Brooding Rebel to Baby Daddy

by Ally Blake

  Sliding a hand around his neck, delving into his curls, she found herself swept away on an ocean of sensation as Rafe held her tighter. Kissed her harder. Heat rose within her, like a storm. A volcano. A rush of memory. And want.

  This, her heart sang. This is what you’ve been missing for so long. This is what you want! Him.

  All her sweetest memories were wrapped up in this man’s smiles, and she wanted to have his baby, and it had been eons since she’d been kissed with such...thoroughness. Who said she couldn’t have her cake and eat it too?

  Her hand gripped the front of his shirt to drag him closer as the kiss deepened. Fuelled by regret and sorrow and punishment and mistakes they both clearly needed to fill with something more joyful.

  Rafe’s hand moved. She whimpered at the loss. Only to feel it slide back around her waist, beneath her coat, beneath her jumper, to find the edge of her waist. Bare skin.

  The rough pads of his fingers—familiar yet changed—created waves of sensation, rocketing through her.

  How long since she’d been touched like this? Since she’d felt wanted. For nothing but her skin, her warmth, her kiss.

  It was heady. A rush. A wondrous thing. She hadn’t even realised how much she missed that part of herself. Raw and honest and needy. Rich veins of need. Needing to be closer, to be a part of him, she lifted her leg to wrap itself around his.

  Rafe growled, the sound echoing in her chest. Taking her under, till she could no longer hang onto a single thought—

  Sable froze, hand at his chest now pressing flat as she tipped her head down, as she drew in a much-needed breath. It took every ounce of effort she had left to cleave herself away.

  Rafe’s hand slid out of her hair, his fingers so deeply entangled they caught. His hold disappeared from her waist. The loss of each touch felt a little death.

  She waited for him to move back, away, to curse himself for giving in. But his hands lifted to hold her by her upper arms, gently, kindly, and she realised how wobbly she was on her feet.

  “You okay?” he asked, a glint in his eye as if he knew exactly what he’d just done to her.

  “No! Of course I’m not okay! I don’t want this. Not from you.”

  She felt his fingers lift a smidge.

  “Could have fooled me.”

  Sable squeezed her eyes shut. “I didn’t mean it that way. I mean, I did. But we can’t be kissing, Rafe. Kissing complicates things. And I need this—us—to be as clear-cut as can be.”

  A muscle twitched under his right eye. “Because all you want from me is my sperm,” he said, his voice a rough burr.

  “Yes,” she countered. “Your sperm!”

  Okay, Sable, perhaps a little less enthusiasm on the sperm front.

  “I don’t want to be a distraction, Rafe. I don’t want Janie to feel as if she has to look out for you. Or for people to whisper behind their hands about you because I’m back—”

  “What people?” he asked, his fingers tightening once more.

  “A few people in town today. You know what they can be like—”

  Her words dried up at the concern in his dark gaze. Rafe, standing so close, his strong hands holding her, his dark eyes on hers, his familiar scent curling through her making her knees melt, and making it hard to put her true wants into precise words.

  Then she closed her eyes, shook her head. “That’s not the point. Don’t worry about me. I’m totally used to it. Water off a duck’s back.” Yeah right. “The point is, I know we can do this right. If it’s direct, honest, simple, clear-cut.”

  Rafe breathed out long and hard, his eyes shifting between hers. Then he slowly let her go. Took a step back. And said, “Sable—”

  Knowing, to the very innermost threads of her marrow, he was about to deny her, she cut him off. Searched frantically through the arsenal of arguments she’d prepared, for something that might stay him. “It’s sudden. I get that. I wish I could give you all the time and space you need to sort through all of this. But as well as being an overwhelming ask, it’s also time sensitive.”

  Hands lifting to rub the spots he’d late been holding, Sable took another breath. This next bit never got any easier to say out loud. The last person she’d told was The Chef. And the way he’d taken it... As if it was a blessing.

  But this wasn’t The Chef. This was Rafe. A good, kind, strong man—which was why she’d come to him.

  “I saw a doctor a few months ago because my cycle has been seriously out of whack. I assumed it was stress-related as things hadn’t been good for quite some time. When she took my medical history my burst appendix came up.”

  “Your appendix burst?” Rafe moved in, hand out to steady her.

  “When I was little,” she quickly added, quietly telling her heart to chillax when it began to thumpity-thump at the concern in his dark eyes. “Before we moved here. Anyway, it turns out there’s damage. Incidental scarring to one of my fallopian tubes means it no longer does the job. That, plus another underlying condition, it’s all a bit of a mess in there. If I don’t do this, and soon, my chances only go downhill, rapidly.”

  She finished with a shrug. Refusing to give in to the hopelessness that came with the litany of reasons why a child might never be in her future. No matter how well she planned it out.

  Right now, hope was all she had.

  Rafe remained quiet. Too quiet. It took every ounce of restraint she had not to ask what he was thinking. Especially when she wasn’t sure she’d like the answer.

  “What kind of condition?” he finally asked, his expression grave.

  “It’s called primary ovarian insufficiency, which basically means my egg-release mechanisms don’t work properly or stopped working earlier than they ought.”

  A shadow passed over his face. Then he ran a hand over his chin and looked away, before leaning back against the closed bonnet of the muscle car and crossing his arms over his broad chest.

  “I thought I was handling this rather brilliantly,” he said. “You. Being back. I told myself I was fine.”

  “Are you not fine?”

  He watched her and said nothing. Stoic. Controlled. Emotions hidden behind a tough facade. It was a side of Rafe she’d conveniently repressed when putting together her plan. His determination to keep such a tight check on his feelings, when hers spilled out of her pores whether she wanted them to or not.

  “Rafe,” she said. “Talk to me.”

  Whether it was the crack in her voice, or the fact she held eye contact and refused to let go, something yielded in his gaze.

  “You walk in here as if we’re in the middle of a conversation from ten years ago. As if all that has happened in the last decade is moot.” He glanced down at his shoes then back at her, as if he needed a break between all the words. “I can feel myself wanting to accept it too. Just forget all the bad and welcome you home. It’s unnerving. You unnerve me, Sutton. I nearly ran over Fred’s foot this afternoon, backing a car out of the garage, because my mind was elsewhere. I lost it at him. Poor kid had no idea what he’d done wrong.”

  “Ouch.” Then, “What were you thinking about?”

  The look he shot her was direct. A warning. The sudden memory of his mouth on hers, his tongue sliding over the seam of her lips, strong enough her knees buckled.

  “Don’t sweat it,” she said, flapping a hand to distract him from the thoughts no doubt written all over her face. “Someone today told me they believed fine was the most loaded word in the English language. I think it’s overrated.”

  “Really?”

  “Mmm-hmm. Who needs fine when we could do something truly unique? We can do this and come out the other end better than fine.”

  His gaze dropped to her mouth again, right as she stopped talking to lick her lips. He pressed away from the side of the car. “Let’s take this outside.”

  “S
ounds ominous.”

  “I think a little air is necessary for this kind of talk. Space.”

  Right. Good call.

  She turned and headed out. Night had fallen fast. She blinked into the darkness when the golden light of the workshop switched off, then the groan of the roller door closing echoed over the night.

  Rafe followed her through the doorway till they stood, two lone figures in the great gaping concrete entrance. Pale moonlight poured over his broad shoulders, the waves in his hair. There was so much unspent energy coiled within him he practically glowed.

  She didn’t think it would serve her cause to tell him that they could be in the middle of a field, a desert, a shopping centre car park and it wouldn’t make a difference. Any time she was near him space was irrelevant.

  Then, his hands delving into the pockets of his jeans, his shoulders lifted to his ears before he let them drop. “I’ve listened. I’ve heard you. Now I need you to hear me. You’ve come looking for something that just isn’t there.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The kid you once knew, the one you came here to find, I left him behind a long time ago. The scourge that came with being my father’s son, the pressure to never set a foot wrong, the burden of keeping Janie alive. That’s so far in my past I barely think about it any more. But then the moment I saw you, it all came rushing back.”

  Rafe’s words hit—snick-snick-snick—like arrows to the chest.

  Sable looked down, knowing she wouldn’t be able to school her features. Unlike him, it was a skill she’d never figured out.

  It wasn’t a no, it was a plea. But could she heed his words and walk away? Should she? In her past, it was what she would have done. Bent to his will to ensure he was happy. But now? She was on a mission here, to no longer bend.

  Rafe swore beneath his breath, muttering something about patience and strength. She felt him near right before he nudged a finger under her chin and forced her to look him in the eye.

  “Know what else?” he said, his voice rough. “You’re not the same girl either. That girl was so tangled up inside—about her mother, about her future, about what people thought about her. But now...”

  “Now?”

  “Steel,” he said. “Along the way you’ve found yourself some inner steel. It suits you. A great deal.” A quick smile, then it was gone. “But the vision you’ve built up inside your head, of how this idea of yours could ever work, it’s based on a phantom. It’s not real.”

  Sable swallowed when tears suddenly burned at the backs of her eyes. Panic rising in her throat, she dug deep, connecting with those threads of steel that now wound their way through her body, and said, “Let me prove you wrong. Ask me anything and I’ll show you I have it covered. I’ve got this, Rafe. I promise.”

  “Anything?” he said.

  Sable tried to ignore the skitters along her skin at the warning in his voice. “Bring it.”

  “All righty, then. Where would you live? With your mum? No. That would be a disaster. And not here, you made that clear. So LA? From what I gather, LA might not be a good fit right now. So if not LA, how will you find work? Will you work? Do you still work? If you work, will you get help? A nanny? If not, what if you get sick? What if the baby gets sick? And when you say ‘no strings’ what does that even mean?”

  Once he’d stopped long enough to take more than a single breath, she said, “You done?”

  “For now.”

  “All right, then. I plan to live in New York. Brooklyn, to be precise.”

  Rafe’s frown deepened.

  “There’s community, neighbourhoods, without the claustrophobia of a small town. Urban suburbia: the perfect place to disappear and simply live. Which sounds pretty much perfect to me. I have a real estate agent on the lookout for an old brownstone in need of some love, near my agent, Nancy, who is also a great friend. There’s a brilliant day care on her block and a great independent school. I will work.”

  As she said it, she knew it to be true. And after months of struggling to feel inspired, struggling to find her voice, it was a blessed relief to have the urge again. No more magazine shoots in Greece, though. She was doing something real.

  “But I don’t need to work. I’ve done well for myself over the years but haven’t had need to touch much of it.”

  Her eyes having adjusted to the moonlight, she saw the shadow pass over his eyes just before he said, “Because you lived with him. Your ex.”

  “Do you have questions about that too?” she asked.

  His gaze darkened. “Only one.”

  Her voice was gentle as she said, “I didn’t hear a question.”

  “Am I your fall-back plan?”

  “No!” she said, taking another step his way. Reaching out a hand to him, before curling her fingers back into her palm. “God, no. It’s not like that.”

  One eyebrow slid north. Disbelieving.

  But how could she possibly tell Rafe what she’d only come to realise since it all fell apart: that she’d stayed with her ex for so long out of habit? That after the excitement of her first year abroad—the prize, the show, the feting—had died down, she’d been so very lonely. Riccardo had contacted her a month after attending her show—asked her out to lunch. How could she explain that she’d taken that first crumb of attention and held onto it with all her might? Mistaking a roof over her head for a home. Mistaking scraps of attention for love.

  When she should have known better.

  For here, before her—all dark coiled energy, all strength and drive and goodness—was the man who’d shown her what it meant to truly feel at home. What it meant to be loved. And she’d thrown it away.

  But Rafe was onto something. She was different now. She had moved on. This was all about her future.

  “You were right,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “I have changed. More in the past few months than the rest of my life combined. That’s what your twenties are for, right? Taking leaps? Making mistakes? Figuring out who you are?”

  She must have hit a nerve, as he grunted. It sounded as if it was in agreement.

  But then he asked the hardest question of all. “Would you have stayed, would you have had his child, had he not...?”

  “Cheated on me with a plethora of women?”

  Rafe made no response.

  “I’d thought, at one time, that would be the case. A time when I was lonelier than I’d ever imagined I could be. I wondered then if a child might be the answer. Might fix us. But I held back. I thought I wasn’t ready, when the truth was I knew it wasn’t right.”

  She lifted her shoulder in a shrug. “Turns out he’d had a vasectomy. Years ago. No intention of letting an accidental pregnancy get in the way of his career. He told me the day I found out about my fertility issues. As if it was a good thing.”

  “Sable,” he said, his voice subterranean.

  “Dodged a bullet there, right? Literally!”

  Her joke fell flat. For beyond the inviolable, unblinking facade, Rafe’s whole countenance was stormy. As if he was imagining all the places around Radiance one could easily hide a dead body.

  “You are not my fall-back, Rafe,” Sable repeated. Then took a calculated risk, saying, “You’re the best man I’ve ever known. And I’ve loved this baby of mine, this baby that does not yet exist, in my head for so long, how can I not want the best for her?”

  “Her?” he repeated, his voice rough.

  Was that a flicker? A softening?

  “Could be a him. We’d have to wait and see.”

  His eyes were so dark now, she couldn’t make out the centre. But she had his complete attention.

  A husky note threaded through her voice as she said, “Say yes, Rafe. Do this for me.”

  He laughed, though there was no humour in it. Then he growled, loudly, as he ran two hands over his fa
ce. “You’re not getting a yes. But—and I can’t believe I’m even saying this—it’s not a no. What it is, is enough for tonight. I’m going to Sydney tomorrow to finish the Pontiac deal. To get some distance so I can think straight. But for now, let me take you home.”

  For a moment she thought it was an invitation—and all her girl parts jumped to attention. Till she realised he meant her home. Her mother’s place.

  “Thanks. But I think I’ll go it alone.” Things had ended well, but precariously. She did not want the chance to ruin it. She turned on her heel, wrapped her coat about her, and walked. Throwing, “Come find me when you get back,” over her shoulder.

  Rafe caught up to her. “Never know who might be out on a night like this. Werewolves. Abductors. The McGlinty brothers.”

  “Don’t the McGlinty brothers work for you?”

  “Right. So they do. And they’re actually great boys. If they saw you out and about they’d likely offer to drop you home too.”

  “Radiance. It’s gone all mellow in its old age.”

  “No place like home,” said Rafe, and Sable felt a clutch in her chest.

  “You’re really going to walk with me unless I let you drive, aren’t you?”

  “Mmm-hmm.”

  “Fine. Drop me home. Where’s your car?”

  Rafe motioned to the astounding line-up of muscle cars under the awning on the other side of the petrol pumps. “Take your pick.”

  It was Sable’s turn to laugh, but hers was real. Like air bubbles popping in her chest. “Seriously? Are they all yours?”

  “Till we’ve done them up and someone buys them.”

  “Are they safe out here?” She couldn’t imagine them lasting a day in LA. Even in the Hills cars like these would be kept under lock and key.

  He cocked his head. Said, “It’s Radiance.”

  Which, she figured, was answer enough.

  “Lead the way.”

  She did. In the end choosing a midnight-blue Charger with enough grunt when Rafe gunned the engine she felt it in her throat.

  Glancing across the console, Rafe’s profile in stark relief, shoulders relaxed, in his happy place, made her ache, just a little, for how things had been.