Waiting for Someone Like You (Destiny Bay-Baby Dreams Book 3)

by Helen Conrad

  “Oh, I’m not interesting.” Kat shook her head in energetic denial, “I’m not in the least bit interesting. Trust me. It’s true.”

  Shelley laughed at her vehemence. “I don’t know.” She looked from Tanner to Kat, smiling. “Something tells me there’s more here than meets the eye.”

  Tanner gave her a quick smile. “I have to confess, Shelley, I do find Kat interesting. Very interesting.” He reached out and covered Kat’s hand with his own. “In fact, I’m getting more interested in her all the time,” he added, raking her with a seductive glance.

  Kat jerked her hand away and glared at him. She knew what he was doing. He was egging her on, encouraging her to,.. to do what?

  Embarrass Shelley? Embarrass herself?

  She wasn’t sure which. And it was pretty hard to know how to react when she still wasn’t sure just who Shelley was.

  But Shelley didn’t seem to find anything odd. She laughed again.

  “I’m sure that could be the case, but don’t tell me the gory details right in front of the poor girl.” Her smile to Kat was warm and personal. “I don’t think she’s used to the old Carrington candor,” she noted lightly.

  Tanner made a rueful face. “Actually, no. She thinks I’m a terrible liar.”

  “A liar?”

  Shelley looked surprised and turned to Kat, who squirmed and tried to look innocent and at the same time figure out how to act in this through-the-looking-glass world. Nothing seemed to make any sense. She was becoming more and more convinced that this couldn’t be Tanner’s wife. A wife wouldn’t act this way when told her husband was “interested” in another woman.

  But if she wasn’t his wife, who the heck was she?

  “Yes,” Tanner was saying sadly. “She’s been accusing me of lying all afternoon.”

  “Why, what has he done?” Shelley asked.

  Kat felt warm color flooding her cheeks. What on earth could she say to that question? The truth didn’t seem to be a very good option at this point. Luckily the waitress arrived to take their order and the topic was forgotten.

  She ordered pie, just as the other two did, and sat back to watch them interact. There was a genuine bond of affection between the two of them, whatever their relationship might be. The funny thing was, she liked them both. She couldn’t help herself. They were, in fact, very much alike.

  “Tanner, you rat!” she cried out. “She’s a relative of yours, isn’t she?”

  His face shone with angelic innocence. “Of course,” he said simply. “She’s my cousin. I told you from the beginning that I wasn’t married.”

  “You...!” She lunged at him and he caught hold of her, laughing as she sputtered, and somehow she was laughing, too, and then their eyes met and time seemed to stand still. The laughter died out in both their throats, but their gazes were locked together.

  Something happened. Something sparked between them, some connection forged and held. Her eyes were huge, luminous, and for a moment he thought he might drown in them. He could barely breathe and he definitely couldn’t think. There was something real here, something honest and precious, and it scared him to death.

  And then they were both looking away again, embarrassed, drawing back and sitting stiffly in their chairs, staring down at their plates as the waitress placed the slices of pie in front of them.

  Tanner put his hand to his chest. His heart was beating so fast he went through a quick mental check of heart-attack symptoms before he realized what it was that was happening to him.

  This was no heart attack. It was her.

  He stared down and shoved pie around with his fork, but his mind was racing. This was ridiculous. He didn’t act this way. He was always the cool one, the one who stayed above emotions, the one who could laugh it off with the best of them. What was wrong with him? He had to stay away from Kat. He knew that now. She was dynamite and if he wasn’t careful, he was going to get blown sky-high. That was something he couldn’t allow.

  “Tanner.”

  Suddenly he realized Kat was poking him with her elbow, staring at his cousin.

  “What’s the matter with Shelley?”

  He looked at her quickly. Funny how he’d forgotten all about her over the past few minutes. But Shelley didn’t seem to have noticed. She was someplace else in a spiritual sense. A glazed look had come over her face and she was gazing into space, her hand on her abdomen, her lips slightly parted.

  Tanner frowned. “Shelley,” he said, reaching out and touching her arm, “are you all right?”

  As though she’d been there all the time, she smiled. “Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?” she said brightly, turning back to face them.

  Tanner’s frown deepened. This wasn’t like Shelley. He didn’t like it. He glanced at Kat and shook his head slightly, and at the same time, Shelley began to discuss the weather as though nothing had happened. Settling back, he watched her, not sure what to think. Everything was shifting around him all of a sudden. He felt like a crab on quicksand—he knew he could get out of here if he just kept moving, but he wasn’t sure which way to go.

  Shelley chattered on. Kat smiled when a smile was called for and automatically used her fork to put tiny bites of pie into her mouth, but she didn’t taste a thing.

  Her brain was in a fog. This was too much, this compelling attraction for Tanner Carrington. It overwhelmed her, drew her irresistibly toward disaster, And yet she couldn’t seem to make herself care enough to get up and leave. That was just the problem. She didn’t want to leave at all. She even seemed to like the fog.

  It took another trancelike episode on Shelley’s part to snap Kat out of it. She looked at Tanner and could see how concerned he was.

  “What is it?” she whispered. “Is she okay?”

  Tanner licked his lips, shaking his head. “I don’t know. I think so. It’s that... that baby thing.”

  She blinked. “What baby thing?”

  “You know.” He waved his hand as though that could explain everything. “The breathing and the concentrating.” But he still looked concerned, and when Shelley returned he tried to pry the truth out of her.

  “What’s wrong, Shelley? Why are you fading out on us this way?”

  Shelley smiled as though she had a secret, and pushed her half-eaten pie away. “I’m pregnant, Tanner. Maybe you’ve noticed.”

  “So it’s just something that happens when you’re pregnant?”

  Shelley laughed. “Yes, it’s just the way I seem to get in the last trimester. Don’t give it another thought.”

  Tanner didn’t look convinced, but he let it drop and began talking about Mexican food instead. But Kat kept up a covert examination of Shelley and her every move. She was finding this whole thing fascinating.

  This was an area Kat was unfamiliar with. She really hadn’t been around too many people with young babies. Friends who gave birth seemed to drop off into their own world for a few years, and they were sometimes difficult to communicate with until they reemerged and joined the rest of society when their kids started kindergarten. Shelley was seemingly about to go off into that world herself.

  “Have you decided on a name for the baby yet?” she asked at one point.

  “Not yet.” Shelley smiled. “We’ve been going over lists like crazy but we really haven’t come up with anything. I have a feeling that when this baby is born we’ll take one look it its little face and know right away what to call it. It’s been my experience that the total personality is right there from the beginning. It’s already imprinted when they’re born. You look down into that face and you see things you’re going to see again and again all their lives.”

  “So you believe in genes over environment?”

  Ah, a philosophical discussion. That she could deal with.

  “To some extent.” Shelley looked thoughtful. “I’ve got cousins who’ve had children, so I’ve had some experience with this. That first look into that little face is just a glorious thing.”

  “I remember wh
en Jill was born,” Tanner offered, pushing aside what was left of his cherry pie and mentioning a niece they had in common. “She had that studious look already. I could just see her putting on little reading glasses and shushing people in a library.”

  “That’s our Jill,” Shelley agreed. “And the spark of mischief was in Chris’s eyes right from the first, too.”

  “I don’t know about that one,” Tanner was saying. “I wasn’t there, remember?”

  Shelley laughed. “Oh, that’s right. You were in Europe.” She turned to Kat. “You won’t believe this. He was in Italy as a chaperon to a college girls’ volleyball team.”

  “It was a dirty job,” Tanner intoned dramatically, “but somebody had to do it.”

  Kat could picture him and the vision made her grin, but he was frowning, and when she looked up, she could see that Shelley’s eyes were glazed over again. This time she was rubbing the top of her abdomen and puffing softly, staring toward the horizon.

  Kat looked quickly back at Tanner. “What can we do?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “Pray,” he muttered.

  Shelley came out of it, but this time she didn’t smile. “People.. “ She looked at them both. “I think I’d better get back to the apartment.”

  Tanner’s face had turned to stone. “Right now?”

  She nodded, still looking distracted. “Semi-immediately.”

  They both stared at her, motionless with shock.

  “Is... is it coming?” Tanner whispered hoarsely.

  “Oh, heavens, no. The baby isn’t due for another few weeks.”

  But her smile was vacant and not very convincing.

  “I’m just a little uncomfortable. You won’t mind, will you? If you could just drive my car, Tanner...”

  Moments later Kat found herself sailing along the boulevard, scrunched up in the tiny back seat of the little sports car. Shelley was doing a lot of that funny breathing, and Kat and Tanner were exchanging anxious looks.

  “Shelley,” he said at last. “Are you sure we shouldn’t just take you on over to the hospital?”

  “Oh, no,” she insisted. “It’s not time yet. Besides, Michael won’t be back from Santa Barbara until…”

  “Michael is her husband,” Tanner informed Kat with a grin toward the back of the car. “The real one. He does go to Santa Barbara for restaurant supplies, but he doesn’t chaperone volleyball teams to Europe.”

  “And he’s also as big a tease as you are.” Shelley reached out and squeezed his hand. “Thanks for being here, cuz,” she said softly, her voice husky with emotion. “I’m glad to have you to lean on.’’

  “Anytime, crazy girl,” he said back, smiling at her.

  Kat sat in the back, watching this exchange and feeling a lump rise in her throat. She’d never been very close with her own cousins, and she’d never had a brother, but if she had, she would have wanted something a lot like this—a man a lot like Tanner.

  “Only honest,” she whispered to herself, looking out at the town as it sped by.

  Yes, honesty was important, and she couldn’t let herself forget it. She had to get back and protect her mother from the colonel. If she didn’t watch out, she knew she could be tempted to stay as long as possible with these Carringtons. They were fun, vibrant, exciting—and she was fascinated by them in more ways than she would like to admit. But she had to keep her goal in mind. Her mother had to be told the truth. Soon.

  She glanced at her watch. It wasn’t that late yet. Just a little more time and she would make her way back. Just a little more time.

  Tanner was driving with only half his mind on the road in front of him. The other half was wrestling with two subjects—Shelley and the puzzling little number in the back seat.

  He’d thought he had her pegged when he’d first seen her at lunch in the hotel restaurant. A gold digger, he’d thought. Just another in a long line of grasping, greedy women his uncle had collected about him since he’d first ventured out into international waters. She was prettier than most, more intelligent than any others he’d met, and certainly amusing to talk to. But basically a career woman, out for what she could get.

  Now he wasn’t so sure. This facade of total innocence and naivete was turning out to run deeper than he had thought. In fact, he was beginning to wonder if it didn’t go right to the core. Either that, or she was an awfully good actress.

  Maybe it was just the mother who was the dangerous one. But he had to admit, it hadn’t been the mother he’d seen setting a comfortable trap at lunch. It hadn’t been the mother he’d found snooping around in Uncle John’s room. It had been the perky little lady sitting behind him, and it would be much safer not to kid himself.

  He’d met very few women in his time who weren’t interested in the bottom line and how big a share of it they could get for themselves. He’d seen greed take over even the loveliest of faces once the shiny, distracting illusions of love and sex had been stripped away. It had happened to him again and again, and there was no reason to expect to find anything different here.

  Mentally, he kicked himself for even going into it in his mind. It just proved that he was still a sucker at heart, always looking for that heart of gold. When was he going to get it through his thick skull that women who loved you for your own sake rather than what they could get out of you just didn’t exist anymore—if they ever had.

  “Turn right at the next corner,” Shelley said, and he did as he was told, glancing at his cousin.

  And suddenly all his cynicism faded away. Shelley was a good one, a genuine peach, the real thing. That was his proof that such things still existed. Maybe it was because of her that he couldn’t really give up hope.

  “Here we are,” she said.

  And there they were, pulling up in front of the simple seafood cafe that belonged to the aunt and uncle of the man Shelley had married, Michael Hudson.

  CHAPTER SIX:

  Talk to Me

  The cafe was charming but simple, and the apartment was relatively sparse. Kat was struck once again by how out of place Shelley’s graceful elegance seemed in such modest surroundings. Kat could imagine her walking through a country club, a tennis racket swinging from her hand, or holding high tea with the upper crust. Instead, here she was, enormously pregnant in an unpretentious two-room flat above a restaurant.

  She and Tanner helped Shelley upstairs and settled her on the bed in the modest room. Shelley looked pale and a bit drawn and Kat couldn’t help but think she was intruding on something private. She shouldn’t be here. She was going to have to leave as soon as she possibly could.

  She glanced at Tanner. His usual amused self-confidence seemed to have deserted him. As she watched, his shoulders flexed nervously and he looked ill at ease.

  “What time is Michael supposed to be back?” he asked his cousin.

  Shelley moved, trying to find a better position. “By six at the latest. That’s when we open for dinner.” She looked fretful. “But I’m supposed to be helping Rosa prepare some of the sauces. I wonder where she is.”

  Kat glanced at her watch. It was not quite five.

  “Are you comfortable?” she asked, trying not to let anxiety show in her voice.

  Shelley smiled at her. “Oh, yes. I’m fine.” Her eyebrows drew together as though she’d suddenly heard or felt something. She glanced up at them again. “If you two would just make me some tea... ?”

  “Of course.”

  They started to turn away, but suddenly Shelley reached out with both hands and took a grip on Tanner’s arm and Kat’s wrist, holding them there. Her crystal blue gaze seemed to be on something far in the distance.

  “Shelley,” Tanner said apprehensively, his hand covering hers, his face tense. “What is it?”

  She looked at him but this time she didn’t smile. “Tanner, could you call Rosa?” she asked faintly. “I thought Rosa would be here by now.”

  Tanner leaned closer, staring intently into her eyes. “Darling,” he said, reach
ing to smooth the hair back from her forehead, “I will do anything you ask. But who the hell is Rosa?”

  “Oh, I’m sorry.” Incongruously, she giggled and suddenly her face relaxed again and she looked almost sleepy. “I forgot. You don’t know Rosa. She’s like one of the family to Michael. She’s worked here for his aunt and uncle forever.” She let her head fall back against the pillow and drew her hands back to rest on her rounded stomach. “Her number’s right by the phone downstairs.”

  “I’ll call her right away,” he said, patting his cousin reassuringly. “You just stay right here and get some rest.”

  He looked at Kat and jerked his head toward the stairway. She followed him, but he didn’t speak until they were all the way down into the cafe and entering the kitchen.

  “I don’t like the look of this.” He swung around and gazed at her as though she ought to do something to rectify the situation, and do it fast.

  “What do you think?” she asked nervously, glancing back up toward where Shelley lay waiting.

  Waiting for what? Her fingers twitched, and then she remembered. It was all right. Waiting for tea, was all. Hopefully.

  He stared at her, his blue eyes dark with a worry even more intense than her own. “I think she’s going to have this baby very soon.”

  Kat’s eyes widened and she felt slightly sick to her stomach. “Today?” she squeaked out.

  He hesitated, then shrugged. “Maybe not in the next hour. But soon.”

  Kat wrung her hands. This was hardly what she’d expected when she’d taken off for a walk through the little town a bit over an hour before. She wasn’t really prepared. “Shelley’s been practicing and preparing for this. Wouldn’t she know?”

  He frowned. “Maybe so.” He grabbed her hand in his, eyes lit with sudden hope. “Listen, I think they go through this kind of thing a lot in the weeks before babies are born, don’t they? Practice contractions, or something like that.” He frowned at her. “Don’t you know? You haven’t ever had a baby, have you?”