DADDY BY CHOICE

by Paula Detmer Riggs

  And neither did you, her expression said loud and clear. She was wrong. Once he'd gotten over the shock, he'd wanted that very much, but he doubted she would believe him. He straightened, sucking in a breath against the hot jolt of pain in his spine. "Is that your medical record?" he asked, indicating the bulging brown folder next to her on the table.

  "Yes, everything from the moment I was born until my last visit with Doc right before I left Texas."

  "Which was when, exactly?"

  "Two days ago, I took the 6:00 a.m. flight from El Paso yesterday morning."

  "May I?"

  "That is why I brought it," she said as she handed it over. "The information dealing with this pregnancy is on the top. Doc included his phone number, and I've already signed a release form authorizing him to answer any questions you might have."

  "Very efficient."

  She dismissed the compliment with an impatient frown. "I can't afford to waste time. I doubt you can, either, Doctor."

  "True enough."

  After fishing his reading glasses from the pocket of his white coat, he leaned back against the sink again, flipped open the folder and started to read.

  * * *

  Madelyn kept her gaze trained on Luke's face, scarcely daring to breathe. Beneath the tailored lines of the loose-fitting linen jacket, her heart was racing wildly, just as it had been that hot September day at the fairground when her gaze had met his across the dusty ring.

  He'd changed of course. Grown older and … harder somehow. Inside and out, she decided after a good long look at the set of his jaw. Certainly he was more physically powerful, which surprised her, though perhaps it shouldn't have. Luke had always been very strong. Growing up on horseback had given him incredible power in his legs, especially his thighs and buttocks. Twenty-two years had added breadth to his shoulders and packed hard muscle onto his chest and arms.

  The glossy black hair that had always smelled of wind and baby shampoo was now liberally threaded with silver. For such thick hair it had been surprisingly silky. Though shorter now, it still fell into a rebellious off-center part where a cowlick defied taming.

  The too-handsome face she'd never quite managed to purge from her mind for all her years of trying was now all hard lines and stark angles. The mouth that had thrilled her every time he'd slanted her a lopsided shy-at-the-edges grin was controlled now and bracketed by deeply gouged creases. His eyes, Paul Newman blue and once full of the devil, were somber now, even guarded, with the war-weary look of a man who'd left innocence behind long ago.

  Unfortunately, however, the aura of raw masculinity that had both exhilarated and frightened her was as potent as ever. More so, she realized with a hard thud in the vicinity of her still-queasy stomach. Buried somewhere in this quiet-spoken professional with a calm manner and a way of looking directly into her eyes was the first man she'd ever loved.

  As a high-school guidance counselor, she'd seen parts of herself in every girl who'd sat across from her, bewildered and scared and hurt because she'd trusted her heart to the wrong boy. Ancient history, she reminded herself as he turned back another page with a large heavily veined hand and continued reading. Being here wasn't personal, nor was it really a choice.

  Instinctively she pressed her hand against her stomach, a gesture she'd repeated many times since Doc had given her the astonishing news. The reminiscent smile that started to bloom died as those amazing blue eyes shifted to capture hers, sending what felt like a white-hot shiver all the way to her womb. Only years of rigid self-control kept her from flinching.

  "According to this, you were already nine weeks along when you consulted Morrow." Though soft-spoken, his voice had a gritty quality that had her tensing all the way to the bone.

  "Yes, that's right." She kept her voice calm and even, the exact tone she used when soothing angry parents or troubled adolescents. "My periods have always been erratic, and they got worse after that C-section. Doc had told me not to worry, so I didn't, but when I started having other symptoms, I decided to have a thorough checkup."

  "Other symptoms?"

  "A thickening in my waistline and tenderness in my breasts." To her dismay she actually blushed. He glanced down quickly, his gaze running over the page again before he closed the folder.

  "Why did you wait so long to consult me?"

  "Doc wasn't concerned until he sent me for this latest ultrasound."

  Luke's mouth compressed, giving his face an even tougher texture. Behind the thin dark rims of his glasses, his blue eyes had taken on flecks of steel. "You're an intelligent woman, Madelyn. It's obvious you want this child. My question is, why did you trust yourself to the same doctor who in your last pregnancy misdiagnosed preeclampsia as indigestion?"

  "It's easy to diagnose after the fact," she replied, her voice sharper than was fitting for a well-bred Southern lady. "But in those days Doc was the only doctor in the county, and he'd been run ragged by an outbreak of chicken pox." She took a breath, hating the painful memories her words had stirred. "I was lucky to have him, especially since my daddy had no money and no insurance. Without Doc's compassion and generosity I would have had to drive 150 miles to the charity hospital in El Paso for my checkups. And God only knows what would have happened when I hemorrhaged."

  His jaw went white. "Maddy—"

  "No, let's get this all out, Luke." She sat straighter and kept her gaze on his. "You're the last person I want to need in my life. I couldn't sleep for two nights before I made the decision to ask for your help. Just being in the same room with you brings up memories I've worked hard to erase. But I want this baby more than I've ever wanted anything in my life. I'll do whatever it takes to give him or her the best possible chance."

  He studied her thoughtfully, then frowned. "Maddy—Madelyn—I can't treat you without touching you."

  "I realize that." She drew a breath. That had been the worst of it, coming to terms with the enforced intimacy that childbirth imposed on doctor and patient. "I also realize that in all aspects but one we're strangers to each other, so it shouldn't be that difficult to maintain a strictly professional relationship."

  "You're the mother of my only child, Madelyn. I would have married you if you'd said yes. I can never think of you as a stranger."

  Something barbed twisted around her heart. "We don't have a child, Luke. She belongs to someone else, thanks to you. To survive I had to accept that. Just as I had to accept responsibility for mistaking sexual attraction for love. I know the difference now."

  His jaw tightened for the briefest of moments before he lifted a hand to rub the back of his neck. His sigh was heavy as he lowered his hand. "Tell you what, you get yourself out of that fetching suit that's got my staff green with envy and into that paper gown yonder while I go see if I can scare up some professional detachment." He left before she had a chance to reply.

  * * *

  After asking Esther to prepare Maddy for a thorough exam, Luke went into his office and shut the door. Though he had other patients waiting, he needed a minute for himself.

  He felt as though he was strangling, and his back was threatening to seize up again. Beneath his shirt and starched coat, his skin was slick with sweat, and his knees were as wobbly as a newborn colt's.

  Heckfire, he was a freaking basket case here, he thought as he eased his aching body into the chair behind his cluttered desk, tossed his glasses on top of the latest Physician's Drug Reference and slumped back against the cool leather upholstery.

  God only knew how much he wanted to help her, he thought, letting his head fall back. Anything he had that she needed, it was hers. If she wanted money, he'd beggar himself. If she needed a place to stay, he'd buy her a frigging mansion. Transportation? No sweat. A call to his friendly BMW dealer and the keys to a new Beemer would be in her hands within the hour.

  With a long-drawn-out groan that sounded depressingly like a whimper, he raked both hands through his hair, then balled them into fists on the arms of his chair. Damn, but th
is was pure misery. As rough as it was on him, however, it had to be about a million times worse for her.

  He'd known right off she had a healthy amount of grit. It had been there in the rigid angle of her head when she'd looked at him, and in the straight line of her back as she'd perched there on the edge of the table, a lady from the top of her shiny head to the toes of those city-lady shoes.

  Asking for help from a man she'd sworn to hate had cost her. A woman with her spirit and class, ready to humble herself.

  Because she loved the child she carried. Loved it as she'd loved their daughter.

  Damn, but he admired her. Flat out respected the hell out of her. It was clear as glass she wanted this baby about as much as he figured he wanted her to have it.

  Letting his shoulders slump, he dropped his hands and willed himself past the pain. Concentrate on what you know, he reminded himself. Diagnostic tests and procedures first, then a carefully considered, strictly monitored regimen of care. His mind clicked through the familiar routine, weighed pros and cons of radical new theories, considered options, then roughed out a plan.

  Preliminary decisions made, the hard angry knot beneath his breastbone loosened. When he figured he had enough control to keep his voice steady, he picked up the phone and punched out Boyd's private number.

  "MacAuley, here, and you have two seconds to state your business before I'm outta here."

  Luke grinned. Poor guy sounded so harried he almost hated to add to his stress level. "Jarrod here, and I can state it in one. Cancel the surgery."

  "The hell you say!" The bellow in his ear had him flinching.

  "You heard me."

  "Give me one decent reason."

  He could give the guy a dozen. About how he still woke up in the middle of the night with his heart pounding and Maddy's small white face shimmering in his head. About how he hated the selfish ass he'd been at eighteen. About how he'd sworn to become a better man. But all those decent reasons came down to one.

  "I promised a lady a miracle, and I intend to do my damnedest to give it to her," he said quietly before hanging up.

  * * *

  Chapter 3

  « ^ »

  "Is this your first?" Esther asked as she set out instruments.

  Madelyn pressed her hand to the gaping front of the paper gown and wondered how a woman was supposed to maintain her poise with her bare feet dangling two feet above the floor. "No, my second. But there are complications, and it's possible I'll deliver too early."

  "Don't worry, Mrs. Foster. Dr. Jarrod will take good care of you." The nurse covered the instruments before adding with a grin, "He might look like he just ambled out of a Louis L'Amour novel, and sometimes he can be a little abrupt when he's worn-out, but he's the best doctor I've ever known—and I've known plenty."

  Madelyn returned Esther's smile with one of her own. In her heightened state of nervous tension, her lips felt numb—and just a little shaky. "Thanks, I—"

  A sharp rap on the door had her jerking her head toward the sound. A split second later the door opened and Luke walked in. It was still there, that indefinable something that always made her think of wind racing across a barren mesa. Her lungs seemed suddenly starved for oxygen. Jet lag, she told herself firmly. Combined with stress.

  "Ready for me, ladies?" he asked, his gaze sliding past her to his nurse.

  "Ready, Doctor," Esther replied as she snapped on the lamp attached to a long gooseneck.

  Suddenly nervous, Madelyn shivered, drawing another quick gaze from those intense blue eyes.

  "Cold?"

  "More like apprehensive." She licked dry lips and tried to ignore the ugly stirrups that Esther had just clicked into an upright position.

  His expression was surprisingly sympathetic. "Took me a bad fall once and spent a little time hooked up in traction. Dam near made me crazy dangling there with my legs halfway to the ceiling."

  He slipped his hand into the glove Esther held for him. "You ever been in the Pacific Northwest before?" he asked.

  "No." Madelyn's reply came out thin, and she cleared her throat. "It's very … uh, lush. It seems like we flew over acres and acres of trees. And then, of course, there are all those rivers. Well, two here in the city, according to the guidebook I read on the plane. The Willamette and the Columbia. It was pretty hazy, so I didn't really get a good look, though." She realized she was babbling and clamped her mouth shut.

  "Darn cold, too, for someone born and reared in desert country." He plunged his other hand into the matching glove, then flexed his long fingers. "Took me a couple of years before I stopped feeling like a Popsicle six months out of every year. Esther still knits me sweaters for Christmas. Soft as a baby's bottom they are. And as pretty as they are soft. Had me three offers to buy the last one right off my back last year."

  Esther did her best not to preen. "You keep on gorging yourself on that junk food and I'm gonna have to buy another skein for this year," she muttered as she uncovered the instruments.

  Tensing, Madelyn fought the urge to scramble down from the table and hightail it all the way back to her hotel. A bubble of laughter caught in her throat as she pictured the unflappable always ladylike Mrs. Madelyn Smith Foster racing through an Oregon drizzle in her paper dress.

  "Lie back, please," Luke said, his tone as impersonal as Doc's when he was performing a similar exam.

  Paper rustled as she swung her legs to the table. His arm supported her as she lay down, his strength as intimidating as it was reassuring. "Comfortable?" he asked, sliding his arm free.

  Her skin tingled from the brief pressure of his hard muscles. She put it down to heightened nerves. "Fine, thank you."

  Her tummy made a nice little mound, and she concentrated on studying that sweet bulge. Beneath the gown, she was naked. As naked as the first time they'd made love.

  "I can't do this," she said, her voice catching. "I thought I could but—"

  "Maddy, it's all right," he said, his voice soothing. "We can reschedule, give you some time."

  Esther was right, Madelyn thought. Even garbed in the starched white coat, with a stethoscope casually looped around his neck and his diplomas hanging on the wall behind him, he was every inch a man of the Old West. Like a working cowboy, he had skin permanently darkened from years of working cattle and mending fences under the hot sun, his temples scored by squint lines and an implacable strength etched into the weathered lines of his face.

  When he'd competed, he'd worn a white straw Stetson, pulled low and tight against the whiplash snap of his head when the bronc twisted and whirled and bucked. One of the good guys, she'd thought then. A hero.

  "Do you still ride?" she asked before she realized how silly that must sound. But she didn't care, not when panic was licking at her again.

  "Not much anymore, although I still stable a couple of horses on a little place near Hillsboro. Two pretty ladies, both palominos." He hooked one foot around a stool on wheels and pulled it closer. "A couple of interns from the hospital exercise them for me a couple times a week," he said as he lowered himself with a surprising stiffness onto the padded black seat. She smelled him then, wind, sky, sun and a hint of soap.

  "Molly—she's the mom—is part Arab and real high-strung. Last time I paid her a visit, she got it into her head I didn't love her anymore and took a chunk outta my shoulder." He shook his head, his gaze flicking to the nurse, who looked surprisingly relaxed. "How many stitches did I have?"

  "Fourteen, and you hollered bloody murder the whole time."

  "Well, heckfire, woman. You were using a railroad spike, instead of a needle. And jammin' it in real good, too."

  Esther rolled her eyes before meshing her gaze with Madelyn's. Humor gleamed in the dark depths, and her expression dripped feminine disdain. "Pathetic the way a grown man turns to jelly the instant he feels the slightest prick of pain, isn't it?"

  Madelyn felt a surge of gratitude toward the empathetic nurse. And Luke, too, she realized. Never in a million year
s would she have credited him with the kind of sensitivity he'd just displayed. For the first time since she'd locked her rental car and walked through the door of Luke's office she felt herself relaxing.

  "It's genetically linked," she replied, falling in with what was obviously a familiar routine. "Like the utter inability to ask directions or find anything remotely smaller than a '57 Chevy in a bureau drawer."

  Luke snorted, but his eyes held a lazy amusement, and the fine web of lines fanning the corners deepened. "Hey, I'm the boss around here, remember? Which means I get to make the rules. And rule number one is no male bashing allowed."

  "It's not bashing if it's the truth," Esther said, sharing a smug look with Madelyn. "Right, Mrs. Foster?"

  Madelyn nodded solemnly. "Absolutely."

  Luke emitted a drawn-out sigh. "I can tell when I'm outnumbered." He offered Madelyn a crooked smile. "So, you want to get this exam thing over with, or should I have Dorie reschedule you for tomorrow?"

  Madelyn blinked. "Do you have office hours on Saturday?"

  "Not usually, but we've been known to make an exception in special cases." He glanced Esther's way. "What time is Walter Junior's game tomorrow?"

  "It's been changed to Sunday at two."

  He frowned. "Should I have known that?"

  "Dorie put it on your calendar," Esther said with a smile. "Tomorrow I can come in any time before noon."

  Madelyn was enormously touched. Maybe big cities weren't as impersonal as folks back home claimed. "You'd do that for me?"

  Luke's expression was suddenly dead serious. "Especially for you, Maddy."

  "Because you think you owe me?"

  "Because I know I owe you," he corrected, his voice thick.

  Then it was there in her head, the excruciating pain that went on and on, the race to the hospital, screaming his name as the contractions ripped through her. She swallowed hard, turned her face away.

  "Esther, can you give us a minute?" he asked quietly.