LAYING HIS CLAIM

by Beverly Barton

  Damn! She had every right to be upset with him. Why had he acted like an idiot?

  "Trent? Trent!"

  "Huh?"

  "Have you heard a word I've said?"

  "Sorry, Molly, my mind wandered."

  "Something's wrong. What is it? Tell me. If I can help you. I want to—"

  "If you really want to help…" Damn, damn, damn! He was torn between Molly and the truth. He wanted to hold on to Molly, on to the plans he'd been making for a peaceful, contented future with her and her children. But how could he do that to her—keep her dangling on a string while he sorted out his feelings for Kate? And God knew those feelings were about as complicated and confusing as feelings could get.

  He wanted Kate now as much as ever. The lust factor between them hadn't diminished one iota. But did he love Kate? Maybe. A part of him would always love her. The real question was did they have a future together, with or without Mary Kate?

  "Molly, I owe you honesty," Trent said.

  "I'm not sure I like the sound of that."

  "Kate and I … that is, we—"

  "The ghost of marriage past has risen its alluring head," Molly said. "Is that it?"

  "In a way."

  "It was bound to happen. Kate was the love of your life, just as Peter was the love of my life. I can't say that I'm not disappointed. I'd hoped we could build a good, solid life together. But in all honesty, if it were possible for Peter to walk back into my life this very minute, I'd run into his arms and never let him go."

  "It's not quite the same for Kate and me. When Peter died, you two were still very much in love. Kate and I could barely look at each other by the time our divorce became final."

  "Oh, Trent, don't you think I've always known, even without Miss Mary Belle telling me?"

  "What are you talking about? What did my aunt tell you?"

  "She told me that you'd be in love with Kate Malone to the day you die."

  Why was it that Molly's statement hit him like a sledgehammer? Because he was afraid it might be true? "Aunt Mary Belle over-romanticized the situation."

  "Look, Trent, I'm not going anywhere," Molly told him. "There isn't anyone else in my life. If you can't renew things with Kate or find out you don't want to, then I'll still be here in Prospect waiting for you. And if you two wind up getting back together, I'll understand. Who knows, I might even like Kate."

  "You're a remarkable woman," Trent said.

  "Not really. I'm just envious that you might get a second chance with the love of your life."

  Trent didn't know how to respond to that, so he said nothing.

  "Take care of yourself," Molly told him. "Call me when you get back to Prospect."

  "I will. I promise."

  Trent hung up, tightened the belt on his robe and marched to Kate's door. He knocked. No response. He knocked again, several, times.

  "Kate?"

  "Go away."

  "Kate, we need to talk."

  "No, we don't."

  "Yes, we do." Trent tried the knob and found the door locked. "Dammit, Kate, don't be this way."

  "I do not want to see you or talk to you. Not tonight. Just leave me alone. If we have to talk, we can do it in the morning. I'm tired and I want to go to sleep."

  "Look, I'm sorry. Is that what you want to hear? I handled Molly's call all wrong. I should have told you she was the caller and I should have told her I'd call her back later. It's just that she caught me off guard and I felt odd talking to her while I was lying in bed with you."

  "You felt guilty. Admit it. You'd just cheated on her and—"

  "Dammit, Kate, don't put it that way. Molly isn't my wife. She's not even my fiancé."

  Silence.

  Trent lifted his fist to the door, but stopped himself just short of knocking again. He leaned his head against the door and groaned quietly. "Molly knows that you and I have issues we need to work through. She's very understanding. She's not jealous or anything like that."

  The door swung open so quickly that Trent almost lost his balance. Hands on hips, Kate stood there and glared at him. "Did you tell her that we'd—"

  "No, I did not tell her. But it wouldn't have mattered if I had. She's not the type to—"

  "Be jealous? Throw a fit? Come to Memphis and rip my hair out by the roots?" Kate lifted one hand and pointed her index finger in Trent's face. "If she isn't jealous, then she doesn't love you. If I were practically your fiancé and you went away with your ex-wife for any reason whatsoever, I'd be jealous as hell. And if I even suspected that you'd made love with her, I'd want to scratch her eyes out."

  "That's the difference between you and Molly," Trent admitted. "If you were practically my fiancé, you'd be madly in love with me. Molly isn't. Unless you've changed a great deal, loving with all your heart is the only way you know how to love. It was always all or nothing for you."

  "Molly isn't in love with you and you want to marry her?" Kate stared at him quizzically as she eased her hands off her hips. "Forget I asked. It's none of my business." Kate turned around and started to close the door.

  Trent stuck his foot over the threshold to prevent her from shutting the door. Kate glanced over her shoulder, her eyes questioning his intentions. "I'm going on forty. I want a normal, ordinary existence, a family, someone with whom I can share my life. I like and admire Molly. She feels the same about me."

  "In other words, you're willing to settle." Kate pivoted around slowly.

  Their gazes met and locked.

  "Yes, I suppose I am."

  "Well, good for you. When we find out what we need to know about Mary Kate, you can go right back to Prospect and marry Molly Stoddard and live the rest of your lives in peaceful, uneventful mediocrity. No disagreeing, no arguing, no ups and down, just smooth sailing on smooth waters. No waves." Kate indicated an even line with the movement of her hand gliding through the air. "But the downside of that is no passion, no to-die-for love and no blow - the - top - of - your - head - off sex that touches not just your body, but your heart, too. And even your soul."

  Kate turned her back on him again and tried to close the door. He remained unmoving.

  "To have that kind of love once in a lifetime is more than most of us can expect," Trent said. "And when you've had it and lost it, the best you can do is settle for less."

  She stood there, her back to him. He wanted to grab her tense shoulders, drag her into his arms and carry her back to his bed for a repeat performance, but he managed—just barely—to keep his hands off her.

  "I'll never settle for less. I still want it all. And if I can't have it all. I'll take nothing."

  She tried again to close the door. This time Trent moved his foot and allowed her to accomplish her goal. He stood there staring at the door for quite some time, his mind reeling with a jumble of thoughts. About Kate. About Molly. About the future.

  * * *

  Chapter 8

  « ^ »

  Dante Moran called at seven-thirty. Kate had been awake since six o'clock, but she hadn't ventured from her room. She'd called herself a coward, a fool and a hussy, not necessarily in that order. A coward for not wanting to face Trent this morning. A hussy and a fool for allowing herself to give in to temptation last night.

  Maybe she should add judgmental bitch to that list. After all, what right did she have to judge Trent? If he wanted to settle for a marriage without passion, was that so wrong? For her—definitely yes. But maybe not for Trent. The old Trent, the man she'd fallen in love with and married would never have been satisfied with less than everything. The new Trent—she didn't really know him, did she?

  "Kate are you there?" Moran asked.

  "Sorry, just gathering wool."

  "Did I wake you?"

  "No, I've been up for quite a while. But it is early, so why are you calling?"

  "To let you know that it doesn't look as if we'll be able to set up a meeting between the adoptive parents and the biological parents."

  "What? Why not?"<
br />
  "None of the adoptive parents are willing to attend a meeting."

  "I see." A gut-tightening sense of disappointment hit Kate.

  "You can't blame them. Not really," Moran said. "They're all scared to death, afraid they might lose their child. Right or wrong, they see the biological parents as enemies."

  "I can understand why they'd feel that way. After all, they're as much victims in this horrific situation as we are. And if the shoe was on the other foot, I'd probably feel the way they do."

  "I called you first," Moran told her. "We'll be letting the others know later today."

  "Thanks."

  "Not all my news is bad."

  "How's that?" she asked.

  "The adoptive parents did agree to send recent photographs of the girls via e-mail attachments. And one is even sending several photos of their child, dating from infancy."

  Kate's heart skipped a beat as her hopes shot sky-high. "From infancy? If we saw a picture of our child as an infant, we'd recognize her immediately."

  "I don't know why I told you about that. Dammit, Kate, she's not one of the two with type O-positive blood."

  Her sky-high hopes nosedived. "But we will see photos of the other two girls, right?"

  Would she know her own daughter from a photograph? Or would her eager heart see something that wasn't there—a resemblance to her or to Trent that would be only in her imagination?

  "Absolutely. All of you will get copies. We're expecting those photos this morning. I'll phone you the minute we get all three sets."

  "Hey, Moran, you know where all three girls live, don't you?"

  "Yeah, we know." A slight hesitation. A deep breath. "But don't ask me to give you the addresses. I can't bend the rules that much."

  "Could you tell me if they're close?" she asked. "Just tell me the states they're in."

  "The two with type O-positive blood are within three hours of Memphis," he told her. "One's in Mississippi and the other in Alabama. And that's all I can tell you at this point. I'm sorry, Kate, I'd tell you everything I know, but—"

  "It's okay. Really. I wouldn't want to get you fired before you have a chance to resign."

  He chuckled. "I'll let you know the minute the pictures come in."

  "I'll be right here waiting."

  She'd no sooner hung up the phone than Trent knocked at her bedroom door. She knew it was Trent. Who else would it be? She had showered and dressed when she first got up, then made coffee and downed every drop the four-cup pot held.

  Bracing herself to see Trent, she flung open the door. He stood there looking much too handsome, his dark hair neatly combed, his face freshly saved and wearing jeans and a cable-knit navy-blue sweater over a light blue button-down shirt.

  "I ordered breakfast," he said, his voice neutral, neither warm nor cold. Not friendly. Not hostile. "It just arrived. I hope a ham and cheese omelette with whole wheat toast and coffee suits you."

  "It suits me just fine. Thank you." It touched her heart that he'd remembered the only way she would eat eggs when she was pregnant with Mary Kate was in an omelette. And her favorite had been ham and cheese.

  Before she entered the lounge, he turned away from her and walked over to the table. Whatever tension their lovemaking had diffused had now been replaced with even more friction—sexual tension, a touch of anger and a hint of awkwardness.

  When she approached, he held her chair for her and assisted her in sitting. She looked up over her shoulder and offered him a smile. He nodded, but didn't return the smile. After he sat across from her and removed the covers from their plates, she took a deep breath, in an effort to bolster her courage, and looked right at him.

  "About last night," she said.

  "What about last night? Are you referring to our lovemaking or Molly's phone call or my stupidity or your overreacting to—"

  "All of the above."

  With his gaze glued to hers, he nodded.

  "Look, Trent, I'm the one who should apologize. I shouldn't have said some of the things I did. You have every right to marry whomever you please for whatever reason."

  "I'm not going to marry Molly."

  Her heart fluttered like a captive butterfly. "You're not?"

  "No, I'm not. I thought a great deal about what you said and I realized you were right. I'd tried so hard to forget what it was like between us when we first got married that I'd actually halfway convinced myself that I could live without passion in my marriage. But I can't. Making love with you last night proved that to me. You and I may no longer be in love, but God help us, the passion hasn't faded one bit, has it?"

  Her breath caught in her throat and for a moment she couldn't speak. She desperately wanted to touch him, to feel his flesh beneath her fingertips. But I do love you, Trent. I always have and always will. Why couldn't she tell him? If she admitted her true feelings, maybe he would, too. But what if he doesn't love you? What if passion really is all he feels?

  "The passion certainly was there last night," she said. "In spades."

  He smiled then. A warm, genuine smile that showed in his eyes. "May I ask who called you a few minutes ago or is that none of my business?"

  "It was Special Agent Moran." Kate poured coffee into her cup, then added a generous amount of cream. "None of the adoptive parents will meet with us, but they are e-mailing photographs of the girls."

  Trent lifted his cup and sipped the coffee. "I suppose I can understand why they don't want to meet with us. If I were in their place, I'd be out of my mind with fear. I feel sorry for everyone involved—the adoptive parents as well as us birth parents. We're all in a no-win situation."

  "If one of the girls is Mary Kate, we aren't going to take her away from the people who've raised her, are we?" Kate needed him to be strong for both of them because she wasn't sure if once she found out one of the girls was her daughter, she'd be able to do the right thing for Mary Kate. "We can't do that to her, no matter how difficult it is for us."

  When Kate lifted her cup, she had to set it back down immediately because her hand trembled so badly. Damn! She swallowed the tears lodged in her throat.

  Trent set his cup on the table. "No, we can't do that to her, no matter how much we'd like to take her with us, shower her with love and never let her go."

  "I have to see her. I have to believe in my heart that leaving her with her adoptive family is the right thing to do."

  "We both need that. Whatever happens, it's going to be difficult for us."

  She looked down at her lap, avoiding direct eye contact with Trent as she spoke. "Moran has the addresses for all three girls. I hope to sneak a peek at them when we go to his office this morning. If I manage to get those addresses, will you go with me to see the girls? Like the other birth mothers, I keep thinking that if I saw her, I'd recognize her."

  "Call me a fool, but yes, I'll go with you," Trent said. "We'll have to be very discreet. We can't let any one of the three girls or their parents see us and realize why we're there. We're in agreement on that, right? Even if you think you recognize Mary Kate, you won't—"

  "There are only two girls we need to see. Only two have type O-positive blood." She lifted her gaze to meet Trent's. "Moran told me yesterday and I'm sorry I didn't share that information with you immediately."

  Trent glanced away, a sad look in his eyes. "Even if you're sure one of the two girls is our daughter, you won't speak to her or alert her to our presence, will you?"

  "I promise that no matter how much I want to grab her and hug her and kiss her, I won't do anything to make our presence known. We can watch her from a distance. But I have to see these girls. I can't wait. I've been waiting nearly twelve years. I feel as if I'm on the verge of shattering into a million pieces."

  "I know how you feel. Believe me, I know."

  "Let's not wait for Moran to call back," Kate said. "As soon as we finish breakfast, let's go on over to the field office. Okay?"

  "Sure thing. But you have to eat first. You're too thin
, Kate. You've skipped too many meals lately, haven't you? You've always been that way, unable to eat when you're upset and worried."

  "You know me too well." She offered him a halfhearted smile, then lifted her cup to her lips.

  * * *

  Robin Elliott lived in Corinth, Mississippi, with her parents, Susan and Neal Elliott, and her younger brother, Scottie, who was also adopted. Christa Farrell lived in Sheffield, Alabama, with her paternal grandmother, Brenda Farrell. She'd been adopted by Brenda's son, Rick, and his wife, Jean, who'd been killed in a plane crash when they'd flown to Barbados for their anniversary six years ago.

  While Trent kept the Bentley humming at sixty-five miles an hour along Highway 72, which would take them all the way from Memphis to Corinth, Kate continuously looked at the copies of the two photographs Moran had issued to the four sets of biological parents. While Trent had kept Moran busy with questions, Kate had rifled through the paperwork on Moran's desk until she found the information on the adoptive parents and their daughters, including their addresses. She'd had easy access to the info, leading her to believe that Moran had known what she'd do and had purposely left that specific file folder on his desk for her to find.

  Kate studied the first photograph, a school picture of Robin Elliott. The child was lovely, her features perfect. A pink satin clasp held the bangs of her short blond hair to one side. It was difficult to make out the exact color of her eyes, but they appeared to be a light brown, flecked with green. Hazel brown. Trent's aunt Mary Belle had hazel-brown eyes.

  The information attached to the picture stated that Robin would celebrate her twelfth birthday in three weeks. She was in the sixth grade, an average student, who excelled at gymnastics and was a mini-midget football cheerleader. From all reports, she was happy, healthy and well-adjusted.

  Kate flipped that photo over and stared at the picture of the second little girl with type-O blood. A pair of large brown eyes looked up at Kate. Eyes as dark as Trent's. She wore her long brown hair in dog ears, green bows attached to each in a shade that perfectly matched her sweater. Christa Farrell was a pretty child, but her features weren't perfect. Her lips were too full and her nose just a tad too big. And a smattering of freckles dotted her nose and cheekbones. Kate had been cursed with freckles as a child, but makeup and staying out of the sun kept her few remaining freckles under control.