She's Having a Baby (2 page)

At least her romantic interests.

She had a career to worry about, granted, but more important than that, she had a brand new life to worry about. The brand new life she'd just discovered yesterday morning existed within her.

Apparently, Jeff was never going to be permanently out of her life.

Or at least a part of him wasn't going to be.

She was pregnant. Probably not more than a few weeks because that was the last time she and Jeff had made love. Three and a half weeks. Just before Dakota's autumn wedding.

Damn it, how could this have happened? Science had advanced so far, you'd think there could be a hundred-percent guarantee for things like birth control pills. But there wasn't because she had used birth-control and still she found herself unexpectedly carrying a new life within her. A baby who by all rights shouldn't have been there.

But it was, she thought, placing her hand over what was an absolutely flat stomach.

It was there. Six stupid sticks, all pointing to the same thing, couldn't be wrong no matter how much she wanted them to be.

Six, that was how many kits she'd brought home,
buying each one at a different drugstore so that if for some reason one batch had emerged from the manufacturer with some kind of malfunction, she could turn to another for the true results.

She'd turned six times.

Not a single one of them had given her a smattering of hope. Each one had pointed to the same results: She was pregnant.

Dragging herself out of her shower this morning after allowing the hot water to wash over her for longer than usual, MacKenzie knew she was going to have to make an appointment with her gynecologist for a true confirmation. Not that she held any real hope that the six sticks had lied to her.

Friday, she thought, drying herself off and then discarding the towel. She'd make the appointment for Friday. Or maybe even sometime next week. Right now, she was too busy with the show.

The show. Oh God, she was going to have to hustle, she thought without glancing at either one of the clocks in her bedroom. She could feel the minutes slipping away.

MacKenzie hurried into her clothes, putting on a straight forest-green skirt and a pale green sweater. Both felt loose. How much longer was that going to last, she wondered. Indefinitely, if the first ten minutes of her day were any indication. She'd spent them throwing up, entering that state while she was still half-asleep. She'd spent the next ten trying to get her bearings, succeeding only marginally.

About to dash out of her apartment, MacKenzie re
alized that she'd left the cameo behind. She was tempted to keep walking, but she knew that would hurt Dakota's feelings and she didn't want to do that. Besides, she certainly didn't believe in the legend, but the small oval piece of jewelry really was lovely.

Securing the ends together at the nape of her neck, she stood for a moment looking at it.

Nothing.

“Magic, huh?” she scoffed. Lightning certainly wasn't striking. It wasn't even tingling. Still, the cameo did look as if it belonged exactly where it was.

Patting it, she left the room, muttering under her breath about superstitions. Sure, she'd been all for it when Dakota had first appeared on the set wearing it. And, admittedly, she'd been charmed by the idea that a Southern belle had once worn it. But that had been when it had hung around Dakota's neck.

Having it now around her own made her uneasy. Uneasy because she was afraid that despite everything she said to the contrary, she might allow herself to buy into the story. To hope when every logical fiber in her body told her that there was nothing to hope on. That hope itself was only a fabrication.

She wasn't the type that had legends come true.

Crossing the kitchen, MacKenzie glanced at her watch and then bit back an exasperated oath.

How had the time managed to melt away like that? She had less than half an hour to get to the studio and traffic was a bear. It was one of the givens living in New York City. Night or day, traffic was always a force to be reckoned with. A force that usually won.

Why was it that time only seem to lengthen itself when she was alone in bed at night, wondering about the direction of her life? Acutely aware of the fact that the place next to her was empty and would undoubtedly remain that way?

Philosophy later. Hurry now, she counseled herself as she headed for the door. There was no time for breakfast. Just as well. She wasn't sure if her stomach could hold it down. Putting on her shoes and grabbing her oversize purse that held half her life in it, MacKenzie flew out of her Queens garden apartment and to her carport.

Where she came to an abrupt, grinding halt. She wasn't going anywhere.

There was one of those self-rental moving trucks blocking her car, its nose protruding so that it was in the way of the car next to hers, as well. The truck's back doors were both hanging open, displaying its contents for any passersby to see. Normally a curious person, MacKenzie had no interest in the truck's contents. What interested her was the person who belonged to said possessions and said truck.

And he or she was nowhere in sight.

Exasperated, feeling the minutes physically ticking by, MacKenzie fisted her hands on her hips, the loop of her purse slung over her wrist.

She looked back and forth down the length of the carports. “Damn it,” she exclaimed audibly.

“Something wrong?”

The deep voice behind her sounded like something that had to be raised by bucket out of the depths of a fifty-
foot well. Startled, MacKenzie jumped and swung around, her wide purse swinging an eighth of a beat behind her. Coming around like an afterthought, it hit the person belonging to the baritone voice squarely in the groin.

MacKenzie managed to turn in time to see a giant of a man—he was at least a foot taller than her five-foot-three stature—doubling over, his handsome, rugged face turning from tan to something akin to ash-gray. His deep green eyes were watering.

The horror of what she'd just done and the way he had to be feeling slammed into her. “Oh, my God, I'm sorry. Is there anything I can do?” MacKenzie cried.

“You can back off,” Quade Preston ground out the words as he tried to regain both his breath and his composure. Both seemed to be just a step out of reach at the moment. He struggled to overtake them.

“Oh, right, sure.” MacKenzie moved back, her eyes wide as she stared at him.

She felt like David the moment after he had brought Goliath down to his knees, except that in this case it had been purely unintentional. If there was anyone she would have wanted to take aim at in this fashion, it was Jeff, even though she knew that wasn't exactly fair. Jeff had never promised her the moon—or tomorrow. She had just assumed…

Lately, her emotions felt as if they were strapped to a roller-coaster ride. This tiny seed inside of her had had terrible repercussions on her emotional state. Right now, she felt like laughing and crying, knowing that neither was acceptable.

Especially laughing.

“I can get ice,” she offered, thinking back to when she'd been a kid and her brother Donald had had something similar happen to him. Her father had immediately applied ice to the injured area.

“Back away,” he told her again, this time with a shade less agony throbbing around the order.

O
kay, if he didn't want her to help him, then she was absolved of her guilt and free to go, MacKenzie thought. As soon as he did one little thing.

“Okay, I'll back away,” MacKenzie said gamely to the man who was trying very hard not to double over, “as soon as you move your truck.” She indicated the slightly dusty cherry-red car in the carport. She'd had it washed just last weekend, but New York dust was a tenacious thing to reckon with. “You're blocking my Mustang.”

It took all of Quade's self-control not to growl at the woman. Pain was still shooting out to all parts of him, making him feel as vulnerable as a day-old kitten. He didn't particularly like that self-image. The little redhead had really swung that case of hers and hit him smack where he lived.

It took effort just to draw a breath. Quade bit down hard on the inside of his lower lip to keep from making any sounds that would give away the level of pain he was enduring. He had his hand clamped down onto the side of the truck to keep from falling to his knees, which were still trying to buckle.

“Right” was all he managed to get out.

Swallowing, he dug deep into his pocket for the keys. Somehow, he managed to get himself behind the wheel of the truck even though every movement brought its own penalty. Throwing the gearshift into Drive, he pulled the truck up several car lengths, allowing the woman to have access to her vehicle.

When he got out, his knees were only marginally in working order.

“Thank you,” the redhead said over her shoulder as she bounced into her car.

He remained standing by the truck, waiting out the pain that was driving sharp carpenter's nails into his entire body.

As she pulled out, the woman offered him what he surmised was an apologetic smile. It didn't begin to cover her transgression. Because he didn't want to move just yet if he didn't have to, Quade followed with his eyes the red Mustang's progress as the woman drove out of the complex.

A plume of smoke was coming out of the vehicle's tailpipe. She was burning oil. It figured.

Quade sighed, straightening slowly. He had to get back to work. He had exactly one day—today—to settle in before he had to report for his new position at the
Wiley Memorial Research Labs. And begin his new life.

And hopefully find a way to move on.

 

It had not been a good day.

Twice, during the course of her workday, MacKenzie had found herself on the verge of breaking down. Both times Dakota had been near her. She'd almost told her best friend that she was pregnant.

But each time she'd begun, the words had stuck to the roof of her mouth, refusing to be dislodged. She'd shared absolutely everything with Dakota in the years that she'd known her and thought of the woman as almost a twin sister. But her pregnancy was something she needed to get used to herself before she could bring herself to talk to anyone else about it.

Hoping against irrational hope that this was all some rebellious act by her body, she'd decided to reschedule her exam with her doctor. She'd asked the nurse to try to squeeze her in somehow.

MacKenzie got lucky. There'd been a cancellation just called in. Consequently, Lisa, Dr. Neubert's nurse, put her down for one o'clock. With butterflies strapping themselves onto Boeing jets inside her stomach, she told Dakota that she was grabbing a late lunch and would be back in time for the show, then bolted.

Less than twenty minutes later, she found herself draped in tissue paper and lying on the examination table, counting holes in the ceiling tiles while Dr. Ann Neubert, her doctor for the last five years, performed an internal exam.

The second Dr. Neubert withdrew, MacKenzie propped herself up on her elbows and tried vainly to read the blond woman's expression.

“I'm wrong, right?” MacKenzie asked eagerly, praying for confirmation.

Ann had stripped off her gloves, throwing them into the small trash basket.

“No, you're right.” The woman's expression was soft, encouraging, as if second-guessing her patient's anguish. “Babies bring rainbows into your life—a new way of seeing things.”

Oh God, it's true. I'm really pregnant. Now what am I going to do?

She wasn't ready for this, not by a long shot. “Easy for you to say,” MacKenzie had muttered audibly. “You have a husband.”

Her doctor had surprised her then by putting down her chart and sitting down on the table beside her.

There was an earnest, faraway look in her eyes as she said, “I didn't when I first found out that I was pregnant.” And then she laughed. “My first daughter was the result of an all-but-out-of-body, wild, impetuous experience one star-filled night on the beach with a handsome journalist who was going overseas to cover war stories the very next day.”

MacKenzie vaguely remembered the woman had two beautiful little girls and an even more beautiful husband who earned his living writing for one of the larger newspapers. “Isn't your husband a journalist?”

Ann winked at her. “Turned out to be one and the same.” The doctor took hold of her hands, which made
her feel just for a moment a sense of calm, that things would work out. “What I'm saying is that perhaps you and the baby's father—”

And the calm vanished. She shook her head. “Not going to happen. He went back to a wife I didn't know he had.”

MacKenzie sighed deeply. Everything always happened for a reason, her grandmother had been fond of saying. Maybe there was a reason behind this, too, although for the life of her, she didn't see one.

“Besides, looking back, maybe I didn't really love him in quite that ‘forever' kind of way.” Helpless to continue, she shrugged.

Ann laid a hand on her shoulder. “Things have a way of working out. You'll see. If not one way, then another.” And then she paused just before leaving. Her eyes were drawn to the small oval at the hollow of MacKenzie's throat. “Nice cameo. New?”

MacKenzie fingered it. So far, it was turning out to be a dud. “Yes, it is. Thanks.”

Ann nodded, then dug into one of the pockets of her lab coat. “If you need to talk, this is my private number.” Ann pressed a card into her hand before leaving the room.

MacKenzie was off the table in a blink of an eye. There was a show to oversee.

She didn't remember the trip back. It was one huge blur, hidden behind the recurring mantra:
You're pregnant, you're pregnant.
Her head throbbed.

The call to Jeff was made the first chance she got, right after the program had wrapped for the day. Even
as she tapped out the old, familiar number, she could feel the butterflies in her stomach going into high gear again. But it had to be done. There was no way around it. Jeff had a right to know. And she wanted to get this over with as fast as possible.

Jeff listened in silence as she choked out the words. When she finished, he was sympathetic and supportive, all the things that had attracted her to him in the first place.

And then he said, “Listen, Mac, if you need money to get this taken care of—”

“I don't,” she said, cutting him off before he could say anything further.

“Then you're keeping it?” There was a clear note of surprise in his voice.

Of course she was keeping the baby, she thought indignantly. How could she not? She'd always had a fondness for all creatures smaller than she was. She just wasn't relishing the notion that her whole life would be replumbed and restructured.

Hormones mounting another rebellion in her system, MacKenzie didn't like the way he dehumanized what was happening. “It's a baby, Jeff, not an ‘it.'”

There was another long pause, as if he were choosing his words carefully. “I'm not interested in being a father, Mac.”

Something shut down in her. It wasn't that she was expecting him suddenly to declare that he'd been blind and could now see and from here on in everything was going to be coming up roses for them, but she didn't like the guarded way he was approaching this. As if she
wanted something from him. As if he were bracing himself for some kind of shakedown.

Her voice grew more formal. “I know that. I just thought you had a right to know that there would be someone walking around with half your gene pool.”

She swore she heard a sigh of relief. When Jeff uttered the next words, he sounded more like his old self. “I'll have my lawyer draw up papers making arrangements for child-support payments.”

For some reason, that just made her angrier. “I didn't call you for that.”

“I know. But I want to do this. I'll be in touch.” He hung up as if afraid that she might still hit him up for something.

She let the receiver drop back into the cradle within the small cubbyhole that was her office. And then left it at that. Left it with a hollow feeling in the pit of her stomach right beside the seedling that was her baby.

Her baby, not his, not anyone else's. Hers, she thought with a sudden cloud of tears welling up within her eyes.

Grabbing a tissue, she blocked a wave of exasperation. There they went again, her emotions climbing onto the same roller coaster they'd been riding for the last week. Damn but she was going to have to get a handle on all this emotional stuff before she found herself being utterly derailed.

Somehow, she made it through the remainder of the day, avoiding Dakota's probing questions and getting everything prepared for the next day's taping. Instead of staying beyond six, the way she normally did, she made it out the first second she could.

Pausing only long enough to pick up the take-out food she'd ordered earlier, MacKenzie had every intention of going home and locking herself up in her apartment. She wanted to keep the world at bay for as long as she could. Heaven knew, this wasn't something that she could keep a secret indefinitely, although there had been women who had managed just that because of minimal weight gain and a bevy of very wide, very loose clothing.

She doubted she'd be that lucky.

The same truck was still there when she pulled into the parking lot behind her complex. But this time it wasn't blocking her space. The vehicle was stretched out over three empty spaces in guest parking. Some of the tenants with visitors weren't going to be happy tonight.

Not her concern, she thought, guiding her Mustang into her spot.

The take-out bag still felt mildly warm, which meant that the food within the cartons was at least equally so, if not more. The thought of warm food was oddly comforting.

Until it hit her mouth, she thought wryly. After that, all bets were off.

She picked up her purse and shifted the bag to her other side. Approaching her apartment, she saw that the door to the apartment beside hers was wide open. She recognized a piece of furniture from the truck and tensed.

This meant that the guy she'd all but robbed of his manhood was going to be her new neighbor. MacKen
zie caught her lower lip between her teeth. Talk about making a bad first impression….

Pausing, she peered inside the apartment but didn't see him anywhere. She squelched the desire to go inside, not wanting him to add the word
trespasser
to his list of grievances against her. The living room was in a state of upheaval. There were boxes clustered everywhere. Had he been moving in all day? Of course he had. Most men were domestically challenged. Moving was a major event to them, right up there with wars and famine and flash floods.

MacKenzie knew she should be moving on before her mildly warm dinner became stone cold. But she'd been diagnosed as terminally curious as a child and couldn't quite get her feet to move away from the doorway.

Was there a Mrs. New Neighbor somewhere? The signs she saw said otherwise. The furniture seemed definitely masculine, but then some women favored clean, unobstructed lines and minimal furnishings.

He was nowhere in sight.

“Hello?” she called out. When there was no answer, she raised her voice and repeated the greeting.

This time, she got a response.

Quade came walking out from the rear of the apartment. The moment he saw her, a note of tension invaded his otherwise impassive expression. She was carrying something in a brown paper bag and her offending purse/weapon was suspended from her wrist. Quade watched it warily, then raised his eyes to her face.

“Should I be grabbing a tray or something to deflect any more blows?”

MacKenzie laughed and flashed him what she felt was her best smile, the one she knew took in her eyes, as well as her lips. “Sorry about this morning.”

“Okay.” He said the word as if it were meant to terminate any further conversation.

By all rights, this was her cue to withdraw. But she didn't like the idea of having someone living next door who bore a grudge against her. It didn't take much imagination to see that was what was in the works here. What was needed right now was a little damage control.

MacKenzie thought of the take-out bag tucked against her side.

Because he'd turned his back on her and had begun tearing the tape off a box that was almost as tall as she was, she took a step inside the apartment.

“Hungry?”

He didn't even spare her a look. “Why, you have some rat poison you want to unload?”

She could feel her back going up, but she forced her voice not to sound hostile as she asked, “Not very friendly, are you?”

This time, he did spare her a look. It was the kind of look that made men with black belts in karate take two giant steps backward. “In general I try to avoid people who try to castrate me.”

She didn't own a black belt in karate, or any other color belt for that matter, but she had been raised with three brothers and had adopted feistiness as her middle name. “That was an accident.”

“And you apologized.” His tone was cold and gave
no indication of what he was thinking, other than the fact that he didn't want to be bothered right now and was dismissing her.