The Baby Surprise

by Brenda Harlen

  Her strength of character was only one of the reasons he’d fallen in love with her, and as hurt and angry as he was right now, he couldn’t deny that he did love her. And he knew that he always would.

  “If you’d let me know that you were planning to come home, I would have advised you of our plans,” she said coolly. “And in any case, you’ve found us now.”

  “But I still don’t know why you’re here,” he told her, and then couldn’t stop himself from asking, “Did you find out that it’s easier to petition for divorce in the state in which you were married?”

  Petition for divorce?

  Paige stared at him, as stunned by the question as she’d been by his unannounced arrival and unexpected distance. And then the words sank in, and her heart plummeted. “Wh-what do you mean?”

  “You really should call home every once in a while to check your phone messages. If you had, you’d know that your lawyer is trying to get in touch with you.”

  Suddenly his distance, his coolness made sense. Except that he didn’t even know half the story. “It’s not what you think, Zach,” she said, suddenly desperate to explain, desperate to make him understand, to erase that cold distance in his tone and the icy disdain in his eyes.

  “You mean you didn’t go see her about your chances of maintaining custody of Emma if we split up?” he challenged.

  She winced. “Okay, I did, but—”

  “Jesus, Paige, why don’t you just take a knife and carve out my heart?”

  The anguish in his voice brought tears to her eyes. She’d hurt him, which was what she’d wanted when she first went to see Karen—to hurt him as he’d hurt her. As everyone she’d ever loved had hurt her by not loving her back. And then she’d gone home after her appointment and spent some time playing with Emma, and she’d realized that Emma would be the one who hurt the most, and as angry as she was with Zach, she never wanted to hurt their little girl.

  “I made a mistake,” she said, silently pleading for him to understand.

  But his gaze was hard and flat and cold when it locked on hers again. “So did I.”

  She swallowed. “Aren’t you going to let me explain?”

  “What’s to explain? If you want out of our marriage, I have no intention of trying to change your mind.”

  Of course he wouldn’t. Because he didn’t care enough to fight for their marriage, to want to keep her with him. No one had ever cared enough.

  And suddenly she felt as if she was seven years old again, trying to understand how her mother could just leave. Or fifteen years old and on a plane flying across the ocean because her father had sent her away. And just like both of those times, she felt helpless and overwhelmed and completely alone.

  But then she remembered something that Kathleen had said to her. That Zach wouldn’t have married her unless he had some pretty strong feelings for her. And although she saw no evidence of those feelings in the man standing before her now, she had to trust that his mother knew what she was saying. She had to trust in Zach.

  And if she wanted him to fight for her, to fight for their marriage, she had to show that she was willing to do the same.

  “I don’t want out,” she told him. “But I don’t know how to do this.”

  “Do what?”

  “Make a relationship work. Especially a long-distance one.”

  “So you decided to walk away.”

  “It was the pattern of my life,” she reminded him. “I never learned how to stick things out. Maybe I never wanted to.”

  “That’s clear enough,” he said.

  “No!” Tears burned her eyes, her throat was tight. “I don’t want to walk away this time.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I want to work it out.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m not sure I understand what you’re asking,” she hedged.

  “Is it for Emma?”

  She knew that her answer to his question could decide their future, that it was time to put her heart on the line. But he was so cold and distant right now, she was terrified that he would throw it back at her, and she wasn’t sure that she was strong enough to handle rejection again. “Of course,” she said. “Emma deserves—”

  “What about us, Paige?” he interrupted. “You and me. What do we deserve?”

  The weary tone in his voice warned that she wasn’t likely to get many more chances to tell him the truth about her feelings, so she took a deep breath and tried again. “I don’t know what we deserve,” she admitted, “but I know what I want. I want to be with you and Emma, to be a family.”

  Before he could respond to that, a little voice called out from the back of the car. “Da!”

  Paige exhaled, torn between relief and frustration when Zach turned away. He was immediately at the door, reaching inside the car to unhook Emma from her seat. Joy, pure and simple, shone from his eyes when he lifted the pint-size child into his arms.

  “There’s my girl,” he said, his tone filled with all the warmth and affection that had been missing when he’d spoken to Paige.

  Emma beamed at him and kissed each of his cheeks.

  Zach closed his eyes as he hugged her. “You can’t possibly know how much I missed you.”

  “Dadadadada,” she said again.

  “Yeah.” He kissed the tip of her nose. “Dadda’s home.”

  For how long? Paige wanted to ask. But she stifled the impulse, reminding herself it was enough that he was here now. And so long as he was, maybe they could figure out their future together.

  “Pawk?” Emma asked.

  He chuckled. “Not right now, honey.”

  She turned to Paige. “Pawk?”

  Paige shook her head. “Grandpa said he’ll take you in the pool after supper.”

  Which was apparently a satisfactory substitute for “park” as Emma clapped her hands together happily.

  She knew that she and Zach had a lot of things to work through. She also knew that they weren’t going to make any progress right now while father and daughter were so completely immersed in one another. Not that she minded. She would never begrudge Emma any time that she had with Zach. She just wished she knew where she fit in his list of priorities.

  After dinner, when Emma was in the pool with her grandpa, Paige cornered Zach in the living room.

  “Do you think we could finish the conversation we were having this afternoon?” She broached the topic cautiously.

  “You mean the one in which you were explaining why you went to see a divorce attorney?” he challenged.

  Although there was still an edge to his tone, it wasn’t nearly as sharp as it had been earlier. She didn’t know if that meant he was willing to listen to her explanation now, or if he’d just grown weary of the whole conversation.

  “I told you that was a mistake.”

  He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Maybe I’m the one who made the mistake,” he said.

  Her eyes filled with tears. “Don’t say that, Zach. Please.”

  “I had unrealistic expectations,” he said, sounding resigned.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Somewhere along the line I started to believe that we were more than two people trying to do what was best for a little girl.” He looked at her now, and the icy mask was finally stripped away. “And I fell in love with you.”

  “You fell…in love…with me?” She was stunned, and thrilled, and filled with cautious hope. She wanted to say the words back to him, to tell him what was in her heart, but he didn’t give her a chance.

  “I didn’t plan for it to happen,” he admitted. “But it did, and I thought that maybe, eventually, you might fall in love with me, too. But I knew it wasn’t going to happen while I was out of the country, so I came home from Afghanistan and heard the message from your lawyer and—”

  “Iloveyoutoo.”

  Zach stopped talking. He stared at her. He seemed taken aback, though she didn’t know if it was by the words or the way she’d blurted them
out.

  “Okay, maybe I wasn’t supposed to shout the words at you like that,” she acknowledged, “but I’ve never actually said them to anyone before.”

  “I know,” he said, his expression wary. “Which makes me wonder why you’re saying them to me now.”

  “Because I do love you,” she said and exhaled a sigh of relief when the words came out more easily this time.

  “Then can you tell me why, if you love me, you went to see a divorce lawyer?”

  She sighed. “Because I’m an idiot.”

  “I’m not going to dispute that,” he said. “Not in this instance, anyway.”

  “I was hurt and angry and it was an impulse,” she admitted. “And then I changed my mind.”

  “What changed your mind?”

  “Realizing that I loved you.” She smiled a little, because the words were getting easier to say every time. “And realizing that if I only had five days a year with you, it was better than no days at all.”

  “Do you really feel that way?” he asked cautiously.

  She nodded. “I really do.”

  He frowned, still struggling to put all of the pieces together. “So why did you come to California?”

  “There were a few reasons that I decided to make the trip,” she hedged.

  “Any particular reason you didn’t tell me?”

  “Because I didn’t think you would find out. I didn’t want you to know.”

  His brows rose. She winced.

  “Okay, that sounded bad. But it wasn’t a big secret so much as it was supposed to be a surprise.” She blew out a breath. “I came to write the bar exam.

  “It was your father’s idea,” she explained. “I mean, he mentioned the possibility of me finding a job in California the last time we were here, and I disregarded the idea because I’m not licensed to practice in California, and then I started to think that maybe I could be.”

  “You’re looking for a job in California?”

  “Well, the test results will take a few months yet, but if I pass the bar, I thought we might want to consider moving closer to your family.”

  “But—what about your family?”

  “I love both of my cousins dearly, but they have their own families now. And if we wanted to give Emma a brother or a sister someday, it would be nice to be closer to your parents and your sisters, especially if you’re overseas.”

  “You want to have a baby?”

  They hadn’t talked about having other children and she didn’t know how he would respond, but she smiled at the hopeful note in his voice. “I’ve found myself thinking about it a lot lately, but I’m not sure I could manage two kids—or maybe even more—on my own.”

  “You wouldn’t be on your own,” he told her.

  “Well, that’s why I was thinking we could live here. Not here in this house,” she amended. “But somewhere not too far away.”

  “I’m happy that you would even consider moving to be closer to my family, and I know my parents would be overjoyed. But when I said that you wouldn’t be on your own, I meant that I will be with you.”

  “I know you’d make every effort, but—”

  “No,” he interrupted. “I won’t try to be with you, I will be with you. I’ve decided to resign from the military.”

  “But…why?”

  “Because you need me,” he said simply.

  She was stunned by his response, shocked that he would really take such a step for her and racked with guilt for the same reason.

  “I don’t need you,” she denied. “Emma and I were getting by just fine and we can continue to do so.”

  “You need me,” he said again, “maybe almost as much as I need you.”

  She was humbled, speechless.

  “That stunned you into silence, didn’t it?” He grinned and finally pulled her into his arms. “Yes, I need you. But even more important, I want you by my side, every day, for the rest of our lives together.”

  “Well, I know that Emma would love to have her daddy around full-time.”

  “What about you?” he prompted.

  “I think that ‘every day, for the rest of our lives together’ sounds a heck of a lot better than the handful of days I was willing to settle for.”

  “You shouldn’t have to settle.”

  “Then I don’t want less than everything,” she told him and lifted her arms to link them behind his head. “I love you, Zach.”

  “I love you, Paige.”

  She smiled. “I could get used to hearing that.”

  “I’ll make sure you do,” he promised.

  “If you’re really going to be sticking around, can we have a honeymoon?”

  He chuckled. “I am so all over that one.”

  “And a baby?”

  He paused, but it was hope rather than hesitation that burned in those blue, blue eyes that locked with hers. “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah.” She smiled. “It surprised me, too, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized it was something I really want.”

  “To have a family of your own,” he guessed.

  “To have your baby,” she corrected.

  He kissed her again. “I think that’s definitely something we could start working toward.”

  “Tonight?”

  “You read my mind.”

  It was later that she finally told him about the last of her reasons for coming to California.

  They were lying naked in his bed, and this time Paige didn’t feel panicked about anything. She only felt completely and blissfully content.

  As Zach stroked a hand down her back, then slowly up again, she snuggled into him, listening to the beat of his heart beneath her cheek and feeling as if all was truly right in her world—or at least moving in that direction.

  “I went to see my aunt today,” she told him.

  “Lillian?”

  She shook her head. “Serena. My mother’s sister.”

  “I didn’t think you had any contact with your mother’s family.”

  “I didn’t—until today. But I had an address in Berkeley, and because I was in California anyway, I thought I would try to track her down. I thought that putting together the pieces of my past might help me build toward the future.”

  “And did you find any of those pieces?”

  “More than I ever would have imagined,” she said. “Most importantly, and surprisingly, that Colonel Phillip Wilder isn’t really my father.”

  Zach’s hand paused.

  “Well, legally he is,” she continued, “because it’s his name on my birth certificate, but biologically, there’s no real connection between us.”

  “How do you feel about that?” he asked.

  “I’m not entirely sure,” she admitted. “I was stunned at first, then angry, because if he isn’t my father, who am I? But now, I think, I’m relieved. I hated to think that a man could be so ambivalent toward his own child, so it’s almost easier to accept that what he felt wasn’t ambivalence but resentment.

  “According to Serena, when my mother decided to leave her husband, she planned to take me with her. But he came home while she was packing and told her that she could walk out if she wanted but no way was she taking his daughter.

  “So she told him that he wasn’t my father, and he said he didn’t care. He didn’t care about that fact any more than he cared about me. It was all about his rights.

  “We were living in Germany at the time, and my mother told Serena that she didn’t want to leave the country without me, but she believed it would be easier for her to petition to amend my birth certificate and get a court order for custody once she was back in the United States.”

  “Obviously something fell through.”

  “After months spent battling bureaucracy and cutting through red tape, just when she thought it was finally going to happen, when she was finally ready to serve all of the required legal documents on her husband, she found out that his unit had been deployed to another country. By the t
ime she tracked him down again, she’d been diagnosed with ALS and decided that she didn’t want to bring me to live with her if it meant that I would have to watch her die.”

  “I’m sorry, Paige. Not just because you lost your mother, but because the last thing you needed after having all of this dumped on you was for me to jump all over your back.”

  “You didn’t know,” she said.

  “But I should have,” he insisted. “And I should have been there with you.”

  “You’re here with me now.”

  He hugged her tight. “You’ve already forgiven me, haven’t you?”

  “I love you,” she said simply.

  “I like hearing you say that.” He kissed the top of her head. “I like it even better when you don’t stumble over the words.”

  She smiled. “The point of all of that was to tell you that I do have a family of my own. Not just my aunt Lillian and Ashley and Megan, but now aunts and uncles and cousins on my mother’s side, too.”

  “So what are you saying—that you don’t need my family now?” he teased.

  “Maybe I don’t need them, but I want them anyway.” She brushed her lips against his. “Although not nearly as much as I want you.”

  “I could happily spend every day of the rest of my life with you just like this,” Zach told her, then sighed. “But I think, eventually, I’m going to have to get a job.”

  “Have you ever thought about getting your commercial pilot’s license?” she asked him.

  “It’s not the kind of job that would allow me to sleep at home every night,” he told her.

  “Would you be gone for months at a time?”

  “No.”

  “Would you come home to me and Emma every chance you could?” she asked.

  “Of course,” he answered without hesitation.

  “Do you love to fly?”

  He sighed. “Yeah.”

  “Then you should do it,” she insisted.

  “I’ll think about it,” he said, and she knew that he already was.

  “Because whether we’re living in New York or California, we’re going to be doing a lot of traveling back and forth,” she told him.

  “So any airline discount would come in handy,” he guessed.