Night Jasmine Read Online Free PDF

to imply you weren’t a good mother or that you weren’t looking after his needs.”
    â€œNo? Then what are you doing? He means nothing to you, Hunter. Nothing.” She pressed her hands to her chest. “But he means everything to me. I love him so much I…”
    She shook her head, choking back the thoughts. “I don’t want him hurt. And if I take your money, someday he will find out about you. Someday he’ll know you didn’t want him.”
    The words, the truth in them, clawed at Hunter in a way he didn’t understand but still felt on an elemental level. He wasn’t accustomed to confusion; emotion was an anathema to him. Now, he was stewing in both. He swore again. “I can’t leave it this way. I won’t.”
    â€œWhy?” she asked, her voice high and tight. “For God’s sake, yesterday you didn’t even know Oliver existed and you were fine. He was fine. What’s so different now? Just go back to California. Just forget about today, forget about us.”
    â€œI can’t,” he said simply. “Knowing changes everything.”
    For long moments she said nothing, just stared at the window and the fading light of the day. Finally, she turned back to him, tears sparkling in her eyes. “I don’t understand,” she whispered, catching his hands, pleading with him. “Why, Hunter? Why can’t you just let this go?”
    He curled his fingers around hers, holding on to her in a way that surprised him. In a way that was too intimate for the strangers they had become. But even knowing that, he didn’t let go.
    He looked down at their joined hands, then back up at her, an unfamiliar tightness in his chest. “I don’t completely understand myself. But I can’t. He’s my son. I can’t love him—but I won’t abandon him, either.”
    Aimee made a sound of pain and frustration. She released his hands and wheeled away from him. “How can you abandon something, someone, you never had?”
    â€œThat wasn’t my choice, Aimee. It was yours.”
    â€œI’m not going to change my mind,” she said stiffly, facing him again.
    â€œThen the ball’s in my court, isn’t it?” Hunter let out a sharp breath, totally frustrated. “You’re not leaving me many options.”
    â€œNo, I’m not.”
    For
long moments, Hunter gazed at her. Then, muttering an oath, he crossed to the door and swung it open.
    â€œGoodbye, Hunter,” she said softly.
    He looked back at her, furious. That she’d thwarted him. That he felt so damn guilty. So torn. He fought to keep his voice cool and unaffected. “What makes you think this is goodbye?”
    Hunter let himself out, shutting the screen gently behind him. As he swung away from the door, he saw that Aimee’s father waited for him. The old man sat next to the rental car, blocking the driver’s side door. He sat quietly in the fading sun, his big hands resting on the chair’s arms. Hunter was relieved to see he’d left his shotgun behind.
    Hunter descended the stairs. Three and a half years ago Aimee had described her father as vital and fit, an outdoorsman who hunted, fished and shrimped for a living. She’d also called him crusty and opinionated, a man very much wedded to the old ways. A man who resisted change.
    Yet the man before him now was much changed from the one Aimee had described. At least physically. By the slight drooping of his right eye, Hunter suspected Roubin Boudreaux was the victim of an aneurysm. He wondered when it had happened.
    Roubin turned and looked directly at Hunter as he approached. Once again Hunter thought of pride. “You and me,” Roubin said, “we have some unfinished business.”
    â€œIt seems that way,” Hunter murmured, stopping before Roubin, leaving enough distance between them so the older man wouldn’t have to bend his neck back