Operation Unleashed. Justine Davis
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Drew kept his voice low even though Luke was so raptly involved with his new playmate he doubted he would have heard anything short of a bomb going off. He didn’t care anymore how the boy had known the dog would be here in the park, he was just savoring the expression of delight on Luke’s face.
“And you’re obviously not,” Quinn said. It was so matter-of-fact Drew felt oddly pleased. “How’d that happen?”
Drew shrugged one shoulder. “Doug was kind of sickly when he was a baby. So everybody fussed over him. Then later he was so damn cute and clever, everybody spoiled him. He was smart enough to figure out early that he could charm people into just about anything.”
“And it’s a lot easier than working.”
Drew studied Quinn Foxworth for a long moment. He instinctively liked the man, for his brisk, businesslike manner, and the innate steadiness he sensed in him. And the obvious fact that he was crazy in love with his Hayley, and wasn’t afraid to show it.
He envied the man that.
“Yes,” he said finally. “And Doug was all about the easy way. But Lyss still insists he was trying to get money to take care of them both when he was killed.”
“But you don’t believe that.”
“More likely he was trying to get enough money to run from the responsibility. He didn’t have it on him when he died, so I’ve always thought he didn’t want to get caught with it and it was stashed somewhere for him and his scumbag partner to retrieve later.”
“The partner that went to prison?”
Drew nodded. “Baird Oliver. That robbery wasn’t his first foray into crime.”
“And they never found the cash?”
Drew shook his head. “Wasn’t in the car when Doug crashed and Oliver didn’t have it on him, either.”
“So your brother’s motives are what you were fighting about?”
Drew sighed, looking again at Luke, glad simply to see the boy so happy. “More who he was. Or wasn’t.”
“And you each have your own version.”
“Yes,” Drew admitted. “But mine’s based in fact, hers is based in...fantasy. Some sort of dream image she’s always had of him.”
“Incompatible visions.”
“Exactly.” He let out a compressed breath. “We agreed early on to not discuss it, because it just degenerated into scenes like last week. Our marriage may be...just a business arrangement, but the fighting isn’t good for Luke. And he’s old enough now, he’s starting to ask difficult questions.”
Quinn studied him for a moment. “About his father?”
“Yes. I wanted to settle that as soon as he was old enough to understand, to tell him the truth, but Lyss kept putting it off.”
“Because she didn’t agree that what you wanted to tell him was the truth?” Quinn suggested.
“Probably,” Drew said with a glum expression. “I didn’t mind that she wanted him to know about Doug, he is his biological father. But she didn’t want him to hear anything negative, anything at all.”
“Which makes a dead man the perfect father. He can do no wrong.”
Drew’s breath stopped in his throat. He stared at Quinn. How many times had he thought just that, and then hated himself for it?
Quinn shrugged. “I tended to idealize my own father, after he died. And it took a while before my sister could get me to remember he hadn’t always been perfect.”
“She’s older?”
“A little.” Quinn grinned then. “Or a lot, sometimes. Our parents always said they had a wise, brilliant kid and a smart but stubborn one. I’ll let you guess which was which.”
Drew smiled, an odd enough occurrence while talking of his family situation that he was acutely aware of it.
“So what do you do about it?” Quinn asked.
“What can I do?” Drew answered wearily. “I kept hoping she’d eventually realize that what she thinks she knows isn’t the truth, but she’s determined to hang on to that idealized image.” He shook his head sharply. “But it’s not all her doing. I let her most of the time, because I just don’t want to fight that fight. I don’t want to fight with her at all.”
Quinn’s steady gaze sharpened, and Drew wondered if he’d let too much show. He wasn’t sure why he was talking so much to this guy he’d just met a week ago anyway. He never talked about all this to anyone.
“So, this is just a business arrangement,” Quinn said, not even making it a question.
“It took me two years to find them, after Doug was killed. When I did, Lyss was really sick. Exhaustion, pneumonia. They’d already taken Luke, put him in a foster home. She couldn’t take care of herself, let alone him. Getting married was the fastest way to get through it all.”
“You would have had claim on Luke by blood, wouldn’t you?”
“Yes. But he needed his mother, too. And she needed help. And—”
He cut himself off. This was insane. He wasn’t going to explain to this near-stranger why he’d done what he’d done. Let him think whatever he was going to think. He was regretting already that Foxworth knew as much as he did.
When did you start running off at the mouth? he asked himself sourly.
He should get Luke and Alyssa, and they should just go home. The fight was over, and Luke had scared them enough that he thought they might be able to avoid the heated exchanges in the future. It would be hard to pry the boy away from the dog he was having so much fun with, but—
Almost on the thought, the dog stopped mid-romp. He spun around on his hindquarters and stared at Drew. And then he bolted, straight toward them.
Cutter sat, not as Drew would have expected, at Quinn’s feet, but at his own. The animal stared up at him intently. No, more than intently. That gaze was intense, and seemingly impossible to look away from. Drew thought of tales he’d read as a boy, of sheepdogs who controlled their flock with just the power of their eyes, and cattle dogs who did the same. He’d always thought it a bit fanciful. Now he wasn’t so sure.
“Uh-oh.” Quinn’s voice was wry, almost wary sounding.
Drew lifted a brow at him. “Your dog trying to tell me something?”
“He’s expressing an opinion, yes.” Quinn crouched down beside the animal, who only flicked a glance at him. “We can’t, boy. We don’t do domestic. It’s not our place.”
Drew shifted his gaze from the dog back to the man, who had seemed perfectly sane moments ago. Yet now here he was, talking to a dog as if the animal could comprehend every word. We don’t do domestic... What the hell did that mean?
Cutter let out a low sound, not a growl but a sort of whuffing bark. It sounded oddly insistent.
“No, Cutter,” Quinn said.
The insistent bark came again just as Luke, clearly curious at the departure of his delightful companion, came up to them.
“Do you have to leave?” the boy asked, looking crestfallen.
“We should,” Quinn said, “but I’m not sure he’s going to let us.”
“Okay, this is crazy. He’s a dog,” Drew said.
“Sometimes,” Quinn said. “Sometimes I’m not sure what he is.”
“Quinn?”
Hayley’s voice came from behind him, and Drew turned to see the woman and Alyssa approaching. Lyss was smiling,