Daddy on Her Doorstep
Lilian Darcy
Obstetrician Andrew was intrigued by his new single tenant and neighbour who looked about ready to pop – and ready to jump down the throat of anyone who hinted she might need help.So he knew he shouldn’t get involved. But with Claudia showing every sign of labour, what could he do but come to her aid? And could being there in her time of need make Andrew her knight in shining scrubs?
You’re pregnant, Claudia.
You have a baby due in a month.
The last thing you need is to feel like this.
About your landlord.
Your sexy, manly, capable, laid-back landlord.
She made a frustrated sound, and it seemed to make him stir. She was just about to whisper something to him about getting to bed—he could stay on the couch till morning, if he wanted, but she needed her room—when he reached out.
Was he still asleep?
His hand curved around the back of her head and pulled her closer. His eyes were still closed. His nose nudged forward. Where was the mouth he was looking for? Ahh …
His lips were so warm. She had to drag herself away. She had to! Or push him, or tell him, “Wake up, Andy. I’m not whoever you think I am.”
But none of that happened. She let him kiss her, her own mouth motionless while his lips coaxed her. He mumbled, “Mm,” the sound coming from deep in his chest. He wanted a response. His dream self was growing frustrated that these soft lips beneath his weren’t answering the kiss.
How could she answer it?
How could she not?
Dear Reader,
I’m lucky enough to be part of a wonderful group of writers who go away together once a year for an intensive week of writing, brainstorming and craft discussion. Okay, I admit there is a small and responsible amount of eating, laughing and drinking as well.
During a brainstorming session, one of our group was looking for inspiration for her next series and I came up with a great idea for a trilogy featuring a family of successful doctors. There was the high-achieving older brother, the laid-back middle child, the burned-out younger sister. I threw in a beautiful rural setting, a baby or two, and a couple of characters—a gold-digging blonde and a blue-collar cop—whom you wouldn’t necessarily expect to be the best match for the hero or heroine concerned. I was so inspired about it … and my friend wasn’t interested.
Writing is funny that way. What sets off fireworks of inspiration for one writer will leave another writer totally cold. “Would you mind if I kept the idea, then?” I asked her. Trust me, she wasn’t planning to fight me for it. Undeterred by her lack of enthusiasm, I rushed back to my room with the whole thing fizzing and singing in my head, and started writing until my hand hurt.
Two hours later, I had the basic outline for the three stories that would become the McKINLEY MEDICS trilogy, and now here’s the first book. Daddy on Her Doorstep is Andy’s story, and who better to pair with a laid-back rural doctor than an uptight city woman with endearingly rigid ideas about having a baby on her own? I hope you enjoy Andy and Claudia’s journey, and that you’ll look out for A Doctor in His House coming soon.
Lilian Darcy
About the Author
LILIAN DARCY has written nearly eighty books. Happily married, with four active children and a very patient cat, she enjoys keeping busy and could probably fill several more lifetimes with the things she likes to do—including cooking, gardening, quilting, drawing and traveling. She currently lives in Australia but travels to the United States as often as possible to visit family. Lilian loves to hear from readers. You can write to her at: PO Box 532, Jamison PO, Macquarie, ACT 2614, Australia, or e-mail her at: lilian@liliandarcy.com.
Daddy on Her Doorstep
Lilian Darcy
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Chapter One
Pregnant.
Andy’s new tenant hadn’t mentioned that little detail over the phone. He sat at the wheel of his pickup and watched her unloading her things onto the porch, with a vague sense that he was spying, while he gave about thirty percent of his attention to his sister Scarlett’s voice in his ear. “… so there was nothing we could do, and it was so fast …”
A very nice wheeled designer suitcase thumped up the wooden steps. The new tenant paused to stretch her lower back, placing a hand there for support.
The bump of her pregnancy was unmistakable in this pose, neat and round and firm, but as soon as she straightened again it almost disappeared. She had the kind of long, lean, gym-honed body that made a pregnancy look like this season’s hot fashion accessory, and she was probably a little chilly in those three-quarter-length sleeves, since it was only the beginning of April and the clear air had a definite bite.
“… so I’ve been thinking I might take a week off, just some quiet time, but not here in the city …” Scarlett had called Andy on his cell just as he was about to drive past his own house on his way from his office to the store, so he’d pulled over in front of his neighbor’s place to take her call, only a few yards from his own driveway. He hadn’t intended to watch his new tenant unloading her car, it had just happened that way.
“… and if it wouldn’t create problems for you and Laura …” he heard Scarlett say into his ear.
He put his reply in fast. “Laura and I have split up.”
“Oh, Andy! When?” His sister sounded distressed.
“February. It’s okay. It’s not a problem.”
There was a beat of silence as Scarlett absorbed the news. “She tried too hard, didn’t she?”
“Yeah, she did,” he admitted, glad that Scarlett understood, so he didn’t have to explain.
“Was she upset?”
“She was the one who made the move. I came home from work and there was a note and a whole lot less stuff.” The extent of Laura’s stuff had been part of the problem. “But we both knew it was coming. She’s found someone who appreciates her for who she truly is, the note said.”
“Ouch!”
“And she was right. I really didn’t do that.”
Speaking of ouch …
The tenant heaved a second suitcase out of the trunk of her car and paused once again to arch and rub away the ache in her back. Her outfit looked brand-new and designer label, the soft sage-green stretch fabric gathered at the side seams so that it made her bump into a graceful curve instead of an inconvenient bulge.
Her dark brown hair shone with rich chestnut lights, and the artfully casual topknot looked as if it had been twisted and pinned in place at a Manhattan salon not more than half an hour ago, just as the fringed and patterned scarf around her neck could have been draped by a Hollywood stylist. Her sunglasses said expensive loud and clear.
But it was the bump that had him thinking.
“Definitely pregnant,” Andy muttered. “Wonder when she’s due …”
“Sorry?” said Scarlett.
“My new tenant seems to be pregnant.”
“Oh, you have a new tenant? Ohh …”
He couldn’t miss the disappointment. “Is that a problem?”
Seemed to be the tenant that was the problem for his sister, not the pregnancy. He didn’t have a problem with either the tenant or her fashionable bump, but he was a little curious about why a woman like this—all big-city sophistication and style—was here in a small, scenic town in Vermont, renting solo, on a short-term lease. Where did the pregnancy fit in?
“Well, see, that’s what I’ve been working up to,” Scarlett said. “I’m taking some time off. Hoping to. Thinking about it. I’d been wondering if I could use your rental half, since it’s been empty. You know, just sit in a porch swing for a week.”
“You can sit in my porch swing, instead of the rental one.”
“I know, but it’s not the same.”
“It’s almost the same,” he pointed out, “since my place and my rental are two halves of the same house.”
He’d loved the extravagant Victorian on sight, four years ago, and since he hadn’t needed such a big place, he’d been happy that it was divided into two generous apartments. He was casual about renting out the half he didn’t live in, relying on word of mouth and a couple of low-key listings on the internet, preferring short leases for the variety. He hadn’t hugely cared when it stood vacant, as it had been all this past winter, while his two-year relationship with Laura had done its slow, splintering crash, like a felled tree.
“Yeah, but that’s … No, I can’t explain.” Scarlett sounded very flat, and very tired.
“This is only a three-month rental,” he began.
This was what made him curious. Three months renting to a pregnant tenant from New York City, who had most definitely told him on the phone that she’d be living there alone, and that she didn’t want a longer lease because she was only subletting her condo in Manhattan for the first two months, and didn’t want it sitting empty for too long. She was a corporate accountant, she’d said.
So where did her due date fit in to her stay here? What was her plan? What were her intentions once the three-month lease was up?
“So if I hold off on my vacation until July …” Scarlett said.
“You may actually be able to come up here and get a Vermont tan,” he finished for her. “And make it longer than a week. Make it as long as you want.”
He’d experienced for himself the therapeutic benefits of escaping the city and coming to the Green Mountain state. Five and a half years ago, one weekend here had led to a major change of lifestyle and priorities. Scarlett had been largely responsible for the whole thing, and now he had a chance to return the favor.
“But, no, I’ll never get July,” she said. “New rotations start. I have a shot at August. Just a week …” She was talking to herself more than to him, mentally adjusting her heavy schedule.
Like every member of the McKinley family except Andy, she was all about crammed schedules. He remembered all too well what that was like.
On the porch, a heavy-looking cardboard box was about to join the two suitcases. This time, the arch-and-rub was followed by a hard lean onto the seat of the porch swing. The swing rocked too much and the pregnant tenant … Nelson, Claudia Nelson … almost lost her balance. She grabbed the swing chain, pivoted on one foot and sat on the moving seat with a hard thump, and Andy had to fight an impulse to leap out of the pickup and rush to her aid.
Which she might not have appreciated, since she would have no idea who he was at this point. Anyhow, she’d recovered her balance now.
Recovered her balance, but not her built-in cool. She flattened her hand over her upper chest and took some breaths that looked as if they’d been learned in prenatal class and practiced diligently since. In through the nose. Out slow and steady, through rounded lips.
Shoot, she wasn’t in labor, was she? She only looked around six months or so, but as he’d already observed, she had the kind of body where it was hard to tell.
“I’d better go,” he told Scarlett. “Think about it for August or whenever, and call me back when you decide. Please.”
“I will.”
“I’ll hold off on another tenant for a while when this one moves out. Meanwhile, if you want to come up sooner, I can check out some of the bed-and-breakfasts around here. They’re pretty quiet. And I can make sure a porch swing is part of the deal.”
“Thanks, Andy. But, no, it was probably a dumb idea.” Down the line, Scarlett sighed to herself and began planning again. “I’ll wait. Even August, with the new interns … I’ll check the calendar. Maybe October …”
Scarlett disconnected the call before Andy could tell her that October sounded too far off, given the stress and fatigue in her voice. He knew what his father, Dr. Michael James McKinley, Senior, would have said to her: “Get a good night’s sleep and pull yourself together, Scarlett. You’re a cancer specialist. You’re going to lose patients. You can’t let it get too personal.”
Speaking of personal, it was time for Andy to introduce himself to the lady with the bump. The trip to the store for some steak and potatoes to accompany salad and a beer as tonight’s meal would have to wait.
There was a man in the front yard. Claudia had been vaguely aware of him since he’d pulled to the curb thirty feet down the street to take a call on his cell, but then she’d taken her eye off him for a few moments while she caught her breath after that scary near-fall.
Now, instead of ending the call and driving away as she would have expected, he was suddenly here, coming toward her, smiling as if he knew her.
Or as if he had suspect intentions.
She had a moment of vulnerability, unfamiliar and unwanted. The baby crammed itself against her lungs, making her breath short. Her female friends—well, her one best friend, Kelly, plus her work colleagues and her hair stylist—kept telling her approvingly that she barely showed. But, oh, the baby was there, and if she didn’t show much from the outside it was only because the pregnancy was crowding out her internal organs, instead.
What did this man want? Around her own age of thirty-four, he looked strong and competent and sure of himself, dark haired, square-jawed, crooked-nosed, dressed in conservative dark pants and a pale polo shirt, with sleeve bands that stretched tight around hard biceps. His stride was long and he had an aura of casual ownership.
Of the moment.
Of the situation.
It might have been appealing in other circumstances. She liked competence and control in a man.
Right now, however, there was no traffic going by and the air had filled with an odd stillness, as if she and this stranger were the only two people anywhere near. He was kind of frowning and smiling at her at the same time. He was incredibly good-looking, with an especially nice mouth. Any woman would be bound to notice. But he was big and strong and she was no match for him physically. Especially not now.
She stood, and the swing rocked again, reminding her of how she’d almost fallen a moment ago, and then had bumped down on it painfully hard.
Scary. Unsettling.
She was used to grace and strength in her body, not this clumsiness.
She was used to being fully in control.
She wasn’t used to this instinctive gesture of curving one hand in protection across her lower stomach, while the other was pressed against her beating heart.
I want this baby, she reminded herself. I chose it. I went for it. It was a considered decision after a ton of research and planning. I didn’t sit around whining that there weren’t any good men and that my body clock was ticking.
She wanted the baby, yes, but she wasn’t a huge fan of the actual pregnancy. It made her feel caged and vulnerable, a familiar feeling from long ago that she hated and fought or avoided whenever she could.
“Claudia?” the stranger said, still with the frown and the grin.
“Y-yes?” He’d said her name.
“Hi. It’s nice to meet you.” He held out his hand, showing strong, clean fingers. “I’m your landlord. Andy McKinley.”
Her landlord! Sheesh, of course he was! Claudia, you panicky idiot! She even recognized his gravelly voice from the phone.
Oh, shoot, she was going to cry.
I’m not. I’m not.
This was another thing she didn’t love about the pregnancy—all the hormonal emotions sloshing around inside her. Just the switch from slight—and let’s face it, pretty irrational—fear about a stranger’s approach to relief that he had a good reason for smiling at her, knowing her name and giving off that sense of ownership, was enough to dampen her eyes and tighten her throat.
“Nice to meet you, too,” she managed, after swallowing the tears back. Fortunately, she was still wearing her driving sunglasses so he wouldn’t have seen. She took her hand away from her chest, returned his handshake and found her fingers engulfed in a warmth and strength that once again reminded her of her own new vulnerability. “I’m a little earlier than I said.”
“No problem.”
“Um, Mr. McKinley, how come you’re parked in the street, not turned into the driveway?”
“I was on my way to the store when my sister called, so I pulled over.”
“Oh, right. It … uh … threw me a little, when you came across the grass. I didn’t know who you could be.”
“Yeah, I can see how you could get the wrong idea. Sorry about that.”
“It’s fine. Just wanted to explain. I don’t normally react like a deer in the headlights when a perfectly respectable man says hello to me.”
“Good to know.” He gave another smile-and-frown, kind of crooked, and she felt she still hadn’t been fully on message. I’m not a jittery flake, I’m on top of everything I do. But if she didn’t let it go at this point, she would only make things worse. “And it’s Dr. McKinley, if you want to get technical.”
“Oh. Dr. McKinley. Okay.”
“Let me help you get your things inside and show you around,” he said easily. “I saw you lose your balance on the swing just now. Are you okay?” He stepped closer.
“I’m fine,” she said firmly.
“Sure?”
“Quite sure.” What did he want from her? He was still studying her, frowning. If only he would look away, she might just rub her lower back again because it ached so much from the drive and the hefting of baggage. She didn’t want to rub it while he was watching, because even now that she knew who he was, she didn’t want to telegraph the vulnerability she disliked so much.
She could still hear her mother’s voice on the subject of the baby, still see her openly scathing expression. Are you crazy? The words had come out harsh and strident and a little fuzzy after several glasses of good wine. Doing it on your own, by choice? There’d still been a wineglass in Mom’s hand as she spoke, held very gracefully by its slender crystal stem but threatening to spill. Do you have any idea? It’s nothing like getting a degree or taking the partnership track, Claudia.
Just as getting through a bottle or two of French chardonnay or very nice Australian shiraz every night in the privacy of her own home, while wearing expensive jewelry and glittery clothes, was nothing like being an alcoholic, in Mom’s view.
Claudia’s argument that she was thirty-four years old, she was a highly competent professional with a corner office that she’d well and truly earned, she was financially secure, she was dealing in a sensible, practical way with the fact that there seemed to be zero decent available men in New York City and she had thought her decision through with enormous care and a detailed budget, hadn’t swayed her mother’s opinion one jot. “You’ll find you’ve bitten off way more than you can chew, my girl.”
Forget about it, Claudia, she lectured herself now, it was months ago.
But darn it, she just couldn’t help rubbing her back, and Andy McKinley had seen.
“I’ll just mention,” he said carefully, “that I’m a family practitioner, with a sub-specialty in ob-gyn.” He took a key ring from his pocket.
“I’m not due for five and a half weeks. And since first babies are often late, I’m working on six.”
“Mmm, so you are planning to have the baby here in Vermont?” He unlocked her front door, extended the handles on her suitcases and wheeled them both into the front hallway. He had strong wrists with a tan line on them that suggested he liked to ski.
“That’s right.” She explained briefly in what she privately called her spreadsheet voice, “I wanted a calm atmosphere for the last weeks of the pregnancy, and for the birth. I wanted my body to recover and to get our bonding and our routine in place in peace and quiet for six weeks or so before I go back to the city and then to work.”
“So you’re going back to work …?”
“When the baby is three months old. I’ll spend my last six weeks of maternity leave back in the city, getting systems in place. I’ve already researched nanny agencies and I’m on the books of the best one in the city,” she said, then added so that he wasn’t left in any doubt, “I’m going to be a single parent. I’ll just say it up front. This was a planned pregnancy, using a sperm-donor father, at a highly reputable Manhattan clinic.”
“Got you.”
“It’s good to get these things out in the open, I think, rather than have you wondering, and making things embarrassing for both of us.” She smiled, again making it brief and cool to give him his cue.
“Right,” he said, nodding and smiling back. Again it was a little crooked, she noticed. As if his view of the world was a complicated thing. As if he stood back from life, faintly amused by the whole messy business. “Thanks for filling me in.”
“Well, it doesn’t make sense not to.”
“Six weeks before, six weeks after. I guess that about takes care of your three-month lease.” He sounded cheerful about it, but maybe she was a little defensive after her mother’s often-repeated refrain of, You’re crazy. She thought she detected some hidden … what? … Criticism? Skepticism? Amusement?
All three.
Why did people have so much trouble believing that a pregnant woman could be organized? That a single-by-choice mother could make good decisions? That even being a single-by-choice mother was a good decision? That proper planning and budgeting did actually lead to a more successful outcome, and babies on a solid routine were more content? It was basic common sense!
And why did people think it was any of their business, even if they did happen to be doctors who knew about babies?
“There’s no need to show me around,” she told him, cool about it once again. “I’ve seen your photo tour on the internet and I’m confident there’s everything I’ll need. As long as the furnace is hot and the refrigerator is cold?”
“Checked them both this morning.”
“Great. Thanks.”
“I’ll bring your boxes in.”
She would have argued, but her back told her not to, so she simply thanked him again, gritted her teeth and waited until he’d shunted the remaining two boxes inside.
“Want me to take those suitcases up?”
“Thanks, no, I’ll be fine.”
“I’ll leave you to it, then. I’m right next door, if there’s anything you need.”
“The nearest store?”
“Straight on down the street, make a left at the end, then a right on Route 11, and you’ll hit a shopping plaza on your left in about half a mile.”
“Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.” He gave a casual click of his tongue in farewell and sloped off along the porch to his own front door. Was he whistling?
He didn’t seem like any doctor she’d met before. Nothing like the rather stuffy, fifty-something, highly recommended and very expensive ob-gyn she’d been seeing in Manhattan. More like a rancher with that pickup he’d climbed out of.
If you went by the whistle, he was Tom Sawyer, all grown up. If you went by the crooked nose, someone who’d had a minor accident while skiing or climbing, or even a punch-up outside a bar. Or maybe a construction-crew boss. Someone who knew what he was doing, but was laid-back about it. Someone good with his hands and with tools.
This place, for example. Had he remodeled it himself?
It was beautiful. The internet tour hadn’t given a misleading impression. Late afternoon spring sunshine poured through the kitchen window on the first floor and her bedroom window above. The wide bay window at the side of the house would glow when the morning sun hit those leaded sections of stained glass.
Beyond the borders of a Persian rug, the hardwood floors shone a dark syrup color, and the two couches looked soft and inviting with their stylized floral fabric. There were prints on the walls, wrought-iron fire tongs on a stand beside the grate, a good-quality coffee table and end tables made of solid wood, thick cream drapes at the windows for privacy, carved newel posts and rails on the stairs.
For the moment, however, with the baby kicking and rolling in a very uncomfortable way, the most urgent piece of exploration she needed was to check out the state of the bathroom.
Of course, Andy ran into her at the supermarket on the outskirts of town less than forty-five minutes later.
She was efficient, he’d give her that. She’d asked for directions to the store, and in the time he’d taken to unwind in a lazy, casual way from a day of seeing patients with conditions ranging from ingrown toenails to advanced pregnancy to serious heart disease, she’d—he could hear her faintly through the walls—toured both levels of the half a Victorian house that were now temporarily hers, tested the bathroom facilities, unpacked at least one of the suitcases and taken a long and no doubt critical look from the back porch at a garden he hadn’t touched since last summer.
Now she was shopping, arriving at the spacious, brightly lit supermarket just off County Route 5 only a few minutes after he’d gotten here himself.
He had steak, potatoes, orange juice and bananas in his basket.
She was filling a whole cart, stocking up big-time.
Buying diapers already?
He had to smile. Of course she was buying diapers!
He’d pegged her to a T, in the space of just a few minutes of conversation. He’d met her kind before. A highly intelligent and competent city professional, who would sincerely believe that efficiently stocking up six weeks in advance on non-perishable baby supplies would give her a significant head start in acquiring that all-important “routine” that would miraculously turn the years-long demands of parenthood, whether solo or shared, into a walk in the park.
Boy, was she in for a shock.
It was funny …
And not.
He didn’t know what to feel, actually.
Impressed? It was brave, no doubt about that. Angry? He was so busy with this mix of wry amusement, anger and … something else that he couldn’t quite work out … that he forgot to keep track of her movements through the store and found her coming down the dairy aisle toward him, pausing to reach for yogurt and cheese on the way.
“Oh. Hi,” she said.
And caught him looking at the stack of diapers.
He hadn’t meant to, but they were hard to miss—five big, block-shaped, plastic-covered, newborn-size sixty-packs piled one on top of the other.
Ten diapers a day for a month. Seven a day for six weeks. Take your pick. She’d probably already worked out a theoretical schedule for how often the baby would need changing.
She flushed. “It’s not like they’ll spoil. This way, I get to carry them into the house while I’m not too big and not too sore.”
“Makes sense,” he agreed.
And it kind of did. Of course it was a good idea to get as much done in advance as you could. But it was a drop in the ocean.
They stood there, him with the basket hooked over his arm, her leaning on the piled-up cart. Her hair was gleaming and pretty but a little too tightly wound for his taste. He liked fullness and bounce, soft waves shadowing a woman’s face, something to run his fingers through, something to tickle his shoulders or cheeks or chest when he came in for a kiss. Was the tight style another piece of efficiency on her part?
Knot it and go. Nothing to get in the way.
She was incredibly well-groomed close up, even more so than he’d observed when he’d first seen her on the porch. Soft hands, their long fingers tipped with a French manicure. Neat gold earrings with just the right amount of sparkle and dangle. A touch of lip gloss. Perfectly arched eyebrows with not a hair out of line. Low-heeled ankle boots and that artfully arranged scarf.
And what was the deal with the scarf, anyhow? If he had something like that fussing around his neck, it would either choke him or fall off every time he moved. It’d drive him crazy. She carried it with casual grace. He wondered if he was underestimating her and she would soon carry a baby on her hip the same way.
Due in five and a half weeks. First babies weren’t always late.
Would she manage on her own? Did she have support systems in place that she hadn’t mentioned yet?
I’m going to find out …
A danger signal suddenly clanged in his head. His father had accused him in the past of being a soft touch for people in need. You don’t know how to keep your distance, Andy. When you let yourself get overinvolved, all that happens is mess and complication.
Was Dad right? He often asked himself this, because Dad was right about a lot of things and knew it. He was a heart surgeon, and patients came to him from hundreds of miles away. But was he right that Andy had a tendency to become overinvolved?
The question hung in the balance for what felt like too long. He murmured something polite in Claudia Nelson’s direction. See you back at the house. Good luck with your shopping. The words didn’t matter. He was only using them as an exit line. Then he moved on down the aisle.
But when he turned at the end, remembering he needed to pick up some milk, he looked toward her, saw her pick up several cans of tomatoes from a lower shelf and once more straighten and rub the band of tightness around her lower back. Suddenly, she looked far too alone, marooned in the middle of a brightly lit supermarket aisle in her designer maternity clothes.
“She’s not going to go five more weeks …” he muttered to himself in a flash of medical intuition. “One or two if she’s lucky. A couple of days if she keeps on with the superwoman stuff.”
Trying to look casual about it, he wandered back. “Hey, I’ve just thought, would you like to come next door for dinner tonight, since you’ve had a full day? Save you calling out for pizza?”
“I wasn’t calling out for pizza, I was going to cook.”
Of course she was going to cook!
“Save you cooking, even better,” he said, keeping it cheerful and bland. “It’s only going to be steak and green salad and microwaved potatoes.”
“Well, the baby does need iron,” she murmured, half to herself, frowning as if working out complex numbers in her head. “But for vitamins, just a green salad …?”
Andy hid another smile. She probably calculated her nutritional intake on a daily basis. He shouldn’t laugh about it, when this was so much better than the patients he saw who paid no attention to their nutrition during pregnancy at all. “Will an offer of broccoli on the side seal the deal? Fresh fruit for dessert?”
Reading his attitude, she fixed him with a patient, tolerant expression, and drawled, “Organic? Locally grown?”
“Great. We’re on the same page.” And she had a sense of humor, even if she was a trifle scary.
“What time shall I come over?” she asked.
“Six? I don’t want to keep you late.”
“Six sounds good.”
They parted company and he went to the produce section and lost his head a little, throwing into his basket broccoli, cherry tomatoes, mushrooms, mangoes, purple onion, baby spinach, parsley, carrots, strawberries and corn.
Standing at the checkout, he looked at the crowded plastic basket and clicked his tongue. His father was right. Ten different items from the fruit and vegetable group was definitely overinvolved.
Chapter Two
Andy heard Claudia’s neat knock at his front door at five after six, when he had the electric grill heating up, the broccoli and corn in the steamer, the potatoes circling in the microwave and the colorful salad already tossed in the bowl.
He’d even cooked up the mushrooms, parsley and onions to make a gravy for the steak, and the mangoes and strawberries sat on the table in another bowl ready to serve as dessert, little cubes of orange and blobs of red.
His new tenant wanted nutrition and she was going to get it, with bells on.
She seemed a little edgy after she’d followed him into the kitchen and looked at what he had on the table and stove top. “You’re doing all this for me?”
“I’m a doctor, remember? I totally support women eating well during pregnancy.”
“Thank you.” But you still think I’m nuts.
She didn’t say it, but she looked at him, head tilted a little, and he could read her face.
Or rather her chin and her eyes.
The chin was raised, showing her lovely, streamlined jaw. Her eyes were narrowed in a mix of defiance and uneasiness. The dark, gleaming knot still sat tight on the top of her head. She was pretty sure of herself with this planned solo pregnancy thing, and yet something—or someone—had put some doubts in her mind at some point.
“No problems with your half of the house so far?” he asked, throwing the steaks onto the grill.
“No, it’s beautiful, a great environment, a wonderful sense of peace and space and light, just what I was looking for. And the town is lovely.”
“What else are you looking for?” he asked before stopping to consider what a personal question it was. He added quickly, “Here in Radford, I mean.” The addition made his query somewhat more acceptable.
“Well, I’ve chosen the Spring Ridge Memorial Hospital for the birth, if that’s what you mean.”
“Mitchum Medical Center is closer.” Radford itself was too small to warrant a hospital.
“Mitchum didn’t have the high-level neonatal facilities I was looking for. Not that I expect to need them.”
“Still, it’s a good hospital.” He sent patients there all the time, delivered most of his babies there.
“Oh, I’m sure it is. I wasn’t implying—”
“It’s fine. Just wanted you to know there is a good hospital ten minutes from here.”
“An hour to Spring Ridge isn’t that far.”
“They have an excellent neonatal transport team, if a baby has to be moved.”
“Don’t they say it’s always better to move a baby when it’s still inside the mom?”
Were they arguing?
She seemed to realize it, too, and pulled back from her defensive position. “As you point out, though, ten minutes is closer. I’ll take your advice and look at Mitchum Medical. Maybe it’s not too late to book in there, if it has everything on my checklist.” There was a tiny pause, then she added, “It’s so good of you to have me over. I wasn’t expecting that from a landlord. Can I put plates on the table? How can I help?”
He directed her to the crockery and silverware, and she went out and laid them on the formal dining table that he almost never used, when he’d envisaged eating here in the kitchen. The choice seemed typical of the differences between them. She liked structure, he was laid-back. She preferred planning, he liked to go with the flow. She dressed for dinner, he stayed in his jeans.
And, in fact, she seriously had changed outfits, he registered. This ensemble was green, like the outfit she’d been wearing earlier, but the green was a little darker, the fabric silkier, and instead of one stretchy top, she wore some kind of tank or T-shirt or blouse with a matching jacket on top. It would probably appall her to learn that he’d taken this long to notice the difference.
It might appall her even more to know that he was struggling not to notice other things. The fineness of her skin. The way she smelled. The mix of lean grace and pregnant clumsiness in how she moved. He was appalled about it, himself. This was not the kind of overinvolvement Dad talked about. It was worse.
They sat down to eat, and asked each other the usual polite questions. Do you have family in the area? You must enjoy your work?
Her answers were almost the same as his. She loved her career. She had family in New York City.
“Although it’s really just my mom,” she said. “My parents divorced a long time ago, and I’m an only child. My dad’s still in Allentown.”
“Pennsylvania?”
“That’s right. I’m not sure what Billy Joel was thinking, setting a song there. There is nothing romantic or interesting about Allentown! And I was born there, so I’m allowed to say it.” She wasn’t smiling. Sounded almost angry about it, as if she and Allentown had been through a bitter and drawn-out breakup.
Well, maybe in a way they had …
“Your dad likes it, though,” he pointed out gently, with some sympathy for the unknown man who’d chosen to remain in a small working-class city on a pretty river, instead of moving into the fast lanes of Philadelphia or New York.
“He must.” Don’t go there, said her tone and her elbows, pinching in at her sides, making her shoulders and whole body look tense.
Andy wanted to tell her to lighten up. He wanted to tease her or tell jokes until she smiled. His sister Scarlett was like this, so driven and rigid. He’d been like this once himself. Successful but unhappy and riding for a fall and not even knowing it. He scrambled for something to say, finding inspiration in the way the silky fabric of her jacket caught the light. “Some of my pregnant patients will want to know where you get your maternity clothes.”
“Oh!” She beamed suddenly, and the wide smile softened her whole face. “You think?” For a moment she’d lost the stiffness and narrow control, and the difference in her seemed to light up the whole room. “I do love this outfit!”
She ran her fingers lightly down the sides of the jacket, unconsciously emphasizing breasts made fuller by pregnancy. Then she straightened the neckline of the top beneath and Andy felt an unwanted—and unwarranted—tightening in his groin. She had such graceful, sexy hands, all smooth skin and long fingers and neat nails. And to watch her touching herself in unconscious sensuality …
But she was his tenant, and she was pregnant, and the baby had a file number in a fertility clinic for a father, and he wasn’t going anywhere near any of that. Dad would be proud. He chewed some steak, instead.
“Clothes are so important,” she said, still energized by the subject. “Well, to me. I love beautiful cuts and colors and fabrics. And you’re right, it’s hard to find nice things when you’re pregnant. I researched it early on, and put together a whole list, stores and catalogs and online, grouped by price range. I could print it out if you think your patients might find it helpful. It would be no trouble.”
So she had a streak of kindness and an appreciation of beauty, along with the rigidity and cool-headed efficiency and drive …
“Really?” he said. “You would?”
“Of course, or I wouldn’t have said it.”
“I might take you up on that. I’ll ask our practice nurse, Annette. Some patients do ask her about that kind of thing.”
“And does Annette have time to answer? I found in Manhattan it was all such a rush. Sit on this bench and have blood taken. Sit at that desk and fill out the questionnaire. I’m hoping it’s a little more personal up here.”
“It’s probably less efficient, though, I should warn you.”
“I can do efficiency on my own.” The crispness was back. “From my obstetrician I need time and attention and openness to the needs of a first-time, single-by-choice mom. If I’ve taken the trouble to write down my questions in advance, I expect a doctor or nurse to take the trouble to give me answers.”
“You’re not wrong …”
“No. But you’d be surprised. People act as if there’s some mysterious, floating magic about having a baby. There’s not.” She was indignant, fluent, still energized. “I’ve done my reading, I have my birth plan in place, my labor partner Kelly is on standby. She’s my best friend, newly married and hoping to be a mom within a year or two herself, and she’s been at the classes with me. She’s coming up here a week in advance of the birth. She’s giving me a portable crib as her gift for the baby, bringing it when she comes.”
“Very practical,” he agreed. As long as the baby co-operated and came at the right time.
“I heard from her this afternoon and it was delivered to her place today. We researched all the available models together and chose the best one. In fact, I’ve researched everything I could, and I’m not going to apologize for that. I keep hearing, Think about that when the time comes, and, You can’t know how you’re going to feel until it happens, and it’s driving me crazy.”
“I can understand that,” he said neutrally, while the doomed and dangerous words birth plan echoed in his head. In his experience, Fate took a perverse delight in throwing the best birth plans out the window from the moment labor began.
Better not tell her that.
Most definitely better not tell her that right now, when she was rubbing her lower back again and wincing as the pain tightened and then let go. “Braxton Hicks,” she said knowledgeably. “I think it was the drive up. I should have taken a break to stretch.”
She took a conscientious second helping of salad with no dressing. They talked about what a pretty drive it was, that last hour after you crossed from New York into Vermont. He offered her the fruit for dessert, and she ate this with the same attitude of confidence that she was doing the right thing. They talked about scenic attractions and prenatal yoga classes and where she might find a health-food store.
He offered her coffee to finish but she said no thank you, and by ten after eight she was pushing back her chair, running one hand over her belly and the other down the silky side of her outfit once again, and saying that she should go.
He leaped around the table to get the chair for her, but didn’t quite make it in time. She was already on her feet and stepping away, her thumb tucking beneath the draping of her scarf to straighten it, while his hands came to rest uselessly against the chair back and his shoulder almost rammed the side of her head.
For some reason, they both froze.
No, not for some reason, for the reason.
The age-old reason.
The age-old thing that happened between a man and a woman.
The words for it were never right, never good enough. The clichés were like overwashed fabric, faded and weak. There was nothing weak about this. It was a slam in the gut, an overpowering onslaught against Andy’s senses.
It had both of them in its grip for seconds he couldn’t have counted even if he’d tried. Five? Forty? More? He saw the echo of his own awareness in her bright eyes, suddenly narrowed, and when he dropped his gaze to her full mouth, this didn’t help, because her lips had parted and the light caught the sheen of moisture there and he could hear the breath coming in and out of her, too rapid and shallow.
She knew. She understood. She felt it.
I am not going to kiss you, Claudia Nelson. I am not going to pull that tight little knot down from the top of your head and run my fingers through your hair …
Nothing was going to happen between them, not tonight and not ever.
She must have reached the same decision. Her laugh was nervous and short. She reached up to twist a tendril of hair between her fingers. “Sorry, I really didn’t expect you to get the chair.”
“You looked tired, is all.”
“I—I am. I’m sleeping so badly.” She shrugged, smiled and frowned, all at the same time.
“Better get used to that.”
“Not every baby is a bad sleeper. I’ve read up on strategies …”
“I’m sure you have,” he drawled, trying not to smile.
She looked at him sharply, and there was a moment when the tension in the air could have switched. Awareness to argument. Sizzle to sniping. But they let go of both moods and she headed purposefully for the front door. “I’ll take a bath. That seems to help.”
“Might help soothe the baby, too, in a month or so.”
“Yes, a lot of the books say that. Thanks for the meal, Dr. McKinley, I really appreciate it.” And I’m calling you Dr. McKinley so you’ll forget what you saw in my eyes.
He cleared his throat. “I’m right here, any time you need me.”
“I’m fine. I’ll take it easy tomorrow, settling in.”
His last glimpse of her as she went along the porch to her front door was of her hand reaching around to her arched back once more, massaging it in a rhythmic circle just above the peachy curve of her backside with the flat of her fingers.
After this, they barely saw each other for several days.
Well, saw each other, but never for long at close hand.
She waved to him from the porch swing a couple of times as he was heading to or from work. He passed her in the street when he was jogging and she was walking back from the store, and they stopped for twenty seconds of greeting.
He heard her on her cell phone one morning, standing in the front yard to catch the best reception. “That was after the merger … Did you look under the original company name? … No, they’re very similar.” It sounded as if her office was having trouble letting go of her, or more likely the other way around.
One night, coming home after dark, he could see her front window lit up and there she was curled under a soft mohair blanket on the couch with a book in her hand. Even from this distance, he thought he could see a picture of a pregnant woman on the cover.
The weather warmed up a little, and he caught sight of her on Saturday afternoon, on a yoga mat in the garden, doing her pregnancy yoga exercises in a white ruched tank top and black stretch leggings, closing her eyes and breathing in, stretching her arms slowly upward, out and down, facing the beautiful sun, making a prayer position with her fingertips poised just below her chin.
That night, he was called out to assist in a delivery of triplets, and had about three hours’ sleep.
On Sunday afternoon, she must have taken a nap—he’d tried, after his long night, but couldn’t—because when he went into the garden himself, to put in a few hours of much needed work, a glance up at her bedroom window showed the blinds tightly closed.
When he’d raked the lawn clear of the last fall’s leaves, tidied the shrubbery into shape and pruned the climbing roses along the side fence, he looked again and found the blinds open this time, to let in the late-afternoon light. He thought he could see a figure moving in there, but she was in the shadows, not near the window and the light. If she’d noticed him down here, it didn’t seem as if she planned to come out and say hello.
Chapter Three
“Have an amazing time in Aruba, you two,” Claudia told Kelly, on the phone.
She moved farther away from the window. Her landlord had just put down his pruning shears and looked in her direction, and she didn’t want to have to wave and smile—or more truthfully, she didn’t want him to know that she could see him so well from up here, and that she was looking.
He was wearing a pair of grass-stained khaki shorts, an ancient chambray shirt with the sleeves ripped off at the shoulder seam and some kind of boots, scuffed and clunky, with a scrunch of thick woolly sock appearing at the top. His bare legs were packed with knotty muscle and his dark hair had a twig and two leaves in it.
The sun shone on his uneven, sporty tan. His face and neck were nicely bronzed. His forearms were ropey and brown and dappled with sun-bleached golden hair. His upper arms and those strong, knobby shoulders were paler, but they’d soon darken up if he kept to the gardening routine.
There was a ton of stuff to do out there. If he went on like this, Claudia would have plenty to look at between now and July.
Plenty of plants, she meant, of course.
“Oh, we will,” Kelly enthused, to Claudia’s half-listening ear. “And I’ll be so relaxed as your birth partner next month, after our break, that the baby will just float into the world. I’m glad it’s working out for you up there.”
“It’s working out great.”
She ended the call, hoping Kelly hadn’t caught the slight edge of doubt in her voice. It was working out great. She did her exercises every day, she read books on birth and baby care, she took naps and walks, she made nutritious meals, she played music to the baby, resting her hands on her belly to feel the movements change in response.
If it was too quiet and a little lonely and there wasn’t quite enough to do—even on the days when she made or took three calls to or from the office—well, that was very temporary.
And if an old wooden Victorian with a big garden and creaky floors and a wraparound porch told you more than you wanted to know about the man in the other half of the house, well that was temporary, too. Once the baby was born, she’d be far too busy to pay any attention to Andy McKinley, in the garden or anywhere else.
She wouldn’t care about his musical taste—everything from classical to country to driving rock, depending on his mood. She wouldn’t notice the lack of a female voice and female footsteps, suggesting he was currently unattached. She wouldn’t clock his hours or his clothing as he came and went—scrubs if he was headed to the hospital, neat professional attire for office-appointment hours, jeans and jackets and shorts and T-shirts for the various athletic things he apparently did in his free time.
One day, she had seen a canoe being strapped to the top of his pickup, and two men had arrived, bringing coolers, and they’d all gone off together in the pickup, wearing spray jackets and laughing a lot. She liked the way Andy laughed, and the way his arms moved when he was strapping the canoe in place.
She tried not to notice nearly this much about him, but how could she help it, when her days and her routine were so quiet? And when she was sleeping so badly, which meant that if Dr. McKinley was called out to an emergency in the early hours, she generally knew about this, too, because she heard the vehicle reversing down the drive.
Pull yourself together, Claudia. You’re a mom-to-be, not a teenager pining for a date.
If only she was sleeping better!
Only another month …
The baby was coming. It was three in the morning, the early hours of Monday, but the delivery room at Mitchum Medical Center had an energy to it that Andy knew well.
Not long now. Almost there.
“Here’s the head … take some short breaths now,” he said. The shoulder was a little stuck. He needed a gloved hand and a well-practiced technique to free it, and then out came the slippery body. “Fabulous, it’s a girl, Gina,” he told the mom. “Congratulations, both of you.” Nurse Kate passed him a couple of instruments and he cut and clamped the cord.
The dad squeezed his wife’s shoulders and buried his face in her hair. Both new parents were tearful and gushy, and there was no doubt about the health of the baby. She was crying and waving her little arms, but when they placed her on her mom’s warm tummy she nestled and snuggled and it was wonderful.
But very late at night, second night in a row. His patients always seemed to give birth in clusters.
Andy delivered the placenta, checked the baby and the birth canal, made the necessary notes, all the small medical and administrative tasks that most new parents were too absorbed in their baby to notice. The high that everyone felt after a successful birth began to ebb and he started to think about a dark, quiet room, smooth sheets, closed eyes, warm dreams …
It was almost four when he turned into his driveway, and there was a light on in Claudia’s front window. He saw a shadow moving behind the closed drapes as he came up the porch steps, and a floorboard creaked. What was she doing up this late? Was something wrong?
He was still thinking like a doctor who’d just delivered a baby. Didn’t even pause to question his action, just knocked at her door and called out, “Claudia? Everything okay in there?”
He heard footsteps and the rattle of the doorknob. A gap of light appeared, partially blocked by a very tired and grumpy figure, holding a mug of hot chocolate with her little finger bent outward. “I’m pregnant and I can’t sleep. Or breathe. What’s your problem?”
“Called out for a delivery.”
The gap opened wider. “Oh? At Mitchum Medical Center?”
“That’s where all my patients go, unless it’s something really serious.”
“That’s right, you told me that last week. I liked it when I took a tour, but haven’t made a decision yet. Was it a good team? Did everything go well?”
“Textbook-perfect. Apart from happening in the middle of the night.”
“Isn’t that when they always happen?”
“Sure feels that way.” He hid a yawn behind his closed hand.
“Come in. You look cold. I’m sorry I sounded snippy. If you have any ideas about the not-sleeping thing …”
He was in her living room before he knew it. She’d lit the fire in the brick-and-tile hearth and the warm air smelled of chocolate and a hint of woodsmoke. She was wearing a fluffy white robe and sheepskin boots. Free of makeup, her eyes had little creases at the corners from lack of sleep. Her hair sat in its usual knot, but it was lopsided and fuzzy with tangles. It looked like a robin’s nest about to fall out of the fork of a tree.
“Looks like you’re doing all the right things,” he said. “Hot drink, warm air.”
“Except I’m so hot in bed.” She said it with total innocence, still grumpily focused on her discomfort and frowning at the fire, and he was shocked at the reply his very male mind came up with—luckily not out loud.
Hot in bed? I’ll bet you are.
The grumpy expression and bird’s-nest hair were weirdly sexy, for a start, as well as those fingers curved around her mug. And what was underneath the robe?
“It’s so crazy,” she went on. “In the daytime, I can go to sleep on the couch or on top of my comforter like that.” She took a hand from the mug and snapped her fingers. “At night, when I climb between the sheets … not happening.”
“So sleep on the couch at night.”
“That’s why I lit the fire. It’s kind of soothing when it crackles. I can watch the flames till my eyes get sleepy. Right now, I think that’s an hour away. Would you like some hot chocolate?”
She sounded wistful and eager at the same time, as if she really did want the company, and he wondered why this baby didn’t have a father.
Why had there needed to be that crisp, distancing announcement, the day they first met, about sperm donation and planned pregnancy? Just how impossible was she to live with? Or just how exacting in her standards about men? Had something happened in the past to scare her off?
Or did she try too hard, like Laura?
Laura had crammed his house with heart-shaped objects and romantic sayings on fridge magnets. She’d told him, “I love you,” so many times that the words lost all meaning. She’d created elaborate “date nights” after he’d worked eighteen hours straight and then sulked when he didn’t want to take part, and generally poked and prodded at their relationship until it died like an overfed fish.
Claudia didn’t seem exacting and impossible. Right now, she seemed adorable and sexy without knowing it and more alone than she should be a month from giving birth. He couldn’t say no to her. He should say it, but—
“Hot chocolate would be great.” He began to follow her to the kitchen, but she shook her head.
“Sit! I’m going to reheat this one while I’m there, I didn’t give it long enough.” She gestured to the mug in her hand.
He heard the refrigerator open and shut, and then the microwave. After a couple of minutes she reappeared, walking gracefully but super carefully with the two mugs so that the foamy chocolate didn’t spill. She’d filled them too full.
The pink tip of her tongue appeared at the corner of her mouth, the way a little girl’s did when she was working on a tricky drawing. Ms. Nelson would not have made a successful waitress if she had this much trouble balancing two drinks. Andy hid a smile, half amused, half captivated by the evidence of imperfection. He was beginning to realize that he couldn’t think straight around this woman, and that there was a lot more to her than the efficiency and the plans.
They sat and sipped the chocolate. She asked him about his firewood supply. Would he mind if she lit the fire each night until the evenings were warmer? Or was that a nuisance, her using up the wood? Would he prefer her to use the furnace?
“The fire is fine,” he told her. “I have one on my side, too, use it on snowy weekends mainly, when I’m planning to be home. There weren’t enough of those weekends this past winter, so there’s plenty left.”
“I love the tiled surround. And the hardwood mantel.” Her voice was lazy. She might not be able to sleep, but she’d lost the efficient edge he had heard in her daytime conversation.
It was so late.
So late, and he was beyond tired.
“They were boarded over when I first bought the house,” he told her, feeling lazy about speech, as well. His voice creaked a little. “There was some hideous death-trap gas thing in this one. I took it out and took a sledgehammer to the boards. That was a great moment, when I saw the tiling and hearth all still intact behind the mess.”
“Bet it was! I can imagine that hammer, too.” She smiled, and he wasn’t sure what she was thinking. “It was on my wish list, once, renovating an old house, but other things kept getting slotted in higher up.”
“May still happen. You never know. Life takes curves.”
He was getting sleepy. Really had been a long night. He’d only just gotten to sleep when the call had come from Gina Wilkins and her husband to say she was in active labor and they were heading to the hospital. Now it must be going on five.
He’d finished the chocolate. He put down the mug, but didn’t want to jump straight up and leave.
“Curves,” Claudia was saying. “It does.”
They both thought about that for a moment.
A long, sleepy moment, with the flames dancing before their eyes—maybe if he just closed his for a second—and the room so … deliciously … warm …
And dark.
And downy, tucked under his chin.
Soft comforter, felt just like his. He decided fuzzily that he must be in bed …
He was definitely asleep. Deeply and righteously asleep, not just dozing as Claudia had thought at first.
Thinking about life’s curves—like her parents’ bitter, drawn-out divorce when she was ten—she’d heard the subtle change in his breathing and in the stillness between them. She’d sat beside him for several minutes, thinking that at any moment he would startle out of sleep and mumble an apology and she would usher him to the door so they could both get to bed. She was starting to feel as if sleep might be a possibility for herself, at last.
The pine log on the fire had begun to burn too low and the room wasn’t so warm. Or maybe it was just because she’d been sitting so still, not sure whether to disturb Andy with her movement or leave him be. After a few more minutes, she’d eased herself off the couch, turned the lights low and gone to bring the spare comforter from the bed she had ready for Kelly.
She’d tucked it around her landlord—very important to remember, at that point, that he was her landlord—still expecting that the movement would waken him.
But no. She crouched uncomfortably beside the couch with her hand still on the puffy fabric she’d just spread across his body and studied his face and his breathing, and he was definitely still fast asleep.
Look at him, sighing into the comforter with the faintest of smiles on his face, the muscles around his jaw and eyes and cheeks so relaxed and smooth, his lashes all thick and dark on his cheeks!
He had freckles across that crooked nose.
She hadn’t noticed them before. They were faint and light and sprinkled like gold dust on his skin, adding to the outdoorsy impression he gave. There was even a freckle on his top lip, right near the corner of his motionless mouth.
I want to kiss him.
I want to reach out and shape his face in my hands. I want to put my mouth on to his and take the heat of it until it wakes him up. I want him to reach for me, too, and pull me down, and make room for me on the couch with the whole length of him. And just keep me there. And kiss me. Hold me. Till morning.
I want the contact. It’s been too long.
I want the connection.
I just want him.
A man.
Him.
It was her body talking, not her. Or it was her loneliness. Or her hormones. Or something. Something she had no control over. The thoughts didn’t even come in words, they came in a surge of need that seemed more powerful because of all the extra blood in her body.
Think about that, Claudia.
Pregnant women had fifty percent more blood. It was one of the reasons she was so warm, most of the time.
You ‘re pregnant, Claudia.
You have a baby due in a month.
The last thing you need is to feel like this.
About your landlord.
Your sexy, manly, capable, laid-back landlord.
She made a frustrated sound, and it seemed to make him stir. She was just about to whisper something to him about getting to bed—he could stay on the couch till morning, if he wanted, but she needed her room—when he reached out.
Was he still asleep?
His hand curved around the back of her head and pulled her closer. His eyes were still closed. His nose nudged forward. Where was the mouth he was looking for? Ahh …
His lips were so warm. She had to drag herself away. She had to! Or push him, or tell him, “Wake up, Andy. I’m not whoever you think I am.”
But none of that happened. She let him kiss her, her own mouth motionless while his lips coaxed her. He mumbled, “Mmm,” the sound coming from deep in his chest. He wanted a response. His dream self was growing frustrated that these soft lips beneath his weren’t answering the kiss.
How could she answer it?
How could she not?
He tasted chocolatey-sweet and delicious and male and perfect. She hadn’t been kissed for a year. She hadn’t been pleasurably kissed for two, because the year-ago man had been a total disaster and had lasted just one date, and Claudia Nelson did not do second dates when the first one hadn’t worked. It was inefficient, a waste of time.
She’d never been kissed like this, so slowly and dreamily and blindly.
She leaned deeper into the soft edge of the couch seat, and the only place to rest her arm was on his shoulder. She felt the baby move and settle, as if she … he? … felt at home inside her body, with all this give and relaxation. She felt a fullness deep inside her, an aching of muscles she hadn’t known were there.
Oh, his mouth! How could it make such a connection with the rest of her body? How could she feel so full and yet so deeply throbbing with need? Her body had changed so much. She felt ripe down to her bones and to the tips of her newly filled breasts. She was a prisoner in her own skin—a prisoner who never wanted to leave.
She leaned in closer, parted her lips and touched him with her tongue then went deeper. Her body was boneless and helpless. He groaned. He stroked the back of her neck, ran his fingers up into her hair, found the knot on top of her head and suddenly the fingers went still.
Totally still.
But only for a moment.
“Claudia,” he said, in a voice that was sleepy and gravelly and only very slightly surprised.
And then he went right on kissing her.
Chapter Four
Man.
You couldn’t think in such a situation. It took Andy several seconds of groping thought, while his whole body clamored with one very simple feeling, even to realize where he was, what time it must be, what he was doing here.
Claudia. Hot chocolate. Middle of the night. Deep asleep.
He’d been dreaming. Not about Laura, or some fantasy woman, or anyone in particular. Just about femaleness and all the things a man loved. Silky hair and skin, sweet musky scent, softness and warmth, curves and weight beneath his hands, the touch of caressing fingers.
Man!
He was sure that it was a dream, that this delicious kissing feeling wasn’t really happening, that it was all part of the cocoon of warmth that wrapped around him, the sense of peace and a good job done.
But when his dream hand reached up to run through dream hair that might have been blond or chestnut or black and he found that tight little bird’s-nest knot with hairpins in it, his dream self had suddenly jolted into knowing that this wasn’t a dream, after all.
This was Claudia.
But he still wasn’t really awake …
Okay, so it was Claudia, sexy Claudia.
Wonderful.
She tasted delicious and she felt even better and she seemed as happy to stay in the dream as he was. He pulled her closer, found her peachy butt beneath his hand and levered her onto the couch beside him. There was just enough room.
They kissed long and deep and lazily. Her lips were like sun-ripened plums against his mouth. Sweet. Juicy. Warm. She burrowed against him like an animal needing warmth and contact, and she was so soft and relaxed.
Mmm, those breasts! Their fullness squished against his chest. The round bump below the breasts almost went unnoticed, the way she lay. Her robe had come apart and he could feel the graze of her big, hardened nipples. He wanted to touch them, cover them with his mouth.
But first the hair. Must do something about the hair. He found the cool metal bend of a pin and pulled, and the whole thing came apart and fell around his hand in a scented caress.
And then he thought, no, stop.
Because of the hair.
Because it felt so good like this, and yet this wasn’t the way she chose to wear it. She kept it scraped back to signal her efficiency, or to convince herself that she was in control. She was his pregnant tenant, choosing single parenthood for he could only guess what reason. Something had turned her off men. Or she’d been cruelly hurt. Or she was too rigid and controlling and competent for any man to stand.
None of those were good reasons for him to get involved like this, not a short-term fling, definitely not a one-night stand, when a month from now there’d be a baby in the picture.
“Claudia …”
She picked up on his changed intent just from the way he said her name. Too fat and too clumsy, she scrambled off the couch and made a pained sound as if she’d hurt her back with the twisting movement.
“I’m sorry,” he said quickly. Shoot, his vision still felt heavy and fuzzy from sleep, and so did his brain. She’d dimmed the lighting, and the fire was almost out. How long had he been here? “I didn’t mean for you to—”
“No, it’s fine. I’m fine.” She had hurt her back. She was moving like an old woman, straightening with extreme care and moving to grip the back of the adjacent armchair. “It does this. It’s the ligaments loosening, the doctor said.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I’m not apologizing for the back.” He swore. “That came out wrong. I am apologizing for the back, and for—”
“No, it’s fine,” she said again. “I know what you’re saying. What you’re apologizing for.” He blinked and focused and saw her flushed cheeks. “But it wasn’t your fault. I—I didn’t wake you up when I could have. We were both— This was a moment. Tired. Not thinking.”
“Yes.” He should have stopped there, but instead said, “It was nice.”
Shoot!
“It was,” she agreed, sounding thin. “But it’s not what I’m looking for right now.”
“No. Me, either …” Stop, Andy! “But it was really, really nice.”
How many ways were there to not cross paths with the person who lived under your own roof?
Going out the side door in the mornings. Taking a peek from the window to make sure there were no stretchy, sexy, pregnancy yoga exercises taking place in the backyard. Listening for the sound of her car backing out of the driveway and checking which way it turned into the street—toward the store or away?
Claudia was as adept at the avoidance strategies as he was. Andy would see her climb off the porch swing as he arrived home after office hours or a stint at the hospital. One day, there was a note from her in his mailbox, saying that the bathroom faucet had begun to leak, and if he wanted to come change the washer, “any time Wednesday evening would be convenient,” and she would leave her key under the mat, because she “wouldn’t be at home.”
He guessed she’d made deliberate plans to go out. Where? Dinner on her own? A movie, eating a carton of popcorn by herself in the cinema in the dark? It sounded lonely.
It wasn’t his concern.
They were avoiding each other, and that was just what he wanted. Neither of them could afford to think about that long, breathtaking kiss during Monday’s early hours, and neither wanted any risk whatsoever that it might be repeated.
They’d said to each other very clearly that it wouldn’t be repeated, that it wasn’t what either of them wanted, and, with his head, Andy knew this was true. They’d be crazy. It would be a disaster. And there was an unborn child involved.
But every now and then …
Man, it had been so good! It haunted his dreams.
His next serious sight of her came on a Thursday night just before bedtime ten days after her arrival, when the light from his bedroom window spilled out onto the wooden deck at the back of the house and showed her walking to and fro there dressed in a pair of loose cotton-knit chocolate-and-pink pajamas and what looked like a vintage pink silk robe.
He’d been just about to close the blinds when he’d caught movement from the corner of his eye and there she was.
Pacing.
Back and forth.
Lifting her face and pressing her lips together and whooshing out a breath.
Not happy.
Even from here, he could see her grimace and push down a sob.
Shoot! That wasn’t just a twinge in her back, this time. She was in labor, and he could read her reaction from here. It wasn’t in the plan, it shouldn’t be happening yet. She wasn’t due for another month. Things clearly always went to plan in Claudia Nelson World, and she was scared.
She was scared, she was on her own and he had no choice.
He left the blinds open, pulled on the casual athletic shoes he’d just kicked under the bed. Down on the deck, he found her still pacing. She’d gone farther, down the steps and into the yard. She had her back to him and he heard her whimper and groan as another contraction hit. It ebbed and she turned and saw him, and from her expression he felt as if he’d caught her out in something private.
Weakness, he realized. She didn’t want to seem weak. She didn’t want to give the naysayers—whomever they were—the slightest ammunition.
It was impressive and oddly troubling to see how quickly she composed herself. “I think I’m in labor.”
“I know you are, Claud,” he said quite tenderly, shortening her name as if he’d known her for years, instead of a tiny handful of meetings, a hot kiss in a waking dream, and a couple of waves and smiles. “Is it helping you to be outside? It’s cold and you don’t look that warmly dressed.”
“I just needed some air. I thought if I walked around, the pains might stop, but they haven’t.” She smiled tightly. “You’re right, it is cold.” She gave a shiver and hugged herself. Her hair was down tonight, but drawn back with some kind of clip at the back of her head. She must have fastened the clip in a hurry because it wasn’t straight, and it was slipping lower and lower through all that gleaming dark silk.
“Come in.”
“I’ll take another minute or two. The books say you should walk around.”
“Let me get you a coat. The books don’t say you should catch cold.”
“I didn’t bring a coat. Just a couple of jackets. It’s April. Spring. I thought I’d just stay inside when it was cold out and the weather would be warm in a few weeks, by the time the baby was born. I didn’t think I’d be outside at night.”
“I can lend you something.”
She nodded. “That would be great.” She began to pace again, and he went inside and found a trench coat that his sister-in-law Alicia had left up here during the winter. Claudia would appreciate Alicia’s expensive fashion tastes. The coat was by some designer. Alicia’s clothes were always by someone, Andy had noted. He wasn’t convinced that this was making model-gorgeous Alicia or his very driven orthopedic surgeon brother MJ happy, seven years into their marriage.
“I’m so sorry to disturb you like this,” Claudia began, when he came back out, as if she’d appeared at his front door to borrow a cup of sugar.
“No problem,” he answered, as if he had bags full of the sweet stuff.
She let him help her into the coat and he caught a tiny waft of her scent, like a tendril of flower-scented mist as she hugged it around herself. It reminded him far too vividly of the other night on her couch, his dream, the way he’d awoken and the way those moments lingered in his head.
She snuggled into the soft lining of the coat and instinctively adjusted the collar and pulled at the sides so that it sat the way it was meant to. Her hair bunched up, and the clip was caught somewhere beneath the coat fabric. She didn’t even notice. If he’d been the father of her baby instead of her landlord who didn’t want to get involved, he would have reached out and tucked the loose strands behind her ears, searched for the slipping clip.
“No problem,” he repeated half under his breath, while he fought and swiftly beat the resurging moment of male awareness.
What the hell was such a thing doing showing up now? Bad enough the other night. She was in labor, for crying out loud, so this was worse. They’d been right to keep their distance from each other, keep to the businesslike footing of tenant and landlord. But how could you do that when the landlord was a doctor and the tenant was ready to give birth?
“You must be about to go to bed and I’m sure you need your sleep,” Claudia went on. The note of apology would have been more suited to an announcement that, most unfortunately, she was going to be a day or two late with the rent. “But if you could just give me some indication …” But then the politeness and frail pretense of efficiency fell away. “Help me! Could you? Dr. McKinley?”
“Call me Andy, for heck’s sake,” he growled, almost as helpless as she was.
She needed someone’s touch. Warm loving arms, kisses of reassurance and murmured words about how great she was doing, but he had no right. And he didn’t have rocks in his head. He’d got a grip about those.
“I don’t know what to do. I just don’t. This isn’t supposed to be happening.”
Okay, Andy, you’re a doctor, you’ve been here hundreds of times before, and if this is a little different, just ignore it and go with what you know …
“Not very much to do at this stage.” He kept his voice neutral and professional. “Everything’s fine and under control, I promise. Keep walking around if it helps. We can go up and down the sidewalk, if you want.” He took her arm and kept her pacing slowly, back and forth on the deck, while she took in his words.
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