CAROL DEVINE - The Billionaire's Secret Baby

He couldn’t blame her. He’d done plenty of underhanded things in his life, but proposing marriage to his intended on the day of her husband’s funeral topped the list. Yet it couldn’t be helped. He’d wasted enough time as it was.

He opened the box, revealing the diamond solitaire ring inside. To her credit, her gaze never faltered, never even dropped to see what he offered.

“A gift,” he said, placing the open box on the table between them.

“No, it’s not. It’s a bribe. You want me to marry you.”

Baldly stated like that, he wanted to throw up his hands and say, Hey babe, you got it all wrong. But she wasn’t wrong. Meg had done more than grow up. “I’m impressed,” he admitted. “You took the words right out of my mouth. Does that mean you approve?”

“I wouldn’t marry you if you were the last man on earth.”

It stung. Not much, but enough to put him into attack mode. He left the box in the middle of the table and lounged back in his chair. “You do realize what the alternative is.”

“You take me to court and sue for custody of Katie? Given your reputation, that’s a chance I’m willing to take.”

“Ah, yes. The familiar ground of my reputation.” He gave her his laziest smile. “I’m a Tarkenton, Meg. Do you have any idea what that means?”

“It means you were born with a silver spoon in your mouth. It means that despite the best education money can buy, you waste your time on wine, women and song. It means you think so little of your family’s good name, you bring heartache to your mother and your sister, the only two people on earth who could possibly care about someone as selfish as you. That’s what it means.”

He’d learned to shrug off such gibes. He had also acquired the correlated ability to ride roughshod over people. “It means, dear Meg, that when people look at me, they see my father. They want to believe I’m him. They want to believe it so badly, that no matter what I say or what I do, they think I’m the one to lead them to the promised land. You know what being John B. Tarkenton Jr. means? I get away with everything.”

“You won’t get away with Katie. I’ll take her to the ends of the earth to keep her away from you.”

“I’m one of the privileged few who has the resources to follow you there. You won’t be able to hide her, not from me. I have too much money and too many connections. There are Tarkenton interests all over the world. And when I do find her, I’ll use your refusal to acknowledge me as her father against you, not only in a court of law, but in the court of public opinion. Don’t forget, Meg. My name and face are recognized around the world. Which brings me to the most pertinent fact, a fact you seem to have forgotten. My being a Tarkenton means Katie is a Tarkenton, too.”

“You want to ruin her life by making this public? Is that it?”

“I’m her father. It’s a statement of fact. I am not going to go away. I laid out my proposal. You have two weeks to come up with a better one. If you don’t, your choice is simple. You can either turn this into a public custody battle or marry me and keep Katie’s paternity private, just between us. As her mother, I happen to think you are the most qualified person to make this decision. Unlike you, I believe both her parents have Katie’s best interests at heart.”

He shoved the box at her, and then he was gone from her house.

The moment Meg pushed open the thick glass-and-brass doors of New York City’s poshest and most exclusive athletic club, she realized she had made a mistake. It was one thing to show up without an appointment at Jack’s Wall Street office. It was quite another to confront him here, far from the trappings of executives and professionals.

Her smart navy business suit clashed with the fluorescent glare and neon graphics of the club. Behind a metallic reception desk stood a cute and bouncy girl who wore a brilliant green polo shirt with the club’s insignia stitched above her name. “May I help you?” she asked brightly.

Debbie’s short sleeves showed off muscular biceps and veins that bulged on her forearms. Intimidating arms they were, too, especially to a woman who was in a crisply tailored jacket, slim skirt and the highest of heels. “Do you happen to know where I can find Jack Tarkenton?” she asked.

Debbie’s bright smile disappeared. “I’m sorry. I’m not allowed to give out the names or whereabouts of our members.”

Meg tucked her purse under her arm and approached the desk. “What do you do in case of emergencies?”

“Is this an emergency?”

“It is urgent that I speak to Mr. Tarkenton, yes.”

Debbie put her hands on formidably narrow hips. “You would not believe how many women come in here claiming they know him. I’m sorry, but I’m not allowed to even confirm the fact that he’s here.”

“I know he’s here. I’m his secretary. It is urgent that I speak to him as soon as possible.”

“If you’re his secretary, why didn’t you just call him direct?”

It figured with Jack’s active social life, he’d carry a cell phone. “This matter is a rather delicate one,” Meg explained, hoping the conversation wasn’t being monitored. “It really would be best if I talked to him face-to-face.”

“One of those matters, huh?” Debbie gestured Meg closer. “I’ve heard he has a bedroom suite in his office. Mirrors, waterbed, hot tub, screening room, the works. True?”

Meg wouldn’t be surprised if it was. Before coming here, she went to the address on his business card. It led to a modern office building—gray with granite and sleek with reflecting glass.

However, the pepper-haired receptionist for Tarkenton, Inc., was far cagier and more protective than this young woman, refusing to either confirm or deny whether Mr. Tarkenton was even in the country. Consequently, Meg hadn’t glimpsed anything beyond the reception area.

Tastefully decorated in rich rosewood and brass, it was classic and brooding and lawyerlike. Which fit. Like his sister, Amanda, Jack had followed in his father’s footsteps long enough to obtain a law degree.

When Meg failed to track him down at the office, she recalled Amanda mentioning this club as one of her brother’s frequent haunts.

“Tell you what,” Meg said to Debbie. “I’m not allowed to divulge anything about Mr. Tarkenton, either. But if you let me deliver my message, I’ll have him autograph something for you.”

“He won’t give autographs. He won’t even sign our register. See?” Debbie showed a clipboard holding a lined sheet scrawled with names and membership numbers.

“Debbie, I’m his secretary,” Meg said dryly. “I can get him to sign anything.”

“I better not get into trouble over this.”

“You won’t,” Meg assured her, wondering if she’d ever strung so many lies together in her life. “If there’s a problem, I’ll explain the situation to your boss myself. After I see Mr. Tarkenton, that is. The sooner he gets this information, the better.”

Sighing, Debbie picked up the desk phone and punched a few numbers. “Hi, Ben. Uh, I need to check on Mr. Tarkenton’s whereabouts. Do you see him down there?” Pause. “By himself? Okay, thanks.” She hung up the phone. “He’s in one of our squash courts, practicing. If I let you go down there, you have to promise to come right back after you deliver your message.”

“You don’t have to worry about that. I have no intention of staying any longer than necessary.”

“He didn’t get somebody knocked up, did he?”

Even Meg wasn’t prepared for that bombshell of a question. Utterly speechless, she blinked in disbelief.

Debbie waved a placating hand. “I know you won’t tell me. I’ve always been curious, though. With all the women he has, you’d think he’d have a kid here or there, you know?”

Meg knew only too well, and fixed Debbie with a genuine glare. The young woman immediately apologized and wrote out a temporary membership card allowing free access to the club.

Shaken, Meg had to use both hands to pick the card up. The worst part was, she would have to get used to it. The man attracted this type of gossip and speculation wherever he went.

Meg glanced at the club doors, wishing there was someplace where the Tarkenton arm didn’t reach. There must be people in the world who hadn’t heard of Jack Tarkenton, people who didn’t know anything about him.

But people the world over knew of his father. In the thirty-plus years since his death, Senator John B. Tarkenton had attained martyr status. Revered for his ethics and character, he had rallied the nation with his youthful vigor and visionary leadership in a last-minute campaign for the presidency of the United States. The triumph of his election ended before he had a chance to take office, in the tragedy of his assassination.

Jack might be his father’s polar opposite in character, but the Tarkenton name still carried enormous weight. In a world hungry for leadership, too many people wanted to believe Jack possessed the same talents and integrity as his father.

Meg knew she couldn’t fight a belief, especially when it was cherished by people who most needed it to be true. People who wanted to live with hope in their lives, who wanted to believe in the future. Meg counted herself one of those people. She wanted Katie to be one of them, too.

Meg passed row after shiny row of exercise bikes, rowing machines, treadmills and stair climbers, torturous-looking contraptions all, and decided that ten thirty on a Monday morning was not the peak time to exercise. She imagined the place after work hours, though, jam-packed with bodies. Sweating bodies.

Jack was no exception. She spotted him in a glassed-in box of a court, dressed in sleek bike shorts and a gray T-shirt that was dark at the shoulders with sweat. Lithe as she remembered, he stroked a blur of a ball with a thin-necked racket, thwacking a regular rhythm against a scuffed backboard.

The nearer she came, the more she noticed the maleness of his body. Her steps slowed. His shirt hung loose, shaping the broad width of his shoulders. If anything, he’d gained muscle over the years. The bike shorts banded thighs honed by hard and steady exercise. Confirmed by calf muscles that flexed and flared as he moved from one side of the court to the other, he challenged himself on every shot, stretching to cover the entire court. The clear, see-through walls had to be made of super-durable acrylic. The velocity of the ball he hit would have cracked glass.

Above his left hand, the hand that held the racket, two sweatbands encircled his wrist. So that’s where it came from. Katie was left-handed, too.

Despite her promise to deliver her message promptly, Meg halted in her tracks and watched for long minutes, her throat too dry for words. She knew next to nothing about the game of squash. She understood pure physical aggression, however, and the advantage a supremely focused individual had over those who were mere mortals.

He never missed.

To the world outside, he projected the image of the rich and idle playboy. The bronzed good looks, the lazy charm that reflected the relaxed savoir faire of a man who had seen and experienced all. In recent years he had even gone on record with the most lurid of tabloids, claiming to have little ambition other than to enjoy life and have fun.

Yet there were many people who discounted those claims, calling them a mandate for the future, honest and modest, like father, like son. Once his days of “sowing his wild oats” were over, destiny dictated that John B. Tarkenton Jr. would enter into the world of international politics as his father had. And like any prodigal son returning to his true destiny, he’d be exalted and redeemed.