She's Having My Baby! (Silhouette Romance)

by Raye Morgan

  “In just a few years our little one will be in preschool,” Maggie mused.

  “Don’t rush things,” he told her, licking mustard from his finger. “Let’s enjoy the babyhood first.”

  She looked at him curiously. “Why did you think you’d never have children?” she asked him.

  “Are you serious? All you have to do is look at them.” He waved a hand in the direction of the pre-schoolers. “They’re noisy and grubby and annoying. They whine, they cry, they demand dessert and beg for toys.” He shrugged, feeling as though he’d pretty much made his case. “They’re nothing but trouble.”

  She gaped at him in astonishment. “You don’t like kids?” she demanded.

  “That was a little louder than it needed to be,” he told her out of the corner of his mouth as a few of the smaller children turned to gape at the man who didn’t like them. “But the fact is, no, I’m not a kid person at all.”

  She twisted her mouth, thinking. “You don’t seem to feel that way about your niece and nephew,” she noted.

  “Oh.” He had to admit she had a point there. But there was a logical explanation. “Well, that’s different. They’re great kids.”

  “Uh-huh.” A grin was beginning to spread to her eyes. “So the only children you actually know, you adore.”

  “Well…” He gave her a slightly exasperated look. “I guess you could say that.”

  She laughed and casually linked her arm with his in a way she’d never done voluntarily before. He noticed, and he liked it. In fact, he liked her. Liked her a whole lot. And that was something he was going to have to keep a leash on.

  They took a cab back to the hotel. Kane flopped on the bed and Maggie sank into a big chair and they turned on music. Kane seemed to be sleeping so Maggie didn’t bother him. But she couldn’t help but enjoy the way he looked stretched out on the bed. She’d never seen him in that position before. It was difficult to keep from imagining what it would feel like to slide in beside him.

  “We have two decisions to make,” she told him after a lazy half hour had passed and she saw him stirring.

  “Hmmm?” he responded drowsily.

  “Number one, what will we do about dinner? And number two, what will we do about that bed?”

  He opened one eye and looked at her. “You think it might look odd if we called down and had the bellboy bring up a roll-away?”

  She thought about it for a moment. That would be the most logical thing to do. But somehow she couldn’t feature doing it. She could just imagine the gossip racing like a brush fire through the hotel staff. “The honeymoon couple called down for a roll-away!” She cringed. No, she couldn’t face that.

  She looked at Kane. He grinned as though he’d read her mind.

  “Don’t worry,” he told her, rolling over to sit on the side of the bed. “We’ll work something out before bedtime. And as for dinner, Jill has that covered, too. All we have to do is call down and tell them we’re ready. They’ll bring a special feast, ordered up by my incredibly energetic and know-it-all sister-in-law, right up here to the room.”

  The dinner was delicious. Maggie wondered if Jill had an ulterior motive for keeping them in the room together instead of out among others in a restaurant, but she didn’t discuss her suspicions with Kane, and they chatted about inconsequential things while they ate, then watched a little TV, and then it was time to go to sleep.

  “You take the bed,” Kane told her firmly. “You’re the one who’s pregnant. I can rig something up here with the chair and a couple of ottomans.”

  She felt a bit guilty letting him take the uncomfortable setup, but there didn’t seem to be any choice in the matter. She went into the bathroom and put on her nightgown and robe, then came out feeling very self-conscious, only to find Kane engrossed in a book.

  “Good night,” she said, looking over as she dropped the robe and slid under the covers.

  “’Night,” he mumbled, and didn’t even look up from his reading.

  She felt relief and chagrin all at the same time. But not for long, because within a couple of minutes, she was sound asleep.

  Kane finally looked over once he heard her even breathing. Letting the book fall from his hand, he watched her for a long, long time, taking in the swirl of her blond hair, the curve of her cheek, her dark lashes against her creamy skin. A smile teased his lips, and he shook his head, got up and headed for the bathroom to make his own preparations for sleep. He was a married man again.

  “Let’s hope there’s a happy ending this time,” he murmured to himself as he left the room.

  Chapter Eight

  Maggie woke up the next morning to find herself alone. Kane had left a note telling her he’d gone on down to breakfast and to meet him in the coffee shop. She smiled to herself as she read it. Surely he was being tactful, allowing her to get up and get dressed on this first morning of their marriage without the embarrassment of having him underfoot. She appreciated his sensitivity and hurried to prepare to meet him.

  When she walked into the restaurant, he looked up and smiled, and she smiled back and the day was off to a great start.

  “What are we going to do with all this time off?” she asked rather pathetically over orange juice. It was strange, but she sort of missed having the structure of a job to go to.

  Kane put his head to the side, thinking, then snapped his fingers and nodded. “We’ll do the city,” he said. “We’ll pretend we’ve never been to Chicago before and we’ll do the tourist thing.”

  And they did, starting off with a trip up to the ninety-sixth floor of the John Hancock Building to look at the spectacular view. The rest of the day was spent sashaying through the parks and museums as though they’d never seen them before—and in some cases, they hadn’t. They talked and laughed and teased each other, and Maggie realized she was having a day like no other. Being with Kane was like being with a best friend and a handsome lover all at once. The only trouble was, he wasn’t really a lover. And she wanted to make sure things stayed that way, despite the fact that each touch, even just to steady her with a hand on her elbow, made her heartbeat race and her breath seem short.

  That evening they ate at a wonderful Italian restaurant on Grand Avenue and afterwards Kane took her to one of his favorite jazz clubs where they listened to cool jazz and sipped fruit juice instead of martinis. They took a horse-drawn carriage back to the hotel and went right to bed.

  “Why don’t you take the bed tonight?” Maggie offered. She’d noticed his back had been a little stiff that morning. “We should take turns.”

  “Get in bed,” he ordered, flipping back the covers for her. “There’s no way I’m letting you sleep anywhere else. After all, you’ve got my baby with you. He needs to get a good night’s sleep.”

  “Oh!” she said, putting a hand on her gently rounded stomach, and suddenly she was very ready to get into the bed. “Speaking of your son,” she said, gritting her teeth. “He seems to be complaining about all the walking we’ve been doing the last two days. Ouch! Hey, kid. Have some respect for your elders!”

  Kane stood over the bed looking uncharacteristically unsure of himself. He watched as she rubbed where the baby had kicked. Looking up, she thought she knew what he was thinking.

  She reached for his hand and drew it down. “Right here,” she told him, pressing his palm down over the spot. “You have to keep quiet and wait. You’ll feel a sort of flutter.”

  The baby moved again, and Kane’s face changed.

  “Was that it?” he said, his eyes luminous. “I think I felt…ohmigod, that’s him.”

  He was transfixed. Dropping down to sit beside where she lay, he put both hands on her stomach, moving slightly, searching for more evidence of the baby.

  She had to grin. She’d only been feeling all this movement fairly recently, and she remembered when she’d first felt something she was sure was the real thing. The thrill had been unlike anything she’d ever experienced. A real life was growing inside her! She k
new he was feeling something close to that himself, and she felt the joy again as though it were the first time. There was no doubt about it, sharing this experience was so much better than living it alone.

  “They say it gets much wilder by the seventh month or so,” she told him. “Sometimes you can actually see little elbows and feet pushing out.”

  He grinned. “That is so…” He couldn’t seem to find a word to express just how great this was, and his voice died away as he felt her stomach again, his eyes full of wonder. Sitting back, he smiled at her.

  “I’ll be honest with you, Maggie. As I’ve told you before, I never in a thousand years would have thought I would get this emotional about this baby stuff. If someone had told me a few months ago that I would soon be running around like a crazy person searching for my child, and then, having found my child, be contemplating marriage, I would have laughed in their face. I would have said they were nuts.”

  She smiled at him. “And they would have been nuts. Because that wasn’t you then.”

  “No, it wasn’t me then.” He put his head to the side, considering. “I’m a different person.”

  “I know. I’m a different person, too. Becoming a parent really changes you.”

  He looked down at her, all curiosity, and took her hand in his. “How?” he asked.

  Suddenly he wanted to know, wanted to be a part of whatever that change was. He wanted to experience this as fully as he could.

  She tried to think of how to explain to him. “It’s almost as though I entered a different layer of existence. I’m aware of things I never noticed before.”

  “Sure,” he said. He knew just what she meant. “Exactly.”

  “Of course,” she went on, ever full of common sense, “everything new you do can create that feeling in you. When you learn a new skill or try art work or learn to tap dance. Or…or fall in love….”

  Their gazes met and both quickly darted away. Somehow it was embarrassing that they weren’t in love with each other. He reached out and put his hand on her stomach again, waiting for a sensation that didn’t come this time.

  “I think he’s gone to sleep,” he said, disappointed.

  Their gazes met again and suddenly they both realized, now that the baby had stopped moving, she was lying there in her sheer nightgown and he was leaning over her with both hands on her body.

  He swallowed and began to inch away. She bit her lip and reached for the covers. In another moment, he was up and talking about something they’d seen that day, and she was turning on her side and trying to pretend her heart wasn’t racing in her chest.

  He puttered about the room and then got into the pajama bottoms he wore to sleep in. Maggie didn’t fall asleep this time, and she saw him as he came out of the bathroom, the lamplight casting a golden glow on his bare and beautifully muscled chest, the pajama bottom slung low on his tight hips. She had to fight back the gasp that threatened to come up her throat and turn her face into the pillow. Oh, why did he have to be so darn gorgeous?

  He turned off the light and got into his chair-bed. They both lay still with their eyes wide open. Somehow the night seemed to stretch out endlessly before them.

  “Maggie?” His voice was soft and questioning.

  “Yes?”

  “Are you awake?”

  “No. I always carry on conversations in my sleep.” She went up on her elbow but she couldn’t see him in the dark. “What is it?”

  His sigh was full of some sort of ambiguous longing she couldn’t identify. “I want you to tell me things,” he said softly.

  She smiled in the darkness. “A bedtime story?”

  “No stories. I want facts.” His voice changed. “Tell me things about you. I want to know everything. Tell me about your husband. I don’t really know anything about your marriage.”

  She winced, turning away. “You don’t want to hear about that.”

  “Okay, then how about your childhood?”

  She sighed dramatically. “I was born on a dark and stormy night in a little log cabin in the woods….”

  “Your real childhood,” he said dryly.

  She hesitated. She really didn’t want to do this, but she supposed it had to be done sometime. Quickly, she went over her very conventional upbringing. “I was a Brownie. I took piano lessons. Attended City College. Lived at home and commuted.” She stirred restlessly. “What else do you want to know?”

  “Tell me about your parents.”

  Now they were getting into a touchy area. She tried to keep her voice steady. “My father was an accountant. My mother was a kindergarten teacher.” Maybe he would let her leave it at that.

  “Sounds like the ideal all-American family.”

  She closed her eyes. Her childhood had hardly been ideal. Should she tell him?

  “Did you meet your husband…what was his name?”

  “Tom.”

  “Did you meet Tom at City College?”

  “Yes.”

  He was silent for a moment, then he asked the inevitable question. “How did he die?”

  “It was a car accident. He was on a hunting trip with friends.”

  “Maggie, I’m really so sorry.”

  His voice was filled with true compassion and she felt like a fraud. She closed her eyes, fighting it, but the sense of cheating him wouldn’t go away.

  “Kane, I’m going to tell you the truth,” she said, her voice trembling just a bit. “The whole story. The unhappy things. And believe me, there were plenty of happy things. But I’m going to tell you about the worst and then I’m never going to talk about it again.”

  He was silent for a moment, thinking over what she’d said. “Okay,” he said at last.

  She took a deep breath and launched into it. “My father was abusive…”

  “What?” She could hear him sitting up.

  “No, not physically,” she reassured him quickly. “Verbally.” She paused and he waited, but she could feel the tension of his emotional response to what little she’d already told him.

  “This is so hard to talk about, because it’s sort of one of those ‘you had to be there’ things. You say ‘verbally abusive’ and people think, ‘So he yelled a lot, so what? All dads do that.’” She paused, trying to find a way to explain. “It wasn’t always yelling. It was quieter, but more deadly. From the time I was a little girl, he tore me down in every way he could. He purposefully set up situations where I would fail, so that he could show me again how worthless I was.”

  Her voice faltered, and she coughed to clear it. “There’s no way I can convey to you how destructive verbal abuse can be. But I lived it and I know. The old saying that words can never hurt you is a lie.”

  “How did your mother handle it?” he said when she paused.

  “She didn’t. She stayed away. She was always at a meeting or doing something in her classroom or visiting someone. And she left it to me to prepare his meals and take care of the house most of the time. So I pretty much got the brunt of his poison.”

  Kane didn’t say anything, but his own anger was palpable. She could feel it simmering in the darkness.

  “I married Tom partly to escape that awful house,” she said calmly. “And my father. I know you’re thinking, why didn’t I just move out on my own? After all, I was twenty years old. I could have taken an apartment and a job and done fine by myself.”

  She hesitated, wishing she had better words to make this clear. “But you see…I don’t know if you can understand this, but when you are being routinely verbally abused, you feel so small. No matter how much you tell yourself not to listen, the words flung at you sink in, and a part of you actually believes that you are worthless and dumb and ugly and…. and….”

  “Maggie…”

  She could hear him moving and she said very quickly, “No, Kane. Please stay where you are, or I won’t be able to finish telling you this.”

  He stayed and she went on.

  “You feel as though you can’t do anything fo
r yourself. It’s a very debilitating process once it gets going. You think you need to depend on someone else. And I depended on Tom.” She shrugged, though no one could see it. “Maybe if I’d had counseling I could have stood on my own two feet. But I didn’t. Instead, I married Tom.”

  “Didn’t you love him?”

  “Oh yes, of course. At first.” This was the hardest part. “But…you know how they say a woman tends to marry a copy of her father if she comes from a dysfunctional family?”

  She sighed. “I’m going to sound like a whiner telling you this, but it is true. Tom turned out to be sort of a junior version of what my father was. He didn’t drink too much and sit me down and harangue me with hour-long lectures on what a failure I was, like my father did, but he did try to control me in his own way. He had a knack for putting things so that they hurt me in the very place I was most vulnerable. And then he would do things like…well, he made it impossible for me to have friends, always objecting to my doing anything that didn’t directly involve him. He would call up stores to make sure I really was where I’d said I was going. And if I objected to any of these things, he told me it was just that he loved me so much, he didn’t want anything to happen to me.”

  “I’ve come to realize it was his way of keeping me under control. He thought he loved me so much he wanted to keep me very close.” There was so much more, but she didn’t want to dredge it all up. It was over and done.

  “Now, I’m only telling you this because you seem to have the idea that I may be pining away for Tom. Well, I’m not. I regret that he died. But I don’t regret that I don’t have to live with him any longer. I just wanted you to know that.”

  “I’m so sorry, Maggie.”

  “Oh, don’t be. In some ways I blame myself for it. I came to him in such a weak position, I was almost asking to be treated like that. But eventually I had something outside my home to cling to. I had my job.”

  “Maggie, that’s what I don’t understand. I would never in a hundred years have guessed you had no self-esteem. At the office, you’re a powerhouse.”