by Deb Kastner
Which was hardly fair. If anything, given his attitude this morning, she ought to be the one on the offensive. Yet he didn’t sense that from her. He didn’t know what she was thinking.
She stared at him, unblinking, unsettling him. Stoked heat flamed into a bonfire in his chest and rose to his face. The woman had the power to unnerve him more than anyone he’d ever known.
He’d always been so confident. So self-assured—especially with women. He hadn’t bothered to think or care much about how others felt, as long as he got his way. Even as an adult, he’d been incredibly immature in both his thoughts and his actions. Shame filled him whenever he thought about it, which, given that he would soon be a father, was often.
Suddenly it mattered what other people thought of him—what Alyssa thought of him. He was walking on eggshells and he didn’t like the way that made him feel.
He slid a quick glance at her to see if he could read her expression. He’d meant to look away again, but she caught his gaze and locked it with hers.
Her brow furrowed, but it wasn’t a frown.
She was concerned—about him.
He wasn’t used to that. The people he used to hang around only wanted him for what he could give them, just as he was only interested in taking what he wanted.
“What can I do for you?” she asked softly.
He choked on his breath and couldn’t force air back into his lungs to save his life.
Alyssa wasn’t taking.
She was giving.
“Look. I know something is bothering you. It’s your choice whether or not you want to share it with me, of course, but I’m warning you now, that if you don’t, my overactive imagination is going to come up with way worse scenarios than whatever your reality happens to be.”
“I highly doubt that.”
There was nothing worse than his reality.
“Is Martin breathing down your neck?”
He scoffed. “Martin is always breathing down my neck. Nothing new about that.”
“And Pete?”
“Well, I don’t know the guy from Adam. I don’t particularly like him sticking a camera in my face every two seconds and I’m glad he’s found other things to do than trailing behind me like a lost puppy all the time, but he’s doing what Martin paid him to do, and he seems like a nice enough guy. Can’t blame him for that.”
“So, not Martin, and not Pete.”
Cash shook his head.
“Are you worried about your baby?” Her voice had dropped to a faint whisper and he had to lean toward her to make out her words. “Have you gotten anywhere with Sharee at all, or is she still refusing to speak to you?”
He pressed his lips together to keep from saying just exactly what he thought of Sharee’s fortification tactics. Alyssa already knew everything there was to know.
He’d never had trouble with his emotions before. He was about as far from being a sensitive guy as east was from west. The media, though admitting to his supposed charm and proven abilities in the rodeo arena, had labeled him cold and callous, and he’d always assumed they were right.
After Aaron’s death, he’d gone from carefree to overwhelmed with guilt, so he’d drowned his thoughts and numbed his emotions with alcohol instead of letting himself feel things.
Even now, sitting across from a woman who truly cared about him, he experienced the urge to drink. It was an easy way out of dealing with his problems, but far from a simple one. Yet both his throat and his heart ached for the burn of whiskey to take the edge off his pain.
He didn’t know how Alyssa did it—kept going in the wake of her brother’s death, her mother’s abandonment and her father’s health issues, much less keeping the store running as successfully as she had.
He was barely able to cope with his best friend in heaven, his pro rodeo career in tatters and, most important, a baby on the way whose mother wanted nothing to do with him.
“Is Sharee finally starting to come around to see your side of things?” she prompted when he didn’t immediately answer her question. “You are the baby’s father and have as many rights to that child as she has.”
“No. I haven’t heard a single word from her. I’ve called her numerous times, but she always sends me to voice mail. Honestly, I don’t think she’s ever going to acknowledge my rights as a father to our baby.”
“That isn’t her choice to make. Maybe it’s time to confront her face-to-face. The longer you wait, the harder it’s going to get between the two of you.”
He blew out a breath. “You’re right. Whether she likes it or not, Sharee and I are permanently connected through this child. It’s essential for me to convince her of that. The sooner the better. We have a lot of details to work out.”
“I’m sorry. I wouldn’t want to be in your place.”
He clamped his jaw around the surge of anger he felt, directed at the one person entirely responsible for the trouble he was in.
Himself.
“I dug my own hole, and I’m the one responsible for getting myself out of it,” he acknowledged. “Just because I was under the influence of alcohol at the time and didn’t think my actions through to their logical conclusions aren’t acceptable excuses. I was young and stupid enough to believe I was invincible. I didn’t think the rules of the natural order applied to me. And then my whole world blew up in my face.”
“It must have been a pretty big shock to discover you had a baby on the way.” If it had been anyone else, her words might have sounded like an accusation, but with Alyssa, it was commiseration mixed with sympathy.
“You can say that again. I can’t believe I had to find out I was going to be a father while watching the news on television. I felt like someone had pulled the rug right out from under me.”
He ran his palm across his whiskered jaw and caught Alyssa’s gaze. “But can I tell you something I’ve never admitted to anyone before?”
Her eyes widened, and she gave him the slightest nod, so tiny he almost missed it.
“That very first moment when I found out I was going to be a father, when I saw the original ultrasound picture of my baby flashing across the television screen—well, everyone expected that my initial reaction would be denial. That I’d be angry at Sharee for putting the news on television before I even knew of my baby’s existence. Which of course I was, and am.”
“She should have told you first before making it public.”
“Yes. She should have. But you know what? Even finding out the way I did, standing in the middle of a bar, half-drunk and with every single aspect of my life headed straight down into a pit of fire, my very first reaction when I saw my baby was—”
He was so choked up he could barely speak. He searched his mind for a way to explain his emotions.
“I’m not even sure I have the right word for it.”
She smiled gently, patiently waiting for him to finish his sentence.
He placed his hand over his heart.
“Joy? Amazement? Downright wonder? All of the above, and then some?”
“You’re going to be a daddy.”
“Exactly.”
How was it that Alyssa could understand what was in his heart, when he barely knew it himself? And yet he could tell by her warmhearted gaze that she did.
“I know I don’t deserve it. The way my child was conceived wasn’t just a mistake, or something I can write off because I was too drunk to know my own actions.
“It was sin. I’ve always known the difference between right and wrong, even when I refused to admit it. I learned it in church and on my own daddy’s knee. I knew what God expected me to do—and not do—and I chose to ignore Him. And I’m not proud of the kind of man that makes me.”
He didn’t give her the opportunity to interrupt, suspecting that she would probably try to take the heat off him. He didn’t want th
e heat off him.
He deserved to be scorched.
“But this baby?” he continued, surprising himself by the smile that slightly curved his lips in an upward slope. “My son or daughter is a blessing, and I downright refuse to look at him or her any other way.”
“I can’t say how much I respect you for saying that. There are many men who wouldn’t.”
“I’m not most men.”
No. He wasn’t. He was scraping the bottom of the barrel.
But at least he was trying to climb out of it. And even in his foolishness, he could recognize the hand of God, forming a tiny human in a mother’s womb, as something amazing and wondrous.
Alyssa said she respected him for his decision. Somehow, that made a difference, and when he stood up and grabbed his hat off the desk, planting it firmly on his head and adjusting the brim, he stood a bit taller, his shoulders a little straighter.
“Is there anything else you wanted to speak to me about?” He didn’t want to look as if he was trying to rush off, but in truth he was.
“I suppose not,” she said tentatively, brushing a stray strawberry-blond curl behind her ear. Her expression clearly indicated that she didn’t feel they’d reached any kind of resolution, and she was right, but that would have to wait.
“Is it okay if I take a break?” he asked. “I have something I need to do real fast.”
“Sure. No problem. You can finish stocking the feed up front when you return.”
“Will do,” he said, grinning and tipping his hat at her. “And thanks.”
She tilted her head up at him, her gaze questioning. “For what?”
“For listening.”
And for reminding him what was truly important in his life.
Not Martin, for all his blustering, or Pete trying to photograph Cash in the best light, or anything else having to do with this ridiculous publicity scheme.
Not even his rodeo career, as much as he intended to eventually return to the circuit. He needed to be successful now, more than ever, because he would soon have a child to support.
He exited the store and half jogged to his truck, fishing his cell phone out of his pocket as he went.
Once he’d settled himself behind the wheel and tossed his hat onto the passenger seat, he unlocked the phone screen and checked his contact list, taking a deep, stabilizing breath before punching the call button.
This was it. No holds barred. If he had to, he was going to call over and over until she picked up her phone just to get him to stop.
The phone rang four and then five times before going to Sharee’s voice mail. Cash closed the call and redialed.
Still no answer.
He hung up and dialed yet again, determined not to let her off the hook without speaking to her.
He tried two more times, growing more frustrated by the minute.
He almost dropped the phone in surprise when Sharee suddenly picked up on the sixth try.
“Hello?” The word came out half a yawn and very groggy sounding, and he suspected that even though it was half past three in the afternoon on a weekday, he’d woken her up, which was possibly why she’d answered the phone at all. Maybe she hadn’t even bothered looking at the caller ID.
Finally, a little bit of luck. No—not luck. God was in this.
“Hello, Sharee,” he said before she could hang up on him. “It’s Cash.”
“Cash?” she mumbled, as if she didn’t quite place the name.
“We need to talk. About our baby.”
“What?” She apparently bumped the phone with her chin as she shifted, and Cash heard a man’s low groan in the background.
Something about hearing that sound made him furious.
It wasn’t jealousy. He’d never cared for Sharee, not in the way that a man should care for a woman in such intimate circumstances.
He barely knew her. But he did know enough to suspect this man wasn’t her boyfriend, any more than Cash had been. He was probably some rodeo cowboy she’d picked up in the bar and taken home with her.
Just as she’d done with him.
He prayed that she had changed, that instead of moving from one man to the next, she’d found someone with whom she could experience a healthy relationship; a man who would marry her, watch out for her and protect her—and their baby.
This time it was jealousy that surged through him. He was the baby’s father. He and Sharee might end up co-parenting, but that child would know their real father’s love.
“What do you want, Cash?” Sharee asked, her voice raspy from sleep.
“I was calling to see when it would be convenient to meet up with you face-to-face. I’d like to connect as soon as possible. We have a lot of details to work out between us regarding how we are going to care for our baby.”
Sharee offered nothing more than a stunned silence on the other end of the line. He could hear her breathing, but that was all.
“For starters,” he continued, “you don’t have to worry that I might not pay child support, because I will, and on time, too. There’s no question about that. I want our baby to have the best of everything.”
“Stop right there, Cash. That’s not going to be an issue, so you don’t have to worry about it.”
He wasn’t worrying—he was just letting her know he was stepping up.
“You don’t understand. I’m telling you I want to contribute to our baby’s welfare. Be a real father.”
“No, you don’t understand. You won’t be losing any of your hard-earned rodeo money paying child support.”
There was a brusque tone to her voice that concerned Cash nearly as much as her words did. They were talking about their baby, here. Of course he was going to contribute.
“What?” He threaded his fingers through his hair. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Why wasn’t she getting that he didn’t give a fig about the money? It almost sounded as if she intended to provide for the baby on her own.
Which wasn’t going to happen. This was all about his child, a baby he had already, in some inexplicable way, come to love, and was unquestionably responsible to care for.
“What that means, Cash,” she said, overemphasizing his name, “is there is no baby.”
She paused long enough for Cash to feel like he’d just been T-boned by a semitruck.
Tears burned in his eyes and his gut churned. He thought he was going to be sick.
“Did you—did our baby—”
“Take a breath. That wasn’t what I meant. The baby is fine.”
The relief that flooded over him made him feel like his bones had suddenly turned into jelly. He slumped over the wheel, allowing his tears to fall unheeded onto his black T-shirt.
With every part of his being, he struggled to compose himself and not come completely unglued. For that one awful moment when he thought his baby was gone...
He hadn’t realized until he thought that he had lost his baby how much he really did want his child.
Thank God. Oh, thank God. It was as much of a prayer as he could offer through his clouded thoughts.
The baby was safe.
His baby was safe.
Had Sharee been trying to scare him on purpose?
He pulled his shoulders back, dabbed at his cheeks with the palm of one hand and tucked his phone closer to his ear. At some point he was going to have to think about what Sharee was trying to do to him, messing with his head like this, but not right now.
Not when the future of his baby was at stake.
“I don’t understand what you’re saying.” His voice had dropped a good octave and he could barely force the words from his dry throat. “Cut to the chase.”
“I’m not keeping her.” Sharee huffed softly, as if even saying the words was an annoyance.
Her?
&n
bsp; His baby was a girl?
His heart leaped into his throat, then danced in his chest with a melody all its own.
He was having a daughter!
Tears threatened to run free again, but he didn’t even care. He hadn’t cried since he was six years old and had flipped over on his bike. He’d skidded a good way on the asphalt. To a scared little boy, it looked as if everything was bleeding—his elbows, his knees, even his chin.
But his dad had grabbed him by the collar and shook him, telling him that only girls cried and he’d better cowboy up.
Be a man.
And he had. No matter how badly he hurt, either inwardly or outwardly, he had never again shed a single tear.
Not until now, when the joy of knowing he had a daughter overflowed his spirit so strongly that it just had to find release somewhere.
His tears.
But—wait.
What?
The second part of what Sharee had said sideswiped him.
She wasn’t going to keep their daughter?
He couldn’t possibly have heard right. Had she really just said that?
He struggled to pull his thoughts back to earth in some semblance of order, but Sharee was already speaking again. Of course, she couldn’t see what her words had done to him.
She had no clue.
“Seriously, Cash. What am I going to do with a baby? You might not know me all that well but trust me when I say I’m about the farthest thing from mother material there could possibly be, and I have zero interest in becoming one. I don’t have a maternal bone in my body. As it is, this pregnancy is really messing up my life. I’ve gone from being perpetually nauseated to feeling like a clumsy elephant. I’m not even allowed to grab a beer with the boys. I hate every second of it.”
Cash furrowed his brow. What Sharee was saying was a lot to take in, and none of it was good.
“You of all people should know my lifestyle isn’t the least bit conducive for a baby. You know how much I like to follow the cowboys in pro rodeo from town to town. As if I would actually consider toting a baby around with me. Ha. I don’t think so.”