Maternity Bride

by Maureen Child

  "Not this time," his friend said. "Now, I know you decided a few years back that you weren't going to love anybody."

  "Dammit, Bob."

  "You can't make those kinds of rules for yourself, man. They don't work. Hell, they can't work. Life happens, Mike." Bob looked at him long and hard. "Somehow, this woman got past that wall you built around yourself and there's no getting her out now."

  He could argue with him, but what would be the point? The man was right, whether Mike wanted to admit it or not. Denise had sneaked up on him. She had slipped beneath all of his defenses until she had reached the heart of him. The heart he would have bet money hadn't existed anymore.

  He shifted his gaze to stare blankly out the open end of the service bay. "How do I make her see that?" he whispered.

  "How?" Bob snorted and turned back to the workbench, his duty to his friend done. "Man, you were a marine. Storm her beaches, buddy."

  Mike nodded to himself. Enough of this waiting around. She'd had it her way for five long days. Now, they were going to play by his rules. Blast it, he wasn't about to lose this war. Not when winning it meant the difference between a lifetime with Denise and a lifetime of loneliness.

  The battle was about to begin.

  Sitting on the floor in the middle of her living room, Denise reached for the closest stack of books and picked up the one on top.

  "The Perfect Baby Through Visualization," she read out loud, then set the book down with a muffled chuckle. How had she ended up with that one?

  Easy, she told herself. Go into a bookstore and ask for every book they have on pregnancy. One of the clerks had had to carry the bags to her car for her and it had taken her three trips to drag them all into the house.

  "What Every Expecting Mother Should Know," she muttered, then flipped through the rest of the first pile. "The ABC's of Babies, Pregnancy 101." She shook her head and reached for the glass of milk she had set on the coffee table.

  Glancing down at her flat stomach, Denise slid one palm across it protectively. "I'm even willing to drink milk for you, kiddo. I hope you appreciate it."

  She took a long sip and smiled to herself. Somehow, after that fight with her father, some things had become clear to her. Oh, not everything. She still didn't know what to do about Mike and the feelings she had for him. But she had accepted one very important fact.

  This baby was coming.

  However it had happened, she had been blessed with the gift of a child. She couldn't get rid of it. Erase it as though it had never been.

  Giving it up for adoption was just as impossible. Besides, there was no need for that these days. Like she had told Mike, it was the twenty-first century. Single women had babies all the time. No one batted an eye at it anymore.

  Too, she was creeping up on thirty years old. Though she hated the expression, there was something to be said for that old "biological clock" argument.

  She had a job, she could support her baby and herself.

  Maybe she had a job, her brain corrected. She still couldn't believe she had actually stood up to her father. A small, tentative smile curved her lips. For the first time in her life, she had shouted right back at Richard Torrance.

  "And you know what?" she asked the baby. "Nothing happened. The Earth didn't open up and swallow me whole. The world didn't stop. He didn't disinherit me or have me thrown out of the office."

  Amazing.

  Of course, she told herself, she might very well turn up at work tomorrow to find out he had fired her. "But don't worry," she said and grimaced as she took a sip of milk, "we'll be okay anyway."

  A deep, rumbling roar thundered along the street and Denise looked up, toward the front windows. She knew that sound too well not to recognize it. When the powerful engine sliced off, silence fell over the room.

  "Daddy's here," she muttered and pushed herself to her feet.

  Walking to the door, she reached for the brass knob and paused before turning it. Was she ready to talk to him? Was she ready to tell him that she would be keeping their child and raising it alone?

  Well, why not? she asked herself. She had already faced down her father for the first time ever and survived it. How much harder could it be to talk to Mike?

  "Come on, Denise," he said from the other side of the door. "I know you're there. I went by your office. Your secretary told me you went home."

  He had gone to the office? She tried to imagine it—an angry biker facing down a room full of secretaries and accountants.

  "Dammit, Denise," he continued, his voice deepening. "I have to see you."

  Her heartbeat jumped into triple time. Deliberately, she tried to regain control of herself as she turned the knob and pulled the door open. "Hello, Mike."

  He didn't wait for an invitation. He stepped into the house, closed the door behind him and faced her.

  "When were you going to call me?" he asked. "It's been five days."

  "I know," she said and turned her back on him to walk into the living room. As she hurried to the couch, she tried not to look at the floor. The floor where they had made love so passionately that they had created a new life. "I'm sorry, but I needed some time."

  He stopped just inside the room. His gaze drifted across the carpet and she felt a flush of heat rise up inside her. He was doing it deliberately. Trying to remind her of that incredible night. It was working.

  "What happened to our original agreement?" he asked quietly.

  "What agreement?"

  "To make decisions together? As friends?"

  She did remember that agreement. But things had changed. They weren't friends. They weren't lovers anymore, either. So, what did that leave? Parents?

  "I've already made a decision," she said and took a deep breath to steady her racing pulse.

  "Really?" He folded his arms over his chest, braced his feet wide apart and asked, "Do I get to know what it is?"

  "I'm keeping the baby."

  A heartbeat of time passed and she thought she saw a flicker of relief cross his face, but it was gone so quickly, she couldn't be sure.

  "Good," he said.

  "You approve?"

  "Hell, yes. I approve. It's my kid we're talking about, here."

  A shiver raced through Denise. Whatever he felt about her, he clearly cared about his child. Would he eventually fight her for it?

  He glanced down at the stack of books on the floor and one black eyebrow lifted as he noted a particular title. With a few quick steps, Mike crossed the room, bent down and picked up the book in question. "Being a Single Parent?" he asked.

  She heard the ice in his voice and fought it with some coolness of her own. "I thought I should start studying."

  "On how to raise my baby alone?"

  "Mike…"

  "No, Denise, it's my turn to talk now." He dropped the book onto the fallen pile and walked to the sofa. Standing in front of her, he continued. "I'm not going to let you walk out of my life without a backward glance."

  "Don't do this, Mike. We both know that getting married isn't the answer."

  "How do we know that?" he shouted, frustration straining his voice. "You won't talk to me about it. What the hell is so awful about marrying me?"

  She scooted farther down the couch, then stood up, a good three feet away from him. She couldn't seem to think straight when he was close to her and if she ever needed to be able to think, now was the time.

  "Mike…" she began, and tried to sound reasonable. "We have nothing in common. You said so yourself on that very first night. You said you didn't want anything that came tied up in a neat little package."

  "Quit throwing my own words back at me."

  "But they're good words, Mike. They make more sense than what you're saying now."

  "Things have changed, Denise."

  "What? The baby?"

  "Of course the baby."

  "That's not a good enough reason to get married, Mike. In fact, it's a lousy reason to do it."

  "Ordinarily," he hed
ged, "maybe I'd agree with that. But not now."

  "Why?"

  Couldn't he see how hard he was making everything? Why couldn't he just go away and let her find a way to live without him?

  "Because I care for you, dammit!"

  Her gaze locked with his. "Me?" She squeezed the words past a tight throat. "Or your baby?"

  "Both of you." He took a long step toward her, but she moved back, staying out of his reach. "Why is that so hard to believe?"

  "Because," she said softly, "before we knew about the baby, there was no talk about forever. In fact, I think you said something about 'just two grown-ups who share something incredible.'"

  "Was I lying?"

  She paused and gave him a sad smile. "No, you weren't. But that's not enough, either."

  "Denise, I know you love me."

  She inhaled sharply and felt the sting of tears in her eyes. "I never said that."

  "Yeah, you did," he said quietly. "Once. In your sleep. The night before we found out about the baby."

  One tear escaped from the corner of her eye and rolled along her cheek. She reached up and brushed it away. "Sleep talking doesn't count."

  "Fine," he whispered. "Say it now. Or deny it."

  Chapter 10

  Mike held his breath. If she did deny it, he didn't have a clue what his next move would be. Odd, that a man who had never wanted love, now found himself hoping to God that he would hear those three words.

  "Fine," she said and her voice cracked. "I love you."

  Relief crashed over him like a tidal wave.

  "But it doesn't matter," she said quickly, shattering the fragile sense of hope building in his chest.

  "Of course it matters." He took another step toward her, but she shook her head, warding him off. "When you come down to it, that's all that matters."

  She laughed shortly. A small, grim chuckle that sent a chill of foreboding up Mike's spine.

  "No, it's not, Mike," she said in a strangled tone.

  "What are you talking about?"

  "I won't make the mistake my mother did," she blurted. "I won't marry the wrong man."

  "The wrong man? What's that supposed to mean?" Pacing now, she marched back and forth across the room and Mike's gaze followed her every step. He noted the tension in her body and wanted to go to her. But first he had to know what he was fighting against.

  "My parents," she muttered. "They were miserable together. Oh, my mother loved him, but that wasn't enough to make either of them happy. He should never have gotten married. My father wasn't meant to marry and have a family." She turned her head to look at him. "Just like you."

  "Wait a minute." It was one thing to be hanged for your own sins…but he wasn't about to be strung up because her father was an ass.

  "No. You said from the beginning that you didn't want love. Or a family." She took a deep, shuddering breath.

  Damn, he had said way too much that was now coming back to haunt him. "I was wrong."

  She shook her head. "No, you were honest. Which is more than you're being now."

  That stung. He was being as truthful with her as he knew how to be. Fine, maybe he wouldn't have leapt at marriage before he had known about the baby. But situations change. People change—if they wanted to badly enough.

  "You're talking about love and marriage and the only reason you're proposing is because of the baby."

  Her features tight, her eyes sparkled with a sheen of tears he knew she had no intention of surrendering to.

  "Fine, maybe that's true. Maybe I did propose because of the baby. But dammit, Denise, that's not saying I would never have proposed."

  "Like I said," she whispered. "You're not being honest now. Not with me. Not with yourself."

  Honesty wasn't always what it was cracked up to be. He had seen a lot of people destroyed by truths that should have stayed dead and buried. But blast it, if she wanted it, she would have it.

  "Honest?" he snapped. "You want honest? All right, honey, here's honest." He knew he should shut up now, but he couldn't. Words he had kept locked away inside him for almost ten years came pouring out in a flood of frustration. "Back when Uncle Sam deployed me and a few hundred thousand of my closest friends to the desert, I had a chance to see love work. Up close and personal. In fact, I saw enough to convince me that loving anybody was a one-way ticket to pain."

  "What are you talking about?"

  "I'm talking about watching kids risking their lives, never knowing when they lay down to sleep if they'd get up in the morning." He rubbed one hand across his jaw as memories tumbled into his mind. Memories he had worked hard at forgetting. "Those same kids lived from mail call to mail call. Grabbing at letters from their loved ones like they were the last life raft leaving the Titanic."

  "Mike…"

  He ignored her and started pacing himself, unable to hold still under the barrage of images rushing through his brain. "You wanted to hear this," he said angrily and wasn't sure if his anger was directed at her or himself. Either way, it was too late to stop the flood of memories and way past time that he dealt with them. "After mail call, I watched those same kids—soldiers, dammit—break down and cry because somebody back home decided that their love wasn't as strong as they had thought. Wives, husbands, sweethearts, it didn't matter." He snapped her a look and wasn't assuaged by the glitter of pain in her eyes. "Love destroyed all of them more completely than any enemy's bullet could have."

  His features tight and pale, he said brokenly, "Love isn't only a gift, Denise. It can be the most powerful weapon in the world."

  "Mike…"

  He shook his head and spoke quickly to cut her off. "It wasn't just the Dear John or Dear Jane letters. Hell, a soldier practically expects those damn things." A bitter smile lifted one corner of his mouth briefly. "Amazing how quickly love fades when it has to cross a few thousand miles."

  She took a step closer and one tear escaped to roll slowly down her cheek.

  Mike kept talking. "The worst was seeing young men and women die and knowing that somewhere back home, someone they loved would die, too. Not a nice, clean death in battle. But a long, slow death from a wound too deep to heal."

  "So," she said softly, "you vowed to never love anyone."

  "Yeah." He pulled in a long breath, surprised that now that he had actually voiced his fears out loud, they were a lot less intimidating. Looking into her blue eyes, he added, "Then I met you."

  "Don't, Mike."

  "Denise, people can change their minds, you know."

  "Their minds, but not their souls."

  "What's that supposed to mean?"

  "It means that my parents had things in common. They liked the same things. Knew the same people. Shared the same world and they couldn't make it work!" She faced him, her fingers plucking at the material of her gray gym shorts. "What chance would you and I have?"

  Before he could speak, she rushed on, tears raining down her face. "Look at us, Mike. Really look. I'm an accountant. You're a biker. I like my life neat and orderly. You don't even get haircuts! What chance would our baby have? I won't bring a child up in the kind of home where I was raised." She shook her head fiercely. "I won't do it."

  Wounded by her outburst, he realized that he did love her. Desperately. It was the only explanation for the pain blossoming inside him.

  Still, he tried to be calm. "Your own arguments are working against you here, Denise."

  "Huh?"

  "You said your folks had things in common and their marriage didn't work. Well, just maybe people need to bring a few differences into a marriage."

  She shook her head, stubbornly unconvinced. He couldn't believe that he was going to lose her, not because of something he did, but because of the mess her parents had made out of their lives.

  "You know, lady?" he said and started for her. "Maybe it's time you realized your parents made their mistakes. You can't go back and change them by refitting your life. Instead, maybe it's time you thought about being adult enou
gh to risk making your own mistakes."

  She glared at him through her tears, but he refused to be swayed by the bruised look in her eyes. He was fighting for both of them here and it looked as though he would be fighting alone.

  "You and I could build something together, Denise. Something special for us and our kids. But you won't even give us a chance."

  "Mike, you would hate living in my world." He put his hands on her shoulders and felt her trembling. "You're just not a suit and tie kind of guy," she went on, "and there are functions that we would have to attend. Can't you see that I'm trying to do us both a favor?"

  "So you're willing to walk away from us over a suit?"

  "It's not the suit itself," she whispered, looking up into his eyes. "It's everything. I like being a part of your world, Mike. The motorcycle, O'Doul's, everything. But I can't stay there. I have a life, too. One you would hate."

  "Let me be the judge of that, okay?" She sighed.

  "At least give us a chance, Denise." As an idea blossomed in his mind, he started talking even faster. "Just because your mother fell in love with the wrong man, that doesn't mean that you have, too."

  She sniffed and let her head drop to his chest. Wrapping his arms around her, he held her tight, loving the feel of having her close against him again. Dammit, he wasn't going to lose her. Not now.

  Not when he had finally realized that what had started as a wild, intense flirtation had become good old-fashioned love. "Go out with me tonight," he said softly. "Mike…"

  "I'll take care of everything," he said. "Just wear your best dress." He pulled his head back and looked down at her. One black eyebrow lifted as he added, "I'm partial to that blue number you wore the first night we went to O'Doul's."

  She sniffed again, this time on a half smile. "You are, huh?"

  "Yeah," he said and just the thought of seeing her in that dress again was enough to get his body up and ready. "That night, I thought I might have to kill a couple of my oldest pals just for staring."

  It was a watery smile, but a smile.

  "All right," she agreed. "Tonight."

  "Six o'clock," he said and bent to plant a quick kiss on her lips. He tasted her tears and vowed right then to never let her cry again. "Be ready."