Last-Minute Marriage

by Marisa Carroll

  He said that deliberately to goad her into coming. She wanted friends. She wanted to belong. He could see it in her eyes. He had heard the longing in her voice. And if he was going to be foolish enough to lose his heart, then he was going to use every means he could to see that the same thing happened to her.

  “When you put it like that,” she said, wistfulness and reluctance tangled together in her words, “how can I refuse? I’ll be there.”

  IT WAS GOING to be a long night. Tessa stood at the window and watched the lights go out in Mitch’s house. She wasn’t certain which bedroom was his, but she suspected it was the first one on the left, because it was usually the last to go dark.

  She wondered if he was going to have as hard a time going to sleep as she was.

  Had it affected him at all, that fleeting brush of his fingers across her cheek? That almost kiss? Lord, she’d been blindsided by the surge of soul-longing and sexual desire that had flooded over her in equal strength. Even the baby had been affected. She had felt the tiny entity within her jump, as though jolted by an electrical charge.

  Or had it all been her imagination and her neediness? Had his touch meant much less? Was it merely a friendly gesture to a lonely woman on a cold autumn evening? The truth was, she wanted it to be more. The reality was that she didn’t dare even dream of that happening. She had given her word to Caleb that she wanted nothing from Mitch. And she meant to keep it. She wasn’t going to let her foolish emotions lead her into heartbreak again.

  She couldn’t be interested in Mitch Sterling romantically. She had been separated from Brian for less than a month. She was carrying his child. But the reality was that she could barely remember what he looked like. And deep in her heart she had to admit that she had known long ago that their relationship was headed for an end.

  But she had stayed for the baby’s sake. And finally she had left him for the baby’s sake. That should be her answer. They were alone in this, the two of them. There was no room in her life for a man. There was no room for dreams of a man, even a man like Mitch, who, she was coming to believe, was everything a woman could want in a husband and father.

  She was going to have to guard her emotions very carefully. Circumstances demanded that she stay in Riverbend for a few weeks longer. They would be weeks fraught with danger for her bruised and battered heart. But there was no way she was going to give in to the impulses of that unreliable organ. She wasn’t going to fall in love with Mitch Sterling. She was not.

  SAM LAY IN HIS BED with his hands behind his head, watching the strip of light under his door. He was waiting for his dad to come in and yell at him for being rude to Tessa.

  Well, not yell at him. His dad didn’t yell. He talked. He asked Sam to explain what he’d done wrong, then he’d tell him why it was wrong, and finally he’d think up some kind of punishment to make Sam remember not to do it again. When he was little, it meant taking away his video game. Now it usually meant no e-mail privileges.

  He hadn’t wanted to be a smart-ass to Tessa. It was just that sometimes…He rolled over in bed, facing the wall, making his isolation complete. Sometimes it was just so frustrating to always have to slow down, form your words more carefully, talk more softly, repeat yourself so others could understand.

  He didn’t want to write notes, or use sign, or e-mail. He had so much he wanted to say, so many things he wanted to express and couldn’t that he almost busted with it. He wanted to talk to people. Sometimes he let his frustration get in the way.

  But most of the time it was okay. He liked the way his dad nodded when he agreed with something Sam said. He liked the way Granddad Caleb’s nose twitched when he was trying not to laugh at one of his corny jokes.

  He liked the way Tessa smiled at him—like tonight.

  He just plain liked Tessa. She was funny and smart and she knew a lot about guy stuff like plumbing and electricity. She would be a great mom. He knew that.

  And she liked him. Or at least he thought she did. Until tonight, when she’d acted like all the other grown-ups. If you don’t speak more slowly, I’m going to have to ask you to write it down.

  Sam rolled onto his back so he could see the door. His face burned. Not just because she hadn’t been able to understand him, but because he’d been a butt-head about it. It wasn’t Tessa’s fault she wasn’t used to hearing him talk. He had to remember that. He had to slow down around her until she got used to him.

  But maybe it was already too late. He’d seen his dad go outside. He’d seen him coming back up the steps from the dock when he came out of the bathroom and looked out the window to see if it was still raining.

  Tessa had been outside, too. They had talked a little and then they’d gone down the steps together. Sam just knew she was going to rat on him for being rude to her. He’d turned off the light and watched until they came back up the steps. They’d talked some more, and his dad had reached out and touched her cheek.

  Maybe they hadn’t been talking about him at all. Maybe they were talking about other things. Man and woman things. Touching led to kissing, and kissing led to…well, Sam wasn’t exactly sure what kissing led to. But it was good if his dad and Tessa were kissing. That meant they liked each other. A lot.

  A shadow appeared at the bottom of his door. Sam closed his eyes to little slits and held his breath, pretending to be asleep. He waited for his dad to come in and sit down on the side of the bed and turn on the light—a sure sign they were going to have a man-to-man talk, no matter how late it was.

  But he didn’t. He just came in and gave the covers a little pull so that Sam’s foot was covered up. He always stuck his foot outside the covers. He didn’t know why. It was like his feet had claustrophobia or something. He didn’t know how to explain it. And his dad always covered him up. It was just a thing they did.

  Better than a good-night kiss. He was way too old for that.

  Sam saw his dad’s lips move and knew he was whispering good-night. He left the room and closed the door, leaving Sam in darkness except for the glow from his oversize clock face.

  So maybe Tessa hadn’t said anything about how he’d talked back to her. Maybe she’d really meant it when her smile had told him she understood.

  He closed his eyes and breathed a sigh of relief. He was going to be the best kid in Riverbend, and if Tessa fell in love with his dad…well, she’d have to fall in love with him, too.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “YOU’RE A HEALTHY YOUNG WOMAN and you’re going to have a healthy big baby.”

  Tessa was more relieved than she wanted to admit by the doctor’s words. She had done everything she could to eat well and get enough rest since she’d left California, but it wasn’t easy. She would never forgive herself if leaving Brian and striking out on her own had caused harm to the baby.

  She finished buttoning her top with fingers that weren’t quite steady, as she watched Dr. Annie Stevens make notations on a computer screen attached to the wall of the small examination room. She’d been pleasantly surprised at the up-to-date look and feel of Riverbend’s hospital. The facility was new, three stories high, built of redbrick with what seemed like acres of mirrored windows. The inside was as high-tech and sleek as the outside.

  “You don’t think I should have another ultrasound?” She tried not to let anxiety shade her voice. But the doctor raised her eyes and regarded her with an assessing look over the rims of her half glasses.

  “If you were staying in Riverbend for the delivery, I’d say yes. But since you say you’ll only be in town a couple more weeks, and I have your previous ultrasound results here—” she indicated the folder of medical reports Tessa had brought with her from California “—there’s no clinical reason to repeat the procedure. Unless you’ve changed your mind and want to know the sex of the child.”

  Tessa shook her head. “I can wait.”

  “It won’t change the outcome.” When she smiled, the doctor’s rather severe expression lightened and she looked much younger and pretti
er.

  “The cost is also a factor,” Tessa said candidly. “I don’t have health insurance.”

  Annie Stevens’s serious expression returned, but was softened by the understanding in her dark eyes. “Cost wouldn’t have been a consideration if I thought you needed the procedure. I’m not totally in thrall to the HMOs yet.” Her smile was rueful. “But as I said, you’re healthy and the baby’s healthy. You don’t smoke, you don’t use alcohol, and you’re watching your intake of sugar and caffeine.”

  “Coffee’s the hardest to stay away from,” Tessa confessed.

  Dr. Stevens laughed. “I know. When I was nursing my daughter, I used to dream about going to Starbucks nearly every night.”

  Tessa smiled as she slid down off the exam table. She liked Dr. Stevens. She wished she could be the one to deliver her baby.

  A ripple of longing skittered through her veins and settled in her heart, but she immediately squelched it. She was not going to think about staying in Indiana. She had made herself that promise two nights ago under the stars. She intended to keep it.

  “We won’t know about your blood tests until tomorrow, but they’re strictly routine, and I don’t foresee any problems with your blood sugar or kidney function. Your blood pressure’s a little high, but that’s probably because you’re scared of me.”

  “Oh, no.” It took Tessa a moment to realize the doctor was joking. She stammered an explanation, feeling a little foolish. “I don’t like going to the doctor all that much, if you want to know the truth.”

  “Most people don’t. I’m terrible about it myself.” Dr. Stevens gave her a surprisingly mischievous grin, shut down the computer screen and motioned toward the door, all business again. “Your doctor in California pegged your due date as December fifteenth. I agree. But with babies you can never tell. Especially the first one. I’d like you to be settled with your sister by Thanksgiving. Do you think that’s possible?”

  Thanksgiving was less than a month away. “Settled” meant more than on her way to Albany. It meant living there. Her time in Riverbend was coming to an end. “Yes…yes, I think so. Even if my brother-in-law does get the chicken pox, he should be over it by then.”

  “I agree.” Dr. Stevens led the way down a hall lined on both sides with closed doors. Her office was in the specialists’ wing of the hospital. Obviously the citizens of Riverbend could have all but the most serious of medical procedures performed in their own hometown.

  “My sister’s on the lookout for a doctor in Albany,” Tessa said. So far Callie hadn’t found an obstetrician willing to take her on such short notice, and with no health insurance.

  “A friend of mine from medical school has a practice in Albany.”

  Tessa wondered if her ears were playing tricks on her. It seemed too good to be true.

  “He’s a cardiologist.”

  “Oh.” Her disappointment was hard to hide.

  Annie Stevens put her chart down on the high counter that separated the receptionist’s desk from the waiting room. She laid her hand over Tessa’s. “I’ll give him a call tonight and ask him to forward me the name of a good women’s clinic. I know there are some in the area. They treat patients on a sliding scale. It won’t be fancy. Not many bells and whistles, but they’ll deliver your baby safely and take care of you both after.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Stevens. I’m very grateful that you’d go to so much trouble.”

  “I’m glad I can be of help. Mike only moved to Albany a year or so ago. Before that he was in Georgia. I don’t know another living soul in New York State. Jackie, will you see that Ms. Masterson gets a copy of all her lab work and my notes. She’ll be needing them for her doctor in New York.” She handed Tessa’s chart to a heavyset, pleasant-faced nurse behind the counter. Mayor Baden’s daughter, according to Maggie Leatherman. Tessa had met the small, round-figured mayor at the Sunnyside Café a couple of days earlier. The resemblance between mother and daughter was marked.

  “I’ll get right to it. You can pick them up tomorrow if you want,” Jackie said to Tessa. The phone started ringing and she spoke with her hand on the receiver. “Or I can mail them to you. You’re staying in Mitch Sterling’s boathouse, aren’t you?”

  Tessa was already getting used to everyone knowing who she was and where she was staying. “I’ll pick them up.” She didn’t doubt for a moment that Mitch’s mailman would deliver the package, but she didn’t want to start getting mail at the boathouse. That would be just one more detail to make it feel like home, instead of the temporary refuge that it was.

  “MITCH?”

  He was helping Bill Webber load two-by-fours into the back of Will Leatherman’s pickup, and he didn’t hear her call his name. Tessa took a moment to watch him. She’d caught herself doing that more and more lately. He was a good-looking man, athletic and graceful in a totally masculine way. The movements of his body were natural and unstudied. Brian moved that way, too. But he worked out for hours in the gym to keep himself in top shape. It was an obsession with him. The muscles that flexed across Mitch’s arms and shoulders and beneath the fabric of his blue chambray shirt were put there by hard work.

  She crossed her arms beneath her breasts and squeezed, trying to squelch the image of those muscled arms wrapped around her, those strong thighs pressed against her legs. That firm mouth on her lips. Images that had begun to invade her waking hours, as well as her dreams.

  Bill Webber looked up from his chore and saw her waiting. He said something to Mitch that Tessa couldn’t hear over the pickup engine and the roar of the tow motor. Mitch turned and gave her a wave that indicated he’d be with her in a minute.

  She went back into the store to wait for him. If she stayed outside, she’d want to keep watching him, and she was proving to be too weak to avoid temptation. She didn’t know how it had happened, this growing infatuation, but it had. And now she had to deal with it. Her life was a shambles. She was only a few hundred dollars from being destitute and homeless, yet her heart wasn’t listening to reason. She was dangerously close to falling in love with her boss.

  Falling in love. Love at first sight. Impetuous. Foolhardy. Something like that had happened with Brian, and look where it had gotten her. She couldn’t trust her heart or her emotions, so she intended to ignore them.

  She turned blindly to straighten a display of stovepipe joints that were housed on one of the nearby shelves just as Mitch walked up. He slapped his work gloves on his thigh to loosen the sawdust clinging to them, then pushed them into the back pocket of his snug-fitting jeans. Taking a deep breath, she cleared her mind of thoughts of making love to Mitch, thoughts that refused to be banished without a fight. “I was looking for a gallon of dark base to mix for a customer,” she said, “and noticed it was dated three years ago. The whole department needs to be inventoried. I’d like to get started on it right away.”

  “I agree that section needs some work, but you’re not going to do it.”

  Tessa met his dark gaze head-on. She had never been one to ignore a challenge. “Why not?”

  “I don’t like the idea of you lifting all that weight. A gallon of paint runs eight or nine pounds.”

  “I’m carrying more than that around all the time,” she said, patting her stomach.

  Mitch’s face turned beet-red. “I mean, I…” He shut his mouth and shook his head. “No. Someone else can do it.”

  “Mitch, you’re not paying me to stand around straightening wallpaper sample books until Rachel Steele or your aunt Maggie comes in to buy something.”

  “Come to think of it, I don’t want you rearranging those big sample books on the top shelf, either,” he said.

  Before she could defend herself on that score, he asked another question. “What did Annie Stevens have to say this morning? Is everything okay with you?”

  “I’m fine,” she said, seeing an opening and taking it. “No restrictions on what I can do. That includes moving paint cans and wallpaper-sample books.”

  One co
rner of his mouth turned up in the devastatingly sexy grin that made her knees go weak. She’d scored a point, but he wasn’t about to give in. She could see it in his eyes. “Maybe there are no medical restrictions, but there definitely are employer restrictions.”

  “Mitch, you’re being unreasonable.”

  “It’s unnatural for employees to ask for extra assignments,” he said.

  “It’s unnatural for bosses to refuse the offer of an employee to take on an extra job.” She put her hands on her hips. She enjoyed sparring with him. Her relationship with Brian had been too intense, too volatile, to allow much room for banter like this.

  Their sex life had been the same way. Brian was so focused on performance, on the mechanics of lovemaking that sometimes Tessa had felt more like she was in a training film than in bed with the man she loved. Somehow she didn’t think making love with Mitch would leave time for her mind to wander as it often had with Brian.

  He grinned. “You’re right. That’s one situation they don’t teach you how to deal with in bosses’ school.”

  She laughed and he laughed with her. “Then I’ll get started right away.”

  She should have kept her mouth shut.

  His smile faded, replaced by a look that reminded her he was Caleb’s grandson and every bit as stubborn. His tone and his attitude turned serious. “I said no. And I meant no. Tessa, you can’t afford to take the slightest risk—”

  “Dad!”

  Sam hurtled himself down the main aisle, his blond head swinging from side to side as he searched for his father. The afternoon had gone so quickly Tessa hadn’t realized it was time for school to be out.

  “Here I am, Sam,” Mitch called, stepping away from the shelves where they’d been standing so Sam could see him.

  “We’ll discuss this later,” Tessa said, not ready to give up. She was determined to earn the salary Mitch was paying her. Every cent. There was no reason on earth she couldn’t rearrange paint cans. “I’m pregnant, not an invalid.”