by Linda Kage
When he saw her name appear on the screen, he answered the phone without thinking, not wanting her to hear Amy’s message again. But as he pressed it to his ear, he realized, oh hell, now he had to talk to her.
The greeting he gave sounded brusque and rude, even to his own ears, and he winced, hoping he hadn’t scared her off. But when he heard the click on the other end, his heart gave a violent shove against his ribcage. Shit. He had scared her off.
He closed his eyes and tried to decide if this was a good thing or not. As he ran his fingers through his hair with one hand, his thumb hovered over the call-back button. When he wondered what he’d say if she actually answered, he blew out a breath and set the receiver back in its cradle.
The next night, he found himself waiting by the phone. Yeah, he was stretched out in his La-Z-Boy, sipping iced tea and watching NASCAR, but he brought the dang receiver into the living room with him and sat it in his lap. So, when it actually rang, he fumbled for the talk button and answered before a name could even flash across the caller ID. When it turned out to be his sister from Reno, he nearly snapped her head off for checking in to see how he was.
He was in an irritable mood by morning. He cut himself shaving, burnt his tongue on his morning coffee, and stubbed his toe on the side of his bed.
Since he had meetings that day with investors, he couldn’t go grunge and wear his comfortable field clothes. He’d just shrugged on a pinstriped shirt and was raiding his closet for a matching tie when he heard someone pull into his drive. Grabbing the first tie he saw, he moved toward the window to glance out the shades.
The sight of B.J.’s Dodge had him sucking in a breath. For a second, he could only stare. She was here. Good God, she was here. His skin prickled with a sudden anticipation. When he realized he’d turned as hard as a stone just knowing he was going to see her in less than thirty seconds, he yanked the tails of his shirt back out of his slacks to hide his response.
Then he checked the mirror, cursed, and pulled a toilet paper square off his chin. Taking the stairs two at a time, he hurried to the first floor. But as soon as he approached the entrance, he heard her diesel engine rev. Frowning in confusion, he moved the screen door and stared out as she backed down the drive. Not sure what to think, he wiped his chin with his hand.
What puzzled him the most was why she kept making these attempts to get a hold of him, only to chicken out before making contact.
And then it struck him. She was as uneasy as he was. Though it was hard to picture the steely-nerved tomboy with any kind of weakness, he had to admit the idea calmed him considerably. If she possessed the same fears and doubts he did, then another dimension had just been stacked to their relationship. That like-mindedness gave them a connection Grady couldn’t ignore.
It also placed the ball in his court. She’d put in her three tries; now it was his turn to make an effort. But the idea of going to her filled him with indecision all over again. Pursuing her would make this all too real. Thinking about being serious with B.J. Gilmore had been nerve-wracking enough. But actually doing something was a whole other story.
He knew where to find her. Ten to one, she’d be at the hangar, working on that old plane of hers. But he didn’t move.
This was foreign territory. Months before he’d asked Amy out for the first time, he’d been prodded by family and friends galore. It’d been expected. And when he’d finally approached her, he’d already known she’d say yes.
With B.J., none of that applied. Nothing was certain, and the only guarantee he’d have was craziness, absolute chaos, which was totally not him. It’d probably be like that every time with her too. A relationship with B.J. wouldn’t be safe and comfortable and predictable. And he was everything that was safe and comfortable and predictable. Imagining himself otherwise just didn’t. . .fit.
But it felt strange sleeping with a woman and then not talking to her again. Sex had always been a special, bonding event for him. He hadn’t slept with Amy only because he’d wanted sex. He’d also wanted to show her how much he loved her. But again, that hadn’t been the case with B.J.
He wasn’t used to sex without emotions being involved. He’d liked the importance of coupling as a means of showing his affection. And no matter how mad he was at B.J. for practically pushing him into being with her, he couldn’t hate her or block the desire budding in him.
The link he felt wasn’t just going to go away. Didn’t mean he had to make his move today, though. B.J. had waited at least twenty-four hours between each of her attempts. So, Grady decided to let the matter sit until this evening, when he wouldn’t have a meeting to plan.
Eight hours later, everything changed.
He stopped by the gas station on the way home and, as he filled up at the pump, he heard two guys outside the front doors, gossiping. Grady wasn’t the type to listen in on rumors. But when he heard the name B.J. Gilmore mentioned, he lifted his head and glanced over.
“Yeah, I heard,” one guy said to the other, shaking his head in dismay. “I still don’t know whether or not to believe it, though.”
His buddy chuckled. “Well, we’ll know soon enough when she starts growing a pooch or not.”
Grady frowned, not comprehending their lingo.
Then the first guy added, “I just want to know who supposedly knocked her up. I didn’t know she was seeing anyone? Hell, I didn’t even think Gilmore was interested in men.”
“What? You didn’t hear about what happened at the diner last week with Junkyard Smardo?” the second man responded.
As he proceeded to spill the gory details of Ralphie announcing how he’d gone skinny dipping with the biggest tomboy in the county, Grady stared sightlessly at the two men. His ears buzzed so he didn’t hear the gas pump click off, signaling his tank was full. His fingers merely gripped reflectively around the handle, and gas kept gushing until it spewed out the side of his truck and sprayed his pant leg.
Grady dropped the nozzle and leaped back a step, staring at the dripping mess.
“Shit.”
By the time he’d pulled himself back together enough to return the station’s gas hose to its resting place and head toward the station to pay, the two men had decided Ralphie was their top suspect as the baby’s daddy.
“Can you just imagine a little Junkyard Smardo running around? Big ears, buck teeth and double chin.”
“Hopefully, it turns out looking like B.J. I’m still convinced she’s got a body that just won’t stop under all those man clothes.”
Brushing past the men, Grady hurried inside to finish his business. He had to talk to B.J. . .now. Realizing that was probably the reason she’d been trying to get a hold of him, he couldn’t help but feel a little stung by the fact she hadn’t wanted to see him personally, she’d merely wanted to deliver an update.
She was pregnant.
God, he hadn’t even considered that possibility. It’d taken so much work for Amy to conceive, he’d been under the impression a lot more than one time was needed to get the job done. But one night with B.J. definitely wasn’t one night with Amy on any level.
Grady returned to his truck. He even started the engine and put the gearshift into drive, but he kept his foot on the brake, unable to move.
This wasn’t fair. Amy, who’d wanted children her entire life, had died trying to get the baby she desired. For years, he’d felt like a failure because he’d been unable to grant her deepest wish. Yet now, after one stupid try, he’d planted a child in B.J., and there was no way in hell she’d been desperate to become a little mama.
He felt like hell. How could he so easily impregnate one woman, a woman he hardly knew, but he couldn’t manage to come through for his wife who’d been the absolute love of his life?
Taking his foot off the brake, Grady pressed the gas. He had to talk to B.J. He had to know how she could do this to him. He didn’t want to be a father. He didn’t want to look down and see a bloody little corpse ever again.
Why couldn’t
she have just left him alone in Houston, damn it?
Since B.J. lived in a small two-bedroom bungalow farmhouse hardly two miles from the filling station, Grady pulled into her drive only minutes later. Her truck was sitting out front, telling him she was home. As he parked behind it and slid out of his cab, he took a long, calming breath.
Realizing he was probably going to hate this encounter, he slowed his step but still reached her porch all too soon.
When he knocked on her door, he heard her call, “It’s open.”
Grady stepped inside. As soon as he’d gained entrance, he stopped and let the door quietly fall shut at his back. Her living room was small but tidy. It looked like a neat bachelor pad. The furniture was old, ugly and mismatched but appeared incredibly comfortable. The colors were neutral, nothing flashy or feminine. She had posters on the wall of four-wheelers and airplanes. And the television was on, turned to NASCAR.
B.J. entered from a doorway on the left. She was barefoot, dressed in an old pair of faded blue jeans with holes ripped in the knees. She had on an equally old T-shirt with a beer logo on the front, and her wet hair was pulled back into its usual ponytail. She carried a bag of microwave popcorn and tugged it open as she strolled in from the kitchen.
The voice of the gossipmonger from the filling station filled Grady’s head. I’m still convinced she’s got a body that just won’t stop under all those man clothes. He knew just how true those words were. Lithe form, long legs, tightly packed muscles, soft curves, breasts that more than filled his hands. His mouth watered.
When she saw him, she jerked to a stop. “What are you doing here?”
His first thought had nothing to do with children. The first—and pretty much the only—declaration to enter his head was, Mine.
Chapter Nine
“You wanted to see me?” Grady asked, clearing his throat and returning to his senses.
B.J.’s eyes widened, and she shook her head. “N-no.”
Grady’s jaw went hard. “You called twice and stopped by once this morning,” he reminded. “What was it you needed to tell me?”
Her head once again swung back and forth, “I don’t. . .nothing,” she insisted.
He bit back a sigh. The woman was an awful liar. It did nothing to ease his growing anger.
“So, the gossip around town isn’t true then?”
B.J. frowned. “I don’t listen to the gossip around town, so I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He lifted a brow and sent her an arch look. “That so? You have no idea what I’m talking about, huh?”
“I just said I didn’t,” she snapped a little too defensively; her stance went from cowering to attack-mode.
“Well, I heard about five minutes ago that someone had knocked up B.J. Gilmore.”
That finally evoked the response he’d expected. Her face drained of color and she dropped her bag of popcorn, spilling kernels around her bare feet.
“Who told you that?”
Grady folded his arms and stared hard. “I overheard Gabe Watson telling Ulrick Pullson about it at Herb’s Quick Stop. Both of them already knew.”
“Who?” she demanded, and then she shook her head furiously. “Oh my God, I can’t believe this. How could anyone know? I just found out myself Tuesday when I went to Dr. Carl’s office and got the damn test taken. I mean, okay, so Pop suspected, but there’s no way my own father would start a rumor. . .”
“Dr. Carl’s office?” Grady repeated, his lungs constricting.
Dr. Carl had been Amy’s doctor too. Just knowing B.J. was going to go to the same man who’d been standing over his wife when she died made him break out in a cold sweat.
Then reality intruded, and he frowned. “Doesn’t Lara Alberts work in Dr. Carl’s office?”
B.J. gasped. “That bitch! I ought to get her fired for breaking doctor patient privileges.”
“I don’t know,” he murmured. “I’m kind of glad she’s the queen of gossip, since that was obviously the only way I was going to find out about this. . .because you sure as hell weren’t going to tell me. Were you?”
B.J. suddenly looked like a little kid who’d been found painting the bathroom walls with toothpaste as she braced herself for the angry lecture she probably thought would follow. Her face was pale and her eyes scared, nothing like the confident, no-cares-in-the-world B.J. Gilmore he’d always thought she was.
“I. . .I just wasn’t sure how to say it,” she answered quietly. “I mean, was there any way to break it to you easily?”
Grady opened his mouth, but B.J. hurried to add, “One thing was sure, I definitely wasn’t going to tell anyone else until you knew.”
She stopped suddenly as if just realizing something. Then she scowled and pressed her hands to her hips, snapping, “Wait a second. What even makes you think this is your kid?”
She’d already given it away, but his answer was a quiet, heartfelt, “Because I’m not that lucky.”
B.J. looked like she was going to cry, and he felt like a heel for saying such a thing. He wasn’t typically a rude man. But B.J. wasn’t the type to break down and bawl when her feelings were hurt either. So why did the two of them together seem to bring out the worst in each other?
God, he wanted to scrub his face with his hands and mutter, “What a disaster,” but he didn’t want to hurt her any further. She already looked like she was on the edge and might crumble any second. He sighed then and really did scrub his face with his hands.
“I guess we’ll need to get married,” he announced, sounding none too pleased.
“What?” she yelped. “Oh, no. Hell, no. I’m not getting married. I’m not marrying anyone.”
Again, Grady sighed. “B.J., there’s a child to consider.”
“So?” she retorted, taking a good three steps in reverse and holding up her hands to ward him off. “Single parents raise kids all the time. It’s not a big deal.”
“Well, I want my child to have two parents,” he said slowly, holding back his impatience. “Living in one house.”
“Hey, you can want all you like in one hand and shit in the other. See which one fills up faster, okay, Slim, because I’m not getting married.”
“Will you just be reasonable?”
“Reasonable?” she shouted. “You’re the one losing it. Do you know how freaking disastrous it would be for us to get freaking married? God, Grady. Do I look like June Cleaver to you? I’m telling you, it would not work.”
Grady studied her for a moment before he spoke with complete assuredness in his voice. “We’re getting married.”
****
B.J. couldn’t believe her ears. The man had lost his mind. He’d gone insane.
But marriage?
Could he mention anything crazier? Probably, but marriage was as far as her imagination could span at the moment. She was just too. . .befuddled to think much of anything. Befuddled and maybe a little scared, because the notion of tying herself to Grady Rawlings for the rest of eternity was. . .well, she couldn’t even allow her brain to go there. But the idea made her shiver from the inside out—and not because she was cold. . .or disgusted.
“I came over here,” he was saying, “prepared to cuss you up one wall and down the other—”
“Well, I really wish you’d get to that instead,” she interrupted. “And quit blathering on about marriage.” The word caused her to shudder again.
Pretending he hadn’t heard her, he continued, “But now that I’m thinking about it, it doesn’t seem so awful. I mean, Amy wanted me to be a father. She died trying to make that happen. What if this is her way of getting her wish?”
B.J. didn’t want to argue with such a hopeful statement. What she really wanted was to curl into a ball and weep. That was probably why she sounded so sympathetic when she said, “But what if I miscarry like she did?”
He went still at the question, and she bit her lip. She almost couldn’t go on, as touchy a subject as this was, but she had a point to prove, an
d she meant to do it no matter how much it hurt him, though hurting him just might kill her.
“What then, huh, smart guy? Suddenly there’s no baby, and we’re still married. Think about that. It’s the stupidest thing in the world to get married just because of a child. If you really want to be involved in this kid’s life, we’ll work out some custody issues. You can have as much daddy time as you want. But that’s it.”
He was shaking his head before she even finished talking. “I want more.”
“There is no more. I mean. . .what. . .what about love?”
He sent her sharp look. “What about it?”
“We don’t love each other,” she blurted out desperately. “How can you expect a marriage to last if the people getting hitched don’t even love each other? Jesus, it’s hard enough when they do.”
“Love isn’t any kind of guarantee. I loved Amy and we didn’t last, now did we?”
“But. . .she died.”
“What’s your point? Death, divorce, it doesn’t matter. I’m not with her anymore. Love doesn’t mean forever.”
B.J. didn’t have a comeback. She merely stared at him mutinously. She wasn’t going to give in, though, and realizing it, Grady sighed in irritation.
“To tell you the truth,” he said quietly, “I’d just as soon not be in love the next go-round.”
“Gee, thanks,” the words blurted out of her before she could stop them. But really. Ouch. No matter how tough she acted, hearing him say he didn’t want to ever love her stung like a son of a bitch, and there was no way she could’ve hidden her knee-jerk reaction of wincing.
His lips parted with the realization he’d actually hurt her feelings, and the apology in his eyes made her humiliation complete. She looked away.
“I didn’t mean—” he started, but she lifted her hand to stop him.
“I know what you meant. Don’t sweat it.”
“No,” he said. “You don’t know. You don’t know at all. That’s just it. I can’t. . .I won’t ever let any woman. . .I mean, if I did, it could be Amy all over again. Don’t you see? If I left myself open, someone else could leave me, or die, or whatever, and there’d be one more huge, gaping hole split open right through the middle of me. So I’m just going to pass on the whole love thing from now on, because I could certainly do without that kind of heartbreak for the rest of my life.”
