The Hidden Years Read online

  What would it be like to make love to a man like Jake?

  Even as an eighteen-year-old, Jake Cochran would have been gentle.

  A loud bang startled Cassidy and interrupted her thoughts. She sat up with a gasp, the blanket falling to the floor, her heart pumping wildly.

  Had someone banged on the door? Had someone found them? Had she seen the doorknob turn?

  Rushing to the window, she peered through the darkness toward the lake. She had just about convinced herself she’d dreamed the noise when the face of a man appeared, wild-eyed, two inches from the windowpane.

  Cassidy screamed and ran out into the hall. And encountered Jake.

  A very wet, very naked Jake.

  Dear Harlequin Intrigue Reader,

  We have another great selection of exciting Harlequin Intrigue titles for you this month, kicking off with the second book in Rebecca York’s 43 LIGHT STREET trilogy MINE TO KEEP. Never Alone is a very special story about the power of love and the lengths to which a man and woman will go to find each other—no matter the obstacles.

  One down—three to go! Our MONTANA CONFIDENTIAL series continues with Special Assignment: Baby by Debra Webb. A covert operation and a cuddly baby are just a day’s work for this sexy cowboy agent. And Caroline Burnes scorches the sheets in Midnight Burning, a story about one man’s curse and his quest for redemption.

  Finally, come play HIDE AND SEEK with Susan Kearney as she launches her new three-book miniseries with The Hidden Years.

  So pick up all four for a dynamic reading experience.

  Sincerely,

  Denise O’Sullivan

  Associate Senior Editor

  Harlequin Intrigue

  THE HIDDEN YEARS

  SUSAN KEARNEY

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Susan Kearney used to set herself on fire four times a day; now she does something really hot—she writes romantic suspense. While she no longer performs her signature fire dive, (she’s taken up figure skating), she never runs out of ideas for characters and plots. A business graduate from the University of Michigan, Susan writes full-time. She resides in a small town outside Tampa, Florida, with her husband and children and a spoiled Boston terrier. Visit her Web site at www.SusanKearney.com.

  Books by Susan Kearney

  HARLEQUIN INTRIGUE

  340—TARA’S CHILD

  378—A BABY TO LOVE

  410—LULLABY DECEPTION

  428—SWEET DECEPTION

  456—DECEIVING DADDY

  478—PRIORITY MALE

  552—A NIGHT WITHOUT END

  586—CRADLE WILL ROCK*

  590—LITTLE BOYS BLUE*

  594—LULLABY AND GOODNIGHT*

  636—THE HIDDEN YEARS†

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  Jake Cochran—As a child Jake made a promise to his father to keep the family together. But the state separated the children. Now nothing and no one can stop him from bringing the family together—not even Cassidy Atkins.

  Cassidy Atkins—A lawyer who likes to live day-to-day. But Jake has other plans for her future.

  Frazier Atkins—Cassidy’s deceased father, who left behind secrets that can destroy his daughter.

  Harrison Gordon—Jake’s number-one employee and a crackerjack P.I.

  Donna Rodale—Friend or foe? She’s the mystery woman who can fill in the missing pieces of the puzzle. But first Jake and Cassidy must find her.

  Burak Sansal—A spy. A double agent. Can he be trusted?

  Ari Ben Goldstein—A former Israeli Mossad agent. He knew Jake’s parents, but is he part of the problem or the solution?

  For Gayle and Steve Brooks,

  my favorite Brooksville relatives.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Epilogue

  Chapter One

  What the hell was she doing in Half Moon Bay? In his driveway?

  Jake Cochran stared at the monitor that exhibited his front gate, a convertible driving through, a woman behind the wheel.

  Cassidy Atkins.

  It might have been ten years since he’d seen her last, but he hadn’t forgotten that tawny skin or the lion’s mane of multicolored gold that framed her face. It might have been more than a decade, but a warm glow of happiness started in his gut and radiated outward before he bottled it up. Ten years hadn’t quite banished memories of the pain she’d caused.

  Jake was no longer that vulnerable kid, but he could no more resist staring at Cassidy now than he could a decade ago. As she parked her red convertible, he hit a camera switch to zoom in on her. Cassidy smoothed her shoulder-length hair into a pony-tail, freshened her lipstick and reached for her compact. Then, with an impatient gesture, she tucked the unused compact back into her purse.

  Interesting. So he rated lipstick but not blush. A visit but no warning phone call. Apparently Cassidy’s impulsive and spontaneous nature hadn’t changed over the years.

  Cassidy gracefully exited the car, reached into the back seat and removed a box. Hip-hugging jeans encased her long legs and rounded hips. A crop top showed a smudge or two of dust as if she’d been working and impulsively decided to stop and pay him a visit. The girl he remembered might be unpredictable, but she usually had good reasons for her actions. And Jake guessed she hadn’t phoned first because she was afraid he might refuse to see her.

  Was she in some kind of trouble and in need of his help?

  He frowned in puzzlement as Cassidy carried the carton toward his front door. It didn’t take his detective skills to figure out that the reason behind her visit might be somehow connected to the box’s contents. However, she couldn’t be returning something he’d left behind, since ten years ago he hadn’t owned enough possessions to fill that box. Back then, just out of high school and a state orphanage, he’d barely had a change of clothes. Yet his limited circumstances hadn’t stopped him from foolishly dreaming of a future with Cassidy.

  Jake had found out soon enough that Cassidy’s father, Frazier Atkins, had bigger plans for his daughter than a relationship with Jake Cochran. Frazier’s high expectations for his daughter included college, law school and eventually a husband from the same upper middle-class background as her own. And according to her father’s plan, she was now well on her way to success. With only twenty miles between their respective homes on Florida’s Gulf coast, Jake occasionally caught news of Cassidy and knew she’d earned her law degree and set up practice with her father in Crescent Cove.

  Jake angled the camera lens onto her left hand. Ha! No wedding ring. Another zing of pleasure sneaked over him before he flicked off the camera and headed downstairs to meet the girl he’d never been able to forget.

  Before she rang the bell, he opened the door and caught the breathless look of surprise in widened eyes still as blue as Tampa’s sky. But not quite as joyous and exuberant as he remembered. These blue eyes couldn’t quite hold his gaze and reflected a bit of indecision, along with a sophistication that quickly covered the flash of uncertainty he’d first glimpsed.

  Nevertheless he enjoyed drinking in the sight of her upturned face, which glowed with a healthy tan. He lingered over the straight nose, the delicately arched brows, the heart-shaped cheeks that she’d always wished were high and sharp like a model’s, instead of impishly round, matching her personality.

  “Hi, Sunshine.” He used his old pet name for her without
thinking, his voice slightly huskier than he would have liked.

  Cassidy’s full lips turned up in a crooked smile, but uncertainty again flickered in her eyes. “Jake.”

  He opened the door, feeling a measure of both pleasure and wariness at seeing her again but mostly wondering what caused the shadows in her eyes. “Come in.”

  She took in the trappings of his success—the soaring ceiling of his foyer, the marble floors and designer wallpaper—without the least bit of surprise. Almost as if she’d expected his prosperity. Had she kept track of him? Jake thought not. Why would she?

  Obviously worried, she clutched that box so hard her fingernails dug into the cardboard and left tiny crescent indentations. Over the years Jake had become good at reading strangers who came to his detective agency seeking his help. His experience as a detective told him she had something unpleasant to tell him. His experience as a man told him this was a nervous woman.

  Yet Jake wasn’t just operating with his powers of observation or by instinct alone. Cassidy was no stranger. Impulsive, spontaneous, giving, she liked to go with the flow, live day to day. She kept her long-term goals in sight, but her free-spirited nature ruled her most of the time. This wasn’t one of those times. Today she was serious. She had a way of angling her chin whenever she was uncertain. She had it tipped at that angle now as she glanced at him.

  He led her past his office into the room that overlooked Tampa Bay. Perhaps the soft cries of gulls and the salty breeze would soothe her nerves. Gingerly she placed the box on the glass table as if fearing it would break, then dusted off her hands.

  “Can I get you something to drink?” he offered as he gestured to a chair for her to have a seat. “Iced tea? Water? A cola?”

  “No, thanks.”

  Jake waited. He’d learned to be patient, learned that when someone wanted to tell him something, it was usually best to let them come to it in their own way.

  Cassidy took in a deep breath of air, then let it out slowly and rolled her shoulders. Slowly she raised those sea-blue eyes to his. “My father died last year.”

  “I heard. And I’m sorry. For your sake.”

  He folded his arms over his chest, refusing to be hypocritical. He’d never liked Frazier Atkins. Ten years ago Jake had known the man disapproved of him, a boy with no family. No past. And probably not much of a future. But Jake had succeeded, throwing his efforts into his detective agency with a determination that had left no room for failure.

  While Jake might have found security, he suspected mere financial success wouldn’t have been enough for Frazier Atkins. The prominent attorney had wanted a better match for his only daughter than a kid from the wrong side of town. While Jake had acquired a veneer of sophistication along the way to success, he lacked the Old World charm that took several generations to acquire. Quite simply, in Frazier’s eyes, Jake could never have been good enough to even wipe the dirt off Cassidy’s sneakers. And he’d coolly made his point to his daughter—not by arguing, but by fighting a battle Jake couldn’t win. Frazier had sent her out West to college. He’d put a distance between them that a boy with barely enough funds to feed himself couldn’t overcome.

  He’d always hoped Cassidy would call, visit him during spring break, but it hadn’t happened. She’d accepted her father’s wishes and hadn’t looked back.

  And through his scheming, Frazier had remained polite, cool and secretive toward Jake. But Jake had always suspected that Cassidy’s father had known more about Jake’s past than he’d been willing to admit. Yet Jake had no more been able to prove that the wily attorney had been holding out on him than he had been able to prove to Cassidy that her father had sent her away to separate her from the wrong kind of boy.

  Cassidy pushed the box toward Jake. “I took over Dad’s law practice and found this.”

  “What is it?” Jake made no move to open the box. Instead, he sat and watched Cassidy swallow hard, wet her top lip and try to hold his eyes.

  Opening the box with shaking fingers, she looked from the papers inside back to him, her eyes dark and mysterious. “You ever find your sisters?”

  Her question rocked him to the core. He’d unconsciously figured that Cassidy had come here seeking his help. He hadn’t expected the conversation to revolve around him. Or his sisters.

  His sisters.

  Jake shook his head at the failure that still haunted his nightmares. Nightmares of a five-year-old child promising his father that he’d help look after the family. That he’d watch over his sisters. Keep the family together. His mother had died overseas, and a week later his father had brought the family back to the U.S., where he’d been killed in a car accident. Awake, Jake couldn’t recall exactly what had happened to his sisters. In the darkest of dreams, shadowy creatures with no faces pulled the kicking and screaming girls from his arms. Every few months Jake still awoke in a sweat, heart pounding, choking on tears.

  He glanced at the box, curiosity welling up. “I always thought your father was keeping back information on my sisters’ locations. Was he?”

  Her expression grim, Cassidy nodded. “He knew more than he revealed.”

  “They’re alive?”

  Again Cassidy nodded.

  Son of a bitch! Jake stood so fast that his chair crashed to the floor. If Frazier Atkins had stood before him now, it would have taken all of Jake’s considerable control not to strike him.

  Jake paced, fuming. “Your old man could have saved me ten years of searching. Ten years of not knowing whether my sisters had lived or died. Ten years of waking up every morning and going to sleep every night wondering if I had any family left or if I was all alone in the world.”

  “I’m sorry, Jake. My father never told me the truth, either.”

  Although Jake had never found his sisters, he’d never given up searching. Would never give up. But he had no more to go on now than he’d had ten years ago, when the day after he’d graduated from high school, he’d looked up Frazier Atkins. Jake had hoped the attorney who’d handled his custody arrangements could help find his sisters. But Cassidy’s father had stubbornly refused to tell him anything.

  Jake paced, needing an outlet for his anger. Frazier had deliberately kept him apart from his sisters. How dare he separate a family? Jake wanted to strike out and hit something to relieve his frustration. But long ago he’d learned to master his anger, and within moments, he’d replaced burning rage with simmering control. Reaching down, he lifted the chair and replaced it exactly where it had been.

  Cassidy’s voice pleaded with him. “You have to understand. A lawyer’s first obligation is to his client.”

  “And just who was the client?” Jake asked, folding his arms over his chest and watching Cassidy closely.

  “I’m not…sure.”

  “Let me get this straight. Frazier Atkins couldn’t tell me how to find my sisters because…”

  “Because the custody matters were sealed. Ditto for the adoption records, unless both parties ask for the records.”

  “You’re saying my sisters were adopted?”

  “Yes.”

  “They’re together?”

  As she heard the concern he couldn’t mask, Cassidy shook her head, regret in her gaze. “I don’t believe so.” A tremor of distress tinged her voice. “The records indicate that all three of you were split up.”

  Jake frowned hard. He knew that the state generally tried to keep siblings together. Maybe he’d been an ornery little boy that no one wanted—too old to interest a family, too old for parents to love, and so he’d never been adopted. Couples came to the orphanage seeking toddlers and babies. But his sisters had been young.

  “Surely it wouldn’t have been that difficult to keep two little girls together.”

  Cassidy seemed to gather her wits and spoke with authority. “The entire adoption proceedings were very unusual. Names were changed. The girls were sent to different parts of the state before families were found for them.”

  “Why?”
>
  Cassidy shrugged and this time a hint of darkness clouded her eyes. “I don’t know. I haven’t gone through the box’s contents that carefully. As soon as I saw that—”

  “Your father’s silence has kept a family apart.”

  “—you would be interested, I just drove over.”

  So coming here had been an impulsive act. He’d been right that her spontaneous nature hadn’t changed, but it gave him no satisfaction. Too many memories spun through his mind. Frazier Atkins and his damn secrets. Cassidy and what she’d once meant to Jake. All the memories in murky shadows, except his one bright hope that someday he could fulfill his childhood promise to his father. Find his sisters. Bring them together again. Only then would he be free to start a family of his own.

  “I thought I could help you track down your sisters from these old addresses,” Cassidy said as she turned to the box and began to open it.

  “Why?” Jake snapped the question as hard and fast as the crack of a whip.

  At his tone, Cassidy jumped as if he’d slapped her hand away from the box. Her eyes flashed with guilt and heat. “I feel bad that my father never gave you…” Her hand fluttered over the box.

  He stared at her, fascinated by the changing hue in her eyes, by the tightening of her lips and the questioning arch of her brows. And fury filled his soul, fury that she thought she could just prance back into his life, insert herself into his thoughts. Invade his privacy. Witness his pain and failure.

  “I don’t need your help,” he told her without bothering to keep the bitterness from his voice.

  “You’re angry?”

  Anger wasn’t the right word for what he felt right now. Rage, white-hot rage, cascaded through him, rage at not just Frazier Atkins, but at the injustice done to a child who still carried a man-size guilt.

  He’d failed to find his sisters. He’d promised his father. And failed.

  Frazier Atkins’s silence had kept him at a dead end for ten years. But he’d never stopped searching. He’d wasted hours, days, months, years. All because of Frazier Atkins.