“Yes.”
Dad paused for a moment. “Are you telling me the truth?”
Hunter ground his back teeth to keep from snapping back at him. He was the one with the problem, not his father. “Yes. I am.”
After his dad eyed him for a minute, he said. “I believe you.”
Hunter blew out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.
They didn’t say anything for a long moment. The silence was stifling, the smooth purr of the engine the only sound in the car.
“Maybe...” Dad glanced away and stared out the window for a second before turning to him again. “Maybe we could—”
His phone rang, and he reached into his suit jacket pocket. “Hello. Now? Can’t it wait until tomorrow? I’ll be in at eight in the morn— Okay. I’ll head on over there now.” He hung up and put the phone away. “I’ve got to return to the office. A crisis of some sort. Where can I drop you?”
Hunter told him where his motorcycle was parked, a block away from Hutton’s. When they reached the destination, Daniel maneuvered the car close to the bike.
“You still don’t have a car?” Dad looked shocked.
“I like the Yamaha.” He opened the door and started to get out, then turned to him. “Glad to see you again... Dad.”
“If you need anything...” He shook his head and faced the front.
Hunter waited to see if he would say anything else. When he didn’t, he got out of the car and shut the door. The Bentley sped off.
He stood by his bike, still trying to process what had happened. For the first time in years, he’d had a conversation with his father that hadn’t turned into a fight. Granted, it was only for five minutes, but that was a start. And he realized something else—he truly missed him. And his mother. Payne and Kirk, too, although not nearly as much.
He walked back to Hutton’s, having avoided his father asking more questions about his “friend’s” interest in a tuxedo. And avoiding more lies. He’d made a vow to stop lying shortly after he was jailed, but this was an exception. After the party, he was never going to lie to his family, or anyone else, again.
***
“We’ll be at your office in fifteen minutes,” Daniel told Arthur as he merged onto the freeway. He glanced at his boss in the rearview mirror.
“Just take me home.”
Daniel frowned. “But what about the crisis?”
“There isn’t any.” His boss sounded defeated, something Daniel had never heard from him before. “It was a spam call. Lila and I have put up strict boundaries where Hunter is concerned. If she found out I’d even talked to him, much less invited him into my car... I saw the opportunity to cut off engagement, and I took it.”
Daniel got off the freeway and turned in the opposite direction.The tension in the car had eased the moment Hunter left, but Daniel was still reeling from the news that Arthur had another son. He thought there were only two—Payne and Kirk. Even in the main house there weren’t any pictures of Hunter, and no one had ever mentioned him. Then again, he realized that the only pictures he did see of the family were recent ones. No baby or school pictures of the kids. Just wedding photos from Payne’s and Kirk’s nuptials, along with a large oil painting of Arthur and Lila on the wall in the formal living room.
“I guess you’re wondering what all that was about,” Arthur said, sounding slightly more collected.
“No, sir.” He inwardly cringed at the fib.
“I’m wondering about it myself.” He sighed, and Daniel heard him shift in the seat. “Hunter’s my youngest son. I think he was about eleven, maybe twelve, when he started rebelling. I’m still not sure why. His personality was always so different from Kirk’s and Payne’s. More free-spirited, but still intelligent. He just refused to apply himself unless sports or girls were involved.”
Daniel turned on his blinker.
“We tried everything to get him to take his studies and life seriously, but he defied us at every turn. Getting kicked out of schools. Drinking all the time. Drugs too, although he never did those on a regular basis, thank God. He even stole from one of his teachers—a spiral notebook, of all things.” Another sigh. “Sorry. I don’t know why I’m telling you this.”
“Maybe because I understand. My past certainly isn’t lily white.”
“What caused you to drink so much— I’m sorry, don’t answer that question. That’s none of my business.”
Hearing the pain in Arthur’s voice, along with the desire to possibly understand what happened to his son, was surreal. Italso tugged at Daniel’s heart. “I don’t mind telling you,” he said. “The answer isn’t a good one, though.”
“What do you mean?”
