Melissa poured him a cup of coffee, snatched the twenty and tucked it in her pocket. “The coffee’s on me. I’ll consider the twenty a tip for services rendered.”
Flags of angry color rose in Cody’s cheeks. His grip on his coffee cup tightened, turning his knuckles white. “There’s a name for taking money for that, darlin’.”
Mabel sputtered and backed off her stool so fast it was still spinning a full minute after she’d gone. Melissa had a hunch she wasn’t all that far, though, more than likely not even out of earshot.
“How dare you!” Melissa snapped.
“You started this round, not me,” he said tightly. “Care to back up and start over?”
“We can’t back up that many years,” she retorted.
Cody visibly restrained his temper. Melissa watched as he drew in several calming breaths, even as his heated gaze remained locked on her. Her blood practically sizzled under that look. No matter how furious he made her, she still seemed to want him. It was damned provoking.
“Believe it or not, I came in here to apologize,” he said eventually, his voice low.
“What’s to apologize for? Just because you didn’t mention that you were involved with another woman—a woman who apparently traveled quite some distance to be with you—that doesn’t mean you owe me an apology.”
To her annoyance, amusement sparkled in Cody’s eyes. “I don’t have a thing to hide, sweet pea. Want me to tell you about Janey?”
Melissa did not want to hear about the gorgeous creature with the exotic features, elfin haircut and sad, sad eyes. Cody had probably broken her heart, too.
“I can see that you do,” Cody said, taking the decision out of her hands. “First of all, yes, Janey is from Wyoming. Second, I had no idea she was coming. Third, our relationship—then and now— most definitely is not what you think it was.”
“Yeah, right,” Melissa said sarcastically.
“Fourth,” he went on as if she hadn’t interrupted. “Her father was my boss, Lance Treethorn.”
He leveled his gaze straight at her, until she felt color flooding into her cheeks. “Fifth, and most important, she is a fifteen-year-old kid.”
Melissa stared at him. “Fifteen,” she repeated in a choked voice. “Cody, that’s—”
He cut her off before she could finish the ugly thought. “What that is, is a shy, lonely teenager with a crush on the first guy who didn’t slobber all over her due to adolescent hormones,” he insisted adamantly.
Melissa wanted to believe him. In fact, she did believe him. Cody was far too honorable a man to do anything so despicable. Harlan might have raised stubborn, willful, overly confident sons, but he’d instilled a set of values in them that was beyond reproach. She was the one who ought to be horsewhipped for even allowing such a thought to cross her mind.
She moaned and hid her face in her hands. “God, I’m sorry.”
Cody shrugged. “Well, she does look older than she is. That’s been her problem. The guys ahead of her in school think she’s a lot more mature than she is and try to take advantage of her. She’s coped by hiding out at the ranch.”
“And you were kind to her, so she developed a crush on you,” Melissa concluded, feeling like an idiot. “Why didn’t you do something to put a stop to it?”
“For one thing, I had no idea it would go this far. The most overt thing she ever did before was leave food for me. She bakes a brownie that makes your mouth water.”
Melissa grinned. “You always were a sucker for brownies.”
“It was the first thing you learned to bake, remember? You were twelve, I think.”
She remembered all right. Even back then she’d been trying to woo Cody by catering to his every whim. She wondered if it was ever possible to get beyond past history and truly have a new beginning. She’d been facetious when she’d snapped earlier that they couldn’t go back far enough to start over, but maybe it was true. Maybe there was no way to ever get past all the mistakes and the distrust.
Despondency stole through her as she considered the possibility that they would never be able to move on.
“Melissa?” Cody said softly.
“What?”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“I don’t believe that. You looked as if you were about ready to cry.”
She tried to shrug off the observation. “Don’t mind me. It’s probably just Monday blues.”
“I know how to cure that,” he said. “Come out to White Pines tonight. We’ll have a barbecue. It’s warm enough today.”
Melissa didn’t think spending more time with Cody was such a good idea, not when parting suddenly seemed inevitable. Maybe Janey Treethorn’s presence had been innocent enough, but sooner or later some other woman would catch his eye. They always did.
“The temperature’s supposed to drop later,” she said by way of declining his invitation. “It might even snow overnight.”
Cody’s expression remained undaunted. “Then I’ll wear a jacket to tend the grill and we can eat inside.”
“You never give up, do you?”
“Never,” he agreed softly, his gaze locked with hers. “Not when it’s something this important.”
“What is it that’s important, Cody?” she asked, unable to keep a hint of desperation out of her voice. “What?”
“You, me, Sharon Lynn,” he said. “I want us to be a family, Melissa. I won’t settle for anything less this time.”
She heard the determination in his voice. More important, she heard the commitment. He sounded so sincere, so convinced that a family was what he wanted.
“Will you come?” he asked again. “You and Sharon Lynn?”
Melissa sighed. She’d never been able to resist Cody when he got that winsome note in his voice, when that thoroughly engaging smile reached all the way to his dark and dangerous eyes.
“What time?”
“Five-thirty?”
“We’ll be there.”
“My house,” he said. “Not the main house.”
Thoughts of making love in that house flooded through her. Melissa shook her head. “No,” she insisted. “Let’s have dinner with Harlan, too.”
“Scared, Me…liss…a?”
“You bet, cowboy. You should be, too.” She lowered her voice. “The last time we were alone in that house, we made love and we didn’t take precautions. I’m not risking that again.”
Cody grinned. “Hey, darlin’, that’s something I can take care of right here and now,” he offered. “I’m sure Eli can fix me right up.”
Melissa’s cheeks flamed at the prospect of having Eli and Mabel know any more of her business than they already did. “Cody, don’t you dare. Besides, we decided that sleeping together only complicated things.”
“Did we decide that?”
“You know we did. We have dinner at Harlan’s or you can forget it.”
“Okay, darlin’, I’ll let you win this round,” he said, startling her with his lack of fussing. “See you at five-thirty.”
It wasn’t until she arrived at White Pines that she discovered the reason for Cody’s calm acceptance of her edict.
“Where’s Harlan?” she inquired suspiciously the minute she stepped into the too silent foyer of the main house.
Cody’s expression was pure innocence as he gazed back at her. “Oh, didn’t I mention it? Daddy’s gone to spend a few days with Luke and Jessie.”
With Sharon Lynn already happily ensconced in her father’s arms, with a huge stack of ribs just waiting to be barbecued, Melissa bit back the urge to turn right around and flee. This round, it appeared, had gone to Cody.
Chapter Fourteen
For the next two months, Cody won more rounds than he lost, much to Melissa’s chagrin. Though she’d turned down his proposals every time he made them, he took the rejections in stride. He just redoubled his efforts to change her mind. Her resistance was in tatters. Her senses were spinning just at the sight of him. S
he was clinging to the last shreds of pride and determination she had left.
There were moments, she was forced to admit, when she couldn’t even remember why she was so staunch in her conviction that marrying Cody was positively the wrong thing to do. He had done absolutely nothing since his return to indicate that he wasn’t thoroughly absorbed in his relationship with her and their child. He was sweetly attentive to her. He doted on Sharon Lynn.
And still, for reasons she was finding harder and harder to fathom, she kept waiting for some other woman to come between them, for some blowup that would send Cody racing away from Texas, away from them. It didn’t seem to matter that his roots at White Pines ran deeper than ever. He’d left his home and her once before. She never forgot that, wouldn’t let herself forget it.
She put more obstacles in their path to happiness than championship hurdlers had ever had to jump. Cody, just as determinedly, overcame each and every one, without criticism, without comment. He just did whatever was asked of him.
The truth of it was that his thoughtfulness and consideration were beginning to wear on her. She figured it was an indication of the depths of her perversity that she longed for a good, old, rip-roaring fight.
She was already working herself into a confrontational state when she reached her mother’s after a particularly exhausting day at work, only to find that Sharon Lynn wasn’t there.
“What do you mean, she’s not here?” she demanded, staring at her father. Her mother was nowhere in sight, which should have been her first clue that her life was about to turn topsy-turvy.
“Cody came by,” her father admitted. “I let him take her.”
“You what?” Her voice climbed several octaves. Was everyone in town on Cody’s side these days? She’d thought for sure at least her parents would stick up for her. Instead her father had joined the enemy camp.
“Why would you do that?” she asked plaintively.
Her father regarded her with amusement. “He’s the child’s father, for starters. He wanted to spend some time with her. He said he’d drop her off at your house and save you the trip. I guess he didn’t tell you that, though.”
“No, he did not,” she snapped. “Which is a pretty good indication of why Cody Adams is not to be trusted.”
“If you ask me, he’s been jumping through hoops to prove he can be trusted. Why don’t you give the guy a break?” He patted her cheek. “Come on, ladybug. You know you want to.”
“I can’t,” she said simply.
“Why not?”
“Because he’ll leave again at the first sign of trouble.”
“He left before, because you provoked him into it. I can’t say I blame him for being furious about finding you out with Brian. Going out with him was a danged fool idea to begin with.”
Melissa’s anger wilted. “I agree, but Cody should have stayed and talked to me. He shouldn’t have run.”
“Don’t you think he knows that now?” her father inquired reasonably. “Don’t you think if he had it to do all over again, he would make a different choice?”
“I suppose,” she conceded reluctantly. “He says he would anyway.”
“And aren’t you the one who made things worse by refusing to tell him about the baby?”
She scowled at her father, the man who had stood by her even though he disagreed with her decision to keep Cody in the dark. “What’s your point?”
“He forgave you, didn’t he? Isn’t it about time you did the same for him?”
Melissa was startled by the depth of her father’s support for Cody. “How come you’ve never said any of this before?” she asked.
Her father’s expression turned rueful. “Because your mother seemed to be saying more than enough without me jumping in and confusing you even more. Watching you getting more miserable day by day, I finally decided when Cody showed up today that enough was enough. I told her to butt out.”
Melissa couldn’t help grinning. “So there’d be room for you to butt in?”
“Something like that. Go on, cupcake. Meet Cody halfway, at least. For whatever it’s worth, I think he’s a fine man.”
Melissa sighed. “So do I.”
She made up her mind on the walk to her own house that she would try to overcome the last of her doubts and take the kind of risk her father was urging. There was a time when she would have risked anything at all to be with Cody. The pain of losing him once had made her far too cautious. It was probably long past time to rediscover the old Melissa and take the dare he’d been issuing for months now.
She found him in a rocker on her front porch, a tuckered out Sharon Lynn asleep in his lap.
“Rough afternoon?” she queried, keeping her tone light and displaying none of the annoyance she’d felt when she’d discovered he’d absconded with her daughter. She sank into the rocker next to him and put it into a slow, soothing motion. She allowed her eyes to drift closed, then snapped them open before she fell completely, embarrassingly, asleep.
“Playing in the park is tough work,” he said, grinning at her. “There are swings and seesaws to ride, to say nothing of squirrels to be chased.” His gaze intensified. “You look frazzled. Bad day?”
“Bad day, bad week, bad everything,” she admitted, giving in to the exhaustion and turmoil she’d been fighting.
“I know just how to fix that,” Cody said, standing. He shifted Sharon Lynn into one arm and held out a hand. “Give me the key.”
Melissa plucked it from her purse and handed it over without argument. As soon as he’d gone, she closed her eyes again. The soothing motion of the rocker lulled her so that she was only vaguely aware of the screen door squeaking open and the sound of Cody’s boots as he crossed the porch.
“Wake up, sleepyhead,” he urged. “Here, take this.”
She forced her eyes open and saw the tall glass he was holding out. “Lemonade?” she asked with amazement. “Where’d you get it?”
“I made it.”
Her eyes blinked wider. “From scratch?”
He grinned. “I didn’t bake a chocolate soufflé, sweet pea. It’s just lemonade.”
They sat side by side, silently rocking, for what seemed an eternity after that. The spring breeze brought the fragrance of flowers wafting by. Hummingbirds hovered around the feeder at the end of the porch.
“This is nice, isn’t it?” Cody said eventually.
“Not too tame for you?” Melissa asked.
“Don’t start with me,” he chided, but without much ferocity behind the words.
She thought of what her father had said and of her own resolution to start taking risks. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that. I guess it’s become automatic.”
“Think you can break the cycle?” he inquired lightly.
Melissa met his gaze. “I’m going to try,” she promised. “I do want what you want, Cody.”
“But you’re scared,” he guessed. At her nod he added, “Can’t say that I blame you. I spent a lot of years hiding from the responsibilities of a relationship. Once you make a commitment, there’s a lot riding on getting it right. I never did much like the idea of failing.”
“Can I ask you something?”
“Anything, you know that.”
“What makes you so certain we can get it right now?”
He grinned at the question. “You know any two more stubborn people on the face of the earth?”
Her lips twitched at that. “No, can’t say that I do.”
“I pretty much figure if we finally make that commitment, neither one of us will bail out without giving it everything we’ve got.” He slanted a look over at her that sent heat curling through her body. “Nobody can do more than that, sweet pea. Nobody.”
He stood, then bent down to kiss her gently. “Think about it, darlin’.”
“You’re leaving?” she asked, unable to stop the disappointment that flooded through her.
“If I stay here another minute with you looking at me like that, I’m g
oing to resort to seducing you into giving me the answer I want. I think it’ll be better if I take my chances on letting you work this one out in your head.”
He was striding off to his pickup before she could mount an argument. She actually stood to go after him, but a wave of dizziness washed over her that had her clutching at a post to keep from falling.
What on earth? she wondered as she steadied herself. Suddenly she recalled the occasional bouts of nausea she’d been feeling that she’d chalked off to waiting too long to grab breakfast in the mornings. She thought about the bone-deep weariness that had had her half-asleep in that rocker only a short time before. And now, dizziness.
Oh, dear heaven, she thought, sinking back into the rocker before she fainted. Unless she was very much mistaken, every one of those signs added up to being pregnant—again.
* * *
How could this have happened to them a second time? Melissa wondered as she left the doctor’s office in a daze the following morning. How could she be pregnant from that one time they’d made love at Cody’s? They’d been so darned careful not to repeat the same mistake. She’d held him at arm’s length, refusing to make love again for that very reason, because neither one of them used a lick of common sense once they hopped into bed together. It was better not to let their hormones get out of hand in the first place.
She had no idea what was going to happen next, but she did know that this time she would tell Cody right away. There would be no more secrets to blow up in her face later.
Dammit, why couldn’t everything have been more resolved between them? They were so close to working things out. She had sensed that last night in their companionable silence, in the way Cody had vowed to give her the time and space to reach her own conclusions about their relationship.
She knew exactly how Cody was going to react. Forget about time and space for thinking. He was going to demand they get married at once. She wanted that, wanted it more than anything, but not if he was only doing it because of the baby. Okay, both babies.
He was a fine father. He’d accepted his responsibility for Sharon Lynn wholeheartedly. That wasn’t the issue. He’d been proving that over and over since the day he’d learned the truth about Sharon Lynn. She had seen the adoration in his eyes whenever he was with his daughter. She had watched his pride over every tiny accomplishment.
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