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“I haven’t lied about the fact I’m your son,” Nash began. “I did find out when my mother had a stroke several months ago.”
“Jake Roycroft is my son.” Damon’s jaw clenched. “So, you came in deceiving us from day one with this fake name, long hair and a beard. Your clothes are all worn and even your truck is dated. You sure as hell thought this betrayal out down to the last detail.”
There was no other angle to look at it. Damon was dead-on.
“I did,” Nash confessed. “I wanted to come in, find out what you had planned for your horses after retirement. I needed a prizewinner to breed with mine and I wanted the best.
“Finding out I was your son was like a slap in the face,” he went on, putting everything on the line for the family he’d come to love...the rival he always thought he’d hate. “I couldn’t believe it. But my mother’s gut-wrenching confession was all the proof I needed. She’d kept the truth from me, from you, because she knew it would tear us up. She’d watched this feud for years, but when she had her stroke, she couldn’t keep the secret anymore.”
“And what was your plan when you first arrived?” Damon asked, his tone anything but that of a loving father or the cheerful man who’d walked into this room moments ago.
Now Nash did rise. He needed to pace, needed to get out of here, but he had to stay and continue to unravel this damn web he’d caught himself in.
“I was hoping if I got a good idea of what your plans were for the horses, I could get my assistant to offer enough money to take them.”
Nash crossed to the mantel where a new photo of Tessa, Cassie and Damon sat. The trio stood in front of Don Pedro after the historic win of the Triple Crown. Nash hadn’t been there, he’d been here at Stony Ridge taking care of the other horses.
Other photos showed Rose holding her two young daughters in front of a waterfall, a teen Tessa atop a Thoroughbred, Cassie in a ring with another horse. The family was tight and Nash wondered if he’d ever truly be able to break in where he longed to be.
“I was also battling whether or not to tell you the truth about being your son.” Nash turned back around. Damon hadn’t moved, except to cross his arms over his chest. “But the more I got to know you all, the more I learned as the film was being shot, I realized you weren’t the enemy I knew over the years. You were a ruthless businessman to me, but with your family...you were a different person.”
Nash refused to succumb to those damn emotions that he was nearly choking on. He wouldn’t show weakness, not now. Remaining strong was the only way he would get through this.
“Between sneaking around with Lily and battling how to tell you who I was, I was torn. I decided to tell you everything after the film crew left, after Lily and I were finished and after you’d hopefully sold the horse to my assistant.”
Damon’s eyes narrowed. “That all changed when Lily became pregnant. Right?”
Nash nodded, disgusted by the look of hatred he’d put in Damon’s eyes.
Being cut off from the Barringtons would kill Nash, but he would take it like a man. He’d done all of this to himself and had nowhere else to place the blame. Every downfall that was about to happen was nothing less than what he deserved. Nash just prayed the people he’d come to care about had mercy on him.
“Have you been lying all this time to Lily?” Damon asked.
The man may as well have punched him in the gut. Nash rested his hands on his hips, glanced away and nodded.
“So she knows you’re my son, but she has no clue you’re a millionaire with your own estate, your own spread of horses,” Damon repeated as if to drive that knife deeper. “She thinks she’s fallen in love with a simple, hardworking, honest groom. You waited until she left town to confront me and, what, you expect this to all be tidied up for when she returns?”
Damn it, why did that explanation make Nash sound more like a bastard than a man who’d started off with good intentions?
“I’m telling her everything when she comes back,” Nash replied, forcing himself to hold Damon’s angry gaze. “I love her. I didn’t come into this expecting to get wrapped up personally with anybody at all, least of all Lily. Then our affair started and spiraled out of control. Then I got to know you all even more and I started wanting more than what I came here for. I started out with a goal to get Don Pedro at any cost. Now, though, I don’t want him. I just want Lily, I want my father. You have all the power. You can cut me out of your life or we can try to make this relationship work.”
