“Thanks.” She indicated the sandwiches. “Which one do you want?”
“Either. I know you like seafood salad but if you don’t want that one, I’ll take it and you can have the turkey.”
She reached for the seafood salad sandwich. “You’re a prince.”
“So they tell me.” He took a bite of his own sandwich, then said, “We need drinks,” and vanished in the direction of her kitchen. When he returned with two glasses of water, he said, “So how long do you have to wait now to find out if this worked?”
“About ten more days. My Beta count is rising but it’s too early to tell.”
He nodded, but she could see the excitement lurking in his eyes. He was as impatient as she was. “Would you like to go down to Chinatown this weekend? They celebrate the Chinese New Year.”
“That sounds like fun. I’ve always wanted to do that.”
“You never have? You’ll love it,” he predicted. “There’s a parade, and they have dances with dragons and lions, and firecrackers. And we can have dinner at the New Shanghai.”
“I’ve heard it’s fabulous.”
“It is. Wendy used to love it. She always had the sliced lamb with scallions.”
Wendy. Again. Was it disloyal to wish her former friend wasn’t included in every conversation they had?
Probably. And selfish, too. But still…if they were going to marry, she would be his wife soon. Would he continue to talk about Wendy then?
She forced herself to smile at him. “Sounds fabulous,” she said. “I’ll put Saturday night on my calendar.”
The week passed surprisingly quickly, and before she knew it, their date was upon her. Dressing snugly to combat the chilly winter weather, she was just digging her gloves out of her dress coat pockets when the doorbell rang.
She walked to get it, puzzled. “Why didn’t you just come in?” she asked when she opened the door to find Ryan standing there. “I gave you a key, remember?”
“I know.” He shrugged. “It just seemed a little…presumptuous to walk in.”
She reached up and patted his cheek. “That’s thoughtful. But feel free to walk in anytime.”
He took her wrist, holding it against his cheek when she would have dropped her hand. “Anytime?”
The look in his eyes was surprisingly intimate, and immediately her mind flashed back to his words from the night they’d discussed marriage. Passion, I can promise you. She cleared her throat as a jolt of pure sexual electricity shot through her. “Sure. Any friend of mine is welcome anytime,” she said, trying to emphasize the friendship they’d agreed on. She wasn’t sure she was very successful, though, since it came out as a croak.
He lifted her wrist to his mouth, and her eyelids fluttered closed as she felt his hot breath sear her tender flesh. Then his lips were on her, lightly pressing a kiss to the sensitive spot at the base of her hand, and she shivered as a knot of quivering nerves drew taut in her abdomen.
“What are you doing?” she managed.
He looked at her over the hand he still had pressed to his mouth, and his blue eyes were full of a triumphant mischief. “Seeing how you taste. Why?”
“I—nothing.” She yanked her hand back, too flustered to pretend the caress hadn’t scrambled her brain cells. Her skin tingled all over. “I thought we agreed to…to…to be friends.”
“That was friendly.” His tone was innocent.
She flung her bag over her shoulder and marched toward the door, unnerved by the sexual vibrations zinging around her small condo. “Hah.”
“It wasn’t unfriendly,” he pointed out.
“No, it certainly wasn’t,” she grumbled under her breath. Darn him! How were they supposed to keep their friendship the way it had been when he did sneaky things like that?
He didn’t say anything else, but he whistled as they rode down to Chinatown, and when she glanced over at him, a small smile played around the corners of his lips.
The Chinese New Year’s parade and celebration was noisy and bright and exuberant, and by the time the last float had gone by and the last firecracker had exploded in a shower of brilliant color, Jessie forgot she’d been annoyed with him earlier. From where they’d parked they walked down Hudson Street to New Shanghai and were seated moments after Ryan identified himself.
The room in which they sat was pretty and airy, its white linens giving it a more formal look than most of the local Chinese eateries. Ryan ordered the evening’s special, a plate of baby eels glazed in a hot pepper and orange sauce, while Jessie stuck to a more mundane vegetarian entree.
“Uck! How can you eat those?” she said when the waiter departed.
He grinned. “Easily. Watch.”
She grimaced again as he swallowed a spicy bite. “Gross. You always were a more adventurous eater than I was.”
He laughed. “I’m a more adventurous eater than most of the known world. Mom always said I’d eat anything that wasn’t nailed down.”
The words brought a wave of unexpected nostalgia sweeping through her so strongly that tears stung the backs of her eyes. “How did you bear losing them?” she blurted out. “If they’d been my parents, I’d still be devastated.”
Ryan’s eyes grew shadowed, and for one brief moment she caught a glimpse of the grief that would always be with him. “We had a wonderful life together,” he said quietly, “and I don’t think they had any regrets. I miss them every day and, yeah, I wish they’d lived longer, but the memories are so good…” He trailed off, then spoke again after a moment of reflection. “What do you remember best about them?”
“That’s easy.” She sensed his unspoken need to gather memories of his family. In fact, she shared it. It was one of the most seductive things about their relationship, in some way, that they shared so much history. “Your mom was such a good cook. I remember she could hardly wait for the Michigan cherries to come in each summer. As soon as she got some, she’d bake pies and cobbler. She let me help, and it’s still one of the few things I truly love to do in the kitchen.”
He was smiling now, his gaze faraway. “I’d forgotten about the cherries. That woman did love cherries.” He reached across the table and squeezed her hand, then lightly linked their fingers and held the connection. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Hmm. What do I remember best about your dad?” she mused. “I remember how he would toss me up in the air and catch me again, and the smell of his pipe when he sat on the porch with your mother on summer nights while we caught fireflies. I remember how, after he’d been fooling around in the car engine he’d come after us with greasy hands, pretending to be a monster.” She shook her head. “I used to wish he was my father, because I thought there wasn’t a more wonderful dad in the world than Mr. Shaughnessy.”
Ryan had been chuckling, but his laughter faded at her last words. “Jess—”
“Do you know,” she said, “I have more vivid memories of your family than I do my own? That’s sad.”
“It is sad,” he said, “but look what you’ve become. I’ve always been amazed that your childhood didn’t squelch your drive and determination. And it’s another reason why I think we should marry. We share memories. We know how to make a child feel loved, how to give it security and a warm family atmosphere.”
She nodded. “You’re right. I never realized where I got my ideas about being a mother, but you and I both know they didn’t come from my mother.” She thought bitterly of the way her mother had simply faded out of the picture when Jessie’s grandmother had caught Jessie in some, usually minor, misdeed. If there had ever been a time when her mother had intervened while her grandmother was administering a “whipping” with the yardstick, she couldn’t remember it. “I’ll never, ever hit my kids,” she said suddenly, fiercely.
“I know.” His fingers squeezed hers again, gently. “You’re going to be a great mother. We are going to be great parents.”
His words echoed in her head, driving home the enormity of the decision they had mad
e in a way nothing had before. We. It was going to take some getting used to, thinking of herself as half of a pair.
She was pregnant!
At the end of the third week, the longest weeks of her life, another blood test confirmed her Beta count had risen sufficiently to make pregnancy a real possibility. And her period was eight days late. She was never late. Jessie wanted to dance around the room, but she was afraid to bounce her uterus around like that. Although the doctor had assured her this should be as normal a pregnancy as any other from this point forward, she figured there was no sense in taking chances.
A baby. She felt her eyes misting. She hadn’t realized exactly how much she’d wanted this. It was hard to take in. She couldn’t wait to tell Ryan!
She walked out of the clinic to her car, but as she climbed in and reached for her cell phone, she realized her hands were shaking. Carefully she dialed his office number, and when an automated voice picked up, she punched the sequence for his private line.
“Hello?” His deep voice made her heart leap.
“Hi, there.”
He laughed, and she could imagine him relaxing, spinning his chair around to look out the plate glass window over the Boston cityscape. He would have the sleeves of his shirt rolled up and the knot in his tie probably had been loosened an hour or so after he got into his office.
“Well, hello.” His voice warmed when he recognized her voice. “What are you up to today?”
“Guess.” She worked hard to keep her voice level.
“Uh…” Apparently she’d interrupted him in the middle of some deep thought, because he didn’t get it. “Give me a hint.”
“I had a doctor’s appointment today.”
“Jess!” She had his full attention now. His voice rose as he said, “Are we going to be parents?”
“I’m almost positive.” She didn’t bother to hide her delight. “My counts are rising, and all the signs are positive.”
“God, Jess…” He sounded a little dazed. “That’s great.”
“I know. I can hardly believe it! Oh, Ryan, I’m so excited.”
“I know the feeling.” His voice became jubilant. Then he grew quiet. “I wish I was there to celebrate with you.”
I wish you were, too. Sternly she reminded herself that this wasn’t a normal arrangement. She had no reason to expect him to be glued to her side. “It’s okay,” she forced herself to say calmly. “We’ll celebrate tonight.”
“We should go out for dinner,” he said. “Do something special.” There was a loaded pause. “Does this mean we can get married now?”
She was silent. Part of her wanted to shout, “Yes!” and she had to suppress the urge. His words reminded her of the reason they’d discussed marriage in the first place. Quietly she said, “In twelve weeks, remember?”
“Right.” His voice was a little subdued now, too. “I guess I’ll see you tonight.”
They said goodbye, and she slowly replaced the handset on the base, wondering why she felt so let down. She was pregnant. She should be thrilled.
And she was, she assured herself stoutly. It was just that…in the past two weeks things had changed between Ryan and her. They’d grown closer in a different way, a warmer, more affectionate way. It had been all too easy to forget that they were together because they each wanted a child. Too easy, she thought, to pretend that they were a normal couple falling in love.
They’d gone out several more times after the Chinatown trip, and though he hadn’t kissed her, Ryan had held her hand, wrapped one hard arm around her back and touched her frequently. So frequently that she’d spent half their time together listing all the reasons it would be inappropriate for her to throw herself into his arms and beg him to kiss her.
He made it all too easy to pretend that love was a part of what was growing between them, with his solicitous attentions, the warm light in his eyes when he looked at her and the interest he displayed in every word she said.
Later that afternoon a large bouquet of pink and blue flowers were delivered to the shop. A small teddy bear on a stick was stuck into the middle of the arrangement, and two baby balloons danced gaily above the blossoms. Fortunately she was alone because Penny would have had a million questions and Jessie probably would have wound up telling her what was going on.
She couldn’t keep herself from smiling as she detached the card and took it out of the small envelope. In bold block letters, Ryan had written: Thank you for making my dream come true.
She stared at the card. It would be easy to misinterpret those words, she thought as her heart beat faster. But he hadn’t meant them in a romantic way. She was indeed making his dream come true: by giving him the child for which he’d always longed. And the sentiment on that card only acknowledged her part in that.
“Thank you for the flowers,” she said when he arrived to take her to dinner that evening. She indicated the sizable bouquet in the middle of her small dining table.
He grinned. “I thought it was appropriate.” Then he came toward her, gathering her into his arms and hugging her hard, lifting her feet clear of the floor. “This is going to be so great!”
She nodded, struggling free of his arms as her pulse raced. He used every opportunity to touch her, it seemed, and though he acted completely unaffected and innocent, she was sure he was doing it on purpose. It just wasn’t fair of him to touch her like that, she thought. In the circle of his arms it was too easy to forget their arrangement.
Four
Three weeks passed.
One morning Jessie sat in her office with the door closed and a scowl on her face as she reviewed the contents of her latest rejection by the venerated monetary institutions of Massachusetts. Her loan application had been denied by the second bank with a speed that was less than flattering; a third bank informed her that they weren’t taking on any new business loans for at least the next six months. Glumly she licked the flap of the envelope that held yet another application. Sooner or later she’d get lucky.
She’d better.
In the past few days she had investigated other avenues, but the interest rates at loan companies were staggering, and she knew better than to even consider it. In the meantime, her competitor had held a grand opening of their new, expanded store and she actually had customers who had the nerve to exclaim to her how wonderful it was. Grr-r-r-r.
And to top it off, she thought, as she hit the print button on her computer that would start payroll checks, she felt lousy. She’d been too queasy to eat breakfast every day for the past week. By midmorning, she was able to keep down a few dry crackers, and she was guzzling diet, caffeine-free soda which seemed to calm her stomach a little, but she was picking at lunch and dinner. Nothing appealed to her.
And she was tired. In the mornings she dragged herself around the store. Every day it was a fight not to simply lay her head on her desk and take a short snooze in early afternoon.
Ryan had been away for much of the past week on an extended business trip to the Northwest and he expected to be gone for at least another ten days. Though he called nearly every evening, she hadn’t told him how she was feeling. It probably would pass by the time he returned.
Jessie finished the last of her decaf tea and set her mug in the dishwasher, then wound her scarf around her neck as she prepared to brave the icy morning. It was ridiculous for her to be missing Ryan. In the past she’d seen him exactly once a month. Once or twice a year there’d been a chance meeting at an art gallery opening, a charity event, a Pops or Boston Symphony Orchestra opening night. She’d nearly always had a date, and he’d been with Wendy. Their contact had been a casual moment of conversation at intermission or a wave across a ballroom.
No, she shouldn’t be missing him. Wouldn’t be, either, under normal circumstances, she assured herself. But nothing was normal right now.
As she walked briskly down the street to the gallery, hoping to settle her stomach, she prayed for a better day today. She hadn’t dared to put anything more tha
n tea in it this morning. Yesterday her queasiness hadn’t been confined to breakfast but had lasted nearly the whole day. She had barely been able to tolerate the odor of her assistant’s Reuben sandwich at lunch, and dinner, at which she’d met two other women who owned small local specialty shops, had been a disaster. She’d wound up in the bathroom on the verge of losing what little she’d been able to put in it.
She’d pleaded the flu to her friends and staggered homeward. Once she was in a horizontal position, she’d felt much better. But she could hardly spend her workday horizontal. As she arrived and began the process of opening the store, she took slow, deep breaths. She had too much to do to worry about a little morning sickness.
By lunchtime, though, she was barely holding on. Penny, her assistant manager, kept fluttering back and forth between the shop and the storeroom, where Jessie was sitting on a packing crate with her head resting against her coat, which was hung on the wall beside her.
“Gawd, Jess, you look awful! Maybe you should just go on home and rest. If this is the flu, I don’t want it.”
Jessie made a face at her. “Thanks, Pen. I can always count on you to know just the right thing to say.”
Unrepentant, Penny giggled. “Sorry. But I’m serious! Nobody wants to feel like you obviously feel.”
“You’re right. I’d better just go home.” She latched on to the excuse gratefully. She didn’t want to tell anyone about this pregnancy until she was sure it was a go. “Why don’t you see if Melissa can come in today and tomorrow?”
Penny nodded and scurried off to call Melissa. Then, before Jessie could catch her, she’d hailed a cab.
“It’s only a few blocks,” Jessie told her.
“A few blocks too many when you feel like that,” Penny countered, giving the cabby a generous tip to make up for the short trip.
At home, she slept for several hours. Good grief, Charlie Brown, she admonished herself. She’d read about the difficulties that many women encountered during the early weeks of pregnancy. She’d thought she was prepared, but this unrelenting nausea was worse than anything she’d ever experienced.
Billionaire Bachelors: Ryan Page 6
