The Perfect Father

by Penny Jordan

  a career woman who worked in the hard-nosed business of modern computer technology, where logic was a necessity—to give in to the impulse to throw caution to the winds and go with the heady wave of emotion which had stormed her, riding its crest triumphantly like Pacific surf as she told Cliff that not only could she disprove his words but that she actually would.

  Naturally it ill behoved the daughter of the State’s Governor to give in to such a hotheaded impulse. Her father was another mark against her in Cliff’s eyes, of course. She had overheard the sneering comments he had made to another colleague when she had been offered the job he had tried so desperately hard to win for himself.

  ‘It’s obvious she wouldn’t have had a chance if it hadn’t been for the fact that her father is the State Governor,’ she had heard him saying bitterly. ‘No prizes for guessing just what’s going on. The company has put in tenders for government work and what better way to tip the odds in their favour than by getting in the Governor’s good books by promoting his daughter...’

  It wasn’t true, Samantha knew that. She had won that promotion on merit. She was, quite simply, the better person for the job and she had told Cliff so in no uncertain terms. He hadn’t liked hearing her saying it, no sirree, and PENNY JORDAN

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  he had liked it even less when she had beaten him hands down in the firm’s annual golf tournament.

  She had Liam to thank for that. He was a first-rate player and, even as a teenager, he had never allowed her the indulgence of beating him, mercilessly telling her just where she was going wrong. He was equally good at playing chess—and poker—which was why her father claimed he would make a first-rate Governor.

  Her parents had been discussing that very subject when they had all sat down to supper earlier in the week.

  ‘Well, I can understand why you’re so keen that Liam should run for Governor when you retire,’ her mother had agreed, ‘but if he gets elected he’s going to be the youn-gest Governor this state has ever had.’

  ‘Mmm...he’s thirty-seven, which I guess does make him a little on the young side.’

  ‘Thirty-seven and unmarried,’ Sarah Jane had persisted.

  ‘He’d stand a far better chance of getting in if he had a wife...’

  As Stephen Miller raised his eyebrows, Sam’s mother had insisted, ‘Don’t look at me like that. You know it’s true. Voters like the idea of their Governor being a happily married family man. It makes them feel secure and it reinforces their instinctive beliefs that...’

  ‘...that what? A married man is a better Governor than an unmarried one?’ her father had asked dryly. But he still had to concede that Sarah Jane had a point.

  ‘Well, Liam certainly isn’t short of suitable candidates for the position of his wife,’ her father had admired, immediately looking a little shamefaced as her mother had expostulated.

  ‘Stephen Miller, I do believe you are envious of him!’

  ‘Envious. No, of course I’m not,’ he had protested.

  ‘Well, I should think you should look a mite ashamed,’

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  THE PERFECT FATHER

  her mother scolded mock severely. ‘Otherwise I might start to believe that you don’t appreciate either me or your family.’

  ‘Honey, you know that just isn’t true,’ her father had responded immediately and so tenderly that tears had filled Samantha’s eyes.

  How could she ever accept second-best when she had before her not just the example of her twin’s fervently happy marriage, but that of her darling, wonderful parents and, of course, her grandparents who were still just as much in love with one another now as they had been that fateful war-torn summer they had first met.

  Only she seemed unable to find a mate for herself, a mate who would love her and father the children Cliff had so hatefully taunted her that no man would want to give her.

  Oh, but what she would give to prove him wrong, to walk into that general office not just with her wonderful Mr. Right on her arm but with her stomach triumphantly, wonderfully big with his child...his children... As yet Bobbie hadn’t followed in the Crighton family tradition and conceived twins. She had hoped earlier on in her current pregnancy she might have done, but her routine scans had shown that there was only one baby, although now in the late stages of her pregnancy Bobbie was grumbling that she felt large enough to be carrying quads.

  Twins!

  Twins... They ran through the history of the Crighton family like an often-repeated refrain and yet, oddly, despite all the new marriages which had taken place these last few years amongst her cousins—first, seconds and thirds—no one had, as yet, produced the next generation of double births.

  Samantha closed her eyes. She could see herself now, PENNY JORDAN

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  leaning a little heavily onto the strong supporting arm of her love, her smile beatific, her body weighed down by the twin babies she was carrying perhaps, but her spirits, her heart, buoyed up with love and excitement.

  ‘Sam.’

  The sharp warning note in her twin’s voice was so clear, so real, that Bobbie could almost have been there beside her.

  Guiltily she opened her eyes and then realised that someone had actually spoken to her but that that someone was most definitely not her beloved twin sister.

  Exhaling warily she looked up into the silver-grey eyes of Liam Connolly.

  Yes, looked up because Liam, thanks, or so he said, to the Viking ancestry he claimed he possessed through his mother’s Norwegian family and in spite of his quite definitely un-Nordic very dark hair, was actually a good three inches taller than she was herself, taller even than her own father—just.

  ‘Er, L—Liam...’ Why on earth was she stuttering and stammering like a child caught with her fingers in a forbidden cookie jar? Samantha wondered.

  Liam indicated the busy road in front of them and told her dryly, ‘I know you like to think you’re super-human but somehow I don’t think the right way to try to prove it is to cross the freeway with your eyes closed. Besides, we have a law in this state against jaywalking, you know.’

  As Sam heaved a small rebellious sigh, she had no idea what it was about Liam that always made her feel as though she was still fourteen years old and hot-headedly troublesome with it, but somehow or other he always did.

  ‘Dad says you’ve agreed to run for State Governor when he retires,’ she announced, trying to change the subject.

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  THE PERFECT FATHER

  ‘Mmm...’ He shot her a perceptive look from those incredible eyes that sometimes could seem so sexily smoky and smouldering and at other times could look so flintily cold that they could turn your heart to ice and your conscience to a clear piece of Perspex with every small sin clearly visible through it.

  ‘I take it you don’t approve?’

  ‘You’re thirty-seven. New Wiltshire County practically runs itself. I should have thought you’d want something you could get your teeth into a little more.’

  ‘Like what? President?’ Liam drawled. ‘New Wiltshire County might not mean much to you, but believe me it’s got a hell of a lot going for it. Do you realise that we’re well on our way to passing new state legislation which will actually have our people voluntarily giving up their guns? Did you know that we have one of the lowest rates of unemployment in the entire union and that our kids have one of the highest overall pass out grades from high school? Did you know that our welfare programme has just been applauded as one of the finest in the union and that...’

  ‘Yes...Yes, I do know all those things, and I’m not knocking the county. It’s my home, after all, and I love it. My father is its Governor and...’

  Fixing his steel-grey gaze on her, Liam ignored what she was saying, demanding seriously, ‘Did you know that the gardens surrounding the Governor’s residence have been declared a tribute to our Governor’s lady’s taste and knowledge of—’

  ‘Oh, but I designed those,’ Sam began and then stopped, g
laring accusingly at him.

  ‘Oh, all right, you got me there,’ she acknowledged ruefully, her own mouth curving into a reluctant smile as she saw the humour in the curl of Liam’s mouth.

  PENNY JORDAN

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  ‘New Wiltshire County is a wonderful place, Liam, I know that. I just thought you might prefer something a little bit more...a little bit less parochial,’ she told him dryly, unable to resist adding, ‘After all, you seem to spend an awful lot of time in Washington.’

  ‘With your father,’ Liam replied promptly before adding, ‘but if I’d realised that you were missing me...’

  Sam gave him a withering look.

  ‘Don’t give me that,’ she warned him. ‘I know you—

  remember... I don’t know what all those girls you date see in you Liam—’ she began severely.

  ‘No?’ he interrupted her swiftly. ‘Want me to show you?’

  To her own irritation Sam could feel herself starting to colour up a little.

  She knew perfectly well that Liam was only teasing her.

  She ought to; after all, he had been doing it for long enough.

  ‘No thanks,’ she responded automatically. ‘I prefer exclusivity in my men. Exclusivity and brown eyes,’ she told him mock musingly. ‘Yes, there is quite definitely something about a man with brown eyes.’

  ‘Brown eyes... Mmm... Well, I guess I could always keep mine closed—or wear contact lenses. What were you thinking about when I saw you just then?’ he demanded, completely changing tack.

  ‘Thinking about?’

  Samantha knew perfectly well how he would read it if she was to tell him. He would be even more disapproving and dismissive than her twin sister.

  ‘Er...nothing...not really,’ she fibbed, then as she saw him start to frown and guessed that he wasn’t going to let her answer stand without some further questioning, she 20

  THE PERFECT FATHER

  added quickly, ‘I was thinking about my upcoming visit to Bobbie.’

  ‘You’re going to England?’

  Samantha shot him an uncertain look. He was frowning and his voice had sharpened almost to the point of curt-ness.

  ‘Uh-huh, for a whole month. More than long enough I guess for Bobbie to put her matchmaking plans into practice,’ she told him flippantly.

  ‘Bobbie’s trying to matchmake for you?’

  ‘You know what she’s like.’ Samantha shrugged. ‘She’s so besotted with Luke that she wants to see me equally happily married off. You’d better watch out, Liam,’ she joked, ‘You’re even older than me. She could be matchmaking for you next! Mind you, perhaps she’s right.

  England could be the place to find a man,’ Samantha mused, her eyes clouding as she remembered Cliff’s taunt.

  ‘There is something deeply attractive about English men.’

  ‘Especially when they’ve got brown eyes?’ Liam asked in an unfamiliarly hard voice.

  ‘Umm...especially then,’ Samantha agreed unseriously.

  But Liam, it seemed, was taking the subject much more seriously than she was because he looked away from her and when he looked back his eyes were a particularly cold and analytical shade of grey.

  ‘It wouldn’t be one specific brown-eyed Englishman we are talking about, would it?’

  ‘One specific...’ Samantha was lost. ‘Well, gee, I guess one would be enough,’ she agreed, putting on her best country-cousin hill-billy voice. ‘At least to start with, but then... What are you getting at, Liam?’ she asked him, dropping the fake accent as she saw the way he was watching her.

  ‘I was just remembering the way Luke’s brother was PENNY JORDAN

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  watching you at Luke and Bobbie’s wedding,’ he told her coolly. ‘ His eyes were brown, if I remember correctly.’

  ‘James...’ Samantha frowned. She couldn’t quite remember what colour his eyes had been and most certainly James had been a real honey, seriously good-looking and seriously open about his own desire to settle down and raise a family, no commitment phobia there and most definitely no bias against tall independent women. No sirree.

  ‘Mmm...you’re right, they were, ’ she agreed, giving Liam an absent smile.

  ‘Of course, we’d have brown-eyed babies.’

  ‘ What did you say...’

  Vaguely, Samantha looked at Liam. She had just had the most wonderful idea.

  ‘Brown-eyes genes dominate over blue, don’t they?’

  she asked him, not expecting a response.

  ‘Sam, just what the hell is going on?’

  Liam grabbed hold of her upper arm, not painfully but firmly enough for Samantha to recognise that he wasn’t easily going to let go of her.

  She gave a small sigh and looked up at him.

  ‘Liam, would you say that I was the kind of woman who couldn’t...who a man wouldn’t...’ She stopped as her throat threatened to clog with tears, swallowing them down fiercely before continuing gruffly, ‘Someone told me today that I’m not woman enough for a man to want her to...to...to become a mother. Well, I’m going to prove him wrong, Liam... I’m going to prove him so wrong that...

  ‘I’m going to go to England and I’m going to find myself a man who knows how to love and value a real woman, the real woman in me and he’s going to love me and I’m going to love him so much that...

  ‘Let me go, Liam,’ she demanded, aware that he’d 22

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  tightened his grip on her. ‘I’ve already overrun my lunch hour and I’ve got about a million and one things I have to do...’

  ‘Samantha,’ Liam began warningly, but she’d already pulled free of him and was walking away. Her mind was made up even if rather ironically it had taken Liam of all people to point her in the right direction and there was no way she was going to let anyone change it. In England she would find love just as her twin had done. Why on earth hadn’t she thought of that...realised that before?

  English men were different. English men weren’t like Cliff. English men... One Englishman would love her as she so longed to be loved and she would love him right back.

  Already she was regretting having told Liam as much as she had. Oh, that wilful impetuous tongue of hers, but she certainly wasn’t going to tell anyone else—not even Bobbie. No, her quest to find her perfect Mr. Right, the perfect father for the babies she so longed to have, was going to be her secret and hers alone.

  Her eyes sparkling with elation, Samantha walked back into her office building.

  CHAPTER TWO

  ‘JUST think, in a little over a week I shall be in Haslewich with Bobbie.’

  Samantha closed her eyes and smiled in delicious anticipation, looking more like the teenager she had been when Liam had first met her than the sophisticated, independent career woman she now was.

  On the opposite side of the elegant mahogany dining table, which was a family heirloom and which her mother had insisted on bringing with them from the family residence in the small town which her husband’s family had virtually founded to the Governor’s residence where they now all lived together, Sarah Jane Miller smiled tenderly at her daughter.

  ‘I really do envy you, darling,’ she told her. ‘I just wish that your father and I were coming with you but it’s impossible right now.’

  ‘I know, but at least you’ll be getting to spend Christmas with Bobbie this year. Dad’s term of office will have finished by then.’

  ‘Mmm... I must admit I shan’t be sorry,’ her mother responded, and then looked apologetically across the table to the fourth member of the quartet.

  Over the years Liam Connolly had worked for her husband the two men had become very close and Sarah Jane knew it was no secret to Liam that she preferred the elegant New England home she had shared with her husband to the rather less intimate atmosphere of the 23

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  THE PERFECT FATHER

  Governor’s residence which was also home to the state’s small suite of administration office
s.

  ‘Oh, Liam, it’s not that the house isn’t...’ She stopped and laughed, shaking her head. ‘What am I saying,’ she chuckled ruefully. ‘ You know all too well that I can’t wait to get back to our own home. I hope that when you do decide to marry that you’ll warn your wife-to-be just what she’s going to have to take on...when she moves in here...’

  ‘It isn’t a foregone conclusion that I’ll get elected to the governorship,’ Liam reminded her dryly.

  ‘Oh, but I hope you do,’ Samantha’s mother insisted.

  ‘You’re so obviously the very best man for the job.’

  ‘Sarah Jane is right,’ Samantha’s father cut in warmly.

  ‘And I can tell you, Liam, that I’ve heard on the grapevine that the New Wiltshire and even some Washington host-esses are already preparing their celebratory dinners for you.’

  Dutifully Samantha joined in her mother’s amused laughter but for some reason she couldn’t define, she didn’t find the idea of Liam being vetted by the sophisticated women of Washington as pleasantly amusing as both her parents did.

  ‘There is one thing you are going to have to consider though, Liam,’ her father was continuing in a more serious vein. ‘I’m not saying that your election to the governorship is dependent on it, but there’s no getting away from the fact that as a married man you would significantly increase your appeal to the voters.’

  Very carefully Liam put the pear he had been peeling back on his plate. He had, Samantha noticed, unlike her, managed to remove most of its skin without either dras-tically altering the shape of the fruit or covering himself in its juice. But then, Liam was like that. She had seen PENNY JORDAN

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  him remove his suit jacket to set about lending a hand to some mundane task requiring the kind of muscle power so very evident in his six-foot-four broad-shouldered frame and complete the job without even managing to get a speck of dirt on his immaculately clean shirt. She, on the other hand, couldn’t so much as open a fridge door without knocking something over.

  ‘It’s only a matter of months before voting takes place,’

  Liam reminded her father dryly. ‘Somehow I feel that the voters would be less than impressed by a hasty and a very obviously publicity-planned marriage.’