“I see.” The pastor leaned back in his chair. “This isn’t a domestic violence incident or anything like that, is it?”
“No, not at all.”
“Adultery?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Did you cheat on her, or her on you? Were either of you unfaithful to each other?”
“We weren’t married long enough for that,” Carter half-chuckled.
The pastor didn’t look amused.
“Really, it was a simple case of incompatibility,” he clarified. Boy, had Ellie and he ever been incompatible. He a shifter, she a human. He the head of security for a notorious mob boss. She a nursing student. “We didn’t part angry.”
“I see.”
The man framed his chin with a forefinger and thumb. His gaze was probing, assessing. He didn’t say anything for a long moment. Carter resisted the urge to squirm, afraid it would make him look guilty. He wasn’t used to feeling the need to squirm, and he didn’t have anything to feel guilty about. He was trying to help Ellie here.
At last the pastor tilted forward, placing both hands on the desk in front of him.
“Give me your wife’s name and I’ll speak to her,” he said.
A hidden sigh of relief. Now he was getting some place.
“It’s Taylor. Taylor Scott,” he answered, using Ellie’s new identity.
The pastor’s face froze.
“Excuse me?”
“Taylor Scott,” Carter repeated, wondering why the man’s voice had that funny, almost strangled sounding note.
“You’re saying Taylor Scott is your wife?”
“Yes, I am.”
Unless he was losing his mind. Which, ever since Ellie had entered his life, he’d honestly wondered more than once.
“I don’t think that’s possible.”
Now it was Carter’s turn to echo, “Excuse me?”
The man’s voice held a sharp edge. His face wasn’t any less intense.
“Taylor Scott is my daughter,” he said sternly. “And I’m pretty sure I’d know if she was married to you or anyone else.”
Chapter Three
Oh, crap.
How had James’s intel failed to tell him Ellie’s father was the associate pastor of the church they’d been seen attending? How had…?
James.
Carter gritted his teeth to restrain certain words that were not appropriate for a church setting. James had to have known. He couldn’t not have known. This had to be his idea of a joke.
Twisted little jackass. I’m going to rip his head off when I get back to Texas.
He would do it too. Unfortunately, he couldn’t focus on James or what kind of revenge he’d take on the kid. Not with Ellie’s father glaring at him in a very un-pastoral way across the desk.
“Uh…Mr. Scott,” he began, trying to figure out how to wriggle out of this mess, or if he should clue the man in that he knew. “I’m sorry. I had no idea you were Ellie’s father.”
Might as well drop the pretense, he decided. If he was going to get past the guard dog, he was going to have to fess up to knowing Ellie’s true identity.
“Ellie? We’re talking about Taylor.”
“No, we’re talking about Ellie. Ellie St. James,” he returned calmly, meeting her father’s gaze head on. “I knew her back in Fort Worth. I married her before she had to leave. Before the identity change. She’s never mentioned me?”
The tiniest shake of his head. “Never.”
“That’s good. She wasn’t supposed to. This thing, our marriage, was all part of the…reasons she had to leave Texas and change her name. I can’t give you any more details than that. But I can tell you my name’s Carter Ballis, and Ellie and I are legally married. I flew out here to meet with her, talk to her about our, uh, situation. I didn’t want to just show up at the family home and cause problems with her parents and brothers. Thought I could do this a different way by meeting her here, at her church. I was hoping to avoid extra questions, extra attention. I didn’t know her father was the associate pastor.”
Ellie’s father didn’t return Carter’s smile. He looked like he was ready to rip someone’s head off. Carter felt on edge. He knew he could physically best the man in any way, but he didn’t want to get into an altercation with Ellie’s dad. That was the last thing he wanted. He could see the man’s fingers clenching and unclenching, as if he were contemplating strangling someone. Maybe he was. Carter couldn’t blame him. If he were a father, and some strange man showed up claiming to be his little girl’s husband, he’d probably want to kill him too.
James was definitely going to die for this. Slowly. Painfully.
The silence settled between them, set and moldered while Carter waited on Mr. St. James to weigh his story and make up his mind. Off in the distance, Carter heard a heavy door open, close. That, finally, seemed to break his wife’s father out of his trance.
His voice cold, Ellie’s dad said, “That will be my family. They show up early to help set up for the service. She’ll be here. Ellie. Taylor. She usually comes in early to make coffee and then practice hymns for the worship service.”
Carter felt a strange jolt, thinking of seeing Ellie again after all these months. After his near-death experience. After weeks, months of recuperation from the accident. Hit. He knew, they all knew, the hit-and-run had been no mere accident.
“May I see her then? With your permission, sir.”
He added on the last bit because he didn’t know how old-fashioned Ellie’s father might be in regards to stuff like that.
Apparently not very.
“You don’t have to kiss up to me,” the man stated bluntly. “It’s Ellie you need to talk to. Especially if it’s true that you’re married.”
“It’s definitely true,” Carter affirmed again.
He hadn’t brought a copy of their marriage license. Maybe he should have. But he hadn’t been expecting to have to prove to somebody the validity of their union, either.
In an abrupt motion, Mr. St. James got to his feet. Carter rose as well.
“I’ll take you to her. We’ll let her decide whether or not she wants to see you. I will say, though—Carter? Is that what you called yourself?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’m telling you right now, if Ellie says this is a lie or she doesn’t want anything to do with you, this is where it ends. We’re not pushing her. Whatever happened to her, it’s been enough. She doesn’t need more stress or complications in her life. If she says no, I’m going to have to ask you to leave. If you don’t go willingly, I’ll call the police. And if you still want to cause trouble…”
Carter watched, hiding his surprise as the associate pastor reached into a drawer in his desk, pulling out a pistol in a holster that he jammed into the back of his belt.
“I’ve got a concealed carry license,” he finished up. “I’m a military vet, and I will use this thing if you try to harm my daughter. Do I make myself clear?”
Carter didn’t bother telling the man he carried his own SIG under his jacket. He cleared his throat.