His Illegitimate Heir (14 page)

What the hell was she talking about? “I'm trying not to be a jerk. I thought a marriage proposal and a commitment was the right thing to do. Obviously, we can't keep working together, because we can't keep our hands off each other.” Her cheeks blushed a furious red. But then again, everything about her was furious right now. “So this is the obvious solution. I'm
not
going to raise a bastard. You
are
going to marry me. We
will
raise our child together and, damn it all, we
will
be a happy family. Unless...” He swallowed. “Unless you don't want me?”

She looked at him like he was stupid. Happiness seemed a long way off. She hadn't even put her bra on—it was hanging from her hand.

“You are trying so hard not to be like your father—but this? Telling me what I want? Telling me what I'm going to do without giving me an option? You're essentially firing me. You're going to put me in this house and make me completely dependent upon you. You're going to hide me away here under the pretense of taking care of me because you somehow think that's going to absolve you of any guilt you feel. And that?” She jabbed at his chest with a finger. “That is
exactly
what your father would've done.”

Her words hit him like a sledgehammer to the chest, so hard that he physically stumbled backward.

“I am not trying to hide anyone away. I'm not ashamed of you!” He realized too late he was shouting but he couldn't stop. “I just want my kid to have something I didn't—two loving parents who give a damn about whether he lives or dies!”

Her face softened—but only a little bit. She still looked fierce and when she spoke, it was in a low voice that somehow hurt all the more. “I am your brewmaster and I might be the mother of your child. I care about this baby and I could care very much for you—but not if you're going to spend the rest of our lives ordering me about. I am not your underling, Zeb. You don't get to decide that what you
think
you want is the same thing that I need. Because I'm only going to say this once. I'm sorry you had a miserable childhood. But it had nothing—not a damn thing—to do with the fact that you were raised by a single parent.” A tear trickled down the side of her face and she scrubbed it away. “Don't you dare act like you're the only one raised by a single parent who had to work and sacrifice to survive.”

“I never said that.” But too late, he remembered her telling him how her mother had died in a car accident when she was two.

“Didn't you?” She moved in closer, and for a delusional second, he thought all was forgiven when she leaned in to kiss his cheek. But then she stepped back. “I give a damn, Zeb. Never think I don't. But I won't let your fears dictate my life.”

She stepped around him, and this time, he didn't pull her back. He couldn't. Because he had the awful feeling that she might be right.

The door shut behind her, but he just stood there. Numbly, he looked down at the diamond ring in his hand. His father wouldn't have committed to the rest of his life with a woman he had gotten pregnant—he knew that.

But everything else?

He knew so little and the thing was, he wasn't sure he wanted to know more. He didn't know exactly what had happened between his parents. He couldn't be sure what made his mother the most bitter—the fact that Hardwick Beaumont had cast her aside? Or had it been something else? Had he forced her out of the company? Made her leave town and go back to Atlanta?

Why was this even a question? Hardwick had been married to a wealthy and powerful woman in her own right. Zeb was only four months younger than Chadwick. Of course Hardwick would've done everything within his power to hide Emily and Zeb.

And Zeb's mother...had she resented him? He was a living reminder of her great mistake—undeniable with his father's green eyes. Maybe she hadn't been able to love Zeb enough. And maybe—just maybe—that wasn't his fault.

Fourteen

S
he couldn't do this. Hell, at this point, she wasn't even sure what “this” was.

Could she be with Zeb? Could they have a relationship? Or would it always devolve into awful awkwardness? Could she work with him or was that impossible? If she didn't work at the brewery, what was she going to do?

It was hard enough to be a woman and a brewmaster. It wasn't like there were tons of jobs ripe for the picking at breweries conveniently located near her apartment. Plus, she was kind of pregnant. How was she supposed to interview at companies that might or might not exist and then ask for maternity leave after only a month or two on the job?

The entire situation was ridiculous. And she couldn't even think the whole thing over while drinking a bottle of beer. Somehow, that was the straw that was going to break her back. How was she going to brew beer without testing it?

There was a possible solution—she could go to Chadwick. He'd find a place for her at Percheron Drafts, she was pretty sure. And at least in the past, he had demonstrated a willingness to work around maternity leave. He knew what she was capable of, and frankly, his was the only brewery within the area that wouldn't force her to relocate. Plus...her child would be a Beaumont. Sort of. Chadwick would be her baby's uncle and the man was nothing if not loyal to the family name.

But even just thinking about going to Chadwick felt wrong. She wasn't six, running to her father to tattle. She was a grown woman. She'd gotten herself into this mess and she had to get herself out of it.

The worst part was, Zeb had been right. There
was
something between them. There had been since the very first moment she had walked into his office and locked eyes with him. There was chemistry and raw sexual attraction and the sex was amazing. And when he was doing everything right, he was practically...perfect.

But when he wasn't perfect, he
really
wasn't perfect.

Instead of going back to her apartment, Casey found herself heading toward her father's small ranch house in Brentwood. She'd grown up in this little house, and at one time, it had seemed like a mansion to her. She hadn't ever wanted to live in a real mansion. She didn't need to be surrounded by all the trappings of luxury—and she also did not need a diamond that probably cost more than a year's salary on her finger.

Instead, she wanted what she'd had growing up. A father who doted on her, who taught her how to do things like change a tire and throw a baseball and brew beer. A father who protected her.

She hadn't grown up with all the luxuries that money could buy. But she'd been happy. Was it wrong to want that? Was it wrong to
demand
that?

No. It wasn't. So that wasn't the right question.

The bigger question was, could she demand that of Zeb?

She was happy to see that the lights were on at home. Sometimes a girl needed her father. She walked in the house, feeling a little bit like a teenager who had stayed out past curfew and was about to get in trouble. “Daddy?”

“In the kitchen,” he called back.

Casey smiled at that. Any other parent who was in the kitchen might reasonably be expected to be cooking. But not Carl Johnson. She knew without even seeing it that he had something taken apart on the kitchen table—a lamp or doorbell, something.

True to form, a chandelier was sitting in the middle of the table, wires strung everywhere.

The chandelier was a piece of work—cut crystal prisms caught the light and made it look like the room was glowing. It belonged in a mansion like Zeb's. Here, in her father's house, it looked horribly out of place. She knew the feeling.

It was such a comforting thing, sitting at this table while her father tinkered with this or that. Casey slid into her old seat. “How are you doing, Daddy?”

“Pretty good. How are you?” He looked at her and paused. “Honey? Is everything okay?”

No.
Things were not all right and she wasn't sure how to fix them. “I think I've made a mistake.”

He rested his hand on her shoulder. “Are you in trouble? You know I don't like you living in that apartment by yourself. There's still plenty of room for you here.”

She smiled weakly at him. “It's not that. But I... I did something stupid and now I think I've messed everything up.”

“Does this have something to do with work?” When Casey didn't reply immediately, her dad pressed on. “This is about your new boss?”

There was no good way to say this. “Yeah, it does. I'm... I'm pregnant.”

Her father stiffened, his grip on her shoulder tight before he quickly released her. “Them Beaumonts—I never did trust them. Are you okay? Did he hurt you?”

Casey slumped forward, head in her hands and her elbows on the table. “No, it's not like that, Dad. I
like
him. He likes me. But I'm not sure that that's going to be enough.” She looked at her father. He looked skeptical. “He asked me to marry him.”

Her father sat straight up. “He did? Well, I guess that's the right thing to do—better than what his old man would've done.” There was a long pause during which Casey went back to slumping against her hands. “Do you want to get married? Because you don't have to do anything you don't want to, honey.”

“I don't know what to do. When he asked me, he made it clear that he expected me to quit my job and stay home and be a mother full-time.” She sighed. It wasn't only that, though.

No, the thing that really bothered her had been the implication that she, Casey Johnson, wasn't good enough to be the mother to his child as she was. Instead, she needed to become someone else. The perfect mother. And what the hell did she know about mothering? Nothing. She'd never had one.

“And that's not what I want. I fought hard to get my job, Dad. And I like brewing beer. I don't want to throw that all away because of one mistake. But if I don't marry him, how am I going to keep working at the brewery?” Her father opened his mouth, but she cut him off. “And no, I don't think asking Chadwick for a job is the best solution, either. I have no desire to be the rope in Beaumont tug-of-war.”

They sat quietly for a few moments, but it wasn't long until her father had picked up a few pieces of wire. He began stripping them in an absentminded sort of way. “This guy—”

“Zeb. Zeb Richards.”

Another piece of copper shone in the light. “This Zeb—he's one of them Beaumont bastards, right?” Casey nodded. “And he offered to marry you so his kid wouldn't be a bastard like he was?”

“Yeah. I just... I just don't want that to be the only reason. I mean, I can see he's trying to do the right thing, but if I get married, I'd kind of like it to be for love.”

Her dad nodded and continued to strip the wire. “I wish your mom were here,” he said in an offhand way. “I don't know what to tell you, honey. But I will say this. Your mom and I got married because we had to.”

“What?” Casey shot straight up in her chair and stared at him. Her father was blushing. Oh,
Lord
.

“I never told you about this, because it didn't seem right. We'd been dating around and she got pregnant and I asked her to marry me. I hadn't before then, because I wasn't sure I wanted to settle down, but with you on the way, I grew up—fast.”

She gaped at him. “I had no idea, Dad.”

“I didn't want you to think you were a mistake, honey. Because you are the best thing that's ever happened to me.” His eyes shone and he cleared his throat a few times—all while still stripping wire. “Anyway, that first year—that was rough. We had to learn how to talk to each other, how to live together. But you were born, and suddenly, everything about us just made more sense. And then when the accident came...” He shuddered. “The reason I'm telling you this,” he went on in a more serious voice, as if he hadn't just announced that she was a surprise, “is that sometimes love comes a little later. If you guys like each other and you both want this kid, maybe you should think about it.” He put down his wire trimmers and rested a hand on hers. “The most important thing is that you two talk to each other.”

She felt awful because, well, there hadn't been a lot of talk. She'd gone over to his place tonight to do just that, and instead, they'd fallen into bed.

The one time she had sat down and had a conversation with the man had been at the ball game. She had liked him a great deal then—more than enough to bring him home with her. Maybe they could make this work.

No matter what Zeb had said, they didn't have to get married. Times had changed and her dad wasn't about to bust out a shotgun to escort them down the aisle.

She wasn't opposed to getting married. She didn't have anything against marriage. She just... Well, she didn't want their marriage to be on his terms only.

She knew who she was. She was a woman in her early thirties, unexpectedly pregnant. But she was also a huge sports fan. She could rewire a house. She brewed beer and changed her own oil.

She was never going to be a perfect stay-at-home mom, baking cookies and wearing pearls and lunching with ladies. That wasn't who she was.

If Zeb wanted to marry her and raise their child as a family, then not only did he have to accept that she was going to do things differently, but he was going to have to support her. Encourage her.

That did not mean taking her job away under the pretext of taking care of her. That meant helping her find a way to work at the job she loved
and
raise a happy, healthy child.

She wanted it all.

And by God, it was all or nothing.

But men—even men as powerful as Zebadiah Richards—were not mind readers. She knew that. Hell, she was
living
that.

She needed to tell him what she wanted. Without falling into bed with him and without it devolving into awkward awfulness.

“I sure am sorry, honey,” her dad went on. “I'd love to be a grandfather—but I hate that this has put you in an awkward position.” He gave her fingers a squeeze. “You know that, no matter what you decide, I'll be here to back you up.”

She leaned in to her dad's shoulder and he wrapped his arms around her and hugged her. “I know, Daddy. I appreciate it.”

“Tell you what,” Dad said when she straightened up. “Tomorrow's Friday, right? And the Rockies play a game at three. Why don't you play hooky tomorrow? Stay here with me tonight. We'll make a day of it.”

She knew that this was not a solution in any way, shape or form. At some point, she was going to have to sit down with Zeb and hash out what, exactly, they were going to do.

Soon. Next week, she'd be an adult again. She would deal with this unexpected pregnancy with maturity and wisdom. Eventually, she needed to talk with Zeb.

But for right now, she needed to be the girl she'd always been.

Sometimes, fathers did know best.