A Baby for Easter (12 page)

“I’m sorry it didn’t turn out to be a very fun evening.”

“What do you mean? I had a good time.”

He slanted her a quick look. “Did you really?”

“Yeah. I mean, I don’t like for Cara to cry, but overall I thought
it was a good evening.” She experienced a sudden surge of concern. “Didn’t
you?”

“Sure. But…” He didn’t finish.

“But what?”

“Nothing.” He gave her a wry smile. “I’ve just never had a
date like this before.”

She giggled in relief, pleased that he was really thinking
about it as a date and that he was concerned about whether or not she’d enjoyed
it. “Me either. But I still thought it was good.”

“Good. Me too.”

They smiled at each other until Cara reached up and yanked
on Alice’s hair.

“Ow.” She untangled her hair from the little hand, and the
pins she’d twisted up her hair with all fell out. Afraid her hair looked like a
mess, she handed Cara over to Micah. “Hold her for a minute. I’ll be right
back.”

She went to the bathroom first, and then washed her hands
and checked her appearance. Her hair wasn’t as bad as she’d been afraid of, so
she just pulled the last of the pins out and tried to smooth it down a little.

The curls were rather frizzy, but there was nothing to do
about that.

When she returned to the living room, Micah had moved to the
recliner and was holding Cara against his chest. She looked mostly asleep.

He smiled at Alice. But, when she picked up her wine and
started to sit down on the couch, he stretched a hand out toward her.

She responded to the gesture immediately, stepping over so
he could pull her down onto the recliner beside him.

“There’s plenty of room next to us for a Dormouse,” he
murmured, adjusting to give her more space. “And I think she’s finally given
up.”

Alice reached over to rub the baby’s back. “It’s been a long
day for such a little thing.”

“It’s been a long day for me too, and I’m not so little.”
Micah’s voice was ironic, but he did look kind of tired. His face was a little
stubbly, and, without thinking, she reached her hand up to stroke his jaw the
way she’d stroked Cara’s back.

Then she realized what she was doing and drew her hand back
quickly.

She’d never made an advance on a man in her life. She’d been
raised in an old-fashioned family, and she was by nature rather reserved. She
wasn’t philosophically opposed to women making moves on men, but it didn’t feel
like
her
.

She wasn’t sure what she was thinking.

Before she could get embarrassed, though, Micah took her
hand and returned it to his face, holding it against him for a minute before he
turned his head slightly and kissed her palm.

She took a jerky breath of excitement at the deep look in
his eyes.

It reminded her of the way he’d looked at her sometimes that
summer so long ago—only richer and fuller, somehow.

But the look that summer hadn’t led to anything, and it
might not now, either.

She was so afraid to hope for something she wanted so much,
since she’d been so completely crushed in the past when she let herself hope
for things she hadn’t wanted nearly so much.

She was suddenly terrified when she thought about how
destroyed emotionally she’d be if the promise in Micah’s eyes came to nothing
again.

Her rules just hadn’t protected her as much as they were
supposed to.

The surge of fear made her slide her hand out of his grip.
To hide her feelings, she climbed off the recliner and picked up a sleeping
Cara from his lap. “I’ll put her to bed.”

She used the time it took to carry the baby into the room
and then lay her down in her crib to compose herself and say a quick, panicked
prayer.

On her way back, she grabbed the wine bottle from the
kitchen. Micah was still slouched in the recliner, but his eyes were watchful
as she filled both of their glasses.

“I could have done that,” he said, straightening up and
pulling her down beside him again.

“I was already up.”

“I meant, I could have put Cara down.”

“I don’t mind.”

She could tell he was still watching her as she sipped her
wine, as if he were trying to figure out what she was thinking.

She didn’t want him to know what she was thinking. She didn’t
even
know
what she was thinking.

She was so completely clueless about men, and she couldn’t
seem to get any smarter about it.

“So you haven’t heard anything about the job yet?” he asked,
taking a long sip of his wine as she tried to relax in the small space she had
beside him in the recliner.

“No. Nothing yet. They were interviewing a couple of other
people, though. I think I was first. I don’t expect to hear anything until next
week at the earliest.”

“Okay. I guess that’s not too long to wait.”

“It’s pretty normal. Colleges don’t usually move very fast
about hiring decisions.”

“You seem pretty relaxed about it.”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe I should be more worried
about it. I mean, I can hardly go on forever like this.” With a sigh, she put
down her glass on the side table. “This is not at all where I imagined I’d be
at this stage of my life.”

He seemed to be really listening, since he thought for a
moment about what she’d said. “Where did you imagine you’d be?”

“Well, I thought I’d be married.”

“You’re only twenty-six.”

“I know. It’s not like I think I had to be married by a
certain age. But all through college I thought I’d marry Jeff. And then I
thought I’d marry Bill.” She released another long breath. “I really wish I
hadn’t wasted so much of my life focused on something so…so ephemeral.”

“You mean marriage?” Something changed on his face.

“No. I mean marriage to men I’d made up in my head, but who really
just…just weren’t worth it.”

He reached out and pulled her closer to him, wrapping his arm
around her shoulders. “We had this conversation. You believed they were worth
it. They’re to blame. Not you.”

“I should have been smarter.”

“You trusted them.”

“Smart women don’t trust men who aren’t worthy of that
trust.”

He didn’t answer, so she looked up at his face. He was
obviously reflecting on the words. Finally, he murmured, “I don’t think that’s
true. I think smart women can misplace their trust just as easily as anyone
else. Including men, by the way.”

“Have you misplaced your trust?”

“No.” Something twisted on his face. “But a lot of women
have misplaced their trust in me.”

“Micah, that’s not—”

“It definitely is true. Way too many women have. And you did
that summer, didn’t you?”

“That was a long time ago.”

“What does that have to do with anything? How likely are you
to trust me now, after how I acted then?”

Alice’s heart was racing, and his arm was still around her,
so she was afraid he might be able to feel her pounding heartbeat against his
chest. “You didn’t do anything so bad. We were friends that summer, and then
you went to college.” She looked down, the way she always did when she was
uncertain about a conversation.

He tilted her head up so she met his eyes. “You thought we
would be more than friends, didn’t you?”

She nodded, feeling a poignant kind of grief over her emotions
so long ago. “I…I hoped so. I thought maybe you…”

“I did. You weren’t wrong. I
did
.”

“Then why—” Her voice broke, so she didn’t finish the
question.

He cupped her face. “I was stupid. Stupid and selfish. I’m
so sorry about it, Alice. I hate myself when I think of it now. But I kept
thinking how hard it would be, with me going to college and you still here. I
just kept thinking about…how hard it would be.”

“It
would
have
been hard. We probably wouldn’t have lasted past the first semester anyway. You
were just eighteen, and I was sixteen. You were right. It would have been too
hard at that age. No reason to beat yourself up about it.”

“But I do. When I think about…I do.”

“Oh, Micah,” she murmured, reaching up to cover his warm
hand on her face. “We were just kids.”

“Maybe,” he said roughly. “But I can’t believe I gave you up
because I didn’t want to work hard enough to keep you. I was crazy about you
that summer.”

“I was crazy about you too,” she whispered.

He made a rough sound in his throat and leaned down,
capturing her lips with his. He brushed his against hers softly at first, and
it felt so good—her body and heart suddenly coming alive with a rush of
feeling—that she reached up to fist her hand in his t-shirt.

He tangled his fingers in her hair and drew his mouth away
just long enough to murmur thickly, “Alice. I didn’t deserve you, even then, but
I’ve never wanted anyone else like that.” Then he pressed his mouth against
hers again, harder this time.

She gasped against his lips, opening her mouth to the
advance of his tongue. He leaned into the kiss, and she instinctively leaned
backward until he had her pressed against the back of the recliner. She wrapped
an arm around his neck in a desperate attempt to hang on, since it felt like
her head was spinning so wildly it might actually fly off her neck.

He shifted his position so that he could slide a hand down
to the small of her back, pressing her body closer to his. She arched into him
instinctively, intense feelings spiraling through her as his strength and his
heat and his body and his mouth and his passion seemed to devour her.

“Micah,” she gasped, when his mouth finally broke from hers.
He pressed little kisses over the side of her mouth, her jaw, down her neck.
Her head fell back, and she clawed at his shoulders, her whole body pulsing in
a way she’d never experienced before.

Not like this, anyway.

He murmured a wordless response and found her mouth again,
one of his hands sliding down to her thigh and then back up to her ribs. He was
almost touching her breast, and part of her wanted him to, wanted him to touch
her everywhere.

But that thought, and the intensity with which she wanted
it, sent a flare of panic shooting through her with the pleasure. She tried to
pull her head back, but he was holding it in place with one hand at the back of
her head.

“Micah,” she mumbled against his mouth. “Micah, wait.”

After just a moment, his hands grew still. Then his mouth
grew still. Then he managed to draw his face back, although he kept his
forehead leaning against hers.

“I’m sorry,” she panted. “I’m not used to…It’s too fast.”

“I know.’ He straightened up, pulling away from her and sitting
stiffly on the edge of the seat. “I know. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine. I just wasn’t expecting…I mean, I don’t
usually…It was too fast for me.”

“Yeah.” He was slightly flushed and still sitting very
stiffly. “Me too. I…got carried away. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.” Her body still seemed to pulse, still seemed to
want a lot more. But her head had stopped spinning, and now it seemed to weight
a hundred pounds. She was confused and awkward and anxious, and she was
concerned about Micah, who wasn’t looking at her at all. “I don’t actually have
a lot of…a lot of experience, and I’m not used to kissing like that
before…well, at all.”

The truth was, she’d never been kissed like that in her
life. And she liked it. She definitely liked it. But not before she even knew
what Micah was thinking about their relationship.

She knew he didn’t sleep around anymore, but he was
definitely a lot more experienced than she was, and maybe he didn’t take
kissing as seriously as she did. If they could talk about it, though, it would
be fine.

She was sure it would be fine.

“I’m sorry,” he said again, his voice rougher than ever. “I
shouldn’t have…I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“I keep saying it was fine. Please don’t worry about it. We
just got carried away. It happens.”

“Yeah.” He said the one word on a dry huff, and then he
suddenly lurched to his feet. “I’ll be right back.”

He disappeared from the living room, and then she heard the
side door open. He must have gone outside.

Then she felt even more awkward and immature than ever. Maybe
he needed to walk it off or something, but she felt insecure and upset left
alone on the recliner. She got up and went to check on Cara, who was sleeping
soundly. Then she washed and dried the wine glasses and put them in the
cabinet. Then she wiped down the kitchen counter and was working on the sink
when he returned.

“Is everything all right?” she asked, turning to him in
concern.

“Yeah.” He looked better than before, but still kind of
stiff and guarded. “Sorry about all that.”

She sighed and lifted her hand to his chest. “I keep saying
it’s fine. Maybe we can just talk—”

Before she finished, he wrapped his fingers around her wrist
and lowered her hand so she wasn’t touching him. “Yeah. We can. But maybe not
tonight.”

She was more upset than ever, but it was obvious that he
wanted her to leave. And maybe he was right. It would be easier to just call it
a night and start fresh tomorrow with a conversation.

“Okay. It’s getting kind of late, so I think I’ll head over
to my place.”

He nodded, his face utterly grave, the way it had always
been with her before Cara came along.

The expression worried her, but there was nothing to do
about it now. Maybe they could talk about it tomorrow.

When she got her purse and started to the door, he came with
her. He escorted her down the walk and up the stairs to her apartment.

“Okay,” she said, dropping her eyes and hoping things hadn’t
all fallen apart in the space of fifteen minutes. “Thanks for taking me to the
play. I had a good time.”

“Me too. Thanks for coming with us.”

She snuck a peek up at him and saw his expression was still
sober, thoughtful, quiet. His eyes seemed to be searching her face, though. She
smiled at him, thinking it would be okay if he kissed her goodnight—just a
little.