Second Time Around (33 page)

“That’s a cute crib.” Trish leaned in for closer inspection. “And I like the upholstery on that chair. What catalog is this from?” She threw up her hand. “Wait. Don’t tell me. Pottery Barn?”

“Pottery Barn Kids,” Anna admitted.

“I
knew
it!” They both started laughing.

There were pictures of Jonas and Anna camping, gathered with friends at holiday dinners, wearing matching Yankee caps at the ballpark. Anna was struck by how much
younger and how much happier they looked in these photos, most of which had been taken before they’d been on the receiving end of the infertility diagnosis.

She glanced up at Jonas. “This must have taken hours. When did you put it together?”

“Keep going,” was all he said. “There’s more.”

She turned the page to find several shots of her vintage cookbooks and his Frisbee collection. And then came the cake photos. Anna had lost track of how many birthday cakes she’d created over the years for nieces and nephews and neighbors and godchildren, but Jonas had documented them all: a trio of goldfish in an aquarium, a canary singing in a cage, a colorful merry-go-round, a gold and silver floor harp, an orange striped tabby cat, the Eiffel Tower, steam engines, and spaceships.

“Holy crap,” Trish marveled. “You made all of those?”

“Yep,” Anna said with a mixture of pride and yearning. “Carved them myself, did all the decorating freehand.”

“Those are unreal. Forget weddings; kids’ cakes are your thing.”

Anna kept flipping until she arrived at the last page, which featured a grainy photo of a shepherd-mix puppy with huge paws and floppy ears.

Jonas pulled up a chair, sat down next to her, and took both her hands in his. “I know you’re not ready for all this yet. Believe me, I heard you loud and clear. But I called an adoption lawyer this week, just to get some information. I refuse to sit around doing nothing. Not when we’re, you know, apart.”

“A man of action.” Trish nodded at Anna. “I approve.”

“The attorney said we should put together a portfolio to
show to potential birth moms,” Jonas continued. “Something that shows who we are as individuals, as a couple, and as a family.”

“It’s—” All of Anna’s objections and questions lodged in her throat.

“Perfect,” Trish finished for her. “I think my cold, Grinchy heart just grew a few sizes.”

“Except for one thing,” Anna said. “What’s with the dog?”

“I was thinking we should get one,” Jonas said. “I grew up with a dog, and I want my kids to have one, too.”

“It’s true,” Trish agreed. “Every kid should have a dog.”

Anna shot her a look. “I notice
you
don’t have one.”

“I’ll put that on my to-do list, right after giving birth and getting back on my feet for more than ten minutes at a time.”

Anna flipped through the pages again, dazed. “I can’t believe you did this, Jonas.”

“It’s nothing compared to everything you’ve done.” His voice deepened. “You’ve spent years tracking down specialists and making the appointments and taking the drugs and charting your ovulation and everything. And I shut down and let you do the heavy lifting because I didn’t want to deal.” He cupped her cheek. “I made a decision on the flight home from Brussels. I’m going to stop thinking about what I can’t do and start focusing on what I can. This is the first step. We’ll take the next one when you’re ready.”

She closed her eyes and pressed the leather folder to her chest. “It’s time for me to concede defeat.”

“It’s not a battle,” Jonas said.

But in a way, it was. Anna let go of the dream she’d been clinging to for so long and surrendered to the fact that she
was not going to be that one-in-a-million who defied all the odds. She would not prevail through sheer force of will.

She and Jonas were never going to conceive a child.

This acknowledgment brought with it a bittersweet rush of relief. She could stop hoping for the impossible and finally start grieving the loss of a miracle that was never going to occur.

But through her grief, she might open herself up to new miracles. During the past few weeks in Henley House, she had witnessed with her own eyes the serendipity of second chances.

Anna opened her eyes to find Jonas and Trish shooting worried glances at each other and at her.

“Okay,” Anna said to Jonas. “Let’s go for it.”

“You’re serious? Just like that?”

“Yes. But I want more than a baby. I want a family, the kind of family we promised we’d be on our wedding night. Do you remember that?”

He nodded.

“You and me,” she said. “First and foremost.”

“You and me,” he agreed. “We’ll always be a team.”

She ran her hand over the portfolio. “But what if nobody picks us?”

“Are you kidding me?” Trish broke in. “After browsing through that, I wish you guys would adopt
me
. Which reminds me, Legacy, I have to ask you something. Something big; brace yourself.” She pushed her curly bangs back from her face. “Will you be the Bug’s godmother?”

Anna sat back, stunned. “I’d be honored. But that’s a huge deal. Are you sure you don’t want to entrust that responsibility to someone you’ve known longer? And who’s up to your culinary standards?”

Trish selected a book on infant care from her couchside library and opened to a random page. “Question: What’s the ideal room temperature to set the baby’s room at to help prevent SIDS?”

“Oh, that’s easy,” Anna said. “Between sixty-eight and seventy-two degrees.”

“You’re hired.”

A
t the end of the evening, Jonas helped Anna return the wedding cake to the safety of Pranza’s freezer, then followed her back to Henley House and walked her to the front door. They stepped to one side of the porch to make way for a pair of arriving guests who were exclaiming, “Will you look at this place? It’s so quaint!” and “Leave it to Maureen to find the perfect storybook inn to go with the perfect fairy-tale wedding.”

“It’s so weird seeing people who aren’t, well,
us
waltz in here.” Anna brushed her lips across her husband’s cheek. “Are you sure you don’t want to stay for the weekend? This place is booked to capacity, but we can find some other hotel nearby.”

He drew her closer and rested his chin on her head. “What time do you have to get up tomorrow morning?”

“The cake has to be at the president’s house by eight, but I promised Brooke I’d help her serve breakfast starting at six, and then Jamie asked me to help the caterers set up at nine, and—”

“Stay here, do your thing, and don’t worry about me.” He tightened his embrace. “Call me after the wedding and tell me how many compliments you got on your cake.”

She tilted back her head and winked up at him. “Well, with Trish and me working our combined magic, how could any mere mortal resist?”

“It’s not magic, Anna,” he said. “It’s you.”

“How did everything change so completely and so quickly?” she murmured. “I let my guard down for one second—”

“Maybe that’s the secret to happiness.”

She laughed. “You went soft on me over in Europe.”

“It’s the dog.”

“I haven’t said yes to the dog.”

“Yet.” He waggled his brows suggestively. “I have ways of convincing you.”

This time, their kiss was long and lingering.

“Are you sure you don’t want to come up?” She nibbled his earlobe. “Just for a few minutes?”

His hands found their way under her coat. “I want to come up for a few hours. But didn’t you just say there’s no room at the inn?”

“Like that’s ever stopped us before. Remember that outdoor shower next to the cabana on our honeymoon?”

“How could I forget?”

“Well.” She went in for another steamy, openmouthed kiss. “Brooke’s suite has a separate bathroom, and I happen to know that the shower pressure is superb in there. I’m sure she wouldn’t begrudge us a quick little tryst while she’s downstairs fluffing pillows and pouring cocoa.”

He yanked off her jacket and started on her blouse buttons. “We’re going to get in trouble.”

She hooked her finger through his belt loop. “Maybe if we’re really bad, they’ll put us on probation.”

When they finally stumbled through the front door, they were greeted by Brooke, who offered up a plate of warm oatmeal cookies and a hospitable smile. “Welcome to the Paradise Found Bed-and-Breakfast. We are officially open for business.”

H
elena stretched her limbs and nestled into the luxurious ivory linens covering the feather bed. She’d never felt more feminine than here amid the masculine black walnut furniture in MacCormick’s bedchamber
.

She turned to him in the bed and sighed happily. He sat with his back against the headboard, his long legs out before him, a satisfied grin on his handsome face
.

When he reached for the bottle of champagne resting on the bed stand and refilled their crystal flutes, she again marveled at their situation. “I truly had no idea that we were in such danger. And from such an unlikely source.”

“You do no’ know how badly I wanted to tell you. But I’d been sworn to secrecy.”

She accepted the glass he offered and took a sip as she traced the scar that ran along his chest. “To think that all this time, you’ve been my protector.”

“I knew from the moment I saw you that you needed a protector in more than one way,” he said, the double meaning clear in his words
.

She smiled against the rim of her glass. “Then it must have surprised you when I saved your life in the end.”

“It’s fortunate I’m so confident in my manhood. A lot of men would no’ care for their women saving the day.”

“Well, after these many hours, there can be
no
question of your manhood.” She gave him a kiss before sipping once more. “You should thank me for continuing to ransack your chamber at every opportunity. Otherwise, I’d never have known where to find a sword in a pinch.”

“For such a well-bred gentlewoman, you’re quite handy with weaponry,” he conceded. “Had you been taking fencing instruction on the sly?”

“No, but I’ve read all about the finer points of swordplay in those novels you dismiss so cavalierly.” She frowned. “Yet reading about running a villain through is one thing; the reality is quite another. Truly, it was merely a stroke of abject terror and blind luck.”

He reached forward to graze the back of his fingers along the line of her cheekbone. “I owe you my life. And now, you’ve stolen my heart as well.”

“I shan’t be returning it.” She handed him her empty flute. “I believe all this celebratory champagne has gone straight to my head.” With a nod toward the bottle on the bed stand, she said, “Won’t you pour me another glass, my darling?”

He cast her that rakish grin she loved so well. “You are very improper, Mrs. MacCormick.”

“You wouldn’t have me any other way.”

C
ait didn’t realize how long she’d been working, how terrible her posture was, or how much her neck muscles
hurt until she felt the light pressure of Gavin’s hands on her shoulders.

“You’re up and dressed already?” His voice was thick with sleep. She could feel the warmth instilled by the down comforter radiating from his body. “It’s the crack of dawn.”

“I know, but I had an idea for the last scene of my book. I wanted to get it down on paper while ‘the heat is in me,’ as Thoreau would say.”

“So you’re finished with the first draft already?”

“If only. No, I still have to tease out a lot of plot points in the middle, but I’m getting there. And I have a ton of research to do.” She double-clicked the icon on the computer screen to zoom in on a pen-and-ink sketch of London’s Parliament building. “Are you upset that I’m using your office?”

“Not at all.” He leaned over to examine the image on the screen. “What are we looking at?”

“Well, right now I’m reading about the Great Stink of 1858, when raw sewage overflowed the Thames. Every Londoner who had the means fled the city for the summer, and cholera decimated the remaining population. It was grosser than gross. Next up is a crash course in 1850s hairstyles and accessories.” She nodded at the stacks of books she’d requested from the college library:
Inventing the Victorians, Love in the Time of Victoria
, and a compilation of lithographs from
Godey’s Lady’s Book
. “Makes me want to slip into some puce kidskin gloves and a gown with a gilt leather sash.”

“Sounds like you’re making progress.”

She sighed. “I’ve pretty much figured out the love story, but I need to go back to the beginning and work on the action scenes and layer in all the details. What style shoes my heroine has, what she eats, what she reads.”

He brushed aside her hair and kissed her temple. “Whether she wore plaid boxer shorts under her petticoats.”

“Exactly. And then I’ll have to go back through again and focus on character development, now that I have a better idea of who these people really are. It’s like the more I write, the more I have left to write.” She sat up straighter. “I just keep telling myself that if Brooke can single-handedly remodel Henley House, surely I can renovate a manuscript of my own making.” She waited for him to weigh in with advice. He just kept rubbing her back and looking at the picture of Parliament, so she prompted, “Don’t you have any words of wisdom to impart?”