The Pregnant Colton Bride

by Marie Ferrarella

  There was no point in pretending what she saw on the menu wasn’t at odds with her stomach. “I’m sure the food’s very good here, but I’m really not up to eating anything hot or spicy.”

  “Then you won’t,” he replied simply. “The nice thing about Diego’s is that Rita and her husband really do want to please their customers.” Zane opened his menu, skimmed down both pages and found what he felt was a solution. “How does a grilled chicken burrito sound—without the cheese, refried beans or hot sauce?”

  “Bland,” Mirabella admitted. “And not why most people come to eat in a Mexican restaurant.”

  “That’s one way to put it,” he agreed. “I see it as protein you can consume and hopefully hold down.” Zane set his menu down, still looking at his assistant. “And isn’t that the main reason for you to eat right now? To take in good food that’ll help nurture your baby?”

  What he said made sense—as long as she could keep whatever she ate down.

  “You have a point,” she conceded, then hesitated. “Are you sure the chef won’t be insulted if I ask to have the order changed from what’s on the menu?”

  Zane could only look at her in amused amazement. Mirabella was worried about hurting the feelings of someone she would probably never even meet. That placed her leagues above whoever had sent out that spiteful email, he thought. She was a really good person who deserved to be treated so much better than she had been today.

  It made him ashamed of his own initially negative thoughts about her. He’d let the events get the better of him and he shouldn’t have.

  Zane found himself wanting to make it up to her somehow.

  “I’m sure,” he told her. He could see by her expression that Mirabella still had doubts. “Don’t worry, I’ll handle it,” he promised.

  She didn’t want him going through any trouble—especially since there was another very real problem in the possible offing.

  “Bland as it sounds, I’m not even sure I can keep that sauceless, cheeseless chicken down,” she murmured.

  He didn’t see Mirabella as the timid type, but he could see where it might get rather embarrassing for her, having to make a sudden dash to the ladies’ room. Still, she couldn’t allow what might happen to dictate her actions.

  “Well, we won’t know unless we try, right?” he asked gamely as Dolores approached their booth to check on them.

  “Are you ready to order?” the young woman asked in a friendly voice, her question sweeping over both of them. “Or do you still need a little more time?”

  Glancing at Mirabella to make sure she was in agreement, Zane replied, “We’re ready.”

  True to his word, he requested the proper modifications be made to her order. Mirabella expected some sort of a protest or reaction from the server, or, at the very least, to have Dolores roll her eyes. But neither happened. The young woman acted as if jotting down substitutions to items on the menu was the norm rather than the exception.

  Finished taking down their orders, Dolores nodded smartly. “I’ll be back with your dinners as soon as they’re ready,” she promised. “Until then, would either of you like something to drink?” She looked from one to the other, waiting.

  Mirabella assumed the server was asking about alcoholic beverages and was about to demur when she heard Zane tell the young woman, “The lady will have some plain hot tea with lemon on the side. As for me, I’ll have a lemonade.”

  Dolores flashed him a smile that transformed her face to a younger version of Rita’s.

  “Very good, Mr. Colton,” the young woman commented just before she collected the two menus and withdrew from their booth.

  He saw Mirabella looking at him quizzically and assumed it had something to do with how he’d taken the liberty of ordering for her.

  “I thought the tea might help soothe your stomach,” he explained.

  The quizzical look on Mirabella’s face only intensified. “How would you know that?” Pregnancy seemed to have a way of changing all the ground rules.

  He laughed softly at her skepticism. “You’re not the first person in the office to get pregnant,” Zane told her, adding, “I observe things.”

  “Apparently,” she murmured. The man seemed aware of a great many things that were going on around him, she couldn’t help noticing. And then, remembering her manners, she tagged on a belated, “Thank you.”

  Zane shrugged off her gratitude. It was entirely unnecessary, and gratitude had always made him feel somewhat uncomfortable. He didn’t do things to earn anyone’s gratitude, he did them because he thought they needed doing.

  “Don’t mention it.”

  The server returned with their drinks and a round loaf of warm bread. The latter was perched on a cutting board along with more than enough butter to slather both sides of the loaf as well as every inch of its insides.

  “So,” Zane began conversationally once Dolores had retreated again, “what are you going to do?”

  She thought he was referring to the very immediate situation.

  “Try to eat the meal and see if it stays down,” she said gamely. “It’s the least I can do after you’ve gone through all this trouble for me.”

  Shaking his head, Zane smiled at her. “No, I mean about the baby.”

  The smile that was even now attempting to surface to her lips faded instantly as an alert look entered her eyes.

  Was he asking her what she thought he was asking? Did he want to know if she was contemplating sweeping this baby from her life before she even saw it? Maybe she’d been wrong about him all along.

  “It’s not an inconvenience,” she informed him tersely.

  “I know,” he replied quietly. Was that what she assumed he was thinking? “I didn’t mean to imply in any way that I thought it was. I was just asking if you’ve made any plans on what to do once he or she was here?”

  Mirabella blew out a breath. What was wrong with her head, anyway? Zane was being nothing but kind to her and she was getting all combative. He probably thought she was some psycho and he should be backing away posthaste.

  “Right now,” she told him honestly, “I’m just putting one foot in front of the other, trying to get through each day as it comes.”

  Zane tried to be clearer. “Do you have anyone who could help you?”

  “What do you mean by ‘help’?” She wanted to know.

  Her mind kept jumping around from one thing to another like a giant frog trying to find a lily pad that suited him. Although she wanted to think the best, especially of Zane, she just couldn’t help the fact that suspicion and distrust kept insisting on rearing its head, spoiling any shot she had at attaining peace of mind, or any sort of even semi-tranquility.

  Rather than take offense at her tone, Zane patiently explained what he was asking her. “Do you have someone you’re close to, someone you can talk to? You know, like family.”

  The word family, in the traditional sense, had ceased to mean things to her. But since she was expecting, it looked as if she was going to have to redefine her parameters, Mirabella thought.

  Because he was still waiting for her to give him some sort of an answer, she proceeded slowly. “My parents are divorced and leading their own lives in different parts of the country.” Her tone was stoic. “We were never close anyway,” she added with a shrug.

  She did have a grandmother who she adored. The woman had practically raised her, but this wasn’t something Mirabella could bring to her. Her grandmother was very old-fashioned.

  Raising her eyes to his, she said almost defensively, “I’ll manage. Don’t worry. I won’t let it affect my work.”

  “I’m not worried about that,” he told her, his voice mild as he cut a slice of the bread sitting between them. He offered the slice to her. “You might want to skip the butter,” he suggested, nodding at the small ceramic vat next to the cutting board. “Otherwise it defeats the purpose.”

  “The purpose?” she echoed uncertainly.

  He nodded. “It’s cr
usty bread. Technically, white bread. That might help soothe your stomach.”

  Mirabella glanced at the cup beside her. “Like the tea,” she guessed.

  Zane smiled. “Like the tea. Now you’re catching on,” he said with approval.

  “Not that I don’t appreciate it,” she qualified, “but why are you so concerned about me?” She thought of his missing stepfather. “Don’t you have enough on your plate right now?”

  “I do,” he agreed, deliberately keeping his emotions in check. It was the only way he could deal with the situation. “But, aside from everything else at play here, for better or worse, you and I seem to be linked together in people’s minds. At least in this case.”

  He was referring to that hateful email. She wondered if the tech Zane felt could perform acts of internet magic could somehow erase that email, and any comments it generated, off the server. She knew it would certainly make her happy.

  “I didn’t think you cared about what people thought,” she said, surprised.

  “Honestly, I don’t,” he replied. “But I’m not the only one involved in this,” he said, looking at her significantly. “I don’t really know all that much about you,” he went on to admit, “but if you do need someone to talk to, you can always talk to me. This is a bad time to feel as if you’re all alone.”

  The corners of her mouth curved ever so slightly. She had to stop being so suspicious of everything, Mirabella upbraided herself. Not everything had an ulterior motive behind it.

  “I do appreciate that,” she told him. “And if I bit your head off before, I truly am sorry. I’m afraid I haven’t exactly been myself this last month or so,” she apologized.

  “Not ‘bit,’” he replied, toning the situation down a little. “Nibbled on, maybe. And that’s understandable,” Zane was quick to add, absolving her of the blame she was so willing to heap on herself. “You’ve been dealing with a lot lately.”

  He was letting her off the hook. She knew she should just nod and agree, and be done with it. After all, Zane was being surprisingly more than nice, more than thoughtful, and she should just accept it as that. If she had any brains in that head of hers, Mirabella upbraided herself, she would.

  But honesty was something she valued above all else and she felt she had to explain to Zane just why she seemed to be behaving so erratically.

  “I feel like an old-fashioned yo-yo,” she told him, searching for the right words.

  Those were obviously not them.

  She saw Zane’s eyebrows draw together over the bridge of his nose as he obviously tried to relate what she was saying to the situation.

  He failed.

  “Come again?”

  She put it a different way. “My emotions are all over the map. One second I feel like laughing, the next, I’m fighting not to dissolve into a puddle of tears. My stomach makes me feel absolutely miserable about three-quarters of the time. I find myself wanting to do all these things—and yet I’m too tired to wrestle even a flea—”

  “I didn’t know fleas were into wrestling,” he commented, doing his best not to laugh at the image she’d created in his head.

  “Luckily for me, they’re not,” she quipped, then grew serious again. “But what I’m trying to say is that I don’t know if I’m coming or going. I always thought if the time ever came when I was pregnant, I’d just be thrilled and filled with anticipation—not moody and filled with anxiety,” she told him, frowning not at Zane but at her own self-image.

  “And I imagine that email didn’t exactly help matters,” he concluded as the server returned with their meals.

  Mirabella made no comment on what he’d just said, but there was a frown on her lips that he took to be agreement.

  He waited until after Dolores had told them both to “Enjoy,” and then withdrew from the table.

  When she did, he lowered his voice and told Mirabella, “I’m going to have Meyer trace whoever sent that email and they’ll be made to publicly retract it and the sender will be disciplined.” It wasn’t what he wanted to do, but the email seemed to affect her so much, he wanted to get her name cleared.

  She offered him a quick, grateful smile. He probably thought she was too obsessed with this.

  “Please, don’t concern yourself on my account. I’ll ride it out.” And then her smile slipped into her eyes. “I’m tougher than I look.”

  “I never doubted it.”

  She couldn’t tell if he was saying that to her tongue in cheek or if he actually meant it.

  But she had to admit that talking to him like this, being with him in such a welcoming atmosphere, went a long way toward making her feel better, at least for the time being.

  She knew that tomorrow she’d be back at the office, facing whoever it was who had started this awful rumor and set it in motion—or, at the very least, she’d be suffering the consequences of that person’s postings.

  But for now, she made the conscious decision not to think about it. She might not be able to control everything, but she could, if she put her mind to it, control her own reaction to the circumstances that were affecting her life. She could either let those circumstances sweep her away, or she could stand her ground and make the best of it.

  She chose to do the latter. It wasn’t in her to go any other route.

  Zane could see the change in her.

  Mirabella seemed to brighten right in front of his eyes.

  More hormones at play? he couldn’t help wondering. Well, whatever it was, he had to admit it seemed to suit her. She especially had a really nice smile and she aimed it at him now. It was the kind of smile that wove itself into the main fabric of a person’s consciousness, brightening their existence as it all but crept into their soul.

  He glanced at Mirabella’s bread dish and was happy to see it was empty. She’d finished eating the slice he’d cut for her without being aware of it.

  Progress.

  “Feeling better?” he asked conversationally.

  For a second, she wasn’t sure what Zane was referring to, and then she glanced down at her plate. The bread was gone and she’d started to eat dinner, all while they’d been talking.

  She waited for her stomach to lurch in protest and was delighted when it didn’t.

  “Actually,” she told him with a wide smile, “I think I am.”

  He nodded. “Told you the warm tea would do the trick.”

  No, Mirabella thought, actually, it’s not the tea. You’re what did the trick.

  But she knew she couldn’t say that, not without having Zane think she had some sort of designs on him, or wanted to turn this admittedly somewhat awkward situation to her advantage, though at the same time it would amount to his ultimate disadvantage.

  So instead, she nodded and quietly replied, “Yes, you did,” giving the appearance of agreeing with him.

  Chapter 10

  Zane thought it had died down.

  No more salacious emails turned up on his computer from “Anonymous.” Nor was he on the receiving end of any group emails sent en masse by any of the employees who felt compelled to take part in some self-righteous forum concerning the initial subject of the email.

  Over the next few days, as he made his way through the office, Zane would occasionally notice one of the people who worked for him glancing his way with a curious expression on their face. It seemed to him as if those people were still somewhat undecided whether or not to believe the hateful words that had been in the group email. But since he was a Colton, as well as the man in charge, no one so much as cast a judgmental look in his general direction, much less said something that could be taken as a criticism or a sarcastic evaluation of his personal life.

  Furthermore, there were no conversations that stopped when he entered the room, no furtive discourses abruptly ceased when someone saw him approaching. In short, there was no indication at all that the memory of the malicious email was still alive and covertly breeding.

  Zane took that to mean it had all blown over,
just as he’d told Mirabella it would. He felt greatly relieved it was over, more for Mirabella’s sake than his own.

  But it hadn’t blown over.

  The thought was the first thing that occurred to him when he walked into the company break room.

  Having a sudden—and rather unexpected—craving for something really sweet, Zane decided to get something out of the vending machine. It was almost three, well past lunch and any company breaks. He expected to find the room empty.

  It wasn’t.

  Mirabella was sitting at one of the tables, her back to the entrance, what appeared to be a container of hot tea clutched in her hands.

  He’d noted her absence from her desk just before he decided to see if the vending machine had anything appetizing to offer.

  “I was afraid you were in the ladies’ room, being sick again,” he told her casually as he fed the vending machine the proper amount of coins.

  The coins created an almost melodic noise as they made their way through the machine, their contents registering.

  Startled to hear his voice, Mirabella suppressed the involuntary gasp that rose in her throat. Her hands tightened around the container. She had to restrain herself from squeezing.

  “I’m sorry,” she apologized, “I didn’t know you were looking for me.”

  Her voice sounded oddly subdued and monotone, unlike her usual invigorated, animated tone. Zane chalked it up to Mirabella being tired. Lunch had long come and gone and he knew of a lot of people who experienced three-o’clock lag.

  Being pregnant most likely made her more so.

  “No harm done,” he assured Mirabella. A tiny package of Oreo cookies fell off the spiral rack to the bottom of the machine. Pushing back the plastic partition, he retrieved his bounty. “I just need you to follow up on the report that was supposed to have come in regarding updating some of the surveillance cameras along the outer perimeter,” he told her.

  When she made no response, he paused at Mirabella’s table. She still hadn’t turned around, which he was beginning to think was rather odd.

  “Belle? Did you hear what I just said?”

  “Yes, yes I did,” she answered, still apparently staring at a spot on the back wall. “You want me to track down the whereabouts of the McCay report,” she said, referring to the report by name.