Love. He smiled as the word tickled his mind, and he kissed the top of her head.
Lisa drew lazy circles on his chest with her finger, and his body answered with a fresh surge of heat and desire. He wanted her again.
He wanted her forever.
He’d sidestepped and ignored the truth for days, trying to give Lisa the time and space she needed to be comfortable with their growing closeness. But after making love to her, sharing the ultimate union of body and soul with her, he couldn’t deny his feelings any longer.
“Lisa,” he murmured, his lips pressed softly to her temple.
She tipped her head back and met his gaze through a drowsy screen of eyelashes.
“I know what we talked about the other night…about how we should take things slow, give you a chance to get comfortable with our relationship, but this—”
He stroked a hand down her back and felt her tremble as she hummed her pleasure. “No regrets, Peter. We both wanted this. Despite our haste, I knew what I was doing.”
He thought about their eager battle to shed their clothes, and a chuckle rumbled from his chest. “Yes, you did. And you did it well.”
She flashed an impish grin, and he couldn’t resist kissing the sassy smile. Fire licked his veins, his hunger for her returning in force. The magic of her lips was almost enough to make him lose his line of thought. But four words pounded in his brain, demanding to be shared.
After raking her hair back from her face, he held her head between his hands and stared deeply into her warm eyes. “I love you, Lisa.”
Lisa gasped softly, and her brow twitched in a frown. Though she grew still outside, frozen by shock, her insides were a farrago of emotions. For a moment, she wondered if she’d misunderstood Peter. But with a glow in his gaze, he repeated the words that sent a frisson of fear to her marrow.
“I haven’t felt like this for anyone since Katie died, and I can’t pretend this is just a casual thing for me. I want you in my life, Lisa. Always.”
She struggled for a breath, pushing against his chest to free herself from his grasp. He’d promised not to rush her, to give her time. She’d made love to him because she was powerfully attracted to him, and the moment had felt right. Yet suddenly their relationship was careening down a path she hadn’t intended. Faster than she could keep up.
“P-Peter, I—”
“We don’t have to get married right away. I don’t mind waiting for you, but I can’t deny my feelings anymore.”
Tears burned her sinuses and spilled onto her cheeks. “Peter, slow down!”
He swiped at her cheeks with his thumbs. “Aw, sweetheart, don’t cry.” A soft laugh laced his voice, and he pulled her close to kiss her wet cheeks.
“Please stop, Peter. I can’t—” Her thoughts scrambling, her stomach bunching, she backed out of his embrace. Suddenly cold to the bone, she tugged the corners of the quilt around her shoulders.
He furrowed his brow, his expression guarded. “What’s going on, Lisa? Why are you crying?”
“You promised not to push.” She waved a trembling hand and blinked hard as more tears pooled in her eyes. “Is this your idea of not rushing me?”
“You just said you had no regrets about us making love. We both wanted it.”
She raked her hair back with both hands then pressed the heels of her palms into her temples. “I know. But saying you love me…talking about marriage. I’m not ready for that kind of commitment!”
He sat up slowly, his gaze wounded. “I had to be honest with you about what I feel. You’re an amazing woman, Lisa, and I want to be with you, build something lasting together.”
“But we can’t!” Anguish sharpened the cry that wrenched from her breaking heart. “I was wrong to think we could dabble with a romance and not regret it. But I’ve told you from the beginning that I can’t have children. My infertility ruined what had been a beautiful marriage. I can’t go through the motions of a relationship that I know will end in resentment and loss again. You want more kids. You’ve said as much. You deserve the big family I can’t give you.”
He stared at her silently for long seconds, her nerves stretching tauter.
“What about adoption? Surrogacy? There are other options,” he murmured.
She pinched the bridge of her nose. How many million times had she gone around this rollercoaster with Ray. Hashing and rehashing. Debating and arguing.
“Red tape keeps good parents from adopting. Surrogates grow attached to the fetus. Every option has so many potential problems and roadblocks.”
“You’re just borrowing trouble. That’s a cop-out.”
“No, it’s reality, Peter. We tried to adopt once, and the biological mother changed her mind. The disappointment was devastating. It was the straw that broke Ray. He left soon after that.”
“I’m so sorry, sweetheart.” He stroked her cheek, his own eyes damp.
Lisa drew a deep breath for courage. “Peter, I care too much about you to let you throw away your life with a barren woman.”
Grasping her chin, he narrowed a stern but loving look on her. “Maybe you should let me decide what is right for me and my life. I love you. Just the way you are. No, it doesn’t make me happy to think of never having more children, but I can deal with it.”
She tugged her chin free from his grasp. “Well, I can’t deal with it, Peter! I’m still haunted by the ghosts of my first failed marriage. I ache every day for the babies I’ll never carry. I don’t think I’m strong enough to survive another broken heart when the reality of my situation catches up with you.” When he opened his mouth, clearly ready to deny her claim, she held up a hand to silence him. “It will catch up. Just like it caught up to Ray.”
Peter tightened his jaw, his eyes dark. “I’m not Ray.”
With a weary sigh, Lisa slumped her shoulders. A sense of defeat crashed down on her. With her back to the wall, she was faced with truths she couldn’t outrun. “But I’m still me, and I still can’t have children. Nothing has changed for me. I care about you, Peter, but I’m scared! I’m so afraid of winding up in the same place I found myself five years ago when Ray had enough and left me. He thought he loved me enough to wade through the pain and disappointment, too. But he was wrong.” Her voice broke, and she paused long enough to wipe her tears on the corner of the quilt. “I’m scared of loving you, Peter.”
Peter scowled, but his eyes reflected the pain of heartbreak. “Well, that doesn’t say much for your trust in me, does it?”
“It’s not you I don’t trust. It’s me. I don’t know if I can ever be happy without my own children, and I won’t drag you down in my pain.”
He scrubbed his hands over his face and shoved to his feet. Snatching up his boxers and pants, he started dressing, his motions jerky. “You know, if it were just me, I’d tell you that I had the patience to wait for you to see what we have together. I’ve waited ten years to find someone I loved enough to put myself out there for, so what’s a few more months or years?”
A sharp ache slashed through her chest as she watched him jam his arms into the sleeves of his shirt. The scene unfolded as if under water—blurry, slow motion, surreal. In her head a voice screamed, begging her to make him stop. To go back and unsay what had been said.
“But I have to think about my son.” Peter met her gaze with a pained gaze. “He’s already forming bonds with you. He lost one mother already. I can’t let him grow attached to you, only to have you walk away down the road because you’re afraid of committing to me.”
Afraid. The disappointment and disgust that filled his tone with that word reverberated inside her. Was she throwing away the best thing to happen to her in years because of fear? She was already planning to change her career path to avoid facing her personal pain and loneliness.
Bile churned in her gut. She was a coward, letting the best of life pass her by while she licked her wounds and mourned her misfortune. But she didn’t know what else to do. She couldn’t change her infertility. And she was sink
ing in the tar pit of her own dejection.
Peter finished dressing and pinned a penetrating stare on her. “You have to choose, Lisa. For Patrick’s sake. But we can’t do this halfway. I have all from you—or we have nothing. What will it be?”
Her heart sank. She couldn’t blame him for issuing his ultimatum. He had to protect Patrick from further heartbreak.
The quilt still wrapped around her like a shield—though a worthless protection that had allowed arrows to pierce her heart—Lisa rose from the floor on shaky legs and gathered her clothes.
Her heart breaking, she gave Peter the only answer she could. “Nothing. I can’t do this halfway either, Peter. And I can’t promise you what I don’t have in me to give.”
Before he could respond, Peter’s cell phone rang. The harsh tones jangled her already frayed nerves. At first she thought he’d ignore it, but after several rings, he stepped over to the end table where he’d left the cell phone and checked the caller ID.
Frowning, he flipped open the receiver and pressed it to his ear. “Hello?”
Numb with loss and trembling with regret, Lisa tugged on her jeans and bra while Peter took his call. Her head buzzed with tangled emotions.
As she pulled her sweater over her head, Peter’s tone, more than his words, alerted her to trouble. She faced him and found his face pale with shock and worry.
“Do your best to calm him down. I’m on my way home.” He snapped his phone closed and spun to face her. His eyes were bright with anxiety. “Get your shoes. We have to go.”
Lisa’s heart climbed into her throat. “What’s happened?”
“A note was left on our porch, and Patrick found it.” Peter’s hands shook as he rammed his feet into his boots. “It was a death threat.”
Chapter 13
Nothing.
Lisa’s blunt response to his ultimatum echoed hollowly in Peter’s head, tumbling with his mother’s frightened voice. Someone’s threatened your life, Peter. Patrick found the note. He’s hysterical.
His world seemed to be crumbling, and he was at a loss what to do about any of it.
Across the cab of his truck, Lisa sat with her hands knotted together and the strain of the past half hour creasing her face. He’d offered to drop her at her house but she declined, stating that she would go crazy not knowing what was happening with Patrick.
Her interest in Patrick’s well-being and concern over the death threat proved to Peter that she cared about him and his family.
She just didn’t care enough to fight her fears and look for a way through the morass of her infertility. Peter’s chest contracted until he couldn’t breathe. Why had he let himself fall for Lisa when he knew the risk to his heart? Her skittishness about getting involved with him should have been enough warning that with her he’d end up nursing the pain of rejection and loss again.
Yet he couldn’t be angry. Couldn’t resent her decision. Because his heart broke for her pain. He understood the depth of her trepidation and the roots of her reluctance.
He simply had nothing that could assuage that fear and convince her to take a chance on love again.
As he pulled into his driveway, Patrick bolted through the front door and was clambering at the driver’s door before Peter even had the engine shut off.
Peter stepped out of the truck, and his son threw himself against Peter.
“Dad, someone wants to k-kill you! They sent a letter with a bullet in it. You said your job wasn’t dangerous. Why would someone want to hurt you? Who would want to kill you?” The flurry of questions that Patrick lobbed at him in a tear-choked voice battered Peter like fists.
He wrapped Patrick in a fierce bear hug intended to calm his son, but which he found he needed just as much to soothe his tattered nerves. He clung to Patrick, battling the sting of his own tears, the fear of something happening to Patrick, the heartache of losing Lisa, and he cherished the feel of his baby—his son—in his arms.
A feeling Lisa had never, would never experience. The grief that shot through him on Lisa’s behalf nearly brought Peter to his knees. Living daily with an unrequited yearning for a baby, dealing with the neverending emptiness on top of her husband’s abandonment… Peter staggered under the weight of her losses. No wonder she was so terrified of another failed relationship, of reviving the ache of being a childless couple.
“Hey, calm down,” he crooned. “I’m okay, sport. No one is going to kill me. And I won’t let anyone hurt you either.”
Jolene crossed the yard, her face lined with stress and worry, and she handed him a folded sheet of paper. “It was taped to the front door.”
With a final squeeze, he stepped back from Patrick. “Did you preserve the tape? We might get a good fingerprint off it.”
She grimaced. “No. I didn’t think about that. I was so worried about you and about Patrick’s reaction—”
Peter stepped back from Patrick and unfolded the note. From the corner of his eye, he saw Lisa round the front of the truck and sweep his son into a firm embrace, mothering Patrick despite her breakup with Peter.
The letter had been addressed to Patrick and read, Tell your father to butt out or he’ll be the next to die.
“Butt out,” Peter muttered under his breath, the message ringing bells in his memory. Wes Colton had warned him away from his investigation with the same words.
Fury burned through Peter, vibrating in every muscle.
Had the sheriff stooped to making criminal threats to children to drive home his point?
For all his distrust of Wes Colton’s handling of the murder investigation, Peter felt the sheriff didn’t seem the sort to resort to such juvenile and gutless tactics of intimidation. But Peter knew with a certainty some Colton was behind the threat.
And his money was on Maisie.
Judging by the number of vehicles parked in the main drive of the Colton ranch, Peter guessed most of the clan had gathered for some family event. Logical, seeing as it was the day before Thanksgiving, and convenient, seeing as how he couldn’t be sure which Colton was responsible for the threatening note.
Most of the lights inside the sprawling, rustic-wood ranch house were ablaze, illuminating the home like a Christmas tree at the foot of the majestic Rockies. The scene was homey, inviting…deceptive.
As he climbed out of his truck and braced himself against the stiff, cold wind, Peter reminded himself that the magnificent stained-wood-and-mountain-stone mansion housed a brood of vipers.
Remembering the terror in Patrick’s eyes because of the death threat, Peter squared his shoulders and strode to the front door. His knock was answered by a young voice calling, “I’ll get it!”
When the door opened, Jeremy Colton greeted Peter with a puzzled look. “Oh, uh, hi, Mr. Walsh.” He looked behind Peter. “Is Patrick with you?”
Peter faltered. He hadn’t counted on Jeremy witnessing his showdown with the adult Coltons. Jeremy, who was Patrick’s friend. And who could easily be his own half-brother.
Acid roiled in Peter’s gut. “No, Patrick’s at home. Is your mother or Wes here?”
“Well, sorta. They’re kinda busy. We’re just about to eat a big family dinner.”
So the gang was all here. Perfect.
Peter took off his gloves and jammed them in his coat pocket. “It’s important that I talk to them.”
“Who is it, honey?” A slim, older blond woman Peter recognized from newspaper pictures appeared in the foyer behind Jeremy. Sharon Colton, Darius’s current wife in a string of many. When she spotted Peter on the porch, Sharon came up short, her expression wary. “Mr. Walsh, is…is there a problem?”
Peter glanced to Jeremy. He refused to air his wrath in front of the boy unless the Coltons gave him no choice. “Why don’t you run along, Jeremy, and tell Wes and your mother I need to see them.”
Jeremy sprinted away, calling, “Mom! Uncle Wes!”
Sharon gripped the edge of the door as if it were all that supported her. “What’s going on, M
r. Walsh?”
The heavy thud of footsteps signaled the arrival of not one, but several, Colton men. Leading the way, Darius spotted Peter and scowled darkly. When he reached the door, he shoved his wife back into the shadows, growling, “I’ll handle this, Sharon.”
Sharon turned meekly and faded into the background.
Peter scanned the other faces that gathered in the foyer. Duke, Damien and Finn stood behind their father like the goon squad, ready to remove Peter bodily on cue from Darius.
“What do you want, Walsh?” Darius’s voice rumbled, low and menacing, like thunder announcing an approaching storm.
Peter thrust the letter toward Darius. The patriarch was as good a place to start as any.
“I want to know which one of you bastards sent this to my son.”
Darius ignored the paper Peter shoved at him and glowered. “Care to rephrase that?”
Peter returned a stony glare. “No, I don’t. Because terrorizing a ten-year-old boy is the kind of vile move only a sorry coward would make. I won’t stand by and let you Coltons harass my family any longer.”
More family members appeared from the back rooms. Susan Kelley joined Duke, lacing her hand in his with a curious frown. Perry, Wes and Lily Masterson arrived right behind Susan. Spying Peter, Wes pushed his way to the front of the group. “What’s going on?”
“Mr. Walsh was just leaving, Wes.” Darius tried to shut the door on Peter, and Peter’s hackles went up.
Ramming his shoulder into the door, he plowed his way into the Colton’s front hall, fully aware of the angry glares and hostile stance of the many Colton alpha males. Peter didn’t care if he was outnumbered. One of the Coltons had come after his son, terrorizing Patrick, making dire threats. He wouldn’t let such an offense pass. “I’m not going anywhere until I know who sent this!” Again he waved the letter. He could feel his blood pressure rising, and he fought to keep it in check. He had to keep his wits about him against the Coltons. “Although I have my suspicions.”
Wes took the note and read it. Furrowed his brow. “Where did you get this?”
“It was left at my house with a bullet. Patrick found it.”
P.I. Daddy's Personal Mission Page 17
