Tara Quinn - Her Secret, His Child

“You guys want some orange juice?” she asked.

“Yeah!” They chorused, never taking their eyes from the screen in front of them.

Glad of something to do, Karen headed for the kitchen to collect the two plastic cups with lids. Purple for Ashley. Yellow for Kayla. She filled them with juice, and while she was at it, she poured a glass of water for herself. Determined to be the type of wife a husband craved coming home to, she’d lost the weight quickly after Kayla’s birth. Especially since coming home was something Dennis did so infrequently.

And now, no matter how much she dieted, she was going to get fat again. Panic returned in force and she carried the drinks back into the living room—to the two little girls who thought she was great just as she was.

“Thank you, Mama,” Kayla said, sliding her chubby fingers into the handle of the cup.

“Thank you, Miss Karen.”

Ashley’s sweet smile almost brought tears to Karen’s eyes. But as she stood she caught a glimpse of her svelte figure in the mirror above the fireplace. How could she hope to keep Dennis interested in her while she was at home swelling up like an elephant and he was out doing business with remarkable, fashionable, intelligent women like Jamie? How was she ever going to compete?

How was she going to make it through another bout of midnight feedings, colicky crying and dirty diapers? Kayla meant the world to her; she’d give her life for her daughter in an instant. But she still felt trapped.

And might very well have another baby on the way. Washing down a sob with a sip of water, Karen turned back to the front window.

She just had to keep it together for a few more minutes. Then, once Jamie got there, maybe she could work up the courage to take the home pregnancy test she’d purchased that afternoon.

JAMIE STAYED UP late again that night. Doing Kyle Radcliff’s taxes. She wanted him gone from her life as soon as possible. She didn’t want to think about him. Didn’t want to remember the hours they’d spent talking. And more.

And she couldn’t think about Karen’s news, either. Hated the insidious envy that had been eating at her all evening as she pictured, again and again, the color change in that little vial this afternoon. Her friend was going to have another baby. Another legitimate baby. A privilege Jamie could only imagine. An impossible dream.

The Karens of this world had husbands. Their children had fathers. Jamie had men like Kyle Radcliff.

She knew what he’d wanted from their association five years ago. What he eventually got. And paid for. Anything else was irrelevant.

“Mommy?”

Or was it?

“Ash?” Jamie pushed away from her desk as the little girl scurried into the office, rubbing her eyes with a pudgy fist. “What’s wrong, baby?”

The footed bottoms of her pajamas scraping along the carpet, Ashley covered the distance between them and crawled onto her mother’s lap. “I waked up.”

Stifling the grin that rose easily to her lips as she gazed at the earnest face of her young daughter, Jamie gathered the child close and gently rocked her back to sleep. But, holding the tender weight against her heart, she couldn’t help wondering if she was waking up, too. From the wonderful dream world she’d created—back into the nightmare that was her life.

She couldn’t let that happen. Not at any cost.

And certainly not for a man who, with a look, a smile, a couple of eloquent words, could make her forget.

Especially not for him.

“PROFESSOR RADCLIFF? Jamie Archer here.” The heavy beating of her heart was due to the speed with which she’d made it from the garage to her office after dropping the girls off at school. Nothing more. With Karen’s news still fresh in her mind the next morning, Jamie was in a hurry to immerse herself in business. Or so she told herself.

“Jamie!” The pleasure in his voice was unmistakable. “I didn’t expect to hear from you so soon.” He paused. “And what’s this ‘Professor’ bit? I’m ‘Kyle,’ remember?”

Yeah. She remembered. “I’m missing some receipts.”

“Okay.”

His voice cooled a bit. And Jamie hated herself for being disappointed.

“I’ll see if I can find them. What do you need?”

Reading from the list she’d prepared before falling into bed early that morning, Jamie told him.

“I don’t know if I even have all this stuff, but I can check this afternoon,” he said. “Give me your address and I’ll bring them by this evening.”

“No!” Thinking only of Ashley, Jamie panicked. “I mean, um, I’ll be out this evening.” She paused. Swallowed. “Tomorrow’s soon enough. I’ll come to your office.”

“Since you’re going to be out, why don’t you come here to pick up the receipts tonight?” he asked, sounding more cheerful. “I’ll be home.”

“That won’t be necessary. Tomorrow at your office is fine.”

“It’s just that with some of this stuff, I’m not sure exactly what all you need. It might be better if you look things over yourself. It’ll probably save you another trip.”

Deforming a paper clip, Jamie blurted, “I might be out late.”

“Doesn’t matter. I’ll be up grading essays, anyway.”

It was hard to picture him as an English professor. She would have been much more comfortable if he’d turned out to be an ambulance-chasing lawyer or something.

“What kind of essays?” She didn’t want to know.

“We’re doing an in-depth study of Clemens, his political and religious views.”

“Huckleberry Finn.” She’d loved the American-literature class she’d taken on Samuel Clemens, alias Mark Twain.

“And ‘The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County.’”

“Tom Sawyer, ” she said, remembering.

“Yeah, what’s with Aunt Polly? You think she’s a woman ahead of her time—or a small-minded old bat?”

“She loved Tom.”

“You go for small-minded, huh?”

Jamie picked up another paper clip. “She did her best. Life hadn’t dealt her an easy hand, raising a hellion like Tom.”

“You think the cards you’re dealt are an excuse to be small-minded?”

“No!” Jamie almost laughed. And then caught herself. What was she doing? “And this has nothing to do with your taxes,” she reminded them both.

“So you’re coming by tonight?”

“I don’t think that would be a good idea.”

“Don’t trust yourself?”

“Of course I trust myself.” Jamie forced every bit of disapproving indignation she could muster into her reply.

“You don’t trust me?”

“Why wouldn’t I trust you?” Why, indeed? But that was something they weren’t going to talk about.

He rattled off the directions to his house. “Come anytime. I’ll be up,” he said. And then rang off before Jamie could tell him, in no uncertain terms, that she would not be stopping by his home that night, taxes or no.

When she rang back, she got his answering machine. Throughout the rest of that day, the man never answered his phone. Jamie didn’t know if it was her imagination that had her thinking he was purposely avoiding her—or if she was just growing unnaturally paranoid. But because she couldn’t get hold of him to make other arrangements and because she needed those receipts if she was going to get his taxes done and out of her life, she asked Karen to keep Ashley that evening.

IT HAD BEEN so LONG since he’d cared enough to impress a woman that Kyle was a little unsure of himself as he unpacked enough stuff to make his house look like home. A home minus most of his furniture, of course. There’d been a little mix-up with that.

Give him a classroom full of know-it-all six-foot punks who hated English, and he was comfortable. But give him an hour to win over a 110-pound woman with a heart of gold, and he was at a complete loss.