“I plan on getting right back to work. If you have no objection, I’ll bring Amanda to the office and set up a bassinet for her. I’m sure I—”
“I’m sure you can, too.” Naomi laid her manicured hand on Katherine’s arm. “But that’s not what I want to discuss. I’m thinking of making some staff changes.”
Katherine’s breathing quickened. She was being demoted. Naomi might have seen her through this problem pregnancy with loving care, but she was the founder of Cachet, and she hadn’t built the magazine into the industry giant it was by being soft. She’d decided to give Katherine’s job to someone else because she didn’t believe a new mother could handle the demands of being a senior editor.
Worst of all, Katherine dared not question the decision. When her parents died, Naomi had been her salvation, giving her a job at Cachet right out of college and promoting her regularly until she finally gained senior editor status. Katherine knew she hadn’t worked up to capacity during the final months of her pregnancy, but Naomi hadn’t ever complained. Under the circumstances, Katherine didn’t feel she could beg for more consideration.
Feeling like a doomed prisoner, she gathered the courage to look directly into Naomi’s eyes and take the bullet like a woman. “What sort of changes?”
“I want to train you to take over for me.”
Katherine sighed with relief. She would work like a demon to justify Naomi’s continued faith in her. “So you’re going on vacation?”
“No, I want you to take over permanently.”
Katherine’s gasp dislodged Amanda’s mouth. The baby’s reedy cry of protest brought her attention back to the task and gave Katherine a moment to recover herself as she resettled Amanda at her breast. But her heart was still pounding when she finally glanced back at Naomi. “I...don’t know what to say. I never in the world expected...” She stopped, at a total loss. Editor in chief. She couldn’t comprehend it.
Naomi chuckled. “I can’t go on forever, you know.”
Katherine felt as if someone had just hit her over the head with the NYC phone book. “I guess I thought you would.”
“And die in harness? Not this lady. Or worse yet, I could start losing my edge and have a staff who’s afraid to tell me. No, I want to slip out of the top spot gracefully and leave someone I trust in charge.”
“But what about Sylvia? Or Denise, or—”
“Darling.” Naomi squeezed her arm. “You’ve been my choice ever since you were born.”
“I have?” Katherine took a moment to digest that startling information. “No wonder you were so excited when I decided to work on the high school newspaper.”
“It was all the encouragement I needed. Of course, I would have backed off if you’d chosen one of those other careers you talked about. I remember once you wanted to be an actress, and then there was your doctor-nurse period. And what was it you wanted to be when you were ten? A wilderness guide?”
Katherine smiled. “Yeah. Then I thought about all the bears I’d meet.”
“Well, you made the right choice, both for you and for me. You’ve turned out to be a damned good writer and a highly competent businesswoman.”
“Who got herself knocked up!” No matter how happy Katherine was about having Amanda, she was still embarrassed that she’d stumbled into motherhood by accident.
“Stress counteracted your birth-control pills,” Naomi said briskly. “You couldn’t have anticipated that.” She gazed at mother and baby. “And don’t tell me you’re sorry, because I know you’re not.”
“No.” Katherine dropped a kiss on the top of Amanda’s head. “I’m not.”
“So, are you up for some new responsibilities?”
The shock of Naomi’s offer had lessened and now Katherine began to fully realize the scope of it—the confidence and the love that it implied. Her eyes filled. “You know I am.”
Naomi blinked and looked away. “Good. Very good.” She cleared her throat and glanced back at Katherine. “We only have one pesky detail to take care of.”
A catch. Katherine wondered if she’d been premature in her gratitude. “What’s that?”
“Amanda’s father.”
Katherine swallowed. It wasn’t a comfortable subject. Many times during the past few months she’d wished she could claim immaculate conception. After promising Zeke that birth control wasn’t a problem, she dreaded telling him she’d been wrong. She’d rationalized postponing the call because she’d seen no reason to involve him if she ultimately lost the baby.
“You have to tell him,” Naomi said.
“I know.”
“He might just relinquish all rights to her.”
“Maybe.” Funny how little she knew about the man who had given her life twice, first by saving her from drowning and second by fathering Amanda. He was possibly the most gentle man she’d ever known, yet beneath that gentleness burned a fierce passion. Her heart still raced whenever she allowed herself to remember their moment of joining, when she’d felt somehow claimed.
The next morning, though, he’d been much more cautious and withdrawn. Plagued by her own insecurities, she’d suggested that maybe she ought to get back. Instead of trying to change her mind as some men might, he’d sealed himself off completely, which had convinced her there was no hope for a relationship.
“Do you feel anything for him?” Naomi asked.
Katherine looked up to find the older woman watching her closely. It was an important question. If she still had an emotional connection to Zeke, one that could potentially lead to a relationship, then she had no business letting Naomi train her as a replacement. She might not know a lot of things about Zeke, but she was absolutely sure of one thing—he would never live in New York. During their night together he’d made clear his love of the wilderness and his aversion to cities and crowds.
“I feel gratitude.” Katherine glanced at the clock on the bedside table and decided it was time to switch Amanda to her other breast. She still felt a little clumsy handling the baby, but once she settled her in again, the tug of her small mouth felt perfect and right. “After all,” she continued, “Zeke saved my life, and he inadvertently gave me Amanda.”
“I’m not talking about gratitude.”
Katherine tried to be objective about her emotions regarding Zeke, but it wasn’t easy. That night was like a blazing comet in her life, but her reaction to him had probably been born of many factors. She’d recently been dumped by Ken, she’d just been saved from drowning, and she’d never been stranded in the wilds with a man, especially a man as virile as Zeke. Maybe the fact that he was part Sioux had tickled her romantic fantasy. And maybe it was that look he gave her across the campfire, a look that promised so much pleasure...
“Katherine?”
She blinked and glanced at Naomi. Heat rushed to her cheeks. “Okay, he’s very attractive, and I have some hot memories that are tripping me up a little. But he’s apparently a real loner who wants nothing but wilderness surrounding him, while all I want is to work at Cachet.”
“But what about your vacation last year? You didn’t choose the Hyatt on Maui, don’t forget. You opted for your personal little Outward Bound in Yellowstone. Maybe that yearning to be a wilderness guide isn’t completely gone. Maybe you have a hankering for the great outdoors yourself.”
Katherine smiled, more sure of herself now. “What I have a hankering for is a crisp set of galleys, a hot cup of espresso and a bagel slathered with cream cheese.”
Naomi beamed in approval. “Good girl. Although you’ll have to go easy on the caffeine as long as you’re breastfeeding.”
“Decaf espresso, then.” She noticed that Amanda had drifted off to sleep, her tiny hands curled into fists. “New York is what I know and love, and I’ve found my dream job. What could be better?”
“I can’t imagine. So it’s time
to tidy up the situation with this man and get on with business. If he wants to surrender his parental rights, we’re home free. If he wants partial custody, which I doubt, I’m sure you can work that out with him.”
She made it sound so easy, Katherine thought. Something told her it wouldn’t be quite that simple, but she tried to look confident as she nodded in agreement. “Right.”
“Great. I’ve set it up so you can do exactly that.”
Katherine stared at her. “Set what up?”
“He was part of a bachelor auction out in Wyoming, a benefit for a boys’ ranch. I donated a chunk of money to the ranch in exchange for you spending a weekend with him in Jackson Hole at the end of August. You can tell him about Amanda then. She’ll be two months old and should travel just fine.”
“Naomi!” Katherine jerked, causing Amanda to startle awake.
“Or were you planning to tell him over the phone?”
“I—” Katherine paused to catch her breath and gently rock Amanda back to sleep. She should have expected something like this from Naomi. The woman had invented the term take charge. “I hadn’t thought how I’d tell him, but...” She gazed at Naomi, still having trouble comprehending what her godmother had done. “You bought him for the weekend?”
Naomi waved a dismissive hand. “That’s overdramatizing the whole thing. It’s a business arrangement. I gave money to the ranch in exchange for helping my chief assistant tidy up her personal life.”
“I can’t imagine Zeke putting himself up for auction, let alone agreeing to spend the weekend with me simply because you paid the going price.”
“I won’t pretend that he was eager to comply. He tried to talk me out of it, said that the two of you had nothing to discuss. But when he realized that my sizable donation to the ranch depended on his cooperation, he gave in.”
Katherine’s chest grew heavy with despair. She’d been right about Zeke. He might have surrendered himself to a night of lovemaking, but he didn’t want complications in his solitary life. Unfortunately, she was about to bring him a very large one.
“I still can’t believe he was willing to take part in a bachelor auction in the first place,” she said. “I’ve never met a more private man.”
“He’s an alumnus of the place. All the bachelors were. Quite an interesting story, really. They must have blanketed the media with invitations. Ours came quite a while ago.”
“And you didn’t tell me?” So Zeke had been raised on a boys’ ranch. She hadn’t known that. It made his lone-wolf image even more vivid.
Naomi regarded her with the same calm assurance that had kept her staff in awe of her for two decades. “You’ve been on an emotional roller coaster for months. Any mention of Zeke seemed to be stressful for you, and I was so afraid you’d miscarry that I decided not to bring this up. But it’s worked out for the best. Going to Wyoming with Amanda is the right thing to do. You can clear the decks and then come home and settle into your new position.”
“But Zeke doesn’t want to see me. You said so yourself.”
“He needs to see Amanda. You owe him that much, Katherine.”
She gazed down at her sleeping child. Zeke’s child. Naomi was right, but the thought of meeting Zeke again under these circumstances scared her to death.
“Your courage is one of the qualities that made me decide to turn over the magazine to you in the first place,” Naomi said. “I’m not giving you anything you can’t handle. You can do this.”
Katherine lifted her head and looked into Naomi’s eyes. “Yes, I can.”
CHAPTER TWO
AUGUST TURNED OUT TO BE a wet month in the Tetons, and more rain looked likely as Zeke climbed into his battered king-cab pickup and headed for Jackson Lake Lodge on Friday afternoon. He spent the drive time singing “Ninety-nine Bottles of Beer on the Wall,” because it reminded him of cookouts at Lost Springs and why he was putting himself through this. Cachet’s donation would go a long way toward remodelling bunkhouses that no longer met the fire code, and Rex had already lined up a contractor for the renovation.
Naomi Rutledge had made it clear, however, that her check wouldn’t be issued until after this weekend.
Zeke had never pretended to understand the thinking process of people who lived back East, but the whole deal was weird, even for New Yorkers. Painful though it had been, Zeke had combed through every moment of the night he’d spent with Katherine, searching for a clue as to what this could be about.
From the beginning, he’d tried to control his growing sexual awareness of her, which had been tough as their conversation grew more personal. He found out she’d broken up with her boyfriend, and to get her head on straight she’d decided to spend some time alone in the wilderness. She’d admitted that notion had been naive and overly dramatic.
Plucky, honest women appealed to him, and this one seemed to be available. Eventually his desire felt natural and right, something to be seriously considered even though they’d just met. But while he was debating the issue, she’d made the first move. It had only been a light touch on his arm, yet he’d felt his world shift. Then he’d turned to look into her hazel eyes. That moment when he knew that she wanted him as ferociously as he wanted her would be with him forever. A moment like that could make a man feel like a god.
This moment, however, when he was about to confront her after nearly a year of silence, when he’d been summoned to this meeting by her boss and kept in the dark about the reason, made him feel like a toadstool.
He sang another chorus of the drinking song as he pulled his beat-up truck in among the out-of-state cars and tour buses parked at Jackson Lake Lodge. But he didn’t have the nerve to keep singing as he walked into the lounge where they were supposed to meet, so the jitters he’d postponed with the song struck with a vengeance. He’d always loved this high-ceilinged room with tall windows facing Jackson Lake and the jagged Tetons beyond. He hoped this meeting wouldn’t ruin the place for him.
Heart pounding, he scanned the room. He didn’t see her. Damn it, after all this, maybe she’d stood him up. Of course, that would be a good thing. He didn’t want to see her, anyway. Except that he’d gotten himself all worked up about the prospect, and at least if he saw her, he’d find out the answer to the mystery.
“Zeke?”
He wouldn’t have bet that he’d recognize Katherine’s voice, but he didn’t have to turn around to know she’d spoken his name. A flood of desire took him completely by surprise as his body replayed the sensation of being deep inside her. He turned to face her slowly, giving him time to regain his cool. He knew she wouldn’t be wearing rumpled khakis this time, and he prepared himself for her city look.
But as he gazed at her, his brain stalled. When he finally admitted what he was seeing, his knees almost gave way.
She looked more polished than she had a year ago, but he barely noticed as his attention fastened on the canvas carrier snuggled intimately against her chest. She supported the weight of the carrier with one arm. With her free hand she cradled the head of a baby. A baby with very black hair.
While his mind shouted denials, his gut reacted with a primitive tug of certainty. His. He relived the dizzy ecstasy of being inside Katherine, of her warmth and a connection unlike any he’d known. When he’d finally poured himself into her, he’d experienced a sense of purpose he’d never felt with any woman. Maybe he’d known then, no matter what she’d said about birth-control pills. Maybe he’d known all along that this could be the only logical explanation for their meeting today.
“Her...her name is Amanda.” Katherine sounded out of breath. “Zeke, I didn’t mean for this to happen. Apparently the stress of nearly drowning short-circuited my system.”
A girl. He noticed the baby’s terry outfit was pink. He began to shake. A baby girl. Somehow knowing that she was a girl terrified him even more. She
was asleep, her dark lashes creating a fringe above each cheek. She pursed her tiny mouth, then relaxed it again. Petrified though he was of this little bundle, he couldn’t seem to look away.
“I didn’t want to tell you over the phone. I realize this comes as something of a surprise.” She paused. “Zeke, I wish you would say something.”
With great effort he lifted his gaze and looked at Katherine. A frown creased her high forehead. How he’d enjoyed touching the smooth planes of her face as they’d lain side by side in his small tent, his battery lantern on low so he could see her while they made love. Her golden eyes had reminded him of a mountain streambed, the kind that he could stare into for hours. He might have even told her that. He knew he’d said things to her that he’d never said to anyone before, risked more than he’d meant to risk.
Her eyes brought him no joy today. All he could see was a woman who’d taken the best he had to give, then acted as if she could hardly wait to get away from him the next morning. Admittedly he wasn’t good at expressing his feelings, but that morning he’d been trying to think how he could tell her what the night had meant to him. Before he had it figured out, she’d announced she’d better leave. He’d been half expecting her rejection. In his experience, caring too much almost guaranteed being discarded like an empty fast-food sack.
And now obligation was all that had brought her here to let him know they had a baby. He wanted to call Amanda an accident, but he knew she wasn’t. At the time she was conceived, he thought he’d found his mate. That belief alone might have cancelled Katherine’s birth-control pills. He’d seen people will their own death, so maybe you could will life into existence, too. Maybe he’d unconsciously done that.
He cleared his throat. “I think we should find a more private spot to talk about this.”
“You’re right, we probably should. But just let me say this. I’m not here to ask for anything—not child support or even for you to give Amanda your name. I take full responsibility for this baby. I understand how you want to live your life, and a child doesn’t fit in very well. Now that you’ve seen her, if you’d like to relinquish all rights and never see either of us again, that’s fine.”
Bachelor Father Page 2