Sheri WhiteFeather - Cherokee Dad

Then finally, on Heather’s eighteenth birthday, she’d come to him. Without the slightest hesitation, he’d made love to her, taking her virginity, making her his.

Yet no matter how many times they joined, how many hot, torrid nights they climaxed in each other’s arms, he feared the obsession, the emotional power she wielded over him.

Michael didn’t want to fall in love. He’d seen how it had affected his mother, the destruction it caused. The only man she’d ever loved, Michael’s freewheeling father, had kicked her square in the heart.

The way Heather had eventually done to him.

He should have never asked her to live with him. He—

“Michael?”

He cleared his mind. Or tried to. The past still seemed like the present—the frustration, the emotional turmoil, the fear. “What?”

“I need your help.”

He squinted. “With what?”

“With the baby.”

He glanced at Justin. The kid tested the perimeters of his confinement, holding on to the sides and rattling the cage. “How so?”

“I need you to commit to being his father.”

Michael’s pulse shot up his arm. “You said the West Coast family already thinks I am.”

“I know, but everyone else has to think that, too. If we don’t keep up the pretense they might find out the truth.”

“You have no right to ask this of me. To expect me to raise your brother’s son.”

“I’m not expecting you to do it forever. Just for a few months.”

He almost glanced at Justin again, then decided not to. What if the boy flashed one of those big, goofy grins? Smiled at him the way he’d smiled at Heather?

She set her coffee aside, and he suspected it had gone cold. As cold as the blood flowing through his veins. He didn’t want to play papa to Reed Blackwood’s baby, not even for a short time.

“I’ve worked out the details,” she told him. “I’ll stay in Texas for a few months, and we can feign a reunion. But our attempt to renew our relationship will fail, and I’ll leave town to start a new life. For appearance’s sake, we’ll keep in touch about the baby. You’ll be the concerned father without having to get too involved.”

He gave her an incredulous look. Did she think that feigning a relationship wasn’t getting involved? Or publicly claiming a child who wasn’t his?

“What makes you think I don’t have a new woman in my life, that I’m not dating someone?” he asked, reminding her of how long she’d been gone.

Her voice quavered. “Do you? Are you?”

“No.” But he was glad to see the suggestion had rattled her, that he’d planted a seed to make her wonder. The way he’d wondered for eighteen grueling months if she’d run off with another man, if that had been the reason she’d disappeared.

“You should have risked a phone call, Heather. You should have called me. Just once.”

“I wanted to. So many times, I wanted to.”

“But you didn’t.”

She glanced at the mist-fogged window, at the overcast light shadowing the room. “I thought about you every day.”

He’d thought about her, too. She was always there, the beautiful ghost from his past, the girl who’d disappeared.

She twisted her hands on her lap, and he noticed her nails were bitten to the quick. He considered apologizing for the barb about another woman, but decided he would sound like a wuss, like he was still obsessed with her.

He held his ground. “Why didn’t you think about me before you took off to California? Before you got tangled up in this mess?”

“You wouldn’t allow me to see my own brother. What was I supposed to do?”

Michael turned cynical. “Everything is always about Reed.”

“This is about Justin. An innocent child.” Her eyes turned watery. “Please understand. This is important. More important than you can imagine. Beverly’s dad will probably keep an eye on us, just to see if we hear from Reed. He’ll probably try to lure information from people we know. So I need to make sure everyone we socialize with believes Justin is our baby. If a rumor leaks that he could be Reed’s son—”

He cursed before she could finish her sentence. What in the hell was he supposed to do? Ignore her plea? Let the mob take the boy away from her?

“Two months,” he said. “And I’m explaining the entire farce to my uncle.”

“No!” She nearly flew off the sofa. “You can’t tell anyone. Not another living soul. This has to be our secret. The lie we take to our graves.”

“It isn’t right.” He hadn’t lied to his uncle since he was a kid, a smart-mouthed youth who hadn’t given a damn about anyone but himself.

“Please.” She went to the baby and picked him up. “Please.”

Michael frowned, and Justin took that moment to smile, to blow bubbles at him.

Damn. Damn. Damn.

“All right,” he said as the boy’s slobbery grin tunneled an unwelcome path straight to his cautious, it’ll-be-over-in-two-months heart.

The day passed quickly, but as evening rolled around, Heather grew more and more anxious.

Michael had gone to work that morning and that was the last she’d seen of him.

She’d kept busy, baby-proofing the house the best she could, moving Justin’s crib, unloading her rental car, preparing the guest room for Justin and herself.

She’d cleaned everything. She’d even dusted the third bedroom, the one filled with junk Michael had been storing for years.

And like Suzy-homemaker, she’d organized the kitchen cupboards, too.

Then she’d gotten the brilliant idea to fix dinner, believing quite foolishly that Michael would come home in time to eat.

The table was set and the food had gone cold. It wasn’t a fancy meal, considering the simple contents in Michael’s fridge, but she made a pretty good meat loaf. And he liked mashed potatoes, with pools of melting butter instead of gravy.

She sat at the table and fidgeted with a bowl of wilting green beans. She’d lost her appetite hours ago. Deciding to clean up, she headed to the kitchen for aluminum foil and plastic containers.

What was she doing? Trying to resume where they left off? If he hadn’t loved her then, what made her think he would fall in love with her now? That the next two months would change her life?

She needed Michael to help her set the stage, to establish Justin’s paternity, but beyond that, she had no right to expect anything more.

Want it, crave it, but not expect it.

She wrapped the meat loaf and scooped the potatoes into a plastic bowl, closing the vacuum-sealed lid. Then the front door rattled, and her heartbeat tripled.

Michael was home.

Should she greet him? Or continue clearing the table? Cursing her quaking hands, she chose the table. How could a man she’d known for over half her life make her so nervous?

Because she’d loved him for over half her life, and he’d always given her butterflies.

She heard him moving around in the living room. Removing his hat, most likely, brushing the moisture from his clothes.

She pictured him, as he was, tall and dark, amid the homespun furnishings. Michael had inherited the old farmhouse from his mother, a hardworking waitress who’d acquired it from her ancestors—German immigrants who’d settled in the Texas Hill Country.

The house bore hardwood floors, paned windows and hand-stenciled trim that dressed up door frames and plain walls. A live oak in the front yard stood guard throughout the year, and bluebonnets blanketed the ground every spring.

As Heather made a face at the green beans, wondering if she should toss them out, Michael entered the dining room.

“You made dinner?”

She looked up. His hair was long and loose and slightly damp. “Yes.” She wished she’d thought to remove the two place settings, the scented candle still burning. The romantic ambience, she thought. “Are you hungry? It’s cold, but I can reheat it.”