Page 8 of The Tempo of Truth (The Monsters Duet #3)

All in all, the Kyser Kent standing in front of me wasn’t too different from the teenager who ran off with my heart the first time we met.

I wasn’t foolish enough to think this version of Ky wasn’t just as dangerous as his unruly younger self.

Before I had his child to protect, his unpredictability was one of the things that drew me to him the most.

My life was so ordered and strictly controlled that I couldn’t fathom doing as I pleased with no regard for how it might affect others. I always deeply envied Ky’s autonomy.

I’d never really been able to pin down if there was a line he wouldn’t cross.

That trait was alluring to a young woman with an ill-advised crush on a cute bad boy.

It was terrifying to a mother who would do anything to keep her child insulated from the harshness of the world for as long as possible.

I tilted my head back and gazed up at Ky’s unsmiling face.

“It’s up to you if you want to be cast in the role as an involved and loving father or a deadbeat dad unwilling to claim the child who is a miniature version of himself.

Your choice doesn’t matter to me until Lowe is old enough to start asking questions about you.

I’ll own up to the mistakes I made. I won’t make excuses for yours when he starts trying to figure out how he came to be. ”

Ky lowered his face closer to mine, and I gulped involuntarily. My fingers tightened on the chain, and I forced myself not to flinch. I refused to fear him for the sake of our son.

“Does it matter which choice I make? Any move I make near the kid is going to label me as a scumbag looking to get close to him, and to you, for the Halliday fortune. I don’t have much of a reputation left, but I do have my pride, Winnie. I’d like to keep those scraps if it’s all the same to you.”

His arms and unmovable body trapped me.

He was in better shape now than when he played football.

According to the investigator my Uncle Win hired to dig into Ky’s current situation, he was working at a boxing gym and participating in underground fights and cheesy celebrity boxing matches.

He looked like he could handle brawling with men twice his size.

I could feel the danger he posed to others while having him loom over me in a threatening manner.

A chill of alarm shot down my spine, but I told myself he wouldn’t hurt me.

He couldn’t. We had too much history, and he’d always been so angry whenever I questioned him about his role in the kidnapping without lashing out at me.

I knew it offended him that I wondered if he could hurt me like that all those years ago when my grandfather ripped me away from my family and caused me to fear for my life.

“Pride is important. But nothing is more important than that little boy.” I kept my tone light so as not to aggravate him further.

“If you choose to be part of Lowe’s life, you have to do so with no ulterior motives.

You’ve always been smarter than people give you credit for, Ky.

I’m sure I don’t need to explain what would happen if you tried to challenge me on custody and financial support issues.

I’ll bury you so deep in logistics and legalities you’ll drown in paperwork before you even think about hiring a lawyer.

” I learned everything I knew about protecting a child from scheming and ill-intentioned adults from my Aunt Channing.

She feared nothing and no one while she battled the goliath that was the Halliday family for my best interests after my mother died.

“I’m offering a chance for you to meet your son.

I’m only offering it once. The choice is yours, but the window to make a decision is closing shortly. ”

Ky’s dark eyes narrowed, and an ugly smirk crossed his face. “Wow. When did you learn to be so cutthroat, Winnie? Was it in a special CEO class you had to take before inheriting the family business? I didn’t think you had it in you to be so callous.”

I cleared my throat and rose to my feet. I put a hand on his chest and nudged him back a step. I inadvertently inhaled the scent of something minty and sharp clinging to his skin. It was much better than the stale booze and hint of failure that clung to him the last time we were this close.

I doubted he would appreciate it much if I told him I picked up on how to be callous and cold from him.

All those years, I loved him from afar, and he never bothered to look my way, leaving an indelible mark.

“Lowe is a good kid. He’s much easier going than I was at his age.

He adapts well to anything. He loves his family and adores his cousins.

He’s been begging me to get him a dog. He’s very anxious about his first day of school.

And he loves to play soccer and yells at me when I call it that.

He knows it should be called football. You’re missing out if you decide to stay a stranger to him, Ky.

Don’t punish your son for my mistakes.” I ducked under his arm to put some much-needed space between us—and so I could catch my breath.

I saw the head of my security team, Helio Alverez, tap his watch.

It was his way of letting me know they could no longer keep the park secure and the public at bay.

I stooped to dust off my dirty shoes and told Ky, “Take a week to think about what you want to do. Obviously, my local number is the same if you decide you want to reach out before then.”

“Do you have any idea the type of life I’ve been living since I was banned from playing professionally, Winnie? I’m not exactly a paragon of virtue or a good example for anyone to follow. How can you trust me to be around a helpless little kid?”

I gave him a contemplative look. “We don’t get to pick our parents.

You are who you are, the same as me. My history is as questionable as yours when you get down to it.

” I still had moments of doubt when I thought I would end up like my mother, losing everything because I couldn’t let go of the man I loved.

“As long as you love Lowe and show him how important he is to you, the rest doesn’t matter.

You’ll always be a superhero in his eyes—unless you show him that you’re really a villain.

” I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear and offered him a weak smile.

“There’s always time to change course if you stop living your life on autopilot.

You’re the one who decides what type of man and father you want to be. ”

I shoved my hands into the pockets of the satin coat I was wearing and purposely stepped around his tall figure.

The meeting went as well as could be expected.

Ky’s reactions were well within the range of what I had anticipated.

The fact that he didn’t explode on the spot or tell me to go fuck myself were considerable wins.

It was irritating that I still responded to him like a schoolgirl with a crush, no matter what situation we were in.

He made my heart race and sent most of my common sense flying out the window the moment our eyes met.

Fortunately, when I was acting in the interest of my child, Lowe’s well-being came before everything else.

Otherwise, I would’ve been a blushing, tongue-tied mess at being this close to Ky after all these years.

He was the only person I’d ever met who made me want to throw all the rules that went with being the Halliday heiress—soon-to-be Halliday Inc. ’s CEO—out the proverbial window.

Just as I was about to walk across the park toward my head of security, my elbow was caught in an iron-like grip.

“Winnie.” I stopped and turned my head as Ky practically growled my name.

“The kid might not owe me anything, but the same can’t be said for you.

Even if I have zero ulterior motives where Lowe’s concerned, it’ll never be that way with you.

There’s no limit to what you owe me for keeping this secret from me all these years. We’re far from even.”

I shook my arm loose and faked a level of calm I didn’t feel.

I wanted to ask him why giving him my first time and my first love wasn’t enough to settle the score between us.

Either of those options should be enough to wipe the slate clean and void the sting from my suspicion that he had to carry around regarding my kidnapping.

He already held a grudge against me. Now, he had a legitimate reason to actually hate me.

“Do your worst, Ky. It’s what you do best.”

I heard him swear at the parting shot. He didn’t attempt to continue the war of words as I walked away.

It was much easier to breathe when I had space to think straight.

His presence was too overpowering and domineering.

He unnerved me more than a room full of old-money millionaires silently judging me and finding ridiculous flaws because I was young, but mostly because I was female.

Helio grumbled as soon as I was close enough to hear.

“I told you to keep some distance from him. We’ve got a photographer in the hotel across the street with a telephoto lens, a couple of kids on the street with cell phones, a news outlet in a van that rolled by three times, and an unmarked helicopter overhead.

There’s no way to stop the images of the meeting between the two of you from leaking.

There were several moments I wanted to intervene because he got so close to you. ”

I waved a hand dismissively. “Don’t worry too much.

Eventually, the news that Ky and I were friends when we were younger and the baby I brought back from overseas looks just like him will make the rounds anyway.

There’s no way to prevent salacious stories from spreading.

Ky’s always been a magnet for trouble. He’ll have people digging into his background for weeks, discovering all sorts of things they use to make clickbait headlines as they try to tie me and him together. ”

“Are you sure you want a guy like that around Lowe?” Helio had been through a gauntlet of rigorous training before my family sent him overseas to stay with me in Ponza while Lowe was growing up.

He was only a few years older than me, and he was there every step of the way when I struggled with adjusting to being a single mother.

We’d grown very close during my preparation to return home.

The reason I got photographed and followed from the airport was that I sent Helio back to the city to make sure the brownstone was secure and to begin figuring out logistics with Lowe’s primary school before classes began.

We often interacted more as friends than as boss and employee.

However, there was one thing in my life that I would never let anyone question.

“He’s Lowe’s father. If he wants to be involved in his son’s life, I will make it happen no matter what.

It’s the least I can do after keeping his child a secret from him for so long.

Plus, I know what kind of man Ky is better than most. He might seem like a trainwreck on the surface, but underneath…

” I trailed off because the truth was, Ky was a bit of a mess through and through.

But that never stopped me from seeing him as someone special. He was always someone I saw as a hero.

He saved me once. And I saved him in return. In my mind, we were even right up until I decided to keep Lowe a secret from him.