by Gina Wilkins
Tilting his head, he planted his fists on his hips. “You aren’t afraid of anything under your bed,” he accused her. He might not have been a father long, but he knew a con when he heard one.
“There could be something under there,” she insisted, innocently batting her eyes.
“But there isn’t and you know it.” He reached down to tuck her covers more snugly beneath her chin, settling Pete and Bob beside her. “Go to sleep, princess. I’ll be close by if you really need anything.”
Maybe she had just wanted to hear that reassurance. Nestling into the pillow, she murmured, “Okay. ’Night, Daddy.”
With a bemused shake of his head, he left the room to return to Mia.
Because Connor was smiling when he returned, Mia allowed herself to relax. “It wasn’t a bad dream?”
He shook his head and sat beside her again. “Not this time. She was just stalling. A variation on the old can-I-have-a-drink-of-water routine.”
“Oh.” She thought about that a moment. “She’s never done that before.”
“No. I used to try every excuse in the book to keep my parents coming into my room at night.”
“Mia!”
Connor placed a hand on Mia’s shoulder when she started to get up in response to the call. “Go to sleep, Alexis,” he called out.
They could just hear the muttered response. “Okay.”
They waited a moment, but when no further sound came from the direction of her room, Connor smiled. “See?”
Aware that his hand was still on her shoulder, she eyed his rather smug expression. “You’re right. You are getting pretty good at this.”
“Thanks.”
Oddly enough, his increasing confidence gave her a funny little pang deep inside. Wasn’t this what she’d wanted? For Connor to start taking more responsibility, gradually replacing her as Alexis’s primary caretaker? So why was she suddenly feeling a little excluded?
“I think I’ve figured out what was causing the nightmares.” Connor glanced toward the doorway and then back at Mia with a somber expression. “So many people have left her. She just needs occasional reassurance that someone’s still here for her. That she can count on someone being there when she cries out. Someone to check under the bed for monsters,” he added with a slight smile.
That was pretty much what she had surmised as well. “I always knew you could do this. Take care of Alexis and finish school, I mean. You see—you can handle much more than you thought you could.”
He looked down at his hand on her shoulder and moved his thumb in a lazy circle that made a shiver run down her back. “I guess you were right,” he murmured.
“I guess I was.”
His eyes met hers again. “I missed you, Mia. Sure, I got by, but it wasn’t the same without you here.”
Her breath caught. “I know it’s easier for you when I’m here to help.”
“Easier?” He gave what might have been a short, skeptical laugh. “I’m not sure I would say that.”
That made her frown. “I meant that I help you with Alexis. Help around the house.”
“You do all those things and it’s great. Gives me more time to focus on my studies. But as for easier—” He shook his head. “When you’re here, it’s all I can do to think about anything but you. The way I feel about you. The things I want to say to you.”
She felt her breath catch.
He started to drop his hand. “I’m sorry. It’s a bad time for me to—”
“No.” She grabbed his hand, gripped it in hers as she stared fiercely into his eyes. “What is it you want to say?”
“You’re tired. We can do this later.”
She shook her head. “The one thing I’ve learned during the last week is that you never know if there will even be a later. We’ve been tiptoeing around each other for months and it’s making us both miserable. We’ve always been honest with each other. The best of friends. I want that back.”
His eyes darkened. She could almost feel him draw away from her, emotionally if not physically. “You want to just be friends. I’m not sure that’s possible now, but we can try. I’ll try to—”
“That isn’t what I said,” she interrupted impatiently. “We’ve always been more than ‘just’ friends. You are my best friend. The person who means more to me than anyone else in the world.”
His head lifted, his eyes narrowing on her face. “What are you telling me, Mia?”
She drew a deep breath for courage, then spoke in a rush. “I’ve always been a giver. I enjoy taking care of my family and friends, doing everything I can to make sure they’re happy. It gives me joy to see people I care about get what they want, achieve their goals and dreams. Sometimes I get so caught up in making other people happy that I forget to take care of my own needs. And there have been a few who have taken advantage of my generosity. Who have used me.”
“Dale,” he muttered with a scowl, referring to her brief relationship with a man Connor had disliked at first sight.
She kept her gaze steady on his. “Among others.”
His hand jerked in hers. “Surely you aren’t accusing me of being one of them.”
Keeping her fingers tightly around his, she didn’t look away. “No. You aren’t anything like Dale. His only concern was what I had to offer him. He never really cared what I wanted or needed in return.”
“I care,” Connor said, his voice rough. “But you have to tell me what you need from me. I can’t read your mind.”
Her eyes burning, she nodded. “I realize that now. It’s occurred to me that I didn’t know whether you could give me what I wanted because I never told you what that was.”
“Name it,” he said huskily.
“I know you need me. I think you even love me,” she murmured.
He reached out to lay his free hand over both of hers. “You should never doubt that.”
“I need to know that you trust me.”
He frowned, looking startled by her whisper. “What are you talking about? Of course I trust you.”
“You trust me as a friend. You trust me with your daughter. Both very important. But do you trust me with your heart?”
“I don’t know what—” He stopped, and she saw awareness come into his eyes.
Still gazing into his eyes, she said quietly, “Alexis isn’t the only one who needs reassurance that someone will always be there. I think you’ve been struggling with the same fears.”
She leaned closer to him, enunciating very clearly. “I’m not Brandy. And I’m not Gretchen. I love you. If you ask me to stay with you, I won’t walk away from you when things get difficult or when I need to find myself.”
His throat worked with a hard swallow. “I know you have plans…”
“Yes, I have plans. I’d like to start working toward a doctorate in American literature within the next year or two. Maybe I’d like to try teaching on a college level eventually. It’s not a burning desire or I’d have started already. I enjoy teaching high school students and I haven’t been in a big hurry to stop. But it’s still my ultimate goal and I have every intention of pursuing it, whether I’m with you or on my own.”
He sighed. “I’m going to be swamped with classes and schoolwork next year, preparing for the Step One exams. For two years after that, I’ll be doing rotations, working and studying long hours. For the next three years after that, I’ll be a medical resident. Long hours, relatively low pay. So for the next six foreseeable years, I don’t know how much I can do to help you with your studies.”
“Can you listen when I vent? Can you encourage me when I doubt myself? Can you celebrate with me when I do well, sympathize when things go wrong?”
“Of course I can do all that, but—”
“That’s all I need from you,” she said steadily. “We’ll have to deal with the logistics of hectic schedules and child care and finances and all the other day-to-day details a busy family encounters. We’ll have conflicts and challenges and victories and disappointme
nts. And through all of that, Connor, I won’t walk away. And I won’t let you walk away either. Not if you tell me right now that you love me and you trust me.”
His hands tightened around hers. “I love you.”
“And—?”
“And I—I trust you.”
“Enough to ask me to stay with you for always?”
“I don’t want you to feel tied down—”
She sighed and asked again, “Do you trust me enough to ask me to stay?”
There was a long pause during which she found it difficult to breathe. Had he been hurt too badly to ever take another risk on love? Was he so focused on his own plans that he just didn’t think he had enough of himself left to give? Could he…?
“Stay, Mia.”
Her heart tripped. “Say that again.”
His smile was so sweet, his eyes so tender that her own filled with tears. “I love you. Stay with me. Be a family with me and Alexis. I’ll be your cheerleader. I’ll be your shoulder to cry on. I’ll be anything you need from me. Just promise you’ll stay.”
“And if I make that promise?” she whispered.
“Then I’ll believe you,” he replied steadily. Confidently. “Just as you can believe that I’m not going anywhere either. You’re my best friend. You always will be.”
With a happy sob, she went into his arms, fitting her smiling lips to his own.
Epilogue
The wedding took place on the first Saturday in June. Because both the bride and groom had very busy schedules, the ceremony was a simple one. It was held beside the lake at Mia’s parents’ vacation home on a warm, clear afternoon, attended by her family and closest friends, Connor’s study group and a few old friends of his.
Mia wore her mother’s fitted sheath wedding dress and carried a bouquet of red roses. Connor wore a dark suit. Natalie served as maid of honor, Duncan Hayes stood as his son’s best man and Alexis was an adorable flower girl in a lace-trimmed white dress with a flowing red ribbon. Following the ceremony, the guests dined at tables set up on the lawn, serenaded by music from hidden outdoor speakers.
As far as Mia was concerned, it was the most beautiful wedding ever.
“You look so happy,” her mother said with tears in her eyes after the vows were exchanged.
Mia laughed and looked at her husband, who was dancing across the grass with his laughing daughter held high in his arms. “Why wouldn’t I be happy? I just married my best friend.”
Gazing at her own best friend and husband of more than thirty years, who looked healthy and content as he chatted with their guests, her mother sighed contentedly. Following the direction of her mom’s attention, Mia smiled, so grateful that her father had been there to walk with her to where Connor and the officiate had waited.
“Mia.” Alexis looked her way, beckoning eagerly. “Come dance with us.”
Connor looked her way, too, his smile loving, his handsome face more relaxed than she had seen him in a long time. “Yes, Mia. Come dance with us.”
Laughing, Mia kissed her mom’s soft cheek, then hurried happily across the lawn to join her husband and the little girl who had made their lives so complete.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-3796-8
DIAGNOSIS: DADDY
Copyright © 2009 by Gina Wilkins
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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§Family Found: Sons & Daughters
§Family Found: Sons & Daughters
**Hot Off the Press
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‡Family Found
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††Doctors in Training