Incredulity filled his gaze followed by a flash of pain so clear it hurt her just to look at him.
But Kelly didn’t have time to lament; Buzz Malone didn’t have time to hurt. Not tonight. All that mattered now was getting her son back. They would deal with the fallout after he was found.
It didn’t matter that her ex-husband would never forgive her. That both their lives would be irrevocably changed. That the truth would tear their lives apart one more time. She’d decided in that first hour as she’d searched frantically for her little boy that she was willing to risk everything to find him. That included her own peace of mind and a future she’d been working toward since the breakup.
Vaguely, she heard Buzz curse. The roar in her ears turned into a loud hum. The lights dimmed. Her overloaded brain was simply going to short out. Her heart couldn’t possibly keep up this insane rhythm. She’d never fainted before, but she feared that in a second she was going to collapse in a broken heap and sink to the floor at his feet.
But she didn’t. Instead, she squared her shoulders, met that hard gaze with one of her own and said, “Eddie is your son. I’m sorry you had to find out like this. But I need you to help me find him. Right now.”
Buzz Malone had been struck by lightning once when he was fifteen years old. One minute he’d been standing on a rock ledge looking out over Pike National Forest during a summer storm. The next he’d been lying on the ground disoriented and confused, with second-degree burns on his arms and feet.
The doctors had said it was a miracle he’d lived.
Buzz wondered what the odds were of a man surviving such an ordeal twice in his lifetime, because he felt as if he’d just been struck again.
Her words rang in his ears like a thunderclap. Shocking. Dangerous. Damning. He wanted to deny them, give voice to the outrage boiling inside him. But for the first time ever, the power of speech failed him. He stared at the woman he’d spent three years loving more than life itself, the last few years trying desperately to get out of his system and the world rocked violently beneath his feet.
“What the hell are you talking about?” He asked the question, but Buzz had already done the math. If the child was four years old, there was no doubt of his parentage. Kelly might not have been able to live with Buzz, but she’d always been fiercely loyal. There hadn’t been anyone else. Not for Kelly. Certainly not for Buzz.
She looked down at her hands twisting in her lap, and bit her lower lip, the way she always did when she was upset or in trouble. Buzz figured the conversation they were having qualified for both of those things—and then some.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I just…at the time, I couldn’t,” she said.
“Tell me what?” He knew damn good and well what she was about to say. But his brain refused to believe it. His mouth refused to say the words aloud. He didn’t want to hear it, but he knew more than anyone just how futile wishes could be.
How in the name of God could she have done such a thing?
“I wanted to tell you a thousand times,” she began. “But I didn’t think you’d want to know.”
Slowly, he turned to face her. “You kept my son from me.”
“I never meant to hurt you.”
“Hurt isn’t the right word.”
“Oh, I forgot,” she choked. “Buzz Malone doesn’t hurt like the rest of us mortals—”
“You stole four years of my son’s life from me. I’m too angry with you to hurt.”
“You made it clear, Buzz. You never wanted children. You didn’t want me.”
Uttering a nasty curse, he turned away from her and stared blindly into the kitchen, his heart ricocheting like a bullet in his chest.
“Don’t you dare turn away from me,” she said. “Not now.”
Clenching his jaws against the shock rocking his brain, he turned back to her. “You had no right to lie to me.”
“I didn’t lie.”
“Don’t play semantics. You lied by omission.”
“You made your choice when we were married. I simply made it easy for you to walk away.”
“You’re the one who did the walking.” But he was guilty, too, because he had merely stood there and watched and didn’t do a damn thing to stop her.
Tears shimmered in her eyes when she looked up at him. “I can’t talk about this right now. I can’t, Buzz. Please. I’m begging you. Just…for God’s sake, help me find him.”
The need to know everything—every detail about his son—was an ache in his chest, but he knew she was right. The backcountry at night was no place for a young boy.
“Okay,” he heard himself say. “Jesus. Okay. I’ll find him. Let me make some calls. Give me a minute to get dressed.” A moment to pull himself together.