Feeling her body whisper along his just reminded him how useless all the arguments he’d tried to use to keep from coming here had been.
Her smile warmed him. “I just wanted to say thank you in private. I didn’t think you’d like a public display of gratitude, even if it is my family.”
She was beginning to understand him, he thought. Or maybe she’d always understood, and it was he who hadn’t. “Well, I’m waiting.”
The smile turned into a impish grin. “Really?”
“Really.”
Talk about an about-face. Christa stood on her toes and sealed her mouth to his. It was like a plug entering a socket. Instant electricity went flowing through her. Through him.
The fit felt so right.
His body, heating, leaned into hers as he took her into his arms. His mouth made love to her, making silent promises he intended to keep.
He tasted her moan in his mouth and knew that he hadn’t blown it by keeping away. He’d been afraid of that, afraid that she would accuse him of playing games and send him packing. The only game he knew how to play was for keeps. He had needed the time to sort out his thoughts and the feelings that were breaking free. Time to sort them out and put the guilt aside once and for all. What he felt for Christa had given him the strength to accept what he couldn’t change.
He drew his head back and looked into her eyes. “Well, that was good for starters,” he told her.
There was something different about him, more relaxed, something more—She didn’t know. It didn’t have a name. It just was.
“We could work on a continuance,” she offered.
“I’d like that.” He fitted his arms comfortably about her waist. “I wasn’t late because I had trouble putting that thing together, you know.”
“I know.” And she did. But she had allowed him his excuse if it had made him feel better.
Of course she knew. She knew everything. Especially the way to his heart. “I was giving myself one last chance to back out.”
She wasn’t going to ask why. She could guess. It didn’t matter. “Failed, huh?”
He nodded. “Miserably.”
“Are you?” She searched his face. “Are you miserable?”
“No, I’m not.” His hands tightened around her. “Not anymore. You cracked the darkness, Christa. The black shell I’d crawled into. I can’t stay there anymore.” He kissed her face, one tiny kiss at a time. He could feel her excitement. Feel his own as it grew. “Spears of daylight keep coming in. Rays of sunshine. And they all have your name on it. Yours and Robin’s.”
If her heart hammered any harder, it was going to fall out. “Speaking for both of us, that makes us very happy.” Suddenly, she remembered. “Oh, I have a gift for you, too.”
A gift? Why would she buy him anything? She’d already given him the greatest gift a man could hope for. His soul.
“It’s not my birthday.” But maybe in a way, it was. The birth of the rest of his life.
He hoped.
She laughed, shaking her head as she opened the storage unit. With all the gifts spread out in the living room, it was now empty, except for the one wrapped gift she’d placed inside. “You don’t have to have an occasion, or a reason, to buy a gift. Here.”
He made quick work of the wrapping paper, feeling like a kid for perhaps the first time. She’d done that for him, too.
He was holding the model of the race car he’d seen in the toy store. Surprised, Malcolm looked into her face.
She couldn’t read his expression. Did he like it? Or had she just made a fool of herself? “You’ve given me so much, I just wanted to give you something, and I didn’t know what.”
He laid the box down. He couldn’t hold it and her at the same time. Malcolm drew her back into his arms.
“You already did. You gave me back my life. Being around you and Robin makes me happy. I felt guilty about that, guilty that I was drawn to someone else, that I wanted another family. But you were right. It wasn’t my fault.” He’d gone over and over it in his mind the past few days, rather than shutting it out the way he’d done these past few years. It made him aware of things, things he had no control over. “I really did everything I could.”
Safe in the haven of his arms, she raised her eyes to meet his. “I know.”
What had he ever done to deserve to get so lucky twice? “I need you, Christa, you and Robin. I’m a family man without a family, which leaves me with a vacancy. Do you want to fill the position?”
She cocked her head and regarded him thoughtfully. “That all depends.”
He wasn’t aware that he had stopped breathing, but she was. “On what?”
“Do you love me?”
Malcolm stared at her, dumbfounded. “Oh course I love you. I wouldn’t be asking you to marry me if I didn’t.”
Her eyes coaxed him. “Then say it.”
“Say what?”
“That you love me.”
Nothing pleased him more. “I love you. I love you, Christa, and I want you to marry me. Okay?”
“Very okay.” She lifted her mouth to his to show him just how okay it was.
Jonas knocked on the inside of the sliding glass door. Too content to feel self-conscious, they merely looked at him.
“You two get lost out here?” As the question came out, he saw the embrace he’d interrupted. “Never mind.” Turning on his heel, he waved a dismissive hand in their direction, pretending that he’d never seen them. “Carry on.”
Which they did.
Neither one noticed the tiny figure beyond the glass, who clapped her hands with glee and laughed before running after her grandfather.
* * * * *
eISBN 978-14592-8011-3
THE MAN WHO WOULD BE DADDY
Copyright © 1996 by Marie Rydzynski-Ferrarella
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Silhouette Books, 300 East 42nd Street, New York, NY 10017 U.S.A.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A
® and TM are trademarks of Harlequin Books S.A., used under license. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.
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The Man Who Would Be Daddy Page 16
