Marie Ferrarella - A Bachelor and a Baby

The desire to kiss her was almost overpowering to Rick. But it was at odds with the renewed feeling of betrayal that seared through him. She obviously had moved on with her life and was now carrying some other man’s child.

“Are you all right?” he asked, his voice harsh with anger, with hurt.

She started to say something and had her breath stolen away before she could utter an intelligible sound. Her eyes widened as her hand flew to her abdomen.

“What’s the matter?” On his knees beside her, concern pushed aside his anger.

“The baby,” Joanna gasped, pushing the words out as best she could. “I think the baby’s coming.”

“You mean later.”

“I mean now.” Joanna clenched his wrist.

“Hold on,” Rick told her, beginning to rise to his feet. “I’ll go get help.” The death grip tightened on his wrist, yanking him back down to her.

“Rick, you are help.”

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earned a master’s degree in Shakespearean comedy and, perhaps as a result, her writing is distinguished by humor and natural dialogue. This RITA ®Award-winning author’s goal is to entertain and to make people laugh and feel good. She has written over one hundred books for Silhouette, some under the name Marie Nicole. Her romances are beloved by fans worldwide and have been translated into Spanish, Italian, German, Russian, Polish, Japanese and Korean.

To Joan Marlow Golan, with thanks for the homecoming

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Rick Masters wasn’t given to cruising around in his car. Certainly not in what was considered to be well past the shank of the evening.

It wasn’t as if he was at loose ends with nothing to do. A stack of reports waited for his perusal, a pile of documents needed his signature and hundreds of people had lives on the cusp of being rearranged, all on his say-so once he made up his mind about the relocation of the present corporate headquarters for Masters Enterprises.

This wasn’t the time to be driving around aimlessly on deserted streets.

Well, not aimlessly.

He hadn’t been aimless in a very long time. And no matter what he tried to tell himself, he knew exactly where he was going. He’d finally given in and looked her up in the telephone book an hour ago.

She still lived there. In the old house. The one he still dreamed about on balmy nights when his mind gave him no peace.

Like tonight.

Maybe it was a mistake, coming back. Maybe this was the one challenge he should have turned his back on.

Too late now.

Besides, leaving a question unanswered was too much like letting the challenge win. Ever since he could walk, he’d always been too competitive to allow that to happen.

He’d taken that light a little too fast. Rick raised his dark eyes to look in the rearview mirror. No dancing blue and red lights approached.

He had to be careful, he told himself. There was no sense in letting his emotions run away with him, stealing away his tendency to be careful.

The way they once had, leading him down a path where he was vulnerable.

It seemed like a million years ago.

It seemed like yesterday.

He glanced along the silent, sleeping streets where he had grown up. It felt strange, being back. Stranger still to know that she still lived here in Bedford. When he’d left, he’d purposely never asked about her. Never given in to his curiosity about just what path her life had taken. It was enough that it was away from him.

Out of sight was supposed to be out of mind.

Right now, the only thing that appeared to be out of mind was him, he thought. Ironic amusement curved his generous mouth as he turned right at the next corner. There was a shopping mall now. He could remember when it was just an orange grove.

Bedford had done a lot of growing up in the last eight years. Why not? He had.

And yet, had he? Part of him didn’t feel like the successful VP of Masters Enterprises. Part of him still felt like that young boy, head over heels in love with the wrong person. Except that then, he hadn’t thought she was the wrong person.

But he had learned.

Learned a lot of things. Mostly how to take the helm of his father’s company. He’d gotten to his present position on merit, not by coasting there because he was the boss’s son. If he’d coasted, no way would he have been able to take over operations after his father’s heart attack last October. The transition in management from father to son in the last six months had been an incredibly smooth one. And why not? All he did was live and breathe business these days. There was nothing else for him, not since he’d been betrayed by the last person in the world he would have thought capable of it.