Still, her heart seemed to rattle around in her chest while she dialed and waited for Holbrook’s secretary to pick up.
Finally she heard a melodic voice say, “Senator Holbrook’s office.”
Lucky could barely squeeze enough air into her lungs to speak. “Is the senator in?”
“He is, but he’s on another call. Can I take a message?”
Squeezing the phone in a death grip, Lucky hesitated. “Could I hold, please?”
“Certainly. Your name?”
“Lucky Caldwell.”
“May I tell Senator Holbrook what your call is regarding?”
“It’s…a private matter.”
The other woman’s pause indicated that she wasn’t pleased with her response. “Does the senator know you?” she asked cautiously.
No. She and Garth Holbrook had never exchanged the most basic of greetings, which would only make this woman that much more reluctant to pass on her message. And if Garth recognized her name and connected her to her mother, he might not accept the call even if he got the message. “Just tell him it’s important.”
“One moment.”
Lucky paced in agitation as two minutes turned into three and three into four. When she’d been holding for nearly ten minutes, she began to think she’d been forgotten, but his secretary came back on the line right before she gave up.
“I’m sorry, Ms. Caldwell, Senator Holbrook told me to tell you he’s late for a luncheon appointment and will have to call you later.”
She was getting the brush-off; she was sure of it. Disappointment brought Lucky’s agitated movements to a halt, and she sank onto the couch. “Fine, no problem,” she said. But when she hung up she doubted she’d ever hear from Senator Garth Holbrook.
PARKED IN THE UNDERGROUND LOT beneath the building where his office was located, Garth Holbrook sat in his black Lincoln Navigator and stared down at the message he’d crumpled in his palm. After twenty-five years—just when he’d begun to believe he could forget—Red’s daughter had contacted him. Why? What could she possibly want?
“Private,” he muttered, reading his secretary’s rolling script.
Lucky knew about him and her mother. She had to know. What other private matter did they have to discuss? Why else would she call him out of the blue when they’d never so much as spoken? From what he’d heard about her, she was a gold digger of the first order, like her mother had turned out to be. She was probably going to make him pay dearly for her silence in order to save his career. But he wasn’t worried about his career. Not as much as he was worried about his family.
Crumpling the message in his fist once again, Garth thought of Gabe and cringed. Since the accident, Garth was the only person Gabe would open up to. If Lucky told anyone what she most likely knew, it would destroy his relationship with his son. Gabe would retreat even further into himself. And what about Reenie? Hardheaded, outspoken Reenie would conclude that she didn’t know her own father. She’d hate him.
And for good reason. His torrid affair with Red had lasted nearly two months. He’d betrayed them all, again and again—just for a little of the raunchy, sweaty sex his wife abhorred.
Panic clutched at Garth’s chest, and he scrambled to loosen the blasted tie that seemed to be choking him. So what if those two months were his only indiscretion. So what if he’d tried to compensate his wife and children for his foolish blunder, tried in a million different ways. They wouldn’t realize that. And he couldn’t, wouldn’t, disgrace Celeste or himself by telling his children how dissatisfied he’d always been with her on a sexual level.
So what, then? What did he do?
Dropping his head in his hand, he sighed heavily. He had to call Lucky before she tried to contact him again, or started spreading what she knew. For Gabe and Reenie’s sake, he had to move quickly.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
LUCKY HAD HER HEAD and part of her upper body in the cupboard beside the stove when the phone rang. Since Mr. Sharp had stopped work for the holidays, she’d been cleaning the nooks and crannies of the house and doing some of the painting.
“Hello?” she said, grabbing the phone on its fifth ring.
“Ms. Caldwell?”
Her breath caught in her throat. It was a voice she didn’t recognize, an older, gravelly voice she felt sure belonged to Senator Holbrook.
“Yes?” she said hesitantly.
“This is Garth Holbrook.”
God, she was right; she had him on the phone. This man could be her father. Of the three possibilities, she had her hopes pinned on him.
But what now? What did she say?
“Ms. Caldwell? Are you still there?”
“Yes, I’m here, sorry.”
“I got your message.”
And now she had the audience she desired. She could hardly believe it. “Senator Holbrook, do you know who I am?”
“Yes.”
She couldn’t read the emotion behind that one word, but she sensed something far from passive. “Well, first off, I want to assure you that I’m not trying to make trouble for you or anyone else.”
“Of course not,” he said.
The sarcasm in those words made Lucky rush to explain. “I found your name listed in my mother’s journal from twenty-five years ago, and was just—”
“She kept a journal?”
“Yes.”
He swore softly under his breath, and Lucky winced even though she’d expected him to be upset. How many men wanted the fact that they’d broken their marriage vows recorded? And he was a politician, which made him especially vulnerable.
“How much do you want for it?” he asked.
“Excuse me?”
“How much are you asking for the journal?”
“I’m not asking anything for it. It’s not for sale.”
“Then why did you call?”
Lucky gathered her nerve. “I was hoping that maybe you’d be willing to…to take a paternity test.” Curling her nails into the palm of her hand, she squeezed her eyes shut as she waited for his response.
“You’re kidding. You think there’s a chance…No. That isn’t possible.”
“Actually, you were with my mother right around the time I was conceived and—”
“Listen, I’m not your father. I might have been a fool, but I wasn’t irresponsible enough to get her pregnant.”
“She told you she was on the pill, right?”