Free Trust Me by Melanie Craft Page B

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     and animals, and Carly had never pressed him. She had always sensed a sadness underlying the old man’s courtly manner.
    “I never knew that Alan had a son,” she said.
    There was no humor in Max’s tight smile. “Neither did Alan.”
    “But Henry—”
    “Found out about me a little more than a year ago. After I hired an agency to find him. Someone got greedy, I guess. How’s
     that for a confidential investigation? Those people are supposed to be the best in the business.”
    “That’s pretty bad. But it did bring you and your grandfather together, so maybe—”
    “Actually,” Max said, “it didn’t. I’ve never met Henry Tremayne.”
    Carly stared at him. “But if you knew about him a year ago, and he knew about you, then why haven’t you met?”
    “Why do people ever make the wrong decision?” Max asked harshly. “We screw up our lives and wonder why everything looks so
     damn clear in retrospect.” The room was quiet for a moment, then he exhaled heavily. “I don’t know. It never seemed like the
     right time to impose myself on him.”
    “But I wonder why Henry never—” Carly stopped herself. For anyone who knew Henry Tremayne, the answer was obvious. “Of course,”
     she said, thinking out loud. “He was waiting for you to come to him. That would be his style. He’s too polite to force his
     way into anyone’s life. He knew that you had found him, so he was waiting…”
    Max winced, and Carly wanted to bite her tongue off. This, then, was the darkness she had sensed yesterday in the clinic when
     she had confronted him with accusations of neglecting his grandfather. No wonder he was suffering silently. Something, a reason
     that she couldn’t have imagined, had kept him from contacting his grandfather, and now he knew he had waited too long.
    “Why weren’t you ready, Max?” she asked, putting a gentle hand on his arm. He seemed hot under her fingers, as if there were
     a fire smoldering just under his skin. He stiffened when she touched him, but didn’t pull away. “You were the one who searched
     for him. What made you stop? When you found him, didn’t you want him?”
    Max turned on her. “Want him!” he said hoarsely. “My own blood? He’s the only family I have left. I’ve been wanting him since
     I was a kid. He just didn’t have a face or a name until fourteen months ago. But then, when I learned who he was…”
    “He’s your grandfather. What else matters?”
    “It’s not that simple. What was I supposed to do, show up at Henry Tremayne’s door, almost forty years after the fact, and
     introduce myself? ‘Hi, Grandpa. You don’t know me, but I’m the product of Alan’s affair with a boozed-up cocktail waitress.
     He would have provided for me, I’m sure of it, if it hadn’t been for that drunk-driving accident. Aren’t you glad to have
     me as a reminder of how much your boy liked to party?’ ”
    Carly knew that the anger in his voice was not directed at her, but still, she felt it sharply. She took a deep breath, rocked
     by the turbulence around him, and reached out again.
    “Max, you need to believe me. That’s not how Henry would see you. You don’t know him yet, but—”
    “I know enough about him,” Max said. “And I know this: Long-lost relatives of rich old men tend to be looking for love of
     the green paper variety. I’m no damn fortune hunter, and I’m not going to let myself look like one.”
    “You?” Carly said incredulously. “You couldn’t.”
    “I could. He’s too rich.”
    “But so are you,” she said, then blushed when he raised his eyebrows at her. “Richard mentioned something about your company.
     What I’m trying to say is, how could anyone possibly think of you as a fortune hunter? You have plenty of money.”
    “Not enough,” Max said. “Not yet.”

C HAPTER 8

    “ M ax Giordano?” Jeannie Martin-Schwartz paused over the bag of groceries she was unloading and considered the