Page 57 of Once Upon a Holidate
He thought she might continue to grill him, but instead she nodded. “Okay, Dad. I know you want to take a shower. We’ll talk after that.”
Twenty minutes later, he joined her in the kitchen. When she saw him, she got a beer from the refrigerator and opened the bottle, then poured herself some water. She put out chips and dip, along with a plate of cut-up vegetables.
“Thanks,” he said, both surprised by and wary of her thoughtfulness.
She picked up a slice of red bell pepper but didn’t take a bite. He waited, wanting her to tell him what was on her mind. He assumed she would want to know more about the morning’s events, but she surprised him by asking, “Were you working for the DEA when you were gone that one year?”
He groaned silently. Not a topic he wanted to discuss with her. He didn’t like talking about that time in his life. So much had happened that still haunted him. His capture and torture, Raine’s death, the realization that someone he’d trusted had betrayed him.
He nodded slowly. “Yes, I was on assignment in Colombia, working undercover. I wasn’t supposed to be gone that long, but the cartel found out who I was and took me prisoner.”
Her eyes widened. “Wh-what?”
He raised one shoulder. “It was a long time ago and I’m fine.”
“It wasn’t a long time ago. You came home less than four years ago.” She brushed away tears. “I thought you were just living your life. No one told me.”
“I’m sure your mother didn’t want to upset you.”
“Upset me? She didn’t tell me my own father was held captive by some drug cartel? How did they even know who you were?”
“Someone on the inside told them.”
The tears stopped. “Do you know who did that?”
He nodded. “He’s dead.”
“Did you kill him?”
He managed a slight smile. “No. I don’t do revenge killings. The cartel did it. While they appreciated the information, they knew he could never be trusted, so they killed him.” He didn’t mention they’d slit open his belly and left him to bleed out and be eaten in the jungle.
“Did they hurt you?”
He thought about the scars on his torso, reminders of the knife fights he’d been forced into. He thought of the beatings and the starvation, of how they’d poisoned him just enough to make him wish he would die, but not enough to actually kill him.
“Joylyn, I’m fine. Why do you want to talk about this?”
“Because I should know what happened to you. What if you’d died? What if the last thing I ever said to you was that I didn’t want to see you anymore? I thought you were just ignoring me, and now I find out you were in Colombia and kidnapped and I never knew.”
“Maybe if you’d bothered to talk to me, this wouldn’t be such a surprise. I showed up every damned weekend for months before taking the first assignment. When I got back, I kept showing up. Every weekend, Joylyn. Until you graduated from high school. What the hell?”
She stared at him, wide-eyed. “You’ve never sworn at me before.”
“You’ve never poked at the open wound before.” He sighed. “I’m sorry. I won’t swear at you again.”
“It’s okay. I probably deserve it.”
He leaned toward her. “Tell me what happened. Please. I want to know. Why did you turn your back on me? I want to say it was just some teenage thing, but I know it wasn’t. I can’t think of a single thing I did that was worthy of that kind of rejection. Just tell me.”
She lowered her gaze before looking at him again. “It was Sandy.”
“My ex-wife? What does she have to do with anything?”
Sandy had never been thrilled to have a stepdaughter, he thought, then reminded himself it wasn’t the stepdaughter she’d objected to as much as Garrick’s devotion to Joylyn. That was what had pissed off Sandy.
“When you two split up, she came to see me.” She bit her lower lip. “She said you’d thrown her out because you’d gotten tired of her. She said you’d never really loved me and that she wanted me to prepare myself because I was next. She said you couldn’t wait for me to grow up so you could be done with me.”
“What?” he roared, coming to his feet.
