Until he saw the tear plop down onto Harry’s belly.
‘What is it? What’s wrong?’
He stepped towards her and squatted beside the chair, realising as he looked up into her face that it hadn’t been the first tear to fall.
And all his good resolutions to stop touching her vanished at those faint stains on her pale cheeks. He put his hand on her arm, stroking it gently, feeling her warm skin, her softness.
‘I never cry!’ she muttered at him, and he had to smile because he believed her. Anyone who’d gone through childbirth so stoically would be adept at keeping tears in check.
‘So why now?’ he asked gently. ‘Is there something else wrong? Has Bob been in? Or the surgeon? Have they delayed the operation?’
She shook her head, and sniffed—something else he was reasonably sure she never did.
‘So tell me,’ he persisted. ‘It must be something.’
Joey looked into the craggy face of the man she really didn’t know, hesitated for a moment, then blurted out what, to her, given her earlier conversations with him, had been a shocking discovery.
‘I love him,’ she said, tightening her hands on the very small ‘him’ in question.
Max smiled at her.
‘I’m pretty sure that’s included in the job description of being a mother,’ he said gently. ‘And didn’t we cover this earlier?’
He eased himself upright and settled on the arm of the chair, sliding a very comforting arm around her shoulders.
Comforting her, that’s all, she reminded herself.
‘So why the tears?’ he persisted.
‘It’s not with my head,’ she all but wailed. She really was losing it! She definitely never wailed.
‘It’s with my heart,’ she admitted grimly. ‘Just like that—I looked down at him and felt it in my heart. I didn’t want that, Max. Definitely didn’t want it because that kind of love is just too painful, too all-consuming—too much to bear when things go wrong.’
She could feel tears welling again and willed them away.
‘It wasn’t that I didn’t intend to love him, or expect to, but like I said earlier, I really thought I could do it with my head. I see children who’ve been adopted and I talk to their parents who often worry about bonding—worry that because the child isn’t genetically their child, the bonding thing might go wrong.’
She sighed and thought she’d better stop this maudlin nonsense, but Max’s ‘Might?’ told her she’d better finish what she’d started.
‘I’d remind them of the majority of animals whose young are usually up-and-about within minutes of their birth, seeking out their first feed. But human babies are totally dependent on whatever adult happens to be around to care for them, and it’s their total dependence on their carer that builds the bond. That was my theory, anyway.’
‘I like it,’ Max said, smiling at her. ‘And I’m sure adoptive parents are very grateful to hear it. In fact, one of my sisters would have been very happy to hear it after her first baby. She thought there was something wrong with her that she didn’t immediately feel overwhelming love for the demanding little human that had come into her life. In fact, she confided to me that she thought the instant bonding stuff was all a myth, so maybe you’re right.’
‘In theory,’ Joey grumbled.
‘Everyone’s different,’ Max reminded her. ‘Anyway, is it so bad to love him with your heart?’
Even as he said the words he remembered the losses she’d already suffered—her husband and then her entire family. Remembered her talking about loved ones being hostages to fate.
And he understood her fear.
He tightened his arm around her shoulders and drew her close so her head rested against his hip.
‘I’m sorry, stupid question,’ he said, ‘Although, from the little I know of you, I doubt you’d ever have been able to separate your head and your heart as far as this little fellow is concerned.’
He felt her head move as if she might be nodding in agreement, but then she just sat, still and silent, her head resting against him—giving him enormous pleasure, although she couldn’t know that.
Was she lost in the past? Reliving those losses—the ones that had damaged her heart?
His arm tightened around her shoulders and he leaned forward and dropped a kiss on her shiny dark hair.
She didn’t move away, although she did look up at him, eyes wide, lips parted...
Asking to be kissed?
Probably not, but it was as natural as night following day for him to lean a little lower and kiss those parted lips.
Gently, softly. Asking nothing. Promising nothing. A quick, light, ‘I’ll be here for you’ kiss.
Except it didn’t end there.
Had she responded, or had he imagined that?
Whatever, the result was the same.
The kiss deepened, exploring first, still tentative but learning through touch and taste, teasing...
Deepened again, demanding now, desire morphing into need as he suckled on her lip, slipped his tongue into the moist, warm invitation of her mouth, met the urgency he could feel building in her response with a passion that he hadn’t felt before—didn’t understand.
His heart was hammering against his ribcage, his lungs desperate for air, but how could he not keep kissing her?
A whisper of sound escaped her—a whimper? a moan?—and he caught it, swallowed it, wanted more, hungry for more. His hand was moving on her arm, sliding up her neck, his fingers burying themselves in fall of her thick, dark hair, tangling there, holding her, wanting more of her so desperately he thought he could hear a moan escaping his lips as well.
He’d reached the summit of some of the world’s highest mountains, he’d revived a baby that had been buried underground for days after an avalanche near a village he’d been working in, he’d had a hundred experiences that had given him indescribable excitement and pleasure, yet nothing came even close to what he was feeling—to the thrill he was feeling kissing Joey.
‘Oh, please, not in front of the children!’
The voice broke them apart, flushed and panting—well, he was definitely panting and she was flushed, delightfully flushed, stirringly flushed.
Max looked up at Bob, who was standing beside the big chair, smirking down at them, a nurse hovering behind him.
‘Getting to know each other?’
Max conquered the urge to punch his old mate in his smiling face, settling on a growled ‘You’ll keep,’ instead.
‘I’ve just come to check Harry out, and run some preliminary tests before the op tomorrow. The surgeon says you’ll both be there. Me too. I assist for Prentice whenever I get the chance.’
He checked the chart at the end of the crib then bent over to look at Harry, gently palpating his stomach.
‘I’ll take some blood—just to check he’s not harbouring an infection—then move him into another room for scans. You two are welcome to wait here until he gets back—that’s if you don’t want to get a room.’
Max scowled at him. Bob, obviously, had never grown up, and was gloating over his adolescent humour.
Joey, who’d sprung away from Max’s embrace as soon as she’d heard Bob’s voice, was already on her feet.
‘I’ll see you later,’ she said to Max, walking carefully around him as if he’d suddenly become contagious. The nurse who’d accompanied Bob had already wheeled the crib out of the unit, Bob following, which left Max sitting in the big chair wondering just what the hell he should do next.
Follow Joey?
Wait for Bob to return and tell him if the scans had been okay?
Would Bob return with Harry, or would the nurse wheel him back?
And the big one—would Joey want him following her?
* * *
Big mistake, kissing him back like that.
Seeking refuge in her room, Joey slumped down on the bed, something that was becoming too much of a habit. Max was obviously a man who scattered kisses around like confetti. He kissed the way some people touched—connecting with whatever female who happened to be near him.
And comforting though a couple of those kisses had been, she certainly shouldn’t be taking them seriously, and most definitely should not be mistaking them for anything more than confetti.
Bad enough that Harry, young as he was, had sneaked under her guard and into her heart, but opening it up to more pain by letting Max in would be a disaster.
Yes, he was a kind man, caring and empathetic, but she didn’t need a man of any kind.
And Harry?
That part of it was a simple enough equation. No father or a now-and-then father—which would be best for Harry?
Her own father had always been around—detached from time to time when he’d been busy—but always there for her.
Had being an only child made her closer to her parents?
Oh, Lordy, Harry was an only child. That brought up a whole new set of problems. Why, when she’d decided to have him, had she not considered that?
Her mind took flight and suddenly she was thinking about family, as in mother, father and children.
Brothers or sisters for Harry. And the father image in this fantasy was most definitely Max.
Except he wouldn’t be there—not all the time.
Would that stop him being a good father?
Hadn’t there always been wanderers in the world? Sailors who were away for months on end, astronauts living in the space station circling the earth right now, and, more prosaically, the men who worked the big mines and gas wells right here in Australia, away three weeks, home for two.
Families could adapt.
Couldn’t they?
She sighed and immediately regretted it as a light tap heralded the arrival of the source of her confusion.
‘I’m sorry for embarrassing you like that in front of Bob and the nurse,’ he said, as he came and sat beside her on the bed—stirring up all the overactive nerves she’d been trying to calm down.
‘Embarrassment’s the least of my worries.’
She must have sounded a little tart for he stiffened and would have moved off the bed if she hadn’t rested her hand lightly on his leg.
Not a good idea as he immediately placed his hand on top of it, and although a memory of a kids’ game, hand on hand on hand, flitted through her mind, it was lost in the more recent memory of the kiss—of her reaction to the kiss—of her reaction to something as simple as his hand on hers on his warm, solid thigh.
‘Could all that’s happened, and our bond through Harry, be overstimulating us?’
Max realised he probably shouldn’t have blurted out that question, but it had followed him from the special care unit to this room—accompanied him, really, nagging away in his head.
Joey turned towards him and smiled.
‘Now, that would be a really, really satisfactory explanation, wouldn’t it?’
She appeared to consider it for a moment then added, with a smile teasing at her lips, ‘You think?’
Max ran his free hand through his hair, probably making it more unruly than it usually was.
‘I’ve no idea what to think—can’t think at all, in fact—beyond how soon I can kiss you again, and whether we could lock the door.’
‘Probably not, it’s a hospital,’ Joey replied, but he thought he detected a hint of gloom in her voice.
Because they couldn’t lock the door?
He could shut the door...
And he did, returning to his position on the bed, wrapping an arm around Joey’s shoulder, lifting her chin with one finger so he could study those blue eyes and that creamy skin, the still reddened lips—
‘Game to try it again to see if it answers anything?’
Her eyes told him she was wavering—worrying—but when he brushed his lips across her mouth he heard that little sound again. Not a moan or whimper, more a plea.
But not for him to stop, apparently, for when he hesitated she came to life, moving closer, straightening so her lips met his this time, testing, tasting, her tongue probing his teeth, his mouth, her arms around him now, hands moving on his back, his shoulders, kneading his muscle and sinew, sliding down to grasp his waist, then up, between them, on his chest, brushing lightly over his nipples.
There was hunger in the kiss, and in the touching, in the little noises that escaped. But not, he thought, a seven-year hunger—not a need for a man and any man would do. No, something in the kiss told him it was personal, and for whatever reason—the shock she’d had, the excitement of giving birth, the burden of Harry’s problem—the attraction she was feeling was for him.
And you know that because? muttered the cynic who was never far away.
Because I feel it too, for her.
There, it was out, at least in his head. One thing sorted.
So he gave himself over to the kiss, wholly and solely, giving and taking in the increasingly frenzied embrace they were sharing.
They parted slightly, mainly to replenish air supplies, but Max wanted to look at her, to really see her—flushed, panting slightly, desire still sparking in her eyes.
She studied him in turn, detaching one hand from his shoulder for long enough to push back a lock of his hair that had fallen into his eyes.
Her fingers stayed on his face, straying there, tracing out the lines, smoothing at an eyebrow, trailing down his nose to touch his lips, outlining them so softly he shuddered at his touch.
Which made her smile—a mischievous smile that caused a riot in his senses and a further hardening of the bit of him he’d hoped to keep quiescent.
‘Not that I’m agreeing to it or anything, but does a convenient marriage include sex?’
This time the interruption came in the form of a loud tap on the door followed by the arrival of a brusque, officious nurse.
‘You’re late for your physio and you’ve missed your time on the breast pump machine,’ she said, not bothering to hide her annoyance.
Max stiffened, upset by the woman’s tone—ready to do battle.
But Joey quietened him with a warning touch on his hand.
‘I used the breast pump earlier, and I didn’t know about the physio,’ she told the intruder, her voice soft and apparently apologetic enough for the other woman to unbend slightly.
‘There should be a card. Probably on your lunch tray. And you haven’t eaten your lunch either!’
The disapproval was back in the last sentence, but Joey was already on her feet, searching for a card, finding and reading it, smiling apologetically.
‘Well, I’d better go. I’ll at least have time to learn a few exercises to help me get rid of my tummy.’
She was out the door in a flash, leaving Max sitting on the bed, feeling like a first-year med student—totally out of his depth.
‘Afternoon visiting hours don’t start until three,’ the dragon informed him. ‘Fathers-only between visiting hours.’
‘I am the father,’ Max told her.
And earned a ‘Hmph!’ as the woman sailed through the door.
But her reaction didn’t bother him one bit. He was far too busy trying to work out why actually saying the words had caused such a rush of emotion in his body, and even more confusion in his head.
Even more than the kiss?
Joey’s question and the word ‘marriage’ had been cavorting in there, but they’d been silenced, packed away. But I am the father—they were just words, but they had so much power they’d knocked all other thoughts completely out of his head.
Just what did
it mean, being a father?
Could he be one?
Or should be back out right now?
He walked back to where the source of all the questions lay, not sleeping at the moment but looking around at the world he’d come into—a limited view of it, admittedly. He was looking at him, although Max knew he probably wasn’t registering faces yet.
A nurse was there, the one who spent most time with Harry.
‘Can I hold him?’ he asked, and she nodded for him to sit in the chair, then lifted Harry out and arranged the tubes and wires so they didn’t tangle.
‘Unbutton your shirt so he’s on your skin,’ she told Max, who found his fingers shaking as he obeyed.
Then she settled the little infant against his chest and as Max cupped his hands, one below the buttocks and the other on his back, he felt his son snuggle into him, and the little head turn, mouth open, seeking milk most likely, but to Max it felt just like a kiss.
‘I’m your father,’ he said quietly, aware of the commitment he was making—unable to do anything else.
He savoured the words as he gently supported the little form against his chest.
‘Your dad,’ he added quietly and felt his heart open like a flower, spreading its petals to embrace the sun.
‘Forever and ever, kid!’
CHAPTER TEN
JOEY TRIED TO follow what the physio was telling her. The exercises had assumed mammoth importance in her head, but the rash question she’d asked Max earlier—the one about convenient marriages including sex—was rattling around in her brain, bumping into her good intentions about exercise.
‘You’re not quite with me,’ the young woman told her. ‘But if you do the exercises properly and keep them up for a few months, you’ll be really glad you did.’
‘I know,’ Joey groaned, going back to the beginning of the sequence. ‘It’s just—it’s just that Harry, my baby, has this op coming up in the morning. I know he’ll be okay, but...’
It wasn’t quite the truth—well, not about the op but the excuse for her distraction.
The Accidental Daddy Page 13
