Christine Rimmer - A Bravo Christmas Reunion

Oh, God. She dreaded all that. And she’d been avoiding facing what she dreaded.

Because she understood Marcus well enough to know that he’d never turn his back on his child. Even though he’d always insisted he didn’t want children, now he was actually having one, everything would change. He was going to be responsible for a child. And Marcus Reid took his responsibilities with absolute seriousness.

He left at last. She went inside and shut the door and ordered her pulse to stop racing, her heart to stop bouncing around under her breastbone.

Marcus knew her secret now. Getting all worked up over the situation wasn’t going to make him go away.

Chapter Three

Marcus,

I don’t know where to start. So I guess I’ll just put it right out there. If you’re reading this it’s because you’re a father. I’ve just had your baby and this letter has been mailed to you because the baby is born and doing fine. The sticker on the envelope should tell you whether it’s a boy or a girl.

I’m so sorry. I know you’re furious with me about now. I don’t blame you. I should have told you before I left Seattle, but…well, I just couldn’t make myself do it.

So you’re learning this way. In a letter.

Try not to hate me too much.

Try not to hate me too much ….

Marcus read that sentence over twice. And then a third time.

After that, he loosened his tie. Then he dropped back across the hotel room bed and stared at the attractively coffered ceiling and thought how she was wrong: he didn’t hate her. True, what he felt for Hayley right then wasn’t pretty. It was fury and frustration and a certain wounded possessiveness all mixed up together.

But hate? Uh-uh. He wished he did hate her. It would make everything so much simpler.

He raised the letter and read the rest. She’d listed the address and phone number of the hospital she would be using. And also the information he already had—her own address and number.

She wrote at the bottom:

Try to understand. I realize this isn’t what you wanted. I swear I was careful. I guess just not careful enough.

Hayley

That was it. All of it. It wasn’t much more information than he’d already had.

He balled up the letter, raised his arm and tossed the thing into the corner wastebasket. Slam dunk.

What the hell to do now?

He was due back in Seattle tomorrow, for a series of meetings, the first of which he had on his schedule for 11:00 a.m. His company was poised for a big move into the Central California market. They were high priority, those meetings.

But then again, so was the kid he’d just found out he was having.

And so was Hayley. She needed him now, whether her pride would let her admit that or not.

Still flat on his back across the bed, he grabbed his PDA off the nightstand and dialed—with his thumb, from memory. She answered on the second ring.

“’Lo?” Her voice was husky, reminding him of other nights, of the scent and the feel of her, all soft and drowsy, in his bed.

“You were already asleep.” He didn’t mean it to come out sounding like an accusation, but he supposed that it did.

“Marcus.” She sighed. “What?”

“I’m flying out at 6:00 a.m. tomorrow. I’ve got meetings in Seattle I can’t get out of.”

“You’ve always got meetings you can’t get out of. It’s fine. I told you. I don’t expect—”

“I’ll clear my calendar in the next couple of days. Then I’ll come back.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“Yeah. I do. We both know I do. I’ll see you. Thursday. Friday at the latest. If you need me before then, call me on my cell. You still have the number?”

A silence, then, “I have it.”

“When’s the baby due?”

“January eighth.”

“You’re not working, are you?” He heard rustling, pictured her sitting up in bed, all rumpled and droopy-eyed, her hair tangled from sleep. “Hayley?”

Reluctantly, she answered, “Yes. I’m still working.”

“You shouldn’t be. And now you’ve finally told me about the baby, you don’t need to be. I’ll make arrangements right away.”

“Give me money, you mean.” She sounded downright bleak. She’d damn well better not try refusing his money. “I’m managing just fine. I like working and I feel great and I’m going to stay on the job until—”

“Quit. Tomorrow.”

“Uh. Excuse me. But this is my life you’re suddenly running. Don’t.”

“I’m only saying—”

“Don’t.”

He had no idea where she worked, or what she did there. His own fault. He’d just had to play it noble seven months ago, which meant only allowing the detective to get the basic information.

So that now he was forced to ask, “Where do you work, anyway?”

“I’m an office manager. For a small catering company. There’s the owner, the chef, the dishwasher and me. We’re in a storefront off of K Street. Around the Corner Catering. We do a pretty brisk business, actually. We’re hooked up with a staffing agency so we offer full service. Not only the food, but the staff, from setup to cleanup.”

“A caterer. You work for a caterer.”

“Yeah. Is that a problem for you?”

“It’s high-stress work and you know it. Chefs are notorious for being temperamental. You’re having a baby. You shouldn’t be in a stressful work environment. You should—”

“Don’t,” she said for the third time.

He let it go. Later, when he got back, they could discuss this again. He’d get her to see this his way—the right way. “I’ll be gone two days. Three at the most.”

“You said that.”

“No, I said I’d be back Thursday or Friday. On second thought, I should be able to make it sooner. Wednesday, I hope.”

“All right. Wednesday, then. Is that all?”

He hated to hang up with all this…tension between them. He should say something tender, he supposed. But nothing tender occurred to him. “We’ll work this out. You can count on me.”

“I know that.”

“Don’t worry.”

“I…won’t,” she said softly after a moment. Then, almost in a whisper, “Good night, Marcus.” Then a click.

He put the device back on the night table and laced his hands behind his head. A kid. It still didn’t seem possible. A child had never been part of his plans.

But plans changed. And sometimes allowances had to be made.

“His assistant called me at work an hour ago,” Hayley told Kelly when the sisters met for lunch the next day. “Her name is Joyce. She sounds very…efficient.”

“That’s good, right?” Kelly forked up a bite of Caesar salad.

Hayley turned her glass of Perrier in a slow circle. “I mean, not young, you know?”

Kelly swallowed and frowned, puzzled. “Not young…like you?”

Hayley turned her glass some more. “It shouldn’t matter, that he hired someone older to replace me.”

“But you’re glad he did.”

Hayley tried to deny it—and couldn’t. “I suppose I am. Even though, since I left, he’s been going out with a bunch of beautiful women.”

“Oh, really?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“How do you know that?”

“I still get Seattle magazine. I saw a picture of him in a tux.” She gazed wistfully down into her überpricey glass of bubbly French water. “He looks amazing in a tux. It was some opening of something. He had a drop-dead gorgeous blonde on his arm. He looked so…severe. And dangerous. And handsome—did I mention handsome?”

“Often.”

“Practically broke my poor little heart all over again.”

“Jerk.”

“No. He’s not a jerk. He’s…just Marcus, that’s all. He was true to me when we were together. As a matter of fact, he’s not real big on the bachelor lifestyle. But then, when we broke up, well, he would have considered it a point of honor, to prove to himself that he was over me.”