Embraced

by Tracy Wolff

  It was time—past time—that he became a father to his daughter. The fact that he broke out in a cold sweat every time he so much as thought about Rose was of no consequence whatsoever.

  And the fact that he hadn’t been able to hold her yesterday—in truth, had barely been able to look at her—didn’t matter, either. She was his responsibility and he would find a way to meet that, even if it killed him. He’d left Sarah and Rose on their own for too long.

  “Hey, Reece, you got a minute?” He looked up to find Matt Jenkins, his partner for the past eight years, leaning against the doorjamb of Reece’s office. With his faded jeans, tennis shoes and football jersey, Matt looked more like a college kid than an award-winning architect.

  “Yeah, sure.” Reece pushed aside the drawings he was working on, reached beneath the light table to turn it off.

  “No, leave it on,” Matt crossed the room in two long strides, his floppy red hair falling over one eye. “Is this the design for the Harbor account?”

  Reece ran a hand over his tired eyes. He hadn’t slept at all last night, his mind too full of his daughter, and Sarah, to allow him to drift into even the most uneasy of sleeps. He had no desire to discuss the intricacies of his newest building, not when all he really wanted was a bed and eight hours of sleep.

  “Yo, earth to Reece.”

  “What?” Reece lowered his hands in time to see Matt staring at him with concern.

  “Is this the Harbor account?”

  “Yeah, it’s coming together nicely.”

  Matt leaned over the light board. “How much do you have left to do?”

  “I’ve got four sets of plans complete—including the outside design. They approved that this morning, so right now I’m working on the drawings for electric and plumbing.”

  Matt whistled, low and long. “I can’t believe how fast this design has come together.”

  Reece snorted. “Yeah, well, when you’ve got no life it makes it easier to devote more time to work.”

  “That’s why I stopped by. You want to go grab a beer, watch the game?”

  “Game?”

  His partner shook his head, even as he gestured to the jersey he had on. “The Cowboys, man. They’re playing tonight.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Reece—”

  “Give it up, Matt.” His voice was harsher than he’d intended, but all the emotions and uncertainties of the past few days welled up inside of him. “You need to figure out that I’m okay with not having a life right now.”

  “That’s all going to change, though, isn’t it, man? You’re getting back on course, taking custody of your baby—”

  “I didn’t say I was taking custody of Rose.”

  Matt’s eyes narrowed in confusion. “I thought that’s what this whole work from home and cut down on the hours was supposed to be about?”

  “It is. Sort of. I mean…”

  “Hey, Reece, nobody blames you if you can’t deal yet. This whole thing was Vanessa’s idea, wasn’t it? You weren’t even sure you were ready for a baby when she was obsessing about it. And she’s gone now, so why should you have to take responsibility for a kid you never really wanted?”

  “Because she’s mine. Because I helped create her, knowingly and willingly, and I can’t walk away from that responsibility. I mean, look at Sarah. She agreed to the pregnancy with the understanding that as soon as the baby was born, she would be Vanessa’s and mine. Instead, Sarah’s been stuck caring for the baby for almost three months. Alone.”

  “That’s what I’m saying. Maybe there’s a reason for that. She’s already a mom—”

  “She’s struggling, Matt. Seriously struggling. Are you suggesting I abandon her? I’ve been down that road and it hasn’t worked out very well for either one of us.”

  “No, of course not. But why not think about adoption? She’s already got two kids to handle on her own, you don’t have a wife to take care of this baby. Maybe it’ll be the best thing for both of you.”

  “No!” Outrage tinted everything with a red haze. “Rose is mine. I’m not giving her up to some stranger to raise.”

  “Whoa, sorry.” Matt put his hands up, backed away. “I wasn’t trying to cause problems. I just thought, since you were so conflicted about this whole thing—you and Sarah both—maybe it would be better for the kid to, you know, go to a family with a mom and dad who really wanted her and could devote the necessary time to raising her. I had no idea you felt so strongly about her.”

  “I don’t. It’s—” Reece stopped talking at the knowing look Matt shot him.

  “No offense, bro. But for your sake and the sake of that little girl, I think you’d better figure out exactly what it is that you do feel—and what you want to do about it. You’re moving in with her mom. You can say it’s going to be totally platonic as often as you want, but you’ll be sharing a house. Sharing a baby. Sharing everything. There are bound to be some issues.”

  “What kind of issues?” Reece asked, determined to play dumb and not admit his best friend had verbalized his deepest fear—and the source of more guilt than he wanted to think about.

  Matt rolled his eyes, before shrugging into his prized Cowboys jacket. “Sexual issues, man. You’re living in a house with a beautiful woman—”

  “It’s not like that.” Surely that wasn’t admiration for Sarah in Matt’s voice?

  Matt eyed him silently before saying in a subdued voice, “Isn’t it?”

  Reece flushed, felt his ears begin to burn. “Of course not. I just want to take care of Rose—”

  “The two aren’t mutually exclusive, you know.”

  “Sarah doesn’t think of me like that. There’s no way—What?”

  “You said Sarah wasn’t interested. You never said anything about yourself.”

  “My wife just died, man.”

  “I know that.” Matt laid a bracing hand on his shoulder. “Which makes you doubly vulnerable right now—to Sarah and to Rose. Give a good, hard think about what you’re doing here.”

  “I’m doing what’s best for my daughter—and her mother.”

  “Yeah. But is it what’s also best for you? I just don’t want to see you get hurt. Or hurt Sarah.”

  Reece snorted. “Says the guy whose longest running relationship lasted all of five weeks.”

  Matt grinned, before heading for the door, “Which is why I know exactly what I’m talking about. So take my advice—” his expression turned serious “—and be careful.”

  * * *

  HOURS LATER, Reece was still thinking about his friend’s advice as he sat in his living room and half watched the Cowboys game Matt had been talking about. What did he want—besides helping Sarah out?

  Matt’s fears were groundless. Reece knew he and Sarah would never end up falling for each other. Despite the little sizzle he got whenever he saw her, Sarah was Vanessa’s best friend and completely off-limits to him. And he knew she felt the same way. Their only connection would be Rose. Somehow he had to make amends for forcing Sarah to be the baby’s sole caregiver.

  He took a swig of his lukewarm beer. Hell, maybe Matt was right about the adoption thing. Maybe Reece should talk to Sarah about giving up Rose. He had no idea how to raise a baby, and she already had her hands more than full with the boys and her business. Logically, it made sense.

  But everything inside of him rejected that course of action. She was Vanessa’s daughter. Maybe not biologically, but in spirit she had been Vanessa’s from the moment of her conception. Earlier, really.

  He tried to ignore the pain as he’d been doing these past months. But tonight it wouldn’t be denied. He reached behind him, picked up a picture of Van he had taken a few years ago. They’d been in Hawaii and had just finished windsurfing. She’d been tanned and happy and so beautiful he hadn’t been able to resist snapping the picture. He’d also been the one to frame it and set it on the sofa table when they’d moved into this house.

  He set the photo aside unable to bear l
ooking at it—at her. Doubling over in an effort to fight the agony, he lost his grip on the beer bottle and the glass shattered as soon as it hit the hardwood floor.

  Shattered, like his marriage to Vanessa. Destroyed, like him without his wife. How had he gotten here? He waited for the familiar—and blessed—numbness to set in, but it wouldn’t come. How had he gone from being on top of the world to having everything in his life turn to shit?

  It was ironic really. Would be funny if it wasn’t so terrible. His whole life he’d been afraid of failing, afraid of screwing up like his older brother had. His parents had spent years trying to get Brad on track, but nothing worked. So, instead of continuing to work with him, they’d written him off and turned all their hopes and dreams—all their attention—to Reece.

  And he had never let them down. Had been afraid of what his failures would do to them after all the drugs and suspensions and misery they’d lived through from his brother. To compensate, Reece had been the golden boy. Good student, good athlete who grew up to have a good career and a good marriage. Everything they’d asked of him he’d done. Anything to avoid being the subject of his father’s bitterness, of those angry, hurtful words.

  And where had that effort gotten him? Sitting alone in his living room, drowning his sorrows and trying to figure out which way was up. The hell of it was, he had zero motivation to even try to make sense of his life, his future. It had taken every reserve he had to do right by Sarah…and Rose. If he had his choice, he’d crawl away somewhere and never come out again.

  But he couldn’t do that. Not him, not Reece Sandler. His father’s most recent lecture echoed in his head. Dropping out of society wasn’t an option. Hiding wasn’t an option. Reece had to keep going. Keep moving forward. Things would get better. They always did.

  He cursed viciously. He had no idea how to make things better—not when he’d created such a colossal screw-up. With Vanessa, with Sarah, with Rose.

  Rose. Before he could block it, an image of his daughter’s little hands followed by images of her in Sarah’s arms flashed into his head. She was beautiful, perfect—an interesting combination of him and Sarah. Strange that he’d never considered what she would look like, had never imagined parts of himself or Sarah on this baby. Rose had always been Vanessa’s baby.

  But Vanessa was dead. Rose would never know her, would never hear the voice or see the face of the woman who had set in motion the plan for Rose’s very existence.

  It was that thought, more than any other, that made up his mind for him. He owed it to his wife. Things might have been rocky the last few months of Vanessa’s life—her unreasonable obsession with having a baby overshadowing all else—but that wasn’t Rose’s fault. Nor was it Sarah’s.

  As he bent to pick up the pieces of the shattered bottle, he knew for certain there would be no talk of adoption. He and Vanessa had made a commitment when they’d decided to have a child—to Sarah, to the baby, to themselves. And if he was afraid of screwing up at fatherhood, afraid of turning out like his old man, then he’d keep it to himself.

  He’d honor the commitment they had made. Even if it destroyed him.

  CHAPTER THREE

  “SO, YOU’RE REALLY GOING to let him be a part of Rose’s life?”

  Sarah glanced up from her computer to find her six-foot-six “little” brother looming in her office doorway. “I have a doorbell, you know.”

  He held up his key ring. “And I have a key. That means I don’t have to knock.”

  “That key is for emergencies only.”

  Tad laughed. “In this house, that’s almost every day.”

  Too true. Sarah rubbed the back of her neck as she fought off a tension headache. Every day there was some new and exciting—or not-so-exciting—crisis to deal with. Hopefully Reece’s presence would help change that, but she wasn’t holding her breath. Part of her feared she was adding one more person to the house that would expect her to take care of him.

  “So, are you?” Tad snatched a cookie off the plate she kept near her desk for Justin and Johnny, and downed it in two clean bites.

  “Am I what?” Sarah answered absently, calculating all the things she still had to do before the day was over. She had a Web site to finish and debug, as she’d promised it to her client by the end of the week. The boys needed new shoes and she had to get to the grocery store—Rose was almost out of formula and the pantry was bare.

  “Are you really going to let that jackass have anything to do with baby Rose?”

  The virulence in her brother’s tone snagged her attention like nothing else could have. “Reece is not a jackass.”

  “You could have fooled me. Any guy who leaves the mother of his child high and dry like he did you, ain’t no prize.”

  “It’s not like how you make it sound.”

  “No.” Tad crowded closer, until he was in her face, his blue eyes blazing with a fury uncommon for her easygoing brother. “It’s a hell of a lot worse than I made it sound and we both know it. I can’t believe you’re letting him into your lives after everything he’s done.”

  Her headache ratcheted up a couple notches. She didn’t need this, not now and not from Tad. She knew he was looking out for her—from childhood, he’d been the only constant in her life. But just because he’d stuck by her—just because they’d stuck by each other—didn’t mean he got a major vote in how she lived her life now.

  Besides, she was uncertain enough about this arrangement.

  “It’s not too late to tell him you changed your mind, Sarah. Hell, I’ll tell him.”

  His gleeful tone sent her over the edge. “Do you have a better idea? Because if you do, then I’m all ears.” Whoa. Judging from the expression on Tad’s face, that came out way too harsh. Taking a deep breath, she released it slowly as she rubbed her weary eyes. “Look, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap.”

  “No, you’re right. This whole situation is a mess and you’re trying to make the best of it.” His tone was stiff, the camaraderie of a few minutes before gone.

  “I wouldn’t exactly call Rose a situation—or a mess.” She wanted to soothe her brother’s ruffled feathers, to make everything okay again, but she was nearly suffocating under the weight of everything she had to juggle, including her own fear and hurt.

  “I didn’t mean that, sis. I just meant—” He gestured as if trying to physically get the words out, his jerky movements indicating how on edge he was.

  One of them had to make the first move to bridge this rift, so she pushed away from her desk and crossed to where Tad was half sitting, half lounging on her futon. She crouched beside him, and said, “I know you think I got a raw deal.”

  “I don’t think. I know you—”

  “And yes, Reece reacted badly. I’m not denying that. But he lost Vanessa. How would you feel if something happened to Pam?”

  Tad actually winced at the mere suggestion of losing his wife.

  “Exactly. So, after screaming at him like a crazy woman, I’m trying to cut him some slack.”

  She straightened and crossed to the door. “I got Rose out of the deal, and I wouldn’t trade her for anything. So the fact that Reece wants to change his life to fit with mine and the kids instead of ripping Rose away from us is a big plus in my mind.”

  “Yeah, but how do you know he isn’t going to bolt at the first sign of trouble?” Tad demanded as he followed her to the kitchen.

  Wasn’t that the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question? And it was a fair question. After all, their father had pulled the exact same vanishing act on their mother when Sarah and Tad were young. They’d lived through their mother’s nervous breakdown and subsequent emotional abandonment.

  The truth was she didn’t know that Reece was going to stick around. The one-two combination of what Mike had done to her when the boys were born and Reece’s own MIA behavior reinforced the lessons from her parents. A part of her doubted Reece would be around for long.

  Despite his behavior, she couldn’t deny h
im this chance to bond with his daughter. He deserved that much. And as long as Sarah didn’t get her hopes up, as long as she didn’t start to count on him or expect him to be there for her, as long as she didn’t let the boys get too close to him, then maybe the three of them could emerge from this with their hearts intact.

  She said as much to Tad, then smiled as his eyes widened in surprise.

  “You really aren’t going into this blindly, are you?”

  “Are you kidding me? Besides my very disastrous marriage to Mike, what have I ever gone into blindly?”

  Her brother smirked. “Oh, I don’t know. Surrogate motherhood?”

  “That’s different. That was for Vanessa.”

  “Yet you’re still screwed.”

  “I am not screwed! I—”

  “Okay, okay.” He held his hands up in surrender. “I give up.” He glanced at his watch. “I need to head home. I promised Pam I’d make dinner tonight and I’ve got to stop at the store and figure out what to make.”

  He leaned down and kissed the top of her head. “I’m not trying to be a jerk, you know. I don’t want to see you get hurt again.”

  That was so Tad. He tormented her and antagonized her, but supported her and looked out for her all the while. How had she gotten so lucky? “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Later, bro. Hey,” she called as he walked out. “Fix that chicken breast thing with the spinach. You know Pam loves it.”

  A two-fingered salute was her only answer as Tad exited the side gate.

  Sarah headed for the high cabinet above the stove where she kept her medicine. She shook out two Tylenol and swallowed them with a grimace. If she was going to get through this day, she needed all the help she could get.

  No sooner had she settled herself in front of the computer to finish her work than the baby monitor on the corner of her desk went crazy.

  Rose was awake.