by Jeanne Allan
He hadn’t recognized the sports car. Probably Steele’s. Cheyenne must be here.
When he was married to Kim, Zane never knew who he’d find at the house when he came home. Kim accused him of spying on her. It saddened him that he hadn’t cared enough to spy.
He heard the voices before he reached the porch. Allie’s and a man’s low mumble.
Fragments of Allie’s conversation carried clearly. “DNA test...prove conclusively you...Hannah’s father.”
Zane froze, blindsided by her words. Last night, when the bottom of his world had dropped out, Allie had lent him her strength, given him her immediate and undivided loyalty.
Loyalty. What loyalty? A red mist of rage shimmered before him as the explanation for her duplicitous behavior hit him.
Revenge. The woman he’d once thought one of the most caring in the world had become this person he no longer knew.
An iron vise painfully squeezed his chest. Hurting him was one thing, but for Allie to use Hannah as an instrument of her revenge was monstrous.
Zane clenched his jaw and strode up the porch stairs. Two startled faces turned toward him. So busy plotting their nasty little surprise, they hadn’t heard his approach. “Get out of here, Doyle, before I throw you out.”
Allie moved to Zane’s side and laid her hand on his arm. “I think you and Sean should talk.”
They were already on a cozy, first-name basis. Zane hadn’t thought he could get angrier. He could. Flinging off her hand, he said to the actor, “You heard me. Get off my place.”
Doyle edged away. “Allie said we should get paternity tests.”
“My wife,” Zane said tightly, “says a lot of things. I don’t need a damned paternity test to know Hannah is my daughter. Get out and stay out and keep away from my daughter.” He would have added keep away from his wife, except his wife had already sided with the enemy. Zane wouldn’t think about that now. He refused to let her know how deep her betrayal cut.
They silently watched the actor get into his car. Zane’s mind raced furiously. He’d get a restraining order. He didn’t even know what the hell a restraining order did, but he sure as hell was going to get one. He’d alert Ruth and the men to be extraprotective of Hannah, to watch for Doyle. They’d start locking the gate.
He couldn’t bring himself to look at Allie. He wouldn’t give her a key. She could honk for admission like everyone else who didn’t belong on the place. Hell no, he wanted her gone.
Before he could open his mouth, Hannah ran toward the porch.
“We’ll wait until after she goes to bed to discuss this,” Allie said calmly.
As if she hadn’t buried her revengeful knife up to the hilt in his back. The only thing they had to discuss was how long it would take her to pack.
“Allie,” Hannah cried, “Daddy got me and Moonie ice cream.”
Allie put her hands on her hips. “Where’s mine?” she demanded playfully.
The two-faced...pretending she didn’t hate the little girl running toward her. Allie had laid out her feelings at the hospital. His mistake was in not believing her. He hadn’t wanted to believe her.
He’d wanted to sleep with her.
She bent over, saying something to Hannah. Her jeans hugged the curves of her bottom. Zane’s jaw ached.
He still wanted to sleep with her.
Allie put down the travel magazine at the sound of Zane’s footsteps. “She settled down for the night?”
“In my office.”
The snapped order annoyed her, but she reminded herself Zane was under a lot of stress. Following him into his office, Allie dropped into the worn, overstuffed chair in front of his desk. “You don’t have to bite off my nose,” she said mildly.
He stood looking out of the uncurtained window, his back to her. “You haven’t moved much stuff in. Obviously you knew you wouldn’t be staying long. Thirty minutes should give you enough time to pack up and leave. Forget about your mare. I’ll trailer her to the Double Nickel in the morning.”
Stunned, Allie stared at his rigid back. “What are you talking about? I’m not going anywhere.”
Zane banged his knuckles against the wooden windowsill. “I only have one question. Was it just a lucky break for you when Vern and Edie dug up Doyle, or were you in on it from the beginning of our marriage?”
The fury in his voice jolted her as much as the astonishing question. “Until last night, I didn’t even know Kim and Sean were acquainted.”
“Then you must have danced for joy when you heard my pathetic tale.” Turning, Zane centered a burning stare on her. “Congratulations. You’ve always been good at hiding your feelings, but last night proved how expert you’ve become.”
She crossed her arms in front of her. “What exactly are you accusing me of, Zane?”
“Cut the innocent act. It won’t work. I know why you married me.”
He couldn’t know. She held his gaze. “Why?”
“Revenge,” he said flatly. “Don’t bother denying it.”
So he had guessed. “All right. I won’t.”
“Damn you, Allie,” he said wearily. “I don’t blame you for hating me, but did you have to include Hannah in your revenge?”
“I’m not exactly sure what you think I’ve done,” she said slowly, “but I never intended to hurt Hannah, only you.”
“The woman scorned,” he said bitterly. “I never thought you’d be a damned walking cliché.”
“I never thought I’d be dumped before my wedding,” Allie flashed. “That’s a pretty crummy cliché. too.”
“I know what I did to you was unforgivable. I guessed why you married me, but I never believed you were capable of hurting Hannah to get back at me. That’s what comes from thinking with what’s below my belt instead of using my brains.”
“A common problem with you,” she snapped. How could he think she’d harm Hannah?
“I suppose you think I deserve to lose the daughter I dumped you for.”
Allie lowered her anger to a slow simmer. Zane Peters was going to get a piece of her mind, a big piece, but first she had to find out why he’d suddenly concluded this whole mess was her fault. “Did you ever reach your lawyer today?” The question merited an icy look of contempt. She tried again. “I made some phone calls.”
“I’ll just bet you did.”
She took a deep breath. “I remembered reading in the newspaper about a place that does DNA testing. I went to the library, found the article and called their 800 number. It’s fast and discreet. All you have to do is scrape the inside of your mouth with a cotton swab and mail it to them. We can send them samples from you and Hannah and Sean.”
“I’m not taking any damned paternity test and neither is Hannah.”
“Zane, use your head. It’s the best way to get rid of Sean. The tests will prove he’s not the father, one hundred percent for sure, and that you are, with a ninety-nine or something like that percent certainty. No one else could match Hannah that close unless you had a brother who’d slept with Kim.”
Zane stalked over to her chair. Looming over her, he gripped the chair’s arms. “You told me to look in the mirror. I looked. Hannah’s hair, the small nose, the soft chin. None of that comes from me or Kim.”
“She’s four years old and she’s a girl. Of course she has a soft chin and a small nose.” Allie didn’t know why she bothered. She couldn’t reach him. Couldn’t convince him.
She refused to give up. “If I’m wrong about the tests, then we’ll fight for Hannah. You’ve raised Hannah while Sean ignored her. She loves you. We’ll get psychiatrists’ reports, testimonials to what a good father you are, whatever it takes. We’ll bury the judge under a blizzard of papers.”
“Do you ever read the newspapers?” he snarled. “Courts don’t give a damn about all that. They haul off a hysterical child and pat themselves on the back for a job well-done.”
Allie refused to back down. Not when she knew she was right. She had to be right. “I don’
t know why you want to believe Hannah isn’t your child.” His head jerked back as if she’d slugged him. His eyes darkened with pain. Allie forced herself to continue. “You can’t drag Kim’s name through the mud. She is Hannah’s mother. But if you don’t voluntarily take a paternity test, Sean will go to court, and everything will be a matter of public record. Is that what you want?”
“I want you to mind your own business,” he bit out.
“Think about Hannah. What if she’d been outside playing when Sean arrived? What if he’d told her he was her father? Are you willing to risk putting Hannah through that? The courts will force you to take the test. Take it now and get it over with so you can get on with your life.”
Zane’s eyes narrowed. “Doyle didn’t know about this wonderful little service until you told him.”
“Is that why you’re mad at me? Get your head out of the sand, Zane. ‘DNA tests’ probably would have been the first words out of any high-priced lawyer’s mouth.”
“You don’t know that. I would have refused.”
He knew he couldn’t refuse. Allie read the knowledge on his face before Zane swung away from her and returned to his post by the window.
Standing, Allie took a piece of paper out of her pocket and laid it on Zane’s desk. “Here’s the phone number of the DNA testing place and Sean’s phone number. He’s staying in Aspen.” Before exiting his office, she paused. “I know you’re worried about Hannah, so for now I’ll ignore your accusations. Once the test results are back, we’ll have to talk.”
He pivoted on his heel to face her. “Where are you going?”
“Taking Moonie out. I don’t care how much you rant and rave, I’m not leaving until this is settled.”
“And when it is?” he asked tightly.
“I don’t know.” She took a step and stopped, adding over her shoulder, “I do know I’m not sleeping on that water bed. If you don’t want to share a bed with me, you sleep on it. Or sleep on the floor or on the living room sofa. I’m sleeping in your bed with or without you. You strongarmed me into marrying you, and the least you can do is let me have a good night’s sleep.”
Zane slept on the sofa in the living room. In the morning Allie folded his sheets and blankets and put them away before Ruth came. Each evening Zane dragged them out of the linen closet again and silently made the sofa into a bed.
Aimlessly tapping her pencil on the top of the table, Allie hoped he slept as little as she did.
She should never have married Zane. Not even for a month.
For much of her life, Allie had believed marriage to Zane would make life perfect. She’d married him, and life was far from perfect. They were two strangers living in the same house. Polite, but distant. If it weren’t for Hannah, Allie doubted Zane would show up at the dinner table. Or come home at all. He’d shut Allie completely out of his life.
Not that she cared. She hadn’t wanted to marry him.
He had not touched her since their wedding night.
How could he believe Allie capable of something so heinous as plotting to make him lose Hannah?
Allie had practically promised him she’d stay a month, but his accusations canceled any implied promise. She couldn’t come up with a single reason why she should stay one more minute.
“How come Daddy doesn’t have to go to bed?” Sitting quietly at the table drawing pictures, Hannah startled Allie with her sudden question.
“He goes to bed.” Allie hadn’t realized the little girl was aware of their sleeping arrangements.
Hannah shook her head. “He makes me go to bed so I’m not grumpy. Daddy’s grumpy.”
Trust a child to sense the tension Zane tried to hide. Fighting hard to keep Hannah unaware of the drama swirling around her, Zane’s efforts obviously had the opposite effect. “When grown-ups worry about things, they sound kind of grumpy.”
“How come Daddy’s worried?”
Allie scrambled for a suitable answer. “Grown-ups worry about everything.”
“I’m not gonna be a grown-up.”
“Wise move, honey.”
Hannah stopped scribbling on her cast with a red crayon and fixed a bright, inquisitive look on Allie. “How come you called me honey? Daddy calls me honey. He loves me. How come Daddy doesn’t call you honey? Davy said Daddy loves you. Davy said that’s why you got married.”
Since Hannah had stayed in Hope Valley the night of her father’s wedding, Allie had been treated to a mind-boggling array of Davy’s opinions. “Davy doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” she said sharply.
“Does, too,” Hannah said defiantly. After a minute she added in a mutinous little voice, “Davy’s a big kid. He knows everything.” She didn’t look at Allie, but bent over a piece of paper, concentrating on her drawing.
Allie tried to work, but guilt for snapping at Hannah nagged at her. There was nothing she could do to convince Zane he was wrong about her. Allie didn’t even care to try. She could, however, for the short duration of her marriage try to make life easier for Hannah while Zane battled his demons. Allie set out to make amends. “What are you drawing?”
Hannah kept her head down. “A picture.”
“Of what?”
“People.”
“May I see?”
Hannah hesitated before pushing the sheet of paper across the table. White space separated three stick figures. The largest figure had black hair. The middle-size one had yellow hair. Red circles surrounded the smallest figure’s head. All three figures had black half circles for mouths. The mouths turned down.
“Tell me about the picture,” Allie said.
Hannah ripped the paper wrap off a black crayon.
“They look unhappy.”
Hannah shrugged.
“I wonder how we can make them happy,” Allie mused.
Hannah stopped fiddling with her crayon. After a long moment, she peeked up at Allie. “Ice cream?”
Every time he saw her drive away, Zane wondered if this would be the day Allie didn’t return. He told himself she wouldn’t leave without her mare, then he remembered he’d brought the mare over in his trailer. Allie would send Worth for Copper.
The small of his back ached. He was damned sick and tired of sleeping on the sofa. The bed belonged to him. He ought to take her up on her challenge, crawl into bed beside her. See how long it took before she fled to another room.
The hell of it was, what if she didn’t flee? He’d be lying close to her warm body, within reach of her silken skin. He knew where one touch would lead.
How could he want to sleep with her after she’d betrayed him?
He wanted to trust her. If only she hadn’t admitted she wanted revenge. Not that he hadn’t guessed her intentions when she married him. He hadn’t guessed she’d use Hannah as her instrument of revenge.
Zane halted his truck behind the barn and rested his head on his arms against the steering wheel. In hindsight, Allie’s intent was crystal clear. Hell, his mother packed more when she came to visit for a week than Allie had brought to the house. Allie had never intended to stay married to him.
If only he hadn’t made love to her on their wedding night. A man didn’t miss what he’d never known.
He’d come so close to attaining his long-time dream of marriage to Allie. She’d made a mockery of his dream. Destroyed the love he’d once felt for her.
He’d never love again. Wasn’t that enough for Allie? Did she have to make him lose Hannah, too?
He’d never thought the day would come when he hated Allie Lassiter.
CHAPTER SEVEN
WALKING into the cool, shadowed hallway of his ranch house, Zane felt the emptiness. His heart skipped a beat before he remembered seeing Allie’s SUV parked out front. Listening, he heard only silence. Although he could smell dinner cooking, Ruth must have gone home. Faint laughter came from the screened porch off the kitchen. He walked down the long hallway, stopping at the screened door to the porch.
Allie sat sprawled in an
old, beat-up relic of a club chair, her feet propped on a footstool Hannah knelt near the stool, her back to Zane.
“I don’t think he would,” Allie said.
“Daddy would,” Hannah insisted.
Zane pushed open the door. “Daddy would what?”
“Daddy!” Hannah squealed, and rushed toward him. Once the pain had eased, she’d quickly adjusted to the cast on her left arm. Holding a small bottle in her left hand, she waved a tiny brush with her right.
The smell hit him as Allie urged caution on Hannah. “What are you doing?” he asked.
“Look, Daddy!”
Zane followed Hannah’s gaze downward to her wiggling toes. Cute round toes with bright orange toenails.
“Allie did ’em, and I’m doing hers.”
Zane glanced at Allie. She smiled. He immediately grew wary. Forcing his gaze from her damned kissable lips, he looked where Hannah pointed. Lavender polish smeared the tops of most of Allie’s toes.
“Aren’t they beautiful?” Hannah asked proudly. “I can paint yours, too.”
“Well, um...”
Allie laughed. “See? I told you men don’t appreciate beautiful toes.”
Zane appreciated beautiful toes. An image flashed across his mind. Allie sprawled, not on the chair, but on his bed. He’d never before ached to make love to a woman’s toes.
“How come you don’t like painted toenails, Daddy?” Hannah bent over Allie’s foot, studiously globbing paint on the top of a bare toe.
“I like painted toenails, but on girls, not on me.”
“Allie’s not a girl. She’s old.”
“Old!” Allie echoed in mock indignation. “If I’m old, your father is ancient.”
Zane’s gaze flashed to her face and his breath caught at the look she gave him. The warm, intimate kind adults shared when children did something cute or funny. He wondered what trickery hid behind her smiles. Masking his suspicious thoughts with a slight smile, he addressed Hannah’s remarks. “I meant men don’t wear toenail polish, like we don’t wear dresses.”
“We’re not wearing dresses,” Hannah said.