He had nothing to say that she wanted to hear.

Her father was an adulterous blasphemer.

Just how long had he been having an affair with his secretary?

Oh, mercy! Her poor, sweet mother!

“Let her go, John Earl.” Erin came up and grasped his arm. “Maybe it was for the best. Better that she know now, that everyone knows.”

John Earl glared at his secretary, a woman he had thought of as a loyal employee and a good friend. He’d never thought of her as anything more and had had no idea she harbored any romantic feelings for him. Not until today. Not until a few minutes ago, when she had kissed him.

They had been talking, just talking. He’d been using her as a sounding board for his concerns about the situation with Missy. Erin had been consoling him, agreeing with him that perhaps Ruth Ann’s kind heart had led her to take on Missy as a charity case while neglecting her own two daughters, at least temporarily.

“Ruth Ann is a good woman, but she isn’t perfect. And she doesn’t love you the way I do. I’d never put anyone else’s needs before yours,” Erin had told him. “You would always come first with me.”

That’s when she had thrown her arms around his neck, told him again that she loved him madly and then kissed him. Thrown off guard by her actions, it had taken him a few seconds to respond by grabbing her waist and pushing her away. Unfortunately, Felicity had walked in and seen Erin kissing him and had jumped to the wrong conclusion.

John Earl grasped Erin’s shoulders and looked directly at her. “Erin, I’m sorry if I’ve ever done anything to lead you on, to make you believe that I reciprocated your feelings.”

She stared at him, her eyes wide and filled with disbelief. “But I love you. I’ve loved you forever. I know that if you’ll only admit it to yourself, you love me, too.”

He gave her shoulders a sound squeeze, then released her. “I believe it best if you go home for the rest of the day. Tomorrow, we’ll discuss how best to handle your resignation.”

“You’re firing me?”

“No, no,” John Earl assured her. “But under the circumstances…I’ll give you an excellent reference and help you find other employment. Now, please, Erin, go home. I need to call Ruth Ann and tell her what happened, and then I need to find my daughter and explain to her that what she thought she saw-”

Erin slapped him, then spun around and marched back into the office. He had to admit that he hadn’t seen that slap coming any more than he had the kiss.

Half a minute later, with her leather bag hung over her shoulder, Erin swept past him without a glance. He returned to his office, picked up the phone and called his wife. He had to put a lid on this before it exploded in his face and his entire family got hurt.

“Jack?” Officer Grimes stuck his head in the door of Mike’s office, where the task force was sharing a working lunch, barbeque from Big Ed’s Barbeque amp; Ribs. “That Cantrell kid is back. He wants to talk to you.”

“Seth Cantrell?”

“Yep. And from the way he’s acting, I’d say if you don’t come out and talk to him, I’ll have to handcuff him to stop him from coming in here.”

Jack glanced around the room. “Will you folks excuse me?” He looked at Mike and nodded toward the door. When he headed out, Mike followed him. They paused just beyond the open door.

“I need to take half an hour,” Jack said. “It’s personal.”

“Problems with Cathy’s son?”

“Yeah, something like that.”

“Can’t it wait?”

“I don’t think so,” Jack told him. “Otherwise, I wouldn’t ask for the time.”

“Okay. Go do whatever you need to do.”

Jack thanked his old buddy and then scanned the outer office for Seth. He saw him across the room, about ten feet away. The boy looked like hammered hell.

When he approached, Seth squared his shoulders and looked Jack right in the eye. In that instant, Jack realized that Seth knew the truth.

“Let’s get out of here,” Jack said. “I’ve got a thirty-minute lunch break. We can take a walk and talk.”

Seth nodded.

They walked in silence as they exited the sheriff’s department and crossed the street. When they reached the small park in the center of town, a block away, Jack pointed to a wooden park bench. “Let’s sit.”

They sat, one on each end of the bench.

“Let’s hear it,” Jack said.

“I know.”

“Know what?”

“That you’re my father, my biological father.”

Jack sucked in a deep breath. “Yeah, it seems that I am.”

“She lied to me,” Seth said. “She lied to both of us. I hate her. I hate her so much. And I hate you.”

Seth hung his head and stared down at the ground.

Jack felt his son’s pain. So this was what it was like to have a child hurting and not be able to help him. More than anything, he wanted to erase the agony he saw on Seth’s face and heard in his voice.

“Exactly what did your mother say to you?”

“Nothing much. I didn’t give her the chance. I didn’t want to hear any of her lies.”

“My guess is that she told you the truth. It might have been sixteen years too late, but give her credit for finally telling both of us.”

“That’s just it-she didn’t tell me. Grandmother told me. She didn’t mean to, but she got so angry when I told her I liked you and I hoped my mom married you that she just blurted it out.”

“Elaine Nelson always was a real piece of work.”

Ignoring Jack’s assessment of his grandmother, Seth asked, “Was Mom telling me the truth when she said that she just told you last night?”

“Yes, she was telling you the truth.”

“How’d you feel when she told you? I bet you hate her, too, don’t you?”

Did he hate Cathy? She had kept the truth about his son from him for sixteen years, and if he hadn’t come back to Dunmore, he might never have found out he was a father. It had been less than twenty-four hours since he had learned the truth about his relationship with Seth, not nearly enough time to figure out how he felt or what he should do. But time enough to realize that when Cathy had married Mark Cantrell, she had done it because she believed she was doing the right thing, the best thing for her child.

For his child.

“No, I don’t hate her,” Jack said, in an honest gut response.

“How can you not?” Seth asked, all his youthful agony quivering in his voice.

“Because I’ve had some time to think about it, and I realize that, under the circumstances, your mother did what she thought she had to do to protect you.”

“Protect me how? I don’t understand.”

“Cathy and I were a couple of kids. She was seventeen, fresh out of high school, and I was twenty, home on leave from the army. We had two weeks together and fell head over heels for each other the way only kids that age can. I was careless. I got her pregnant.

“I had no idea she was pregnant, and she didn’t have any way of letting me know. I was sent to the Middle East during the Gulf War and wound up a POW. The army told my family that I was MIA and presumed dead. By the time I could let Cathy know I was alive, she had already married Mark Cantrell.”

“Mom thought you were dead?” Seth’s eyes, a duplicate of his own, stared at him, and Jack knew his son had desperately needed complete honesty.

“Yes, so you see, she did what she did because she felt she had no choice if she wanted to protect you. She married Mark Cantrell to give you a father. And from what I’ve learned, he was a good dad to you, wasn’t he?”

“Yeah, he was a good dad, but…”

“But what?”

“But when Mom found out you were alive, she should have told you. She should have told me.”

“You’re right. She should have, but she didn’t. And we’re both going to have to find a way to forgive her, because we both love her and we know she did what she believed was best for you.”

Seth stared at him in disbelief. “You still love her?”