Out of Time Read online

  “The usual dumb excuses. A party without our spouses. Too much drinking and reminiscing. Me feeling ignored by my wife whose focus was on our new daughter. Your mom vulnerable from the difficulties she and your father had been having in conceiving a child—something they both wanted very much.”

  Jesus. Scott didn’t know what to say. “I didn’t realize.”

  “Of course you didn’t,” the senator said sternly. “You weren’t supposed to. You were a child.”

  “When did my father learn the truth?”

  “As soon as your mom realized she was pregnant she went right to him—before she told me, as a matter of fact. By that time I’d gotten my head out of my ass and realized how much I loved my wife and what an arrogant, selfish fool I’d been.”

  “Did your wife know?” Kate had seemed to think she hadn’t.

  He shook his head. The stern facade softened in shame. “I never told her. Maybe I should have, but I was too scared she would never forgive me or be able to look at me the same way again. And there was Katherine to consider. But your dad forgave your mom for her moment of stupidity. He did more than forgive. He considered it a gift.”

  Scott was incredulous. “What? For cheating on him?”

  “No, maybe not for that. But for you. He’d just found out that he couldn’t have a child. Not knowing how to tell your mom was one of the reasons they’d been fighting.”

  Scott couldn’t believe it. “So he knew? This whole time he knew?”

  The senator nodded. “But he never wanted you to. He made your mom and me promise never to tell you. It was a promise I came to regret. At the time, I’m ashamed to admit that I was worried about my wife and the election I was about to run. I didn’t think about all that I would be giving up.”

  “But you kept your word?”

  “Reluctantly. I felt I owed it to him. And I would have gone on keeping it if Kate hadn’t come to me with what you both had found out. I’d kept up with you. Followed your progress. I wasn’t surprised that you’d gone into the service. It’s in your blood. I was the first in the family not to go into the military. My father was an air force pilot in Korea, and my grandfather was an admiral in the Pacific during the Second World War.”

  Shit. Scott didn’t know what to say. Kate had never said anything. Although he supposed he’d never asked. He’d made it clear the subject was off-limits.

  But it was what else he’d learned that was harder to process. He was both overcome and humbled by what he’d just heard. His father had known and loved him anyway. He hadn’t been deceived.

  The senator stood, obviously intending to leave him with his thoughts. “You were Stephen Taylor’s son from day one. I’m not trying to change that. But I’d like to get to know the man he raised in the little time I have left.”

  Scott watched him go, feeling as if the world—his world—had just shifted all over again.

  Twenty

  Natalie felt the shadow fall over her and opened her eyes. She blinked. Scott loomed over her, his body—his big, half-naked body—blocking most of the sunlight.

  For all that he was a SEAL and spent a good part of his life in the water, she’d actually never seen him in a bathing suit before—in this case, board shorts that hung nice and low on his hips, emphasizing the washboard stomach and eight-pack abs. The print was green camo with some kind of flag on the tag. Jamaica maybe?

  “You carry board shorts with you on all your missions?” she asked with a laziness she wasn’t really feeling anymore. Her pulse was racing a little too fast for that.

  He smiled and scooted her feet over to sit down on the end of her lounge chair. “Never know when surf will be up. Gotta be prepared.” He lifted a brow, taking in her white shorts and T-shirt. “I was hoping you’d tossed in a nice teeny-weeny bikini.”

  “Sorry. Even if I could squeeze into one right now, a bathing suit didn’t make your two-minute packing cut.”

  He frowned, letting his gaze roam over her again. There was something hot and possessive about it that made her think he wouldn’t mind a little squeezing into in certain places. Namely the chest area where he couldn’t seem to take his eyes off her tight scoop-neck T-shirt.

  “You look incredible. You are barely showing.”

  Her hand went self-consciously to the slight round bump on her stomach. The one problem with the T-shirt was that it fit snugly against her stomach, too.

  His gaze followed and Natalie felt her cheeks flush. When he lifted his eyes to hers, the look that passed between them made her chest squeeze with the kind of happiness she never thought would be hers.

  They were going to have a baby together and sharing that with him filled her with a new kind of joy. A special kind. Her secret wasn’t just hers anymore. Knowing Scott would be there for the baby was such a relief; for the first time she actually felt truly happy about her pregnancy.

  “The senator guessed,” Scott said.

  “He did?”

  “He noticed you weren’t drinking wine last night and only decaf this morning.”

  She crossed her arms and glared at him a little. “And not any barely there bumps?”

  Scott grinned. “He might have mentioned something.”

  She socked him playfully, doing more damage to her knuckles than the rock-hard muscle of his arm.

  But then all of the sudden, she realized what he was saying. “You talked to him?”

  He nodded. “You were right.”

  “I was?”

  He stood and dragged her to her feet. “I’ll tell you all about it if you swim with me.”

  “But I don’t have a . . .”

  She didn’t get to finish. He picked her up and tossed her into the water fully clothed. When she came up sputtering—and cursing—he had already dived in and swum half the length of the pool underwater.

  She didn’t bother trying to catch him. She knew when she was out of her league. Instead she swam over to the entry stairs and sat in the water, which actually felt refreshing, waiting for him to come up for air.

  He had to come up sometime, right?

  As her watch was now a doorstop, she’d guess it was a good two minutes—and four lengths of the twenty-five-meter pool—before he did.

  He stopped and stood a good ten feet away from her at the bottom edge of the stairs, breathing heavily. The water was only about three feet deep there, which gave her plenty of wet chest and abs to view. But it was a big, Cheshire cat grin that was getting to her right now. He was obviously proud of himself.

  “You’re buying me a new watch,” she said, holding up her wrist. It hadn’t been expensive, but the one he’d be buying her would be. “And I’ve suddenly taken a fancy to little gold crowns on my watches.”

  He laughed at the reference to a Rolex. “Whatever it costs me it was worth it. The expression on your face was priceless.”

  “What if I hadn’t known how to swim?”

  “You would have learned fast or realized you could stand—it’s only five feet there. And we’d be having mandatory lessons before anyone found out. Christ, that would be embarrassing.”

  He might have shivered.

  “Lucky for you then that I was pollywog champ in the seven-to-eight-year division at my local swim club.” Indoor swim club—it was Minnesota after all—but she left that out.

  “Pollywog?”

  “It’s a tadpole.”

  “I know what it is. I was just impressed.”

  She harrumphed. “You should be.”

  He inched closer, eyeing her carefully. “You still mad?”

  She gave him a long look, trying not to be distracted by how sexy he looked and failing miserably. “I don’t get mad, I get even.” She gave him a smile of pure evil. “When you least expect it . . . expect it.”

  “Now you’re just turning me on,” he said in a husky v