by Raina Lynn
“Bradshaw, this isn’t a financial merger with a timetable. We’re talking about our lives here.”
Some of his aggressive determination drained away. “I know, Jill. Please, meet me halfway. We might just make it.”
She took in his tuxedo again, seeing represented there a lifetime of experiences that she knew nothing about. Maybe if she didn’t love him so much, she could push him away and make it stick. “Lead on, Bradshaw. Maybe I’ll do something tonight that will so repulse you that you’ll be glad I refused your proposal.”
“I doubt that,” he said, helping her with her coat.
From the corner of his vision, Mason had watched Jill’s face. At first, she actually seemed to be enjoying herself. The visiting orchestra had played an exceptional rendition of Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade. The program explained the stories represented in the emotionally charged symphony, and he caught her smiling more than once.
The small step forward had given him cause for hope. If they could build a stable foundation of common interests and open communication, maybe they had a chance. He realized how many times he’d said those words to himself and how badly he needed to believe them.
But now he looked at Jill, who’d fallen asleep after the last intermission. Without waking her, he’d pulled her against his shoulder where she’d slept peacefully for the rest of the performance. In all fairness, a woman eight months pregnant and who’d put in a full day at work had a right to be exhausted. Even knowing that, he still found it a little discouraging.
Their constant confrontations had long since become an unbearable weight, and she had to be tired of them too, but as long as their child needed him, he’d never give up.
“Wake up, Jill,” he whispered as the last note echoed into silence. “It’s time to go.”
The lights came up, and she forced her eyes open. A mortified blush stained her cheeks. “I didn’t. Did I?”
He chuckled. People around them noticed her sleepy face, and the exaggerated way she blinked.
“How sweet,” observed one elderly woman, smiling at Jill’s belly. Then she looked at Mason. “When is your wife due?”
Jill straightened up with frozen humiliation, her jaw quivering as if suppressing a yawn.
“One month.”
“Won’t be long now,” chimed in another lady. “Is this your first?”
“Yes, thank you,” Jill said, tense. Embarrassment slipped into anger, and Mason helped her to her feet.
“They’re just trying to be polite,” he whispered in her ear.
“I know that,” she snapped.
The friendly smiles became fixed. Jill scanned the group from beneath her lashes. “Sorry. I’ve been awfully irritable and moody lately.”
Expressions turned understanding, but no one lingered. On the way to the car, she apologized again. “I didn’t mean to create a scene.”
“It was my fault, really.” He unlocked her door. “I should have waited to take you to one of these on a weekend when you wouldn’t be so tired.”
Inside, she seethed. “Do you know how aggravating you are? Ever since you found out about the baby, you’ve turned into this good-natured juggernaut who’s determined to drag me to the altar. I am sick of it. I want a knockdown, let it all hang out, screaming fight.”
He glanced at her stomach. In the last few weeks, she had gone from large to huge. To his untrained eye, she looked like she’d have that baby in the parking lot. “Marry me. Then you can scream at me about anything you want. If it makes you happy, I’ll argue back.”
For a moment, she thought she might go for his throat. Instead, she plopped into the passenger seat of his Buick, and he shut the door.
The next morning, Jill had her regularly scheduled obstetrics appointment. Mason always called her at lunch to find out what the doctor said, but a co-worker said she took the afternoon off—very unlike her. When he called her apartment, he got her machine. He left a message, then tried again in fifteen minutes. That turned into a routine that lasted three hours.
At four o’clock, he pulled on his coat and headed out through the reception area. “Vicki, I’m out for the rest of the day. If Jill calls, tell her I’m on my way to her place.”
“You sound upset.” Vicki got to her feet. “Is she all right?”
“That’s what I’m trying to find out. The only thing I can think of is that she went shopping, but she still wouldn’t be gone this long. Nor would she have taken time off from work.”
“The baby’s not due yet.” The pinched worry on Vicki’s face matched the knot in his gut.
“I know.” He separated his car key from the others on his ring. “If she’s having our daughter alone, I’ll strangle her.”
“Tell her I gave you permission,” she fired back as the door closed behind him.
Jill’s canary-yellow Volkswagen sat in its usual space in the parking lot in front of her apartment. When she didn’t answer at Mason’s second knock, he tried to convince himself she might be in the shower, but his instincts didn’t buy it.
He tried the knob; it wasn’t locked.
“Jill?” He stuck his head inside and found her sitting at the table in what passed for the dining room, her back to him, elbows propped and forehead resting in her hands. Even when he shut the door behind him, she didn’t turn around. “Jill, are you all right?”
“No. I’m pregnant. I feel like a hippo with a thyroid condition, and I’m not very good company.” The defiance didn’t completely mask the tremor in her voice. “I’ll call you later.”
“Knowing you, I’ll wait a long time before you ever pick up a phone.” His frustration came through unmistakably clear in the harsh edge to his voice. “You’ve been crying.” He took long strides across the room.
“No kidding, Sherlock,” she muttered, her back still to him. “Go home.”
“Are you in labor?”
Rounding the table to see her face, he found what he expected, tearstained cheeks and swollen eyes. Something deep inside turned over, and he pulled her into his arms. He didn’t think about it first—he just did it. Maybe he felt more for her than he’d realized. Given the worry that had eaten at him on the drive over here, he found the possibility promising.
She glanced up at him through moisture-spiked lashes. “Why would you think I’m in labor?”
“Never mind.” He waved her off. “What happened? Why are you in tears?”
“It’s nothing.”
Anger ignited in the pit of his stomach, and he gripped her arms, pushing her away from him just far enough to glare down into her reddened eyes. She wanted a fight. Fine. He’d give her one. “Do all women play this game? When something’s obviously wrong, they say there’s nothing. Yet they expect the poor unsuspecting male to be a mind reader. If he doesn’t figure things out, he’s in trouble forever.” With monumental effort, Mason sat on his temper. “I don’t know many men who handle that real well, Jill.”
Defensive amusement lit her face and tugged a smile from her puffy lips. “Did you know you’re kinda cute when you go ballistic?”
“Hurray,” he muttered drily. “Tell me what’s wrong, or we’ll be at this a very long time.”
Her brief foray into humor faded, and a trembling sigh shuddered from the depths of her soul. “Thanks, but the only thing wrong with me is a monumental case of humiliation.”
“Over what?” He knew his mouth gaped open, but he couldn’t do anything to stop it.
“I fell asleep on you last night. After my comment about doing something to repulse you, I’m having a hard time with it.” She wouldn’t look at him.
“You must be kidding.”
She stepped away and poured a glass of water. Her hand shook.
“Jill, you needed to rest last night, not traipse around a college campus.”
She shrugged and finished her drink.
Then it hit him. “You’re telling the truth. Just not all of it.”
Even through the generous cut to her
maternity smock, he saw the muscles across her back tense. He turned her around and tilted her chin up. Keeping her eyes lowered, she jerked away.
“I’d like a little privacy, Bradshaw. Having you living in my back pocket for the last month hasn’t exactly been a piece of cake. Go home.”
“I’ll be happy to,” he conceded, “just as soon as you tell me what upset you this badly.”
“I’m pregnant!” she snapped. “I have crying binges. Is that so hard to believe?”
“No, but—”
“I hate it, but it’s one of the joys of life in the fat lane.”
He tried to read in her face some clue as to what was going on here, but she wouldn’t look at him. “Jill, carrying a baby isn’t the same as being fat.”
After taking a moment to apparently absorb what he’d said, she muttered, “You’ve got strange fetishes, Bradshaw.”
He saw no point in arguing with her, so he watched her pace around her apartment. She opened the refrigerator, studied the contents, slammed the door, then wandered to the living room. Her movements were jerky and agitated, not at all like a woman having a simple crying binge. Worse, whatever bothered her seemed to have taken over completely. He wondered if she remembered she wasn’t alone.
“Are you ready to tell me the rest of it?” he asked, sitting down.
Startled, her attention snapped to him. “Go home, Bradshaw. This is something I have to figure out on my own.”
Well, that confirmed his suspicions. Controlling his anger suddenly became a lot harder. “Damn it, Jill. You won’t even try to depend on me. Not even a little. This is my baby, too. It’s not fair that you’re calling all the shots.”
“You’re not the one whose body is occupied for the duration!”
Mason crossed his arms. “If I could take it from here, I would. Unfortunately, God didn’t set things up that way.”
She stared at him, her eyes huge. “You’d take over? Why?”
His emotionally charged outburst had come so unexpectedly that he hadn’t had a chance to think about the words before they tumbled from his lips. A flush of embarrassment crept up his neck, and he shrugged. “Fathers are sort of on the outside looking in at this stage. I don’t know exactly what you’re going through. I wish I did.”
Her expression turned wondering and infinitely tender, the look of a woman passionately in love.
Despite himself, Mason stiffened. Not only had he embarrassed himself, he’d inadvertently set himself up to look better in her eyes. He didn’t want her—or anyone else—to love him, at least not now—not until he’d finished healing and could figure out what he might be able to feel in the future. Why couldn’t they be on equal footing!
What a mess. He nearly groaned aloud under the weight of it. Deliberately, he leaned forward and projected a body language that said he wasn’t going anywhere.
“Bradshaw, you never give up, do you?”
“When our daughter’s grown, I’ll think about it.” He dragged in a long, slow breath. “Now, for the last time, what’s wrong?”
Defeated, Jill’s head slumped, and she looked down at him through impossibly long lashes. Then she slid into the other chair. “Just remember, I solve my own problems.”
His instinctive reply wouldn’t be one she’d accept, so he glared at her in silence.
“The Caseys are closing down the store. Mr. C. has to retire because of his heart. Mrs. C. has tried to come back to work, but she can’t make herself get past the sidewalk.” Jill looked at him, then. “I’m the one who had a gun pointed at her head. I’m the one with a right to be a basket case.”
“Not everyone is as strong as you are,” he said gently. “The Caseys are also almost eighty. Maybe the robbery was the last straw.”
“And of course that explains why half the employees have quit or taken time off.”
“That’s not all that’s bothering you.”
She stared at him. “You don’t get it, do you?”
“Apparently not.”
“They are shutting the store down now. Their kids are flying in to take over the books and oversee the disposition of the inventory. Everyone except Frank, the warehouse manager, is out of a job on Monday.” She stood up and turned sideways, giving him a perfect view of her stomach. “Care to explain how I’ll find a new job when I look like this?”
More truths settled on him. “How about unemployment benefits?”
She dropped her head in her hands. “I already checked. It’ll barely cover rent. What about food? Or the hospital bill and clothes for the baby? I can’t even finish paying for the crib now. And nobody will hire a woman with a newborn.”
Mason’s patience snapped. This nonsense had gone on long enough. Playing hardball wasn’t any more his style than were one-night stands, but with Jill’s and their baby’s security at stake, personal ethics became irrelevant. The only remaining question was whether he could maneuver her into a very tight corner without her catching on.
“Well, if you’d marry me, we wouldn’t have a problem, but—”
She opened her mouth to protest, and he held out a hand in a bear-with-me gesture.
“Unfortunately, you won’t. Too bad, because I have a two-bedroom apartment. Lots of room.” He took a deep breath. “So the next best thing I can do is take out a loan to cover your living expenses until—”
Her head whipped up. “Bradshaw, are you nuts? A mouse couldn’t live on what you call a salary! You’ve thrown every scroungeable dime into that newspaper. There can’t be anything left over to make loan payments.”
“All the hard work is beginning to pay off,” he countered. “Subscriptions are coming up.”
Jill snorted. “Slowly.”
“Eventually, I’ll make a good living with the Journal.”
“Not for several years yet. Certainly not soon enough to pay the bills on two separate households.”
He allowed himself to be persuaded. “True.”
A tight, I-knew-it expression settled over her features.
“Jill, how else are we going to survive this?” He scratched his head in a calculatingly thoughtful gesture.
“You’re fine, Bradshaw. I’m the one with the cash flow problem.”
He frowned at her. “Have you checked into Aid For Dependent Children?” he asked smoothly. Her horrified gasp gave him no pleasure. Her big brown eyes took on the bewildered terror of a trapped deer. “Maybe they have some kind of special handout.” Even as a ploy, suggesting that welfare support any child of his revolted him.
Her breathing became alarmingly labored and irregular. “Mason, what am I going to do? I can’t handle being on the public trough.”
“It doesn’t have to be a life sentence. Besides, that’s what it’s there for.” He crossed his arms. “Since it may take a while to process the paperwork, I’d better take you to the county offices on Monday. No sense risking any delays.”
She launched out of her chair and started pacing.
“Also,” he continued blandly, “while we’re there, we can establish up front that I’m the father, and they can begin steps to sue me for child support—or however they handle that sort of thing.”
Jill whirled on him and took a step backward as if repelled by the entire notion. “You can’t afford child support.”
Another minute and he’d have her where he wanted her—he hoped. “I’m open to suggestions. You can’t pay your own rent, and I can’t pay it for you.”
Inner turmoil tightened as she apparently ran through the well-worn paths of unworkable options. Defeated eyes looked up at him. “Did you say your apartment has two bedrooms?”
“What about it?”
“I hate to ask, but what about me camping out in your extra room? Not permanently—just until I can go back to work. That cuts out one rent.”
Bingo. However reluctantly, she’d finally looked to him for help. Not exactly the course he’d hoped she’d take, but close enough. What was it about her that drove her to such i
ndependence? Probably the same as him: a lifetime of ingrained necessity. Slowly, he rose to his feet, deliberately towering above her, then dropped his hands onto his hips.
“Jill, you’re the mother of my child. I will support you, care for you, see to all your needs.” When she closed her eyes in abject relief and swallowed, his resolve to drop the bomb faltered. Glancing at her burgeoning stomach, he pushed onward. “But only if you’re my wife.”
Her eyes snapped open, her expression one of betrayed accusation. “How many times must I say this? I won’t marry you!”
“Marriage or the public trough. Take your pick.”
She sucked in her breath and blistered him with a glare. “Why does it have to be your way or nothing?”
“I told you,” he said softly. “I’m a dinosaur. Living together is against who I am.”
“Well, a farce marriage doesn’t cut it either, Bradshaw.”
“I’m sorry you feel that way.”
“Not sorry enough to bend.”
“True.” He gave her a stony look. “By the way, it won’t be a farce.”
She returned the look.
“Jill, the only decision you need to make is whether we get married the same day we get the license or the first weekend afterward.”
“Neither.”
“Okay, I’ll have Vicki clear my schedule for Monday morning, and we’ll talk to the welfare people. How does nine o’clock sound?”
The defeated slump to her shoulders didn’t make him feel particularly proud of himself, but he tried not to think about it. Only the end result mattered.
“You’re despicable, Bradshaw.”
Mason held motionless, allowing none of his own turmoil to show.
“Are you really going to stand up in a church and promise to love, honor and cherish?” she demanded.
“That’s what I said, isn’t it?”
“You’re gonna lie to a minister?”
He took Jill’s hand. Her fingers were ice cold, but he hardened himself to her pain. Knuckling under now would do neither of them any good, not to mention the impact it would have on their daughter’s life. “Shouldn’t your first concern be the baby?”
