Daddy in the Making

by Crystal Green

  “Don’t even tell me you fell head over heels in love with me.” A short laugh escaped her. “From what you just said, you don’t seem the type who would’ve succumbed to that.”

  She started to climb out of bed, taking the sheet with her.

  He grabbed the material, and she couldn’t go anywhere—not unless she wanted to bare her body to him, and that would make her feel more stripped than ever.

  “Rita, I’m not that guy. You have to believe me.” He sounded just as bewildered as she was. “I’m sure of who I am now. I’m ready to have children with you. And I’m not afraid to give my heart to someone—not after you came back into my life. Can’t you see any of that?”

  By now the shock had passed and churning hopelessness took its place, quivery and out of control.

  “No, I can’t see it,” she said. “What I see is a man who’s just on the edge of remembering other things about himself—things he probably won’t like. What else did you do in the past that might affect us? What else will you recall that might make me feel as if I’m only a token chance at redemption for you?”

  He sounded destroyed. “Why does it matter what I felt then? Because now I—”

  “Don’t say it.” She couldn’t hear a profession of love. She didn’t even know what the word was anymore, didn’t even know if old Conn or new Conn would be here a few weeks from now if more awful memories started rolling in, one after another.

  Stubbornly, he finished his sentence. “I love you, Rita.”

  Dammit. She had been so ready to say it to him only minutes ago.

  But now it was so easy to remember that Kevin, too, had said I love you to her. He was living proof that it didn’t have to mean a thing.

  A sob that she hadn’t even noticed finally burst out of her. “You’re in no shape to be telling anyone about loving them.”

  He reared back, because, once, she had told him he was unreliable. Certainly, he had proven otherwise, but with this surfaced memory, they were right back at square one.

  “I’m a better man now than I was,” he said, repeating what he had told her before, even though it didn’t sound as if he quite believed it as much now.

  She had to get out of here, because love was a trap. She’d been in it once, and she couldn’t survive another epic failure—not when there was still enough time to save herself and her children.

  “This is where it all begins,” she said, hating herself for pointing this out. “You’re going to start getting other memories back. Maybe you’ll fall into old patterns, because people don’t change as much as they’d like to think, Conn—they only do what’s easiest for them. They leave their women because there’s a newer upgrade to be had. They forget that they have responsibilities.”

  She could’ve been talking about Kevin...or the old Conn. Either way, neither could ever have a place in her life. She was sure of that now.

  “This isn’t about your ex,” he said.

  Yet even if that was true, the shadows still remained in Conn’s gaze, telling her that her comments had struck home, and he was wondering if he could hold on to the personality he had adopted.

  Since he had let go of the sheet, Rita cocooned it around herself now, leaning back against the wall for support as another sob gathered in her chest. Even with all this pain, she wanted to give him one more chance so badly.

  Just one.

  “Can you really tell me,” she asked quietly, “if you’re sure that you’ll never go back to being the way you were?”

  Something sliced through his gaze then, and she recognized it as pure doubt.

  And that was all she needed to feed her fears, making them burn harder, obliterating everything else.

  How had this happened? Why? God, it just wasn’t fair that they’d been so close to happiness, only to have it yanked away like this.

  But she’d known this day would come, hadn’t she? And it made perfect sense that this memory would’ve resurfaced after the first time they’d been together, dredging up the same emotions.

  She began to leave, only wanting to find her clothes and fumble her way back into them.

  But his wrecked voice stopped her. “Rita?”

  “Time,” she murmured. Nothing made sense—not even her answer, until she pushed down that sob in her throat and her thoughts clarified slightly. “I need some time.”

  The longest pause in existence followed. Then he said, “I understand.”

  She tried with all her might not to look back at him, but damn her, she did it, and for the second time that day, she broke apart.

  He was halfway out of bed, covered by the quilt he’d tugged over himself, his feet on the floor, his back hunched as he rested his arms on his thighs. It looked as if he hadn’t slept in months, his gaze haunted, yearning, as he watched her.

  Just as broken as she was.

  Was this what the rest of their lives would be like together? One revelation after another that chipped at them, as well as their family?

  She couldn’t imagine subjecting Kristy or another child to that, not after one father had already left.

  Couldn’t imagine surviving it herself, either.

  There wasn’t anything more to say, so she went to the entryway, where her clothes waited in disarray.

  Then she went out the door, feeling as if she’d left her heart in that room right along with Conn.

  * * *

  Conn packed up and headed home after that.

  Why stay and make matters worse? Rita had told him that she needed some time, and if he was there looming over her, it would do more harm than good.

  He’d written a short note to Kristy, leaving it at the reception desk for Rita, who wasn’t on duty when he checked out. She could decide whether to give the message to the little girl he’d grown so fond of lately. It didn’t say much—just that he needed to get back to his ranch and that he wasn’t very far away and he would miss her.

  But he didn’t make promises to the girl. He didn’t feel right about doing that anymore when he had no solid ground to base them on.

  Would his memories change him?

  Would he revert back to the old Conn one day and realize that he wasn’t built for a relationship, then cause a lot of damage to the one he was in?

  If Rita needed time to herself, then he probably did, too, so he drove to his family ranch, trying not to feel as if he was traveling back in time to the old Conn’s house...and the old Conn’s habits of escape.

  The first night, he was able to keep to himself, without anyone bothering him after he’d let Bradon know he was back on the property.

  The next day, he threw all his efforts into checking the fence lines, then had dinner in front of the droning TV by himself. He thought of how Rita liked to eat in front of the tube, too.

  Actually, he couldn’t get his mind off Rita.

  Dammit, he felt as if there were an empty cave inside of him—one that had been lit up when he’d been around her and Kristy, but was now pitch dark.

  The third day, he did some maintenance work in and around the cattle barn, managing to avoid any deep conversation with his brothers. But that night, Emmet showed up on Conn’s porch with a six-pack of beer.

  “You look in need of a drink,” his older brother said.

  Conn couldn’t disagree, and he invited Emmet into his cabin. They plopped down on his couch, which was covered by a throw with spur decorations sewn into it.

  Emmet popped open the caps on the two bottles, handing one over. “I’ve never seen you looking so hangdog.”

  Conn’s first instinct was to play the lone wolf and keep his problems to himself. But that was what the old Conn had done, and damn it all if he was going to fall into that guy’s habits, no matter what Rita feared.

  “I’m in a quandary,” he said.

  “It’s your woman, isn’t it?” Emmet flipped his hat off, and it landed on a nearby recliner.

  “I wouldn’t say she’s my woman. Not anymore.”

  “I shoul
d’ve known right off the bat. You’ve been spending all your time with her, yet, suddenly, here you are again, looking like the saddest story in creation.”

  Conn put down his beer, untouched. “I got back a memory, and it told me that I intended to ditch Rita after I spent another night with her.”

  “You got some insight into your full libido, then. I’m sure it wasn’t a surprise.”

  “Not after you told me over and over what I used to be like.” He slumped in his seat. “It just showed me that I might really be as unstable for her as she thought in the first place.”

  “Why does that matter?”

  Conn ran a hand through his hair. “She’s carrying my baby, Emmet.”

  His brother gave a low whistle. “Congratulations?”

  “I was happy about it, if you can believe it.”

  “With the way you’ve turned things around, I kind of do.”

  “Did I ever do that before?”

  “Impregnate a woman? Not to my knowledge.” Emmet narrowed his gaze at Conn. “And you never introduced the family to a woman before, either. Yet on Thanksgiving, you were here with a real live woman and her little girl.”

  Now that Conn had started sharing, it all came out. How he had wanted to prove to Rita that he was father material in spite of his shortcomings, how the memory had come back yesterday and thrown them both for a loop that might’ve ruined everything.

  Emmet had been listening patiently, but when Conn was done, he asked, “I don’t know what to say. My track record with women isn’t exactly first-rate, either, so I’m not really one to come to for advice.”

  “Sarah Humphries?” Conn asked.

  Emmet nodded, gripping his beer bottle. “I proposed to her on a whim. Generally, I tend not to think matters through to their fullest, and she knew that. And she was smart enough to say no to me.” He exhaled. “I’m not sure where she is now, but I think of her sometimes. Wish I didn’t, but I do.”

  The two of them sat there for a second or three, as if neither of them knew what to say about Conn’s problem.

  Finally, Emmet spoke. “I can’t blame Rita for needing some time to herself to think. Put yourself in a woman’s head for an instant. It’s bad enough that they worry so much, but now, with what Rita knows about you, there’s got to be a huge doubt about what other shenanigans you pulled.”

  “How could I fall back into my old patterns, though?” He shook his head. “You said once that there are a lot of people who would love a clean slate in life. I have that. So why do I think it’s suddenly going to be cluttered with the decisions I made before now? Haven’t I learned anything lately, and isn’t that enough to overcome the old Conn?”

  As he said it, he realized it was true. Rita, Kristy and the baby had altered him in a profound way. He’d grown up. He’d owned up to being the man they deserved.

  But it really might take some time for Rita to see that. She’d said she was ready to get over what her ex-fiancé had done to her, yet Conn wasn’t so sure that Kevin’s actions weren’t coloring everything that was happening now.

  Emmet was nodding at Conn, drinking his beer, and smiling.

  “What?” Conn asked.

  “I like what I’m seeing. It’d be so simple for you to shut yourself away from all this trouble, yet here you are, ready to get back into the thick of it.”

  “Yeah, I am.” He picked up his beer again. “Mom’s gonna burst when she finds out that Dillon isn’t the only one who’s having a baby.”

  “She always did have high hopes for you.”

  Rita had nursed them for Conn, too, and he wasn’t going to disappoint her.

  But how long would he have to wait until she gave him another chance to prove that?

  * * *

  As the sun brought morning to St. Valentine, Rita was already up and about, covering maid service for an employee who had called in sick, then taking Kristy to preschool and rushing back to the hotel to continue changing beds and tidying up.

  She hadn’t stopped working since Conn had regained that morning-after memory, and sometimes she wondered if this was her own way of blocking out the agony—by finding diversions.

  Was that what she’d been doing the whole time since Kevin had worked her over?

  While Rita pushed a maid’s cart through the hallway, Margery Wilmore came up the stairs. She saw Rita and her hand flew to her ample chest.

  “You’re going to drive yourself into the ground,” she said, going around to the other side of the cart and trying to pull it away from Rita. “Have you even eaten a decent breakfast? Pregnant women need more than the usual, you know. I heard you telling Janelle at the desk that you’d grab a big meal when you got back from taking Kristy to school.”

  “I had a little something.” An apple and some yogurt sprinkled with granola. But she was still hungry, and she really would eat more just as soon as she was done with this room.

  Margery was still on her. “I’m telling you, you should—”

  “I’m fine.” And she was. She would even have been able to handle all Kristy’s questions about when Conn was coming back. Her daughter had listened as Rita read his note and Kristy hadn’t stopped asking about him since.

  But would Rita ever have any answers for Kristy—or herself? Especially with a man who might change before her very eyes?

  When Rita grabbed a load of towels, Margery raised her hands in surrender. “At least let me help.”

  “I can do this myself, Margery.” Just as she had raised Kristy and...

  And would raise this baby?

  As she entered the room and dropped the towels on the clean bathroom counter, she braced her hands on the edge, head down.

  She was more exhausted than she remembered ever being. Her mind was always whirring with scenarios, even in the middle of the night. What if Conn decided that she wasn’t enough for him, and he sought out another woman? What if he changed his mind about the baby and said he wasn’t ready for one, after all?

  She’d been blindsided by Kevin, but with Conn, she could be prepared.

  Biting her lip to keep from letting her emotions take over, she bent her head.

  I just want him to come back...

  Margery was in the main room, changing the sheets, but Rita could still hear the woman’s singsong voice.

  “Where’s that friend of yours? Conn? He was doing a good job of seeing that you took care of yourself.”

  Rita raised her head, looking in the mirror and seeing a total stranger with smudges under her eyes. Weird, because Conn had probably gone through the same thing a hundred times or more.

  This was what it was like to not know yourself. But did that make her a bad person, unreliable?

  Unsuitable?

  “Conn had to go back to his ranch,” Rita said. “But I thought you didn’t like that I was taking some time off while he was around.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  Maybe her employee hadn’t, in so many words. But Margery Wilmore was as transparent as a microscope lens.

  “Anyway,” Margery said, “maybe you should get him back here. He seemed to have an...attachment to you.”

  Rita rolled her eyes. She came close to blurting out that Conn was the father of this baby, that’s why he had an attachment, but she couldn’t. She didn’t have the strength.

  It would take a lot of it for her to admit that she did love Conn and that, in spite of what she’d said to him the other day, she did trust him.

  But had she already pushed him so far away that he wouldn’t come back? Would she be getting word from a lawyer sometime that he was going to go around her to get his parental rights?

  Rita’s head kept spinning with everything that was in it, but she pushed away from the counter, hanging the towels on the racks, then coming out of the bathroom.

  Margery was halfway through making the bed. “Just look at you. I’ll take over and—”

  A wave of dizziness attacked Rita so fast that she stumbled, the floor ru
shing up toward her. She grasped for something, but there was nothing to break her fall, and she dropped to the ground.

  Right flat on her stomach.

  The breath was knocked out of her, and she barely got out an “Oh, God.”

  Margery shrieked and tried to help her up.

  “I’m calling Dr. Ambrose,” Margery said through Rita’s fog.

  All she could think of was the baby and...

  Wonder Woman. She’d been trying to do it all herself, attempting to forget about Conn, and now...

  As she hugged her tummy, she touched Margery’s leg.

  “Conn,” she said without thinking of the consequences. All she was doing was feeling, reeling, needing him here.

  “Call Conn for me.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Conn had been just outside St. Valentine, looking at a nearby ranch’s cattle stock for sale, when he got the call from Margery Wilmore.

  He dropped everything and was at the county hospital in record time, rushing into the waiting room and to the reception desk.

  “Rita Niles?” he asked the nurse on duty. Around him, it seemed as if nothing else existed. There were just drab colors, dull walls and empty chairs, all stirred together and slipping down the edges of his perception.

  The nurse asked, “Are you family?”

  Yes, he wanted to yell.

  Someone gently touched his arm, then led him away from the desk.

  Kim, Rita’s tomboy sister. She had her hat in her other hand, her gray-green eyes red-rimmed.

  “How is she?” His question sounded like one slurred word.

  “Rita’s with the doctor right now. They’re giving her an ultrasound.”

  The answer wasn’t nearly enough. “Margery, the woman who called me, said Rita had fallen and she was holding her stomach afterward.”

  “Right. She got dizzy at the hotel and lost her balance. She wasn’t in any pain, though. But she came right to the hospital, just in case.”

  Oh, God. Just in case.

  Conn would never forgive himself for not being here if something went wrong. It was stupid to think he could’ve stopped this from happening, but he felt responsible anyway.