by Anna Adams
“Thanks, Mom.”
“Gotta go, sweetie, but look for me at the party.”
The line clicked in Sophie’s ear. She hung up and twisted around to set the phone on the table. Ian was leaning against the kitchen doorway, comfortingly large, sympathy shining a warm light from his eyes.
“I’ll add a small plate of kippered herrings to a tray with your tea,” he said.
Wonder robbed her of speech. The tomatoes were one thing, but there’d been moments lately when she’d known if she couldn’t find a supply of those nasty little fish, she’d have to start smoking her own. “You noticed that, too.”
“The cans stink.”
“Oh, sorry. I try to remember to wrap them in a plastic bag before I throw them away.”
“I can live with it.”
“Thanks,” she said, and as he turned away, “Ian, remember to act surprised when my dad’s family shows up with a party.”
“Your mom’s a piece of work.”
“Yes.” She couldn’t argue, and she was too tired to explain her mother’s me-me-me tunnel vision.
“Sophie?”
“Hmm?”
“I shouldn’t have said that. Sorry.”
“It’s okay. She’s just different.”
“At least she never took up golf.”
His tone teased, but Sophie shuddered. Would they be lousy parents, too? They’d both been single-mindedly tied to their careers until they’d collided with each other.
FROM THE LANDING above the glass-paneled front door, Seth watched Greta turn the doorknob several times before she dug in her purse for the key. Silver glinted between her fingers as she tried, unsuccessfully at first, to insert the key. God forgive him, his wife’s nervousness pleased him.
After the accusations she’d shouted at him last night when she’d finally come home—that he was trying to control her, that he’d ruined his life with retirement and he just wanted her to ease his boredom—he was the last thing she wanted.
Just as his anger reached a slow boil that had grown as familiar as sleeplessness or hunger, she tried to look through the mottled top of the beveled door glass. Optical illusion showed him her face in a series of puzzle pieces. Worry pinched her nose.
He never locked the door when he was home. She’d rattled the handle for endless seconds before she’d begun to search for her own key. She assumed he wasn’t home.
She opened the door to the whisper of air-conditioning escaping. She sniffed, but she’d find no aroma of dinner cooking—a greeting she’d taken for granted in the past few years.
“Seth?”
He was too angry to answer. After she’d flounced to the guest room last night, she still expected to come home to the pliant husband who’d twiddled his thumbs waiting for her—for years. This morning he’d actually considered packing his things and moving down to the bed-and-breakfast their son Patrick ran with his wife, Eliza.
Greta looked up the stairs, but Seth was still determined not to say anything else he couldn’t take back. He eased into the shadowed corner of the landing. She searched the stairs as if anticipating a trail of socks and the jeans he’d worn since the day he’d last sat on the judicial bench. Jeans Greta had announced last night that she hated.
What else had she grown to hate about him?
“My Lord,” she suddenly said. She pushed away from the door, her face twisted with alarm, and started up the stairs.
In that moment he forgot she’d walked out of his bedroom for the first time in their marriage. Fifty-five years of loving her, waiting for her, depending on her even when she’d let him down, softened his anger. She needed him. Without thinking he ran to meet her. “What’s wrong?” He slipped on the top step, barely caught himself before rocketing headlong into her.
Immediately her expression relaxed. “Seth.” Relief nearly rendered her voice unrecognizable.
His fate was sealed. He had to stay and fight it out. He loved her. She loved him. He couldn’t afford to move out and take a break at this late date in their marriage.
“I’d never leave you, Greta.” He grimaced, considering how badly he’d wanted to when he’d awakened alone in their bed this morning. “At least, I wouldn’t take the coward’s way out and disappear.”
Tears slid from her eyes. “No. You’d leave me a note and phone numbers where my attorneys could reach yours.”
“How can you assume that about me?” He shook his head. “I pay attention to detail, but you mean more to me than phone numbers for a lawyer.”
She climbed the last two stairs and leaned into him. Her soft white hair tickled his chin. Her hands, strong enough to bring life into the world, held him with the tentativeness of an uncertain welcome. “You mean everything to me,” she said, his Greta, who’d always known how to run her world with no help from anyone, speaking through tears.
“We’ll work this out.” He curved his hand around her shoulder. “It’s a rut in the road, like others we’ve faced. After fifty-five years, a rut—” even one that looked like the Grand Canyon “—can’t pull us apart.”
“All my life I’ve needed to work. I have to learn to take down-time without feeling guilty.”
Her work came first. Trying not to let it would be the challenge. Seth tried hard to swallow a sense of betrayal. She didn’t realize how deeply her words cut. What kind of man had to beg his wife to come home?
IAN DELIVERED TEA and smelly fish and then started the only meal he knew how to cook. Chili that had even drawn Zach’s father-in-law, a media mogul accustomed to cordon bleu cookery, to the kitchen on the cook’s day off.
In the middle of chopping onions, he noticed how quiet the house seemed. He set his knife on the blue plastic chopping board. He’d made Sophie promise to rest, but he wouldn’t put homework assignments past Greta Calvert. Sophie might be nose deep in one of the files that overloaded her briefcase.
She wasn’t.
Still sitting straight in the chair, she’d fallen asleep, her mug of tea cradled in both hands in her lap. Far from glowing with hormones, she looked half-dead with exhaustion. Even that night in the church rest room she hadn’t been this pale.
Ian hesitated. Touching her felt like taking liberties, but that was his baby rounding her belly, and he had a right and a need to care for them both.
He eased the cup onto the coffee table and took the foul-smelling fish back to the kitchen. After he’d sealed them firmly in plastic and tossed them into the garbage, he went upstairs to his room to sort through his unpacked boxes. He came up with lanterns and books and dried food packs for camping before he found a fleece blanket that he pressed to his nose. It smelled faintly of his apartment in Chicago and of an open fire, but it should be warm enough to make Sophie comfortable.
The thick walls of their cabin kept the house cool during the day, but up here on Bardill’s Ridge in early summer, night could be chilly. He descended the stairs more slowly than he’d climbed them. At the bottom he had a clear view of the living room, cluttered by a few boxes and furniture that hadn’t found a final resting place. Still sitting up, a testament to her iron control, Sophie slept on, her head to one side.
A surge of tenderness startled Ian. He’d watched her before, sleeping in his bed or tucked against him as he’d barely clung to the edge of the full-size bed she’d kept since childhood. His need to be with her then had astounded him, but tonight felt different.
Sophie was his wife. If he was capable of love, he had to learn to love her. Not just for a few stolen moments, not only with the passion that seemed to grow more possessive each day she carried their child. He had to love her and their baby enough to establish a real family.
Ian spread the fleece and gently wrapped it around Sophie. Taking her rounded shoulders in his hands, he eased her against the cushions on the roomy chair. Her hands curled into the blanket. Not opening her eyes, she sank as far as she could manage into the padding and muttered a sound that resembled “thanks.” Ian stepped away, trying n
ot to fully wake her. He stared at his palms, warm from holding her. If theirs had been a real marriage, he’d wake her and wrap his arms around her and remind her of the need that had brought them together in the first place.
She wasn’t ready, and he had to make himself wait. He rubbed the back of his hand across his mouth and tried to think of her as a client. If she’d hired him to protect her, he’d be handing her his speech on setting a healthy schedule. Tonight she’d be more comfortable if he finished the chili and woke her in time for dinner and an early bath and bed.
A sick client made his job more difficult, and Sophie was damn close to being ill. She might have a heaping helping of the Calvert-family energy on a normal day, but moving, marrying and changing her entire life had obviously taken more out of her than she knew. Yet, if he suggested she do less, she’d try to prove she could do more.
He had to find a way to care for her without letting her in on the secret. Cooking was a constructive first step. And since she’d fallen asleep, it was her own fault if he let her nap to replenish a store of energy.
After the chili began to bubble, he quietly emptied the rest of the packing boxes and put their contents away. The task taught him how little time he and Sophie had spent in their own kitchens. Together, they didn’t own enough pots, pans or dishes to fill up the few cabinets in their new home.
When he ran out of goods to unpack downstairs, he gave the chili a stir and returned to his room to unpack. His stash of towels looked lonesome in the narrow hall linen closet. His books overloaded the top of his dresser and the flimsy shelf beside his bed. He wouldn’t be able to leave them there, anyway. Soon the baby’s things would need the space.
Working the riddle of what to leave in boxes, he heard the phone ring. He ran to Sophie’s room to catch the call before it woke her.
As he picked up the receiver, he heard her saying hello. His boss, Adam Quentin, asked for Ian.
“I’m on,” he said.
Sophie hung up in mid-yawn.
“Ian, I know you told me you weren’t working for a while, but I have an assignment. A client who asked specifically for you.”
“I can’t.” Sophie wouldn’t take his disappearing for a job as a sign of devotion.
“You didn’t resign from the agency when you left the Kendall assignment.”
“Don’t start, Adam. I warned you I needed time off.”
“You’ve already had almost a month. I’m asking for a few days. Big bucks for us, and I’ll pass on a commission to you.”
“It’s not the money.” He had enough. What the hell had he had to spend it on all these years?
“I know. You’re newly married. You have better things to occupy you, but this is a good job. It won’t take more than a week.”
“Don’t try to sell me.”
“I need you to escort a courier who’s taking a CD to Washington, D.C. It’s proprietary software, but the company that’s hiring us wants it hand-carried. They’ve had so many intrusions they don’t trust their own fire wall. You know D.C., so you won’t have any prep work.”
He was tempted. Other than the initial setup for a protection assignment, he liked the short, sweet jobs best, and no matter what he said about money, a guy who hadn’t worked in a while could use a salary. “Don’t couriers generally know how to take care of themselves?”
“Yeah, but for this one, they want backup.”
“For software?”
“That’s what I said.” Adam laughed. “But they insisted they want us. Seems as if industrial espionage in that sector can be serious.”
“I’ll have to talk to Sophie.”
“You’ll let me know once you get the wife’s permission?”
Adam’s jab felt good, like a sharp crack in the ribs should. “Right—when Sophie says I can come play.”
“Great. I’ll be at the usual numbers. No rush, but I need to know by Friday, so I can set up someone else if Sophie says no.”
Adam never knew when to rest a joke. “Friday’s tomorrow.”
“Yeah, so let me know tomorrow.”
Adam hung up and Ian made his way slowly down the stairs. He was in deep trouble. Sophie would accuse him of running.
With his blanket neatly folded in her hands, she joined him at the bottom of the stairs. “Adam Quentin? He’s your boss, right?”
Ian nodded. “He offered me a short job. A quick trip to D.C. and back.” Her bland look exposed nothing of her feelings. “You can come with me and see your friends.”
“Gran would have a heart attack if she thought I was homesick already.” She stopped, apparently focusing inward. Suddenly she grabbed his hand and placed it on her belly. “Feel that.”
He waited, holding his breath. He knew she’d felt the baby’s movements for several weeks, but his child seemed to play hide-and-seek with his old man. “Nothing,” he said.
“Wait a minute.”
He waited, to no avail. Except that Sophie’s gaze softened.
“I’m not trying to be difficult, but how do you protect someone on a quick trip?”
“I’m actually ensuring delivery on a package.”
“You’re working as a courier.” She stared at his hand and then met his eyes with a challenge in hers. “Is that safe?”
What had she seen in his hand? Six-guns? Silencers? The last thing he wanted was to worry about Sophie worrying about him. He lied. “No problem at all.” No job came with a promise of safety, but this one sounded innocuous, and he didn’t intend to make her more anxious.
“You want to go?” She sounded as if she didn’t care.
He tried to reassure her with nonchalance. “It’s a day up and a day back, and Adam’s been understanding about the time I’m taking away from the agency.” She still appeared to feel nothing. “Are you angry?”
“It’s your job.” She looked down at the blanket she’d folded nearly small enough to fit in a pocket.
He tweaked it from her hands. “I’m not running out on you. I have to work, same as you. We came here for your job. I have to leave for mine.”
She lifted her head and her eyes raked him, searching for the truth as if he always lied. “As long as you’re not grateful to escape from duty.” Almost before the last syllable left her mouth, she bit her lip with regret.
This was starting to feel like the same-old-same-old. “I’m not lying.” He tried to sound sincere, but she also made him feel guilty. “Duty is the farthest thing from my mind with you.”
“I want to believe you.” She gripped his sleeve, not quite touching his skin, but establishing contact. “I don’t want pity.”
He turned his hand, catching both her wrists, and easing her against his chest. “Don’t you know how ridiculous it is to talk about pity? I’m here. I came here practically on my knees. I want us to be together.”
She went limp, contouring her body to his. He held her tighter, incoherent with need as he ran his hands down her back. She sighed, to his surprise, pressing a kiss to the ridge of his collarbone.
He longed to reassure her. He opened his mouth to promise nothing could happen, but thought better. Promises kept screwing them up.
“I’ll try not to doubt you,” Sophie said. “And I guess calling you a liar isn’t part of our deal.” She lifted her head, smiling with funny self-awareness.
He hugged her again, wanting her mouth beneath his, afraid to push her that far. He contented himself with a fervent kiss on the top of her head. He drank in the scent of her hair, its softness and vibrant texture. As his fingertips reached the curve of her breast, he had to let her go or beg for more.
“I’d better stir the chili. How do you feel about cheese toast?”
“Cheese toast?” She looked interested. “I like anything with cheese on it.”
He eyed her incredulously. Back in Washington, she’d owned the most extensive takeout menu collection he’d ever seen. “Haven’t you ever cooked? Even bread with cheddar cheese, under the broiler?”
“Sounds delicious. I’ll make it.”
“No.” He started her up the first stair step. “Change out of your work clothes. You’ll do dinner one night when I’m tired.” Or too delirious to care what his expectant wife ate, now that he understood her lack of culinary knowledge.
“Thanks. And thanks for the nap. I was exhausted. I don’t know how Gran does it.”
“Give yourself a break.” She looked back, questioning but not on the defensive. “You act as if you’re supposed to deliver babies, including ours, rebuild the cabin, run your gran’s baby farm and maybe establish a clinic in downtown Bardill’s Ridge.”
A smile lit her weary eyes. “Great diagnosis from the man who’s out to save the world one possibly fatal situation at a time.” She undid her top shirt button. “I kind of like that clinic idea.”
Grinning, he headed for the chili pot. “Megalomaniac.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
ON THE LAST DAY of her first week at the baby farm, Sophie trailed her moody grandmother through the crowd of lounging patrons sprawled in the armchairs outside her office.
Greta tried to shut the door behind her, but Sophie caught it. Gran glanced over her shoulder, distracted. “We’re through for the day, dear. You can go home.”
“No, I can’t. Gran, you have to start letting me see patients. For one thing, you’ve grown so impatient with the staff, I’m concerned you’re edgy with the moms, too.”
“Never.” Gran dropped into her chair. The glow from her green banker’s light painted shadows beneath her eyes. “The patients—patrons deserve our best care and our first attention.”
“What’s wrong with you, Gran?” Sophie took the chair on the other side of her desk. “Or should I ask what’s wrong with me? Are you disappointed in my skill?”
“Not at all. I knew you’d be good the first time I saw you at your office in D.C., and besides, I’ve known you all your life. I followed you through your schooling. You’re perfect for The Mom’s Place.”
“Then why are you so reluctant to let me start?”
