and the dark-haired child who appeared to only be interested in the patterns her sneakers made on the snow-covered steps. While he didn’t know much about raising kids, he at least knew better than to let them go running around without socks when it was only twenty degrees outside.

“Why didn’t you call me?” What he really wanted to ask was why had Chantal waited almost twelve years to spring such a life-changing surprise on him. “Or tell me before now?”

One minute, he’d been getting ready to head out for his regular breakfast over at the Cowgirl Up Café, wondering if today would be the day he’d finally convinced the shy server who waited on him every morning to go out on a date. The next minute, someone was banging on his front door and then accusing him of being a deadbeat dad to a child he’d never even known about.

“Because I didn’t find out I was pregnant until after you’d joined the Navy and shipped out. It wasn’t like you left a forwarding address before you and your dad ran out of town that summer.”

It was true, Ethan had enlisted right after graduation. His dad was in the oil rigging business, constantly on the move to different cities depending on the latest job. Ethan had already switched high schools five times in three years and, that summer, the only new start he’d been eager to make was the change that would finally begin his adult life.

Scanning the alley behind the row of Victorian buildings that made up the downtown business district of Sugar Falls, Ethan realized that the local merchants would soon be filling up those parking spaces. “Maybe you should come inside and we can talk about this.”

“Nothing to talk about,” Chantal said, snatching the plastic sack out of her—and possibly his—daughter’s hand and tossing it into his entryway. A purple T-shirt spilled out and landed on his bare foot. “I can’t do this anymore. I’m just not cut out for motherhood. It’s your turn to step up and be a father.”

She turned around and gave Trina’s shoulder an awkward hug. “I’m sorry, Trina,” she said, a hint of sadness creeping into her voice. “But it’s for the best. You’ll see.”

Chantal then brushed past the girl and marched down the steps. Ethan took a few strides to chase after the woman, but only made it halfway down the staircase when he realized that the child wasn’t following. Or begging her mom not to leave her. The poor thing just stood there, looking as miserable as Ethan felt.

Something was ricocheting in his chest with a thumping urgency, but his body remained perfectly still. He needed to do something, to say something, but all he could do was grip the wrought iron handrail until his brain and his body could work in sync.

What he wouldn’t give for a shot of bourbon right about now. Or for a call from his AA sponsor. But no amount of booze or platitudes or even SEAL team combat training could’ve prepared Ethan for the blow he’d just been dealt.

Not knowing what to do, his feet grew restless and the snow squishing between his toes began to sting, causing him to take a step toward the girl. Then he froze up all over again, like that time in Kabul when he and his buddy Boscoe faced an unexpected rainstorm of firepower. One wrong move could cause everything to blow up in his face. Worse than it already had.

An engine turned over in the alley below his apartment and he looked over his shoulder in time to see Chantal speeding off in a Geo Storm that might’ve been yellow twenty years ago. The shredded end of a rope holding the hatchback down to the bumper dragged along the wet asphalt as she made her escape.

A shiver started between Ethan’s shoulder blades and traveled its way down his back. He ran a hand through his still damp hair and faced the young girl huddled on his porch.

His gut was telling him that it couldn’t be possible for him to have a daughter. However, in the right light, if the child would look up and shove some of the stringy, black hair from her eyes, Ethan might concede that she somewhat resembled his French grandmother.

To be fair to Chantal, he had to admit he hadn’t exactly kept track of every person he’d ever slept with over the years, but certainly he would’ve remembered if he’d gotten someone pregnant. Wouldn’t he?

The girl made a sniffing sound, as though her nose was running, but she still didn’t raise her head or look in his direction.

Shame flooded through him at the realization that he’d never even thought to ask her if she was okay. Or to try and put the child at ease. He opened his mouth to say something but couldn’t command his tongue to form any words and ended up snapping it closed again. Damn. He was already proving himself to be a crappy father.

Clearing his throat, he reminded himself that he was once a member of an elite Special Forces team and had encountered dangers far graver than an eleven-year-old landing on his doorstep. “Hi,” he said. “I’m Ethan.”

“I know,” the girl whispered, then wrapped a scrawny arm around her waist. It was then that he noticed she wasn’t even wearing a sweater, let alone a coat.

“Why don’t you come inside, Trina? It’s freezing out here.”

The girl eventually lifted her face and his lungs seized. Her eyes weren’t wide with fear, as Ethan would’ve expected. Nor were they filled with humiliation or hurt, which would’ve been understandable given the way her mother had just dumped her here. Instead, they were completely without expression. Witnessing their empty depths would’ve been downright spooky if he hadn’t recognized that same look in his own eyes the night after his last covert ops assignment. Or recognized the identical sapphire-blue color that ran rampant in the Renault family.

Trina didn’t decline his invitation, but she wasn’t exactly quick to make a decision either. She had to be equally as afraid of him as he was of her. Stranger danger and all that. She must’ve heard her mother announce that he was her father, but that didn’t mean she necessarily believed it. Well, that made two of them.

Being careful not to touch her as he stepped around her shivering form, Ethan held open the door, hoping that the heat coming from his apartment would be more inviting than the ugly used furniture inside. He was about to go into the kitchen and grab his cell phone to call for backup when finally, with an apprehensive look cast in Ethan’s direction, her feet shuffled toward him.

Trina gave him a measured glance before swooping low to grab her purple T-shirt and shoving it back into her grocery bag. She held the recovered belongings close to her chest, as though they were some sort of shield that could protect her from him.

“Are you hungry?” Ethan asked. He left the front door wide-open as he walked toward the kitchen, not wanting her to feel trapped. Would she follow? Or would she run off, just as her mother had?

“Kinda,” Trina replied, her voice again no louder than a whisper. She was on the thin side and he wondered when she’d had her last meal.

Ethan stared at his bare counters, knowing full well the only thing he could offer the girl right now would be a mug of triple-brewed dark roast.

“I...uh...wasn’t exactly expecting company.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and rocked back on his heels. “I usually eat breakfast at the café across the street.”

Trina tilted her head at him, her blue eyes still empty, her arms still clutched tightly to her in apprehension. If she was truly his daughter, Ethan wanted to do the right thing by her. He just wasn’t convinced that taking care of her all by himself would be the right thing.

He really could use some direction here. This town was bursting with know-it-all busybodies who had opinions on everything from which colors to paint the historical homes to who should play point guard for the high school basketball team. Unfortunately, none of those people were currently inside his apartment.

“I’ve got an idea,” Ethan said, but Trina’s blank expression didn’t waver. “I’m going to grab my coat and, uh, something for you to put on to keep warm, and we’ll go across the street and grab a hot breakfast.”

Surely someone over at the Cowgirl Up Café would have an idea of what he should do with the girl.

“I’ll be right back,” he said, walking down the hallway toward his bedroom. As he looked at the few clothes hanging in his closet, he wondered if Trina would still be standing in his living room when he came out. Or had she already made a run for it the second he turned his back? It was what he would’ve done in her situation.

But she was right where he’d left her when he returned with a fleece-lined hooded sweatshirt branded with the eagle and trident logo. “Here, this is the best I could come up with. But we’re not going very far.”

She had to drop her bag on the scuffed dining room table to take the sweatshirt from him. He sat at one of the cheap pine chairs to pull on his work boots, trying not to notice the way Trina kept having to push the sleeves up her arms to keep her hands from getting drowned by the heavy material of the borrowed sweatshirt.

Locking the front door behind him, Ethan realized that Trina was very careful not to get in front of him. She would only follow after he’d already passed. Whenever his team had infiltrated compounds and taken captives or brought in noncombatants for questioning, they’d been trained to always stay behind the enemy—to never turn their backs on a potential threat.

The thought that his own daughter might view him as a threat made his stomach go sour, however, Ethan didn’t say anything as they walked down the steps to the alley and then through the narrow walkway that put them out on to Snowflake Boulevard. When they got on the main street of town, he glanced down the block toward the new public safety building that housed both the police department and the fire station. It would be so easy to lead Trina over there and drop her off. His mind calculated how long it would take him to leave her at the entrance and then hop into his secondhand truck and drive down the mountain to the Boise airport.

How long would it take to leave this whole mess behind him?

But he’d lived his life being on the move, alternating between taking on the most dangerous assignments to come through his unit and then drowning himself in a bottle to escape the unpleasantness of the world. The whole point of his leaving the Navy and relocating to Sugar Falls was so he could finally slow down, sober up and figure out what his next chapter would be.

He just hadn’t expected fatherhood to be on the first page.

* * *

Monica Alvarez was balancing a tray of refilled salt and pepper shakers in one hand and a pot of decaf in the other when the tingling bell sounded above the saloon-style front doors of the Cowgirl Up Café. As a part-time waitress, early Wednesday mornings were usually her easiest shifts—most of the weekend tourists were long gone, replaced with only a handful of regulars lounging in their favorite booths, ordering their usuals, which she now had memorized. However, it wasn’t the blast of frigid air coming in from outside that made the welcoming smile fade from Monica’s lips.

It wasn’t even the arrival of the hunky contractor who ordered the same exact breakfast—four scrambled egg whites, turkey sausage patties, sliced tomatoes and black coffee with a side of flirtatious banter—that made her pause. It was the unexpected appearance of a young girl cowering behind him that had stopped Monica in her tracks and caused the ceramic cowboy boot–shaped spice shakers on her tray to wobble.

The first time she’d waited on Ethan Renault several months ago, she’d written him off as a harmless bad boy who would eventually give up once he figured out that she wasn’t interested in his type. Initially, it had been easy to brush off the sexy smirk and ignore the lazy way his thick-lashed eyes followed her as she messed up orders and proved herself to be an incompetent waitress.

But the man had been patient and stealthy and, occasionally, he’d even made her laugh. Last week, when she’d been at her real job, Ethan had come into the library and asked for a recommendation. Anyone who knew her understood that the best way to get Monica involved in a conversation was to talk about books. That’s how she related best to people, by understanding them as readers firsts. Knowing a person’s reading habits revealed so much, it was like a secret superpower that only librarians and booksellers possessed.

She’d given him a copy of Rejection for Dummies and he’d happily taken it without batting his handsome blue eyes. Then, the first thing he’d told her Monday morning was that the book was okay, but that he was waiting for the movie. While Monica hadn’t had the time—or the desire—to date much since college, she’d had a feeling that his line was a lead-in and that Ethan would’ve asked her out to the movies if a very confused and agitated Gran hadn’t called the restaurant right then and needed Monica to come home to help find the cat that they didn’t own.

Today, she’d been expecting him to pick up the flirtatious banter right where he’d left off and she’d even toyed around with the idea of accepting his offer—if he asked her out, anyway—because she could barely remember the last time she’d gotten out and had a little fun for herself.

However, there was nothing jovial or flirty about the man right this second. In fact, the deep grooves along his brow and the hardened line of his jaw made him look like a completely different person—like he’d been hiding his true personality all along.

With only two other occupied booths in the restaurant this early in the morning, there were half a dozen sets of eyes trained on the new arrivals. The curious stares coupled with the silence spoke volumes and reassured Monica that she wasn’t the only one who’d noticed that something was out of the ordinary.

A prickling sensation made its way down the back of her neck and she cleared her throat. “Table for two?”

“Uh...yeah,” he finally said, and glanced behind him at the girl. Ethan normally walked into the restaurant with a grin and a sense of purpose, saying hello to all the locals before grabbing his favorite seat at the end of the counter. Today, though, he didn’t make a move toward his usual spot despite the fact it was empty. He didn’t really move at all.

“How about that table over there.” Monica used her chin to nod toward an empty corner booth that was on the opposite side of where the other diners were now blatantly staring at them.

“Great,” Ethan replied, and began walking in that direction. He took a few steps, then paused and turned to the child. “Is this okay?”

The girl’s only response was to follow behind him, her head not lifting. Something about the child tugged at Monica’s heart and reminded her of how shy and awkward she’d once been at that same age.

Monica took the tray of shakers to the prep station and switched out the pot of decaf for regular coffee, since Ethan normally drank at least three cups.

When she returned to their table, she passed them both laminated menus. Not that Ethan ever needed one, but something was definitely off about him this morning and she no longer knew what to expect. Using the same smile she used during the tiny tots reading circle at the library, she faced the girl and said, “Hi. I’m Monica.”

The child lifted her face and Monica gasped at the resemblance to Ethan. Their mouths were the same shape and their chins shared matching dimples. If the girl’s stringy hair was washed and brushed, it would likely be the exact inky-black shade as Ethan’s, as well. Yet, it was the bottomless sapphire-blue eyes that were the dead giveaway.

They were definitely related.

That didn’t make sense, though. Monica could’ve sworn that she’d once overheard him bragging about being single and carefree. Plus, she was positive that he’d told Freckles, the owner of the café, that his mom died when he was a boy and his father had passed away a few years ago and he didn’t have any other family.

So then where had this child come from?

If Freckles hadn’t taken the morning off, the nosy older woman would’ve been asking all kinds of questions, like whether this was the girl’s first time in Sugar Falls and how long was she visiting. Unfortunately, Monica wasn’t quite as smooth when it came to starting conversations with the customers. Sure, she liked listening to people talk and picking up information here and there, but she didn’t have that ability of asking the right kinds of questions to illicit much more than a two-or three-word response. Unless it was about their favorite books.

But a million questions were floating through her head as she stared at the child, who was having trouble keeping her hands pushed through the sleeves of the man-size sweatshirt she’d obviously borrowed from Ethan.

There was still snow outside this time of year. Where was the girl’s jacket?

Monica turned over Ethan’s mug and poured him a steaming cup of coffee, but he avoided eye contact so she couldn’t read any clues on his normally friendly face. Turning to the girl, she said, “It’s pretty cold this morning. How about some hot chocolate?”

The girl’s eyes grew wide, and for an instant, an almost...craving expression flashed across her face, as though she’d never wanted anything more. Yet, her only reply was to study Ethan with a guarded look.

“Do you like hot chocolate?” Ethan asked her, and the girl nodded slowly. “Then hot chocolate it is.” He turned to Monica. “This is Trina. We’re still...uh...getting to know each other.”

A chill spread through Monica, making her skin prickle with unease. Stumbling backward, she retreated to the prep station behind the counter. She fumbled with the bottle of chocolate sauce several times as she thought about Ethan’s odd response. How did he not know the girl before now? They were clearly related.

Monica caught a movement out of the corner of her eye and turned just in time to see Trina dart into the hallway leading toward the restrooms. A hissing sound, followed by a blast of steam, drew her attention back to the complex frothing machine her boss had installed a few weeks ago and she barely got the thing shut off in time to prevent the hot milk from splattering everywhere. Monica cupped the warm mug in her trembling hands as she quickly walked to the table where Ethan was now sitting alone.

She needed to hurry if she wanted to talk to him before Trina returned from the restroom. Out of all the questions she wanted answered, the first one that came tumbling out of her mouth was, “Is she yours?”

Monica winced at her own words, her whisper-soft tone not making the personal question sound any less rude.

But Ethan either hadn’t been bothered or he was too absorbed in his own thoughts to notice the impolite tone. He shrugged his shoulders, the expression on his face almost trancelike. “That’s what her mother said when she left her on my front porch this morning.”

“What do you mean, her mother left her on your front porch?” Monica had to brace her hand on the cowhide printed backrest of the booth. She was no longer whispering, drawing the curious stares from the other side of the restaurant.

“She knocked on my door this morning. I didn’t even recognize her.”

“Trina?” Disgust rose in Monica’s throat. How had the man not recognized his own daughter?