“I can hear you,” she said softly. “Don’t yell at me, Father.”
He grimaced tightly, glancing away again. “I don’t mean to yell.” He attempted to throttle the sound. “My fellow cabinet members are forever chastising me for it. Sometimes, I don’t realize…” He broke off again.
“Why now?” She couldn’t figure that part out. “Why come to me now when I needed you years before?” Her voice was roughening with tears, and she hated that. She shouldn’t hurt; she shouldn’t care.
He cleared his throat again, shifting uncomfortably. “I read her diary. You left it out at Briar Cliff. When you renounced the estate, I was given a letter she wrote me before her death. I went to Briar Cliff to try to make sense of it, and I found the diary.” He blinked jerkily.
“When you were five, the evening of your birthday, she led me to believe you may not be mine. It’s no excuse,” he snapped furiously. “No excuse for what I did. But while I was reading her words, I realized we hurt you. In our selfish attempts to hurt each other, in my own moralistic, self-righteous belief of right and wrong, I had committed an even greater sin. I had denied the child I accepted on her birth. Shouldn’t have mattered if she had lied to me, or if she had truly cheated me. I accepted you. And I was wrong.”
He stared straight ahead as he spoke, his hazel eyes a bit watery, his hands bunched in his pockets as Kimberly watched him in shock, uncertain, confused. She glanced back down at the doll. It had taken longer than a few weeks for this creation. He would have to have commissioned it more than a year before.
“I don’t expect forgiveness,” his voice was rising again. “Don’t deserve it. But I wanted you know. I know what he does, that man you’re marrying. That Club he’s a part of. I know what it means. I don’t like it. You know I don’t like it…” He stopped, obviously attempting to control the volume of his words. “You’re my daughter. What you do in your privacy is none of my business… I just want…” He broke off again.
Kimberly stared back at him silently.
“One day…” he continued, “you might have children. Maybe a little boy, too. I want…” He cleared his throat roughly. “I don’t want to lose the chance to know your children, as I denied the chance to know you… Dammit, don’t cry woman. I won’t have those tears,” he yelled then.
Before Kimberly could respond he had jerked a handkerchief from his pocket and pressed it to her cheeks. A bit roughly, wiping at the tears before pushing it into her hands.
“Clean it up…” he snapped, gritting his teeth, lowering his voice. “I can’t stand to see you cry. Reminds me of too many things, Kimberly. Too much pain I caused in the past. Please don’t cry. I didn’t mean to make you cry.”
“She tried to tell me at the end,” she sniffed. “And I misunderstood.”
He nodded bleakly. “I know. I heard what she said and I misunderstood as well.” He patted her head roughly. “I have to get back. I have work to do, girl. I don’t have time to stand around here. Just…” He swallowed tightly. “Be happy, Kimmie. That’s all I ever really wanted for you.”
He turned and began to stalk to the doorway.
“Father.” He paused as she called out to him. “I’m getting married. Carolyn informs me the wedding is in six months.”
He grunted roughly. “That woman’s a busybody.”
Strangely, his voice was filled with a fondness she hadn’t expected.
“Yeah, she is,” she agreed. “But I’ll need someone to give me away,” she said hesitantly, wondering if she was only hurting herself with the words.
He turned slowly. It was his turn to be shocked, filled with disbelief.
His lips opened. Closed.
“I don’t deserve to,” he finally whispered. “I never expected to be able to.”
“If you want to,” she said, aching for the years lost, the father she realized she never knew. “Love me, love my husband, Father.”
He blinked roughly. “He stole my daughter,” he growled. “But I was doing a lousy job taking care of you anyway. And I would be proud…damned proud, Kimmie, to give you to him. I sacrificed your love for my own selfish pride. But I’d be damned proud to give you away.”
She licked her lips warily. “I never hated you.” She couldn’t say anything more. Right now, she was stunned, unable to explain to herself how this had happened.
He nodded jerkily. “I’m thankful for that. Now, I have a country to try to help slap back in shape for my grandkids. You keep that man you’re marrying in line.” He pointed a finger at her demandingly. “He’s too damned stubborn and sure of himself. Gives the rest of us a bad name…” He pressed his hands nervously into his pockets again. “Love you, Kimmie.”
He turned and left abruptly then, weaving quickly around Jared as he passed him in the hall.
Kimberly met her lover’s eyes. He stared back at her in surprise, his lips quirking in sudden amusement.
“Your father has issues,” he said with all seriousness.
She shook her head, a smile curving her lips as he came to her, his arms wrapping around her.
“You’re worth every sacrifice, Kimberly. He only realized that,” he said as he pulled her to his chest a second before her tears flowed again. “Every sacrifice. And trust me, dealing with that pious father of yours is going to be a sacrifice…”