In Protective Custody

by Beth Cornelison

  “I’m not going anywhere.” Grinning, Emily nestled into her pillow as if preparing for a bedtime story. “So spill it, brother. You have something going with her, don’t you?”

  “Had. It’s over, and I’d rather not talk about it.”

  Emily scowled. “Over? Why?”

  “Drop it, Em.”

  “Do you love her?”

  “Does it matter if I do?” Max rose from his chair with an impatient huff to pace. “I loved Jennifer, but I couldn’t give her the family she wanted. I won’t make the same mistakes with Laura that I did with Jenn.”

  Emily’s gaze followed him back and forth across the room as he paced. “But you already are! You’re giving up! You love her, but you’re quitting. Is that what you teach your Pee Wee team? When it gets too hard or hurts too much, then quit?”

  “Of course not! It’s not the same—”

  “There were lots of times these past two weeks when I wanted to give up, Max. I hurt. I was weak. I was scared. But I love you. Love my son. So I fought. That’s what you have to do if you love Laura, Max. It may be hard, and it may hurt sometimes. But you can’t quit.”

  He dragged a hand down his face and groaned. “Emily…”

  Emily aimed a finger at him. “No quitters on my team either, Max. Find her and tell her how you feel. Don’t you owe her that much?”

  The toddler playroom at Happy Camper Day Care Center teemed with enough droopy-diapered rug rats to give the average bachelor a case of hives.

  The first thing that Max noticed when he opened the door to the playroom was the volume. The high-pitched squeals of the energetic tykes, the clatter of plastic tea sets and crash of tumbling block towers jangled his already taut nerves.

  Yet in the middle of the chaos and noise, Laura sat with the serenity of a butterfly, rolling out blue clay with a table full of children.

  He stood and simply watched her for a moment, gathering his thoughts, wondering what he could possibly say to make her understand the tough choices he’d made. Remorse pinched his chest.

  Laura smiled at a little girl beside her and tousled the child’s hair. Max’s stomach somersaulted. Seeing Laura’s face brighten when she looked at the child was all the reminder he needed of what he couldn’t give her and why he had to let her go.

  Reaching in his pocket, he wrapped his fingers around her car keys, but before he could call to her, her gaze snapped up. As if she sensed his presence.

  Her easy smile faded, replaced by surprise. Despite the shouts and squeals of the children clambering about the room in frenzied activity, the world narrowed to two people.

  He cleared his throat and drew her keys out of his pocket, held them out to her. “I brought you your car. The bullet holes are all fixed up. Good as new.”

  She nodded. “Thanks.” Then tossing her curls over one shoulder she added, “I hope you told them to take care of that funny noise under the hood.”

  He puckered his brow. “What noise? I drove it home from the mountains and never heard—”

  A sly grin tugged the corner of her mouth…and he remembered. A fraction of the tension inside him uncoiled.

  “Smarty-pants.” He held her gaze. “Can we go somewhere quieter to talk?”

  Laura lifted her chin and squared her shoulders, a fiery determination blazing to life in her eyes. “Yes. We definitely need to talk.”

  As she stood from the child-sized table, she rubbed her hands together to roll the clay off her fingers. “We can use the director’s office.”

  He stood back to let her pass and caught a whiff of strawberry shampoo. The sweet scent slammed into him, conjured images of the hours they’d spent tangled together under the sheets, the silky feel of her curls slipping through his fingers.

  “Susan, can you watch the toddlers while I speak to Mr. Caldwell, please?” she called to her coworker as she led him down a short hall decorated with cartoon characters and smiling suns. Stepping into the private office, she closed the door to the children’s noise.

  He rubbed his sweaty palms on his slacks, drew a deep breath. God, he hated this. “Laura—”

  “How’s Elmer?”

  The baby. Of course, she’d want to know about the baby first. He gave her a quick half grin. “Trey.”

  She tipped her head and frowned. “Hmm?”

  “Emily named him Trey. Maxwell Trey. After me.”

  Warmth filled her face, and a smile blossomed on her lips. “I know that means a lot to you.”

  He cleared his throat. “Uh, yeah…it was nice of her.” He gritted his teeth, hating the stilted, formal words that came out of his mouth.

  Hell, he’d made love to this woman, spent days learning every nuance of her touch, and now he was talking to her as if they were strangers. He didn’t want small talk. He didn’t want any talk. He wanted to press her up against the wall and lose himself in her kiss. Forget the speech he’d prepared. Forget everything but the warmth of her in his arms.

  “And Emily?” Laura asked. “Is she better?”

  He gave her a jerky nod. “She’ll come home today.”

  Her smile brightened. “Wonderful. I’m so glad.”

  “How do you feel?” He glanced at her right side, even though any evidence of her injury was well hidden under her bulky sweater. “When did you get back?”

  “Thursday. And I have to move slowly. I still hurt, but…not as bad as I did last week…when I woke to find that you’d left without a word to me.”

  Her bluntness landed a sucker punch in his gut. But he knew he deserved it. Guilt sat in his stomach like a knot, as if he’d swallowed a lump of the clay she’d been molding with the kids.

  “That’s what I came to explain.” He reached for her, but she stepped back, straightening her spine.

  “I know I hurt you. I’m sorry.”

  “Go on.” She arched an eyebrow and crossed her arms over her chest. She wore an expression of cool confidence and satisfaction that baffled him. Her manner and appearance had changed dramatically since he’d first met her, and he puzzled over the change in her.

  “I couldn’t walk away from this without letting you know how I truly felt.” He saw the first flicker of apprehension in her eyes and rushed on before he lost his nerve. “I fell in love with you up on that mountain. Deeply in love.”

  “Max, I—”

  “I love you, Laura, but I—”

  “But?” Her arms dropped to her sides, her hands balled into fists. She narrowed a hard, challenging gaze on him and scoffed. “You can’t say ‘I love you’ and ‘but’ in the same sentence.”

  He groaned. “Laura, listen to me….”

  “No! You listen to me, hotshot.” She jabbed him in the chest with her finger. “I’ve heard all the buts in my life that I can take. ‘I’m sorry, but your mother died last night.’ ‘I don’t want you to go, but Mr. Powell needs all my attention now.’” She aimed a finger at his nose. “If you love me, then you love me. Period.”

  Guilt twisted in his chest.

  “But I can’t give you the future…the family and children you deserve.” He tried to take her in his arms and soothe her, but she raised her arms and shook loose.

  “No buts!”

  Hell, why did she have to make this so difficult? But then when had anything, other than falling under her spell, ever been easy with Laura?

  “Please, try to understand. It’s not what I want, but—”

  “But nothing!” she shouted, stubborn determination setting her face, tensing her body. “When I was a child, I had no choice but to suffer through the changes, being ripped from one home and shuffled off to another. I had to live with the shattered bonds and torn relationships inflicted on me. I was defenseless. But I’m an adult now, and I won’t lose the man I love without a fight.”

  “I know this is hard for you. It’s hard for me, too. Damn hard.” His voice sounded hoarse. “But you know I can’t give you children. And I know how empty your life would be without them. You need a famil
y. You deserve a family. I can’t give you that. I love you enough to let you go. To find a man who can put babies in you.”

  Laura shook her head, stirring her strawberry scent. “That’s crazy.”

  “Is it? I watched my marriage to Jennifer crumble because I couldn’t give her what her heart desired, what she had every right to have. I couldn’t make her happy. Her love turned to resentment and—”

  She pressed her hand to his mouth and leaned into him. “I’m not Jennifer.”

  “I know that.”

  Her blue-green eyes lifted and pinned him with a steady gaze. “I won’t let you go. I won’t let you throw our love away as though it means nothing.”

  “What about children, Laura? We can’t conceive because of me, my low sperm count. Can you honestly say that you’ll be happy never having a baby of your own?”

  “Yes. Because I know, firsthand, that there are thousands of children waiting in foster homes for people like you and me to give them a family. I know, firsthand, that I can love another woman’s baby as well as my own flesh and blood. And I know you can, too. I saw it in your eyes when you looked at Elmer. We can adopt.”

  Max sucked in a sharp breath and stepped back, staring at her, feeling slightly dazed.

  Adoption. Jennifer had rejected the option from the start, selfishly rejecting the idea of raising someone else’s child. Why hadn’t he known Laura would embrace the idea?

  He drew a hand down his cheek, scratched his chin and let the idea percolate in his brain. “Are you sure?”

  Laura closed the distance between them and took his hands in hers. “Positive. Max, I need you in my life. I don’t want to be alone any more. I found my home when I met you. I want to build a family with you.”

  He raised one of her hands to kiss it, but stopped with it inches from his lips. He pulled back to look at her fingers more closely. Blue clay lined her fingernails.

  She tried to pull her hands back, blushing.

  But he tightened his grip and grinned. Then his smile bloomed to a full laugh. “Only you could make blue clay look sexy.”

  He kissed her palms then pulled her arms around his neck and wrapped her in a hug. “Come home with me, sweetheart. I need you in my life, too.”

  “Do you mean it? You really want me?” Tears filled her eyes, and a childlike wistfulness tinged her voice.

  He pulled her hips more fully against him. “Oh, yes. I want you, sweetheart. For always.” He dropped to one knee. “Laura Dalton, would you do me the honor of becoming my wife and—”

  “Yes!” she breathed happily.

  He held up a finger. “I’m not finished. And will you make a home with me—”

  “Yes!”

  He shook his finger. “And will you help me make a family for, say, two or three children who need a home?”

  “Five.”

  “Five?” he gasped.

  “Or six.”

  He laughed and pulled her into his arms. “We’ll start our own Pee Wee football team.”

  “Yes,” she whispered and kissed him soundly on the lips.

  Epilogue

  Max, like the rest of the firefighters at the station, was exhausted. Rising in the night to feed a newborn had nothing on the night he’d just had. He’d gotten no more than two hours of sleep. The department had been called out six times before dawn, and he still smelled like smoke and sweat from his last call.

  Still, when Laura appeared at the door to the firemen’s living quarters and waved him over, Max perked a bit. The mornings he was on duty at the station, she made a habit of stopping on her way to the day care to say hello and to give him a good-morning kiss.

  This morning, she punched his shoulder.

  “Ow! What was that for?” Max rubbed the sore spot and frowned at his fiancée.

  “We can’t get married in June.” She scowled at him. “Do you know how long I’ve dreamed of a June wedding?”

  “Why can’t we? Is there a conflict at the church?”

  “No. The church has us on the calendar. The problem is you!” She stabbed a finger in his chest.

  “Me? What did I do?”

  “You got me pregnant. By June I’ll be too fat to fit in my wedding dress. I don’t want to get married looking like a blimp.”

  Max shook his head as if to clear it. “Whoa! Back up. Run that part about me getting you pregnant by me again.”

  A spark lit her blue-green eyes, and she tugged her lips in a crooked grin. “You heard me, hotshot. I’m pregnant.”

  Max struggled for a breath, disbelief and hope warring inside him. “That’s impossible. I have—”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know. You have a low sperm coun—”

  He slapped a hand over her mouth. “A little louder, huh? I don’t think the whole station heard you.”

  He pulled her into the fire marshall’s tiny office, where large glass windows looked out to the main living quarters for the firemen. Only then did he take his hand from her mouth.

  “That’s what I told my doctor. But she said, low sperm doesn’t mean no sperm.” Laura flipped her hair over her shoulder and tipped her head. “And there was your three-year abstinence to build up your reserves, so to speak.”

  Max drew a slow breath. “I know that, but do you have any idea the odds that my doctor gave me that I’d ever…”

  “Then we beat the odds, Max.” She stepped close and pressed her body against his. “Because at least one of your little guys had your determination and results-orientation. That one little guy got the job done. He didn’t quit till he crossed the goal line.”

  “You’re really pregnant? You’re gonna have my baby?” He tried to wrap his brain around the concept. He was stunned.

  Laura shot her arms up, grinning broadly. “Touchdown!”

  An incredible sense of fulfillment swelled inside him until his chest hurt. He threw his own arms in the air and whooped loud enough for the whole fire station to hear. He grabbed Laura and lifted her in a jubilant hug. “Oh, God, but I love you.”

  “We’ll still adopt, though, right?” she asked.

  “Of course. Gotta build that football team.”

  He smiled then captured her lips for a soul-deep kiss. Catcalls and wolf whistles filtered in from the firefighters in the next room.

  Laura broke the kiss and gave him a serious look. “So we move the wedding up to Christmas?”

  “Whatever your heart desires, sweetheart. You’ve already made me the happiest man in the world.”

  “Done. Christmas it is. Oh, and one more thing…” She quirked an eyebrow.

  “Anything.”

  “I name the baby. My children will not bear the names of cartoon characters.”

  Max laughed and hugged her tightly. “You’ve got a deal.”

  ISBN: 978-1-4268-6314-1

  IN PROTECTIVE CUSTODY

  Copyright © 2006 by Beth Cornelison

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Silhouette Books, 233 Broadway, New York, NY 10279 U.S.A.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

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