by Anna Jeffrey
“He’s a smart kid,” Luke said. “He knows how to find what he wants.” He stretched across the baby, tipped up Dahlia’s chin and placed a tender kiss on her lips. “That’s for giving me Joe,” he said softly. “I know you could’ve made an easier choice.”
“No, I couldn’t have. I wanted him.”
Luke propped himself on his elbow studying the image, imprinting it into his memory—Dahlia’s thick black hair all tousled from hours of lovemaking, his healthy son drawing nourishment from her breast. She had never been more beautiful.
He could hear the baby suckling with a vengeance and swallowing.
“Now he’s getting the good stuff,” Dahlia said with a laugh.
Luke traced the baby’s jaw with his finger. “How long are you gonna nurse him?”
“The doctors say a year, but a lot of women tell me they stop when teeth grow in.”
“I forgot how long that takes.”
“Six or seven months.”
Luke moved his finger from the baby’s jaw to the mother’s breast. “You look like a mother should look. I always wondered what my other kids missed, not having this.”
Dahlia rolled her head and smiled at him. “What, breastfeeding? It really is more convenient and much cheaper than formula. And I enjoy it.”
He stroked her hair, his heart hurting as he thought of the hours she worked and how difficult her life must be. “What are we gonna do about this, Dal?”
A frown creased her brow and she looked down at the baby. She didn’t answer.
Shit. He guessed he couldn’t assume that one night in the sack had changed her mind about his family or the Double Deuce Ranch. Or for that matter, him.
They lay there in awkward silence watching Joe. Finally, she said something. “When he’s finished, you can bathe him and dress him if you like and I’ll fix breakfast for us.”
“You don’t have to cook for me. I’ll get something between here and the airport.”
“I want to. I didn’t eat in the mornings before Joe, but now I have to.”
He shrugged. “Okay.”
In the kitchen, Dahlia stared at the kitchen floor bestrewn with clothing—everything she had been wearing yesterday along with Luke’s shirt. Now what?
Lust, plain and simple, nothing but lust had driven her to strip naked and practically beg him to carry her off to bed.
They had made love no less ardently or urgently than they ever had. Luke had been tender and patient and the initial discomfort melted into the heat of their reunion. The depth of their passion, even after the bitterness she had harbored toward him and his family, stunned her. More shocking were the heady emotions that had raised their heads. Emotions like feeling protected and safe lying in his arms again, sensing the connection that had fostered the making of a child.
Thankfully, every time her thoughts drifted in that irrational direction, she heard the squawk of the cranky old hen that had carped in her head since his arrival, reminding her she couldn’t risk giving him her heart again. His priorities were still his Idaho family and the Edge-of-Civilization Ranch. No way could she let herself assume last night had been anything other than an intense romp in bed.
Now, he would go back from where he came and with two thousand miles between them, maybe she would never see him again. She wanted to be glad about that, but the unexplainable anger that had sprung up yesterday began to seep back.
She bent to pick up the scattered clothing and her head throbbed. Three nights with little sleep had left her with a headache. A stitch of pain caught in her back. Come to that, she ached everywhere. A night in bed with Luke McRae wasn’t for the physically unfit. He was a strong, athletic man. In hours of unbridled sex, she had used muscles she had forgotten.
As she laid his shirt across the end of the kitchen counter, she thought about the handling of the clothing he had worn and the strangeness of such an intimacy with someone who had never told her his hopes and dreams. But then, she hadn’t opened up with hers either. Last summer, they had been nebulous and drifting—
Dear God. Last summer had been another life in another world. Nothing else could be said about it.
In the bedroom, Luke put on his jeans and boots. Then he gathered up Joe and the bath stuff Dahlia had set out for him and took him to the bathroom sink. His little mouth formed into an O when Luke submerged his spindly legs and narrow butt and he smiled and squealed while Luke washed him.
Just as every newborn calf or colt left him in awe, he was no less fascinated by baby humans. He loved all of his children, but in only three days, this one had found a special place in his heart. He couldn’t escape the intuition that little Joseph Lucas was the fruit of an ordained union.
Luke wrapped him in a thick towel and took him to the crib to dry him and dress him. A smile tugged at his mouth as he dried the miniature toes and feet, the wee fingers. He had forgotten how delicate a baby was.
Dahlia had left one of those one-piece, knit things with snaps for him to wear. He squealed with delight and his fragile arms resisted being fed into the soft clothing and Luke laughed and told him he was a pistol.
Sorrow washed over Luke as sparkling blue eyes looked up at him. This was his son, without so much as a shred of doubt. He pulled the baby to his chest, cuddled him close. How could he go back to Callister and leave him? And how could he leave the mother who had supported him with her body and born the pain of bringing him into the world?
But he had to go home. People, animals and chores awaited him.
A feeling of helplessness nearly overwhelmed him. Cradling Joe in the crook of his arm, he sighed, regret running rampant through his system. He thought about sharing his life with a woman again. He missed it, wanted it. And he wanted it with Dahlia. He wanted every morning to be like this one, where he had eased into semi-consciousness with his hand cupping her breast. They had lazily loved their way through layers of sleep and that tension had built again—until the baby awoke . . .
He knew what had to be done and it couldn’t wait any longer.
He kissed Joe’s forehead and laid him back in his crib. “I’m gonna leave you this morning, son, but before too long, we’ll be together. I’ve got a fine horse just waiting for a good little cowboy to ride him.” He clicked on the mobile hanging above the crib. Cute little animals began to move in a slow circle. “You just lie there and watch this for a while. I’m gonna go have a talk with your mama.”
Dahlia heard Luke cross the living room and turned toward the sound. He swung his suit bag over the back of the sofa—as if she needed to be reminded of his leaving—and came into the kitchen. Bright-eyed and shiny-faced, he looked as if he hadn’t missed any sleep at all. His hair, still damp from the shower, curled in little “c’s” at his collar. His khaki shirt with its embroidered Cinch logo was striking with his eyes and coloring and he smelled as if he had bathed in Polo.
Rat! He would encounter dozens of women between Loretta and Callister today. The cranky old hen popped up and told her to forget it, she didn’t need him. Still, she wished she had put on something more attractive than a denim smock dress that looked like a sack. “Is Joe okay?”
“Gave me a razz before I left him. How about you? You okay?”
“I’m a little tired. We didn’t get much sleep.”
He smoothed a hand over her bottom and nipped below her ear. “Want me to make coffee?”
“Why not?” she said curtly. “Oh. I put your shirt on the end of the counter.”
She went to the refrigerator and inventoried its contents, attempting to be casual. “Cereal or toast and eggs? I’m afraid eggs are the only cholesterol-laden food we have in the house.”
You need your head examined, the old hen said.
“Whatever’s easiest. I’ll help.”
She handed him a partial loaf of bread. “Make toast.”
He took the loaf without comment, but she could see the tic in his jaw muscle. They worked in strained silence. Luke made toast. She scrambled e
ggs, her bad mood mollified by their sharing a task. Condescending to have an egg herself, they sat opposite each other, eating without speaking. As ugly and brown as smog in the Metroplex, gloom hung around them.
Luke cleaned his plate and pushed it aside. “Good breakfast, sugar. Guess you’ll do as a cook.”
“It doesn’t take a chef to make scrambled eggs.”
He took a sip of coffee, then rested his forearms on the table. He had that fish-or-cut-bait look in his eye. Something serious was going on inside his head.
“You can’t ignore last night,” he said. “And I don’t intend to ignore my son. It’s time we quit this BS and get married.
The bite of egg Dahlia had just swallowed lodged in her throat. She didn’t know if she
wanted to laugh or cry. Seconds turned to a minute. His mouth tipped into a faint smile. “Cat got your tongue? . . . I told you why I came, the day I got here.”
“Well . . . I just—”
“Come on, Dal,” he said softly. “You know it’s the right thing to do. . . . Now. While he’s a baby.”
The right thing. Is this what she owed Joe, to marry a man whose affection she would always doubt? Should she pretend Luke held a deep, undying love for her? That she loved him in the same blind-idiot way she had loved him last summer? That they would stroll hand-in-hand into the happy-ever-after?
Of course she couldn’t. On a long list of foolish presumptions she had made about their relationship, letting herself believe in a fairy tale ending would be the most unreasonable one yet. “It isn’t that simple. Here, you can’t just go get married.”
“Okay. Then I’m willing to make a commitment to the future. I’d like the same from you.”
The future. Hers spanned a twenty-four hour period at a time. A long-range forecast was as blurry as an Idaho snowstorm. Marrying Luke could solve that problem except for a few obstacles—like the grocery store. Employees depended on her. Loretta needed the Handy Pantry. And what of the hours of time and energy, not to mention money, she had spent rescuing it? Didn’t she owe herself the opportunity to see it successful?
That was the Texas end of the dilemma if she said yes, the simple-to-solve issues. On the Idaho end were the critical challenges—Luke’s nearly-grown daughters and Jimmy who would be a child forever, the rest of the McRae family.
And its matriarch.
The thought of Claire McRae’s hawk-like eyes scrutinizing her life and her son’s flooded Dahlia with hopelessness. She put down her fork slowly, stalling, giving the flutter in her stomach a chance to cease. “I, uh, don’t think I can.”
“You saying you wouldn’t even give it a try?”
“How do you give marriage a try? It’s not like something you can take back if it doesn’t fit, is it.”
Luke rose, toted his chair around the table and set it down beside her. He sat down, took her arm and turned her to face him. His thumb stroked her forearm. “I know this isn’t perfect. I won’t say moving to the Double Deuce wouldn’t take some adjustment, but I’d do my damnedest to make it easy. You know I wouldn’t be mean to you. Your foot wouldn’t be nailed to the floor either. If you got cabin fever, well, there’s things to do, places to go, and I’d take you. . . . . As long as it’s not shopping,” he hastily added. “I’m not much for shopping.”
She gave him a quirky smile, teased him with her eyes. “You’re making a statement like that to somebody who makes a living in retail? Shopping’s my life.”
Evidently he didn’t appreciate her attempt at light-heartedness. He scowled. “I want to be around my son, Dahlia.”
Oh, you’d marry me alright. To get Joe. Her teeth clamped together.
“I can afford to give him things you can’t.”
She looked away, explored a cobweb on the ceiling to her right, rationalizing the insult. Why be angry? He had only stated the facts, lined up priorities, put their son first. Things would include a college education at a good institution, financial security for the rest of Joe’s life and an enviable position in an old, respected family.
She, too, should be thinking of Joe before herself. But she wasn’t happy to be included like a two-for-the-price-of-one special, where you take an extra one you don’t want so you can have the one you do want.
“You, too,” he added as if he had read her thoughts.
She had never made a snap decision in her life except for what he had talked her into. Now he was trying to persuade her to tackle the impossible. She wanted to tear her hair and wail, she wanted an aspirin for her aching head. She let her gaze travel back to him and found her voice. “I guess I’d have to say the last reason I would ever marry someone, Luke, is because he can afford things. My former husband could afford things. I was miserable.”
“I said that wrong.” His shoulders sagged and he looked away. “I feel chicken about all this, Dahlia.”
And just when I thought he couldn’t make things worse. “Chicken. You mean guilty. I think the second-to-last reason I’d marry someone, Luke, is because he feels guilty.” She hooked a sheaf of hair behind her ear. “Look, you don’t have to marry me just because we slept together. And we don’t have to be married for you to have a relationship with Joe. I’ve thought about it. I won’t keep you from seeing him and if I ever marry again, you can be sure Joe will always know who his father is.”
Color drained from Luke’s face. Pure savagery boiled up in his eyes. “What the hell are you talking about? What kind of games are you playing with me, Dahlia?”
“None. I mean, I don’t think we have that much in common anymore, Luke. I don’t know if we ever did, really. It was mostly sex between us, right.”
Luke knelt on one knee. He pulled her close. His fingers touched her chin, lifted her face. “Dal . . .” He kissed the corner of her mouth, gently drew her lower lip between his teeth, ended by cupping the back of her head with his hand and kissing her deeply and so very, very sweetly and . . . oh, hell, she kissed him back until they were both out of breath and her blood began to heat again.
He drew back, his breath unsteady against her mouth. “You can kiss me like that, do what we did last night and try to tell me we don’t have anything in common?”
“There’s more to it than sex,” she said on a pathetic choke. “We don’t want the same things.”
“No? Maybe you better tell me what is it you want that you think I don’t.”
A man who loves me. “For starters? More children. Brothers and sisters for Joe.”
He stiffened and tucked back his chin. Oh, she had nailed him with that one, as surely as if she had punched him.
He stood abruptly and stared down at her. “It’s too late for me to start having babies again, Dahlia. My girls are old enough to have kids themselves.”
“I know. The next kids in your life will be grandchildren. But that doesn’t have to be true of me.”
His expression had gone from angry to hurt to puzzled. “You said you aren’t seeing anybody. You’re past thirty. What’re you gonna do—go for insemination? Raise a bunch of kids with no daddy? Because if you are, no son of mine is gonna be a part of that.”
“Don’t threaten me. I might not know what I’m going to do, but I know what I’m not doing—I’m not packing up and taking off two thousand miles with, with—” She stopped. She had almost said with a man who doesn’t love me. She couldn’t extort a specious declaration of love from him now any more than she could have tried to make him marry her against his will last summer.
“It’s not a decision I’m ready to deal with,” she said.
“Dammit, what’s there to deal with? It’s a simple thing. Why are you making this harder than it has to be? There’s something else on your mind. You might as well let me have it.”
“Okay, I will. This is my home. The grocery store’s my business now. It was close to bankruptcy when Dad got sick. It’s coming back.” She splayed her hand over her chest. “I saved it. Me. And I’m rebuilding it into something that’s working. Me. M
y personal accomplishment. If I went with you, I’d have to sacrifice it and I don’t know if I’m ready to do that. If I asked you to give up your ranch at the drop of a hat, could you? Would you?”
“I was hoping you’d see the Double Deuce as replacing what you’ve got here with something just as good.” He paused, looked at the floor, shook his head, then looked up at her. “I believe men and women have specific roles in life, Dahlia. A place for each one of them to be. And a woman’s place, especially if there’s a kid, is with the man who’s willing and able to take care of her.”
“A woman’s place? That’s the most obsolete idea I’ve ever heard.” She started to clear away their breakfast dishes. “Even if I bought into that, which I don’t, I’ve never lived so far away from things. If I didn’t go crazy in the isolation of the Double Deuce, your mother would probably poison my food.”
She added an exclamation point by clacking a mug onto a plate and carrying the stack of dishes to the counter by the sink. She ran water over a dishcloth, went back to the table and began to wipe away their breakfast crumbs. “This sounds more like a negotiation than a marriage proposal. I feel like I should ask what I get in return for my agreement.”
“Anything you want that I can afford. You know I’m not stingy.”
She took the dishrag to the sink, then turned, leaned her backside against the counter and crossed her arms under her breasts. “I told you what I wanted, but you’ve already nixed the C-word. What about the L-word?”
There. She had thrown it out there to sink or swim.
“What’s that? C-word, L-word?”
Dahlia rolled her eyes. “Children. Love, for crying out loud. We just bypass love and base our future on sex?”
He gave her another one of those how-can-you-be-so-dense looks. “You think we were bypassing last night? You think I came to this hot, damn place ’cause I needed a vacation in Hades?”
Dahlia let a few beats pass, knocked off balance again by the convoluted way he expressed himself. As declarations of affection went, his could be labeled a joke, but she didn’t doubt his sincerity. “And children? I’m serious about that, Luke.”
