Nine Months

by Beverly Barton

  “Hello?”

  “Sorry to wake you,” Greg Addison said.

  “Mr. Addison?”

  “Yes, Paige, it’s me. I know this is a godawful hour to wake a person, but Jared insisted I get in touch with you immediately.”

  “Jared? Is something wrong?” Paige sat up in bed, bracing her back against the headboard.

  “Jared had a skiing accident yesterday afternoon,” Greg said. “He’s all right. Just a badly sprained ankle. He’ll have to stay off it for a few weeks.”

  “Please tell him…” Paige paused momentarily. Tell him what? Tell him that she was sorry he hadn’t broken his damn fool neck? Tell him that he deserved to be in pain since she’d spent the entire weekend in misery imagining him with another woman? “Tell him I hope he gets better soon.”

  “In typical Jared fashion, he’s being a royal pain in the butt about this.” Greg chuckled. “They released him from the hospital around midnight and he flew straight back to Grand Springs and called me to come to the airport and drive him up here to his place on Eagle Ridge.”

  “I don’t suppose Jared will come into the office today, will he?” Paige asked.

  “I was getting around to that,” Greg said. “Jared insisted I call you so you can get an early start. The doctor doesn’t want him putting any weight on his ankle for a while, so he’s going to be working at home for at least a week. He wants you to come out here this morning.”

  “Oh. I see.” She didn’t want to spend the day alone with Jared in his home. It would have been difficult enough seeing him at the office, wondering every time she looked at him if he’d spent the weekend with another woman. But to be alone with him? No, she couldn’t do it. But she had to. It was her job. “I understand. Tell Jar—Mr. Montgomery that I’ll be there by eight. But I’ll need directions.”

  “No need for directions,” Greg told her. “I’ve been instructed to come get you and deliver you personally to the great man’s door.”

  “It seems he’s thought of everything,” Paige said. “I’ll be ready by seven, Mr. Addison.”

  * * *

  Snow covered the mountaintops, their sharp peaks piercing the blue sky. The aspens and cottonwoods stood tall, proud and barren, like emancipated sentinels guarding the verdurous evergreens. A heavy frost coated the land. The farther they drove up the mountainside, the denser the early morning fog and more concentrated the fine mist.

  Greg whipped his Explorer into the circular gravel drive in front of Jared’s enormous three-level log home. Perched on a sloping hillside, surrounded by towering ponderosa pines, the wood-and-glass structure blended with the rugged, north central Colorado terrain. The glass face of the A-frame core of the sprawling cabin reflected the frost-tipped trees as they shivered in the cold November wind.

  “What do you think of the place?” Greg asked. “Impressive, huh? Jared doesn’t do anything by half measures. Nearly five thousand square feet of house and over fifty acres, all for a single man living alone.”

  “It’s fabulous.” Paige surveyed the massive structure as she opened the door and got out of the Explorer. This was the house Jared had offered to give her?

  Wooden stairs led upward to the second level, joining the first tier of decks that spiraled around and upward like a garland on a Christmas tree.

  “The front door’s straight up those stairs.” Stepping outside, Greg pointed toward the double glass doors, flanked by floor-to-ceiling windows across the expanse of the A-frame section. “He’s waiting for you. I think he’s expecting you to prepare his breakfast.”

  “Oh, really. When did meal preparation become part of my duties?” Paige stuffed her gloved hands into the pockets of her quilted thermal parka.

  “I’m not issuing orders, Ms. Summers,” Greg said. “But I’ll warn you that he’s not in a good mood, so you might want to give him a little leeway and—”

  “Pamper the poor invalid?”

  Greg chuckled. “Yeah, something like that.”

  “Aren’t you coming in?” Paige asked.

  “No, thanks. I’ve got a ton of work waiting for me at the office.” He glanced meaningfully up at the cabin. “Besides, I’ve done my tour of duty. Now it’s time for you to earn your hazardous duty pay.”

  “Thanks for warning me.”

  Paige squared her shoulders, stiffened her spine and marched up the steps. Turning the brass door handle, she found the front door unlocked.

  “Hello? Jared?” she called out to him, but received no response.

  Entering the foyer, she gasped as her mind assimilated the massive grandeur of the cabin’s interior. Pine log walls reached upward toward the cathedral ceiling. A hand-carved staircase led to an upper balcony. The hardwood floors glistened as the early morning light, descending from an enormous skylight, spread across the polished surface.

  “Jared.” She called to him again.

  “I’m in here,” he said.

  Going in the direction of his voice, she entered the living room. Stopping suddenly, she glanced around the thirty-by-thirty-foot area. Jared, wearing faded jeans and a long-sleeved cotton shirt, sat in a large navy blue corduroy recliner, his leg resting on a matching round ottoman. A pair of crutches lay propped against a square wooden table beside the chair.

  “What the hell took you so long?” Tilting his head to one side, he glared at her. “I was getting worried. Thought maybe that light drizzle out there had turned to sleet and Greg had had a wreck.”

  “The rain has almost stopped,” Paige said. “And it’s not late.” She checked her watch against the mantel clock. A roaring fire burned brightly in the huge rock fireplace.

  “It’s after eight,” he told her. “And I’m starving. Do you suppose you could scramble me some eggs or something? I haven’t eaten a bite since lunch yesterday.”

  And just who did he have lunch with yesterday? she wondered. “Maybe you should have had Greg bring out a cook for you instead of an administrative assistant.”

  Jared rolled up the newspaper he held and slapped it across his palm. “Dammit, Paige, don’t play women’s lib with me this morning. You’re not just my administrative assistant. You’re supposed to be my friend, aren’t you? Is it too much to ask a friend to fix me a little breakfast?”

  “As a friend, I’d be glad to fix your breakfast.” She unzipped her gray ankle-length parka and removed her purple knit cap and gloves. “But as a friend, I’m warning you that, after breakfast, your disposition had better improve or I’m out of here.”

  Sticking out his lip in a little boy pout, Jared looked at her pathetically. “Have pity on me, honey. I’m an injured man in pain. I haven’t had any sleep in twenty-four hours. Haven’t eaten in eighteen.” And haven’t had sex in five months. But he could hardly say that to her, could he? If he admitted that he hadn’t been with another woman since the evening they met, she’d know just what a powerful hold she had on him.

  “You poor baby.” She tossed her parka, gloves and cap across the back of one of the two red-navy-and-gold plaid sofas that formed an L in front of the fireplace. “Since you seem to be in need of pampering, why didn’t your weekend ski bunny come back to Grand Springs with you?”

  “My what?” Turning sideways in the recliner, Jared stared at Paige. Lovely, vibrant, scowling Paige. How could a pregnant woman in a nondescript gray-and-tan pin-striped jumper look so damned sexy?

  Paige thought Jared looked too sleek and tanned and gorgeous for a man who’d spent hours in a hospital emergency room. With his long, lean, powerful body sprawled out in the comfortable chair, he projected an aura of pure, unadulterated masculinity.

  “I was referring to the woman you spent the weekend with in Aspen.”

  “Oh. That woman.”

  Jared grinned. Paige’s stomach quivered. He laughed. She frowned.

  “Just what’s so funny?” she asked.

  “You are,” he said. “What gave you the idea that I spent the weekend with some woman? Or should I say who put
the idea in your head?”

  “No one put the idea in my head. I just assumed that you… Are you saying that you didn’t spend the weekend with a woman?”

  “Would you care if I had taken some cute little snow bunny with me to Aspen?”

  “Why should I care? We’re not married. We’re not engaged. We’re not—”

  “Lovers? No, honey, we’re not any of those things, are we.” Jared glanced meaningfully at her stomach. “So why didn’t I spend the weekend with another woman?”

  “Are you telling me that you didn’t?” Paige mentally scolded herself for feeling so relieved. “You spent the weekend alone?”

  He could lie to her and see how she reacted. Or he could be honest with her, the way he wanted her to be honest with him. He could take a chance and trust her. God knew he wanted to trust her.

  “Did I mention that not only am I tired, sleepy and hungry—” he paused for effect “—but that I’m also lonely and horny as hell?”

  Amusement rose in her throat and erupted in an uncontrollable giggle. “You’re awful. Do you know that? You’re absolutely awful.”

  But you love me, anyway. God, where had that thought come from? He didn’t really believe Paige loved him, did he? But maybe she did. Maybe she— Hell, what difference did it make? He didn’t want her to love him, he just wanted her to— To what? Marry him. Be his lover. Allow him to train her how to be Mrs. L. J. Montgomery.

  “So, will you fix this awful guy some breakfast?” he asked.

  “If you promise to behave yourself today and not give me any trouble.” She took several steps toward the foyer, then paused and turned halfway around. “Where’s the kitchen?”

  “Go out into the foyer, down the hall past the stairway. It’s straight back. You can’t miss it.” When Paige headed toward the foyer, Jared called out, “Hey, you can cook, can’t you?”

  “You’ll just have to wait and see,” she told him, then disappeared down the hallway.

  The kitchen was as enormous as the living room and opened up onto a rear deck that overlooked a small stream. The arched, paneled ceiling loomed a good fourteen feet overhead and recessed lighting combined with a wide expanse of windows to illuminate the interior.

  Twenty minutes later Paige served Jared a plate filled with crisp bacon, scrambled eggs and buttered toast. She watched in amazement while he devoured every bite and finished off three cups of coffee.

  “You were starving, weren’t you?”

  “I’m a big boy, in case you haven’t noticed,” he said. “It takes a lot to fill me up.”

  “I’ll clean the kitchen, and then we can start work.”

  “Fine. But before you do that, help me into the den. I’ve got things set up in there. A computer that’s linked to the ones at the office, a fax machine, a second phone line. Everything we’ll need.”

  Jared eased his feet off the ottoman, reached for his crutches and stood, balancing his weight on his uninjured foot.

  Paige rushed to his side. “What can I do?”

  “Just follow along behind me and make sure I make it into the den without falling flat on my face.” He started the slow, cumbrous trek across the living room and out into the foyer. “I’m not used to maneuvering like this.”

  “You’re doing fine,” she assured him.

  She helped Jared settle into his den-cum-office, a large, open room with another rock fireplace and double doors opening onto a patio.

  They worked together all morning in a mutual sense of camaraderie, each trying to stay on the other’s good side. Occasionally, Jared’s temper flared, especially after the mild pain medication wore off and his ankle ached.

  Before preparing lunch, Paige insisted Jared take a couple of his pain pills. When she carried a tray laden with their lunch of soup and grilled cheese sandwiches into the den, she heard Jared snoring. Pausing in the doorway, she shook her head and smiled. The map he’d been studying lay across his chest, lifting and falling with each steady breath he took. His head rested on his shoulder. His foot with the sprained ankle had slipped off the small, cane-bottom footstool he’d used as a prop.

  After setting the tray on the massive oak desk, Paige walked over to Jared and knelt down beside him. She lifted a rectangular pillow off the empty rust red leather chair across from where Jared sat, placed the pillow on the footstool and lifted his foot to rest on top. She picked up the neatly folded, Navajo-print, cotton throw off the end of the wide rock hearth, shook it loose and arranged it over Jared’s sleeping form.

  Leaving him to rest peacefully in front of the warm fire, Paige took the tray back to the kitchen and ate her lunch alone. Later, she returned to the den and cleared away the work she and Jared had begun that morning. She reorganized Jared’s home files, which were a mess, explored the huge kitchen, which she found stocked with enough food to see a dozen people through a rough winter, and finally settled down with a geology report on the Rocky Springs Ranch, a large section of property just outside Grand Springs that Montgomery Real Estate and Land Development had recently purchased.

  Jared woke at four-thirty and found himself alone in the den. Someone had wrapped him in a cotton throw. Paige? Of course, Paige. He called her name. No answer. Where was she? Surely, she hadn’t phoned Greg and he’d already taken her back into town.

  Unsteadily, Jared made his way down the hall. His rubber-capped crutches would have allowed him to move in relative quiet, but with all his weight bearing on one booted foot, his hampered walk drummed noisily along the wooden floor.

  “Paige, are you still here?”

  “In the kitchen,” she said loudly. “I just put a pan of lasagna in the oven for your dinner.”

  He found her at the sink, her hands in soapsuds up to her elbows and a dish towel thrown over her shoulder. He grinned. So this was what the phrase domestic goddess really meant. Paige looked right at home in the kitchen. In his kitchen. Preparing his dinner. A primitive masculine sense of Paige was in his kitchen and all was right with the world overwhelmed him. It was only a short mental leap from Paige in his kitchen to Paige in his bedroom.

  “What would you say if I asked you to stay here with me this week?”

  Dropping the plastic mixing bowl into the soapy water, Paige whirled around and gazed at Jared, her mouth open in an astonished gasp. “I can’t.”

  “Why not?” He pulled out a chair from the kitchen table and sat, propping his crutches against the wall directly behind him.

  “You know why not,” she said.

  “What if I promise to be on my best behavior? What if I sign an agreement, in blood, that—”

  “I can’t stay here. I have things to do at home. I’m working on the baby’s nursery. Anyway, all that stuff you bought in Denver is being delivered this week.”

  “So I’ll call and have the delivery delayed until next week,” he said. “You have plenty of time to get the nursery ready. Besides, I thought you were going to let me give you this house. For you and Angela.”

  “I never agreed for you to give me this house.” Paige jerked the dish towel off her shoulder, dried her hands and marched over to Jared. “My staying here is out of the question.” She flipped the dish towel back over her shoulder.

  “Look, honey, I’m going to be working from home the rest of the week. You’ll have to drive out here early every morning and drive back into town late every evening, maybe sometimes at night. It would make a lot more sense for you to move in for the week.”

  “But what would people—” She paused midsentence, realizing what an idiotic statement she’d been about to make.

  “See, you can’t think of a logical reason not to stay here.”

  He was right, of course. The whole world knew they’d been lovers, knew she was pregnant with his child. There was no logical reason for her not to move in for the week. But there were several illogical reasons. She was in love with Jared, and therefore very susceptible to him on an emotional level. And then there was the ever-present sexual attract
ion that fairly crackled between them as if they were two live wires.

  “I’ll stay,” she said. “But only if you agree not to touch me.”

  Laughter rumbled up from his chest as he shook his head. Paige glared at him.

  “I mean it. I don’t want you to even shake my hand.”

  The laughter died inside him. They were in an impossible situation. He and Paige. They were an unfeasible combination, but a combustible one. Even knowing how wrong they were for each other, how easily they could destroy each other, they could not extinguish the passionate fire that blazed anew each time they touched.

  “I promise that I won’t touch you…unless you touch me first. I’ll force myself to resist you. Do you think you can resist me?”

  “Why you egotistical, macho—”

  “Now, honey, don’t get yourself all riled up.”

  Paige realized that he had issued her a dare—do you think you can resist me? A dare she’d be a fool to take. But then, where Jared was concerned, she’d been a fool since the first moment they met.

  “I’ll need to go home and get some things,” she said. “I can hardly wear these same clothes the rest of the week.”

  “Call Kay and have her go to your place and pack what you need. Greg will bring your bag when he comes out in the morning for our meeting. He’s going to Florida for a couple of weeks to handle some problems in my office down there and I need to brief him before he leaves.”

  “But I can’t sleep in my clothes, and I don’t have a toothbrush and—”

  “I have extra toiletries. Half a dozen new toothbrushes still in their boxes.” He looked her over from head to toe. “I’ll loan you a pair of pajamas for tonight. The top should be just about right for you as a gown.”

  Paige groaned. Her gut instincts told her that she’d live to regret giving in to her desire to be with Jared. Just one week, alone with the father of her child. A week to share a life with him. To pretend that…

  “If you don’t keep your promise, I’ll leave immediately,” she warned him. “And I’ll never trust you ever again.”