Was that rueful admiration she saw? She’d always felt at such a disadvantage, being older and plainer than Persia, that she enjoyed one-upping her former rival for a change.
Pathetic, Nora. Honestly, why should you care?
“How’s it going?” she asked pleasantly.
“Well, look who’s here.” Persia raked her with a mixture of arrogance and apprehension. What did she think, that Nora would try to reclaim her unfaithful ex-husband?
“I happen to work here,” Nora said.
“You’re looking good. Very good.” Reese sounded surprised.
Her ex-husband was as suave and men’s-magazine-handsome as ever. Yet Nora no longer felt like an awkward teenager in his presence. There was something too calculated and overgroomed about him.
He certainly didn’t compare to the rugged man she’d just noticed swinging out of the elevator. What had brought Leo here?
At the moment, Nora didn’t care. His powerful presence eclipsed her ex-husband, and she really, really deserved a moment of payback.
“There you are!” she declared as if she’d been expecting him.
Leo barely broke stride. He took in the other couple, and she saw a flicker of understanding as he grasped the situation. Thank goodness practically everybody in Safe Harbor knew who Reese Kendall was.
Nora hoped Leo would play along. But considering the issues between them, how could she expect him to cooperate?
By doing so, he would also risk offending one of the town’s power players. She was being unreasonable, Nora thought, and braced for Leo to coolly put her in her place.
Chapter Thirteen
To Leo, Reese Kendall appeared even slicker in person than in his pictures in the paper. So this was the jerk who’d tossed Nora aside for his barely-out-of-school wife. As for the new Mrs. Kendall, the chubbiness didn’t detract from her exotic beauty nearly as much as that petulant expression.
He’d stopped by only to ask for a few minutes of Nora’s time. No way was he going to let these snobs score a round at her expense, though.
“Hi.” He slid an arm around her waist and nuzzled her temple. The scent of flowers and femininity tingled through his senses.
From the way she shifted against him, no one could miss the fact that they were lovers. “Leo, I don’t know if you’ve met my ex-husband, Reese, and his wife, Persia.”
Keeping his arm anchored around Nora, Leo shook the other man’s hand. To Persia, he said, “Congratulations.”
She glanced at her rounded midsection. “It’s a girl. I’m due in August. The doctor says I’m extremely healthy, but I refuse to have natural childbirth. Why should women suffer? We don’t live in the Stone Age.”
She didn’t appear to expect anything other than agreement, so Leo merely nodded.
“You’re a friend of Nora’s?” Reese asked, as if it weren’t obvious.
“We hang out.” Leo grinned to indicate this was an understatement. “Don’t know how you let her get away, but hey, I’m glad you did.”
Was he laying it on too thick? The gratitude in Nora’s expression reassured him. He was sure going to miss being around her.
“We’re off,” she told her ex. “Nice to see you.”
“Nice to see you, too.” Was that regret tightening his mouth? Served the jerk right.
Persia tugged his arm. “Come on, Reese. I’m starving. Call the damn cook and tell her we’re eating out.”
“Have a good time.” Leo let a hint of irony bleed through, and sliding his hand down to Nora’s shapely rear end, he steered her along the hall.
“How was I?” he said after the elevator doors closed them inside.
“Brilliant.” Nora brushed her cheek across his shoulder. “My best birthday present ever.”
“It’s your birthday?” He hated to spoil the occasion.
“I’m thirty-five.” She nibbled on his earlobe. “Way older than you.”
He was getting hot. Surely pregnancy didn’t require complete abstinence, did it? “Guess that makes you a cougar.”
“Grrr,” she murmured close to his ear.
Leo’s body went hard as iron. “If you don’t have any plans for your birthday, we could have dinner. Or skip dinner and cut to dessert.”
“That whole candles-on-the-cake business is over-rated.”
“I didn’t mean that kind of dessert.”
“Neither did I.”
They probably broke the sound barrier en route to her condo. When they entered, Leo was in such a hurry he nailed Nora right on the living-room sofa. Not the casting couch—they didn’t make it as far as the den.
“I guess that answers my question,” he said afterward as they lay side by side, entwined and entangled.
“What question?” She wiggled, brushing his sensitive core, but he was spent. In an hour or so, he’d undoubtedly spring back to life.
Maybe sooner.
“About whether pregnant women are allowed to have sex,” Leo said.
“Unless there are contraindications, sure.”
He traced a hand lazily across her breasts. He’d been right—they were bigger. “And you don’t have any of those?”
“No bleeding or preterm labor,” Nora responded. “Later on, couples do have to get creative about positions.”
“Creative is good.”
“Creative is very good.”
Hazily, Leo recalled that he’d only planned to meet with Nora to tell her they needed to put distance between them. That distance, at the moment, amounted to less than a centimeter.
He was grateful her ex-husband’s presence had given him a reason to flirt with her. And to find out what a special occasion this was. “Happy birthday. Did I say that already?”
“Yes. Let me know when you’re ready to celebrate again.”
His motor was definitely revving. But pregnant women needed to eat. “You must be hungry.”
She brushed back the hair tangling around her face and slender neck. “I have leftover pasta.”
“Sounds good to me.” He rose to his feet.
She held out a hand and let Leo pull her up. Her arms slipped around him and they stood, holding each other, stark naked in her living room.
“We have to stop doing this,” he told her. “It’s muddling my brain.”
“What’s wrong with muddling?”
“Good point.”
After eating, they headed for the shower and soaped each other thoroughly. Leo found himself sneaking glances at her stomach, wondering how long it took before you could see the baby growing.
What had Ralph said? “When it comes out, it’ll be a whole new person.” Strange how he was beginning to find that prospect fascinating. “You haven’t told me when you’re due.”
“November,” Nora said.
“Boy or girl?”
“Too soon to tell.” She turned off the water and reached for a towel.
He wondered if there were some way to stay involved without…without what? Without getting bogged down in expectations and obligations. Without quarreling, sniping, baiting each other or relaunching the Cold War.
Leo knew that not all relationships deteriorated. But he had two strikes against him—being a cop, and having grown up in a home where the parents might as well have lived in different countries. Add Nora’s failed marriage, and that made three strikes between the pair of them.
Anyway, he had no time for a serious relationship. After that scene with Captain Reed this morning, he’d better focus on his promotion or he’d be stuck on patrol for the rest of his life.
The hair dryer cut off. “You’ve run through enough expressions for an entire soap-opera season,” Nora said. “Are you mad at me?”
“What makes you think that?” He pulled a comb through his damp hair.
“Let’s start with the frown and move on to the scowling.”
He hadn’t meant to bring this up, but he might as well. “The captain called me into his office this morning. Violet informed her ex-boy
friend that I was investigating his family, and the Hightowers complained to the chief.”
Her eyes widened. “I never meant to get you in trouble.”
Leo felt a tug of remorse. “This isn’t your fault. But if Violet’s mom receives any more threats, she should make a formal report. I can’t be involved.”
Nora drew on a pair of jeans, tugging hard to get them fastened. “I don’t want to involve you in anything else, either. Only, this odd thing happened today. It isn’t illegal, or at least, I don’t think so, but I could use your opinion.”
Leaning in the doorway, Leo watched her fumble with the buttons on a blouse that refused to close. “You expect me to concentrate while you’re sticking your breasts in my face?”
She stared down at the blouse. “Gee, there’s one plus to getting knocked up. I got bigger.”
Leo found her so cute, he had to restrain the impulse to undress her again. “If you’re concerned about legalities, you should ask my brother. Tony’s a lawyer, and he does work at your hospital.”
She discarded the shirt and selected a jersey. “I hate to risk stirring up a hornet’s nest over nothing. Also, I’m concerned about patient confidentiality.”
“If patient privacy is an issue, you shouldn’t tell me, either.”
“I wasn’t going to mention any names.”
What if there genuinely was a public safety problem in Safe Harbor? Leo didn’t kid himself that unearthing a scandal would score points for him; more likely, he’d be sticking his neck in a noose. All the same, he hated to ignore a potentially serious issue. “Go ahead. I’m listening.”
She didn’t get to respond, because her phone rang.
“You on call?” he asked.
“No.” She checked the phone’s display. “But it’s the hospital. That’s odd.” Into the mobile, she said, “Dr. Kendall.”
She listened intently for a moment, responded, “I’ll be right there,” and clicked off. “Suzy’s been admitted and she wants me there. She may be having a miscarriage.”
Leo pictured Ralph’s broad face alight with eagerness as he’d talked about welcoming his child into the world. The kid had mapped out an entire future, and now it might be disappearing. “That’s rotten luck. Ralph’s likely to be in crisis.”
“Want to come?” she asked. “I have a feeling he’s going to need support.”
“I’ll drive.”
She didn’t argue.
ON THE WAY OVER, NORA TOLD Leo about the two patients who’d been contacted by an adoption attorney. She half-expected him to dismiss the issue as irrelevant, but instead he drew out his pad at a stop sign and took a few notes.
“Did they mention the name of the attorney?” he asked.
She shook her head. “It didn’t come up.”
“Any chance you could find out?”
Nora supposed she could make some excuse to call and ask. “I’ll try. Why?”
He steered into the hospital parking structure. “Eleanor Wycliff complained about someone leaving an adoption attorney’s cards at the counseling center. It might be a link.”
The possibility of a connection, however remote, troubled Nora. “Neither of my patients is a client at the center, as far as I know.”
“But the center used to be headquartered at the hospital,” Leo pointed out. “And there’s a lot of connections through the volunteer staff.”
“You think we should notify Samantha?” Nora asked.
“I have the impression she tends to go off half-cocked.”
That was putting it mildly. “If she learned someone might be abusing her clinic, she’d have a conniption.”
“Is that a medical term? Does it hurt?” Leo teased.
Nora laughed. “My grandmother used to say that. I think it’s really ancient slang for a hissy fit. Or is that ancient slang, too?”
“I have no idea, but let’s leave Dr. Forrest and her temper in the dark for now.” He killed the engine. “After getting called on the carpet at work, I prefer to proceed with caution. Why don’t you start by asking about the attorney? If your patients didn’t use Fergus Bridger, there’s nothing to investigate.”
“That’s his name?” Nora asked as they got out.
“The very man.”
“I never heard of him.”
“You have now.”
As they hurried toward the hospital’s labor-and-delivery unit, she stopped thinking about the attorney’s possible shenanigans. There were more immediate issues to confront.
While Suzy might have intended to relinquish her baby, a miscarriage could hit a lot harder than anyone expected. No telling how she and Ralph might react.
Thank goodness Leo was here, Nora thought, and held his hand in the elevator.
THEY LEARNED WHEN THEY arrived that Suzy had lost the baby. Nora rushed to comfort the girl, who’d apparently declined to summon her family and was refusing to see Ralph, either.
Leo found the young man pacing across an otherwise empty patient lounge, his unshaven cheeks wet with tears. As part of his professional training, Leo had taken courses in consoling crime victims and offering support to fellow officers who’d suffered trauma. In his five years on the force in this quiet town, however, he’d rarely drawn on those skills. And nothing had prepared him to help a boy suffering such a devastating and unexpected loss.
“She won’t even talk to me,” Ralph muttered. “I was with her when she started cramping. Why won’t she let me stay with her?”
As if Leo understood women! Then a possible explanation occurred to him. “Maybe she doesn’t want to deal with your feelings. Are you angry?” Anger would be a natural reaction, since Ralph had wanted the baby so badly and Suzy hadn’t.
“Yeah.” Ralph nodded slowly. “Yeah, I guess I am.”
“At Suzy?” Leo took a seat.
Ralph shoved his hands into his jeans pockets. “If she cared more, maybe the baby would have lived.”
Leo doubted maternal hostility caused miscarriages or there’d be fewer unwanted babies. “I doubt her emotions have anything to do with it. Did the doctor say what went wrong?”
“He said they’d run some tests.” The boy stopped pacing. “I can’t believe this is happening. The baby seemed so real.”
And mine feels so unreal.
The perception startled Leo. He didn’t envision the fetus inside Nora as a baby like Tara. But it was, or soon would be.
“You think Suzy picked up on what I was thinking?” Ralph asked. “Is that why she doesn’t want me around?”
“I think that’s highly likely.”
“But I still love her,” the boy said miserably.
“Unlike in the movies, love doesn’t necessarily conquer all,” Leo observed.
“You ever been in love?”
Leo struggled to sort out his thoughts. If he couldn’t make sense of his own feelings, how on earth was he supposed to help Ralph? “I thought I was, a few times. It felt intense, and the breakups hurt like hell, but the relationships wouldn’t have lasted.”
“How can you be sure?”
Good question. “I missed the idea of the woman more than the actual person. It didn’t take long for me to realize they could be replaced.”
“I can’t replace Suzy,” Ralph said dejectedly. “We used to be best friends. We talked about everything. I never figured a girl as smart and pretty as her could care about me.”
“Well, you haven’t necessarily lost her. Just hang in there.” That was the best Leo could come up with.
Footsteps approached. Even before he saw her, he knew it was Nora.
She blinked back the tears darkening her eyes. “How’re you doing, Ralph?”
“Not so good.”
She lowered herself carefully onto the edge of a couch, moving so stiffly that Leo wondered if she’d strained a muscle. “Do you have any questions?”
Ralph’s mouth trembled, although whether in anger or grief, Leo couldn’t tell. “Why did this happen? Is it because Suzy hat
es the baby?”
Nora wrapped her arms around herself. “She doesn’t, Ralph. You should see how broken up she is. Motherhood is a complicated business. So is fatherhood, as I guess you know.”
“If she loved it, she wouldn’t have wanted to give it away,” he said.
“That’s not necessarily true. To her, giving a baby to the right parents seemed like an act of love. The miscarriage… She’s devastated. She needs your support. But if you’re going to blame her, it’s better that you stay away.”
He ducked his head. “I just wish I knew why this happened.”
Leo wanted the answer to a different question—why Nora had been avoiding his gaze since she entered the lounge. Was she just empathizing with Suzy, or was she holding something back?
Whatever it was, she didn’t intend to say it in front of Ralph. Instead, she straightened, shifting to full doctor mode. “Between 10 and 25 percent of all clinically recognized pregnancies—pregnancies doctors have confirmed—end in miscarriage. It’s far more common than people realize.”
“But why?” the boy pressed.
“We can’t always find a cause.” Strands of blond hair wisped around her face. “Often, something goes wrong very early, with the chromosomes or the cell division. That means the baby couldn’t have survived.”
He was crying openly. “He never had a chance?”
She handed him a tissue from a box set out on an end table and used another to dab her own eyes. “Probably not. Suzy didn’t do anything wrong, and neither did you. It wasn’t a matter of getting jostled or eating the wrong thing or thinking the wrong thoughts. The good news is that having a miscarriage doesn’t usually preclude the mom from having future healthy children.”
“As if she’d want to. With me, anyway.” Ralph blew his nose.
“I suspect she might, when she’s ready. Right now, she’s worried that you’ll never forgive her for losing the baby.”
“She is?” Ralph swallowed visibly. “She’d like to see me?”
A tremulous smile warmed Nora’s face. “She sent me out here to talk to you. She wants to see you, very much.”
“All right!” He jumped up. “Thank you, Dr. Kendall.” He pumped her arm and ran out of the lounge.
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