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A stab of hurt pierced into hi ht A child to be avoided, forgotten, not loved and finally knohy only intensified the pain The shadows cast by his past reached far into the future, destroying everything If he hadn’t been able to love Lisa, how could he love his child?

Hell, he really didn’t need this guilt now Not on top of recent revelations and now today’s headlines, which played to the one thing he hated—being illegitimate The bastard child of the man who’d broken his mother’s heart and wrecked their lives without so y and definitely never an explanation He’d walked out one night and never coht, that had been a tall order and yet another failure as far as he was concerned

Now he had to face that itimate son The son he must have really wanted His true heir His half-brother, Raul, had only said that as part of his will his father had wanted hiht into the family business So as this all about? His father’s pathetic attempts to make peace?

He et thisunder way He paused outside the restaurant, took a deep breath and then opened the doors and walked in It was empty of anyone except a couple ere locked in a heated debate They were lovers, of that there wasn’t any doubt, lovers who hated and loved with equal passion Neither was he in any doubt that he was looking at his brother

For a moment Max waivered If he couldn’t do eely he pushed the thought aside He’d do this to show his father he wasn’t completely cast from the same mould as him

Lisa’s nerves were so taut she could hardly sit still, the events of the day, which had unfolded at breakneck speed, only adding to her nausea Raised voices had come from the room and the hasty retreat of another woone quiet now Too quiet

‘How did it go?’ She jumped up from her chair as Max pushed open the door From the look on his face she already knew the answer to that She also had so many more questions to ask, not least as the woman who’d fled the room, almost in tears What had happened in there?

‘As well as such a o’ He fired the words back at her, his jaw firm and hard, and a tremor of fear slithered down her spine

‘That’s it?’ Lisa could see the defensive wall being built around hi her away from him, from his emotions, just as he always did Her heart softened She’d picked the wrong day to tell Max he was going to be a father

‘For now, yes,’ he said, but froht set of his jaw, she knew things were far froht

‘Will you see hiain?’