“Are you saying that when you left, he simply found an alternate bride?”
“And without much difficulty,” she said. “Genevieve Durand’s family and his have been close for a lot of years.”
“Then I guess she knew what she was getting into.”
She nodded.
“How do you feel about all of this?” he asked cautiously.
“Relieved. And ecstatic. My biggest worry was that he would try to make a claim on Caden—now I know that isn’t a concern.”
“What about his accusation against your father?”
“I didn’t even think about that,” she admitted. “And really, it doesn’t matter anymore, because Elliott has nothing to gain by going public with his claim.”
He stopped beside a two-story red brick building. “Don’t you want to know if there’s any truth to it?”
She looked at the writing on the glass door, then at him. “What are we doing here?”
“I thought, if you really wanted to put the past behind you, we should know exactly what’s in that past.”
“This is almost scarier than facing Elliott,” she admitted.
He held out his hand.
After the briefest hesitation, she took it. And they walked into the DA’s office together.
* * *
Nerves tangled in Julie’s belly as Lukas chatted with the receptionist. After a few minutes, she led them down a long hallway to the conference room where Mr. Chasan was seated at the end of a long, glossy table, reviewing a file folder that was open in front of him.
He closed the cover when they entered and rose to his feet. “Harry Chasan,” he said. “Former District Attorney, mostly retired now, but I hang around occasionally and consult on cases. I was hanging around today.” He offered his hand to Lukas first, then to Julie, then smiled at Caden.
He gestured for them to sit, which they did. Julie didn’t know what to say—she wasn’t sure how Lukas had arranged this meeting or what information he’d given, so she let him take the lead.
“I was told that you were the prosecutor in the State of Massachusetts vs. Cosgrove case.”
“I can’t say the name rang any bells,” Harry admitted. “But I pulled the file when your brother called to inquire about it, and sure enough, I was.”
Julie looked at Lukas. Apparently he had no qualms about his brother pulling strings to help him get what he wanted. On the other hand, there was nothing unethical about one attorney contacting another for information about an old case.
“Do you remember it?”
“I do now.” His gaze shifted from the file to Julie, and he nodded. “You’ve grown up, Miss Marlowe. I almost didn’t recognize you.”
She managed a smile. “It’s been six years.”
“A drop in the bucket when you get to be my age,” he told her. “Can you tell me why you’re digging into this now?”
“I just had some questions,” she hedged.
“What kind of questions?”
“Mainly I wondered why I wasn’t prosecuted.”
“Insufficient evidence,” he said bluntly.
“Who—” She swallowed. “Who made that decision?”
“I did.”
“Did you, uh, consult with anyone about it?”
“Yeah, the idiot cop who arrested you.”
She blinked at that.
“There wasn’t any evidence to justify charges. You should have been released into your parents’ custody as soon as you were brought in, but the arresting officer had a real hard-on about the fact that he’d busted a judge’s kid.” He shrugged apologetically. “Sorry, but there’s no other way to describe it.”
“So my father didn’t pull any strings to get me released?”
Harry laughed at that. “Judge ‘Morality’ Marlowe? Not a chance.”
“You didn’t talk to him about the case at all?” she pressed.
“Sure I did. And Reg told me that I wasn’t to do him any favors. If there was evidence to charge you, I should charge you.
“Between us now,” he confided, “I think he was a little concerned about the path he could see you going down and thought a few hours in lockup might have done you some good. But I reviewed the evidence in this case the same way I would have any other, and the undisputed facts were that you went for a ride in a car that you didn’t know was stolen. You made a bad choice, but you didn’t commit a crime.”
They shook hands with Harry again, thanked him for his time, and left the DA’s office.
“I guess I owe you another thank-you,” Julie said.
“Does that mean I get another kiss?”
“You’re going to get a lot more kisses after we get back to my parents’ place and get Caden settled down,” she promised.
“When are your parents coming back?”
“Their flight is scheduled to get in to Boston at six-oh-five tomorrow morning, and it’s about an hour and a half from the airport to our place.” She glanced at her watch. “So we’ll have the place to ourselves for about sixteen hours.”
“Lead the way.”
* * *
By the time they got back to the car, Caden was seriously fussing, so Julie fed and changed him before they started the drive to her parents. Sleepy and satisfied, the baby fell asleep within a few minutes. Fifteen minutes later, Luke pulled into the driveway of her parents’ home.
He took Caden in his carrier while she gathered the diaper bag and her purse. Inside the door, he set down the carrier beside an antique chest so that he could take his shoes off. But he didn’t get a chance before Julie pushed him back against the wall and started kissing him. A deep openmouthed kiss with full body contact. She teased him with her teeth and her tongue as she gyrated against him. And then, just as abruptly as she’d started, she stopped.
“That’s just a prelude,” she said, and turned away.
He snaked his arm around her waist and hauled her back against him.
“Two can play that game,” he warned, and kissed her again, slowly and deeply, using his tongue in a teasing imitation of lovemaking until she moaned and shuddered against him.
“Julie?”
She jolted, dropping her hands from his shoulders and pushing him away. “Mom.”
Luke closed his eyes and softly banged his forehead against the wall, cursing silently.
“I, uh, didn’t think you were coming back until tomorrow,” Julie said, crossing the room to embrace her mother.
The older woman’s arms came around her daughter, and she held her close for a long moment. “We caught an earlier flight,” she said. “And I’m so glad we did. I’m so glad you’re home.”
“It’s good to see you, Mom. I missed you—so much.”
Her mother blinked away the tears that had filled her eyes and turned her attention to Luke, who was hoping like hell she wouldn’t notice that he was still partially aroused. Apparently being caught in an erotic lip-lock by a woman’s mother wasn’t quite humiliating enough to cool his ardor.
“And who is this?” she said, her tone decidedly less warm. “Is this the surprise you mentioned?”
“What? Oh, no. This is Lukas Garrett. Lukas, meet my mom, Lucinda Marlowe.”
“I apologize, ma’am, for the, uh, situation you walked in on.”
“I’m glad I wasn’t ten minutes later.” She took a few steps toward the staircase that led to the upper level. “Reginald—Julie’s home.”
“About that surprise,” Julie began, just as her father came into the foyer.
There were more hugs and kisses and tears as Luke tried to blend into the elegant satin-striped wallpaper.
And then Caden woke up.
* * *
Several hours later, Julie took her overnight bag up to her childhood bedroom while Lukas was escorted by her father to the guest room on the opposite side and at the far end of the hall. After nursing Caden and settling him to sleep in his portable crib, she tiptoed down the hall in search of Lukas.
�
��I’m really sorry about this…arrangement,” she told him.
“I’m not. In fact, I’m grateful they’re not digging a hole in the backyard right now to bury my body.”
“Maybe if it was the spring,” she teased. “But this time of year, the ground’s too hard for digging.”
“Well, your brothers are supposed to be here en masse tomorrow. I’m sure between the three of them and your father, they’ll figure something out.”
She linked her arms behind his neck. “They’ll figure out that I’m finally with the right man for me.”
“Yeah, that’s likely.” His words dripped with sarcasm, but he wrapped his arms around her waist and drew her into his embrace.
“Seriously, I don’t think either of my parents was as scandalized as you were,” she teased.
“It’s just that I’d hoped you’d have my ring on your finger instead of my tongue in your mouth when I met your parents for the first time.”
“Actually, my dad was still upstairs when your tongue was in my mouth.”
“Because that makes a lot of difference.”
She laughed softly.
“I wanted to make a good impression.”
“There’s no doubt you made an impression,” she assured him. “Now, about that ring you mentioned.”
“You mean the ring you didn’t want me to give you a few days ago?”
“If that’s the same ring that I couldn’t accept until I got my life in order, then yes.”
“Are you saying you want it now?”
“I want the ring.” She brushed her lips against his. “I want you.”
“The ring’s in my pocket,” he told her.
“Really?” She immediately dropped her arms and began searching the pockets of his jeans, then she looked up at him and rolled her eyes. “It’s not in your pocket.”
“It’s not? I was sure I put it there… Oh, right. It’s in the pocket of my jacket.”
She fisted her hands on her hips. “Are you going to give it to me—or have you changed your mind?”
He crossed to the wing chair in the corner, where he’d tossed his jacket, and retrieved the ring box from the pocket. “I haven’t changed my mind,” he assured her. “But I thought you might have reconsidered.”
“Why would you think that?”
“Because Elliott is out of your life now, completely and forever. You don’t have to worry about him making any claims on your baby, so you don’t need a stand-in father for Caden.”
“I never wanted a stand-in father for my son,” she told him. “I want a real father for him. But that has nothing to do with my response to your proposal.
“I love my son, more than anything in this world. More than I ever thought it was possible to love another human being,” she continued. “But I’m an old-fashioned girl at heart, Lukas. And I never would have agreed to marry you if I wasn’t in love with you.”
He felt as if an enormous weight had been lifted off of his chest. “You told me you wouldn’t fall in love with me,” he reminded her.
“I didn’t want to,” she admitted. “But my heart had other plans.”
He took the ring—a square cut diamond with smaller channel-set diamonds around the band—out of the box. “You really do love me?”
“I really do love you.”
“And you want to marry me?”
She offered her left hand. “Yes, I want to marry you.”
He slid the ring onto her finger, then dipped his head to kiss her.
There was no hesitation in her response, but when he eased his lips from hers, her brows drew together.
He rubbed a finger over the furrow. “Is something wrong?”
“Is something wrong?” she echoed. “Is that all you’re going to say?”
One side of his mouth turned up, just a little. “What do you want me to say?”
“I’d kind of like to hear that you love me, too.”
He skimmed his knuckles down her cheek. “Do you doubt it?”
“No,” she admitted. “But it would still be nice to hear the words.”
“I love you, Julie Marlowe.” He brushed his lips against hers. Once. “With my whole heart—” twice “—for now and forever.” And again.
She sighed happily. “Wow—that sounded even better than I expected.”
“You’ll probably get sick of hearing it,” he warned. “Because I’m going to tell you every single day, for the rest of our lives.”
“I’m looking forward to it.” She snuggled closer to him. “It’s hard to believe that only five weeks ago, I was stuck in my car in a ditch and thinking that things couldn’t possibly get any worse. And then you tapped on my window, and changed everything.”
“You changed everything for me,” he told her. “You and Caden. Which reminds me—there was one more thing I wanted to ask you.”
“What’s that?”
“After we’re married, will you let me adopt Caden so that I can be his father in every sense?”
Her eyes filled with tears. “You already are,” she told him. “But yes, I would be thrilled if you adopted Caden.”
“And maybe someday we could give him a little brother or sister?” Luke prompted.
She smiled, nodded. “I’d like that.”
“But when we do start thinking about another child, could we try to plan it so that he or she will be due in the spring or summer?” he suggested.
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want to chance you going into labor in the middle of another blizzard.”
“You mean you don’t want to have to deliver another baby,” she accused.
“I’d rather not,” he admitted.
She laughed. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Epilogue
Julie stood at the window, her arms folded across her chest, watching the snow fall. Behind her, flames were flickering in the fireplace.
“I’m experiencing the oddest sense of deja vu,” she admitted to Lukas when he entered the family room.
“You said you wanted a white Christmas,” he reminded her.
“I was hoping for a light dusting, just enough to make everything sparkly and pretty.”
“Obviously Mother Nature had a different idea.”
“So much for our plan to attend Christmas Eve church service,” Julie noted.
He took her hand and drew her over to the sofa. Of course, Einstein tried to climb up, too, but settled when Julie reached down to scratch between his ears.
“Are you disappointed?” Lukas asked her.
“A little,” she admitted. “It’s one of my favorite Christmas traditions, and I wanted to share it with you and Caden.”
“Next year,” he promised. “And the year after that, and every year for the rest of our lives together.”
“I like the sound of that.”
“Me, too.”
She settled into his arms. “I was thinking about a June wedding.”
“June? That’s six months away.”
“A wedding takes time to plan.”
“Ava managed to plan Jack and Kelly’s wedding in a few weeks,” he reminded her.
“And it was a beautiful wedding,” Julie agreed. “But it’s going to take some time for my mother to forgive me for not telling her that she was going to be a grandmother. I don’t think she would ever forgive me if I deprived her of a proper wedding on top of that.”
“I don’t care about proper as long as it’s legal. And my brother has connections at the courthouse—”
“No,” she said firmly.
He sighed. “June? Really?”
“Maybe May.”
“How about February?”
She shook her head. “Too soon, and the weather’s too unpredictable.” She tipped her head up to look at him. “Speaking of weather, I’m a little worried about my parents traveling through all this snow tomorrow.”
“Your dad has an SUV with snow tires,” he reminded her. “And as he assured you, no les
s than a dozen times, there’s no way he and your mom are going to miss their first grandchild’s first Christmas.”
“I know they wanted us to spend the holiday in Springfield with them, but I wanted Caden’s first Christmas to be here.”
“No doubt it will be a Christmas to remember, with your parents and my brothers and their families all underfoot.”
“It will be chaos tomorrow.” And she was already looking forward to it. “But tonight—” she lifted her arms to link them around his neck “—it’s just you and me.”
“And Caden,” he reminded her.
“Who has a full belly, a clean diaper and visions of sugar plums dancing in his head.”
He dipped his head to nibble on her lips, and Julie’s eyes started to close when she felt a swipe of tongue between her toes.
“And Einstein,” she added, giggling when he licked her toes again.
Lukas went over to the Christmas tree and found a package with the dog’s name on the tag. “Look, Einstein. Santa brought something for you, too.”
He tore the paper off of the conical-shaped rubber toy that he’d prefilled with treats and offered it to him. Einstein raced across the room, his attention immediately and completely focused on the toy.
“That should keep him busy for a long time,” Lukas said, returning to the sofa.
“And Caden will sleep for at least a couple of hours,” Julie told him.
“If we have a couple of hours—” he brushed his lips over hers “—I have an idea.”
His hands were already under her shirt, skimming over her skin, making her tremble.
“Am I going to like this idea?”
“I think so.”
A long time later, snuggled in the warmth of his embrace, Julie knew that she had never been more blessed. Because she didn’t just have their first Christmas as a real family to look forward to, but the rest of their lives together—and she knew the future was going to be a merry one.
* * * * *
Keep reading for an excerpt from Lost and Found Father by Sheri WhiteFeather.
We hope you enjoyed this Harlequin Special Edition story.
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