Page 33 of Ruined by My Ex’s Dad (Silver Fox Obsession #2)

"Lucas," she agreed. "Though I suspect we've experienced rather different versions of the man."

The waiter returned with menus, but Catherine waved them away.

"We'll have the chef's tasting menu," she informed him. "With the wine pairings."

I raised an eyebrow at her presumption but said nothing. This was her game; I needed to understand the rules before challenging them.

"You were together for how long?" I asked once the waiter had departed.

She settled back in her chair, studying me with unnerving intensity.

"Long enough to understand what I was, and wasn't, getting with Lucas Turner."

"And what was that?"

"A brilliant mind. A relentless work ethic. Undeniably ambitious.” She paused, taking another sip of champagne.

"And emotional unavailability so profound it could be studied as a psychological condition.”

The assessment hit closer to home than I wanted to admit.

I'd seen glimpses of that unavailability, that careful distance Lucas maintained even in our most intimate moments.

But I'd also seen beyond it—to the vulnerability he'd revealed the night he'd come for me, to the tenderness he showed in unguarded moments.

"People change," I said, keeping my voice even.

"It's been thirty years."

Catherine laughed, the sound genuinely amused.

"Oh, my dear. Men like Lucas don't change. They become more adept at appearing to change when it serves their purpose."

The first course arrived—tiny, perfectly portioned servings of something artistic and undoubtedly expensive. I took a small bite, needing the moment to compose my response.

"Did you invite me here to warn me off?" I asked when the waiter had departed. "To share cautionary tales about your Lucas?"

"Not at all." She looked genuinely surprised at the suggestion. "I invited you here to understand what Lucas sees in you. What makes you different from the string of polished, disposable women who've warmed his bed over the decades."

The casual cruelty of her assessment stung, but I refused to show it.

"And have you found your answer?"

She tilted her head, studying me with renewed interest.

"Beginning to. There's a directness to you I can appreciate. An unwillingness to be managed that must simultaneously attract and infuriate him."

"I'm not sure if I should be flattered or insulted."

"Neither. Simply observed." Catherine set down her fork, leaning forward slightly. "Do you love him, Savannah? Truly? Or is this about rebellion, excitement, the thrill of the forbidden?"

The question—so direct, so unexpected—caught me off guard.

"Why would you care about my feelings for Lucas?"

"I don't, particularly." She shrugged one elegant shoulder.

"But I care deeply about my son. About what this revelation might do to him when the inevitable gossip reaches his ears."

Miles.

Of course, this was about Miles.

I should have realized the maternal instinct would be her primary motivation.

"Miles and I ended things months before Lucas and I..." I paused, searching for the right word. "Connected."

"Connected," she repeated, amusement coloring her tone.

"Such a delicate euphemism for what I imagine is a rather passionate affair."

I refused to be baited. "My relationship with your son was over. Completely. I didn't leave him for Lucas, if that's what you're implying."

"No, Miles ended things with you, as I understand it." Her gaze sharpened.

"Did that sting? Make you receptive to attention from the more powerful Turner? The original rather than the copy?"

My hand tightened around my champagne flute, temper flaring.

"I think we're done here."

"We haven't even reached the main course," she observed mildly.

"And I haven't shared what I brought you here to tell you."

Despite my better judgment, curiosity won out.

"And what's that?"

The waiter arrived with the second course—a delicate fish preparation that smelled of saffron and butter. Catherine waited until he'd departed before continuing.

"Lucas has been investigated by the SEC three times in the past decade," she said quietly.

"Each time for increasingly aggressive market positions that bordered on insider trading. Each time, the charges were dropped before formal filings."

I stared at her, processing this unexpected revelation. "Why are you telling me this?"

"Because you should understand who you're involved with. The moral... flexibility he's capable of when something matters enough to him." She took a bite of her fish, chewing thoughtfully.

"The lengths he'll go to protect what he believes belongs to him."

"Lucas doesn't consider me a possession," I said, though some part of me recognized the grain of truth in her assessment. The possessiveness that edged his passion, the intensity with which he'd claimed me that night in his car.

"Perhaps not consciously," she allowed. "But Lucas operates from deep patterns established long before he met you. Before he met me, even." She set down her fork; her expression softened slightly. "His mother left when he was young. Did he tell you that?"

I nodded, remembering our conversation in his penthouse. "He mentioned it."

"What he probably didn't mention was that she left because Richard—Lucas's father—tracked her affair, documented it with private investigators, then used the evidence to ensure she received nothing in the divorce. Not a penny. Not even personal possessions beyond clothing."

Catherine's voice had taken on a different quality—less cutting, more reflective.

"Lucas watched his father systematically destroy his mother for the crime of wanting something different than what she had."

The revelation settled over me like a cold shadow. What impact would witnessing that have on a young boy? What lessons would it teach about love, about power, about control?

"Why are you sharing this?" I asked again, genuinely confused by her motives.

"Because someone should understand him," she said simply. "Really understand him. Not just desire him, or admire him, or fear him—though most people experience some combination of the three." She leaned forward, voice dropping.

"I couldn't be that person. I was too young, too self-absorbed, too unwilling to do the work of loving a complicated man."

"And you think I can?"

"I think you might be the first woman with a chance." Her eyes—dark, intelligent, assessing—studied me with new intensity.

"But only if you go in with your eyes open. Only if you recognize the damage that's there, beneath the success and control and perfect suits."

The third course arrived—something with lamb and reduction sauces that I barely registered. My mind was too busy processing Catherine's words, searching for the hidden agenda, the manipulation beneath the apparent candor.

"Why do you care?" I asked finally. "Whether I understand him or not?"

Catherine was silent for a long moment, swirling the red wine that had been paired with our course.

"Because, despite everything, I don't hate Lucas. I respect him. I appreciate what he's done for our son, financially if not emotionally. And I've watched him spend three decades punishing himself for what he sees as my rejection, building walls so thick no one could possibly penetrate them."

"Until?"

"Until he met someone who reminded him what it felt like to be seen. To be known." Her gaze pinned me.

"To be vulnerable."

I set down my fork, appetite gone. "And how would you know that?"

"Because I saw you together. At Marcello's, last week." A small smile touched her lips at my surprised expression.

"I was having dinner with friends in the private room. Saw you across the restaurant. The way he looked at you..." She paused, something like wonder coloring her voice. "I've never seen that expression on Lucas Turner's face. Not once in all the years I've known him."

"What expression?" I couldn't help asking.

"Fear," she said simply.

"The terrified recognition that he's found something he can't bear to lose."

The word hung between us, charged with implications. Fear. Not passion or possession or even love. But fear—raw, genuine vulnerability from a man who'd built his life around avoiding precisely that.

"Does Miles know?" I asked, changing the subject as dessert arrived—a delicate soufflé I couldn't bring myself to touch.

"Not yet. But he will, inevitably." Catherine sipped the dessert wine, studying me over the rim of her glass.

"The question is whether he hears it from you and Lucas, or from San Francisco gossip."

She was right, of course. Miles deserved to know about our relationship directly, not through rumors or speculation. The thought of that conversation made my stomach clench, but the alternative was worse—cowardice disguised as discretion.

"We'll tell him," I said with more confidence than I felt. "Soon."

"Good." Catherine signaled for the check, waving away my offer to contribute.

"This was my invitation. My purpose."

As we waited for her credit card to be processed, a question formed that I couldn't suppress. "Were you ever happy with him? With Lucas?"

The directness of my query seemed to surprise her. For the first time all evening, I saw Catherine Reid’s carefully maintained poise slip, revealing something more human beneath.

"Sometimes," she admitted, voice soft with remembrance.

"When he'd forget to be guarded. When work or passion broke through his defenses, there were moments of.

.. extraordinary connection." She met my eyes directly.

"But moments aren't enough to build a life on.

Not without someone willing to do the work of bridging the gaps between them. "

The waiter returned with her card. She signed with a flourish, then reached into her handbag and withdrew a small, cream-colored envelope matching the one that had contained her dinner invitation.

"For Lucas," she said, sliding it across the table. "If you choose to give it to him."

I took it, feeling the weight of the heavy stationery. "And if I don't?"

"Then that's your choice." She stood, gathering her wrap around elegant shoulders.

"But choices have consequences, Savannah. As I suspect you're learning."

We parted at the restaurant entrance, her car arriving first. She turned to me one last time, eyes assessing in the glow of the streetlights.

"He's worth the work, you know," she said quietly. "If you're brave enough to stay when it gets difficult. When he retreats behind those walls."

"Why are you telling me this?" I asked one final time. "What do you get out of this dinner, these revelations?"

Catherine smiled—the first genuine, unguarded expression I'd seen from her all evening. "Peace of mind, perhaps. The knowledge that my son's father might finally find what's eluded him all these years." She tilted her head slightly.

"Or maybe just the satisfaction of seeing Lucas Turner finally meet his match."

Then she was gone, sliding into the waiting black car with practiced elegance, leaving me holding an envelope and more questions than I'd arrived with.

I drove home in a daze, Catherine's revelations circling in my mind like hungry predators. The SEC investigations. Lucas's mother. The fear she claimed to have seen in his eyes when he looked at me.

Truth or manipulation? Genuine concern or calculated interference?

The envelope sat on my passenger seat, its presence almost physically intrusive. What did it contain? What message had Catherine written to Lucas, and why use me as the messenger?

By the time I reached my apartment, I'd made a decision that surprised even me. I decided I wouldn't give him Catherine's letter until I understood more clearly what game she was playing. Wouldn't introduce this new complication into the delicate balance we'd established.

Instead, I would do something far more significant. Something that would force all of these shadowy concerns into the light.

I pulled out my phone, typing a text before I could second-guess myself:

We need to tell Miles. This weekend. Together.

Lucas's response came almost immediately:

Are you sure?

Yes, I replied. It's time for honesty. All the way.

As I pressed send, I realized I'd just chosen a path that couldn't be undone.

No more shadows. No more secrets.

No more pretending our relationship existed in a bubble separate from the real world.

Catherine Reid had intended to plant seeds of doubt, to make me question Lucas's capacity for transparency, for genuine connection.

Instead, she'd galvanized me toward the one thing that would test all her theories and warnings.

Complete honesty. Full exposure. The dismantling of the carefully constructed privacy that had previously protected our relationship.

If Lucas had walls as impenetrable as Catherine claimed, this would reveal them. If he retreated when vulnerability became too threatening, I would see it happen.

And if he didn't—if he stood beside me, facing his son with the truth of our connection—then perhaps Catherine Reid had done us an unexpected favor after all.

Either way, by Monday morning, everything would change.

The thought should have terrified me. Instead, I felt something almost like peace settle over me as I slipped Catherine's unopened envelope into my bedside drawer.

Some battles you chose.

Others chose you.

This one, it seemed, had been choosing me from the moment I'd met Lucas Turner at that wedding bar, before I knew his name, before I knew the complications he would bring into my life.

Before I knew he would become necessary to it.