A Dad At Last (14 page)

As if a lifetime would even be one-tenth enough to show her what she meant to him.

Right and wrong ceased to have meaning. There was only here, only now. Only her.

As he filled her, she filled him. With so many wondrous feelings it was impossible to identify them all. All he could do was enjoy them.

And pray that the dawn never came.

She found it hard to catch her breath. It was snatched away at the final moment as his lips pressed against hers, as his heart beat wildly against her own.

Gasping, she drew back and realized that somehow, this time, she had managed to be the one on top. Now, without an ounce of energy to her name, she melted against him, her legs splayed around his like flesh and blood parentheses, her oxygen-depleted lungs heaving against his broad, muscular chest, her fingers limp in his hair as her hair curtained one of his shoulders.

“Tired?” His question skimmed the top of her head.

At first, all she could offer in response was a languorous sound. And then, from somewhere, words finally came. “This would be a very bad time to hold a fire drill,” she murmured against his chest.

Her breathing tickled his skin.

His arm tightened around her. She'd surprised him. Again. The woman had shared with him pure
erotic sex at the end, and yet it was somehow still tinged with a sweetness that wrenched his very soul.

He knew at that moment that he would never be able to get his fill of her. No matter how exhausted he became, he would continue to want her, to want to make love with her.

“Then we won't hold one,” he told her.

Though it wasn't easy, she summoned the strength to raise her head. Blinking, she focused her eyes enough to look at him. Humor painted a smile on her lips. “Promise?”

He tried to sound solemn and had no idea if he failed miserably or succeeded. “Promise.”

She laid her head down, content to remain here like this, being held by him. Wishing she could stay like this indefinitely.

“I'll hold you to that.”

“Uh-huh.” He wasn't sure if he said it or just thought it. Connor concentrated on making his mouth work. “And I'll just hold you.”

He felt her smile as it widened against his chest. “I'd like that.”

“Yeah, me, too.”

Connor remained that way a long time, just holding her to him. Vaguely aware that the minutes were passing, transforming into hours. It didn't matter. There was nowhere else he wanted to be. Only here. With her.

He'd never known such contentment.

But he wasn't a fool. He knew he was living in a fool's paradise and that soon, all too soon, he'd be forced to evacuate and stand helplessly by as the locks were changed on the doors, barring his entry.

She murmured something in her sleep. He tried to hear what it was, but it was too soft. Probably nothing, he knew. But he'd still wanted to hear.

He was too old for her, he thought, and she'd realize that soon enough, when the novelty of their affair wore off.

There was nothing else he could classify it as in his mind. An affair. To think of it as anything more would be to feed himself false hopes, and he had never been guilty of that.

Above all else, Connor knew he had to stay grounded. The reality was that Lacy would find a younger man to love her all too soon. A younger man whose stamina promised to last years before it eroded.

A younger man who could grow old with her, not before her.

But for now, he could just lie here, holding Lacy to him, listening to her breathe. And pretend that what they had would continue forever.

T
HERE WAS
no doubt in her mind.

Though a single test hadn't been done to support her suspicions, Lacy knew the signs. Remembered them well from the last time.

A bittersweet sadness pervaded her. All it had taken then was once.

All it had taken this time was once, too. By her calculations, it had happened the first night, after Megan had come to dinner and then gone home.

She was pregnant.

They'd used protection, and still she'd gotten pregnant. She knew these things happened, but the odds were supposed to have been in her favor.

They weren't.

Standing with the cool tile pressing against her bare feet in the bathroom whose renovations she had so carefully overseen, Lacy felt tears gathering in her eyes.

This couldn't be happening. Not again. Not unplanned.

Although she already loved this unborn child forming beneath her heart, she couldn't help feeling
that it simply wasn't fair. This would push her further away from Connor instead of closer.

She couldn't tell him about this, couldn't stand to see him stoically accept this newest addition into their lives. She wanted happiness, and there wouldn't be any.

And what if this second unscheduled pregnancy changed the way he felt and acted toward Chase? The little boy was responding to Connor so well. Responding to his daddy. She couldn't just rob Chase of that.

So this was what she got for falling head over heels for the same man not once in her life, but three times. Three times, because she'd fallen for him as Sara, as well, when she couldn't remember anything else about herself, not even her name. But the moment she'd seen him, her heart had remembered. Without knowing who or why, it had remembered how she had felt about Connor. Remembered and opened itself up all over again.

And now she was pregnant with his child for the second time.

Lacy blinked back tears. She couldn't do this to Connor. To them. Or to Chase. Couldn't put Connor through the awkwardness of having two children with a woman he wasn't married to. And she wasn't about to put him in the position of proposing to her again.

There was only one thing she could do.

 

P
ULLING HIS HAND
back from the rim of the hot frying pan, Connor stifled an oath, then quickly stuck his hand under the faucet so cold running water would cover the grazed area. He didn't know what the hell he was doing, but he was trying.

He shook his head at his clumsiness. This was completely unlike him. He'd be the first to admit it. But it felt right just the same.

Damn, but even with his fingers smarting, he felt like singing. Not just with his lips, where the tune would emerge completely off-key, but with his entire being. He felt as if he'd swallowed a six-piece band. A band that could only play one tune, one song.

And its name was Lacy.

Part of him still knew he was living in a fool's paradise, but after the other night, he was determined to hang on to that paradise for as long as possible.

Maybe, if he behaved a little nicer to her, took more care of her feelings, she wouldn't notice all the things he knew she eventually was destined to notice.

Now was all he had, and he wanted to make the most of it. If he didn't wind up burning his fingers in the process.

“What's this?”

Surprised, Connor turned from the stove and saw that Lacy was in the doorway, holding Chase. She was earlier than he'd anticipated. He'd hoped that she would sleep just five minutes longer. He'd wanted to take this up to her on a tray.

The best laid plans of mice and men…

She still looked under the weather, he thought as she crossed to him. She'd had that faint pallor for at least a couple of weeks. Because he liked his privacy, he wasn't the kind to butt in on anyone else's business. But she wasn't just anyone else, she was Lacy, and he cared about her. Maybe after she'd eaten, he'd insist that she see a doctor.

Or at least suggest it.

“It's called breakfast. Or at least, it will be once I get it on the table.” He pulled a plate out of the cupboard and tilted the pan, emptying its contents onto the plate. “Scrambled eggs and toast,” he announced needlessly, feeling a little awkward. He dumped the pan into the sink and surrounded the yellow mound on the plate with two slices of buttered toast. “I was going to make bacon, but you're out of bacon. We're out of bacon,” he corrected.

She could only stare numbly at the offering, not knowing what to think. “Why?”

He shrugged, his awkwardness mounting. She wasn't sitting down. “Because I ate the last of it the other day, I guess.”

Holding Chase closer, she raised her eyes to Connor's face. “No, I mean why did you do this?”

Why did she have to ask? Couldn't she just sit down and accept the gesture? He pulled out a chair for her, waiting. “You're always cooking for me and I thought that maybe you'd like a break.”

That really didn't explain anything, Lucy thought. This wasn't like him. As much as he'd softened toward her and Chase, this wasn't like him. Something was going on. “I'm being paid to cook,” she said.

Helpless, he threw up his hands. “Then call it a whim.” He saw her looking at the plate and thought he knew what she was thinking. It was a far cry from the breakfasts she made for him. “You might want to call it something else after you sample it,” he added.

She could feel the tears gathering. Her emotions had gone completely out of whack. But no one had ever cooked for her before, not since she'd been a small girl.

“I'm sure it's very good,” she said slowly, afraid her voice would crack, “I'm just not very hungry right now.”

He knew it. She was sick. That was the only explanation.

Connor surprised her by placing his hand on her forehead. She tried to draw back, but his other hand was firmly on her shoulder.

“No fever.” Connor frowned, dropping his hand to his side. “Maybe I should run you over to Maitland Maternity.”

Her heart jumped, though she struggled not to show it. Did he suspect for some reason? Had he heard her throwing up this morning? She was sure he'd gone downstairs before she'd dragged herself
into the bathroom and emptied the meager contents of her stomach.

“Why?”

He thought that was an odd question, but chalked it up to her being ill. “To see Abby. She wouldn't mind squeezing you in and taking a look at you. Maybe she could recommend a good GP for future visits.”

The last thing she wanted was to see an ob-gyn, even if it was Abby. Doctor-patient privilege aside, news had a way of surfacing and traveling through the Maitland infrastructure. She'd seen evidence of that even before she'd regained her memory and discovered that Connor was part of the family. He was Abby's half brother, and that made the baby she was carrying Abby's niece or nephew.

“No.” Her voice was adamant. “I'm just a little under the weather.”

The circles under Lacy's eyes looked like deep smudges. He couldn't remember her ever looking this way, not even when she pulled what amounted to all-nighters with Chase.

“Under the weather, nothing.” He snorted dismissively. “It looks as if the weather ran right over you driving a Mack truck.”

Why did he pick now to be thoughtful? Any other time, she would have reveled in it. “I'll be all right. Really.”

To prove it, she deposited Chase in his high chair,
strapped him in, then sat in the chair Connor had pulled out for her. She picked up her fork and dug in.

“Look, I'm eating, see?” The eggs had been in the pan a little longer than necessary, and the toast was burned, but it didn't matter. He'd done this for her. It was something she was going to remember for the rest of her life. She turned her face to his, smiling. “It's very good.”

She was being charitable, and they both knew it. He suddenly felt like a little boy trying to impress an adult. “It's overcooked.”

He began to pull the plate away from her, but she stopped him. “Just the way I like it.”

Embarrassed, he turned away, pretending to be busy cleaning the pan. The man who had invented no-stick cookware deserved to be made a saint, he thought as the burned-on pieces lifted off the skillet.

“I'm going to be gone most of the day,” he told her, then mentioned the foreman he'd hired the day after he'd bought the ranch. “Gus brought the new horses and—”

Was he trying to find ways to avoid her? Lacy felt as if all her emotions had booked permanent passage on a roller coaster. “You don't have to make excuses to me.”

He tossed the sponge into the sink a little too hard. It bounced and landed on the counter. Why was she
twisting everything? Didn't she understand he was making an all-out effort?

“I'm not making excuses, I'm just letting you know where I'll be in case you need me.” That sounded too possessive. Backtracking, he shrugged. “Or something. I'll be on the north range. So if you need me—”

She nodded, anticipating his next words. “I'll send one of the hands.”

“Or you can just call.” He pulled a cell phone out of his back pocket. The phone was one of the concessions he'd made to progress. A man couldn't afford to be out of touch these days. “What's so funny?”

Despite the situation that was weighing so heavily on her mind, Lacy began to laugh. The image of Connor talking into a cell phone while sitting astride a horse was so incongruous it was funny.

She waved away the frown that was forming on his face. “Nothing. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to laugh. It's just that I don't think of you as a modern sort of man, that's all. To be honest, I can see you sending smoke signals more readily than talking on a cell phone.” He was, and always would be, the rugged, strong, silent type to her. Cell phones didn't enter into the picture.

He looked at the phone in his hand, and his frown melted into a grin. It was kind of funny, at that, he
supposed. “Just goes to show you that you don't know everything about me.”

No, she thought as he turned his back on her again and finished cleaning the spatula, she didn't know everything about him. Just as he didn't know everything about her.

And she was going to keep it that way as long as possible.

 

T
HAT MORNING
, after she watched Connor ride away on his palomino, Lacy got Chase ready and drove into the city. She purchased a home pregnancy kit in a pharmacy where no one knew her and brought it home with her, hiding it in her underwear drawer beneath a nightgown. She would use it the following morning. The hours until dawn promised to drag on.

Until Connor came to her room that night after she had put Chase to bed.

She'd thought he was going to work into the wee hours of the night. She'd gone to bed, leaving him to go over sales receipts and bills in his den.

When he stood in her doorway less than ten minutes later, her heart jumped.

And placed itself straight in the palm of his hand. She knew why he was there before a word was said. Silently, she crossed to him, took his hand and drew him into her room.

That night, Lacy made love with him, and to him, with wild abandonment, trying not to dwell on the
thought that it was for the last time. Anticipating the positive answer to the pregnancy test, she'd made up her mind what to do. All she needed was the courage to carry out her plan.

But in the interim, she wanted this one last night. A night of love to last in Connor's memory forever, even when everything else faded away.

To last in her own after all the other dreams had disappeared.

 

“W
ELL, HI, STRANGER
.”

Rounding the diner's long counter, Shelby Lord threw her arms around Lacy. Chase squealed at the close contact and immediately grabbed her sleeve. With a laugh, Shelby disengaged herself from his grasping fingers.

“Strong grip,” she commented. “Nobody's going to order this little guy around when he grows up.” She patted her sleeve into place. In the lull between breakfast and lunch, the diner had only a couple of patrons at the counter and one in a booth. All were immersed in the newspapers they were reading. “I haven't seen you around since Connor whisked you out to his ranch.” Pleasure filled Shelby's eyes as she took inventory of her friend. “How've you been?”

Lacy still felt a little shaky about the course she'd plotted for herself. She'd come to the diner because Shelby was as close a friend as she had in this world.
The bond between them had been forged when Shelby had realized Lacy needed a hand. Shelby had extended it, never once making Lacy feel as if she was obligated in any way. That was what made Shelby so special.

Lacy took a deep breath. “Well, I've been better.”

Concerned, Shelby nodded to the corner booth where she usually sat observing the customers when she wasn't working behind the counter.

“Pull up a booth and tell me about it.” She waited until Lacy sat with Chase on her knee. She kept her voice low, knowing that whatever was wrong, Lacy would want it to remain between the two of them. “Connor not treating you right? Because if he's not—”

Lacy shook her head. She didn't want her best friend entertaining a single bad thought about Connor. Especially since he was trying to be so nice to her. “He's treating me fine, Shelby.” She pressed her lips together. “I'm the one who isn't treating him right.”

She'd been right. Something
was
up. Shelby placed her hand over Lacy's, squeezing it warmly.

“That's not possible.” Shelby remained silent as long as she could, waiting. When Lacy said nothing, Shelby took the lead. “Want to tell me about it, or do I have to play twenty questions?”

There was no way to say this but to blurt it out. “I'm pregnant.” The instant the words tumbled from
her lips, tears threatened to spill from her eyes. Lacy pressed her lips together, as if that would somehow make the tears recede.