“She guessed that we’re sleeping together,” Harper told him.
“And that bothers you?”
“A little.” She moved back to the fridge to pour him a glass of lemonade, set it beside his plate.
He might have smiled at the domesticity of her actions if it hadn’t been so apparent that she was upset. “Why does it bother you?”
“Maybe it wasn’t that she figured it out so much as that she wasn’t surprised. After all, what woman could resist Ryan Garrett for more than two days?”
“You held out for years,” he felt compelled to point out.
“But in the end, I succumbed. Just like every other woman.”
“There aren’t any other women,” he said, starting to realize what was bothering her.
“Not right now,” she acknowledged. “But in all the years that I’ve known you, it seemed as if you were with a different woman every time our paths crossed.”
“You can’t really be upset that I went out with other women during a period of time in which you made it clear you weren’t interested in going out with me.”
“I can,” she said. “I know it’s not rational, but I can.”
“Do you think you could maybe give me more of an explanation than that?”
She exhaled a frustrated breath. “You remind me of my father.”
His brows lifted. “That’s a little...disconcerting.”
She smacked his shoulder. “I don’t mean like that.”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re so effortlessly charming. You don’t even have to try, and women fall at your feet.” She looked pointedly at the floor, where Coco had plopped herself down by his toes and was looking up at him with adoring eyes. “Or maybe I should have said ‘females of all species.’”
“Coco doesn’t count—she loves everybody.” He scooped up the dog, because he couldn’t resist those eyes, and tucked her into the crook of his arm. The puppy exhaled a soft blissful sigh. “And I’m not your father, Harper. I wouldn’t ever treat you—or any woman—the way your father has treated your mother.”
“I know,” she said. “Logically, I do know that. But it isn’t always easy to be logical when you’re involved with someone on a personal level.”
It was the closest she’d ever come to admitting that she had feelings for him. He knew that she did, of course. Over the past couple of months, as they’d got to know one another better, they’d naturally grown closer—and the physical intimacy they shared was only one part of that.
He tipped her chin up and touched his mouth to hers. “That’s okay—I don’t mind if you’re occasionally illogical. It proves you care about me.”
“Of course I care about you.”
He couldn’t help but smile at the begrudging tone. It wasn’t much of an admission of her feelings, but it was a start.
Chapter Twelve
Kenna and Daniel had a beautiful home on a larger-than-average-size lot, but the backyard didn’t look nearly as spacious with the number of people who were milling around it.
Harper knew the birthday boy and Kenna and Daniel, of course, and Ryan’s parents were there, too. But while several other faces looked familiar, she was at a complete loss to connect names with those faces.
“Those name tags would come in handy right about now,” Harper said to Ryan, after Ellen stole Oliver away so they were free to mingle. At least that was the explanation the older woman had given for taking the little boy, but Harper suspected Ryan’s mother was also worried about the upcoming custody hearing and wanted to spend every minute she could with him.
“You’ve met most of them before,” he reminded her.
“Maybe,” she acknowledged. “But there have to be close to fifty people here.”
“Forty-three,” Kenna said.
Harper turned to face her friend. “You said it was going to be mostly family.”
“Thirty-four of them are family—thirty-one from the Garrett side.”
“Wow—I guess our numbers really have expanded over the past few years,” Ryan said.
“And they’re still growing.”
Ryan looked at her with raised eyebrows.
Kenna shook her head. “No. Not me. Not yet.”
“Who?”
“Rachel and Andrew’s baby is due in November and I just found out that Lukas and Julie are going to be parents again early in the New Year.”
“Is there something in the water?” Harper wondered.
Her friend chuckled. “That’s what Nate asked about Pinehurst, when Matt, Jack and Luke all hooked up with their respective spouses within a calendar year.”
“Is that Matt over there—talking to Justin?” Ryan asked.
Kenna nodded. “He was coming down for a weeklong medical conference anyway, so he brought Georgia and the kids to visit with their North Carolina relatives.”
Something must have caught the corner of her eye, because she turned her head slightly and nodded. “Daniel’s signaling for me to bring out the burgers,” she said. “Please—eat, drink and be merry. There are snacks on the tables, beverages in the coolers and dinner will be ready soon.”
It was easy enough for Harper to identify Matthew, because Ryan had said he was talking to Justin. As for his wife, she didn’t have a clue. “Which one is Georgia?”
“The one beside my cousin Tristyn.”
“That would be helpful if I knew who Tristyn was.”
“She’s holding the baby in the pink overalls. But the baby—Kylie—belongs to her sister Lauryn. She’s sitting on the swing with Maura—Andrew’s daughter.”
She remembered Maura from the funeral, because the little girl had spent a lot of time with Oliver. And wrestling on the ground beside Maura were two little boys, probably around eight years old. “Twins?”
Ryan followed her gaze, nodded. “Quinn and Shane—they’re with Matt and Georgia.”
“Oliver’s enough of a handful some days—I can’t imagine what we’d do if there were two of him.”
“Actually, Matt and Georgia have four—the twins, Pippa and Aidan.”
Harper looked at Georgia with a new respect. “How does she do it?”
“You’d have to ask her.” He slid an arm across her shoulders. “Come on—I’ll introduce you.”
They spent a few minutes chatting with Georgia and her husband, when he came to join them. Harper was surprised to learn that Georgia had been married before and that only Aidan, the youngest, was Matt’s biological child. Through further conversation with other people throughout the afternoon, she learned that Matt’s brother Lukas had adopted his wife’s son from a previous relationship, and Nathan’s fiancée had a nine-year-old son from her first marriage.
No wonder Ryan hadn’t balked at the idea of raising his best friend’s orphaned little boy—he understood, probably far better than Harper did, not just the importance of family but that the definition was not limited by biology. The Garretts were made up of a lot of different pieces, but they all seemed to fit seamlessly together to make the whole. And as she mingled with Ryan, she wondered where she fit with the group—or if she could.
After everyone had eaten, Daniel carried out an enormous slab cake with Happy 1st Birthday, Jacob spelled out in blue letters. Kenna carried a matching oversize cupcake decorated simply with a number 1 on it and set it on the tray of Jacob’s high chair.
The birthday boy looked from the cupcake to his audience, as if he wasn’t quite sure why so many people had gathered to watch him eat his dessert. But as camera flashes went off, he smiled, clearly accustomed to the spotlight.
The baby shoved his hand into the cake, making a face as icing squished through his fingers. Then he bent over and put his mouth directly on the cake, so that icing smeared his nose and his chin. He looked up as another flash went off, then clapped his hands together, spraying icing in the process. By the time he had eaten his fill of the dessert, there was as much on his face and in his hair as had ended up in his mout
h. And when he was done, his dad just scooped him out of the chair, stripped his clothes away and dunked him in a little plastic pool that had been set up for the little ones to play in.
While he was doing that, Kenna cut up the big cake for the rest of their guests. Oliver, unwilling to wait for cake, was eyeing the remnants of a fruit platter on the picnic table. His hand was curled in a fist and, judging by the color of the juice that dripped down his arm, he’d already snatched a piece of watermelon from the tray.
Before Harper could take a step in that direction, Ryan’s mother was there. Ellen guided Oliver’s hand to his mouth, encouraging him to eat the fruit. Then she unfurled his fingers and carefully wiped each one on a paper napkin.
The little boy was in good hands with Ryan’s family—competent, caring and loving hands. He was one of those pieces she’d been thinking about earlier. As soon as he’d become part of Ryan’s life, he’d been accepted as part of theirs by the rest of the Garrett clan. Harper was grateful to know that although he’d lost his parents, he’d grow up with a strong sense of family, of knowing he belonged.
Yes, she was pleased for Oliver—and just the tiniest bit envious.
* * *
“You’ve been quiet since we got back,” Ryan said to Harper, after they’d returned from the party and settled Oliver into bed.
“I was just thinking.”
“About anything in particular?”
“About how lucky you are to be part of such a close-knit family.”
“I was lucky to steal some cake to bring home in a crowd that size,” he agreed, peeling the plastic wrap off the plate and nudging it across the table toward her.
“No, thanks.”
He retrieved a fork from the drawer. “You didn’t have any at the party.”
“I’m not really a fan of cake.”
He stared at her as if he couldn’t believe what she’d said. “It’s cake—it’s soft, it’s sweet, it’s delicious. What’s not to like?”
The thousand calories per bite, but of course, she wasn’t going to admit that to him.
“Try it.” He waved the fork near her mouth. “And don’t you dare say you don’t like chocolate, because I’ve seen the stash of Godiva chocolate bars in the back of the freezer.”
“Why would you open a container marked ‘quinoa’?”
“Because I didn’t know what quinoa was and I was hungry.”
“Did you eat my chocolate?”
“Your stash is safe,” he assured her. “So long as you tell me why you don’t want a piece of Jacob’s birthday cake.”
“I filled up on other stuff.”
“You had a hamburger without a bun and about two tablespoons of broccoli salad.”
“Why are you so preoccupied with what I eat?”
“Because you are.”
She shrugged. “Lifelong habits are hard to break.”
“You’re not old enough to have lifelong habits,” he chided.
“I was a catalog model for designer children’s clothing before I was two years old.”
“No kidding?”
“No kidding,” she confirmed.
His lips curved. “So I’m dating a model?”
She rolled her eyes. “Hardly.”
“Ex-model, then.”
“Ex-ex-ex,” she said. “And you could probably add a few more exes considering that my career in front of the camera ended when I was nine.”
“What happened?”
“I took a tumble while skiing and tore the ACL in my right knee, after which I had surgery and then spent six weeks not able to do much of anything. I gained eight pounds and the company hired another girl for their catalog. My mother was furious and that was the end of my illustrious career in front of the camera.”
“Good for your mother,” he said, “pulling you out of the business.”
She managed a wry smile. “My mother was my agent. She didn’t pull me out—she put me on a diet. No fat, no sugar, no starch.”
“You’re kidding.”
She shook her head.
“That explains a lot about your eating habits,” he noted.
“I like salad,” she said, just a little defensively.
Ryan made a face. “Nobody likes salad that much.”
“When I finally lost the extra weight, I promised myself I wouldn’t put it back on.”
And she obviously hadn’t, because she was all angles now. He shook his head. “I’m sorry—I’m still trying to get over the fact that your mother put you, at nine years of age, on a diet because you’d gained eight pounds.”
“She lives and works in a world where people are judged as much by how they look as what they do.”
“Is that why you left New York City?”
“I think that’s probably why I chose to work behind the camera,” she admitted. “Because even after four years of therapy, I still wondered if I wasn’t pretty enough, skinny enough or talented enough to do anything else. And because I’m in control there. Because I’ve proven that I’m smart enough, organized enough and committed enough to make Coffee Time the number one–rated show on WNCC.”
“You should be proud of everything you’ve accomplished,” he told her sincerely. “And some people should not have kids.”
She looked away. “I know.”
He tipped her chin up, forcing her to meet his gaze. “I was referring to your mother, not you.”
“But she’s the only example I ever had—can you see now why I’m so worried about screwing up with Oliver? I don’t want to be the reason he’s in therapy in high school.”
“You’ve got my family now,” he reminded her.
“Your family is great,” she admitted.
“And they love you.”
Her gaze skittered away again. “That’s not a word that you should just throw around like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like it’s...easy.”
“Loving someone is easy,” he told her.
And it always had been in his family. Not that everything was always hearts and flowers, but he’d never had any doubt that his parents loved each other and their kids. Even when he’d fought with his brothers, as was inevitable with sibling relationships, he wouldn’t hesitate to call on either of them—or any of his cousins—if he needed anything, and he felt confident that they would do the same.
Harper hadn’t grown up with that same kind of unconditional support, and he hated to think that those who should have bolstered her self-confidence and self-worth had managed to do just the opposite.
Maybe she wasn’t actually perfect. In fact, he’d be the first to admit that she was a little uptight and a lot demanding. She was also beautiful and warm and giving. She always committed 100 percent to whatever task was assigned to her—not just at work but in life.
She’d been devastated by the loss of her best friend and then expected to take on the responsibility of raising her child. It would have been simple enough for her to say that she didn’t want to do it. Instead she’d accepted the challenge.
And he knew it had been a challenge. He wouldn’t have thought it was possible for anyone to have less experience with babies than he had, but it had been apparent to both of them that Harper won that contest hands down. She hadn’t had the first clue what to do with Oliver, but she’d learned. Even when she’d been beyond exhausted, he’d see her reading over books on child care or researching toddler menus on the internet.
She wasn’t perfect, but sometime over the past two months he’d decided that she was perfect for him.
He knew it was going to take some time before she was ready to hear it, before she let herself trust his feelings—and her own. So for now he put the empty cake plate aside and took her upstairs to show her—loving her slowly, tenderly and thoroughly.
* * *
Ryan glanced up at the knock—and bark—at the door to see his brother standing there with Coco on her pink leash, her tail wagging ecstatically.
�
��Look at you,” he said to the puppy. “I swear you’ve grown three inches in the past three days.” Then, to his brother, “Why didn’t I get the memo about bring-your-dog-to-work day?”
Braden didn’t respond to his attempted humor. “It turns out that Dana’s allergic to dogs.”
He lifted a brow. “And you didn’t know that?”
His brother looked away, making Ryan suspect that his sister-in-law’s excuse for not wanting to keep the puppy was just that—an excuse.
“How bad are her allergies?” he asked. “Because I know Jordyn has to take an antihistamine every day to live with that ugly cat of hers.”
“I don’t know how bad,” Braden admitted. “But aside from the allergies, she accused me of patronizing her—expecting a dog to take the place of the child she hasn’t been able to have.”
“Is that why you got the puppy?”
“Not to take the place of a child,” Braden denied, squatting down to scratch Coco’s head. “But maybe I wanted to see if she could focus on anything other than her obsession to have a baby.”
“She still won’t consider adoption?”
His brother shook his head. “She’s so screwed up from her father’s abandonment of his family that she’s determined to figure out a way for us to have a baby that is truly ours so that she can have a real family again.”
Ryan could hear the frustration in his brother’s voice, and although he wanted to help, he didn’t know that anyone could. The baby issue was something Braden and Dana had to figure out for themselves. “What do you want?”
“I want to hear her laugh again, to remember the woman I fell in love with. The past three years have been an endless cycle of anger and tears, and I honestly don’t know how much longer I can do it.” He stroked the puppy’s fur in a gesture that Ryan suspected was as much apology as affection. “And it doesn’t help that there are babies crawling all over the place at every family gathering.”
Over the past year, Ryan had noticed that Dana was uncharacteristically subdued whenever they were all together, and then she’d simply stopped showing up for family events. In fact, when Lauryn had given birth to Kylie in early March, Braden had visited them at the hospital but his wife had been conspicuously absent. “Does she know that Rachel’s pregnant?”
A Forever Kind of Family Page 14