“It’s imperative that I go,” he told her.
“It’s okay,” she assured him. “Things happen. Besides, it’s only my third month. I seriously doubt anything exciting will happen.”
“I wanted to meet the doctor.”
“So you’ll meet him next month.”
But next month didn’t happen, either. Two days before her appointment Adam caught a nasty flu virus.
“You sound terrible,” she said when he called to tell her, dousing her disappointment.
“I feel terrible,” he croaked, his throat so raw and scratchy he could only speak in a coarse whisper.
“Do you have a fever?”
“One hundred and one. Celia won’t let me out of bed and she’s been force-feeding me chicken soup.”
“Good. It sounds like what you need is rest.”
“I’m sorry, Katy,” he rasped. “For what?”
“I feel terrible for missing another appointment. Not to mention the amnio. I wanted to be there with you.”
And she had wanted him there. She didn’t like feeling that she was in this alone. But he couldn’t help that she was sick.
“I’ve heard it’s really not that big of a deal. They’ll numb me so I won’t feel a thing. And, no offense, but I wouldn’t want to go anywhere near you right now. The last thing I need is the flu. Just take care of yourself and you’ll be better in time for the next appointment.”
Her mom went with her to her appointment, and after her checkup, it was off to the hospital for the amnio—which really wasn’t all that bad. Doc Hogue had already warned her that it usually took six to eight weeks to get the results—in some cases even longer, and she knew the waiting would be torture.
When she called Adam to tell him the test went well, he sounded relieved. “Nothing will stop me from making the next appointment. I promise.”
She hoped that was true. And not just because she wanted to see him, but things were progressing faster than she’d anticipated. Her mom had always said that she started showing early in her pregnancies, so Katy shouldn’t have been surprised when, in the last week of her fourth month, she woke up one morning and couldn’t fasten her jeans.
“Isn’t that supposed to happen?” Adam asked when she called him later that night to complain. “And didn’t you tell me that you’re not worried about the physical repercussions of pregnancy.”
“I don’t care about that,” she told him. “But there’s nothing more I hate than shopping!”
He laughed and called her “unique.”
Delaying the inevitable, she wore her jeans with the button unfastened, but after a couple more weeks, when she couldn’t get the zipper up more than an inch, and the buttons on her shirts were stretched to the limit, her mom dragged her to the maternity shop for a new wardrobe.
With her next appointment only a week away, Katy felt torn in two. On one hand, she was anxious to see Adam, on the other, she was dreading it. They talked on the phone almost daily now, but seeing him face-to-face…she was afraid it would be a stark reminder of everything she couldn’t have. Would never have. And though she had never come right out and told Adam how she felt, she was pretty sure he already knew. She also knew that if he was going to have a change of heart, he’d have had it by now. Losing his mother, then Becca, had done something to him. It had cut him so deeply she didn’t think he would ever completely heal. He would never come right out and say it—he was too tough for that—but she knew he was afraid of being hurt again.
The Friday before her five-month checkup, Katy had finished up in the office for the day and was taking an afternoon nap when she woke to the sound of her mom’s voice. She stood in the bedroom doorway.
“Wake up, honey. We have a visitor.”
She sat up and yawned, rubbing her eyes. “Who?”
“Come down and see for yourself,” she said, wearing a smile that made Katy suspect she was up to something.
Katy rolled out of bed and peeked out the window. There was a sporty little red car parked in front of the house. Who did they know who drove a sports car? She stretched to look out toward the barn and saw her father standing by the fence with a man Katy didn’t recognize. Not from the back anyway at this distance. He was tall and broad-shouldered, wearing jeans, cowboy boots, a plaid flannel shirt and a black Stetson.
Puzzled, and anxious to meet the mystery man, she quickly dragged a comb through her sleep-matted hair and brushed her teeth.
She grabbed a sweater and headed downstairs, and as she glanced in the family room on her way out the front door she noticed a duffel bag next to the sofa. Whoever it was, it looked as though they were there for an extended stay. Maybe it was some long-lost cousin or uncle that she didn’t know about.
She stepped out onto the porch, checking the car out as she walked past. The plates were Texas, but the car looked totally unfamiliar. And very expensive.
So it was a rich long-lost relative.
She crossed the yard to where her father stood with the mystery man, and he must have heard her coming because he suddenly turned in her direction. “There you are, Katy! Look who came to visit.”
The man beside him turned, his head lowered so that his face was hidden by the brim of his hat. Then he lifted his chin, and when his face came into view, her heart did a somersault with a triple twist.
“Hello, Katy,” Adam said.
Her first instinct was to throw herself into his arms and just hold him, but she restrained herself. Especially with her dad standing there. “What are you doing here? Our appointment isn’t until Tuesday.”
“I figured if I came early I would be guaranteed not to miss it this time. And your mom is always telling me I should come and stay for a few days. So here I am.”
“Well,” her dad said, looking from her to Adam. She could tell he was wary of Adam’s presence, but he restrained himself from butting in. “I better head in and…see how dinner is coming along.”
They both knew that the only part of dinner he ever participated in was eating it, and he was just making an excuse to leave them alone. But she was grateful.
When he was gone, Adam looked her up and down, eyes wide, and said, “Wow, you look…”
“Pregnant?” she finished for him.
He grinned, and it was so adorable her knees actually went weak. She’d missed seeing him smile. Missed everything about him. “I was going to say fantastic. Pregnancy definitely agrees with you.”
She laid a hand on her rounded belly. “Doc Hogue said he’s never had a patient who took to it so well. If it wasn’t for my belly getting bigger, and the fact that some days I need an afternoon nap, I wouldn’t even know that I was pregnant.”
He nodded to her belly. “Can I feel?”
This was the part she dreaded. Well, one of the parts. He talked a lot about being anxious to touch her belly, and feel the baby move, and she knew darned well what happened when he put his hands on her. But she couldn’t tell him no. Not when it meant so much to him.
“Sure,” she said, trying to sound casual, when in reality her heart had begun to pound.
His hand was so big it practically dwarfed her tiny bump, and the warmth of his palm seeped through her shirt to warm her skin. “Have you felt the baby move?”
“Little flutters, but the book says those could just be muscle spasms. No kicks yet. But Doc Hogue said probably soon.”
The feel of his hand on her belly was making her go all soft inside, and the energy building between them was reaching a critical level. She knew if she didn’t back away soon she was going to do something really dumb, like throw her arms around his neck and kiss him, but Adam didn’t give her a chance. His arms went around her, tentatively, as if he thought she might object to being held, and said, “I missed you, Katy.”
She couldn’t have fought it if she wanted to. She wrapped her arms around him and squeezed, tucking her head under his chin, breathing him in. “Me, too.”
It was wonderful, and awful, because
she managed to fall in love with him all over again. Not that she’d ever really stopped. But being apart for so long made her forget a little.
What if she never got over him?
The dinner bell started clanging and her mom called from the house, “Come on, you two. Time to eat!”
Though she didn’t want to, Katy let go of Adam, and decided right then that there would be no more hugging and touching while he was here. It seemed he could turn his feelings on and off like a lightbulb, but for her it wasn’t so easy. A few more days of this and her heart might never recover.
Something very weird was happening.
In the past, whenever Becca brought Adam over it was always awkward, the conversation stilted. Probably because Becca herself was so uncomfortable, as if being back home would rub off on her somehow and tarnish the new life she’d built with Adam. But now, everyone was happy and relaxed and seemed to genuinely enjoy each other’s company.
After supper, while her dad took Adam out to the stables, Katy and her mom sat out on the porch swing.
“As much as I hate admitting I’m wrong,” her mom said, “You were right about Adam. He’s a good man. Maybe if your sister had been more comfortable here, he would have been, too.”
“I’ve given up on trying to figure out why Becca did the things she did. Maybe if she’d lived, she would have eventually come around.”
“Maybe,” her mom said. They were quiet for several minutes, then she said off-handedly, “I noticed Adam couldn’t keep his eyes off of you at dinner.”
Katy had noticed that, too. Adam sat across from her, and every time she looked up from her plate he was watching her. And each time their eyes met she would feel this funny zing through her nervous system, and her heart would skip a beat. She’d barely been able to choke her dinner down. “What are you suggesting?”
Her mom shrugged. “Only that a man doesn’t look at a woman that way if he doesn’t care about her.”
Whether or not Adam cared about her wasn’t in question. “But for me, that just isn’t enough. I want the whole package. I deserve that. And, Adam, well, he’s not available.”
“Things change.”
“Not this.”
She might have argued further but Adam and her dad walked up, putting the conversation to an abrupt end.
They all sat out on the porch and watched the sunset until ten, when a chill set in the air. It was hard to believe it was fall already. The time seemed to fly by lately.
Her parents settled in front of the television to watch their favorite sitcom and her mom told Katy, “Why don’t you get Adam settled in the blue room.” When Katy cut her eyes sharply her way, she added, “It’s the nicer of the two.”
It was also right next door to, and shared a bathroom with, her own room. The green room was at least across the hall. Although, if he were staying with the men in the bunk house it would be too close as far as she was concerned.
Her mom wasn’t trying to set them up, was she? Did she think proximity would make Adam change his mind? She wanted Katy to be happy, but she was making her miserable instead.
“This way,” she told Adam, leading him up the stairs. He grabbed his duffel and followed her up. The heavy thud of his boots on the steps seemed to vibrate up through the balls of her feet to twang every single one of her nerves.
As soon as she hit the top step Sylvester darted out from his hiding spot behind the artificial palm tree and tried to wrap himself around her legs, so she toed him out of the way.
“The homicidal cat,” Adam said.
“Homicidal?”
“He did that to me the last time I was here. I almost fell down the stairs.”
“He can’t help it. He got kicked in the head by a horse a few years back and he hasn’t been right since. He mostly just stays up here and hides.”
“And opens doors,” Adam said with a grin, and she didn’t have to ask what he meant. If it hadn’t been for Sylvester opening her bedroom door, Adam never would have seen her naked, and maybe this entire mess might have been avoided.
She doubted it, though. With sexual attraction like theirs, sleeping with him had been inevitable.
“Here it is,” she said, stepping into the spare room. “I know it isn’t the Ritz, but the linens are fresh and there are clean towels in the bathroom cabinet. But if you flush the toilet and it keeps running just jiggle the handle and that should fix it.”
The door snapped shut behind her and she whirled around to find Adam leaning against it. He had a look in his eyes, as if he was about ten seconds from devouring her.
Oh, Lord, give me strength.
“Don’t look at me like that,” she said.
His duffel landed with a thud on the floor beside him. “Like what?”
“Like I’m the main course on the buffet table.”
He grinned. “Is that how I look?”
“I can’t, Adam.” But she wanted to. She wanted to slide her hands under his T-shirt, up his wide, muscular chest. She wanted to feel his bare skin against hers.
He took a step closer and her heart started to hammer. “I was just going to ask if I could feel the baby, that’s all.”
She didn’t believe him for a second. Once he got his hands on her, her belly wasn’t the only thing he would touch. And she would probably let him, because she wanted him so much she could hardly see straight.
“Maybe tomorrow,” she told him. “I’m going to turn in for the night.”
“It’s barely ten.”
“And I have to be up at five.”
“How about a kiss goodnight, then?”
Why was he doing this to her? “I don’t think so.”
“Why?”
At the end of her rope, she asked, “Adam, what do you want from me?”
He shrugged. “I just…want you.”
Isn’t that the way it always was? They wanted her…until they didn’t any longer. Well, she wanted forever, and he wasn’t a forever kind of man. Not anymore. “That’s not enough for me.”
His expression was grim. “You want more.”
“I deserve it.”
“You do. And I’m being selfish.” He opened the bedroom door. “I’m sorry. I’ll back off.”
“Do you need anything before I turn in?”
He shook his head. But as she walked past him to the door he caught her arm and pulled her to him. And heaven help her, she couldn’t resist wrapping her arms around him.
Though it was packed with emotion, there was nothing sexual about the embrace. He just held her, and she held him. But it wasn’t any less heartbreaking.
“I wish I could be what you need,” he whispered against her hair.
She nodded, because if she tried to speak she would probably start blubbering. Besides, they’d already said all they needed to say.
Since he’d popped in unannounced, Adam felt it was only fair to do his share of work while he was visiting, so when Gabe invited him to ride along while he repaired fence posts, he went with him. It was tiresome, backbreaking work, but it felt good to be out in the fresh air and not cooped up in an office behind a desk for a change. Since Becca’s death he’d become something of a shut-in. Now he was even thinking it was time to start living again.
They had finished replacing several busted fence posts when Katy’s mom brought them lunch on horseback. Thick barbequed beef sandwiches, a plastic bowl full of potato salad and cold sodas. They sat in the truck bed and ate. Adam was so famished he wolfed down two sandwiches and a huge pile of salad.
“Don’t they feed you in El Paso?” Gabe asked with a wry grin.
“I don’t get this hungry sitting behind a desk,” he admitted.
“Out here you earn your appetite. When I think about sitting at a desk day in, day out…” He shook his head. “Being outdoors, that’s my life.”
“You never considered doing anything else?”
“Nope. I know every inch of this land. It’s who I am.”
“It sure
is beautiful.”
He pointed to the east. “See past that fence line? That’s ten acres of prime land, some of the prettiest around here. It used to be a horse farm but it went belly-up last fall and the property went into foreclosure.”
“I’m surprised no one was interested in buying it.”
“Times are bad. I thought about purchasing it and expanding the east pasture, but with this economy it’s too much of a gamble. It would be perfect for a young couple, though. Build a house, raise a family. Maybe keep a horse or two.”
Adam couldn’t help wondering if he was talking about Katy. Was it possible she was she seeing someone? No, she would have told him. But realistically she wasn’t going to stay single forever. She was going to find a good man. One willing to give her everything he couldn’t. What she deserved.
“I understand you should be getting the DNA results soon,” Gabe said, balling up the plastic from his sandwich and stuffing it in the paper sack from their lunch. “What do you plan to do if it’s Katy’s?”
The question put him on edge. Up until now they had avoided talking about Adam’s relationship with Katy. But it was bound to come up. “I want to assure you that I’m going to take care of her and the baby. They won’t ever want for anything.”
“You know, it makes sense in a weird way. You fell in love with one of my daughters. I guess it’s not so unusual you’d fall in love with the other one.”
Love? Did he think…did he think Adam was going to marry Katy? “Katy and I…we don’t have that kind of relationship.”
“Is that why you two talk on the phone for hours practically every night?”
“Gabe—”
“And you can’t keep your eyes off of her?”
“No disrespect to you or to Katy, sir, but I don’t want to marry anyone.”
“You’ve got something against marriage, son? I know Becca could be a handful, but—”
The Tycoon's Paternity Agenda Page 14
