Teresa Southwick - The Bachelor's Baby

“What, Casey? Spit it out.”

“I got pregnant a year ago tonight, Tucker.”

His eyes blazed like twin blue flames. He didn’t move or flinch. He just stared at her for several moments. Finally, in an angry tone, he asked sarcastically, “And I’m the father?”

She recoiled as if he’d slapped her; she couldn’t have been more shocked if he had. She’d never expected this reaction, because deception wasn’t something she ever practiced, and no one who really knew her would accuse her of it. His accusation made her feel cheap and dirty.

Breathing hard, she stood. Her hands started to shake, and she curled her fingers into her palms. But the shivering spread straight through to her center. With an effort she kept her voice steady. “There’s only one reason I’m not going to slap your face for that remark. We spent one night together, and you couldn’t possibly know anything about me.”

“You got that right.”

Tears burned the back of her eyes, and Casey blinked hard. So much for playing by the rules. She had felt it only right to tell him face-to-face he was a father, not interrupt his life on the rodeo circuit. It was probably for the best that during her pregnancy and the birth, when she had no family support, she hadn’t known he felt like this or she would have known how alone she truly was. Always in the back of her mind was the dim fantasy that Tucker was there. That when she told him they had a baby, he would be happy about being a father.

She couldn’t have been more wrong. The truth hurt more than she’d thought possible.

“No matter what you think, Mr. Smith, I don’t lie. I thought you should know you had a child. Now you do. What you do with the information is of little consequence to me. Goodbye.”

She turned on her heel.

“Casey, wait—”

Her shoes squeaked loudly on the wooden floor, muffling the sounds behind her. The only thing that had gone right all evening was that she made it outside before the tears she’d been holding back fell, turning her into a blubbering fool.

“Don’t slam the door, Casey.”

Tucker put his wide palm on her front door when she pushed against it. If she’d been tall enough to see through the peephole, she’d never have opened it in the first place. Against his strength, there was little she could do to shut him out unless he chose to leave.

Still, a good bluff couldn’t hurt. “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t.”

“I came to see my child.”

“Yours? That’s not what you thought last night.”

“I’ve had a chance to think.”

She glanced at the cow watch on her wrist that she’d bought a year ago at the rodeo. It showed eleven in the morning. “It’s been all of fifteen hours since you got the news. Is that enough time to change your mind? You all but called me a liar—”

“You didn’t give me a chance to say much of anything.” He held up a hand. “Not that I blame you. I’m sorry, Casey, but you have to admit that news like that comes as a shock to a man.”

“It comes as a shock to a woman, too.”

“Look,” he said, moving his body into the doorway. “Can I come in? Or would you like your neighbors to get an earful?”

“No, I don’t want you to come in, and no, I don’t want to be grist for the rumor mill in this building.”

“It’s one or the other,” he said, pushing gently on the door.

“All right.” She let him into the entry way, then shut the door after him. “How did you find me?”

“Palmdale’s not all that big. I found that accounting firm you’d told me you worked for in the phone book. Wasn’t too hard to charm your address out of the receptionist.”

Kim Delaney had the loosest lips in the world—a failing Casey planned to take up with her friend at the first opportunity.

“So you found me. Why did you bother? For that matter, why did you keep a date we made a year ago?”

His gaze turned intense as he looked from the top of her head, over her buttercup yellow tank top, khaki shorts, bare legs and down to her pink painted toenails. The heat of the megawatt smile he turned on her never reached his eyes.

“I had to see for myself if you were as cute as I remembered. If that wheat-colored hair of yours was as spiky and flyaway. If your eyes were still as green as the hills after a rainstorm.”

Her knees went as weak as soft-serve ice cream. Just like the first time she’d seen him. She leaned back in the entryway, trying to make the movement appear relaxed. The leaning had more to do with selfpreservation, since she needed to sit down before she collapsed. As it was, she could barely manage to find the wall and plant her rear end firmly against it.

She’d been almost glad last night when he’d thought she was a deceitful witch. It had given her a good reason to leave and not look back. If he kept up this sweet talk, she would have no defenses left.

She didn’t have enough self-control to keep from asking breathlessly, “Am I?” She blinked. “Spiky, flyaway and green, I mean?”

“Nope.” A muscle in his cheek jerked as his jaws clamped tightly together.

“Oh.” She should have been relieved. Instead, disappointment settled over her.

“As for why I bothered coming today, I want to see the baby. Boy or girl?”

“What?”

“Last night you didn’t say whether it was a boy or a girl.”

“I had a boy.”

A small smile lifted the corners of his nicely shaped mouth. That information seemed to please him. Absurdly, she was glad he was glad.

“Can I see him?” He took his hat off and jammed his fingers through his hair.

“He’s asleep.” For reasons she didn’t understand, her protective instincts started blinking like a pediatrician’s switchboard on Monday morning.

“I won’t disturb him.”

“He’s a light sleeper,” she said quickly.

She needed time to think through the ramifications of suddenly having her baby’s father in the picture. If she was lucky, he would get good and mad at the abrasive attitude she assumed just for him, tell her off, then turn around and walk out before she could say, “Been nice knowing you, Cowboy.” Instead, he stood his ground, looking at her as if she’d cut the stirrups off his favorite saddle.

His mouth thinned, making his jaw look more square. “Look, Casey, I’ve been up all night. I’m not in the mood to play games. I just want to see my son.

“Why do you suddenly believe he’s yours?” She stared up at him. Lord, he was tall. Six foot two if he was an inch. At her own five foot two, that was a lot of distance between mouths. A year ago they’d succeeded in overcoming that problem. The memory set off a serious fluttering in her stomach, a sensation she tried her best to ignore.

“I’m not sure,” he admitted. “Just a feeling.”

He glared down at her. Funny, she thought, those eyes carried as big a wallop angry as they did when passion filled. He rubbed a hand across his jaw, setting off a rasping that told her he hadn’t shaved any more than he had slept.

“I don’t want his routine upset.” It was worth a last-ditch effort to see if she could make him angry enough to leave her in peace.

She hoped for one final mad-as-hell scowl before he turned on his boot heel and hit the trail. But he stood in her doorway looking as tall as a mountain and just as immovable. Apparently she wasn’t going to be lucky. He was ticked off, all right. But he wasn’t leaving. She was stalling, and he knew it

Actually, what harm could it do for him to see the baby? It would be quick, she told herself. He’d do his duty, feel noble, then he could go. After all, one reason they had hit it off so well was because they had both agreed relationships were a complication. Neither wanted any strings attached. She hadn’t changed her mind about that, except where her son was concerned. Since Tucker was a transient rodeo cowboy, the odds were in her favor that he hadn’t changed his mind, either, and would be especially reluctant to want a child hampering his life-style.

She stood up straight and held a hand out, finally indicating that he should come in. “I apologize. I’m being rude. Please…”

“Thanks.” He frowned, then walked in, his boots thudding on the oak floor in her entry way.

Without hesitation she could say that there had never been a pair of boots in this condo. If all went as she hoped, there never would be again. Blue eyes, dimples, black hair, cowboy hat and boots. There was more masculinity under her roof than she was prepared to handle.

She led him up the two steps into her living room. “Have a seat,” she said, indicating the mauve-andblue floral chintz sofa.

“Thanks.”

He laid his hat on the rosewood coffee table. Then he sat down, draping both arms across the back of the couch as he rested one booted foot on the opposite knee. She bit back a smile as she thought how out of place he looked in her feminine surroundings. His loose-limbed, relaxed posture said he felt right at home. As the rolled-up sleeves on his white cotton shirt pulled up his forearms, she was amazed at the muscles there.

“He should be waking up anytime for a feeding. Would you mind waiting until then to see him?”

His black eyebrows pulled together thoughtfully as he nodded his head. “Give us a chance to talk, without one of us running out.”

“One of us had a pretty good reason,” she said.

“Why didn’t you tell me sooner that you were pregnant?”

She cursed the heat that burned her cheeks. For God’s sake, she was a twenty-eight-year-old woman. Why couldn’t she do this without blushing like a teenager?

She sat in the powder blue velvet wingback chair across the table from him. Nervously twisting her fingers, she gathered her thoughts. “You move around a lot.”

“Yeah. I know. You said something about that last night.”

She shrugged. “I’ll admit, I didn’t try very hard.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because when it comes right down to it, the whole thing was my fault. I know that. I didn’t want you to feel that you had to do anything. No one should take responsibility for me. I made my bed—” she glanced up quickly “—metaphorically speaking. And I had to lie in it.”

“It’s an awfully big bed to lie in by yourself. What’s his name?”

She blinked. “Who?”

“My son.”

She frowned. He was suddenly taking this more seriously than she had expected. “I named him Jason Smith Wright.”

“My father’s name was Jason.”

“I know. He weighed eight pounds, four ounces. He was twenty-one inches long.” She looked into Tucker’s blue eyes, then lower to the dimples that were more like slashes on either side of his mouth as he frowned. “He’s the spitting image of you.”

He took a deep breath. “I don’t know what to say.”

“I’d figure you to question again whether or not I’m telling you the truth.”

“My gut tells me you didn’t plan to tell me anything at all if I hadn’t showed up on your doorstep today. Why would you lie?”

“I wouldn’t.”

He frowned. “That night—a year ago, we discussed this. Well, not this, but pregnancy. Right after I told you there was nothing to worry about from me. You said it was a safe time for you.”

“I truly believed that. Apparently I practiced the idiot’s method of rhythm contraception. I counted wrong. My cycle threw me a curve. My body has a wacky sense of humor. I zigged when I should have zagged. I don’t know what happened.” She threw her hands in the air. “It’s all my fault. Not yours.”