by Laurie Paige
Drake pulled his dignity around him, her words adding insult to injury as far as he was concerned. He sauntered into the house.
Inez was in the kitchen as he expected. After pouring a cup of coffee, he propped a hip on the stool at the end of the counter and watched her prepare fish for baking. He sighed heavily.
“Problems?” she asked.
Relieved that she always understood a man, he nodded. “Maya,” he said, disheartened by his whole visit home. “Nothing is going according to plan.”
He’d expected Maya to be grateful to him for returning to see about her, to take care of her so she wouldn’t have to worry about the child’s future. And this was the thanks he got—her fury.
“I just don’t understand her at all,” he muttered.
Inez brushed butter over the fish fillets. “Mothers-to-be are unpredictable.”
“I’ll say,” he agreed glumly, still feeling the sting of Maya’s calling him a brute.
“Hormones and all, you know. The body changes a lot.”
He nodded. Recalling the slender perfection of last summer and comparing it to the rounded curves of the present, he felt the not-so-subtle changes in his own body as heat flowed to that dark place deep inside.
Hunger surged through him, the desire not at all slaked by the changes in Maya. In some ways, she was sexier than ever, the baby proof of the wild passion they had shared, reminding him of the ecstasy he’d tasted with her and no one else. Longing joined the hunger.
“One thing I know about my daughter,” Inez continued after a few seconds of silence, “she would not give her body where her heart did not also go.”
Misery coiled in his chest, making it tight and achy. “She seems real close to Andy Martin.”
“Yes, Andy is her friend.” Inez rolled the fillets in cracker crumbs sprinkled with grated cheese, then laid them in a baking dish. “It’s wise for lovers to also be friends.”
“He isn’t her lover,” Drake said furiously.
“Someone was.”
Heat hit Drake’s face as this inescapable truth quivered in the air between them. “I’m sorry,” he said. “You’re her mother. I shouldn’t have…”
“A mother has to let go when her daughter becomes a woman. Still, it isn’t easy to stand by silently while your children make mistakes.” She gave him a wise but sad smile. “You will learn this with your daughter.”
“Marissa. Maya is going to name her Marissa.”
“A beautiful name,” Inez said in approval.
A fist closed around his heart. He looked at his hand and recalled the baby thumping against his palm as if welcoming him home. His twin’s face appeared, and Drake shook his head in confusion. The darkness returned, driving out the warmth and light of passion.
“My work,” he said, trying to explain. “It’s dangerous. There’s no place for a wife and child where I go.”
“Woman have gone with their men to dangerous places in all of history,” Inez told him in a gently scolding voice. “Perhaps it’s your courage that is lacking.”
Her dark eyes, so like her daughter’s, gazed at him with her usual kindness, yet he felt rebuked. “Someone has to be practical about the situation,” he told her as need and hope fought with his conscience.
“I have often found Maya to be levelheaded.”
“Maybe,” he said doubtfully.
Obviously the mother didn’t know her daughter at all. Needing movement, he headed for the corral. Maya was there, sitting on the top rail with no regard for her condition as usual. The familiar anger coursed through him, dislodging the other, confusing emotions.
“Be careful,” was all he said, though, as he leaped over the fence to begin the roping lessons.
“I am,” she said with no inflection, which told him she was still furious with him.
“You want to try your luck from a horse?” he asked the boys.
Joe and Teddy thought that sounded great. Johnny didn’t say anything. Drake studied the teenager while he supervised the saddling of three trusty ponies. Johnny did exactly what Joe and Teddy did, but his fingers were awkward at the task. His mount had to take the bit on its own and practically put its own head in the halter.
“Be sure and loop the reins,” Drake instructed the younger boys as he realized Johnny wasn’t familiar with horses. He demonstrated and made them retie the leather, then showed them how to mount in one smooth leap.
Johnny followed his every order. Drake nodded approval when the teenager sat in the saddle, his shoulders tense, the reins in one hand the way Drake held his.
“As soon as you lasso the sawhorse, the pony will hold the rope tight. Jump down and keep your hand on the rope as you run to the target to release the rope. Remember, that would be a live, squirming animal on the end if this were real.”
Aware of Maya’s eyes on him, he gave the kids pointers and watched their skills improve rapidly. Maya was right—Johnny was a quick learner. Maybe the boy could get a sports scholarship to college. He’d talk to Maya about it. That should get her attention.
He broke off that line of reasoning. He wasn’t thinking of the teenager’s future just to get her approval. Although it did irk him that she refused to even glance his way while she kept an eye on her charges. As if she didn’t trust him to watch after them properly.
Later that afternoon, when he went to his room to shower and change for dinner, he considered something that had occurred to him earlier. Maya no longer trusted him.
But he’d told her, in the note he’d left, that his life was too uncertain. He’d said things in passion that he hadn’t meant to say, but then he’d explained why he had to leave and why he had to go alone…
Why?
The question ambushed him, bringing him to a stumbling halt, but only for a second. Then reason reasserted itself.
He’d explained it all, dammit. He didn’t have a life like normal men. His future was one that couldn’t be depended on.
Why?
Because of his missions. His return was never guaranteed. Because he’d vowed to never leave anyone behind to mourn his passing.
The way he’d been left behind when his twin died?
He had no answer for that. It just wasn’t fair for a man in his position to have a wife and kids…except there was already a kid on the way. And Maya…
His breath caught at the thought of greeting her warm, sweet welcome with the fierce passion she stirred in him each time he came home, safe and sound, to her arms.
The new scar on his hip throbbed. The problem was that he might not always return. The one left behind suffered in a hell that never let up.
Except for those wild moments of incredible passion last summer.
He shook his head as pain ran over him. He shouldn’t have taken her innocence, her trust, nor her love if he hadn’t meant to return it.
Emotion he couldn’t define plunged wildly through him. He had to go to her, to tell her…what?
A man with no future had no right to involve another in his life. That was what he had to make her see. If that meant she had to turn to another man—
The idea wasn’t bearable. He and Maya had to come to terms. Their child’s future depended on it. That’s what he had to think about—Marissa’s future.
Suddenly a whole world of possibilities opened before him.
Seven
Maya hurriedly looked through her notes. Yes, she had everything. Didn’t she? She riffled through the papers again. Yes. She had to grin at her nervousness.
Today was the big test, the last of the semester. All her other classes had required a term paper, but not the one on early childhood assessment methods. The prof gave long, hard tests that took three hours.
Closing the folder, she stuck it in the tote bag with a packet of cheese crackers and a bottle of water. She hurried to the kitchen to tell her mom she was on her way. Drake was there.
She nodded to him only because her mother was present. “I’ll be home by nine, I shoul
d think,” she said. “The boys have their instructions and will study here in the kitchen before dinner. Each gets to choose one hour of television, Teddy first this time, then Joe has to read to you from one of the books on his desk for thirty minutes.”
“I remember,” Inez said, stirring a pot on the stove. “Then I read a chapter of Teddy’s book to him. Joe gets to listen. Both go to bed at nine.”
“Where are you going?” Drake asked, frowning.
Maya answered reluctantly. “San Francisco.”
“She has an exam,” Inez added, a worried light in her eyes as she looked Maya over. “I don’t like your being out on the road alone for such a long time. There’s a storm coming. What if something happens?”
“Nothing will happen,” Maya assured her mother.
“You could have a flat tire. The road could wash out. You know we have mud slides at this time of year. Spend the night in the city if we get rain.”
“Well, we haven’t had but one drizzle in a week. I’ll be okay. Stop worrying,” Maya scolded affectionately.
“Here’s your lunch.” Inez handed her a plastic bag. “In case something happens and you need to eat.”
With a resigned smile, Maya tucked the bag into the tote, gave her mother a kiss and headed out. Drake rose and followed her. She was as aware of him at her heels as she would have been if he’d been a wolf bearing down on her.
At last she turned on him. “What?” she demanded.
“You going in that old car of yours?”
The question surprised her. “Yes.”
“No way.”
“I beg your pardon?” she said haughtily.
“I’ll take you. Don’t argue,” he advised. “It won’t do you any good.”
“I don’t need anyone to take me.”
“Please.”
The softly spoken word hung in the air between them. Perhaps if she hadn’t looked into his eyes…but she did. She saw determination, but also worry, and the bleakness that never left him.
“You don’t have to,” she said, trying to reason with him and her stubborn heart, which pounded eagerly at the thought of hours alone with him.
“I know, but…I’d worry.”
The simplicity of the statement undermined her resolve to have as little to do with him as possible.
She went with him, not without misgivings, to his well-maintained truck. Once they were on their way, she sighed and relaxed. “I have to admit, it’s nice to be able to watch the scenery instead of the traffic.”
His eyes flashed over her. “Yeah.”
Heat worked its way through her as Drake guided the pickup onto the winding road over the mountains to Highway 101, which was faster going than via the coast road. Even so, the trip took the rest of the morning. They spoke rarely, but, with soft music on the CD player, the silence eased into a semi-comfortable companionship. It was after eleven when Drake joined the traffic pouring across the Golden Gate Bridge into San Francisco.
The sky was overcast, and a mist fell on the city, driven by a chill wind off the Pacific.
“Let’s have lunch at one of the places along Fisherman’s Wharf,” he suggested.
“I’d rather go to the campus. I want to look over my notes once more,” she said.
“Okay. You’ll have to direct me.”
He expertly followed her orders, and they arrived at the busy university buildings shortly after that. Parking was a problem, as usual, but they finally found a space.
Drake got out and fell into step with her as she headed for a quiet alcove on the first floor of the building where the exam was to be held.
“You’ll have hours to kill,” she told him. “It’ll be four before the exam is over.”
“I brought a book to read. Is there a cafeteria or someplace to get lunch?”
She rummaged in the tote and brought out the meal her mother had sent. “Mom sent food in case I was marooned on a deserted island for a week. You want to share?”
“Sure. I’ll get drinks,” he said, pointing to a machine with a variety of canned sodas in the lobby.
Maya watched him, his stride long and sure, as he bought drinks for them. The misery and excitement of being with him left her confused and wary. She’d been wrong to follow her heart last summer. She wouldn’t be foolish again, she vowed, no matter how wonderful Drake could be at times.
He’d been super to Johnny and his younger brothers over the weekend, working with them for hours at the stables. Drake seemed to have a natural affinity for youngsters. He’d been endlessly patient and good-humored at Joe’s and Teddy’s demands for attention.
His help had given her a break, although she’d been careful to stay close and keep an eye on the boys so Ms. Meredith wouldn’t worry or get upset.
Laying a hand on her abdomen, she found herself wondering, against her better judgment, how he would be as a father. Firm or indulgent? Loving or distant? Would he spoil Marissa when he came in for one of his quick visits, then ignore her the rest of the time?
If they married, would she turn into a nagging wife, hating it when he went off on one of his missions? What if, one day, he didn’t return?
She worried about the dark part of his soul that drove him to court danger and challenge death. However, he wasn’t a thrill-seeker or adrenaline junkie. Drake had a strong sense of right and wrong. He was an honorable person.
And therein was the problem. He would marry her and try to give her the life he thought she wanted. To make things right—that was his nature and why he’d chosen his life’s work. It was also a part of why she loved him.
Longing for more than life seemed to offer seared her with needs she’d suppressed the past few months. Pride had refused to let her contact Drake when she’d realized she was expecting. She’d heard nothing from him after he left.
There’s no place in my life for a wife and family.
The stark, written denial of their softly spoken words of love were burned forever into her heart. For a moment, she felt pity for that young, trusting girl who had given her love so freely. It had been a bitter awakening to read that note and know Drake had left—
“Here,” Drake said again and handed Maya the soda can and a straw.
He wondered what thoughts had taken her away. Jealousy flamed in him. He wanted her in every way—her thoughts, her time, all her attention. He shook his head as knowledge, bitter and lonely, forced him to remember all the reasons he should leave her alone.
Except it was too late for that.
Looking at her rounded figure, yearning tore at him. He wasn’t even sure what he longed for. A return of the raw passion they had shared last summer? Yes. A renewal of the trust in her eyes when she gazed at him? God, yes. Her love?
He’d never allowed himself to think of the softer side of life and the comfort of home and family. Those weren’t in the cards for him. That was a fact he’d always known, long before he’d chosen a career or felt this passionate intensity toward Maya. He hadn’t meant to hurt her….
But he had.
That was another fact he had to face up to. Years ago, when she’d been seventeen and just blossoming into womanhood, he’d noticed and been attracted. Sense had prevailed, and he’d fled the homestead.
Too bad he hadn’t exercised the same caution last June. Now it was too late. He let his gaze wander over her, noting the way her hands trembled as she ate and read over the notes. She’d always hated tests.
It came to him that their lives had been and would always be entwined in many ways. Whether she agreed or not, he had to think of her and the baby. All his assets were now assigned to her—his insurance, saving account, trust fund—in case he didn’t come back from a mission.
He ate a sandwich, carrot sticks and an apple with hardly a notice as worry gnawed at him. In his inner vision, he kept seeing a pair of big, brown eyes, like Maya’s, only in a younger face, filled with trust. He wanted to explain about his work and his commitments to this new life, but his excuses seem
ed feeble and self-serving instead of noble as he’d once thought. Maybe there was room in a life for more than one thing….
Watching Maya, he saw her close her eyes. Her lips moved as she went over some bit of information she wanted to remember. “Give me your notes,” he said. “I’ll quiz you.”
When she handed them over without a quibble, he realized just how worried she was. For the next ninety minutes, he asked questions, all of which she answered perfectly.
“You’ll ace the exam,” he told her.
“I hope.”
He had to smile at her fatalistic tone. She’d always been a serious student, eager to learn. She’d been the same as a lover, eager to please and to explore the full realm of passion with him.
His body went hard with needs long denied but dreamed of nightly. Without thinking, he leaned forward and kissed her soft, soft mouth. “Good luck,” he murmured, knowing he had to let her go.
“Thanks.”
He watched her gather her composure and the papers, then walk down the hall, joining other students entering the theater-style room. He got out a book on naval maneuvers in past wars and settled down to wait.
After a couple of chapters, he gave up on the book. His mind kept drifting to Maya and the baby and their future. Their daughter would grow up, marry, have children of her own. Would he be around to see it?
Outside, the storm came down in full force, bringing wind and heavy rain. The mountain road would be hazardous.
At three, he called Inez and found out it was raining hard there, too. He made a decision. “I think I’ll see about rooms and spend the night in town,” he told the housekeeper.
“That’s good. I was worried about Maya being out on the road in this storm.”
Guilt nibbled at him, but gently, while he made arrangements for two rooms with a hotel down on the bay. It wasn’t as if he’d planned the storm or anything. Even her mother had been relieved to know Maya wouldn’t be out in the weather. Yes, staying in town was definitely the best thing to do.
Beyond that, he didn’t want to think.
Maya handed the test to the student aide at the door and walked out of the room, glad the ordeal was over.
