Baby, Oh Baby! (21 page)

She looked down at their intertwined hands, then slowly pulled back her hand. Her eyes took his measure for a long moment, then she breathed out a sigh. "If you draw something up, I'll look at it. I can't promise I'll sign it, but I'll look at it."

"Good." He wasn't about to tell her he had the papers already drafted and sitting in a folder in the backseat of his car. Some issues needed to be broached bit by bit, baby step by baby step.

Thwak! Something warm and wet suddenly hit Jake smack in the middle of his forehead. He reflexively raised his hand and touched his face. When he pulled it back, he was alarmed to see it covered with spaghetti sauce.

Madeline giggled gleefully, and Annie gave a snort of laughter.

"What just happened?" Jake asked.

"Madeline stole a meatball off your plate and lobbed it at you."

Jake looked down at his lap. Sure enough, a meatball sat damply on his navy slacks, wedged suggestively between his thighs. He gingerly picked it up and plopped it on the tabletop. "Good one, Madeline."

Annie covered her mouth and sniggered.

Jake picked up his napkin and wiped the sauce off his face. Annie scooted the metal dispenser of paper napkins toward him. He pulled out a handful and attacked his white shirt. "What's the deal with this kid and my clothes? Every time I take her out in public, she covers me with dirt, food, or bodily fluids."

"Maybe she's trying to decorate you."

"Like a Christmas tree?"

"Maybe." Annie's smile was blinding. "Or maybe she's just trying to get you to loosen up."

"I don't need loosening up." He stopped wiping his shirt, looked up, and quirked an eyebrow. "Do I?" "Maybe a little."

It was ridiculous that such a benign remark should prick his pride, but it did. "In what way?"

Annie's lips curved. "Well, you have to admit you're a little too structured."

"Structure isn't a bad thing to have in your life." In fact, Jake thought darkly, you ought to try it some time.

"Neither is the ability to trust other people and go with the flow." Her full, sexy lips curved in a teasing smile. "I bet if I frisked you right now, I'd find an itinerary outlining how you plan to spend every minute of your day, complete with goals and objectives."

The idea of being frisked by Annie held a disturbing appeal. "Planning your day is the best way to. prioritize your time."

The curve of her lips made him realize how completely stuffy he sounded. With a noncommittal grunt, he resumed wiping his clothes.

"Babies don't fit into a Day-Timer," Annie said. "They're messy and time-consuming and prone to accidents. Especially our baby."

Our baby. There was no reason a simple possessive pronoun should make his heart beat like a judge's gavel in a disorderly courtroom, but it did.

Annie, too, seemed hit by the significance of her unwitting remark. Her eyes widened and met his across the table, and the moment came and went when one of them should have looked away.

Our child. It was a weighty concept to grasp. He and Annie were inextricably bound together by the cherubic imp at the end of the table who was now merrily finger painting on her plate with tomato sauce. Before he'd ever met this woman, his seed had impregnated her womb, his heritage had fused with hers, and their futures were irrevocably intertwined.

But they were complete opposites. In the normal course of events, their paths probably never would have crossed, and if they had, they never would have given each other more than a cursory glance. He would have considered her much too free-spirited and Bohemian, and she would have thought him too rigid and stuffy. The only reason they were sitting here together now was because they'd made a child.

That had to be the only reason he was feeling such a strong, hot pull of attraction toward her. He was pretty sure it wasn't just a one-sided thing, either. He could feel heat sizzling between them, bouncing back and forth, firing off so many sparks it was a wonder the restaurant wasn't filled with smoke.

They'd made a baby, but they hadn't made love. They'd skipped an important step in the natural order of things. That must be why they were so physically aware of each, so sexually curious. After all, people who made babies together were lovers. He didn't even know what Annie looked like naked.

But, boy, I'd sure like to. The thought made him jerk his eyes away from her in alarm.

Annie quickly averted her gaze, too. Picking up a napkin, she busily wiped Madeline's chin, then pushed Jake's plate far out of the baby's reach. "You'd better watch out, or she's likely to resume pitching practice."

Jake gave a weak grin, thinking that the baby was the least of his worries. Madeline might throw meatballs, but Annie threw him for a loop.

"The nurse's car is still gone," Jake said as he pulled into the drive of Annie's house. "I'll stay with you until

she gets back."

For some reason, the thought of being alone with Jake made Annie's stomach quake. "You don't need to do that."

"Maybe not, but I'm going to anyway." He softened

the words with a smile as he braked the car and killed            i the engine. "Stay put and I'll get the door for you."

He circled the automobile and helped her out, then opened the back door and gazed down at the sleeping child. "Looks like the meatball hurler is down for the count."

Annie smiled as . Jake unfastened the strap of the baby's carseat. He carefully Iifted the child out, nestling her against his shoulder, so that her head rested against his. A lump formed in Annie's throat. Their dark hair was a perfect match.

Annie followed as Jake carried the child into the nursery and gently placed her in her crib, then she covered the sleeping baby with a blanket. Her shoulder brushed Jake's, and a current of attraction rolled through her, along with a strong feeling of d~j~ vu.

She suddenly knew why. This was the scene she'd imagined so many times in her fantasies. Over and over, she'd pictured herself here at her grandparents' ranch, standing beside a crib, smiling down at a baby, a handsome man by her side. She'd never envisioned the man's face in her fantasies, but if she had, it would have been Jake's.

That thought made her freeze. She needed to stop letting her imagination run away with her. Jake was emotionally unavailable. Hadn't he just told her he had no interest in a relationship, that no one could ever measure up to his late wife?

She gave the blanket a final tuck, then quietly left the baby's room, wanting to leave the disturbing thoughts behind. Jake followed her to the kitchen.

"Want some coffee?" she asked.

"Sure. Here, I'll do it for you." He headed for the refrigerator and pulled out a bag of freshly ground coffee. It was disconcerting, how this man was invading

her space. He'd fathered her baby, he'd stayed in her

house, and he knew his way around her kitchen, yet she knew very little about him.

Well, that was something she could change. She glanced over at him as she filled the coffee maker's pot with tap water. "What made you decide to go into law?"

Jake pulled a measuring cup out of a drawer and carefully poured in some coffee grounds. "I guess I figured that if I couldn't save the world by fighting neurological illness, I'd do it by fighting injustice." He poured a half-cup of grounds into the coffeemaker. His lip curled in an ironic expression that was more grimace than grin. "That was back when I was young and idealistic and believed justice actually existed."

"You don't now?"

Jake gave a derisive snort.

"Not too jaded, are you?"

He shrugged. "Let's just say I've seen the scales tipped by the weight of a wallet a few times too many. Corporate law isn't exactly a bastion of fairness."

"You could always do something else." She switched on the coffeemaker.

"Like what?"

"You tell me. What did you want to be when you were a boy?"

Jake leaned against the kitchen counter. "Batman or Superman. But they didn't offer superhero training as a major in college."

Smiling, she rested a hip against the walnut cabinet beside him. "You wanted to be one of the good guys."

Jake met Annie's gaze. He'd never thought of it that way. This woman had an uncanny way of seeing things that he'd never realized about himself. "Yeah. I guess so.,'

"Have you ever thought about being a prosecutor?" "I've done more than think about it. I was assistant D.A. in Tulsa for two years."

"How was it?"

Jake thoughtfully rubbed his jaw. "Frustrating as hell. It was like fighting a war that'll never be won. But it was somehow rewarding, too. I looked forward to going to work every day." He looked away, vaguely embarrassed to have said so much.

She nodded slowly. "It was a war worth fighting." "Exactly." There it was again—that uncanny ability of hers to know what he was feeling.

"So why did you switch to corporate law?"

Jake lifted his shoulders. "My father-in-law's partner retired. Tom had been after me for some time to join his firm, and my wife ..." He trailed off. Rachel had resented the long hours he put in as D.A., for little pay. She'd been jealous of his job, as if it had been a mistress. And in a way, Jake mused, he supposed it had been. Jake blew out a breath as he ran a hand through his hair. "It was the logical thing to do."

Annie looked at him, just looked at him, her gaze cutting him no slack. "Sometimes logic isn't the best criteria for decisions."

"What is? Tea leaves?"

"No. Your heart."

Jake rolled his eyes.

"You said you used to look forward to going to work everyday. I bet you can't say that now."

"How do you know how I feel?"

She waved her hand, dismissing the question. "I'm right, aren't I?"

She was. Tension hummed between them. The air grew thick with it, thick and still and heavy. "Okay, fortune-teller. What else do you see in your crystal ball?" He was stepping into quicksand, venturing onto dangerous ground, but he couldn't resist the question.

She gazed up at him with those blue, blue eyes. "That you don't let people close. You keep your distance because you don't want to get hurt, but the very distance you think will protect you is hurting you."

Jake deliberately stepped closer, wanting to prove her wrong. "You think I'm hurting?"

She nodded. "I think you're lonely."

Hell, she made him sound as pathetic as a homeless hound. His eyebrows knit in a hard scowl, and his voice lowered to a deep growl. "You offering to change that?"

Annie's eyes widened.

He didn't know what demon seized him, but it was a dark one. Two years of heartache bubbled up and boiled over. He'd show her, by damn. He'd teach her what came of trying to psychoanalyze him and pry into his soul. He'd wipe that pitying look off her face if it were the last thing he did.

He reached out and pulled her to him. She stared up, her eyes wide, as he caught her face in his hands. She was still staring up when he slanted his mouth over hers.

He'd intended to give her a short, hard, I'll-show-younot-to-feel-sorry-for-me kind of kiss, but all coherent thought fled his brain the moment his lips met hers. All that remained was the kiss.

Soft. Her mouth was so soft, softer than anything in recent memory—soft and pliant and willing, soft and lush and salty-sweet. He wanted to drown in that softness, to dive in and be surrounded by it, to let it soothe away all of the sharp, rough edges of his soul. His hands skimmed down the top of her arms. Her skin was soft, too—as soft as her lips.

And warm. His hand slid down to her back, and suddenly the heat between them ignited. She gave a soft little moan and fitted herself against him, winding her arms around his neck, pressing her breasts against his chest, snugging her pelvis against his. His body responded. She moaned again and moved against him.

Good Lord, he was on fire, ablaze, blind to everything but the scent of her hair, the feel of her body, the taste of her mouth. He was consumed by an aching need, a need so great that it overpowered all reason and shrank the world to nothing but Annie—Annie's skin, Annie's warmth, Annie's lush, soft woman's body.

His hand slid down and cupped her breast. It was full and heavy and warm, and she groaned with pleasure as he ran his thumb across the tip. Her responsiveness inflamed his senses. He deepened the kiss, and her fingers threaded through his hair, pulling him down, urging him on.

A soft noise seemed to come from a far distance. Jake would have ignored it, but Annie abruptly pulled away. The noise sounded again. This time Jake realized it was a discreet cough.

"Mrs. Forest—hello." Annie's voice sounded startled and unnaturally high.

Jake opened passion-glazed eyes to see the middle-aged nurse standing in the kitchen doorway, her jowl-lined cheeks beet red, an embarrassed smile on her face. She lifted two fingers in a tiny wave.

"I, uh, just wanted to let you know I'm back," the woman warbled. "I'll be in the back of the house if you need me." She turned and fled as fast as her rubber-soled shoes would take her.

Jake dropped his hands as if they'd been scorched. Good God in heaven, what was the matter with him? He'd never done anything so irrational in his life.

Folding her arms across her chest, Annie rubbed her upper arms, as if she were suddenly cold.

Jake looked away. "Hey—I'm sorry. I—I didn't mean for that to happen."

Annie ran her hands up and down her arms. "I didn't, either."

Jake awkwardly rubbed his jaw. What the devil had he been thinking? He hadn't been thinking, that was the problem. He cleared his throat. "I don't know what got into me. I hope you'll forgive me."

She nodded. "It's okay. It was just one of those things."

Jake nodded uncertainly. He couldn't help but wonder what kind of a thing she thought it was. He shoved his hand in his pocket. "Well, look—I'd better be going."

"All right." She walked him down the hall to the door.

"Well..”

"Yes. Well ...”

They stared at each other. Jake started to hold out his hand, but that seemed ridiculous, considering they'd just been swapping saliva.