He sat down in an old office chair and raised the bourbon to his lips. He would be the first to admit he’d wronged that boy. For several years now, he’d tried to make it up to his son. But Nick was a stubborn, unforgiving man. Just as he’d been a defiant unlovable boy.

If Henry had more time, he was sure he and his son could have come to some sort of understanding. But he didn’t have time, and Nick didn’t make it easy. In fact, Nick made it damn hard to even like him.

He remembered the day Nick’s mother, Benita Allegrezza, had pounded on his front door, claiming Henry had fathered the black-haired baby in her arms. Henry had turned his attention from Benita’s dark gaze to the big blue eyes of his wife, Ruth, who had stood beside him.

He’d denied it like hell. Of course, there had been a real good chance that what Benita claimed was true, but he’d denied even the possibility. Even if Henry hadn’t been married, he never would have chosen to have a child with a Basque woman. Those people were too dark, too volatile, and too religious for his taste. He’d wanted white, blond-haired babies. He didn’t want his kids confused for wet-backs. Oh, he knew Basques weren’t Mexicans, but they all looked alike to him.

If it hadn’t been for Benita’s brother, Josu, no one would have known about his affair with the young widow. But that sheep-loving bastard had tried to blackmail him into recognizing Nick as his son. He’d thought Josu had been bluffing when the man had come to him and threatened to tell everyone in town that Henry had taken advantage of his grieving sister and had knocked her up. He’d ignored the threat, but Josu hadn’t been bluffing. Again Henry had denied paternity.

But by the time Nick was five, he looked enough like a Shaw that no one believed Henry anymore. Not even Ruth. She’d divorced him and taken half his money.