SWEET ANTICIPATION (3 page)

“You didn’t fire her, did you?” Lauren asked with honest concern. The way she saw it, it was all Jordan’s fault, not the nurse’s.

“We considered it, but decided not to. She is an excellent nurse with a perfect record up to now. With such a nursing shortage, we really couldn’t afford to lose her, but she has been reassigned out of the lab and into the nursery.”

“Working in the nursery doesn’t sound like punishment to me.” Lauren smiled. “Personally, I can’t wait for my turn.” Her smile slid away as she remembered Dr. Daniels’s words. Nervously her hands began to twist the slender strap of her purse that lay on her lap. “So be honest with me. If he is the father, does he have any legal claim on my baby? Can he really get partial custody without my approval? I didn’t ask for his contribution and I don’t want him to become involved with our lives.”

Dr. Reese slowly shook his gray head. “Lauren, I’ve been a doctor for almost thirty-five years. I’ve delivered thousands of babies, including you, but never in all my experience has anything like this happened. I’ve been very conscientious in keeping up with the newest discoveries and latest technology in obstetrics, but this problem has never, to my knowledge, come up before now. I have no idea what the father’s rights would be in a situation like this, since he signed no release forms. On the other hand, you entered into an agreement of trust with this medical facility and your feelings should be respected. It’s a really sticky situation and I’m sure you can see that I’m caught in the middle. As your doctor, I’m telling you, for your baby’s sake, that you should try not to worry yourself sick about this. But as your friend, I would strongly recommend that you consult your attorney to see what your rights are should Jordan decide to pursue this.”

“I can’t help but feel that Jordan is responsible for this whole mess. If he had informed everyone about his actions and taken a few seconds to label his vial, none of this would have happened and he would still have his precious frozen sperm and I would be pregnant by some cute, sweet, but poor intern.”

“I’ve worked with Jordan for several years and, although I’ve never heard it mentioned, I would suspect that his intelligence is in the genius range. He has done a lot of excellent work in this department, both in the lab and in the operating room. There is no doubt about his dedication and skill, and usually he is so meticulous with his data that no one would have suspected that he might have forgotten to label his experiments. I’m sure that’s why it never occurred to that nurse to check with him. And on the bright side, if he
is
the father, he has all of the genes for intelligence and appearance that you could possibly hope to be passed on to your child.”

“Please don’t tell me any more about him. I don’t want to hear what a paragon I have as an adversary. It makes it easier for me to dislike him if I just think about what an awkward situation his carelessness has put me and my baby into. If anyone should lose their job over this incident, it should be him.”

“I can understand your anger, but I would hate to see Jordan leave because of this. Losing him would be a real blow to this medical facility.”

Lauren replied dryly, “Losing even partial custody of my baby would be an even bigger blow to me. You, of all people, know how important this child is to me and Johnny. This is our last chance and I can’t let some mad scientist interfere with our plans.” She sat, thoughtfully silent for a few seconds, sorting through all the things she had heard this afternoon. The mix-up with the unlabeled vials still bothered her and hadn’t been resolved to her satisfaction. Until someone could
prove
that Dr. Daniels was the father, then she refused to let herself believe that he was.

Lifting her chin and squaring her shoulders, she voiced her feelings. “I’m still not convinced that Dr. Daniels is the father. I can guarantee that unless he can prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he is, he won’t get a chance to so much as look at my baby. And even if he
can
prove it, I won’t give up without a fight.” She managed a smile that showed her growing confidence. “I figure the odds are fifty-fifty that he isn’t the father and even greater that he’ll get so involved with his next experiment that he’ll lose interest in this whole matter before the baby is born. I’ll bet it was the shock of finding out that his experiment was ruined that got him so upset,” she continued. “If he’s as immersed in his work as you said he is, then he’ll probably forget all about us in a few days. After all, why would he want to have his life complicated by a child? He doesn’t even have time to label a test tube, much less change diapers and wake up for two a.m. feedings.”

“You have a point there,” Dr. Reese agreed. “I can’t imagine trying to keep the hours he does at the lab and take care of an infant at the same time.”

Lauren stood up. “Thanks, Dr. Reese. I feel better already.” The relief she felt was so strong that she didn’t notice the skeptical look in the old doctor’s eyes as she headed for the door. She had already begun to convince herself that she had been worrying about nothing.

Until today, she had never been a gambler, but after overcoming so many obstacles to get this baby, she believed the odds just had to be in her favor. No one had ever wanted a baby as much as she wanted this one.
No one—especially not Dr. Jordan Daniels!

Chapter Two

“Dr. Reese must have given you a shot of good news,” Rita remarked when Lauren returned to the shop. “That’s the first time I’ve seen you smile since yesterday before lunch. So tell me, it’s all a big mistake, right?”

Lauren walked around the end of the counter and put her purse on the shelf below the cash register. “It was a big mistake, all right.” She went on to explain the details of her unusual situation to her friend.

“You’re kidding!” Rita exclaimed several times during the narrative, her eyes growing wider and wider.

“I only wish I were.” Lauren sighed as she finished repeating her conversation with Dr. Reese.

“But there’s a good possibility that that crazy guy you met yesterday isn’t the father, after all,”

“That’s the way I see it, too,” Lauren agreed. “I don’t know what it is, woman’s intuition or maybe a simple hunch, but I’m convinced that he
isn’t
the father, I just can’t believe that after all the time and trouble Johnny and I went through to get this baby that God would let something go wrong now.”

Rita reached out and placed her hand on top of Lauren’s in a comforting gesture. “It’s just too bad that Johnny is not here to help you get through this. You’re in no condition to fight this battle alone.”

“Alone? I’m not alone.” Lauren gave Rita a peaceful smile. “I’ve got you, my parents and this little guy to help me,” she replied, resting her free hand possessively on her stomach. “Of course, it would be wonderful if Johnny could be here to experience this with me….” Her voice trailed off and the smile wavered.

“But you’re strong and healthy and you’re going to be a terrific mother,” Rita hastily reassured her, trying desperately to divert the line of conversation.

“Sure, I know that. I’m going to be the best mother in the whole state of Texas, and that covers a lot of territory!” Lauren felt her spirits start to lift. This was no time to get melancholy. She couldn’t sit around feeling sorry for herself when there was a new life growing inside her. Now was the time to plan and prepare for the future—hers and her baby’s. There might be some doubt about who the father was, but no one could deny that she was the mother.

The bell over the door tinkled and a well-dressed woman entered the shop. Lauren glanced toward Rita, reassuring her friend with a nod that everything would be fine. Rita gave Lauren’s hand one final squeeze, then went into the back room to work on some flower arrangements.

“May I help you?” Lauren asked the customer.

“Yes, I’d like to send some flowers to my daughter. Can you deliver them to the hospital?”

“Certainly. What did you have in mind?”

“Oh, something bright and beautiful. She just presented me with my first grandchild,” the woman answered proudly. “And my second—she had twins!”

Lauren’s excitement was sincere. “That’s so wonderful. I’ve always thought it would be nice to have twins.”

The woman’s gaze lowered to Lauren’s expanded waistline. “It looks like you’re going to have an addition to your family soon, too. Maybe you’ll be lucky and have twins.”

“No, my doctor is quite positive that there’s only one in here, even though it sometimes feels like it’s a whole football team,” Lauren said with a laugh.

“Well, you’re young. You’ve got lots of time. Perhaps next time, you’ll have a set a twins, or even triplets.”

“I’m afraid there won’t be a ‘next time’ for me. My husband is dead and it looks like this baby will be an only child,” Lauren blurted out, regretting the words as soon as she said them. This woman had come into her shop to buy flowers, not listen to Lauren’s life story.

But instead of being repelled, the woman gave Lauren a motherly smile. “Don’t worry, dear. A pretty little thing like you won’t have any trouble meeting a nice young man and falling in love again. I bet you’ll have a whole houseful of children.”

Lauren didn’t bother to deny this statement. It wouldn’t be good business to argue with a customer, especially about a matter such as this. Besides, what good would it do to tell this well-meaning woman that Lauren had no desire to fall in love again? She had loved once and that should be enough to last her a lifetime.

The thought of dating, with its awkwardness and pretense, held no appeal to her at all. In fact, it frightened her to death. There had to be a huge difference between being sweet sixteen and going to a well-chaperoned dance with a nervous boy and being a twenty-nine-year-old widow and spending an evening with a sophisticated, grown man who probably expected the date to end with breakfast in bed.

Instead, she took the woman’s order for an arrangement of pink and blue spring flowers and chatted about more neutral subjects such as the ever-humid Houston weather and a sale on baby clothes at a local department store.

It was several days before Lauren took Dr. Reese’s advice and went to see an attorney. Positive thinking and constant pep talks had convinced her that she had nothing to worry about, so she didn’t think it was really necessary to spend her time and money on a lawyer—especially since Jordan Daniels had not even cared enough to get in touch with her again after their meeting.

But Rita had insisted that Lauren should be prepared—just in case. Together they flipped through the yellow pages, finally deciding on an attorney because his office was located only a few blocks away. It was a ridiculous way to select one, but since neither of them had ever had any legal problems, they didn’t have any personal experience on which to draw. And so it was with a notable lack of enthusiasm that Lauren drove to the law offices of Barney, Barney, and Smith.

“I think you should know that this is probably a waste of time,” she said after being ushered into Mr. Smith’s office. “I don’t really expect anything to come of his threats.”

“Threats? What sort of threats? And do you know who is responsible?” the attorney asked.

“Actually, that’s the whole problem. I don’t have any idea who’s responsible. If I only knew for sure who the father of my baby is, I would feel a lot more secure.”

Mr. Smith eyed her with thinly veiled disgust. “You mean you’ve been involved with several men and now want to proceed with a paternity suit against one of them?”

“Oh, no, it’s nothing like that.” Lauren could feel her cheeks flush scarlet as she hurried to deny his accusations. “It may involve a paternity suit, but certainly not from me.” She went on to tell her story one more time, fervently hoping that when she was finished, Mr. Smith would tell her that she had nothing to fear and would be better off spending her time looking at baby furniture than with an attorney.

As Mr. Smith listened carefully to her unusual experience, he watched her with growing interest. As junior partner of the firm, he needed a big case to bring him a little extra recognition. Anything involving a prominent doctor and an attractive but struggling local businesswoman would have been worthwhile, but a paternity suit was a godsend.

“Mrs. Nelson, I want you to know that you’ve done the right thing. Now is the time to begin preparing our case against Dr. Daniels. We wouldn’t want him to catch us unawares. First of all, we’ll issue an injunction against him to keep him from bothering you. Then we can decide when to file our defamation of character suit against him along with a negligence suit against the medical center and the nurse and, of course, there will be a malpractice suit against your personal doctor. … Now what was his name? Dr. Reese?” The attorney was busily jotting down notes on a white legal pad.

Lauren’s blue eyes widened as her dismay increased. Instead of offering her some words of comfort, this attorney was frightening her even more. It sounded as if he planned on suing everyone in the city of Houston. If he kept this up, she would be spending more time in court than with her baby.

“And then if the blood tests prove that he is indeed the father, we’ll sue for child support, which should be substantial considering his income potential.” Mr. Smith continued with his profuse ideas and his pencil scratched wildly across the page, adding item after item to his list.

“Wait a minute,” Lauren spoke up, but the lawyer didn’t pay any attention as his eyes began to glaze with dollar signs. “I don’t think I want to do any of those things,” she said, trying again to be heard, but still he continued, practically frothing at the mouth in his anticipation.

“And I can begin today, gathering information on past cases that could have some bearing on yours. Of course, we’ll want to hire a detective to get some incriminating evidence against Dr. Daniels and the whole staff at the medical center. Now let’s talk about my fee. I usually charge two hundred dollars an hour, but that should be no problem once we tap into the doctor’s resources. I can’t give you an approximate total because I don’t have any idea how much time I’ll have to spend, but we can start with a thousand-dollar retainer. If you’ll just write me out a check, I’ll get my secretary to give you a receipt and I’ll go to work on your case right away.” The verbose Mr. Smith finally paused for a breath and Lauren jumped at her chance to be heard.

“No thank you,” she stated firmly, pushing herself out of the depths of the cold leather chair.

“I beg your pardon?”

“I said that I’m not interested in having my problem dragged through the courts for the next ten years.”

“But you have so much potential for income,” Mr. Smith protested. “We could take that whole medical facility and its doctors to the cleaners. I could set you up with enough money so that you would be able to live in style and never have to work again.”

“I like my job and I like my doctor. This is not at all what I had in mind when I came here today. I wanted to find a way so that I wouldn’t have to go to court. I’m not interested in taking
anyone
to the cleaners. I just want to be left alone to raise my child as I see fit and not have to share him with a stranger.”

“But we could get a settlement that would deny him anything but the minimum of visitation rights. From what you’ve said about him, we might even be able to prove that he isn’t responsible enough to take care of a child and…”

“Stop,
Stop,
STOP!” Lauren leaned forward until her palms were resting on the front of his mahogany desk. “This is all wrong. I knew I never should have come here. As I said before, I’m sorry I’ve wasted so much of your time. I’m afraid I’ve decided that I don’t want an attorney handling my affairs after all. Good day, Mr. Smith.”

“But Mrs. Nelson, you shouldn’t—” His desperate plea was silenced by the door she shut behind her as she left his office.

Lauren fumed all the way home. Sue Dr. Reese? That was absurd. Without him, she would have never gotten into the artificial insemination program and wouldn’t be pregnant today. Sue the medical center? Of course not. They had been nothing but kind to her when she had gone in for her treatment. Sue Dr. Daniels? Lord, no. She didn’t want that man in her life forever, sending child support checks and stopping by her house every Saturday to take her baby away from her for the weekend. Now if he had suggested deporting Dr. Daniels to Brazil, or better yet Siberia, then she might have been more receptive. She wanted that man as far away from her and little Johnny or Joanna as possible.

“I think if I had sat in his office much longer, he would have asked me to sign over the florist shop and probably even the baby!” Lauren exclaimed as she sat in the workroom with Rita that same afternoon. They were putting together a large order for a wedding the next day. Long white gladioli lay in piles on the table, along with orchids, baby’s breath, roses and an assortment of other flowers that would be fashioned into arrangements and bouquets.

“So this attorney didn’t work out,” Rita said soothingly. “We’ll just go back to the yellow pages, pick out another one and start over.”

“Oh, no,
we
won’t. That one experience was enough to sour me on attorneys for the next ten years.” Lauren shook her head so violently that her silky blond hair swung back and forth across her cheeks. “The only good that came from that interview was that it helped me to decide that I’m going to sit back and wait for Dr. Daniels to make another move. After all, it’s been almost a week and I haven’t heard a peep out of him. I’m hoping that he’s already busy with something else and has decided that a legal battle is not worth his valuable time.”

“But you’ll need an attorney if he decides to take you to court,” Rita reminded her.

“I’ll worry about that when the time comes. Right now, I’m too happy with my pregnancy and my business to let myself worry over something that is beyond my control.” Lauren twisted a thin white-satin ribbon into an elaborate bow, tied it, snipped the ends and fastened it securely in the bouquet she was working on. “So until I am forced to think about
that man,
I refuse to discuss him any further. And that goes for you, too.”