Craving a Hero: St. John Sibling Series, book 3 (17 page)

She exited the car and climbed the steps to the house, letting Dane's call go to voice mail.

#

Kelly didn't visit her father in the ICU, though she tried to visit him when he'd been moved into a regular room. Standing outside his doorway listening to him struggle to speak all but brought her to her knees.

Once, after he started physical therapy, she slipped just far enough into the therapy room to see the therapists manipulating the damaged side of his body. He looked so small and frail. This was not the father she knew.

At her mother's and sister's urgings she attempted a visit just after he was moved to the nursing home for extended therapy. His speech was still garbled. But the minute he saw her, he started banging on his bed tray with his good hand.

She left, refusing to return no matter how much her mother and sister insisted he hadn't been hitting his tray out of anger. Kelly knew better.

And through it all there'd been Dane's texts, emails, and the calls she didn't take until he threatened to show up on her doorstep.

"I'm sorry about answering your calls with texts," she said when she finally called him back.

"I don't want you to be sorry," he said. "I want you to be okay, or at least to know you're okay."

Cell pressed to her ear, she sat in the middle of her bed rubbing her forehead. If he thought she wasn't okay, he'd likely show up and she couldn't handle him and her father's medical condition at the same time. But, she wasn't a good enough liar to keep Dane from seeing through one so she stayed as close to the truth as possible.

"We're all focused on Dad's rehab."

"He's still in the nursing home, isn't he?"

"Yes. He'll be there about four weeks. But the more family and friends he has around him, the better it is for him. There's even exercises family can help him do." She grimaced at her attempt to imply she was among those helping her dad exercise and the half-truth she was about to tell him. "We're all pretty busy."

"Didn't mean to intrude on your time. It's just… Your texts, they've been…short."

"I haven't had much to say."

"I would have thought you'd have had a lot to say between your dad's situation and hunting seasons starting."

Was that a hint of irritation she heard amidst his concern? She pulled in a breath. "I've kept you updated on everything going on with Dad. Work is…just work."

"But you haven't told me anything that's going on with you," he said.

She closed her eyes as if that was enough to shut away
all
of what she hadn't told him, knowing she had to tell him something. And soon.

"I'm tired. Really tired." She wasn't completely successful at keeping all the emotion from her voice and her final words wobbled a bit. But she'd told him all she could handle sharing for the moment.

"We're wrapping up the exterior shoots. We'll be moving onto a soundstage for interior shots and green screen stuff. Maybe I can beg a couple days off—"

"No." She cut him off. The dead silence coming from his end told her she'd come off too strident, too desperate. She forced a laugh and went for teasing. "You, Mr. Big Movie Star
begging
for time off? How does that work?"

There was another beat of silence before he responded. "Like I've told you before, Bright Eyes, I'm not the
big
star you think I am. I'm in no position to demand anything…yet."

Schooling a lightness into her voice, she joked, "Yet?"

"If movie two goes blockbuster like number one did, then I rise to demanding status. But about you…"

Damn the man's intuitiveness. She sighed. "Dane, things are just too complicated here for me to have to deal with you, too."

There was a slight hesitation before he responded. "I didn't realize I was something you had
deal with."

She winced. "I didn't mean for it to sound like you're a bother or anything. I—" She splayed her hand across her abdomen, remembering what it was like to be with him, feeling what
being with him
had left inside her. "I know what happens when you and I get within arm's length of each other and I just can't handle
that
right now along with everything else that's going on."

"Flattered as I am you still got those kinds of feeling for me, Bright Eyes, I really want to help you out any way I can."

Biting back the tears scratching at the backs of her eyes and silently damning her hormones, she said, "Stay where you are. Keep working. That's how you can help me."

"By keeping out of your way," he said, a flatness to his tone that didn't reassure her. "And by not calling, either, I take it. How about the texts and emails? You want me to stop bothering you with those, too?"

"No," she said in a small voice, knowing she should say yes—knowing that answering yes would end their connection. But she wasn't sure she was ready to let him go yet—wasn't sure she was ready to risk losing him.

"Don't do this to us, Kel."

Us?

"We've been getting to know each other beyond the sex, haven't we?"

Is that what all this texting and emailing had been about? She rubbed at her temple, her head beginning to hurt.

"Kel?"

"Yeah, I guess."

"You don't sound convinced."

This was exactly why she didn't want to talk to him on the phone. He heard way more than she was ready to reveal. "My head's in a bad place right now. Between my dad and—"

She caught herself before she said baby. Another reason she shouldn't be
talking
with him. She was too weary to watch her every word.

"And what?" he asked when she didn't continue.

"Work," she said, covering. "We're into the busy season—hunting season. Lots of meetings and strategizing. You know how it goes. You have job obligations."

"I guess," he said slowly.

"I better let you go," she said. "Middle of the day, you must have a shoot to get to."

"Yeah, sure."

He sounded like he wanted to say more—wanted her to say more.

"Take care," she said, disconnecting before the conversation went any further.

#

Sitting in the tall make-up chair, electric heater blasting his legs, Dane stared at the blank screen on his cell.

"Long distance relationships are the pits," said the make-up girl who'd been waiting for him to finish talking so she could freshen up the fake blood dripping from the corner of his mouth.

"Yeah," he said absently as he pondered Kelly's
you must have a shoot to get to.
Is that why she'd chosen to call him in the middle of the day, because she thought he'd be working and she could have left a voice mail rather than talked to him?

Or was she really just overwrought about her father?

"Yep. This business is hard on relationships," the make-up girl went on as she applied the last touches to her artistry.

He hoped not.

CHAPTER TEN

Hey Dane,

Dad comes home from the nursing home tomorrow. He still needs therapy, but it'll be in-home. Mom and I rearranged the living room so they could put a hospital bed in there, and Carrie moved home to add her nursing skills to his care.

Kelly's fingers stilled over the laptop keyboard. Yeah, right. Like her mother would let her move furniture. She slid a hand over the little bump rising from her abdomen. She was growing into a first rate liar…at least as long as she could avoid phone calls with Dane.

She sighed and continued typing.

First floor, in front of the TV, and close to where Mom can watch over him. Should be a boost to his morale.

Like she knew anything about her father's morale other than what her mother and Carrie reported to her. Like it mattered how he was in the nursing home. The real test would come tomorrow when he and she faced each other for the first time since…

We're all looking forward to being together again.

And the lies keep rolling. Now, what lies could she tell him about herself besides that big one by omission?

"Got any whites that need washing?" her mother asked from her bedroom doorway.

"I'm a big girl, Mom. I can do my own laundry."

"Just figured, since I'm throwing in a load of whites…"

"Got no whites, Mom."

But instead of leaving, her mother sat on the bed beside where Kelly typed at her desk on her laptop. "You still haven't told the boy he's going to be father, have you?"

"Dad's my priority right now."

"You've been using that excuse for weeks."

"It's not an excuse. I can't deal with anything else at the present besides Dad."

"I don't see you dealing with your dad, either. All I see is you avoiding him."

"Won't be able to do that any longer come tomorrow," Kelly muttered, "unless one look at me puts him right back in the hospital."

"Still beating that old horse of an excuse too, huh?"

She gave her mother a sharp look. "What does that mean?"

"You and Frank face down angry bears, forest fires, and men with guns. But you're both afraid to face up to your feelings."

"I think I've been dealing with a helluva a lot of feelings lately."

Her mom patted her shoulder. "Sweetie, I don't think you've dealt with your feelings ever, at least not the ones at the core of why you haven't told Dane about the baby."

Kelly scowled. "You don't know what it feels like to grow up knowing you were rejected by your own father. I don't want that for my child."

"And you're afraid Dane will reject his child." Her mother rose from the bed and headed for the doorway. "I think
you
don't want to risk being rejected again."

Kelly jerked around so fast she nearly fell out of her chair. But her mother's footsteps were already fading off down the stairs, leaving her alone with her absurd theory.

It was absurd, wasn't it?

#

"I don't know what to do," Dane said into the mouthpiece of the headset he'd attached to his cell in anticipation of a long talk with his sister.

But the one and only time Dixie had met Kelly, Dixie's attention had pretty much all been on Sam. He couldn't blame her. It had been her wedding day. Though Dixie had consoled Dane and promised him her support whatever his decision, she'd had no real advice for him.

Tess, on the other hand, had spent hours chatting with Kelly.

"Long distance relationships are hard, Dane," Tess said.

"I already got that message," he said, impatience thick in his voice. "I just can't figure out if I should call it quits or not."

"Do you want to end the relationship?"

He shifted forward on the couch in his trailer outside the sound stage where they'd begun shooting action shots against green screen and interior shots, his answer an emphatic. "No."

Tess didn't say anything and he continued through a tight throat, "But, I need to know if it's over for her."

"Then you need to talk to her face-to-face," Tess said.

"Every time I suggest visiting, she puts me off."

"From what you've told me, she's got a full plate what with her father's stroke and a busy work schedule. You can at least understand the heavy work schedule, can't you?"

He groaned. "Yes, Tess. I get it. Career women are work-focused."

Tess's voice softened. "Maybe she's trying to spare you because she thinks you'll expect too much of her attention."

"You going to give me that middle child crap, too?"

"I don't know if it's about being a middle child or not, Dane. But you do like the spotlight. You've got to concede that."

He had to admit, he did like the attention the first movie had brought him. Hell, he'd always enjoyed the way women were attracted to him and the admiration his athleticism gained him. Still, he frowned at the cell in his hand.

"I thought I did a good job making her the center of attention, at least the center of mine. Hell, she was—is my center."

"Judging by the way you treated Kelly on the day of the wedding, Dane, you did an outstanding job focusing on her. There were times you two seemed to be in your own world."

He closed his eyes, recalling their first dance—recalling how, when the music stopped, they hadn't.

"Roman said he's never seen you like that before."

Dane rose from the couch and paced from the living area into the narrow kitchen galley. "I've never felt for any other woman what I feel for Kelly."

"Then listen to me, Dane. Don't call, email, or text her that you're coming," Tess said. "Don't give her a chance to dissuade you. Just go there and see her."

He stopped on the far end of the galley just short of the bedroom. "And if she still refuses to see me?"

A sigh filled his ear and he didn't like the finality it seemed to convey. "Then you have your answer."

#

Inside the back entrance, Kelly shucked her boots and hung up her jacket, mumbled a greeting to her mother as she passed through the kitchen, and entered the living room where the hospital bed was. Her father hadn't stroked out when he'd seen her the first time after coming home a month ago. He didn't even bang on anything with his good hand at the sight of her, lending credence to her sister's claim that the event in the nursing home wasn't done in anger, but frustration, or maybe even excitement at seeing her. Or maybe the old man had mellowed…or given up on her…or was depressed as her mother and sister kept insisting.

But he had stared at her that first time he saw her after coming home and she'd sworn she'd seen fear in his eyes.
Impossible
. Dad feared nothing. But it was enough to give her the courage to face him, say a few words to him…tell him she was sorry.

After that, she convinced herself what she'd seen in his eyes was expectancy because that's what she saw every time she came home from work and he lifted his face in her direction. So they'd fallen into the routine of her sitting with him at the end of each day, telling him every detail of her workday while feeding him cookies and cocoa and wiping his chin. Like she was now.

It was her fault he was like this, silent and helpless.

Her mother strode into the living room, hands on hips. "Make him ask you questions about your day."

Kelly blinked at her mother. "What?"

"The speech therapist says he isn't making the progress he should be, that we should make him ask for things."

"He's progressed to sitting up in his recliner," Kelly said.

"Physical therapy…and that could be going better, too."

Kelly looked from her mother to her father. Her father stared straight ahead, his way of avoiding things he didn't want to face these days—refusing to look at them.

Like he never looked at her expanding belly.

This was the sort of stuff she would have talked to Dane about, if she weren't pregnant and afraid he'd make good on his threats to visit her. Maybe it was time to stop lying to him about how well Dad was doing—how well she was doing. Maybe it was time to confess all to Dane. Goodness knew she could use the comfort of his arms.

And if his response to the news of impending fatherhood was to reject the baby—reject her?

What the hell.
Between her father's snail's-paced improvement, deer hunting season in full force, and a pregnancy that was exhausting her, she couldn't feel much worse.

Up in her room, Kelly flipped open her laptop and turned it on. A lightness floated through her stomach as it always did in anticipation of an email from Dane. Though he didn't email and text every day anymore, he still did one or the other each day. And since she hadn't gotten a text today…

The computer screen populated. She clicked on her email icon, bringing up a handful of messages. She scanned the list, reading it. Having not seen Dane's name, she read it again. There was no email from Dane today, either.

She slumped back in her chair, staring at a screen that held nothing for her. It was bound to happen eventually, that he'd stop corresponding with her. It's what she'd expected from the very beginning. What she knew all along would be the outcome. To be stunned by it was…pitiful…and painful.

Or the result of pregnancy hormones, she'd convinced herself by bedtime. She'd also convinced herself this is what she wanted, for him to stop contacting her—show his true colors so she could move on. Yet, when her cell pinged and woke her up at pre-dawn, the possibility that she'd received a text from him sent her heart into her throat.

She grabbed her phone and opened the message without even taking the time to note who it was from.

Pre-dawn shots reported from the flats just outside town. Ur closest. Check on them. Respond 2 verify. Didn't want to wake household.

Meaning they hadn't wanted to wake her dad who slept closest to the hardwired DNR phone downstairs. She jumped out of bed and pulled on her clothes when she'd rather have pulled the cover over her head and cried herself back to sleep.

But time was of the essence regarding an illegal shoot. Wait too long and there'd be no proving when the deer had been shot and no catching the bad guy who disregarded the rules of good sportsmanship.

She slipped out of the house, and out to her truck without notice.

By sundown, Kelly'd apprehended her illegal shooter, checked out a half dozen camps for tagged deer, followed up on a complaint about a stolen kill, and eaten only power bars to keep her going. She pulled into a local gathering hole, Big Lil's, for a late supper and whatever gossip the hunters brought in from camp.

She'd barely stepped onto the porch of the bar-café when a text ping alerted her.

With a weary sigh, she pulled out her cell and glanced at the ID. Dane.

Her stomach bottomed out and she stutter-stepped to a halt.

Hi
,
the message began.
Flew to New York yesterday to promote movie. Big push 2 release it 4 the holidays. Good 4 movie. Bad 4 any of us thinking we were going 2 get some time off. Not happening with whirlwind promotion tour. Catch u when I can
.

She stood there on Big Lil's porch, tapping out a reply with numb thumbs.

Understand about work. Gotta do what u gotta do. Beyond busy here, 2.

And she did understand. His career was just taking off. There were sacrifices to be made. She'd made her share to become a woods cop. She was still fighting for the respect of the old-time COs. At least she had been until she found out she was pregnant.

That's when it struck her how little she cared any longer what the old COs, Pykkonen and Grieg, thought of her. Had she been that distracted by her father's stroke and recovery, her guilt? Could she be
that
broken up about losing Dane?

Except she hadn't so much lost Dane as pushed him away before he could reject her. Yeah, her mother had nailed that one. She
was
afraid of being rejected.

So, was that what distracted her to the point she no longer cared who she impressed or didn't?

Something moved in her belly. A distinct fluttering as though something or
someone
was announcing their presence. She opened her jacket and splayed her hand across her abdomen.

Life. A baby. Her baby. This was what mattered. Family. And it was time to find out how much of a family her baby had, especially now that Dane was back in the States.

But, of course, this news merited a phone call, not a text.

She tapped out Dane's cell number before she lost her nerve. But her call went directly to voice mail. He must really be on a tight schedule since he'd just texted her. And her news wasn't the kind to be left on a voice mail, either.

#

The next day proved as busy as the previous. Kelly pulled into a gas station-convenience store to replenish her supply of power bars. At the checkout, she came face-to-face with a rack of tabloids. A glossy magazine caught her eye. It wasn't the big image on its cover that stopped her dead, though, but the trio of smaller pictures next to the one labeled Sexiest Man of The Year. The top shot of the three, to be specific. Dane's picture. If his picture was on the cover of
Holywood Magazine's
Sexiest Man issue, it could mean only one thing.