Operation

by Barbara Bretton

  “I do,” Julia said, locking the door behind Sam. “Now what was that you said about no husband?”

  “You heard me.” Sam stalked in the general direction of the living room. “Your prayers were answered. I am no longer a married woman.”

  Julia claimed one end of the flowery chintz sofa and gestured for Sam to claim the other end. “That doesn’t happen in one day, darling. What’s the story?”

  Sam sat down for a split second then jumped up again. Her adrenaline was flowing too fast for her to stay still. “It’s actually quite a simple story, Mother. You can’t have two wives at one time.”

  “Two wives?”

  “You remember Lana, don’t you? After all, you were the one who told me all about how much my husband loved her.”

  “Oh, my God,” Julia exclaimed. “They’re back together?”

  Sam made a face of disgust. “Only in the legal sense. You see, Mother, Lana wants to marry a man named Bryce and she can’t do that if she’s still married to one named Duncan.”

  “What a wonderful mess,” Julia said, looking positively delighted. “I was praying you’d come to your senses and now you don’t have to. Your marriage is over.”

  With that Sam burst into loud tears.

  “Darling!” Julia was beside her in an instant. “Whatever are you crying about? That was a marriage of convenience, not a love match. You don’t need a man to help you bring up your baby. You have me and you have your father and your sisters. We’ll help you.”

  Sam sank onto the edge of the sofa and cried all the harder.

  “Now, now,” said Julia awkwardly. Her maternal skills were practically nonexistent. For Julia, this was the equivalent of twenty years of mothering crammed into one ten-minute period. “He wasn’t right for you anyway, darling. I’m sure he and that terrible Lana creature are right now—”

  “Mother!” The word tore from Sam’s throat in desperation. “Haven’t you understood one single word I’ve said? I love Duncan Stewart.”

  Julia sighed. “I wish you wouldn’t say things like that.”

  “I love Duncan,” Sam repeated, amazed at how easy it was to say the words.

  “And when did you come to this amazing conclusion?”

  “I don’t know,” she said honestly. “All I know is that I do.”

  “I hope to heaven he doesn’t know anything about this.”

  “I should have told him,” Sam murmured, more to herself than to her mother.

  “Never tell a man something like that,” Julia cried out. “My God, Samantha, don’t you know anything about being a woman? You can’t give a man the advantage that way.”

  “You never told Daddy that you loved him?”

  “My one mistake,” Julia said, “and see how it ended. Divorced before I knew it.”

  “Mother,” said Sam, “you also had a boyfriend. I think that might have contributed to the situation.”

  “A symptom, not a cause,” Julia said, unmoved by Sam’s logic. “I’m older than you, darling. I understand the way it is between men and women better than you ever could. The best thing you did was to keep your emotions to yourself. Now, at least, you don’t have to worry about being embarrassed.”

  “I wouldn’t be embarrassed.”

  Julia looked at her in horror. “Well, now I understand why you’ve been single so long.”

  “No, you don’t, Mother,” Sam said. “You haven’t the foggiest idea.”

  Julia was not a woman comfortable with confrontation. “Darling, you look exhausted,” she said, rising to her feet. “Why don’t I make you some warm milk then tuck you in for a nice long nap? You must think about the baby.”

  Tears sprang to Sam’s eyes. “You don’t have to do that, Mother,” she said.

  “Indulge me,” Julia said. “I know I haven’t been a very good mother to you, Samantha. At least let me try to learn how to be a good grandmother.”

  Sam nodded, too emotional to speak. What a strange twenty-four hours it had been. She watched as her mother left the room, wondering what bizarre twist of fate had decided to bestow maternal instincts on Julia at this late date. Or make Sam feel like her daughter.

  She leaned her head back against the sofa and closed her eyes. She saw Glenraven rising up from the Scottish mist. She saw Old Mag and Robby. She saw their wonderful friends and neighbors toasting their happiness.

  But no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t quite see Duncan.

  She supposed she should be grateful to Lana for forcing her to take a clear-eyed look at the situation. She loved Duncan and he didn’t love her.

  And nothing on heaven or earth would ever change that.

  * * *

  JULIA’S FLAT was less than two blocks from Kensington Palace, one of London’s better areas. Duncan, however, was not in the mood to be impressed by its royal ambience. The only thing he cared about was finding Samantha.

  The doorman to Julia’s building blocked his entrance. “May I ask who you’re here to see, sir?”

  “Julia,” Duncan said. Bloody hell. He couldn’t remember her last name. He manufactured a man-to-man smile. “The one and only Julia.”

  The doorman smiled at him. “And you are?”

  “Expected,” Duncan said.

  “I’ll need a name.”

  “Tell her Duncan Stewart is here.”

  The doorman nodded then went off to use the house phone.

  Minutes later Duncan stood in front of Julia’s door. The gold and silver wedding ring was in his pocket. His heart, however, was on his sleeve.

  Samantha’s mother took her sweet time opening up for him. For a moment Duncan wondered if he’d missed his guess and his bride had gone home to Texas after all, but the moment he saw Julia’s face he knew he’d come to the right place.

  “I want to see Samantha,” he said, bypassing a polite introduction.

  “She doesn’t want to see you.”

  “Let her tell me that and then I’ll go.”

  “You have no rights over my daughter,” Julia said, glaring at him.

  “I don’t want any rights over your daughter,” he said. “I want to talk to her.”

  “She’s asleep.”

  “Then I’d ask you to wake her up.”

  “And I’m asking you to leave.” Julia’s eyes narrowed. “You’re not her husband any longer, Mr. Stewart.”

  He felt as if he’d been dealt a body blow. “I love her,” he said, dropping his pride at her feet.

  “Oh, Mr. Stewart,” Julia said, with a sigh. “How I wish you hadn’t said that…”

  * * *

  SAM WAS THUMBING through a copy of Tatler when she heard the knock on her door. So far Julia had been an unending source of warm milk, buttered toast and good intentions. Being mothered was a new experience for Sam, and although she had had her fill of all three commodities, she didn’t want to discourage Julia.

  “Come in, Mother,” she called, not looking up from her magazine. She heard the door squeak open, then heavy footsteps.

  “I’ve come to take you home, Samantha.”

  Duncan.

  The world seemed to suddenly narrow into nothing more than the sound of his voice. Hands trembling, she turned the page.

  “Go away,” she said. “I am home.”

  She could feel his presence in every part of her body. He charged the atmosphere in the room simply by being there.

  “Look at me, lassie.”

  “Why should I?” she countered, longing to do exactly that. “It’s not like you’re my husband or anything.”

  He sat next to her on the bed. She turned away from him.

  “I love you, Samantha.”

  His words grabbed her by the heart and wouldn’t let go. “Don’t,” she whispered. Don’t play games like that, Duncan. Did he have any idea how easy it would be to break her heart with words he didn’t mean? “You really should go.”

  “Not until you look at me, lassie.” He brushed the hair from her cheek with a ge
ntle hand. “Not until you listen to what I have to say.”

  She turned to face him, and the expression in his beautiful eyes was almost her undoing. Hope, foolish hope, sprang to life inside her heart and no matter how hard she tried to control it, that hope continued to grow.

  “I’m listening,” she said.

  “I love you, lassie. I believe I’ve loved you from that first moment in the plane when you stormed out on me, determined to find your own way to Glenraven.”

  He reached for her hand, the one with the signet ring she hadn’t been able to bring herself to take off. His fingers locked with hers and she didn’t pull away. Wisps of hope. Pieces of dreams. And one very important question.

  “That’s infatuation,” she said at last. “That isn’t love.”

  “It’s how love begins. When the plane hit trouble, I saw who you really were. A brave woman with more heart and courage than twenty men.”

  A small smile tilted her mouth. “And you fell in love with my bravery?”

  “Aye, that and more. With your beauty and your bravery. With your heart and with your soul.”

  “You knew nothing of me, Duncan. How could you possibly love what you didn’t know?”

  He told her of an evening in a little pub outside Glasgow. About a man who spotted his loneliness and called him on it. A man who made him see the empty shell his life would be without her by his side.

  “You never wondered why I followed you to Texas? You never thought about that?”

  “At first I thought you wanted your ten thousand dollars,” she said.

  “And then?”

  She shrugged. “And then it was about the baby.”

  “I had no way of knowing about the baby, Samantha. I came to Texas for you.”

  How could she have forgotten that? The night of her sister’s wedding was such a blur of emotion that somehow she’d managed to overlook the fact that he’d traveled from the Highlands all the way to Houston to see her again. To hear her voice. The baby’s existence had been unknown to both of them.

  He had come to see Sam.

  She struggled to rein in her feelings.

  “Lana—” She stopped, unable to continue over the swell of emotion inside her heart.

  “What did Lana tell you?”

  “She told me about the baby—” She swallowed. “Your baby, the one you lost.”

  His expression turned dark, and she drew back instinctively. “That’s what she told you, is it? That we lost the baby?”

  “Yes,” Sam said, bewildered. “A miscarriage. And that once she’d lost the baby, you had no more use for her.” That all he’d wanted from the marriage was a child of his own.

  “It wasn’t a miscarriage, Samantha.” He met her eyes. “She aborted our baby without my knowledge.”

  His pain seemed to flood her body and she closed her eyes against it. She’d never known a man’s voice could hold such terrible grief. “My God, Duncan…I had no idea.”

  “Neither had I,” he said. “She was two months pregnant and she said she was as happy about it as I was. A movie role came along and she went down to London to audition. When she came to Glenraven a week later, she had the job but she didn’t have the baby. A ‘business decision,’ she called it.”

  It explained so much about him. The steadiness of his support, right from the start. His devotion to their unborn child. But did it explain his love for her?

  “I’m so sorry,” she whispered. To lose both wife and child through a selfish, impulsive decision, taken with no consideration whatsoever for his feelings on the matter.

  The experience had changed him, he told her. He withdrew into his studio. He lost faith in love. His interludes with women were based on physical attraction, not the possibility of love. His heart had closed itself off to the world.

  “And then I met you, lassie, and the sun came out again.”

  She wanted to believe him. With her entire heart and soul, she longed to throw herself into his arms and give herself up to the hope and wonder of love. But she had to be sure, both for her sake and the sake of their baby.

  “I thought we were doing the right thing when we got married, Duncan,” she began, choosing her words with great care. “I believed that a marriage of convenience was possible, that two intelligent people could put aside their personal concerns for the greater good.” She drew in a steadying breath. “For the good of our baby.”

  His eyes were shadowed, his expression impossible to read. “And what is it you think now, Samantha?”

  She couldn’t stop the flow of tears that rolled down her cheeks. “I think we made a mistake. Marriage should be between two people who love each other. It’s not a business arrangement. It can’t be reduced to a stack of legal documents.”

  Duncan turned away from her. Had she reached into his heart and tore it from his chest, she could not have hurt him more.

  “Duncan.” Her voice pierced the web of regret that had settled itself over him. “You’re not listening to me.”

  “I heard every word, lassie,” he said. Each of those words had left their mark on his soul.

  “I want us to start over,” she said. “Did you hear me say that?”

  He met her eyes one more time. “To what purpose?”

  “To what purpose?” She spread her arms wide. “Don’t you know?”

  “I want you to tell me.” He wanted her to say the words he’d longed to hear her say from the first moment they met.

  Her cornflower blue eyes grew soft and dreamy, the way they had after he made love to her. It was almost his undoing.

  “I love you, Duncan.” Her tentative smile widened and lit up her lovely face with radiant light. “I don’t know when it started. I don’t know why it took me so long to realize it. But I love you.” She gripped his hand more tightly. “With my entire heart and soul.”

  She told him she wanted a real marriage, the kind that was based on love and mutual respect. She wanted them to be a family in every sense of the word, to raise their children in love and hope and joy.

  She wanted them to try again.

  She moved into his arms and his mouth found hers. Their kiss was sweet, reverential, as filled with wonder as the sound of a child’s laughter.

  For Sam, it was like walking from the darkness into the light. From cold winter into the shimmering warmth of summer.

  From an uncertain present to a miraculous future she’d never believed possible.

  He broke the kiss and she murmured her protest against his lips. The smell of his skin, the sweet taste of his mouth were intoxicating. She loved everything about him, heart and soul and body.

  “Duncan?” He stood and reached deep into the pocket of his trousers. “What are you doing?”

  “This,” he said, then dropped to his knee next to the bed. “Marry me, Samantha.” He flipped open the lid of the box and withdrew a breathtaking ring of intertwined gold and silver. “Marry me because I love you and you love me in equal measure. Marry me because when we’re not together life loses its luster and its meaning.”

  She held out her hand and he placed the ring in her palm.

  “There’s an inscription,” he said. The emotion in his voice was unmistakable, and her heart soared.

  She held the ring under the lamplight and saw her new initials and his and the date of their wedding.

  “When did you do this?” she asked. Certainly there hadn’t been time tonight.

  “I picked it up the day before the party,” he said. “I’d planned to give it to you after all the guests left.” He paused. “After I finally told you that I loved you.”

  The last of her doubts vanished in one wild burst of joy. She moved the signet ring to her right hand then handed the silver-and-gold band to him. “I want you to put it on my finger,” she said. “To make this official.”

  He slid the ring onto her finger with all the ceremony it deserved then made her gasp when he kissed the palm of her hand then folded each finger over the spot. Her
Highland warrior. Her Scots poet.

  Her husband.

  If someone had told her this time last year that she would give her heart to a stranger on a windswept day in Scotland, she would have thought him mad. But she had, and that one moment of passion had changed her life forever. She’d discovered she knew how to love passionately and well and that, even with its difficulties, a real marriage between equals was the grandest adventure on earth. They were both opinionated and stubborn, as much prone to argument as discussion. Their marriage would be a fiery one but it would never be dull. Not as long as they loved each other. And somehow she knew they would love each other until the end of time.

  She opened her mouth to say exactly that, then stopped.

  “Samantha?” He leaned forward, his look of joy sliding into one of concern. “Is something wrong, lassie?”

  She shook her head, motioning for him to be still.

  “Oh, Duncan!” She reached for his hands then placed them on the roundness of her belly.

  His brows knit together in a frown then suddenly he leaped back, as if burned. “Is that—”

  “Yes!” she exclaimed, laughing and crying at the same time. “The baby, Duncan. Our baby moved!”

  That flutter against his palms, that almost imperceptible ripple—that was their baby, his and Samantha’s, waiting to be born. If he’d ever doubted the existence of angels, Duncan doubted it no more.

  Angels were everywhere. He knew that now. Sometimes they came in the guise of a lovely blond American in need of a ride to Glenraven. Sometimes they came in the form of a baby, curled deep within its mother’s womb.

  And sometimes, if a man was very lucky, he was smart enough to hold tight when he found his angels, and never let them go.

  Duncan drew Samantha and their baby into his arms and held on tight.

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