Mommy Heiress (Accidental Dads #2)

by Linda Randall Wisdom

  “You heard me, lover boy. That little blonde has your tail wagging, and if anyone should know what to do about it, you should.” She grinned.

  “Before or after the townspeople lynch her?”

  Ella shook her head. “Guess who I saw go into the cottage about an hour ago?” She purposely waited.

  Ben sighed. “I hate guessing games.”

  “Too bad.”

  He dropped his pen on his desk. There would be no peace until Ella had her say. “Fine, I give up. Who?”

  “Thalia.”

  Ben jumped to his feet. “And you didn’t try to stop her?”

  “She didn’t look as if she was going to commit murder but I stayed by the window just in case,” she told him, hot on his heels as she followed him to the door.

  “I can’t believe this,” he muttered, charging out the back door and almost running to the cottage. Without bothering to knock he ran in.

  “Are you sure it isn’t too much?” Thalia could be heard asking in a hesitant voice.

  “Are you kidding? You look gorgeous! I’m talking very elegant,” Cori assured.

  Both women were walking into the living room when Ben ran in, with Ella right behind him.

  “I don’t believe it,” Ella said in an awed tone as she stared at Cori’s companion.

  “You and me both,” Ben muttered, his mouth agape.

  Thalia Roberts stood in front of them—a completely transformed woman.

  Thalia’s skin seemed to glow, her eyes had been discreetly and expertly made up to show them off as her best asset and her lips were colored a lovely soft red. Her hair was wrapped in a black silk turban with what looked like a diamond clip at the center and drop earrings sparkled with the same expensive lights. She wore a black slip dress that was perfect on her gangly frame, a lacy bolero jacket and high-heeled pumps.

  “Doesn’t Thalia look wonderful?” Cori practically beamed. “We were real lucky we wear the same size shoe.”

  Thalia literally glowed. “She called me and asked if I would come by. She said she wanted to make up for what happened to my hair.” Her fingers fluttered near the turban. “Well, I wasn’t too sure I wanted to see her again, but she sounded so sorry for what she did and Regina couldn’t do anything. When I came over, Cori suggested I wear this turban. She said it’s the rage in Hollywood.”

  Ben stepped forward and picked up Thalia’s hand. “Darlin’, if Rawley doesn’t propose to you, I will,” he drawled, pressing his lips against her hand.

  “Wow,” Thalia said breathlessly, wide-eyed at the gesture. She turned back to Cori. “I really want to thank you. Even if everybody’s wrong and Rawley doesn’t propose, I know tonight I do look pretty.”

  Cori hugged her. “Pretty?” she argued. “You look gorgeous and you remember everything I told you!” She gently pushed her out the door. “And don’t run in those heels unless you want to break something!”

  She closed the door and turned back to her unexpected visitors. “May I be blunt and ask why you’re here?”

  “I wanted to make sure Thalia wasn’t turning your hair orange,” Ben replied.

  Her lower lip quivered, then she quickly shored herself up with a high-voltage smile. “I thought about what happened and how she was looking forward to tonight. I hoped I could do something and was glad she allowed me to.”

  “If I thought I could come out looking so good, I’d have you take a crack at me,” Ella interjected.

  Cori’s smile suddenly dimmed. “If you’ll excuse me—” She quickly bolted to the rear of the house.

  There was no mistaking she was in the bathroom and what was going on.

  “I bet she didn’t eat a thing all day,” Ella clucked, hurrying into the bathroom to be of assistance.

  “I hope I don’t have the flu,” Cori fretted, allowing Ella to help her onto a chair. “I hate being sick, and this throwing up at the toss of a hat isn’t all that fun.”

  “Maybe I should look you over,” Ben offered. “You did faint the other day.”

  “I’m fine,” she told him, only to grimace and bolt for the bathroom again.

  Something was niggling the back of Ben’s mind and, for once, he hoped he was wrong.

  “Bring her to the clinic,” he instructed Ella. “I’m examining her whether she likes it or not.”

  “Something tells me she won’t.”

  By the time Ella ushered a protesting Cori into the examination room, Ben was ready for her.

  “Why don’t you get undressed? I want to give you an exam,” he told her, handing her a gown and walking out of the room, closing the door behind him.

  “Exam?” She stared at the nurse. “What kind of exam?”

  “Don’t worry,” she soothed, reaching for the gown. “Doc’s the best around. He just wants to make sure you don’t have a nasty stomach virus.”

  Cori groaned. “No wonder they warn you to always wear clean underwear.” She started to unbutton her vest. “Although, I do wish doctors would come up with more attractive gowns.”

  For the next ten minutes, Cori was alternately stunned, shocked and mortified as she lay on the examination table and answered Ben’s intimate questions. Considering she was attracted to him, she found them embarrassing and difficult to answer.

  “You know more about me than most men I’ve dated,” she quipped, although the joke fell flat.

  Ben stood and pulled off the latex gloves. The expression on his face was wry as he faced Cori. “Why don’t you get dressed and we’ll talk in my office.”

  “What’s wrong?” She tried to grab his sleeve and almost fell off the table when she missed.

  “In my office.”

  “In my office,” she mocked, pulling on clothes with shaky fingers. “Doctors are the same everywhere. They have to do everything their way.”

  By the time she had dressed and then entered his office, she was convinced she was dying from a rare disease.

  “All right, just give it to me straight,” she ordered. “It’s a tumor, right? Or some exotic parasite is tunneling its way through my body. Or something equally gruesome. I’m not going to give birth to one of those creatures they had in Alien, am I?”

  Ben started to smile at her questions, then sobered. “Not exactly.”

  “Then what?”

  “All right, I’ll give it to you straight. I’d say you’re about ten weeks’ pregnant.”

  If Cori hadn’t been sitting down, she would have fallen to the floor.

  “No, I’m not,” she quickly denied, even as the truth wormed its way into her mind. “I can’t be. I’m on the pill and I believe in totally safe sex. So you see, Dr. Charm, you’re wrong.”

  He shrugged. “Admittedly, we can run a test, but it will show up positive.”

  She shook her head. “No, I am not pregnant. Because if I was pregnant that would mean Rufus is the father and I will not allow him to be the father of my baby!” Her voice rose in agitation. “He’s an idiot! He was a major mistake in my life! I don’t want to think of him as a father! No baby should be born with his lack of common sense!” She jumped to her feet and paced back and forth.

  Ben eyed her closely. While she was upset she wasn’t hysterical. Not yet, at least. He had an idea it hadn’t truly sunk in yet.

  Odd, he hadn’t bothered to think that she probably had a lover back in L.A. Although it sounded as if the man were well and truly out of her life. All he had to do was wait and see what she would do now. Still, for a man who hadn’t thought much about a family, the idea of this little blond vixen pregnant wasn’t all that bad.

  Cori turned on him with blazing eyes and outstretched arms. “Don’t you have anything to say?”

  He settled back in his chair. This, he could handle. “After your reaction, I figured you didn’t want to hear anything more from me.”

  “I can’t be a mother! I don’t know anything about babies.” She waved her hands in the air around her as she resumed her frenzied pacing.

  “D
on’t worry, it will come to you.” He prayed she wasn’t thinking of alternatives.

  Cori dropped into the chair and stared at Ben. A strange calm seemed to overtake her as the truth sank in with the impact of an atomic bomb. “Then I hope the baby comes with a complete set of instructions or we’re both in a lot of trouble.”

  Chapter Four

  Dr. Benjamin Cooper’s Clinic

  “Well, Benjamin, what do you intend to do for that little girl?” Ella advanced on Ben with the force of a Sherman tank.

  Ben was still reeling from Cori’s erratic reaction and her sudden departure. She had simply announced she needed to think things over and left. Ben looked up with a pained expression he was rapidly coming to think of as a permanent fixture on his face.

  “I didn’t think I needed to do anything for Thalia. She looked fine to me and I bet Rawley’ll be knocked on his butt when he sees her.”

  She shot him a threatening look. “You know very well I’m talking about little Cori.”

  “‘Little Cori,’” he repeated. “Isn’t she the person you almost considered a jinx to the entire town? Someone you thought would bring us down? A flighty twit, a real airhead?”

  Ella was horrified by his implication. “Benjamin, I can’t believe you said such a thing! That little girl is going to have a baby. It’s clear she doesn’t intend to tell the father, and it doesn’t sound like she can expect her daddy to stand by her. She needs emotional support.”

  Ben sat back, eyeing his nurse with a speculative gaze. “I didn’t expect to hear all that from you, Ella. After all, she’s not a member of this town.”

  She drew herself up. “We are a town of God-fearing folk who were put on this earth to help those in need. I’d say Cori is most definitely in need of our help.”

  He laced his fingers behind his head, looking very comfortable as he gazed at his nurse. “Do you realize that in the space of two days she’s ticked off three-quarters of the population and almost destroyed two businesses? Considering her track record, I don’t think they’d be all that eager to help her out.”

  “They don’t hold grudges. Well, maybe Elliott will,” she amended her statement, “but he’ll come around. I’ll make sure he does.”

  “God help Elliott.” Ben looked down at the pad of paper he had been doodling on while he first talked to Ella. Tiny pictures of pudgy babies smiled up at him.

  He had already delivered a great many babies in his career. Even had a few named after him. So why should the knowledge of Cori’s pregnancy affect him so? A woman he was attracted to; a woman he had only known for a few days; a woman who was driving him nuts. And the baby wasn’t even his.

  “You look like something even the cat wouldn’t drag in. You haven’t had a decent night’s sleep for the past month. Why don’t you just head on home and get some rest,” she suggested. “By morning, you’ll be refreshed and come up with an idea to help her.”

  He knew she was right. He felt like hell.

  “I should check on Cori,” he argued. “She hasn’t been taking care of herself and she had quite a shock today.” He could still see her stunned reaction as his diagnosis sunk in. “It’s bad enough she’s stranded a good fifteen hundred miles from home, but for her to find out she’s pregnant…” Not to mention he had kissed her, only to discover he wanted to do it again.

  “I bet the guy seduced her. Those Hollywood types do that kind of thing, you know.” Ella clucked, shaking her head. She patted her hair, but not one strand from her French twist had dared stray. “I think what she needs right now is a mother figure, not a man who’s been looking at her as if she’s a rich dessert and he’s still hungry after a full meal.”

  Ben looked at Ella as if he had never seen the woman before. First she wanted him to do something about Cori, then she wanted him to keep his distance. And now what did the woman want? “What did you just say?”

  “You heard me. You’re showing too much interest in that girl. While you should be in here treating your patients, you’ve been on the phone trying to find her a job. Then going out and interfering when she had trouble.”

  “Wait a minute. You’re the one who wanted me to go over to Regina’s! You’re the one who thinks I can solve all of Cori’s problems. You’re the one who…” He stood and shrugged off his lab coat. “Okay, enough, Ella. I already have one mother who lately has been lamenting the fact that her only boy and husband’s namesake doesn’t have a wife or any babies. Maybe if I turn Cori over to Mama, she’ll get so involved with Cori she’ll leave me alone.”

  “Or—” Ella ambled toward the door “—she’ll decide Cori needs a husband. And who better than you?” She tossed her verbal bomb back to him as she left.

  Ben looked at up at the ceiling for divine help. “What did I do to deserve this?” he demanded to know.

  Unfortunately, no answer was forthcoming.

  *

  CORI THOUGHT ABOUT fixing herself another bowl of soup even if it meant sandblasting the burned pan.

  She stood at the sink, using a steel-wool pad on the burned crust. In between scrubs, she alternately sniffled and mumbled to herself.

  “I can’t believe that one time with Rufus ended up this way,” she muttered, her movements becoming more savage the longer she thought about her condition and how she got that way. “He was one of the biggest mistakes I’ve made in my life. So how come one of his lousy sperm manages to break through and swim upstream?”

  “The school’s science teacher has a great video on the subject. I’m sure I could borrow it for you, so you could find out exactly how it happened.”

  She spun around, the pad she still held sending droplets of water flying. “How did you get in?” She gasped, pressing one hand against her chest.

  “The door was unlocked.”

  Ben, looking about as sexy as a man could get, was standing in the doorway, leaning against the jamb, his arms crossed in front of him. His faded jeans molded to his muscular thighs with a lover’s ease and the faded denim over the fly unerringly drew Cori’s gaze.

  “So what was this Rufus like?” he asked. “Other than not having any common sense and having strong sperm, that is. Not to mention getting you pregnant that one less than memorable time.”

  Cori could feel her face burning with embarrassment. She was positive her color was a bright tomato red. She had never thought of it as a good color for her.

  “Look, you’ve seen parts of my body even I haven’t seen. You’ve asked me intimate questions I hated answering.” She tossed the scrubbing pad into the sink. “And you expect me to stand here and tell all? I don’t think so.”

  Ben straightened up and walked over to the sink. It was admirable he held back his grin when he saw the pan and brown suds.

  “Having a problem?” he asked with an amicable nonchalance. He tsked at her less than polite reply. “You know, sometimes all you need is a little muscle.” He rolled up his shirtsleeves and plucked the scrubber out of the sink.

  Cori had no choice but to stand back and watch Ben apply said muscle and soon had the pan sparkling clean.

  “It was problems like this that had me eating more often at Myrna’s,” he explained, rinsing out the scrubbing pad and pan. “In fact, how about some dinner?”

  A ghost of a smile flitted across her lips. “Trying to feed me again?”

  He looked her over with a clinical eye. “I’d say you’re a good fifteen pounds underweight and now you have someone else to look out for.”

  Cori flinched. “Sorry, it’s still pretty new to me.” She looked off in the distance. “I don’t know a lot about small towns, but after the past couple of days I can see that the residents love to talk about friends and neighbors. Not necessarily maliciously, but just about everything. It’s as if they feel gossip is better than daytime television. If we show up at the restaurant again, people will start to talk and I can’t imagine that dining with an unwed mother from California would be good for your image.”

  “Cor
i, I’m not eighty and I don’t think anyone will throw stones at you,” he said gently. “Especially after they hear what you did for Thalia.”

  She grimaced. “I made her promise not to say anything.”

  “For Thalia, that’s easier said than done since she has one of the biggest mouths in town. Not to mention Ella, who’s on your side and will now let anyone who will listen know that. Now—” he rubbed his hands together briskly “—why don’t you do whatever you feel you need to do before going out in public and we’ll head over to Myrna’s for some of Ralph’s chili. I can guarantee you’ll find it better than anything you’d find in Texas.”

  Cori couldn’t argue she didn’t want to spend time with Ben.

  “Why are you willing to do all this for me?” she questioned him. The cottage, the jobs, upholding her reputation. It seemed she got more from a stranger than she did her own family.

  Ben shrugged. “I guess I’m just a sucker for a blue-eyed blonde.”

  She didn’t believe his flippant answer, but had an idea she’d never hear the truth from him.

  “Why is it called Myrna’s if the owner is Ralph?” Instead she asked the question that had bothered her from the beginning.

  “Because Myrna was Ralph’s mother and after her death he decided the name should stay. She was the one who opened the place and gave the people not just a place for a meal but for company. We have a lot of retirees in the area. The men like to get out of the house and out from under their wives’ feet. Myrna’s offers that. They usually take up a couple rear booths where they can have their coffee in peace and figure out how to change the country.”

  “You’re right, a nice idea.” She walked out of the kitchen and stopped in the bathroom long enough to make sure her hair wasn’t too mussed. She fluffed it up and added a quick spritz of her favorite perfume.

  As she applied her lipstick, she suddenly recalled Ben’s mouth on hers. A wave of heat swept through her body, leaving her weak at the knees.

  What was wrong with her? She had been kissed before. Kissed by men who viewed lovemaking as an art and kissing as a part of that art. Not that it meant she allowed them to kiss their way into her bed. Just that they knew what they were doing. So what was so potent about Ben’s kiss?