The Billionaire's Christmas Baby(35)

“If anyone is to blame it’s me. I’m the one who turned my back on her.” He had never admitted that out loud. He had spent most of his adult life feeling angry at Louise, but deep down he knew he’d given up on her. He could have tried one more time. He felt Hannah take a steadying breath against him and slowly step out of his arms. Just like that, like a flurry of clouds suddenly taking away the sun, Hannah put distance between them.

She looked up at him and he wanted to know what she saw, uncomfortably aware that he hadn’t given a damn in a long time what someone thought of him. Once he’d become wealthy and successful he’d thought that was all he needed. He had made it and nothing could touch him. But now, standing here in this tiny kitchen, with her beautiful face and glorious eyes staring up at him, he questioned all of it. Everything he had achieved, he wondered if it was enough.


“We all do what we have to do to survive. You gave her so much. No one can blame you for finally taking care of yourself.” How did she do it? How could she see through him like that?

She turned to get the coffee.

“Hannah?”

“Mm-hmm,” she murmured, stepping around him to pull out a carton of milk from the fridge, as though nothing had happened, as though they were merely casual acquaintances about to share a cup of coffee.

“You never answered my question.” He caught the tremor in her hand as she poured the coffee. She was a master at avoidance.

“Are you hungry?” she asked, peering into her fridge.

He shut the fridge and she frowned up at him.

“You’re not going to let this go are you?”

He shook his head.

“It’s really not as dramatic as she made it sound,” Hannah said, and he knew she was trying to act casual as she walked passed him to sit at the round table. He followed her, picking up his mug of coffee, sitting across from her at the table.

“So then it shouldn’t be too difficult for you to talk about it,” Jackson said, watching her eyes flash with annoyance. He took a sip of his coffee, his fingers gripping the handle tightly, waiting for her to speak. He was half expecting her to tell him she wasn’t going to talk about it.

She cleared her throat after taking a long drink. “It was one of my first cases I’d been assigned to. She was a teenager, living with an abusive, alcoholic father. Long story short, when she didn’t return my calls I found out she had gotten approval to get out of our system.” She traced the rim of the smooth cup and he could tell she was getting lost in the memory. He felt his muscles tense in anticipation of where this story was going.

“I had a gut feeling that things didn’t magically get better at home. So one night, I stopped by their place. I was a total rookie,” she said with a small laugh that didn’t hold an ounce of amusement. “I heard yelling. Men’s voices. Then I heard Jen’s voice, but it was more of a scream.”

Jackson held his breath and waited for her to continue.

“At that point I should have called in for help, but I was young, and stupid, and I ran in there and, God, did I learn a lesson that night,” Hannah said with laugh that was so self-critical, so deprecating that Jackson felt his throat tighten. She looked up at the ceiling, blinking back tears that she couldn’t hide from him. “Her dad was gone and two of his friends had her pinned down on the sofa, half naked. And uh…I was no match for them,” she said, turning her eyes to him. And at that moment he hated more than he ever thought he could hate someone. Hannah’s eyes didn’t leave his when she continued.

“They pushed me down before I could run, before I could think of how to defend myself. They laughed, they slapped me around, ripped my clothes. The harder I fought, the harder they laughed. They touched me and when I thought…when I thought that was it, Jen came up from behind and whacked the guy that was on top of me with a frying pan. We managed to knock the other one unconscious too. We ran out to my car and drove to the police station.” Jackson was torn between wanting to hold her and wanting to smash something. He knew, based on her stiff posture, the tilt of her chin and her cool tone that she didn’t want him to touch her. And he knew it was because she would lose it if he did. That stranglehold she had on her emotions would come undone.

But he couldn’t sit still anymore. He couldn’t get the image of Hannah being thrown on the ground and touched by those animals out of his mind. Jackson had lived through his own hell. He wasn’t a naive man. But hearing this, hearing someone try and hurt someone so good, someone he cared for, made him want to go out and inflict some serious bodily harm.

“They didn’t—uh—” How the hell could he finish that sentence? He gripped the side of the thick pine table as Hannah shook her head.

“No. And I have no regrets for going in there that night. If I hadn’t gone in, they would have raped her, Jackson,” she said, emotion returning to her eyes, softening her voice…and ultimately melting his heart. “I only regret not having a plan, walking in there by myself. The next morning I registered for self defense classes.” He knew they were both thinking about that night in his bed, when she’d told him she could have knocked him to the ground. He almost wanted to smile with pride for her, for her strength and determination, and that unwavering courage. Then he thought of the last night when she was in his arms and had stopped him from making love to her. She was still afraid.