Cart Before The Horse (9 page)

“Don’t think I’m some goofy sap, okay?”
He reached for her hand and laid it on her stomach with his. “I’ve never loved anything so much in my whole life. It seems strange to me too, be-

cause I can’t see it. But I love this baby more than I’ve ever loved anyone.”

“More than Jasmine?”
Her voice was soft, and his eyes were sad when they met hers.

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry. That wasn’t nice.”

Gabe raised his hand to her cheek and rested it there.
“It’s okay. I’ll always love Jasmine. But, Holly, there’s a lot of room in my heart.”

“Gabe.”
She reached for his hand to remove it, but he kept it there. Warmth resonated through her entire body, and it—he—comforted her in a way no other person had been able to in her life. There was more there than friendship. Perhaps not love, but it went deep, and she knew by his touch.

“I know you don’t want anything between us.
I can’t blame you. I feel like I’ve done you wrong. But I can’t help but think this was fate for both of us.”

“How do you figure that?”
He was so close she could feel the heat from his body, a sharp contrast from the cold of the refrigerator at her back.

“I needed to love again.
I needed to move on. And you needed something that would take away your control. Nothing does that like a baby.” He smiled then stepped away. “Besides, think of it this way. Our night together was for fun. We intended it that way and we utilized it that way, but we were careful. We used protection and we didn’t plan this. This is bigger than both of us.”

Gabe picked one of the mugs and handed it to her. He took the other for himself before turning off the coffeepot.

Holly watched him.
He was wise and she hated to admit it. “Gabe, I don’t feel like you’ve done me wrong. Things were always backward for me, I just thought this part of my life wouldn’t have been. My plan for motherhood included years of marriage preceding it. I’m not good with spontaneous.”

The grin was back and there was an evil twinkle in his

eyes.
“That’s why I’m here. C’mon. I have a spontaneous and
very
normal
adventure for us.”

A knot in her stomach formed, and she swallowed back fear that would normally hold her back. “What are we doing?”

“I’ll tell you as soon as we get in the car. But we have to hurry. It’s four o’clock now. It might risk our mission if we wait any longer.”

She was too stunned and sleepy to ask too many questions as they drove through town.
The night was growing colder, and the coffee warmed her nicely.

Gabe pulled onto the highway and headed toward the south end of Denver.

“Are you going to tell me where you’re going?” She took another sip of her warm coffee and tried to keep from growing tired with the motion of the car.

“Look in the backseat.”

She turned and looked. “Gabe, you have toilet paper in the back seat.”

He laughed.
“Yep.”

“Dear, God.
What are we going to do?”

“Cause a little trouble.” His face lit up.

She didn’t want to smile at him, but she couldn’t help it. She wasn’t sure it was a very good idea, but just like the macaroni and cheese, it pleased her to watch him enjoy himself.

Gabe weaved through the streets and then parked on a quiet, dimly lit residential block.

“Whose house is this?”

“Chandra’s.
She deserves a little of what’s coming to her.” He reached for the package of toilet paper and tore it open. He took two rolls and shoved them into the deep pocket on the front of his sweatshirt. Then he handed her two rolls and she did the same. “Okay, here are the rules. There aren’t any.” His teeth flashed white in the dark. “But if someone comes, run back to the car. Okay?”

Holly nodded, and Gabe climbed from the car. He came

around to the passenger side and gave her a hand out. “Stick with me.
Your first time can be scary.”

First time?

Gabe pulled her by the hand down the block and to a house enveloped in darkness.

He motioned to her to head to a bank of bushes, where he began unrolling his toilet paper roll and launched it into a tree.
It fell to the earth, leaving a trail of paper on the limbs. He gave her a nod to do the same to the bushes.

Her heart raced so fast she wasn’t sure it would stay co
nfined in her chest. She’d never done something like this. Wasn’t it illegal? But he was right about her—she needed to learn to be normal. She took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and counted to three. With shaking hands, she held the toilet paper and pulled off strips. She tossed them onto the bush and let go an inaudible laugh.

In Holly style, the bushes were draped with simple but elegant garlands of toilet paper by the time she was done.
When she turned to see what Gabe had done, the entire front of the yard looked like it had snowed. He was certainly experienced.

He held out his hands for her to throw her another roll, which she did.
He went about wrapping up the mailbox.

It was then a set of headlights lit up the street.
Holly’s heart rate ramped up even faster. Gabe dashed across the lawn and grabbed her hand. He pulled her to the side of the house and pushed her down into a crouch behind the bush. The car drove by and Gabe gave her a pat on the head.

They finished the roll and ran back to the car.

When they were securely inside and driving away, hysterical laughter took over and she laughed until tears rolled down her cheeks.

Gabe looked at her.
“You had fun.”

There was a lightness inside of her where the ball of fear had once weighed her down. “Yes, I had fun.”

“We would have soaped the windows too, but I didn’t know if you would.”

“Perhaps we’ll save that for another day,” she said on another roll of laughter.

The sky had become lighter when they pulled up to
Holly’s building.

She raised her travel mug of cold coffee in a toast. “Would you like to come up for a warm-up?”

“Yes.” He reached for her hand and ran his thumb gently over her knuckles. Then he looked up at her, his eyes warm and compassionate. “But I’m going to head home instead. Thanks for letting me kidnap you. I haven’t done that in years.”

She couldn’t help but smile at him.
“Thank you for taking me. I’ll never forget it.” She leaned over the console and gave him a kiss on the cheek.

Holly grabbed the two coffee mugs as Gabe got out of the car.
A moment later, he opened her door and helped her out.

“Thank you.” She stepped to the side and Gabe closed the door. His arm brushed her, and his body, so close, yet he pulled back to give her distance. “I’m heading up to Boulder around one.
Would you like to go with me?”

“Are you sure?”

She let out a sigh. “Yes, I’m sure.”

“Would you like me to pick you up?”

“No, I’ll pick you up. When you drive we seem to do
bad things.”

“But enjoyable.”
He flashed that sexy grin. “I’ll see
you later.”

Holly turned as she opened the door to the building and saw Gabe still standing next to his car.
He gave her a thougtful smile before she walked inside then took the elevator up to her condo. Aside from the night she’d snuck out of bed and left Gabe sleeping, she didn’t remember another time she’d gotten home in the wee hours of the morning.

She was exhausted, but she wondered if she would be able to sleep.

Holly unlocked the door to her condo and went to the window and looked down. He was still there looking up. She turned on a light and waved down. He gave her a wave and a nod, then climbed back in his car and she watched him drive away.

She knew at that moment she was going to let things slip beyond the limits she’d set.
Gabe Maguire seemed to do that to her. Was it so bad? Could she let herself go and enjoy him, even love him a little?

She walked to the kitchen and set the mugs in the sink, her shoulders bowing.

He loved Jasmine, and she’d never be able to replace his feelings for his late wife.
They were friends having a baby together, that was all. It would only hurt if she let herself think differently.

Chapter Six

G
abe sat at the bar nursing a cup of coffee. Taking Holly out to TP Chandra’s house had been more fun than he’d anticipated, but it had severely cut into his sleep and he was feeling it. When you were seventeen and you stayed out all night you could sleep it off. But at thirty-nine you didn’t bounce back so quickly.

The restaurant had a few lunch patrons, but the Saturday crowd was always smaller than the weekday ones.
He could usually get by without being seen until six in the evening. Though he’d love to be upstairs in his bed, he’d promised Holly he’d go with her to her parents’ house.

When the front door opened and Chandra walked through, she chucked a roll of toilet paper at his head.
“You forgot one.”

The smile that took over his face hurt his cheeks.
“Good afternoon. How are you today?”

“Frickin’ mess you left.”

He laughed. “Oh, it was so worth it.”

“You weren’t very quiet either,” she said as she shrugged her coat off and hung it on the rack by the door.

“Didn’t have to be.”

Chandra shook her head and walked behind the bar.
She poured herself a cup of coffee and leaned across the counter. “Did you turn her into a deviant like you?”

“Not yet, but I will.” The thought of shaking up Holly’s world was a good one.

“Knocking her up wasn’t enough, huh?”

His smile disappeared and his cheeks relaxed. “Why do women see it like that? I see this great opportunity to bring a child into the world, and she’s mortified.”

“Touchy subject, huh?
Well, of course that’s how we see it. You just altered her path in life. She’s a career gal, right?” He nodded. “Now she has to think about new career clothes, sick time, birth time, nannies, being up all night, breast-feeding…”

“Got it.
Got it.” He drank down his cold coffee and pushed the mug toward Chandra, who refilled it. “You know, she was in that bed too.”

“I know.
And when you walked out of here that night with her attached to your face, I knew I’d be seeing her around for a long time.”

His smile returned.
“I really like her.”

“It shows.”
She sipped her coffee. “Even if she doesn’t admit it, she really likes you too.”

“Her father gave me a ring to give her.”

“The ruby? I saw it.”

“You don’t miss much.”

“It’s my job to pay attention.”

“She’s wearing it, but she doesn’t want to get married.”

Chandra shrugged. “Give it time. What else do you have? You’re raising the kid together, right?”

“Of course.”

“So what if the kid is ten by the time she figures out you’re the prime catch? Neither of you is going anywhere.”

She was right.
No wonder she was his most popular bartender. He saw Holly’s car pull up out front.

He pushed his mug toward Chandra and she put it in the sink.
He grabbed his coat off the back of the bar stool and slid his arms through. “Your son have to clean up that mess?”

“That was the deal.”

As Holly walked through the door, he took a twenty out of his pocket and handed it to Chandra. “Tell him thanks.”

“This is a little steep for an eight-year-old, don’t you
think?”

“A deal was a deal and it was worth every cent.” He turned to Holly. “Hi, beautiful.”

“Hello.” She looked at him and then at Chandra.
Her head dropped and her cheeks turned red. “Hello, Chandra.”

Gabe bit down on his lip to stop the smirk that threatened to surface.

“What’s new?” Chandra gave her a nod.

“End of the world is about to happen.”
Her face faded to white, and he wondered if she was that nervous or if she was sick again.

Chandra slapped the top of the bar. “Don’t sweat the small stuff, honey.
Get this guy out of my hair for the night, okay? In fact, I’d really like it if I didn’t see him until I come to work
on Tuesday.”

Holly laughed.
“I’ll see what I can do.”

She turned and walked out of the restaurant, and Gabe turned back to Chandra.
She pulled a bottle of wine from under the bar and handed it to him. Then she gave a shrug and a nod and went about her business. He wasn’t even sure Holly realized what she’d seen go down. How would she feel if she knew she’d been set up, Chandra knew about the TP-ing of her house, and that he’d paid the eight-year-old to clean it up? And did she catch the not-so-subtle suggestion that she should keep Gabe occupied all weekend? He thought that had been a stellar idea.

The holidays were right around the corner.
Gabe thought he might have to budget Chandra a pay raise.

Holly started the car and waited for Gabe to buckle in. Her palms sweated against the steering wheel, and the urge to turn the car off and go back inside nearly won over the plague of guilt that would follow. “What’s the wine for?”

“Chandra thinks I should give it to your parents.”

“Oh.” Her mother would appreciate that. Her nerves settled a bit knowing Gabe was going to win her mother over, for

a little while anyway.

“You look pale today.
Are you okay?” He reached across the car to push a lock of hair behind her ear.

Leave it to the man, sitting across from her looking go
rgeous, to remind her how bad she felt and looked. If it wouldn’t take more energy than she had, she would push him out of the car. But she needed him. She gave a grunt and pulled back from his hand. “I’m very tired and of course I got sick this morning. But that doesn’t seem to be news anymore.”

“Would you like me to drive?”

“No, I’ll be fine.”

She figured driving would keep her mind otherwise occ
upied as she merged onto I-25 and headed north.

She’d been so tired when they got home she’d fallen asleep quickly, but once she woke and realized what she was about to do her nerves took over.
Then there was the shiny reminder on her finger of the web of lies she’d twisted.

As she merged onto Highway 36, she caught Gabe’s
stare. “What?”

“You haven’t been talking to me since we left downtown.
But I think you have a whole conversation going in your head.”

“Sorry.
I guess I do.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“No.” She switched lanes. “I’m just nervous. My mother’s going to want to talk wedding plans, and if she’s calmed enough and I mention the baby, she’ll want to discuss nurseries too. Mind you, this will be after the curtain of tears falls because her daughter has done everything backward again.”

“This is the twenty-first century.
Is there really a
backward?”

She gripped the steering wheel tighter.
Of course he didn’t understand that it was backward, his mother was a woman who believed in moving ahead in life. Forging to the top of corporate ladders and raising fine children. Her mother was too worried about what the neighbors might think if things
 

w
eren’t just right. “There is to Trudy Jacobs.”

Gabe looked at his watch then crossed his arms over his chest.
“How do we handle wedding talk?”

Holly blew out a breath, irritated with his attitude toward the whole thing.
No matter what they planned, her mother was still going to want a wedding. “I don’t know. We don’t plan on getting married.”

Gabe turned in his seat and his eyes opened wide.
The grin that crossed his lips matched the one he’d had last night before he had her TP Chandra’s house. “Why don’t we?”

“Why don’t we what?”
Her voice rose with her nerves, and she gripped the steering wheel even tighter, trying to keep her focus on the road instead of on the lunatic in the
passenger seat.

“Why don’t we get married?
I’m not going anywhere,
are you?”

“No,” she said weakly, wondering when he’d lost his mind.

He turned so that he was completely sideways in his seat looking at her, and she could feel the heat rise in her skin at the fear of the mere mention of what he was proposing. The grin had turned into a smile on his lips, and she kept her eyes focused away from him and on the road. He leaned toward her. “I’m not seeing anyone, are you?”

She swallowed hard. “No.”

“We’re committing to having a child together and raising it together, aren’t we?”

“Gabe, is this some kind of quiz?”

He lifted his sunglasses to his forehead and now looked at her with those dark, sexy eyes. “Humor me, will ya? Aren’t we already talking about raising the baby together? I mean time with you, time with me? We’d have to show up at the same events anyway.”

She reached toward the air and turned the heat down.
She couldn’t live with someone she didn’t know. Her body was burning up, and she forced back the waves of anxiety in her

stomach. “You’re talking nonsense.”

“No, I think you are.”
He turned back in his seat, lowered his sunglasses to hide his eyes from her again, and crossed his arms over his chest. “Really, Holly, it just makes sense.”

He was crazy.
Marriage. That was something you did when you’d known someone a long time and had a relationship with him. She didn’t have a relationship with Gabe. They had one night that had turned into the rest of their lives. Now that sounded crazy.

She didn’t know how to deal with forever.
But the baby was forever. Now her mind was jumbled. Then she thought about it. He did understand forever. “What about Jasmine?”

He shook his head then looked at her. “Jasmine has been dead for six years.
Don’t I deserve some happiness? I mean, yes, she was the love of my life, but if the tables were turned wouldn’t you want to love again?”

Love?
How could he be talking about loving someone when he’d loved so deeply? Her chest was tightening, and she sucked in as much air as she could because it was getting harder and harder to do. “Gabe, you don’t love me.”

“The hell I don’t.”

Her mind clouded over immediately, and her heart rate kicked into an uncomfortable level. She’d lost focus and she realized it when the car beside her honked and she jerked back into her own lane. “Now look what you’ve done to me.”

“Get off the highway.” He sat up straight in his seat and looked out the window around them as if he were going to take the wheel from the passenger seat and drive.
“You’re going to kill us. Pull over at the mall and just stop the damn car.”

It was easier said than done. But five minutes later she parked in the far corner of the Flatiron Mall’s par
king lot and put the car in park. Her hands shook and she was very close to crying, but she sucked it back.

“Gabe, you can’t go and tell me things like that.
We haven’t known each other very long.”

He slapped his hands down on his thighs. “What the hell do you need? A month? A year? A lifetime? For being such a smart woman, you sure think backward.” She snapped her head up and he shook his. He pinched the bridge of his nose.

Holly focused on the road.
He loved her? There was no way that was what he meant. People just didn’t fall into love like that, did they? Then again, he was the only one between them who’d been in love before. He’d know what it felt like.

He turned in his seat and rested his hand on her shoulder. “I know.
Holly always does it backward, but who the hell cares? Are you going to worry so much about what your mother thinks for the rest of your life?”

She gritted her teeth. “No, but—”

“Didn’t your mother ever make a mistake?”

Holly thought back to what she knew of her mother’s first marriage. Getting pregnant at fifteen so that she could run away with a man seemed a big enough mistake to Holly. Her mouth became uncomfortable in the frown she’d formed as she thought about all the times her mother had gone on and on about how men would ruin your life.
All because she’d first chosen the wrong one, Holly thought. “That’s why I can’t make a mistake with this. It has to be perfect.”

“It’s as perfect as it’s going to get.” He turned back
in his seat.

Holly did a quick inventory of their brief life together.
She certainly wouldn’t call it perfect, but then again she had to concede that it had been nice. It was nice to share meals with someone, and stories of your past. Getting to know Gabe was an adventure. And aside from the recent comment about her thinking, he’d accepted her, flaws and all. She’d never given anyone a chance to do that before.