In His Keeping (Slow Burn #2)(4)

“Is there a note?” she asked anxiously. “Anything at all to explain what in the world someone was thinking to do such a terrible thing? It’s Christmas! You don’t abandon a baby in this kind of weather at Christmastime!”

Distress radiated from her in tangible waves. He quickly tossed the contents of the carrier and indeed, an envelope fell to the floor next to the blankets and two tattered stuffed animals.

“Read it to me,” she urged, though she never looked at him. Her gaze was solidly fastened on the baby in her arms and for a moment he couldn’t breathe.

He was looking at what could never be for them. The pain was nearly overwhelming. Ginger looked at the baby with such tenderness and love as she rubbed her hand over the baby’s back in an effort to soothe him or her. Hell, was it a boy or a girl?

He tore open the envelope with shaking hands and quickly scanned, fully prepared to spare his wife anything that could hurt her. But what he read shook him to the very core.

I can’t take care of my baby. She would always be in danger with me. She needs someone to love and protect her. I’m counting on you to raise her as your own and never let anyone know the circumstances of her past. You likely think I’m the most horrible mother on earth to give my baby to complete strangers, but it’s because I love my daughter that I give her into your care and keeping and ask you to love her as I would and raise her as your own. She can never know about me or her biological father. Swear to me you’ll keep my secret. My heart is breaking, but only the knowledge that you’ll provide for her as I cannot gives me the strength to do what is best for her. She was deeply loved. Please never doubt that. I only ask that you love her every bit as much as her father and I do.

When Gavin finished reading the letter, his hand was shaking noticeably and Ginger sank onto the couch, holding the baby tightly against her chest as she stared incredulously at her husband.

Then he quickly went to sit beside her on the couch, reinforcing her hold on the tiny bundle because she was shaking every bit as much as he was.

She pulled the blanket down to expose the baby’s face and Gavin lost his heart on the spot. A beautiful baby girl stared back at him as Ginger gently stroked her finger down one soft cheek.

And as quickly as he’d lost his heart, he made a decision. A decision that would forever change the course of his and Ginger’s lives. Calm descended even as his mind began working at incredible speed, swiftly calculating their options.

“I want you to pack a bag,” he said, the betraying note of uncertainty leaving his voice and in its place implacable resolve. “We’re leaving the country and we’ll be gone for a while.”

His wife’s eyes widened. “What are we going to do, Gavin?”

His gaze was steady as he stared back at her. He curled his hand around her knee, not wanting to take her hand away from the baby.

“We’re going to do as we were asked and raise her as our daughter.”

TWO

FIVE MONTHS LATER . . .

GAVIN had always had an understanding for what money and power could achieve, but it wasn’t until Arial, the name they’d chosen for their precious baby girl, that he fully appreciated or felt there was a purpose for the wealth he’d accumulated his entire adult life. As though he’d always been preparing for something so important. In the moment that innocent baby girl had arrived on their doorstep, he’d known that his wealth would finally serve a greater purpose.

It had all come down to this and to what he had been able to provide his wife—and now his daughter.

Ari was theirs. There was a paper trail he’d meticulously crafted documenting his wife’s pregnancy and the fact that after so many miscarriages he’d taken her away and kept her in complete isolation and privacy to give birth to their daughter.

A birth certificate listing date of birth, his and Ginger’s names as the parents, even the small clinic he funded where she’d been “born.”

Now, for the first time, they were returning to the United States with their daughter, assured that Ari’s past was airtight. That all the i’s were dotted and t’s crossed. All they had to do was resume their lives, but even with the confidence that Ari’s past was unshakable, Gavin wasn’t fool enough to ever even think about relaxing his guard. Their lives would be forever altered, and he didn’t have a single regret for the changing course of their destinies. He had all a man could ever hope for—wish for. It was all finally his, a fact he gave thanks for every single day since that snowy Christmas night when Ari had entered their lives.

He’d carefully explained to Ginger the changes to their lives that would occur, that they would have to exercise complete caution in every aspect of their day-to-day lives. He’d worried that Ginger would feel imprisoned, that she’d grow tired of living such an isolated existence, but he should have known that his wife—like him—would do anything at all to protect their daughter.

An unbreakable bond had been formed that night when Ari had been left on their doorstep. It was inexplicable and instantaneous, as if she’d always been meant to be theirs. And that bond had only strengthened until neither of them could remember their lives before Ari was a part of their family.

The very first thing Gavin had done in his preparation to return to the United States was to quietly sell his house in Connecticut, because he wanted no trace of their past before Ari. No chance of Ari’s mother showing back up at the same place she’d left her baby, asking for her back.