Hidden Pleasures - Brenda Jackson [36]
“Is that why you wanted that house so much?” he prompted. “Did you live there at one time as a foster child? Did you—”
“No,” Brittany said, interrupting his questions.
“That’s not the reason.”
She paused, then said, “I wanted the house because it was willed to me by someone I’ve never met. My birth mother. She gave me up for adoption when I was born. Only thing is, I never got adopted. Most of the people who took me in did so for the extra income. I have to say I was treated decently the majority of the time, so I won’t complain.”
She paused for a moment before continuing. “Six months ago…in fact, it was the same day I saw you and returned from New York. When I got home, I discovered I’d gotten a letter from a woman informing me that she believed I was the daughter she’d given up for adoption twenty-eight years ago, and that I would be hearing from her again soon with arrangements for us to meet if I wanted to do so. There was no return address and that’s all the letter said. I anxiously waited, and last week I received a letter from an attorney letting me know that my mother had passed away and had left her house to me.”
She paused again. He’d come to a traffic light and glanced over at her. She was staring straight ahead. “It was only when I got here and met with her attorney that I found out about the back taxes on the house. Her taxes got delinquent because she used the money to hire a private investigator to find me. She had been diagnosed with cancer and was given five years to live. She found me, but we didn’t get the chance to meet face-to-face.”
She drew in a deep breath and glanced over and met his gaze. “So now you know the reason I want that house.”
Yes, he knew, Galen thought. He’d known all along. At least the part he’d overheard when he should not have been listening. He was silent for a long moment and was grateful when the traffic light changed and the car moved forward. He needed to concentrate on his driving and not on the woman sitting beside him. She was doing strange things to his emotions and Galen wasn’t so sure he could stop them.
Brittany swallowed hard and her heart beat furiously in her chest when Galen brought the car to a stop in front of the house that used to be her mother’s home. She couldn’t move, so she just sat there and gazed at it through the windshield. The first thing she noted was that the windows were no longer boarded up.
She glanced over at him. Her brow furrowed. “You’ve been here already?”
“No. Once I got your call yesterday afternoon I contacted someone to come take the boards off the windows. This is my first time seeing it.”
She nodded. He’d said from the first that the only reason he’d bid on the house was because she’d wanted it. Galen Steele had proven that he definitely had an ulterior motive for owning this home now.
“Ready to go in?” he asked.
Her throat closed and she could barely get out her response. “Yes.”
By the time she had unbuckled her seat belt, he had already gotten out of the car and walked around to open the car door for her. She was discovering that Galen used good manners and could be the perfect gentleman when it suited him.
They didn’t say anything as they headed down the walkway. The moment she stepped onto the porch she saw up close what she hadn’t seen from a distance. The house could use a paint job and the screen door needed to be repaired. She couldn’t help wondering if these repairs, too, had taken a backseat to hiring a private investigator to find her.
Brittany paused for a moment to take in the enormity of what she was feeling, the emotions deep within her that had risen to the surface. Would she find answers to all the questions she had? Would she ever know why she’d been given away? Who was her father? Had he even known about her? “You okay?”
She glanced up at Galen. She might have been mistaken, but was that concern in the depths of his green eyes? “Yes, I’m fine. Thanks for asking.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a single key. “Here, the house is yours.”
She raised a haughty brow. Did he assume because