Beverly Barton - The Outcast

She opened the door, but stopped dead still when she realized what her aunt had done. The room was now a nursery. The baby bed that had belonged to both Aunt Margaret and her grandmother was the focal point of the room. A crocheted baby shawl lay in a cradle beneath the window. A padded rocking chair rested in the corner, and an open steamer trunk filled with antique toys had been placed against the right wall.

"It looks like a nursery." Reece followed Elizabeth into the room. "I'd say your aunt is trying to tell us that we're going to have children one of these days." He whirled Elizabeth around in his arms. "Would you like that, Lizzie? Would you like a houseful of children?"

"Would you, Reece?"

"Nothing would make me happier than for us to have a child. A little girl who looks just like you."

"Would a little boy do the first time? He won't look just like me, but he'll have my blue eyes."

"Are you saying you've looked into the future and seen our first child?"

"I didn't try to look into the future. It just happened."

Reece lifted Elizabeth off her feet. She wrapped her arms around him when he sat in the rocking chair with her in his lap.

"Wouldn't it be wonderful if our son was conceived on our wedding night here in this cottage.'' Reece slid his hand up and under Elizabeth's skirt to caress her thigh.

"I'm afraid he couldn't wait," Elizabeth said.

"What do you mean, he couldn't wait?"

"I'm already pregnant, Reece. Six weeks pregnant."

"You're what?" He sat up straight in the rocking chair, almost toppling Elizabeth to the floor. He grabbed her just as she began to slide off his lap.

Tightening her hold around his neck, she looked into Reece’s amber eyes-warm, glowing eyes, filled with love. "Come November, I'm going to give you a son."

"When did you find out?" Reece laid his hand across her stomach.

"I've known since the night he was conceived, our last night together. I knew before we made love."

"You wanted my child, even though I had nothing to offer you, even though I couldn't make a commitment?" He hugged her close, his lips covering hers in a tender kiss. "How did I get so lucky?" he whispered against her mouth. "Why me, out of all the men in the world?"

"Because we were meant for each other," Elizabeth said. "You came to me in my dreams, a stranger who entered my heart and never left it."

Reece held her in his arms as they sat in her great-grandmother's rocking chair. Late afternoon turned to evening while they sat in the honeymoon cottage and talked about their future. MacDatho found his way to the bedroom, curling his big body into a ball of black fur beside the rocking chair, occasionally glancing up at his mistress and the alpha male in her life.

Love knows no boundaries and cannot be confined. It transcends time and space. Love is the greatest power on earth and in heaven. Elizabeth and Reece did not question destiny's hand in their happiness; rather, they accepted fate's assistance as a blessing.