The Daddy Plan

by Karen Rose Smith

  Sam nodded to Patches who was asleep in his bed by the sofa. “Why don’t I come with you? Jasper and Patches can stay in the van and keep each other company. We won’t be in the store that long.”

  “You want to shop for baby things?” She knew how most men felt about shopping.

  “Let’s just say I could use an education in baby supplies.” His gaze never left hers. “If I’m going to spend time around our baby, I’ll have to know what I’ll need and how to take care of him or her.”

  A panicked look must have crossed her face.

  “I imagine I’ll be babysitting some of the time,” he continued.

  “Babysitting?”

  “Sure, or do you intend never to go out on your own again?”

  He had a point there and she wasn’t sure at all yet what she was going to do about working.

  “You’ve got nine months to work this out, Corrie, and I’ll help you.”

  The question was—would his help complicate her life or simplify it?

  It would be fun to have somebody to share the joy with. What harm would it do if Sam came along on a preliminary shopping trip with her?

  “Do you want to go to Target?”

  “I’ve never been in the baby section. This could be an eye-opener,” Sam said.

  They did as Sam suggested. After he followed Corrie to her place, they let the dogs run. Then they piled into Sam’s van. The dogs seemed happy just to sit in the back together while Corrie and Sam left them and found their way to the baby section of the department store. Corrie was so happy, she was afraid to believe she really was pregnant. As they studied the baby bottles, the diapers and other necessary supplies, she turned to Sam. “I just can’t believe it’s true—that I’m really pregnant!”

  “If your doctor says it’s true, then it’s true.”

  “Thank you, Sam.”

  “My part in this was minor,” he said wryly.

  “Without you, I wouldn’t be pregnant. I just don’t think I could have used a stranger’s sperm.”

  Looking more serious than happy for her, he responded, “I think if you had used a stranger’s sperm, this would have been easier for you, though. A stranger wouldn’t care which bottles you bought, or which diapers or whether or not you worked after you had your baby.”

  Her heart sank. “Sam…”

  “If you stay at the clinic, you can work part-time. You can take off whenever you need to.”

  “I need a full-time salary, Sam, not a part-time one. I have to think of the future, not just now.”

  “I’m thinking of the future, too, and how the time you spend or don’t spend with your baby is going to matter later.” His jaw set and he seemed determined to make her think his way.

  “Didn’t you tell me your mother wasn’t happy being a homemaker?” she probed. “Didn’t you tell me that you and your brothers knew that? I believe the best way to take care of my child is for me to be happy, too.”

  “You’re not happy at the clinic?”

  “Oh, Sam. This isn’t about whether I’m happy at the clinic or not. It’s about a new opportunity to expand my world and my child’s. You’ve got to give me time to come up with a plan that I think is best. You can’t try to argue me into looking at your side and only your side. We’ll have constant friction. Work certainly won’t be a pleasure, and raising a child will become one confrontation after another. You don’t want that, do you?”

  “Of course I don’t, but I also don’t think you can abandon a child to a new job and think you’re doing the best thing for the baby.”

  “My child will never be abandoned. You know what kind of relationship I had with my mother. Do you think for a minute I don’t want the same kind for me and my daughter or son?”

  Corrie could see that Sam’s feelings about this were deeply rooted so she went on. “My mom worked part-time when I was young, but after the divorce, she had to work full-time. Don’t you get it, Sam? It’s a fact that women don’t depend on men anymore. They don’t want to depend on men.”

  Sam’s eyes were the deepest brown Corrie had ever seen them, and he looked as if he was about to erupt. She felt close to the boiling-over stage herself.

  Just then, she heard, “Sam! Corrie! What are you doing here?”

  When Corrie glanced over her shoulder, she spotted Sara.

  Sam was the first to recover. “What are you doing here?” he questioned his sister-in-law.

  “Nathan and Kyle are making me a surprise,” she said, making quote marks with her fingers. “I think it’s a chocolate cake with peanut butter icing. They know that’s my favorite. Kyle needed a refill on his inhaler so I decided to come get that.”

  “So what are you two doing here?” Sara asked.

  “I’m pregnant,” Corrie admitted quietly.

  Sara gave her a big hug. “Congratulations.”

  “The second try at artificial insemination was a success.” Corrie wanted to make that clear. She didn’t want people to think she and Sam had slept together to make a baby, even though they had slept together.

  “That’s wonderful. Should I keep quiet about this, or can I tell Nathan and Galen?”

  “You can tell them,” Sam said with a shrug. “Everyone will know soon enough, when Corrie starts showing.”

  “That could be a few months,” Sara offered. “As soon as you tell a few people, everyone will know. But the family can keep it quiet if that’s what you want.”

  “I guess that will be up to Corrie.”

  “I just found out this evening and I’m trying to absorb it. Go ahead and tell Nathan and Galen. I’m sure Sam will want to tell Ben, too. But other than family, I think we’ll keep it quiet for a while.”

  As if Sara sensed the tension between them, she tucked her pharmacy bag under her arm. “I’ll let you two alone. I imagine you have a lot to discuss.” After a hug for Sam and a final wave goodbye, Sara walked down the aisle and headed for the front of the store.

  Corrie didn’t break the uncomfortable silence.

  Sam finally concluded, “We do have a lot to discuss, including what happened Sunday.”

  “When I went to your place tonight, I was so happy and excited, Sam. But now, you’re making me wish I had gone to that fertility clinic in Minneapolis. I think our research trip is over for tonight. I’d like to go home.”

  Without waiting for Sam, she headed for the front of the store. He was not going to bully her or boss her or tell her what to do. She wouldn’t let him, not now, and not after the baby was born.

  The baby.

  Their baby.

  Sam’s baby.

  Corrie’s heart hurt. Each day that passed, it hurt a little more. Sam had backed off. In the past five days, he hadn’t spoken to her about the job…or about their baby. Was he giving her time to think, or was he giving himself time to build a persuasive argument that would convince her he was right?

  By Wednesday morning when Corrie exited an exam room after another professional—and only professional—consultation with Sam, her turmoil was giving her a headache. Not only were her feelings for Sam interfering with her usually calm life, but her dad was coming on Sunday and staying for a week!

  When Corrie spotted Alicia standing by the receptionist’s counter, the pounding in her head increased. Her first thought was to go up to the woman and tell her Sam wasn’t here. But that would be stupid. Corrie had absolutely no say whatsoever in Sam’s life.

  She wanted it that way, didn’t she?

  The truth was, she didn’t know what she wanted where Sam was concerned. They were two reasonable adults for goodness sakes! Why was everything getting so muddled?

  Alicia spotted Corrie. Giving her one of those fake smiles, she beckoned to her.

  Corrie crossed to her.

  “Jenny was just telling me she didn’t know how long Sam would be with his patient. Do you have any idea? I’d really like to see him for a few minutes.”

  “He’ll be finished shortly. He’s just giving
final instructions.”

  Jenny interjected, “I told Miss Walker that he doesn’t have a break between patients.”

  “I only need to talk to him for about two minutes, just to make a lunch or supper date. I promise, I won’t hold him up. I know how busy he is,” Alicia said sweetly.

  Jenny gave Corrie a what-can-we-do look, and Corrie knew this was Sam’s business, not theirs.

  The door to the exam room opened and Sam came striding out. When he saw the three women at the desk, he stopped. The decision of whether he wanted to talk to his ex-fiancée was his; Corrie was just afraid that he did.

  “Alicia,” he greeted her, neither with a smile nor frown. That was the thing about Sam. When he didn’t want to show any emotion, he was good at it.

  “I was just telling Corrie and Jenny I need about two minutes with you. Can we talk in your office?”

  “Is Mrs. Norris here yet?” Sam asked Jenny.

  “No, not yet,” she said.

  He motioned Alicia down the hall to his office. When they went inside his office and closed the door, Corrie’s stomach did a nosedive.

  Jenny muttered, “I wish she’d leave him alone.”

  “Maybe he doesn’t want to be left alone,” Corrie murmured. Maybe underneath it all he really did love Alicia and with a bit of persuading from her, they’d be back together. What did that say about Sam? That he was willing to forgive? Or that he was willing to compromise his values to be with a woman like Alicia.

  Corrie might have stayed spruced up since her makeover, but she could never compete with a woman like that, whether Sam liked her freckles or not.

  She wouldn’t stand around waiting to see what happened.

  Seeing Eric’s next patient coming through the door, she motioned to the man with his dalmatian and took him to an empty exam room.

  After Corrie jotted down pre-exam notes on the chart and Eric took over, she went to the kennel. She needed a few minutes just to pull herself together. After she petted a few of the animals and talked to them, she washed up and went back to the reception area.

  Sam was escorting Mrs. Wellington and her Persian into an exam room. He glanced at Corrie impatiently. “You have to tell me if you need a break. We’re backed up in the reception area. A poodle and Mrs. Wellington’s cat almost had a duel.”

  Sudden tears came to Corrie’s eyes and there were many things she could say, like, I’m not the one who had a conference with my ex-fiancée. But Sam was her boss. And their schedule was tight because of taking an emergency patient earlier. Instead of saying something she shouldn’t, instead of making the situation worse, instead of letting Sam see her upset, she turned her back on him and went to the unisex bathroom down the hall and locked the door. She had to pull herself together whether they were behind schedule or not.

  She’d no sooner braced her hands on either side of the sink when a loud knock punctuated her already scrambled thoughts.

  “Corrie, it’s Sam. Open up.”

  “I’m in the bathroom, Sam. That’s a private place.”

  There was silence for a few moments until he asked, “Are you all right?”

  No, she wasn’t, but she wasn’t going to tell him that. “I’m fine. Just give me a minute and you won’t get any farther behind.”

  He rattled the knob. “Let me in, Corrie. You’re hiding in there.”

  Hiding? He thought she was hiding? She unlocked the door and opened it. “I am not hiding. I’m just trying to pull myself together so I don’t make a fool of myself. But you’re doing a good job of making a fool of both of us.”

  Eric was standing at the end of the hall and so was Jenny. She could hear a dog barking in the reception area and maybe someone else was listening, too.

  After Sam glanced over his shoulder, he nudged her inside and shut the door. The bathroom had been equipped for efficiency, not luxury.

  Sam was almost nose to nose with her and she felt claustrophobic. “What are you doing? There are patients out there to see,” she said.

  “I’m sorry I snapped at you.”

  To her dismay, she felt close to tears again. She took a deep breath.

  As if Sam sensed only complete disclosure would lessen the tension between them, he admitted, “Alicia wanted to go to lunch.”

  “This isn’t any of my business, Sam.” Her voice was shaky and she hated that he could see how upset she was.

  “The hell it isn’t. If you think I made love with you when I still had feelings for Alicia Walker, you’re wrong. There’s nothing left and that’s what I told her. We aren’t going to have any lunches or dinners, or even friendly chats. What she did was just too enormous for me even to see around. Alicia is out of my life.”

  “But do you really want her out of your life, Sam? If you do, then why were you short with me?”

  Reaching toward her, he fingered a few of her curls and then shook his head. “You’re not who I thought you were, Corrie. You’re this complicated woman who surrounds herself with a thick, high wall, independence painted all over it. I’m worried about how that will affect my relationship with my son or daughter.”

  She could see he was being sincere. He usually was and that was one of the things she loved about him. “I won’t keep you from your child, but I don’t want to feel as if you’re running my life.”

  “Is it running your life to tell you what I think is best?”

  “No, but it is running my life if you always expect me to do what you think is best.”

  His lips suddenly turned up at the corners. They were such sexy, masculine lips. She wanted them on hers again. She wanted to be in his arms again. She wanted him to make love to her again, yet she couldn’t let that happen. In spite of what he said, he had wounds from Alicia and Corrie didn’t think they were healed. She had her own wounds. The scars just meant she’d put everything behind her, but she’d never stop being affected by them, just as Sam wouldn’t.

  “We’re two stubborn, self-determined people. Why didn’t I notice this in the past three years you were working for me?” Sam asked.

  “Because then I wasn’t carrying your baby. Now I am.”

  His smile slipped away. “We’ll figure this out, Corrie. We have to for the baby’s sake.”

  Yes, they did. For the baby’s sake.

  On Saturday afternoon as Sam drove down the lane to the Klinedinst farm, he remembered Corrie’s excitement when he’d phoned her, asking her to join him for dinner at Nathan and Sara’s.

  She’d explained she was at the farm, looking over the property. It had so many possibilities.

  Sam felt as if he had a lead ball in his stomach and he didn’t know why. Maybe he didn’t want to envision Corrie’s life at the farm if the homeless shelter was established. Maybe he was jealous of Nathan and the fact that he was a dad in every sense of the word.

  Exactly what was Sam going to be? A role model that his son thought of as more of a benevolent friend than a father? A visitor who lived on the fringes of his child’s life?

  Wasn’t that what he’d intended all along? No relationship complications with a woman. No chains that bind. No vows that could be broken.

  It had sounded good in theory.

  Colin Bancroft’s BMW was parked in front of the detached garage. Sam pulled up beside it, noticing the tall firs to the left of the house, the snow-covered fields stretching as far as his eye could see. Outbuildings had been torn down long ago. It had been many years since this was actually a working farm. But Corrie would have enough property that she could build barns and rescue horses, too, if she wanted to. And she would want to.

  Sam climbed out of his van. His boots crunched on the mixture of snow and gravel as he made his way to the two-story farmhouse with a side porch, a bay window and a second-story gable. The clapboard house needed to be modernized with siding, maybe even new windows. But that would be Corrie’s concern, not his. If she decided to take the position.

  The doorbell didn’t work. When he knocked, he got no answe
r. Trying the knob, he pushed open the door.

  The house was empty. Stepping over the threshold, he saw that the living room had dull wood floors and flowered wallpaper that had yellowed with the years. Both hinted at the house’s age. He could hear voices coming from beyond French doors. He went that way and heard Corrie saying to Bancroft, “This window area would be a perfect place for floor-to-ceiling cat condos. They’d love the sunlight.”

  Bancroft was peering out the bay window. “Would you fence in the yard area? Or would you build dog runs?”

  “I have a lot of research to finish before I even contemplate doing this.”

  Bancroft gave a dry chuckle. “I have a feeling you’ve already contemplated doing this.”

  Sam did, too, noticing Corrie’s color was high and her eyes were bright with enthusiasm.

  “Making plans?” he asked as nonchalantly as he could manage as he walked closer to them.

  Corrie spun around. “Hi, Sam. I didn’t hear you come in.”

  “These old houses with their plastered walls and wide windowsills don’t let sound carry like new houses do.”

  “What do you think of the house?” Corrie asked him.

  He really had to be careful how he answered her. He had the feeling she didn’t want anyone squashing the ideas running through her mind. “You need to have some work done before you turn this into a shelter.”

  “What kind of work?”

  “The practical kind. You need to make the building low-maintenance. You also need to ask a few questions, like how old is the furnace? Will you soon need a new roof? Is the plumbing adequate? If you’re going to live here, you might have to turn the upstairs into an apartment.”

  “I’m going to wander outside a bit,” Bancroft murmured, perceptively sensing a discussion brewing.

  “We’ll be out in a couple of minutes,” Corrie assured him.

  After Bancroft crossed to the front door, Sam asked Corrie, “Have you thought about having a crying baby upstairs and barking dogs and meowing cats downstairs?”

  Corrie moved away from the windows and closer to him. He caught the scent of her perfume, the one she wore when she wasn’t working. She was dressed for winter today in a navy and light-blue turtleneck, pale-blue corduroy slacks. The house was barely heated, only enough so the pipes wouldn’t freeze. Corrie’s yellow parka was unzipped. It was as bright as the sunshine outside. She always seemed to bring the sun into a room with her along with the warmth that came from caring about whatever she did. But now that warmth was replaced with determination. When he thought how close they’d been that Sunday when they’d made love and how far apart they seemed to be right now, his chest tightened.