Her mother’s voice held a smile as she said, “I don’t think he was talking about money, sweetie.”
The words sent a trickle of fear down her spine. What was he up to? Melanie said goodbye and hung up, then sat back down and cupped her coffee mug. She’d sulk if she had the time, she thought, feeling a little betrayed by her parents.
“He called your father,” Lisa said, her eyes wide. Melanie nodded. “Oh, gutsy Jack. That must have been interesting.”
A little smiled twitched at Melanie’s lips. “I bet it was.”
Lisa pushed Juliana’s cereal loops within reach. “You know my brother is a great guy, don’t you?”
“I plead the Fifth.”
“Hey, he hasn’t done anything wrong.”
Melanie sighed. “Except threaten me.”
“What?”
“He said he was in my life and I couldn’t stop him.”
“Well, that is a threat, though weak and understandable.” Lisa made faces at Juliana and the baby imitated her. “What are you going to do?”
Melanie shrugged. When it came to Jack Singer, she felt pretty helpless.
“You know, Brian’s asked me to join him on his next business trip. For a month. I think I will.”
Melanie arched a brow. “Jumping ship on me?”
“No, I’m trying really hard to preserve what I have. A wonderful friend and a loving brother. I don’t want to have to choose.”
“Who says you’ll have to?” It was Lisa’s turn to look doubtful. And darn it, Melanie could see her friend’s point. She didn’t want to put Lisa in the middle, either. “Okay, go. I can handle Jack.”
Her friend stood and grabbed her purse, hitching it onto her shoulder. Lisa kissed the baby and smiled at the mother. “Good luck.” She headed to the door.
“Why did you write and tell him?”
“Because as much as I love you, I love my brother best.” Her eyes hardened.
So like Jack’s, Melanie thought.
“What if that night was all we had, Lisa?” Melanie called when Lisa reached the door. She couldn’t afford to get her heart crushed again.
Lisa looked at Melanie, sympathy in her eyes. “You have to give the relationship a chance to find that out, don’t you, Mel?”
Before Melanie could argue that she had to risk an already bruised heart to do that, Lisa slipped out. Turning to her daughter, Melanie picked bits of cereal out of her hair and watched her bang her pudgy palms on the high-chair tray. There was no mistaking that Juliana was Jack’s baby. She had his eyes. Intelligent, probing blue eyes.
“Hey, Jules,” Melanie said, and the baby looked at her, smiled brightly and offered a fistful of squishy cereal loops. Smiling, Melanie leaned down for a pretend bite. “I love you, munchkin. God, I love you.”
Melanie blinked back tears and wondered what would become of them. She’d had it all figured out till Jack showed up. She liked things neat and in order, to know the outcome of events. Which was why she was a banker. Figures didn’t lie. Figures didn’t cheat on you while you were selecting china and bridesmaids. Numbers didn’t leave you with the pitying gazes of everyone you had to tell about the broken engagement. Twice.
She wondered what was wrong with her that men left so easily. She was nice. She had a good sense of humor. She wasn’t a supermodel, but she wasn’t ugly. What was it about her that sent men running to someone more interesting?
Jack’s face loomed in her mind as she gathered up her baby. She held Juliana closely and prayed Jack would just leave. She’d handled Craig’s betrayal with his old love. She handled Andy’s with his bimbo secretary.
But with Jack? If he got her hopes up and dumped her, well, she’d never recover. She was certain of that. And she’d have his daughter to look at every day to remind herself of her failure. No, it was better her way. No chance, no heartache. Right?
She looked at the baby. “Right?”
Juliana didn’t answer. It was just as well. There wasn’t one, she thought. There just wasn’t.
Juliana was fussing for her dinner, Melanie was trying to get a load of laundry collected and into the washer before she started the evening phase of her day. Her day off, too, she thought. A heavy knock shook the door and for a split second, Juliana stopped whining and looked with Melanie at the door.
“Probably a salesman again,” she said to her daughter, and crossed the living room. Propping the laundry basket on one hip, she opened the door.
“Jack.”
“Good, you didn’t forget me.”
Like that would ever happen, she thought. Just looking at him made her insides turn to mush. “Why are you here?” Her voice sounded steady, right?
“Lisa and Brian took off and I was alone and hungry.”
“Good that you have a houseful of food, because Lisa is a great cook.”
Jack’s gaze slipped over Melanie. She filled out those jeans better than any woman he’d known, but her face showed signs of fatigue.
“Then I guess you aren’t up for takeout?” He held up the pints of Chinese food.
Melanie inhaled the delicious scent and smothered a groan. Moo goo gai pan. Her favorite. He fights dirty, she thought. “No thank you, we’re fine.” Juliana took that moment to exercise her lungs and Melanie glanced at her daughter. “Hey, be patient. It’s warming.”
“What’s warming?”
“Her dinner, her bottle, followed by a bath, quiet time, then sleep.”
“Then you get to do what, Melanie? Sit here alone and watch TV.”
She made a rude sound. “I get to keep cleaning, working. Ironing my clothes for work. Then I get to rest.”
“It’s tough alone, isn’t it?”
Her spine stiffened. She walked right into that one, she thought. “I manage. And will continue to do so, without your help.”
“Hey, I’m not taking over, darlin’, I’m just bringing chow.” She arched a brow. He calmly gazed back, then smiled. “You going to keep me standing out here all night for the neighbors to see or what?” When she just stared, he swung the boxes. “It’s hot. And I’m starving.”
Tempting…so tempting. Both Jack and the dinner. But if she let him in now, he’d only expect to be able to come back whenever he felt like it. “So go home and eat it.” She was too tired to deal with him now.
“Listen, Melanie, she’s my daughter, too, and I barely got a chance to look at her.”
A tiny twinge of guilt poked at her. “She has all ten fingers and toes, is in perfect health, and the longer you bug me, the madder she’s going to get about being denied her dinner.”
Jack pushed his way inside. “Then I guess you should hop to it, huh?”
“Jack.”
“Have dinner with me, Melanie. We need to talk.”
It was the smell of moo goo gai pan that did it, she thought. Not that smile. Not that pleading look she’d never seen on his face before. Okay, he was right, they needed to talk. Getting it all out on the table, so to speak, would make it clearer to Jack that she couldn’t marry him.
She nodded and he smiled, walking to the kitchen and dropping the pints and bags on the kitchen table. She was right behind him.
He turned and took the laundry basket. “I’ll do this.”
“I’m capable.”
“I don’t doubt that. But Her Highness looks like she’s working up to a Mach 1 scream.”
Melanie looked. Juliana was trying to move the walker, but her legs were still too short and all she did was kick the air in frustration. The baby was reaching for her and Melanie’s heart shifted. She handed over the basket and went to her daughter. “Come on, munchkin, dinner’s on.”
Jack watched her with the baby for a moment. How Melanie soothed Juliana, offered her a cracker as she set her in the high chair. She held a conversation with their daughter as if they were the only two people in the world, and feeling like the odd man out, Jack disappeared into the garage with the laundry basket, assuming that was where the washer and
dryer were located. They were. He separated a load. Ignoring the lace panties and bras, he focused on the baby clothes. Baby detergent, he thought, remembering a TV commercial for it. He started the load and went back into the kitchen. Melanie was feeding the baby.
Jack watched. He couldn’t help it. Just the sight of them, doing something so ordinary, fascinated him.
Then Juliana leaned out to look past her mother at him. His heart soared and he blew her a kiss. She smiled and spit food as she tried her best to talk to him, and Melanie turned to look at him, a smile tilting her lips.
“I think we’re communicating,” Jack said.
“That doesn’t say much for your intellect.”
His gaze narrowed. “You’re crabby.”
“I’m sorry. I’m a mother. This time of day we’re required to be crabby.”
He smiled, shaking his head and moved to dish up the Chinese food. “You ready for some chow?”
“I’ll wait. But you go ahead.”
He frowned at her over his shoulder.
“I have to give her a bath after this. She sleeps better.”
Jack nodded. “I’ll wait for you. But…” He fished in a bag and took out a few egg rolls, then cut them in pieces and brought the plate to her. “Appetizers?”
She snatched up a piece and popped it into her mouth. Jack sat adjacent to her as she finished off the plate while she fed the baby. Then she cleared the dishes and lifted Juliana out of the high chair.
“Bath time,” Melanie said to Juliana, then looked at Jack. “We’ll be a little while.”
A direct hint for privacy, he thought and leaned back in the chair and folded his arms. He wanted to be a part of their lives, not a pest. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Dang. Hopes dashed again,” she said, and walked to the bathroom.
Jack shook his head. She was as determined to keep him at a distance as he was to get closer. But then, she really didn’t know him that well. But she was going to learn.
A half hour later, Melanie closed the door to Juliana’s room and stepped into the bathroom to clean up the mess in there. She was beat. And she really didn’t want to deal with Jack on top of that, she thought, bending to collect dirty clothes and towels. She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror and groaned. Her hair was coming out of the ponytail, she didn’t have on a stitch of makeup, and her shirt had baby food all over the shoulder.
Some “I can handle everything” impression, she thought. She dumped the clothes in the laundry hamper and slipped into her bedroom to run a brush through her hair and change her blouse. It smelled, anyway.
When she stepped out of the bedroom, the aroma of moo goo gai pan made her mouth water and she walked toward the living room. Something more than maternal instinct made her pause at her daughter’s room. She heard Jack’s voice, soft and deep, like the distant rumble of thunder. Gently she pushed open the nursery door.
He was leaning over the crib, stroking the baby’s back. “No, I swear to you, princess, nothing is ever going to hurt you. I’m here for you, even if Mommy doesn’t want it. I’m not going away. And I’m going to protect you. You can count on it.”
Melanie’s throat tightened.
“I’ll slay your dragons for you, princess. I give you my word of honor.”
Tears burned in Melanie’s eyes.
“And if she’ll let me, I’ll slay Mommy’s, too.”
Melanie swallowed hard and tried not to notice the flutter of her heart. Quietly Jack lowered the side of the crib and bent to kiss Juliana’s soft brown curls. The night-light illuminated his features, fierce, and loving.
Her daughter had a champion, Melanie thought, backing out of the room. Whether she wanted it or not. But that didn’t mean she had to like it. And it didn’t mean she had to marry him just because he wanted it. She and Juliana had done just fine without him. She slipped into the living room and sank onto the sofa. She didn’t want to doubt herself, her capabilities.
When he came out, he paused at the edge of the hallway, his hands on his hips. Tipping his head back, he took a long cleansing breath and let it out, smiling as he did. He hadn’t noticed her yet. He looked as if he was measuring himself against the responsibility of fatherhood. She understood that. The day she’d learned she was pregnant with his child, she had done the same thing.
He met her gaze, like an arrow shooting straight toward a target. “Hi.”
“Hey,” she said. Lord, he was devastating to look at, she thought. In fitted jeans and a black T-shirt that flowed over every contour of his chest and arms, she wanted only to run her hands over that body. A body she’d had only one night to learn.
He moved toward her and her heart skipped an entire beat at that sexy hip-rolling walk of his. Did the man even know how powerful he was? Maybe he did, she thought as he slid down onto the sofa beside her.
His face was inches from hers, his gaze making a slow prowl of her features, the neckline of her blouse. Her breasts tightened in instant reaction.
“You keep looking at me like that and we won’t be dining on Chinese takeout,” he said softly.
“I’m starving,” she said, and knew she should have kept her mouth shut.
“Me, too. But I’m only hungry for you.”
Melanie felt herself turn to mush. “Jack, don’t.”
“What? Don’t be honest? Don’t tell you how many times I’ve thought about you?”
“This isn’t helping.”
“Denying isn’t helping,” he said, and leaned closer, his mouth a fraction from hers.
She could feel his breath on her lips. Almost taste him. And if memory served her, and it did, he tasted great. She leaned, and an instant before his mouth crushed hers, the phone rang.
She lurched to get it before it woke the baby.
“Hello,” came out on a croak and she had to clear her throat. “Oh, hi, Michael.”
Jack’s blue eyes narrowed dangerously, and Melanie thought that between her disappointment at the interruption and the stupidity of falling into his arms again, this was the bucket of ice water she needed.
“Busy? Well, actually I am.” She didn’t look at Jack. “Sure. Bye.” She hung up.
“Who was that?”
“A friend.”
“How close a friend?”
She didn’t mistake the edge to his voice. “I work with Michael.”
“Was he asking you out?”
“I imagine he was trying.”
“You’d date this man?”
No, she wouldn’t. It would be trading one piece of heartache for another. But she couldn’t resist asking, “Any reason I shouldn’t?”
“Yes, I can barely get you to sit still long enough to speak with me and we have a child together.”
And you’re more dangerous to me than Michael could ever be. She could barely recall the guy’s eye color, but there wasn’t a thing about Jack she’d forgotten. “What is it that you want to say, Jack? Except propose marriage.”
“You’re not even going to consider it, are you?” he said.
“No, but thanks for the offer.”
“You act like I did this without thinking first.”
She folded her legs under her on the sofa. “It was a gut reaction, Jack. An obligation. I will not be a man’s ball and chain when he doesn’t want it.”
“Who says I don’t?”
“If Juliana wasn’t between us, would you have come here first?”
“I’ve been in-country for three days and two of them I’ve been here. What do you think?”
“You want to do the honorable thing. I can understand that. But I don’t need you to. Nor do I want to marry a man only for the sake of a child. Marriage is tough enough without going in with such low expectations.”
“I don’t have those—you do. I’ll be a good father.”
“Oh, I know you will,” she said gently. “But you don’t have to marry me to be one.”
Jack thought of his own blood father. The man did
n’t marry Jack’s mother, wasn’t there for Jack when he was young and impressionable. Later, his mom had fallen in love with a great man, David, and they had married. Lisa was the product of that love, and the man Jack called Dad had been great to him, even when he didn’t have to be. But Jack resented that his birth father hadn’t the guts to marry his mother and left a little lost kid to bear the reaction of being a bastard. He would never do that to Juliana. Even if things didn’t work out between him and Melanie, he was in his daughter’s life for good.
He thought about telling Melanie his reason for wanting to marry, though he knew his father’s lack of backbone was only part of it. Melanie herself was the real reason, and she wouldn’t understand. She’d tell him that just because he was born out of wedlock didn’t mean he had to make up for his father’s mistakes—which was true.
Jack just didn’t want to repeat them. Not at his child’s expense.
Four
Melanie pushed through her front door, glad to be home. Her feet ached, and her head was brewing a whopper of a headache. Mostly because while managing the bank, she’d been plagued with thoughts of Jack and what happened last night.
She’d fallen asleep on him. Literally. And during a conversation she should have been paying strict attention to. This morning she’d awoken in her own bed, alone, the doors tightly locked and the dinner mess cleaned up. And no sign of Jack.
Jack at night was hard to handle.
Jack in the morning would just bring back a ton of memories of waking up in his arms, feeling his strength surround her.
She hadn’t set her briefcase down before the scent of something wonderful cooking hit her full force and made her mouth water. Had Diana, her sitter, cooked? It wasn’t unusual since the older woman did more than just care for her daughter.
“Diana, you shouldn’t have gone to the trouble.”
“I didn’t, dear,” the woman said before Melanie stepped fully inside the kitchen. “It’s his show.”
Melanie went still with anger. “Jack.”
“Yes,” he said, his back to her while he stirred something in a saucepan.
“What are you doing here?”
The SEAL’s Surprise Baby Page 4
