Feels Like Family (22 page)

She lifted her gaze to his and nodded. “I think I am.”

“Then I’ll pick you up at noon. No need to bring a present. I’ll get something from all of us.”

“From all of us?” she echoed. That would be a declaration of sorts.

He nodded. “Is that a problem?”

“No,” she said slowly. “No, it’s not a problem at all.”

For the first time, he gave her a full-fledged smile, then touched her cheek. “I’m glad you changed your mind,
querida
.”

It was the first time he’d used the endearment. It touched a place inside her that had been cold and lonely for way too long. “Me, too,” she said. “But let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves, okay?”

“How far is too far?” he asked. “Just so I understand the rules.”

Suddenly feeling more daring than she had in years, she told him, “No rules. Let’s just improvise.”

“Slow-track improv,” Elliott concluded. “I can do that. In fact, I’m looking forward to it.”

So was Karen. It didn’t mean she wasn’t scared. Nor did it mean the future was certain. But she was looking forward with anticipation, rather than panic and dread. It was a darn good feeling.

Helen got dressed after her examination, then went into the obstetrician’s office. She hadn’t been able to read anything from Dr. Matthew Dawson’s expression while he’d been poking and prodding her.

In his office, she sat across from him while he made notes in her chart. Her pulse scrambled wildly as she waited for the words that would confirm whether or not she was finally going to have the baby she wanted so badly.

Eventually he looked up, his expression grave. Once again, her pulse went crazy. Wouldn’t he look happy if she were pregnant? Or at least neutral?

“You’ve been really anxious to get pregnant, haven’t you?” he said at last. “We talked about it the last time you were here.”

Unable to speak, she nodded.

“Well, the good news is, you’ve gotten your wish. You’re definitely pregnant.”

Helen heard a
but
in there, a very worrisome
but
. “Why do I get the feeling you’re not as happy about that as I am?”

“I’m not unhappy,” he told her. “I’m just concerned. Your blood pressure’s not as low as I’d like to see it at this stage. With your history, it’s going to be very tricky for you to safely carry this baby to term.”

“I’ve been under some unexpected stress the past few days, but I’ll work harder to get it back down,” she promised eagerly. “I’ll do whatever you tell me. I want this baby more than anything.”

“Enough to agree to complete bed rest if I decide it’s necessary?” he inquired skeptically.

“Absolutely,” she said at once. She would find some way to work it out. She’d divert her clients to other attorneys. She’d hire a housekeeper. Whatever it took. Nothing was going to endanger this chance to become a mother.

“You say that now,” he said, “but you’re a very driven woman, Helen. That’s how you got yourself to this point. Stress is part of your daily life. How are you going to eliminate that?”

Seeing Brad Holliday arrested would certainly help, but she didn’t want to get into that. The doctor would probably recommend she spend her entire pregnancy on some nice, quiet island.

“I’ll take yoga classes. I’ll meditate. I’ll exercise.”

“All things you’ve been promising me for months that you’d do,” he reminded her.

“And I have,” she said. “At least most of the time.”

“Your blood pressure says otherwise.”

“I’ll do better,” she promised. “Really. I’ll be a model patient. Nothing means more to me than having a healthy baby.”

To her relief, he seemed to believe her as he wrote out prescriptions. “One’s for a prenatal vitamin. The other’s for a stronger diuretic than the one you’ve been on. We need to avoid water retention. Take them. And do all of those other things you promised. I want to see you again in two weeks, rather than a month. We’re going to need to monitor you closely if you’re to carry to term.”

“Can you tell how far along I am?”

“I’d say a month, maybe six weeks at the most. We’ll do an ultrasound next time and we’ll know more.” For the first time, he smiled. “Congratulations, Helen. I’ll do ev
erything I can to see that you have the healthy baby you want. You just need to do your part. Avoid stress above all else. Understood?”

“Yes,” she assured him.

She just had two stressful conversations to get through and hopefully by then Brad would be in jail. From then on, she intended to eliminate anything even faintly stressful from her life.

She decided she’d start by talking to Dana Sue. Once Dana Sue had calmed down, she might have some ideas about how she should tell Erik. And no matter how badly either of them reacted, Helen had to put it behind her. From now on this baby was her number-one priority. Period.

For three months Erik had been caught up in a situation he couldn’t explain, all but living with a woman who didn’t seem to have any expectations outside the bedroom. Helen wasn’t demanding. She didn’t seem to be interested in staking some sort of claim. All she cared about was the kind of hot, steamy sex men dreamed about. In fact, he was just about worn-out from all the late nights. As incredible as it had been, he couldn’t help thinking that there was something going on he didn’t totally understand, especially over the past week.

He knew Helen had been annoyed with his protectiveness despite her own concern that Brad Holliday might come after her, but it was more than that. She’d been quieter than usual, more withdrawn, especially since Caroline Holliday had wound up in the hospital. He would have chalked it all up to fear, but Helen was the kind of woman who faced fear head-on. He was beginning to get a sinking feeling that this had more to do with him.

He was on his way into the kitchen at Sullivan’s when he heard raised voices coming from Dana Sue’s office. He recognized his boss’s and then Helen’s. Unable to stop himself, he walked closer to the door.

“Dammit, Helen, what were you thinking?” Dana Sue shouted. “How could you do something like this? Maddie knows, doesn’t she? That’s what she’s been so annoyed about lately.”

“Maddie guessed, but I don’t see what you’re getting so worked up about,” Helen replied stiffly. “You knew all along that Erik and I were spending time together. Heck, we’ve been living together ever since Brad Holliday became a threat.”

“Of course, and I couldn’t have been happier,” Dana Sue said. “You two are great for each other. I’ve been waiting for weeks now to have one of you admit you were falling in love. Instead, you come in here, tell me you’re pregnant and that you’re dumping him. You’ve used him, accomplished your goal, and that’s it? How could you, Helen?”

Erik stood rooted in place as Dana Sue’s words sank in. Helen was pregnant? How the hell had that happened? She’d told him… What
had
she told him? He searched his mind, trying to remember a single conversation they’d had about birth control. Surely way back at the beginning they’d talked about it, he thought. Then he recalled one hastily uttered claim from her that everything was okay, that he didn’t need to worry. He’d taken her at her word. Why wouldn’t he? Helen was supposedly one of the most trustworthy people in town.

And now she was pregnant? And if he was correctly interpreting the gist of her conversation with Dana Sue, that had been her plan all along? She’d apparently wanted a
baby and chosen him to help her make one, despite his oft-repeated statements that kids were not in the cards for him.

A blind rage swept through him. Before he could think about it or reconsider, he pushed open the door and stalked into Dana Sue’s cramped office. Both women regarded him with dismay. He faced Dana Sue first.

“Out,” he said tersely.

She scrambled from behind her desk, gave him one last sympathetic look and left.

After her initial shock, Helen faced him with a surprisingly calm expression. “I gather you heard.”

“Enough,” he said. “Maybe you ought to start from the beginning, though, and spell it out for me. I want to be sure I have all the facts straight.”

“It’s nothing for you to be upset about,” she began in a reasonable tone that made him want to start breaking things.

“Maybe you should let me decide just how upset I want to get,” he retorted. “You’re pregnant, is that right?”

She nodded. “But I don’t expect anything from you. I’m happy about this, Erik. Really happy. I’ve wanted a baby more than anything for a long time now.”

“More than anything,” he echoed, ice in his voice and in his veins. “But you saw no need to mention that to me?”

“Actually we have talked about it, at least in a general way,” she reminded him.

“A general way?” he echoed. “Oh, yes, I do remember that. But I don’t recall a single mention of the role you intended for
me
to play. Didn’t you consider that perhaps I ought to have at least
some
say?”

She swallowed hard. “I see your point. I probably should have discussed it with you.”

Erik saw red. “Probably?” he all but shouted, then fought to bring his temper under control.

She regarded him earnestly. “Erik, I swear to you that I can give this baby everything it needs. You’re under no obligation to be part of his or her life at all. It’s not as if I did this to trap you or something.”

“Which doesn’t exactly deal with the real issue, does it?” he said. Clenching his fists to keep from grabbing her and shaking her, he said, “And if I
want
to be a part of the baby’s life?”

That seemed to rock her back on her heels. “What?”

“I asked you how you feel about me being involved in the baby’s life.”

“I told you it’s not necessary,” she said. “I know you don’t want children.”

“And yet here we are,” he said sarcastically, “with you pregnant with my baby.”

“But there’s no reason for you to feel obligated,” she insisted again. “This is my baby. I take full responsibility for what happened.”

“It happened because you made it happen,” he said. “Isn’t that right?”

She winced. “I suppose you could say that. I knew it was a possibility.” At his scowl, she said, “Okay, I did everything possible to make it happen, which is why I’m taking responsibility and expecting nothing from you.”

“It doesn’t work like that, sugar,” he said grimly, not sure if he was more furious about her decision to have this baby without consulting him, or about her willingness to shut him out of their lives as if he’d been nothing more than some anonymous sperm donor.

Granted he hadn’t ever planned on becoming a father,
not after losing his baby when his wife died. The pain of that loss had stuck with him and was something he couldn’t bear to risk repeating.

Nor had he thought about marrying again, especially not to Helen. Their casual relationship with no demands, mind-blowing sex and mind-challenging conversation had suited him just fine. Now, suddenly, all of that had changed and he didn’t intend to be shut out of her life or their child’s.

He grabbed the chair from behind Dana Sue’s desk and set it down right in front of Helen, then straddled it. Given the room’s lack of space, she had no wiggle room at all. She had no choice but to stay where she was and listen.

“Here’s the way it’s going to be,” he said, looking at her intently. Despite the shock he’d felt when he’d heard the news, he was as certain of what needed to happen next as he’d ever been of anything. “You’ve gotten your way apparently. You’re pregnant. Now I’m going to do what
I
want. Are you listening, Helen? I really need you to hear every word of this.”

She nodded, her eyes wide, her expression shaken.

“You and I will get married,” he said flatly. “We will go through this pregnancy together. After the baby’s born, if you still want to be some kind of supermom on your own, we’ll talk about a divorce, but I will have shared custody of our child. That’s it.”

She regarded him with an unmistakably panicked expression. “You can’t be serious.”

“I’m as serious as a heart attack.”

“But why?”

“Because I lost one baby and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it. I won’t lose another. And if you think I’ll change my mind once I’ve had time to think things
through or that you’ll just postpone and delay your way out of making a commitment, think again.”

“You can’t
make
me marry you,” she protested. “We’re not in love.”

“You should have thought of that before you hatched this cockamamie scheme of yours,” he said mildly. “Console yourself with this. At least you know the sex will be great.”

He got up and left the room.

It was only after he was in the kitchen—and Dana Sue had bolted in the direction of her office—that he realized he wasn’t nearly as upset about the idea of marriage as he’d thought he’d be. He might be shaking with rage over being duped. He might be panicky at the thought of losing yet another child. Helen was, after all, forty-three and at a high risk for carrying a baby all the way to term.

But as his temper cooled, he knew that being with Helen for the rest of his life was something he’d wanted for a long time now and been too scared to go after. It seemed fate—with a very deliberate and calculating assist from Helen—had stepped in and forced his hand.

“O
h, my God, what have I done?” Helen said when Dana Sue came back to check on her.

“Offhand, I’d say you’ve stirred up a hornet’s nest,” her friend said without much sympathy. “I’m a little surprised to find you in one piece. I thought I saw steam rising from Erik when he came back to the kitchen. I’ve never seen him like that before. Just how mad was he?”

“He says he’s going to marry me,” Helen said, regarding Dana Sue with bewilderment. “I don’t think he’s going to take no for an answer.”

For the first time since Helen had broken the news of her pregnancy, Dana Sue’s dire expression softened. “Well, now, that’s an interesting turn of events, though not entirely unexpected.”

“It’s not funny and it is totally unexpected,” Helen grumbled. “I didn’t want to trap him into marrying me. That was the last thing on my mind.”

“Maybe it shouldn’t have been,” Dana Sue told her. “Surely you know the kind of guy Erik is. He’s solid and dependable and protective. You’ve seen that firsthand in the way he looks out for me and Annie. Didn’t you stop for
one second to think about how he’d be with a baby involved, especially
his
baby?”

“Okay, I get that he feels a little protective about the baby, especially with what’s happened to Caroline Holliday, but marriage? Isn’t that going too far?”

“Obviously he doesn’t think so,” Dana Sue replied.

“But what about love?” Helen asked wistfully.

Once more Dana Sue regarded her with a complete lack of sympathy. “Another of those things you should have thought about before you decided to take matters into your own hands. Besides, you two have strong feelings for each other, anyone can see that. Call it whatever you want, but it seems close enough to love to me. Even though I’m not one bit happy about the underhanded way you went about this, I still think this is the best thing that could have happened to you. Otherwise, you two might’ve danced around your feelings for years. You’re both too stubborn for your own good. Seems to me this is exactly the push you both needed to get you where you should be.”

“But none of this was about getting married,” Helen protested.

Dana Sue grinned. “Well, it is now.” She reached for the calendar on her desk. “So, let’s pick a date. If there’s going to be a wedding, I need time to plan. And I assume, given your pride in your appearance and your preference for designer clothes and fancy footwear, you won’t want to be the size of a whale when you walk down the aisle. In that case it had better be soon.”

Helen scowled at her. “There’s not going to be a wedding,” she said grimly.

Dana Sue merely smiled. “Wanna bet? I’d suggest you get with the program, or the most important day of your
life will happen and you won’t have control over one single detail.”

“No wedding,” Helen repeated.

Dana Sue went on as if she hadn’t spoken. “Tell you what, we can meet Maddie at the spa tomorrow morning and start making lists. You’ll love that. We can go over all this with her at eight. I can’t wait to see her face when you tell her the news.”

“She won’t be as shocked as you might think,” Helen muttered. “She tried to warn me I was going about this all wrong, even though she couldn’t get me to acknowledge what I was doing.”

“I still hate it that she figured this out and I didn’t have a clue,” Dana Sue groused. “I must have been so wrapped up in what was going on in my own life with Ronnie that I never saw this coming. I’m going to have to watch that, especially if you’re going to get into the habit of trying to keep things from me.”

“It wasn’t like that,” Helen argued. At Dana Sue’s arched brow, she amended, “Not exactly anyway. I just knew you’d try to talk me out of it or warn Erik and ruin everything.”

“Maybe if I had found out, you wouldn’t be about to marry a man who’s furious with you,” Dana Sue suggested.

“I keep telling you that we are
not
getting married,” Helen countered.

“I think you need to get over that refrain,” Dana Sue said. “Nobody’s going to buy it, not once they’ve crossed paths with Erik and seen the determination in his eyes, anyway. Let’s just get together with Maddie tomorrow and put this wedding together the way you want it.” Her mood visibly improved. “This is going to be so much fun.”

“Forget the wedding,” Helen said again. “Ganging up on me is not going to work. And since when do you and Maddie side with an outsider against one of your own?”

“When it’s the right thing to do,” Dana Sue said without hesitation. “You and Erik are good for each other. You’ll be terrific parents, too.”

“You make it sound like we’ll be some happy little family holding barbecues in the backyard,” Helen grumbled. “You said it yourself, Dana Sue. He’s furious with me. That’s what this is about. Nothing good can come from a marriage that starts like that. I won’t do it. None of you can bully me into it.”

But even as she said the words, she, too, recalled the determination in Erik’s eyes—the same determination Dana Sue had obviously seen—and shuddered. Maybe she should look up the law on whether a woman could be forced to marry against her will. She was pretty sure it was on her side, but if there was some loophole she didn’t know about, there wasn’t a doubt in her mind that Erik would find it.

Barb had a stack of messages waiting for Helen when she got to her office the next morning, after skipping the little tête-à-tête that Dana Sue had planned for eight o’clock. She had a hunch she was going to pay for that act of rebellion, but she hadn’t been up to facing her two best friends and their current mission to see that she got properly married to a man who was forcing a wedding only because he was angry.

“Ten of those messages are from Erik,” Barb said, her expression filled with curiosity. “He seemed edgy. Is something going on?”

“I moved out of his place yesterday,” Helen said. “And I didn’t take any of his calls last night.”

Barb stared at her in shock. “Why on earth would you do that, especially now with Brad Holliday on some sort of rampage?”

“It was the right thing to do,” Helen said. She’d had her things out of his place by seven o’clock, long before he was likely to be home from Sullivan’s. If she hadn’t had a such a busy schedule for the next couple of weeks, she would have packed and headed for some tropical island to relax until Erik’s temper cooled down and he dropped this whole marriage insanity.

Helen had been a little surprised that Erik had gotten so upset over her departure. Surely he’d known they couldn’t go on living under the same roof. She’d said as much in the note she’d left so he wouldn’t worry that Brad had kidnapped her or something. Apparently that had only given him another reason to be angry with her, as the tenor of his messages revealed. Barb had clearly picked up on that, as well, because she was scowling at Helen.

“That man is the best thing that ever happened to you,” Barb scolded her. “Why would you want to sabotage that?”

“Look, things happen. People change. Emotions can’t be trusted. It was time to move on.”

Barb’s eyes suddenly filled with understanding. “In other words, you got scared. He wanted more than you were prepared to offer and you panicked.”

Helen didn’t see any reason to share the whole truth with Barb, even though her secretary was more friend than employee. Right now, the fewer people who were in on the mess she’d made of things, the better.

“Something like that,” she agreed. “Now, if you’re all through digging around in my personal life, I think I’ll go in my office and get some work done.”

Barbara regarded her with a disappointed expression. “Whatever you say,” she said stiffly. “Just tell me what you want me to do when Erik—”

Helen cut her off. “I’m not taking his calls.”

“But—”

“Don’t argue with me,” she said, noting that Barb simply shrugged and gave in to Helen’s command.

Two seconds later she understood why her secretary had capitulated so easily. Erik walked in practically on her heels and slammed the door shut. Obviously Barb had been trying to tell her he was on his way over. Helen concluded she really did need to start listening to people, instead of issuing orders.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, giving him one of her haughtiest glares.

“You never used to ask dumb questions,” he said, taking a seat on the sofa and patting the space beside him.

Helen deliberately walked behind her desk and sank wearily into her chair. “Go ahead. Say whatever’s on your mind. I know you’re mad.”

“And worried,” he said. “Let’s not forget that a crazy man could be stalking you, yet you decided to take off from someplace where you might be safe. Since when did you turn into the kind of woman who would take foolish risks just to avoid a confrontation, especially one you know you can’t avoid forever anyway?”

Helen shivered. Somehow, in her haste to get away from Erik’s before things got worse than they already were, she’d discounted the danger Brad Holliday presented.

“I’m sure the police knew where I was,” she replied. “They’re supposed to be keeping an eye on me.”

“That makes me feel all warm and fuzzy, sort of the way I felt when I couldn’t reach you for hours on end.”

Even under the unmistakable edge of sarcasm, she could hear real concern in his voice. “I’m sorry you worried,” she said sincerely. “That’s why I left you a note, so you’d know where I was. I just thought it was for the best that I go home.”

“Best for whom?”

“Both of us,” she told him.

“And the baby? Is it best for the baby that you could have been putting your life at risk just so you could get away from any uncomfortable questions I might ask?”

“It’s not your questions I’m worried about,” she retorted. “It’s your demands.”

“Running away won’t change that,” he said quietly. “We
will
get married, Helen.”

The emphatic note in his voice left her shaken. “But why?”

“Because my child is going to have my name. It’s going to grow up with a mother and a father, no matter what kind of patchwork, nutty relationship we manage to have.”

Helen shook her head and sighed. “Who would have thought you’d be so traditional? A few days ago, all you cared about was great sex and some lively conversation from time to time.”

He gave her a wry look at her assessment of their relationship, then shrugged. “Okay, I’ll admit it. It surprises the hell out of me, too. But that’s the way it is. Get used to it. Who knows, you might turn out to be traditional, too.”

A part of Helen yearned for just that, but she didn’t see
how it was possible when a marriage started off as unconventionally as this one would if Erik forced it on her. And even if it somehow lasted, she would always wonder if he loved her or if he was just making the best of a situation he hadn’t chosen, a situation she’d thrust upon him in her blind rush to get something she wanted.

He leaned forward and regarded her intently. “Let’s forget the whole marriage thing for a minute. There’s a safety issue here for you and the baby. You need to come back to my place, Helen. Now’s not the time for you to be living alone.”

“I’ll be fine,” she insisted.

“You won’t even consider it?” he asked in frustration.

“No.”

“Then let me move into your place,” he suggested.

She gave him an incredulous look. “I think you’re missing the point. I’m trying to pull off a clean break.”

He actually smiled at that. “And I’ve already told you that’s not going to happen. Right now, the only thing you’re going to accomplish is knotting my muscles up like pretzels.”

She frowned. “How am I going to do that?”

“Have you tried spending the night in the front seat of a car?”

She stared at him incredulously. “What? Are you crazy? You’re actually telling me you’re going to sleep in your car in front of my house?”

“You’re not giving me a choice. My back will have kinks in it for months after being out there last night. I’d prefer not to repeat the experience, but until Brad’s in custody or you and I are married and living together, then I have to keep an eye on you somehow.”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she complained. “You know you’re being ridiculous, don’t you?” Still, she had to admit that it was rather sweet of him to care that much.

“I don’t see it that way,” he said. “Nothing is happening to you or the baby on my watch.”

Her gaze clashed with his, but he didn’t flinch. “You’re serious, aren’t you?” she said, resigned.

“You bet.”

“Fine. I’ll come back to your place, but I’m staying in the guest room.”

He shrugged. “Up to you.”

Apparently satisfied, he stood up and headed to the door, then turned back. “By the way, the wedding’s the last Saturday of the month. Dana Sue and I’ve agreed on that much. We’ll hold the ceremony in the park and the reception at Sullivan’s. I’ve made all the arrangements.”

He was gone before she could react. She wasn’t sure which made her more furious, that he’d had the gall to make plans without her, that he’d involved one of her best friends, or that he didn’t seem to care what her reaction was. He just assumed she’d go along with them.

She was still seething with indignation over that when Dana Sue and Maddie breezed in, armed with bridal magazines, color swatches and albums of floral arrangements. Obviously they’d joined forces with Erik.

“Since you didn’t show up at the spa, we went ahead and narrowed down the choices,” Dana Sue said cheerily. “It’ll save time. We only have three weeks to pull this off if you’re going to be your fashionable, svelte self. After that, your body will start to change and your dress might require too many last-second alterations.”

“So, you chose the date based on my dress size?” she
asked incredulously. “That may be even more absurd than the idea of us getting married at all.”

“Sweetie, I think that ship has sailed,” Dana Sue said. “Erik’s pretty determined.”

“Since when is this wedding all about what Erik wants?” Helen asked petulantly.

“Having a baby was all about what
you
wanted. Seems fair he gets a turn,” Dana Sue replied. “Besides, he seems a little more into it than you are. I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again—maybe you ought to get with the program.”