Marrying the Playboy Doctor - By Laura Iding Page 0,13

paperwork and photos aside and rose with an agitated lurch to his feet.

There was no reason he could think of to hide the truth. Why on earth would his mother keep such a big secret?

The angry pressure was building in his chest so he began to pace, taking slow, deep breaths.

There had to be a reason. His mother hadn’t been a vengeful woman. The anger slowly eased, turning into a bewildered resentment. Had she kept the secret because it had been too painful to talk about her first husband?

He wished he knew. The marriage might have been brief but there had been three children born to the couple. He stopped and stared down at the grainy photograph, trying to comprehend what his mother’s life had been like. She’d been a widow at a young age, with three small children to care for. He imagined the Air Force had provided some income for her, but when had she met their father, Gregory Taylor? It must have been shortly after their biological father’s death.

He wanted to know the details. How exactly his parents had fallen in love. All he’d ever been told was that they’d met at a party given by mutual friends.

But he hadn’t known his mother had been a widow at the time.

All his life he’d believed Gregory Taylor was his dad. But really his biological father was Shane Andre. A young pilot killed in the line of duty.

Damn. He scrubbed his hands over his face, knowing he needed to call Caleb and Tess, to tell them the news. He even reached for the phone, but then he stopped.

He couldn’t do this now. Not yet. Not when he was still feeling so resentful. Not when he hadn’t even really accepted the truth for himself.

Besides, Caleb and Tess were both busy with their respective families. Why make them miserable, too? His gaze rested on the small pack of pale blue letters. From the address on the top one he could see it was correspondence between his mother and Shane Andre.

He couldn’t read them. Not now. Heck, maybe not ever. For some reason he couldn’t quite accept that his mother hadn’t been honest.

Had she planned to tell them at all?

Maybe. Her death had been sudden, the aneurysm in her brain bursting without warning. It wasn’t as if she’d been sick for a while, knowing the end was near.

Yet on the other hand she’d had years to tell them the truth and hadn’t.

He wished he could talk to Kylie. As an outsider, not part of the family, she might have a different perspective. Especially since she was a young single mother herself.

No. What was he thinking? Kylie wasn’t like his mother. Kylie couldn’t know why she’d kept the truth a secret. He was just using that as an excuse to talk to her. Despite his decision to stay away from her and Ben, he found he was looking forward to seeing her tomorrow at their meeting.

Strange to realize he had more in common with Kylie’s son Ben than he’d originally thought.

Neither one of them knew the man who’d sired them.

Kylie swiped her damp palms on the sides of her pants, feeling unaccountably nervous about her scheduled meeting with Seth Taylor. She’d purposely worn her dark blue paramedic’s uniform, since she’d been sorely tempted to wear something nice and feminine. Shaking her head at her own foolishness, she grabbed the hypothermia protocol she’d created, using the ones she’d researched as a template, and quickly headed out to her car. She drove the short distance to Cedar Bluff Hospital, nestled off the highway, just on the outskirts of the town.

The building didn’t look much like a hospital, if you asked her. Most of the hospitals she’d been in had been huge white buildings. Not Cedar Bluff. This hospital was built on a hill, against the backdrop of a gently wooded area, the hospital’s brown frame blending nicely with the landscape.

Peaceful. The first time she’d seen the hospital and the town she’d sensed she’d found a home. A great place to raise her son.

Ben was back in day care today, and the stitches over his eye seemed to be healing nicely. She’d made an appointment for Tuesday with the ophthalmologist, as Seth had suggested. Ben’s school started in ten days, and she still had so much to do.

She parked in the ED parking lot and walked inside. Hoping Seth wouldn’t be forced to cancel their meeting, she swept a glance through the trauma room, noting with