Little Secrets--Claiming His Pregnant Bride

by Sarah M. Anderson

  She didn’t know if it was anger or adrenaline—she hadn’t seen him in months. Not since he’d agreed to pay child support but promised that he’d never have anything to do with her daughter. “Pregnant?” she finished before he could say something crass. “Yes. I’m pregnant. I told you that, remember?”

  He didn’t even have the decency to look ashamed at coming within a hairbreadth of insulting her. “Yeah, I know. I just didn’t...” He waved a hand in her general direction.

  She blinked at him. “If you’re implying that I was lying about being pregnant—”

  “No, no. I believe you. You just look...”

  How had she ever thought she could love this man? It’d been a crappy lie that she had forced herself to buy into because, for some reason she still didn’t understand, her dad liked this man. Maybe it was because Roger and her father were too much alike. And Kate did exactly what her mother had done—shut up and went along with what her father wanted.

  Well, no more. Seth had spent months telling her how gorgeous she was, how beautiful she looked—even as she got huge. She was carrying Roger’s daughter and all he could think about was that she’d gotten fat.

  He could go to hell.

  “Did you have a reason for being here or did you just feel like insulting the mother of your unborn child?”

  Roger recoiled.

  “And I swear to God, Roger, if you ask if I’m sure it’s your child, I will not be held responsible for my actions.”

  “Jeez, Kate—calm down. I didn’t come here to pick a fight.”

  When, in the history of womankind, had telling a woman to “calm down” ever worked? Because it sure as hell didn’t now. “Then why are you here?”

  He scrubbed at the back of his neck. “Listen, I’ve been thinking—that kid’s not even born yet. You’re not going to need any child support for what, another year or so?”

  Good Lord, just when she thought it couldn’t get any worse, it did. “What are you talking about?”

  “I heard you had a few big sales,” he went on, completely missing the horrified shock in her voice. “To Bolton, of all people. I would’ve thought he’d come to me if he needed something—we’re friends.”

  Liar, Kate thought. She’d been spending nearly every waking moment with Seth for the last several months and not once had Roger made an effort to talk to either of them.

  She didn’t say that, though. Instead, she focused on what Roger was really saying. “Yes, I sold some property. I happen to be a real estate agent. What’s it to you?”

  “You don’t have to get all upset,” he said, his eyes darting around the office. “I’m just saying, it would probably be best if we delayed the child support payments for a little while. That’s all.”

  “Best for who?” Roger tried to smile, but it was more of a grimace. “Roger, what the hell is going on? I’m pregnant and you rolled in here to insult my appearance and try to get out of your financial obligations to a child you helped create?”

  “Hey, I didn’t ask you to get pregnant.”

  “News flash, I didn’t ask to get pregnant. It was an accident, but if you’re going to act like I did this all by myself, I’m going to have to explain some basic biology to you. What do you want?”

  The silence was awkward, but she debated whether or not she needed backup. How fast could Seth get here?

  “See,” Roger began, and she heard the whine in his voice that made it clear that he hadn’t gotten his way with something, “there were some investments that didn’t pan out and business has been slow and...”

  “And you’re suddenly broke?” she supplied.

  “Broke is a strong word. But there have been some cash flow difficulties.”

  She mentally translated those passive statements. Why hadn’t she ever noticed that when Roger screwed up he never owned his mistakes? “You lost all your money, didn’t you? What’s the matter, my dad cut you off?”

  That grimace again. Roger looked like a cornered animal trying to bluff its way out of a dangerous situation. “Look, are you going to help me out or not?”

  The nerve of this man. And to think, she might’ve been stuck with him. “You want me to help you out by releasing you from your financial obligations to your own child for an indeterminate amount of time because you made some unwise investment choices and you don’t have me to bail you out—am I getting all of this right?”

  Finally, he looked ashamed of himself. As well he should. “I wouldn’t put it quite like that. We could get married, you know.”

  She almost gagged. “No,” she said with as much force as she could. “I don’t have to take your crap, Roger. I don’t love you. You never loved me. And if you try to bail on child support, I will sue you back to the Stone Age.”

  “Come on, Kate—”

  “No,” she repeated again. “You kept the house. You kept the wedding gifts. You went on the honeymoon without me. What do I get? Child support. I had to rely on a family friend to give me a job. You gave me nothing, Roger. You are legally obligated to provide for your child. And I will hold you to it. There’s nothing else I want from you.”

  He jerked as if she had slapped him. “When did you get so bitchy?”

  Oh, that just did it. “Get out. I’m not your doormat anymore.”

  “But—”

  “Now,” she repeated, putting as much menace as she could into her voice.

  The jerk had the nerve to just stand there and stare, his mouth open in shock.

  She was reaching for her phone when the door behind him jingled and suddenly, there was Seth Bolton, stepping around Roger and putting himself in between that jerk and Kate. “Roger,” he said, his voice cool. He looked back at Kate. “Everything okay here?”

  “Yes,” Kate said before Roger could attempt to turn on the charm—not that Seth would fall for it. “Roger was just leaving, after renewing his commitment to paying child support.” She left the or else hanging invisibly in the air.

  Roger was an idiot, but not such a great idiot that he was going to argue with her in front of an audience. “We can talk later,” he said in a conciliatory tone.

  “No,” she said, standing up as straight as her belly would allow. “We can’t.”

  “Let me see you out,” Seth said, almost—but not quite—sounding friendly. He crowded Roger toward the door and opened it, waiting.

  Roger’s shoulders slumped in defeat. He looked back at Kate and said, “You look great, you know.”

  There was a time when Kate would have clung to that halfhearted compliment as proof that Roger did care for her, that she was doing the right thing staying with him. Now?

  Too little, too late. She did not return the compliment.

  Roger opened his mouth as if he were going to say something else, but Seth cleared his throat. It was the most menacing sound Kate had heard come out of him yet.

  Then the men were outside and Kate half wanted Seth to take a swing at Roger and half just wanted the idiot to go away.

  She was going to have to take Roger to court—that much was obvious. Lawyers were going to be expensive, but she wasn’t going to let him weasel his way out of this.

  She sank down in her desk chair and dropped her head into her hands. He hadn’t even asked if she was going to have a boy or girl. Why was she surprised? She wasn’t, really. Of course Roger was going to disappoint her. He really didn’t care. Not about the baby, not about her.

  The door jingled again and there was Seth, shutting it firmly behind him. “He’s gone,” he said, looking at her with open concern. “Are you all right?”

  Kate’s throat was thick with emotion—damned hormones. “I stood up to him,” she said around the lump in her throat. “He doesn’t want to pay child support and I told him I’d sue him if I had to. God, what a hassl
e.”

  Seth grinned at that. He glanced back at Harold’s dark office and then came around her desk, pulling her up into his arms. “You were amazing,” he agreed. Rubbing her back in just the right place. “I wish I could’ve seen the whole thing.”

  She was crying—but she was also laughing. “Oh, you would’ve hit him. I would’ve liked to have seen that.” Seth leaned back and stroked her tears away. She loved that her random bouts of hormones didn’t freak him out. “I can’t believe I almost married him.”

  He cradled her face. “I’m so glad you didn’t.”

  Kate almost lost herself in the tenderness of the moment. No—she couldn’t fall for Seth all over again. “Did he say anything to you outside?”

  Seth snorted. “He seemed hurt that I hadn’t used him for my real estate agent.”

  “Lord.”

  Seth hugged her tighter, and she sank into his warmth. He was always here when she needed him, lending her his strength. Without him, she might have buckled and agreed to marry Roger. She might have let Roger out of his financial obligations.

  She would’ve been miserable. But she wasn’t. Upset, yes. Pregnant, definitely. But she’d refused to roll over to make someone else happy. Seth had shown her she could fight for what she wanted and for that, she would love him forever.

  He stepped all the way around her and began to knead his thumbs into her lower back. God, it felt so good. “What are you doing here?”

  “I needed to see you,” he said, sending a thrill through her. Then, after a long pause while he worked on a particularly sore spot, he added, “We finalized the plan for the Shanghai showroom.”

  All of her good feelings disappeared in a heartbeat. Because this was it—the end. “Oh?” she got out in a strangled-sounding voice.

  “Yeah.” Kate couldn’t tell if it was a consolation or not that he sounded almost as depressed as she felt. “Best-case scenario is Shanghai for six months, but it’ll probably be closer to ten, maybe even twelve.”

  She shut her eyes, although that didn’t change things. “That’s great,” she lied, because his job was important to him. His family was important to him, and she could not allow him to damage those relationships for her.

  “Yeah,” he said again, sounding positively morose about it. “It’s going to be really exciting. I’ll leave on the second.”

  They were down to days at this point. Sixteen days. And then he would be gone from her life and she would still be here, arguing with Roger and trying to do the best she could with what she had.

  Suddenly, she couldn’t bear it. She turned, throwing her arms around his neck. “I wish I could go with you.”

  His hands cradled her belly. “I couldn’t ask it of you. I wish I could stay.”

  She shook her head against his shoulder. “I couldn’t ask it of you, either.”

  He pulled a small box out of his pocket. “I got this for you.”

  She stared at the Christmas wrapping. She didn’t want to open it—didn’t want to accept the fact that the best thing that had ever happened to her was winding down to its natural conclusion. “Thank you. I haven’t had time to get you a present yet.”

  “I don’t...” He pulled her back into his arms and held her for a long moment. Then, almost by unspoken agreement, they both pulled back. Lingering would do no one any good. “Promise me,” he said, taking her hands and staring down into her eyes. “Promise me you’ll take care of yourself and Madeleine. Promise me you won’t...” He swallowed, his eyes suspiciously bright. “Don’t wait for me, Kate. There’s a great guy out there who is going to be really lucky to have you and I don’t want you to pass him up.”

  “You’re being ridiculous,” she said, hiccupping. She was almost seven months pregnant. The number of men who would look at her and see anything but baggage could probably be counted on one hand.

  In fact, there might only be one of them. Standing right in front of her.

  “If you need anything,” he went on, ridiculous or not, “you call my parents. My mom’s an expert about single moms with new babies. Okay?”

  “Seth—”

  “Promise me, Kate,” he insisted, squeezing her hands.

  All good things came to an end. And that was what this was. The end. “I promise.”

  She’d never realized how much that sounded like goodbye.

  Sixteen

  An odd sort of tension settled in and made itself comfortable between Seth and his family. Sure, they all opened presents together Christmas morning. But even Julie, who professed to still believing in Santa Claus, was giving him looks that he didn’t want to think about. She was too much like their father sometimes, and he was in no mood to be judged by a ten-year-old.

  His mom would look at him and sigh and damned if it didn’t sound like disappointment. And his dad? The temperature dropped a solid ten degrees anytime he walked into the room.

  No one spoke about it. No one asked about Kate. They barely talked about Shanghai. Just tension.

  Just Seth slowly going insane. He hadn’t seen her since that day in her office—the day he’d given her the necklace. She hadn’t opened it. He almost called her Christmas afternoon but he told himself he’d wanted a clean break and that it was for the best.

  That didn’t explain why he called Kate on New Year’s Eve and asked her to come spend it with him. She must have been doing okay, because she refused and in a way, he was glad. He was flying out first thing on the second to LA and from there, to mainland China. If she came over for one last night, he honestly had no idea how he was going to leave.

  He was miserable and pissy and worried sick about her being alone for Madeleine’s birth. Even though he knew that if the shit hit the fan his family would step up and make sure Kate was taken care of, he still worried. What if Roger came back? What if she had to sue him for child support? What if there was a problem with Madeleine? Hell, what if there wasn’t? He remembered how hard it’d been for everyone the first few months after Julie had been born. And Julie had had Mom, Dad and Seth to take care of her. How would Kate handle the sleepless nights and diapers and feedings by herself?

  He did his best not to worry as he packed up his stuff. His dad took him to the airport. It was still pitch-black at five in the morning, but at least it was clear. Flying out of South Dakota in the middle of winter was always dicey.

  True to form, they didn’t talk. Billy just glowered, and Seth? He tried to focus on the future. He’d never been one to settle down. Wandering all over God’s green earth was who he was. He knew it. Kate knew it. His family knew it.

  At least, he thought they did. They got to the airport and Billy silently helped unload Seth’s bags and Seth couldn’t remember ever having been more miserable than he was right now because this felt wrong. Everything about it was wrong.

  Panicking hard, Seth stood before the only man he’d ever called father. “I’m not Madeleine’s father,” he said, wishing he could take the words back even before he was done saying them.

  It was not Dad’s business—it was none of anyone’s business. But he knew, deep down inside, that Billy Bolton was disappointed in him.

  Billy jammed his hands on his hips and stared up at the midnight-black sky. “No, I didn’t figure you were.”

  “I have to put the family first.”

  Once, long ago, Seth had punched this man in the face for daring to break up with his mom. It was the only time he’d ever struck Billy, and the man hadn’t yelled or hit back. Instead, he’d looked at Seth with disappointment in his eyes—the same disappointment in his eyes right now. “Neither of them is family, but you already know that baby’s name.”

  Seth’s throat closed up. “You guys made me a Bolton. That wasn’t something I took lightly. I’m not going to let you or the business down.”

  Seth hadn’
t realized he was staring at the sidewalk until Billy’s massive hands settled on Seth’s shoulders. “Son,” he said, and it just about broke Seth’s heart to hear that word spoken with so much sadness, “God knows I tried to do right by you and your mom. And God knows if it weren’t for motorcycles, I’d either be dead or in jail.”

  “I know,” Seth said, wishing for numbness because he couldn’t take this. The business kept his father going and he couldn’t turn his back on that.

  Billy’s grip on him tightened. “Look at me, Seth.” Seth raised his head, swallowing back tears. “The business is important, but we could lose it tomorrow and it wouldn’t change anything about you and me and our family. We will always be family because we chose you, and more important, you chose us.” He gave Seth a little shake. “You don’t have to prove a damned thing to me. You never did.”

  Then he pulled Seth into a mammoth bear hug before quickly shoving him away. “Write your mother,” he called out as he got back into his truck and drove off.

  Seth stood there for a moment in the freezing air, shaking.

  He hadn’t chosen the Boltons—his mom had. His aunt had—they’d both married brothers. He’d been part of the deal, but not as a voting member. He’d just...

  He’d spent the last ten years of his life living and breathing motorcycles and the motorcycle business because when he welded a frame Billy approved of or pitched an idea Bobby got behind, it made Seth feel like he was part of something. Crazy Horse Choppers had given him a place. A purpose.

  That was what mattered.

  Wasn’t it?

  * * *

  Not that anyone was buying real estate right now—no one really wanted to move on the second day of the year in the middle of winter—but Kate went to work anyway. She couldn’t handle staying alone in her crappy apartment all day, staring at the lovely Christmas card her mother had sent.

  She wore the stunning diamond pendant necklace and matching earrings Seth had bought for her. She wasn’t an expert in diamonds, but she’d listened when the jewelry salespeople had talked cut and clarity and all that and she was wearing probably close to four carats of diamonds. It wasn’t a stretch to say that she was wearing close to fifty thousand dollars’ worth of jewelry—a fortune.