by Diana Palmer
“Of all the things two people do together, I think having a child is the most poignant,” he said gently. “I want to share every step of it with you, from morning sickness to labor.” His hand slid to her cheek and stroked it with a light, caressing pressure while he searched her eyes. “I’ve never had anyone of my own,” he said slowly. “Don’t shut me out, Becky.”
She wanted to give in. She wanted to throw her arms around him and tell him that she’d do anything he wanted her to, but there had been too much deception already, and too many lies. She didn’t trust him. He wanted the baby, but that didn’t mean he loved her. She couldn’t really see him taking on her whole family just to be a parent, either. The first glow of fatherhood had enveloped him, but that might wear off. Worse, there was always the danger of a miscarriage this early in her pregnancy. She couldn’t take the chance of letting him too close right now, until she was sure of his motives. And love was the one word he’d never mentioned to her, not even during their greatest intimacy, like yesterday. Men could desire without loving, couldn’t they?
She lowered her eyes to his tie. “All right. I won’t shut you out. But I won’t let you take me over, either, Rourke.”
“Fair enough,” he said solemnly. “Now, let’s go and get your grandfather. I hope you remembered the rope and chains,” he added mischievously as he helped her out of the car. “I wouldn’t give five cents for my chances of getting him in the car without restraints.”
“No? I would,” she murmured, walking alongside him toward the nursing home entrance. “He respects people he can’t push around.”
He glanced down at her warmly, liking the way she looked walking beside him. He felt a thrill of pure possession. She was his woman, with his child growing inside her. It was enough to make a man strut.
Becky noticed the way women’s eyes went to him when they were walking down the spotless hall toward Granddad’s room. He was a handsome man—all dark sensuality and wicked spirit. He towered over her and made her feel small and feminine, and she liked the way his gray suit hugged the powerful lines of his body, emphasizing its fierce masculinity. He was a strong man, and not just physically. She allowed herself one sweet second to wonder if her child would be a boy, and if he would look like his father.
Granddad was waiting impatiently in his chair. Dr. Miller had already released him. Once Becky signed the papers, he could get out of here and straighten out the mess Rourke Kilpatrick had made of his family.
“It’s about time,” he raged at her, and then glared at Rourke as he came in with her. “You, again?” he muttered.
“I’m glad to see you, too,” Rourke said, unperturbed. He grinned. “Becky signed you out before we came down here. If you’re ready, I’ll have the nurse bring the wheelchair.”
“I hate being beholden to you,” Granddad fumed minutes later, sitting rigidly in the front seat of Rourke’s car while Becky—and Mack, who’d been picked up at Mrs. Addington’s house on the way home—sprawled in the back seat.
“Oh, I can imagine,” Rourke said with an aplomb that made Becky want to giggle.
“And I hate those damned cigars you smoke,” he added.
“So do I,” Rourke said, taking another puff as he wound through the open country and down the road that led to the farm.
Granddad glared at him. He tried to think of something else to complain about, but it was getting harder to come up with things. He sighed and looked out the window. “Nice car,” he muttered.
“I like it,” Rourke replied. “It has advantages over the Mercedes-Benz, because it’s newer. But I miss my dog.”
“Mean, low-down thing, to kill a man’s dog,” Granddad said reluctantly.
“Yes.”
“How’s MacTavish?” Becky asked gently.
He glanced over the back seat at her. “He’s fine. He misses going on picnics and out to the parks, but he’s adjusting.”
She averted her eyes to the farmhouse in the distance.
“You need something done about that roof,” Rourke remarked as he parked in front of the house. “Those shingles over the porch will come off in the first strong wind.”
“I can’t climb up there,” the old man said with ravaged pride.
“I can,” Rourke told him. “I’ll take care of it. We can’t have Becky pelted with falling shingles, in her condition.”
Granddad reached for the door handle, looking uncomfortable. “Shameful, letting her get in such a condition unmarried,” he said under his breath.
“I quite agree. You might use your influence to convince her that I’m excellent husband and father material,” he replied, and Mack did giggle this time.
“You ought to marry him, if he’s willing,” Granddad told her when they were all out of the car. “Having a baby and no husband is scandalous.”
“Besides, he likes trains and basketball,” Mack said.
Becky glared at her relatives. “You both hated him only last month,” she reminded them.
“I didn’t say I liked him, did I?” Granddad asked impatiently. “I just said you should marry him.”
“I like him.” Mack shrugged.
“Thanks, Mack,” Rourke said, clapping a big hand on the boy’s shoulder. “It’s nice to have friends.”
Later, he felt as if he needed more than just one. Becky was polite and grateful for what he’d done, but she was suddenly as remote as the moon in every other way. He might have pushed too hard, he decided. Seducing her again seemed to have put more distance between them than ever. He should have remembered her bristly pride. He’d probably shattered it by making her succumb to him so easily. Apparently she felt even guiltier because she couldn’t say no to him. He was almost sure that she loved him, but until she admitted it and he could make her understand what he felt, they were at a stalemate.
He went to see Clay, mostly to see who his new cell mate was. The bad check passer was only a little older than Clay, and not belligerent or rude. Becky would manage with this one, he decided.
“How’s it going?” he asked Clay, after he’d had him moved into an interrogation room so that they had a little privacy.
“Slow,” Clay said. “Is it always so slow?”
Rourke lit his cigar and nodded. “Welcome to the criminal justice system.”
“I wish I’d had the good sense to keep my nose clean,” Clay muttered. “This is the pits. How’s Becky? She hasn’t come back, and I figured it was because of the creep they put in the cell with me, but they moved him this morning and put this new guy in. Is she okay? How about Granddad and Mack?”
Rourke leaned back precariously in his chair and propped his long legs over the desk. “You have been kept in the dark, haven’t you?” he murmured dryly. He blew out a cloud of smoke. “Granddad is home. He pitched a fit when he found out Becky was pregnant, and he’s decided not to die because she won’t marry me. He thinks babies should be born to married people.”
Clay stared at Rourke blankly. “Granddad is at home because Becky is pregnant?”
Rourke flicked an ash into the dirty glass ashtray. “That’s right.”
“My sister is going to have a baby?!” he said, saucer-eyed.
“Yes,” Rourke said, then frowned thoughtfully. “Maybe more than one. I think there may have been twins in my family a few generations back. I’ll have to ask Becky if she knows of any in hers.”
Clay’s eyebrows began to lever upward. “It’s your baby?”
He glowered at Clay. “What kind of girl do you think your sister is? Of course it’s my baby.”
“But Becky doesn’t do that sort of thing,” Clay said, trying to make the older man understand that she couldn’t be having a child. “She doesn’t even go out with men, and she goes to church on Sundays, and she gets all excited and mad when people talk about abortion and living together.”
“Yes, I know,” Rourke replied.
“She doesn’t go around getting pregnant when she’s not married!” Clay burst out.
“Well, what are you going to do about it?” he demanded.
“I’ve given that some serious thought,” Rourke told him. “And considering how stubborn she is, I’ve decided that the only way I’m going to get her in front of a minister is to arrange the wedding, invite the guests, and carry her bodily down the aisle. It won’t be easy. Handcuffs might be overdoing it a little, and I suppose people would notice if I gagged her,” he added thoughtfully.
Clay’s face broke into a helpless grin. He still couldn’t quite believe it. He was going to be an uncle. “How did Granddad take the news?” he asked.
“He got up out of his bed in the nursing home and demanded to be taken back to the farm so that he could save Becky from me. Then, when he found out she was pregnant, he demanded to be taken back to the farm so that he could make her marry me.”
“She doesn’t want to?”
Rourke shook his head. “I don’t really blame her. She thinks I set her up so that I could spy on you. I did, actually, but she grew on me.” He smiled wistfully. “The baby is one big bonus. It was like Christmas, when I knew for sure.”
Clay sighed. He’d never have figured Kilpatrick for the paternal sort, but nobody could accuse him of being a womanizer. If he’d only wanted Becky for a casual interlude, he certainly wouldn’t be enthusiastic about her pregnancy, or keen on marrying her. He studied Kilpatrick for a minute, while another worry began to play on his mind.
“Mr. Davis talked to me about turning state’s evidence,” he told Rourke. “I wouldn’t mind for myself. But what about Becky and Granddad and Mack?”
“Your grandfather said the same thing,” Rourke replied. His dark eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “I won’t make any promises, but there may be another way. I’ll talk to Davis. The fact that you were willing may go a long way. If we could talk your friends into confessing that they railroaded you, we might even get you off with a suspended sentence.”
“Which is more than I’d deserve,” Clay said. He’d had a lot of time to think, cold sober, and the past few months seemed like a nightmare. He still couldn’t believe he’d been so thoughtless and cruel. “If I have to do the time, it will be all right, Mr. Kilpatrick,” he said in a subdued tone. “I guess taking your licks is part of being a man, isn’t it?”
Rourke smiled. “Yes. It’s part of being a man.”
He didn’t tell Becky about the conversation he’d had with Clay, or what he was planning to do about the Harris boys. The less she knew, the safer she would be. The Harrises were probably already convinced that Clay was going to spill the beans, and that was why they’d volunteered to testify against him. He had one ace left up his sleeve, and he was going to play it.
It took Granddad the better part of a week to regain his strength, but he ate like a horse and cursed Rourke for sport. Rourke came and went as his free time allowed, ignoring Becky’s cool politeness and Granddad’s restrained antagonism. He patched the shingles on the roof Saturday afternoon. He’d shown up in old, faded jeans and a stained white cotton sweatshirt and sneakers, carrying a toolbox.
Mack had stayed outside at the foot of the ladder to fetch and carry as needed, talking enthusiastically about basketball, a passion that Rourke shared.
Becky had tried not to notice that he was there, despite her frantic heartbeat and the furious excitement having him around engendered. She put her hair in pigtails, wishing she looked less frumpy in her long print skirt with the waistband unfastened and a floppy oversized shirt with “Beam Me Up, Scotty” and a drawing of the USS Enterprise on the front. She was barefoot, too, her usual condition around the house.
Rourke came down an hour later, just after the banging and hammering and cursing stopped. He had a cut on one brawny wrist, which he held out to Becky as naturally as if they’d been married twenty years and he was used to having her patch up his cuts.
“I’ve got some antiseptic and Band-Aids in the kitchen,” she said gently.
“Remember to kiss it and make it better, Becky!” Mack called after them as he sat down beside Granddad to watch an old western movie on TV.
Becky went to get the first aid things out of the kitchen cabinet. Rourke unobtrusively locked the kitchen door before he joined her at the sink. “Mack made a good suggestion,” he murmured dryly while Becky cleaned the cut and applied an antibiotic ointment through the thick hairs on his dark skin.
“You don’t need kissing better,” she murmured. “Does it hurt?”
“No. District attorneys are tough. Predators, you know.” He leaned down. “Do you know why sharks don’t eat lawyers?”
She glanced up warily. “No. Why?”
“Professional courtesy.”
She laughed in spite of herself, and her face brightened. Her freckles stood out on her nose, and her hazel eyes were big and soft and radiant.
He framed her face in his hands and bent, drawing his open mouth over hers in a teasing travesty of a kiss that aroused her at once.
She gasped, shocked at the force of what she felt from such a light caress.
He searched her eyes. His own narrowed and darkened as they fell back to her parted lips. He did it again, and again, and again, feeling her body tauten as he moved his hands to her hips and pulled her against him. He made a sound deep in his throat, and all at once his mouth settled on hers and hardened insistently.
She couldn’t even make a pretense of holding anything back. Her dreams had been feverish and explicit only the night before, and the memory of how sweetly they’d made love was all too fresh in her mind. Her body knew the pleasure he could give it. It wouldn’t let her fight.
The smoky state of his hard mouth was heaven, the possessive ferocity of his arms ecstasy.
He moved her backwards until she came up against the cool, rough wall, and his hands flattened against it beside her head while his body levered down over hers in blatant intimacy.
She gasped, which only gave him deeper access to her mouth. His tongue stabbed into it, deep and hard, and her short fingernails dug into his back as the fever began to kindle in her body.
It wasn’t until she felt his hands under her skirt that she opened her eyes. His own were almost black, his face rigid, his arousal stark and demanding against her belly.
“Here?” she gasped under her breath.
His eyes glittered. “Here. Now.” Holding her eyes, he stripped the briefs down her slender legs, then his lips brushed behind the briefs in a caress so sensual that she gasped.
He worked his way back up her legs blatantly lifting the skirt and blouse up under her chin so that his mouth had free access to her heated skin. He took her hard nipples into his lips and tormented them, his arm half supporting her sagging weight. There was a metallic sound and his mouth lifted and he positioned her gently and readjusted his weight so that his legs were between hers.
He held her shocked, misty eyes and pushed, impaling her.
“Rourke!” she groaned achingly, shivering.
“Hold on,” he breathed huskily, repositioning his hands on either side of her as he began to move. “It’s going to be hot and quick, and you’re going to want to scream. But don’t. They’ll hear you.”
His mouth bent to hers. He ignored the incredulous protest. Of course it was insane, but his body had him on the rack, and she was nothing if not welcoming.
“We can’t,” she whispered as he began a sharp rhythm against her. But even as she said the words, her hips arched up to his to help him. Her mouth opened in a soundless cry. She saw his face harden, felt him becoming part of her body, felt the rhythm become tormented pleasure.
Above her, his teeth clenched. “God,” he breathed jerkily. “God, Becky, I can’t stop!” his face contorted. He groaned helplessly, his body out of control now, mindlessly lifting into hers, his eyes closing as he fought to suck air into his lungs. “Feel how bad it is for me!” he ground out, pausing for an instant so tha
t she was completely possessed, his eyes staring tormentedly into hers. “Make it stop hurting, Becky,” he whispered into her mouth. “Make me whole.”
Becky watched him, shocked by what was happening, delighting in his fierce pleasure even as her own body sought desperately to satisfy him.
“Is it good?” she whispered huskily.
“Ecstasy,” he managed. His eyes opened into hers. He was shuddering. “Touch me,” he whispered under his breath.
It amazed her that she could, and so hungrily, giving in to his demands with frantic eagerness. He caught his breath when he felt her shy hands. He covered them with his, teaching her how.
The pleasure was digging into her like hurting hands now, and she was as wild as he was. His breath was audible, tormented, as he moved down against her roughly, sharply, his eyes never leaving hers.
“Watch,” he managed just as the first shudder hit him.
This time she didn’t look away. His face registered the anguished pleasure her rapt gaze gave him, his eyes black and steady on hers. He began to tremble and she watched his face contort, feeling her stomach tauten as the sharp pleasure echoed in her body.
His breathing was audible, like his heartbeat. He pushed down against her suddenly, desperately, and a hoarse cry escaped his mouth as his throat arched and his teeth ground together in anguished completion. Incredibly, watching him triggered her own, so that the same silvery pleasure washed over her like fire, even as he convulsed above her in blind completion. Seconds later, his heavy body collapsed on hers and ground her into the wall. She opened her eyes, looking up at him with shocked awe.
Her heartbeat shook her. She swallowed, astounded at what they’d done, and where they’d done it. Her wide hazel eyes met his with disbelief.
Neither of them was breathing normally or steadily, and she could hear and feel his heartbeat on her bare breasts. She stared up at his damp hair dazedly.
“Now you know,” he said with shaken humor. “It’s possible to do it standing up when you’re too desperate to get to a place where you can do it lying down.”
“It’s nothing to joke about,” she said miserably, feeling unsettled by her ready accommodation.