by Ginna Gray
Wilson stiffened even more and his voice dripped ice. "She isn't here. Miss McCall began her maternity leave last week."
"What?" Rhys shot to his feet as though he'd been blasted from a cannon. "She did what!"
* * *
A little under a half hour later Rhys brought his car to a screeching halt outside Meghan's building. It had barely come to a stop when he bailed out, raced across the parking lot and took the stairs two at a time. He would have been there sooner, but he'd wasted ten minutes trying to convince her boss that he hadn't known Meghan was pregnant.
He'd kill her. First he'd kiss her senseless, then he'd wrap his hands around that sweet neck and throttle her. Or at least he'd threaten her with it, he promised himself furiously.
His anger and frustration mounted when he discovered that Meghan was not at home. He banged on her door over and over, then held his finger on the doorbell for two minutes, but she did not answer. Pressing his ear to the door, be could not detect the least sound from inside. Finally he banged his fist hard into the wooden panel and loped back down the stairs, cursing every step of the way.
A Texas "blue norther" had swept through Dallas that morning, and the leather seats in the rented car were colder than a tin toilet seat in the Yukon, but Rhys huddled down in his sheepskin jacket and waited, his eyes on the entrance to Meghan's building. She had to come home sometime.
If she was having a difficult pregnancy and had been ordered to take it easy, why the devil wasn't she at home where she belonged?
Briefly, Rhys thought about returning to Jacobson and Howly and demanding to know if Wilson knew her whereabouts, but he decided against it. He doubted the old coot would tell him if he did. Besides, it was late; everyone had probably gone home to spend the holiday with their loved ones.
Which was what he would be doing right now, if one little redheaded firebrand had had an ounce of faith in him.
Rhys did not budge from the spot. He stared at the entrance door until his eyes burned, while other parts of his anatomy were so cold they felt as if they would fall off.
Sometime around one in the morning he awoke with a start, and cursed roundly when he realized that he had fallen asleep. Great. Just great. She'd probably come home while he'd been snoozing.
Stiff and achy and not in the best of moods, he got out of the car and climbed the stairs again. He rang the bell with no results and then started pounding on the door. After a few minutes the door across the hallway cracked open as far as the safety chain would allow.
"She's not there," a woman murmured tentatively.
Rhys swung around, and the woman peering out through the crack gasped. "You're Rhys Morgan!"
"Where is Meghan?" he demanded, ignoring the outburst.
"I.. .I don't think I should tell you. Meghan doesn't want to see you."
"That's tough. Look, lady. I know that she's pregnant with my baby, and I'm damned well going to find her if I have to tear this whole state apart. Now where is she?"
The brown eyes widened and he heard, an audible gulp. "She.. .she left this morning for Crockett. She plans to stay there with her family until the baby is born."
* * *
As usual, Christmas dinner was bedlam. This year, with the addition of David and Abbey's twins, the Blaine/McCall clan numbered twenty-one.
Each Christmas they alternated houses, and this time they were eating at Meghan's parents'. To accommodate them all, the Blaines' dining table had been brought over and butted up to the McCalls'. The long linen-covered tables, stretching from the huge Victorian dining room, through the double sliding doors and halfway through the parlor, groaned under the weight of the feast.
Meghan sat quietly, picking at her food, wondering how she was going to break her news, while all around her the others carried on happily, talking and laughing and teasing one another unmercifully.
"Is something wrong with your food, Meghan Maureen?" her mother asked sternly. "No, it's delicious, Mom. Really. I'm just not very hungry."
"Humph. You must be sickening for something. You've done nothing but pick at your food since you got here yesterday."
Max Delany snickered and shot his wife a teasing look. "No one can accuse you of that."
"Max! You know perfectly well why," Erin huffed.
Sam Lawford shook his head and gave his partner a pitying look before winking at his sister-in-law. "Erin, I know you and Elise wanted to wait until the end of the meal, but you might as well let him tell them. He's going bust otherwise."
"What? Tell us what?"
"Is something going on?"
"Whatever it is, you might as well spill it. We won't give you any peace until you do."
Everyone was talking at once and casting curious glances between the twins and their husbands. Erin bubbled with suppressed excitement and Elise looked more serene than ever.
Sam, with his usual stoic expression, gestured to Max and said, "You do the honors."
Grinning like a Cheshire cat, Max stood up and tapped his water glass with a knife. "Attention. Attention everyone. I have an announcement to make." He cleared his throat, then sent a smiling glance around the table. "Christmas is a season of joy, but this year it is especially so for this family, with Meghan back among us. We thought since we were all gathered together in love and celebration this would be the perfect time to share our news with you." He paused to take his wife's hand and smile at her tenderly. "Erin and I are expecting our first child in about six months."
"You're kidding!"
"A baby!" Dorothy Blaine exclaimed. "I'm going to be a grandmother again?"
"Hey, that's great!"
"It sure is!"
A sudden hush fell and every pair of eyes switched to Elise and Sam, who were quietly holding hands. Elise's madonna-like smile blossomed wide. "Yes. Sam and I are expecting, too," she said with a laugh, and another round of congratulations erupted.
No one was really surprised. The whole family knew that since the day they were born, Erin and Elise's lives had followed parallel paths; whatever happened to one invariably happened to the other. It was one of life's mysteries that they had all simply come to accept without question.
At the opposite end of the table, Travis and Rebecca started laughing. "Oh, I don't believe this," Rebecca gasped, holding her side.
"What? What's so funny?" her father-in-law demanded.
"Nothing. It's just that...Travis and I are expecting, too."
"Oh, my goodness," Tess gasped, grabbing Ryan's hand. "So are we!"
Amanda made a strangled sound. She and Tess exchanged a look, and while Reilly hooted Tess cried, "Oh, no. Not you, too!
While Amanda bobbed her head, all around squeals and shouts and guffaws broke from the rest of the family.
The only one silent, besides twenty-seven-month-old Molly and the infant twins was Meghan.
Pandemonium reigned for several minutes. Maggie McCall and her sister, Dorothy, hugged and kissed and wiped tears as they congratulated each other on becoming grandmothers together. Their husbands, Colin and Joe, thumped each other on the back and the cousins teased one another and made bawdy jokes.
"I still can't believe it," Maggie said when things settled down. She squeezed her sister's hand. "Just imagine, Dorothy, more grandbabies."
"Yes. Five all at once."
"Six," Meghan said quietly, grabbing her opportunity while she had the courage. Beneath the table her fists clenched so tight her fingernails cut into her palms as she sent a wavering smile around the table. "I'm pregnant, too."
The announcement had the impact of a bomb. For the space of two seconds everyone gaped at her. Then the men erupted.
"What!"
"No!"
"Impossible!"
Travis shot to his feet so violently his chair overturned with a crash, and Meghan jumped. "I'll kill that damned crooner!"
"Get in line," Reilly bellowed. "I'm gonna tear that bastard limb from limb!"
"I'm afraid you'll both have to bea
t me to him." Ryan's deadly quiet voice sent a trickle down Meghan's spine and frightened her even more than Travis and Reilly's rantings.
"Now, boys, just settle down. All of you," her mother admonished, giving her husband a pointed look. She rose from her chair to pull her youngest into her arms, and Erin, Elise and their mother were right behind Maggie. When they were all huddled around Meghan, Erin shot her male relatives an arch look.
"Will you quit behaving like throwbacks to the Victorian era?"
"The hell with that noise! That guy took advantage of our baby sister!" Reilly roared.
"So? It's not the end of the world, you know. For heaven's sake, they were all alone on an island, as far as they knew, for always. What did you expect? Besides, this is the nineties. Single women have babies all the time."
"Not in this family, they don't!" David bellowed, every bit as incensed as Meghan's brothers.
Meghan promptly burst into tears.
The effect on the men was instantaneous. Their rage turned to hand-wringing concern and desperate attempts at comfort. Every woman at the table rushed to Meghan's side, and the men became the recipients of eight withering stares mat made them fed lower than slime.
"Meghan, baby, don't cry," her father pleaded. "It's not you we're mad at. Is it, boys?"
"No."
"Absolutely not."
"Of course not."
"Shoot, honey, we know this isn't your fault."
"That's right. It's that Rhys Morgan fella who's to blame," her Uncle Joe agreed.
"But don't you worry. He won't get away with this." Her father patted her hand awkwardly. "You just leave it to us."
"But, Daddy, you don't understand. Rhys— Oh, who is that?" she moaned as the front doorbell chimed.
"I'll get it."
From her seat at the parlor end of the table Meghan had a clear view of the entry hall and the front door, and when Travis opened it and she saw the man standing there she gasped.
"You! Why you sonofa—"
Before Rhys could say a word, Travis lunged and landed a solid punch on his jaw that knocked him flat.
Chapter Fourteen
"Rhys!" Meghan screamed.
"It's that Morgan guy!" one of the men yelled, and as one, Reilly, Ryan and David sprang out of their chairs and charged out onto the front porch to get in their licks. Right behind them came their fathers.
"You men come back here this instant!" Maggie yelled, but she might as well have been talking to the wind. Rhys had barely regained his feet and was about to dodge another blow from Travis, when Reilly's fist plowed into his nose, sending blood spurting. Then the others were on him, too.
"Rhys! Oh! Oh! Somebody do something!" Meghan jumped up and ran out to join the fray as Rhys disappeared from sight beneath the pile of men.
"Oh, man!" Sixteen-year-old Mike exclaimed as he skidded to a halt on the porch. "This is awesome!"
"C'mon, Max. Sam. You've got to stop them," Erin ordered, pushing her husband and brother-in-law ahead of her as she and the rest of the women hurried outside.
"Oh, great." Max rolled his eyes at his partner, and in unison they heaved resigned sighs, but both men waded into to the brouhaha.
"Hurry! Hurry!" Meghan hopped from one foot to the other, wringing her hands. "Stop them before they kill him!"
"We're... trying!" Sam grunted.
One after another, he and Max pulled the men off the pile and shoved them aside for the women to deal with.
No sooner was a man peeled away from the writhing, flailing, kicking mound than he bristled and fought to rejoin the melee, but the irate women were having none of it.
"Now you stop that!"
"Behave yourself! I won't have that kind of behavior in my house. Do you hear me!"
"You ought to be ashamed of yourself. Just look at you!"
"Grown men, fighting! Honestly."
The men found themselves being whacked and pinched and poked while receiving blistering tongue-lashings from several quarters.
It took the combined efforts of Sam and Max and all the women to quell the mini-riot and bring tempers under control. Even then, when the last McCall brother was pulled from Rhys, if Meghan had not flung herself over him, the free-for-all would have started all over again.
"Get away from him, Meghan," Reilly snarled, shaking off Max.'He's gonna get what's coming to him."
"No! Leave him alone!"
"What the devil's the matter with you? That guy used you, got you pregnant, then dumped you the minute you got off that island. He hasn't even bothered to call you once since you've been home."
"You don't know anything about it," she shouted right back. "None of you do. Rhys didn't know about the baby."
"What?"
"Is that true, Meghan?" Ryan demanded.
"Yes."
"That's right. I didn't know until yesterday, no thanks to your sister. I had to find out from her boss." Rhys struggled to sit up. One eye was swollen almost shut, there were scrapes along his jaw and cheekbones, his lower lip was cut and bleeding and so was his nose.
Meghan gave a cry and started dabbing at his injuries with the hem of her full skirt. "Oh, Rhys, your poor face," she wailed, then she turned on the others.
"Just look what you've done." She swept her brothers and David with an angry glare, but she noted with satisfaction that none of them had escaped unscathed. Reilly had a split lip, blood was dripping from a cut above Travis's right eye, David had a lump on his jaw, and if she wasn't mistaken, Ryan was going to have a shiner by morning. Rhys might have been outnumbered, but he had given as good as he got.
Flustered, the men exchanged baffled looks and grumbled, anxious to take some sort of action but not sure now what to do.
"Well, all right...maybe he didn't know about the baby, but the guy still dumped you. He hasn't even bothered to call you since you been home."
"Oh, just hush, Reilly. I'm the one who broke off with Rhys."
"Oh." Nonplussed, Reilly looked to the other men for help, but they appeared just as confused as be.
"Yeah, well.. .you know about the baby now," Travis blustered. "And I don't give a good tinker's damn who broke up with whom, I'm telling you right now, Morgan, you're damned well going to marry my sister.''
"Just try and stop me."
"What?"
"That's what I came here for. Meghan and I are going to be married as soon as possible." Rhys dabbed at his cut lip. Over the top of the bloodied handkerchief his gray eyes moved from one man to the next, daring anyone to object.
That threw them all for a loop. They shuffled their feet and exchanged baffled looks, muttering under their breaths.
Finally Colin stepped forward. He was still frowning, but the fierce hostility had faded somewhat. "Now let's get this straight. You're saying that you came here as soon as you learned about the baby. And you're willing to marry my daughter? Of your own free will?"
"No," Rhys said calmly, and David and the brothers stiffened. "I'm saying I want to marry your daughter."
"Oh. I see." Colin looked more confused than ever. "Well, good. Good. Then, that's settled."
"No it most certainly is not," Meghan snapped. "Because I'm not going to marry Rhys."
"What!" her father yelped.
"Now wait just one minute, young lady," Ryan growled. "What do you mean, you're not going to marry him?"
"Yeah. You have to marry him,"
Travis could not have said anything worse. Meghan shot to her feet, gave her brother a blistering look, and stalked into the house.
"Hey! Where're you going!"
"Meghan, come back here!" With a helping hand from Sam, Rhys struggled to his feet and stormed after her.
The others immediately followed, all twenty of them— infants included—trailing in Meghan's wake like a line of baby ducks following their mother.
Meghan led them into the kitchen, where she took a first-aid kit from the cabinet and slammed it down on the table. "Sit," she ordered Rhys, pointin
g to one of the chairs.
While he obeyed, she filled a pan with warm water and banged it down beside the first-aid box. Water sloshed over the sides and into Rhys's lap and he jumped back.
"Sit still. A little water won't kill you."
"Meghan, we have to ta— Ow! That hurt!"
"Hush up," she snapped and swabbed another cut. "I don't want to talk to you. I don't want to talk to any of you," she declared, sweeping her eyes around at the men. "Grown men, fighting like little boys." Heartlessly she daubed iodine on Rhys's cuts and abrasions, ignoring his flinches. "And all for nothing."