"I'd like it if we got to know each other a little," she heard herself say in a voice softer than was appropriate.
But she did have things she wanted to ask him, she rationalized as temptation gained the upper hand. Things that pertained to Willy. Plus, getting to know Jace, letting Jace get to know her, might aid her cause. The friendlier they were, the better. It might go a long way toward making him realize that she was worthy of taking over custody of her nephew, 7"he budding attraction to Jace himself didn't have anything to do with it.
Or so she tried to convince herself.
"I am curious about some things," she added. "Things I don't want to bring up around Willy in case he might overhear and get upset."
"Why don't we go into the living room, get comfortable and talk there?" Jace suggested.
There was nothing but friendliness and courtesy in his tone and even that was sexy when it came out in that deep baritone. Not to mention that the reference to getting comfortable conjured up a whole slew of images that Clair didn't want to think about.
"Okay," she agreed, despite what was going on in her body and mind as she tried to ignore the ripples of something primitively sensual.
"Want a cup of coffee or a soda or a glass of wine?" he asked as he motioned for her to precede him into the other room.
"No, thanks. I'm fine," she assured him, thinking that the wine they'd shared the previous night might have been the ultimate cause of that brief kiss she was determined not to repeat.
Clair sat at one end of the couch, pressing against the arm with her hip. It was exactly the opposite of where she wanted to be – which was in the middle of the sofa sitting as close to Jace as she did when they were in his truck.
Jace, on the other hand, seemed much more at ease with the situation and sat at an angle on the sofa so he was nearly facing her, one long arm stretched across the back, one thick leg up on the cushion with only his booted foot dangling off the edge.
"So what are you curious about?" he asked when they were settled.
It flashed through her mind that at that moment what she was most curious about was him. Probably because she'd never known anyone quite like him. Anyone who could care so tenderly for a child while still being such an elementally sexy, charming he-man.
But that wasn't a subject for discussion, so she worked to recall what she'd been referring to when she'd told him she was curious about some things.
"I'd just like to know the whole story behind how Kristin came to give up Willy to the Millers. And how – and why – you ended up with him."
"Fair enough. I'm not so sure where to start, though."
"How about with the Millers themselves?"
"Okay. Billy met Kim on a cruise ship. He entered a contest some juice company was having about eight years ago and won the grand prize. Kim was on the same cruise with some friends. If that wasn't fate takin' a hand I don't know what is."
"And it was love at first sight?''
"Pretty much. After ten days aboard ship they were already talkin' marriage. Two months later they tied the knot, decided they wanted kids right away and started what turned out to be nearly six years of try in'."
"One of them was infertile?"
"Nobody ever figured that out. Separately they both one of her rides and was afraid to go on doing that. Anyway, Billy and Kim took her in for the last half of the pregnancy."
"To be their live-in baby factory."
The words had spilled out, and only after they had did Clair realize how condemning they sounded. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean that to be so snippy."
Jace acknowledged the apology with a nod but went on to defend his friends, anyway.
"Billy and Kim wanted the baby and, yeah, that's how they came to be acquainted with Kristin. Their bringing her here is how we all got to know her. But Billy and Kim didn't for one minute just look at her as their baby factory."
Clair cringed when he repeated the insensitive phrase.
"Takin' Kristin into their home wasn't what they had to do," he continued. "They could have just put a roof over her head someplace else and still adopted Willy when he was born. They wanted to get to know Kristin. They wanted to help her. They wanted her to be in a loving, caring environment. And they didn't turn their backs on her once Willy was born – which they could have done and would have, if they'd only thought of her as a baby factory."
"It was a poor choice of words," Clair said, trying to make amends.
It didn't help. Apparently Jace wasn't going to stop until he'd said his piece. "They helped her finish high school here in town and, since she'd talked about wan-tin' to go to college, they got her scholarships and seemed line but together they just never clicked. So they finally gave up and admitted that the only way they were likely to have a family was to adopt."
"Isn't that usually a long process in itself?"
"Kim had an inheritance that left them in a financial position that helped speed things up. They could afford a private adoption, and an adoption lawyer hooked them up with Kristin."
Her sister's sudden inclusion in the story seemed so cold, so clinical. Nothing more than a means to the Millers' end. At least that was how it seemed to Clair, even though that wasn't how Jace had said it, and it made her flinch internally.
"How far along was she by then?" she asked quietly.
"About midway. She'd just turned eighteen, she was homeless and she said she'd learned that she couldn't take care of herself, let alone her baby."
Sudden, unexpected tears flooded Clair's eyes as that internal flinch turned into plain, outright pain. Her sister had been homeless. Pregnant. No doubt scared silly. And at least in some part it was Clair's fault....
Apparently Jace saw the tears because he said, "Are you sure you want to hear this?"
She didn't want to hear it. But suffering through hearing it was no more than she thought she deserved.
"Yes," she said firmly. "Go on."
"When Billy and Kim heard about how Kristin was living they paid her way here. She was in Billings. Apparently she'd hitchhiked from Chicago, wanting to go to California to a friend, hut shed had a scare with grants to pay her way there, too, and made sure she had enough money to get a place to live and start her off on her own They would even have been happy if she'd come hack here for holidays and visits, but Kristin opted for no contact once she was on her feet again. Otherwise I think they would have basically adopted Kristin, too."
Clair knew she should be grateful. But she just felt guilty. And jealous. And resentful that other people – strangers – had provided what she would have liked to give her sister in Kristin's greatest hour of need. She didn't think she could bear to hear any more about how wonderful the Millers had been.
So she changed the subject.
"Well, I guess that's how the Millers got Willy. Now tell me how you ended up with him."
But Jace didn't let her off the hook that easily. Instead of going on in that new vein, he said, "You don't have to feel guilty, Clair."
He was watching her closely, and it was as if those blue eyes of his could see everything she was feeling, everything she was thinking. As if he knew. It was bad enough that he was great looking, did he have to be all knowing, too?
"Sometimes it's easier to take help from folks who aren't family," he continued, even without confirmation that he was right. "Kristin didn't have to feel as if she'd shamed or embarrassed anybody around here. She was honest about the fact that she'd done things she wasn't proud of. But she wanted to do what was right for her baby, and giving it up was what she thought was best.
"Still, it should have been me giving her the comfort and support she needed. She should never have been out on the streets. Homeless. Scared. Hitchhiking..."
"It wasn't your fault. She made the choice to run away."
Nothing he could say could make her feel better or absolve her, but she appreciated that he tried and just pressed him to move on.
"So tell me how you ended up with Will
y," she repeated, trying to sound more cheery. "You must have been really good friends with his father."
Jace went on studying her for another long moment but finally he allowed the subject change.
"Billy's mom died of a heart attack when he was sixteen. Two years later – to the day – his father couldn't stand the grief he'd never gotten over and shot himself. It was September of our senior year of high school. Billy didn't have any other family, and since he was my best friend and hung out at the ranch as much as I hung out at his house, my parents had him come live with us. I guess my mom figured what was one more pair of smelly feet in a house full of them. If Billy and I hadn't been like brothers before that, we were after. We went off to college together, roomed together for those four years, then came back to the ranch."
"Billy came back to live with your family even after college?"
"Sure. He was welcome. We all considered him one of us. But then he got the itch to be sheriff and bought this place." Jace glanced around the living room. "He married Kim about six months later. I was best man at their wedding and got to be friends with Kim, too. 'Course I got married about the same time, so the four of us – "
"You were married?"
"Until about a year ago," he answered, but there was an unusual curtness to his voice that warned her he didn't want to talk about it. "Anyway, I was as close a friend as I could be to the two of them, and after they got Willy they decided they'd better make out a will and choose a guardian for him in case anything ever happened to both of them. By then Kristin was long gone and no one knew where she was. But they felt confident she would make something of herself, so they thought she should have the chance to have Willy back if she wanted him. And if she didn't, then I was to be his guardian. I guess it was just more of fate takin' a hand that she died just when she could have had that chance."
"And you got to be a daddy by default," Clair said, repeating Rennie's words of that morning.
It made Jace laugh. "That about sums it up. Mostly I look at it as a sort of blessing to help make up for losin' Billy."
Clair definitely didn't want to think in terms of that. Not when taking Willy away was on her agenda.
"Does Willy seem to miss his mom and dad?" she asked then.
"It was worse at first," he said. "And confusing. Kim was killed instantly but Billy was in a coma for four months, so first I had to try to explain that his mom wasn't coming back and that his dad was really, really sick. But it was all basically over his head. He'd still ask where his mom and dad were, call for them. One night he kept wandering from room to room looking for them – that broke my heart. And then Billy died and I had to say his dad had gone to heaven with his mom – still not a concept he understood. But most of it has stopped now. He'll still ask about them sometimes, as if he's testing me to see if he gets the same answer, but for the most part he's adapted. He's feeling more and more secure. More and more comfortable with the way things have ended up. He's pretty settled with me."
Clair had the sense that there was an underlying message for her in Jace's words. A message that she could be doing Willy a disservice by rocking the boat for him again.
But she held fast to the thought that the more comfortable Willy got with her, the less that would be the case. Because knowing just what her sister had gone through after leaving Clair's apartment that last time only solidified her determination to make amends by raising her sister's child.
But it was too soon yet to get into that with Jace. So when the grandfather clock in the corner of the room chimed the hour, she used that as her cue.
"I didn't realize it was so late. I should go," she said, standing.
Jace stood, too, and as he did Clair said, “Thanks for filling me in."
"None of it was a secret," he assured her on the way to the front door.
"No, but you didn't have to bother."
"Tallin' to you isn't a bother, Clair. I like it. I like you."
That last part surprised her, and when she looked up at Jace as they stopped in the entryway, she had the impression that saying it had surprised him almost as much.
Or maybe the surprise was in the realization that he meant it.
Clair didn't know how to respond, though. It seemed odd to say she liked him in return, despite the fact that she did. Much more than she wished she did.
But instead she seized upon something else she was getting to know more and more about him with each passing day. "You're a good man, Jace."
"Ooo," he said, joking and scrunching up his handsome face as if he'd just taken a punch. "Is that another way of saying I'm a nice guy? Because everybody knows that's the kiss of death."
Clair laughed. "No, it isn't another way of saying you're a nice guy, but you're that, too. And I don't think it's the kiss of death." But kissing was most certainly on her mind again as they stood there at the site of the kiss he'd given her the previous night.
"Don't kid a kidder," he went on teasing, 'i know you women all like bad boys."
"And from the look in your eyes 1 can tell there'ssome of that in you, too," she said, flirting without meaning to.
"I'm a good man and a bad boy?"
"Actually," she said with a laugh as she thought about that, "I think that's exactly what you are. The man in you is good, but the boy? Watch out for him."
Jace seemed to like that, because he smiled a slow, pleased and very sexy smile.
“Then watch out," he warned in a husky voice just before he leaned over and kissed her.
It took her so off guard that she almost pulled away out of reflex.
But she caught herself before she did and stayed for the kiss.
Stayed? She did more than merely stay. After that initial, instantaneous shock, she kissed him back.
And tonight she really had the chance to kiss him back because, unlike the night before, this wasn't only a brief peck. This was a kiss. A full-on, lingering kiss that let her actually feel the hot, supple smoothness of his lips. That let her feel the slight scratch of his beard. That let her breathe in deeply of the clean woodsy scent of his aftershave.
And, oh, how she liked it all!
She let her head fall back enough for him to kiss her even more deeply. She let her lips part in answer to the gentle persuasion of his. And she most definitely kissed him back!
But even though this was a real kiss, it still ended before she wanted it to. Before she was ready for it to.
Of course, she wasn't sure she would ever have been ready for it to end.
But she fell him drawing it to a close. Slowly. Reluctantly? But to a close nonetheless,
"I have to stop doing that," he said when his mouth finally abandoned hers. But the low, raspy tone of his voice and the glint of pure deviltry in his eyes, in his smile, made her doubt that he meant it.
"Yeah," she agreed, although with a dreamy-sounding sigh.
"Tomorrow we're at the ranch again," Jace said then, changing the subject but still using the intimate tone that seemed to wrap around her and hold her mesmerized. "Are you interested?"
Silly question. There didn't seem to be anything about him she wasn't interested in....
"Just tell me when."
"After lunch? I have some things I need to take care of around here first." "Perfect."
Perfect? Had she actually said that? And, again, in that dreamy voice? As if tagging along with him and Willy to do ranch work was the best way she could possibly think to spend a day? Maybe she was losing her marbles.
"Come over a little after noon, then/' he instructed.
He hadn't touched her with anything but his lips, and even as they stood in the entry way, his hands were in his back pockets. Yet Clair still felt held there just by his gaze.
"Okay," she agreed, and then she put some effort into tearing her eyes away from his. Into moving to the door and opening it.
"Thanks," she said. Then she wondered if it sounded as if she were thanking him for the kiss and added, "For today and tonight and
everything."
"Nothin' to thank me for."
Again his voice was deep, husky, intimate, and the intensity, the potency, of his charm mixed with the pure gorgeousness of him was enough to knock her socks off. Enough to make her want to throw herself into his arms and have him kiss her again and again. Have him do a whole lot more than kiss her. Enough to make her forget herself and why she was there and everything else in her life.
But she couldn't do that and she knew it. So she made herself step through the door and say goodnight.
"'Night," Jace answered.
Clair waved a hand over her shoulder but didn't give him so much as a backward glance because she knew that was all it would take to make her forget everything again and give in to what she was beginning to want as much as she wanted to make amends for failing her sister, as much as she wanted to raise her nephew.
Just one more glance was all it would take to make her forget everything again and give in to wanting Jace....
Chapter Five
“Harry. Thanks for getting back to me so quick," Jace said into the phone at eleven the next morning after the lawyer's secretary announced that it was Mr. Aronson calling. Harry Aronson was the estate attorney who had made out Billy's and Kim's wills.
"No problem," the lawyer said in a high-pitched voice that belied his 280-pound weight and the expertise that earned him $175 an hour. "How is everything?"
"On the surface?Great. But I'm not sure what might be brewing under the surface," Jace said, thinking that wasn't altogether true. Part of what was brewing under the surface – at least under his surface – he recognized. Attraction – intense attraction -to Clair. Intense attraction to Clair that he wished he were fighting more successfully than he was.
But what was under her surface was the point of the phone call to the attorney.
"Willy's birth mother's sister has shown up," Jace said.
"Uh-huh," Harry responded noncommittally.
"She's a nice woman. Great, in fact. I like her." A lot. Too much. "And she hasn't come right out and said she wants custody of Willy. But I'm getting the feeling that's why she's here." Among so many other feelings he was getting in response to Clair. Feelings that were all the more treacherous and unwise if he was right about why she was in Elk Creek.
Baby Be Mine Page 7
