“You know,” he told Rico, “she was crying when she called to tell me you’d disappeared.”
“She cries over you, too.”
Nick straightened and took a breath. “I know. I found that out tonight, as well.”
“I thought...” And then the little boy was sobbing.
Nick pulled Rico to him and held on tight. Rico stood stiffly in his arms at first, then finally gave in and let Nick hug him.
“Tell me what you thought, buddy.”
“I thought we were going to be together. You know, like a real family.”
“Is that what you want?”
Rico nodded, his tears still falling.
“I needed some time to think about that. It scared me a bit. I never had a little boy before.”
“I never had a dad,” Rico said.
Rico made it sound so simple, and maybe it was. Rico had never seen his father. It wouldn’t be hard for Nick to do better than that.
“I had a dad for a while,” Nick said. “He went away when I was a little younger than you are.”
“Do you still miss him?”
“I do. Or, I miss the kind of dad I wish he had been. I miss the kind of dad some of my friends had.”
“I still miss my mom. But Miss Laura is going to be my new mom, if the judge says it’s okay.”
“I know. I think it’s going to work out just fine.”
“So, what about... you know?”
“Me?”
Rico nodded.
“Laura is on her way over, and I think you and I need to work some things out before she gets here.”
It took Laura forever to get across town to Hope House. And the whole time, she kept thinking of Rico making this journey again by himself, miraculously without running into some kind of trouble along the way.
Then once she arrived she had the hardest time making herself go inside. There was no telling what Rico had said to Nick, no telling what kind of answers Nick had given him.
She still couldn’t believe she admitted to Nick that Rico wanted the three of them to be a family. She found that the height of humiliation.
He had to know how she felt about him, and he must have his reasons for staying away from her and Rico. Maybe he would tell her what those were. And maybe they could overcome them. Maybe they couldn’t.
Either way, she had to walk into that shelter and listen to him explain these things to her. She wasn’t sure she was up to facing him.
Funny, for the past three weeks she had longed for some word from him, some signal, some explanation. None had been forthcoming.
Now, here she was, about to get what she wanted, and she wasn’t sure she was ready.
Laura swiped a hand past her cheeks, relieved to find them dry. She fidgeted with the clasp at the back of her neck that held her hair in place and smoothed her hair back from her face again.
She wondered if he’d look at her and know she’d cried off and on during the trip over, then remembered that it didn’t matter if he did. He’d heard her crying on the phone already.
Her cheeks burned. She straightened her shoulders and marched inside. The teenager at the desk directed her upstairs to what she thought must be the room where Rico had spent his first night here. That seemed like a lifetime ago, though it had barely been a month.
Her legs felt like lead as she climbed the back stairs and walked down the hall. The door was closed. She put out a shaky hand to open it.
“Hi.”
Startled, she turned toward that deep, husky voice she’d come to know as well as her own. Nick stepped out of the darkness at the end of the hall, where a bulb had burned out. “Hi.”
“Rico is fine. I tried to get him to go to sleep, but he was reluctant”
“Nightmares,” Laura explained. “He still has nightmares.”
Nick nodded. “He didn’t run into any trouble on the way over here.”
Laura felt marginally better. She took a breath, hoping to steady herself, but still had the shakes.
Nick looked ... uneasy. He looked a little tired, a little tense, but otherwise wonderful. He was such a striking man. She always forgot that, always found it a little unsettling to see him at first. His dark hair, his eyes, that determined set to his jaw—they all came together in a way that had her catching her breath and making rash promises to herself about not making a fool of herself over him.
Of course, it was probably too late for that now.
She thought about the brief hours they’d spent together during those two nights, the way she’d held back nothing when she was in his arms, the way their bodies fit together as if they were made for each other.
And then it was over. Like the best of dreams, the worst of nightmares, the whole thing had flown by. Sometimes she had trouble believing it ever happened. Then she closed her eyes and saw his face. Her heart felt as if someone held it in his hands and squeezed it, the pain a tangible thing.
“I’ll give him a few minutes.” She looked at her watch, because that was safer than looking at Nick. “Then I’ll need to take him home.”
Nick nodded. “That should give us enough time to talk.”
Laura closed her eyes and hoped some mysterious source of strength would come to her right then. It didn’t. She felt as shaky as she had outside the shelter.
“Come over here.” Nick tilted his head toward the darkness at the end of the hallway, toward the big, double-paned window there.
Laura managed to force her legs to move. As she passed him, he turned to walk beside her. His hand settled lightly against the small of her back, and she couldn’t help it. She fought not to react in any way, but he must have felt her tense.
Nick pulled his hand away. She watched him struggle to keep his expression blank.
“This is very difficult for me,” she said.
“I know. Do you hate me now?”
It would be so much easier if she did. “No, I just don’t understand. And I guess I’m not even entitled to an explanation from you—”
“Yes, you are.”
“Well then, I’m not sure if I’m up to hearing it right now.”
“I missed you.”
He’d said it like a man in anguish. Laura felt a little better. “We missed you, too.”
“I don’t know what happened. Everything was so simple when we were running away from that madman, and then it wasn’t anymore.”
“Nick, does this have anything to do with the fact that Rico is biracial?”
“No.”
“Sorry, I had to ask.”
“He could have purple stripes and pink polka dots. It wouldn’t matter to me.”
“Then what’s wrong?”
“There was so much I wanted to say to you, but at the same time, there was so much I hadn’t figured out for myself yet. And I didn’t want to come to you with nothing but doubts and questions and uncertainties. But, Laura, those are all on my part. They’re inside me. They don’t have anything to do with you or Rico.”
“Is this about your father?”
“I guess it is.”
“Whatever he did to you, however he hurt you, you’re not going to be anything like him, Nick. Surely you know that.”
“It’s taken me a while to figure that out. And I’m sorry it took so long, sorry that you got hurt in the process while I was trying to get my head on straight.”
“Just tell me next time, okay? You can have as much time as you need—just let me know what’s going on.”
“You’re a very generous woman, Laura. I was afraid that generosity might have run out where I was concerned.” He reached for her hand. “I did miss you.”
“That’s a good start.”
“I never stopped wanting you. I never stopped needing you. I thought somehow you’d know that, but...”
She shook her head, amazed by what she was hearing. “You never said any of those things to me.”
“You mean I never told you I love you? Laura?” He turned her face up to his
with two fingers on her chin. “You never said it to me, either. Did you think I’d just know? Or is love not a part of this?”
“It is. At least, on my side it is. I didn’t think I had to say it. I thought I’d given it away in a dozen ways, at a dozen different times.”
Nick shook his head then, and she thought she saw the glint of tears in his beautiful, dark eyes.
“Tellme,” he whispered, his lips coming to meet hers.
“I love you, Nick. I always will.”
“I love you, too, sweetheart.”
“What are you going to do about it?” she asked.
He kissed her once, hard, fast, deep. She had trouble letting go of him when he was done.
“I just got scared, Laura. That night at the cabin, thinking about what a mess I’d made of my life and then trying to take on the responsibilities of raising a kid who was starting out with as many problems as Rico had—I just got scared. And I kept thinking about my own father. He was such a mess, and he always told me I’d never amount to anything. I never believed it until last year after Jason Williams died.
“My father told me something else I started to believe, as well. He left me and my mother when I was younger than Rico, and I found him a couple of years ago because I wanted to talk to him. When I asked him why he left, he said he didn’t know anything about being a father. His father was never around when he was growing up. He claimed I’d understand someday. I’d be a father, too, and he doubted I’d manage the job any better than he had. After all, look at the example he set for me.”
“You can’t believe that’s true, Nick.”
“For one awful night, when I wanted you so badly I couldn’t think straight, when I considered what was at stake, I thought about letting you down, letting Rico down. I thought about what a mess I’d made of my life this past year, and I believed it.”
“And what about now?”
Nick smiled at her then. “Rico said something that made it all seem so simple. I told him I didn’t know a lot about being a father, and he said that was all right, because he didn’t know much about having a father.”
“He doesn’t. His father took off when he was still in diapers. Rico doesn’t have any memory of him.”
“I can do a lot better than that,” Nick said. “I’m here, and I’m not going anywhere. I’d never leave him the way his father left him or the way my father left me.”
Laura didn’t know what to say to that. She couldn’t quite speak anyway.
“I’m working again,” Nick said. “Here at the shelter, and I got a call today from a friend of mine whose psychiatric practice has grown too big for him to handle. He’s looking for a partner. He wants that partner to be me.”
“Nick, that’s wonderful. You want to do that? You’re ready?”
“I think I am. Jason Williams’s parents came to see me, and we talked. They don’t blame me for his death, and they helped me see a lot of things differently. Of course, they didn’t do nearly as much for me as you and Rico did. Rico thinks the three of us should be a family,” Nick said. “What do you think?”
“I... I can see some merit in that idea”
“Can you see a ring, my ring, on your finger?”
“I’d like to see that.”
“What if you saw me get down on one knee and beg?”
“I’d listen to what you had to say.”
“What if I told you Rico is playing video games in the basement and there’s a room down the hall with a bed in it and a lock on the door?”
“I’m open to suggestions.”
He took her hand and tugged until she followed him down the hallway. Inside the room, the lights were out. He pulled her through the open door, closed it, locked it, then held her against it as his mouth claimed hers.
He made her dizzy, made her weak, made her want him so badly she ached with it.
“I don’t know how I got so lucky to have you and that little boy stumble into my life,” he said. “I don’t know what I would have done without you, sweetheart.”
Laura felt the tears come into her eyes. “I was coming after you tomorrow.”
“I don’t know if I would have made it through another day. You probably would have found me camped out on your doorstep the next morning.”
He kissed her again, a kiss to get lost in. When it was over, they were both struggling for breath. Nick was eyeing the bed in the corner with a grin that had her trembling in anticipation. His body was pressed against hers, and the feel of it left her with no doubt about what he wanted to do next.
“I forgot to tell you the reason we came in here,” he said. “There’s one more thing Rico wants. A little brother.”
Be sure to look for SECOND FATHER, the
next captivating novel from Sally Tyler Hayes,
available in December from
Silhouette Intimate Moments.
ISBN : 978-1-4592-7960-5
TEMPORARY FAMILY
Copyright © 1996 by Teresa Hill
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.
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
“Come on, Laura, cut me some slack—unless you’re afraid of me.”
Letter to Reader
Books by Sally Tyler Hayes
About the Author
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Copyright
Temporary Family Page 20
