The Cowboy and the New Year's Baby (13 page)

Of course, he hadn’t counted on delivering a baby, either. Who could have guessed that that simple act of rescuing a lady in distress would tumble his whole view of the world into disarray?

Before he could analyze the meaning of all that, he arrived at the store, only to realize that he’d instinctively arrived early. Maybe subconsciously he’d wanted that stolen moment alone with Trish, after all.

As long as he was the first one parked on the block, he couldn’t very well hide out in the truck until the other guests started showing up. He might as well go inside and see what he could do to help.

He opened the door to chaos. Sharon Lynn and Trish were running around like crazy trying to get all the food arranged on folding tables they’d set up across the back of the store. Laura was in her carrier screaming at the top of her lungs, furious at being ignored. Trish took one look at him and latched on to his arm as if it were a lifeline.

She cast a look from him to her daughter and pleaded, “Do something. I thought she’d sleep through this, but she hasn’t stopped crying. I don’t have a second to pace the floor with her, not if everything’s going to be ready when people get here.”

“Leave her to me,” he soothed. “Looks to me like you and Sharon Lynn have everything just about ready. Laura and I will take a little walk around the place, so she can get acquainted with the business.”

“Bless you,” she said fervently.

“No problem.” He scooped his favorite miniature person out of her carrier and settled her against his chest. “Hey, sweet thing, let’s you and me go check out the children’s books. Maybe we can find you a bedtime story. How does that sound?”

To his amusement, Laura gurgled appreciatively. Trish shot him a look of pure venom.

He winked. “Your mama can’t stand it that you and I have a thing going,” he advised the baby. “Personally, I think she’s jealous.”

“No, what she is, is frazzled,” Trish declared, slapping a plate of fresh vegetables and dip onto the table so hard that the dip splattered. “Now look what you made me do.”

“It’s okay,” Sharon Lynn soothed. “We just plop the plate on top of the stain and no one will notice a thing.”

Hardy headed for the children’s books to get out of the line of fire. He figured if he weren’t careful, the next plate was likely to end up in his face.

Unlike the huge chairs in front of the fire, the only chair in the children’s section was meant for someone about a quarter of his size. He managed to scrunch down on it, while he selected a board book that looked as if it was about Laura’s speed.

“Goodnight Moon,”
he said, reading the cover. “Sounds like a winner to me.” He held it up for Laura’s approval. He took her gurgles for a yes. He turned the thick pages slowly, reading to the baby and showing her the pictures. He was pretty much engrossed in the simple story when he heard the front door open and close, followed by a hoot of masculine laughter.

“Will you look at that?” Harlan Patrick said. “The world’s most dedicated bachelor has taken to reading stories to the baby.”

“Can this bachelorhood be saved?” Slade Sutton chimed in.

“Oh, stop it,” Val ordered before Hardy could get up and silence both men with a punch. “I think it’s wonderful.”

“I agree,” Laurie said.

Hardy felt his cheeks flame. “I was just helping Trish out. The baby was upset and she had things to do and—”

“It’s okay,” Val soothed. “Don’t pay any attention to the two of them. They’re cretins.”

Slade bent down and kissed the tip of her nose. “That’s not what you were saying last night.”

“Last night I was deluded into thinking that you had a sensitive side,” she countered.

More people flowed into the room, filling it to capacity with laughter and conversation. Slade’s daughter joined them before her father’s teasing could veer into dangerous territory. “Oh, she’s darling,” Annie cooed. “Can I hold her?”

Hardy hesitated.

“I’ll be real careful,” she promised.

“Over in the chair,” Val instructed. “And you don’t budge.”

Hardy followed Annie to the chair and delivered Laura to her with some regret. “Just holler if you want me to come and get her.”

“She’ll be fine,” Annie said, gazing at the baby with a rapt expression. She glanced up at Val. “When are you and Daddy—”

“Don’t even go there,” Slade said. “I’m just now getting the hang of being a father to you.”

“That means you’ve had plenty of practice,” Annie countered. “I need a baby brother or sister.”

“It isn’t about what you need,” Val declared. “Your father and I will decide when the time is right to expand our family.”

The look she gave her husband suggested to Hardy that the time was a whole lot closer than Slade suspected.

Suddenly feeling as if he were intruding, Hardy
searched for Trish in the growing mob scene, then moved off in her direction. She was standing apart from the crowd, looking a little shell-shocked by the sheer number of people who’d turned out for the grand opening.

“Looks like you have a success,” he observed, moving to her side.

“I never had this many people turn out for my year-end sale in Houston,” she said, her expression dazed. “And I gave really good discounts. I owe this to the Adamses, I’m sure. Their approval counts for a lot around here.”

“No,” he corrected. “You owe it to all your hard work and planning. Don’t sell yourself short.”

“I wasn’t. It’s just that this is amazing. I had no idea so many people would come. What if we run out of food?”

“Sharon Lynn made more than enough. Besides, most of these people just like getting together. The food’s a bonus.”

“I wonder if I should have hired a cashier for today,” she asked worriedly. “Several people have wanted to make purchases.”

“They’ll be back. I think it’s better that the party is just to show the place off.” He glanced around. “It makes a good impression, doesn’t it? Did it turn out the way you envisioned?”

“You know it did,” she said. “Thanks to you.”

“They were your ideas. I was just the muscle.”

“Still, I can’t thank you enough.”

Her gaze met his, and he felt his head spin. “Trish…”

Whatever he’d been about to say was lost, because she stood on tiptoe and kissed him. It was the same kind of chaste peck on the cheek he’d given her when he’d taken her home on their date. Suddenly, though, he hated the polite little charade, the mockery of the passion that a kiss between them could be.

Before she could move away, he turned his head and captured her mouth beneath his. He took full advantage of her startled gasp, tasting her, savoring the shock of sensations swirling through him, the slight trembling he could feel in her.

When he finally released her, she stared at him mutely, her lips swollen, her eyes bright.

“We need to talk about this,” he said tersely, all too aware that the room had gone silent and that they were being watched with evident fascination. “Later. I’ll come back when this is over.”

Trish nodded.

Because he didn’t want to explain to anyone what had just happened—wasn’t even sure he could explain it—Hardy fled.

He figured he had an hour, two at most, to get a grip on the emotions churning inside him. Otherwise, when he came back here tonight, he was going to break every vow he’d ever made to himself and to Trish.

T
rish sensed that she and Hardy were at a major turning point in their relationship. The barely restrained lust simmering between them was about to sizzle out of control. She was no longer in control of her own reactions to him and, she suspected, he was losing his tight rein on his responses to her.

As the party swirled around her, she went through the motions of being a proper hostess. She chatted innocuously, skirted prying questions from the Adamses about Hardy’s sudden disappearance, and made sure everyone ate their fill of scones and little sandwiches.

After a few minutes of forcing herself to play the role, it began to come naturally. She finally remembered the purpose of the party beyond simply show
ing off the store. She asked people about their book preferences, making mental notes for her next order. She queried them about other items that they wished a local store would carry and collected a whole list of ideas for a gift section.

All the while she kept track of the time, counting the minutes until the afternoon tea was scheduled to end. She knew Hardy would wait until the last guest was gone before making an appearance. Her pulse zipped as she mentally skipped ahead by an hour or so.

What exactly did he want to talk about? The kisses? The barely leashed passion? Was that something someone could sit down and discuss as rationally and dispassionately as the weather? She doubted it. She knew she couldn’t. She had never before felt the out-of-control spinning sensations that Hardy’s touch set off in her. She had nothing to compare them to, no idea if they were the sort of responses that cooled once they’d been allowed to rush wickedly to a natural conclusion.

Maybe Hardy, with all of his practice, could put a name to what was going on between them. But as badly as she wanted to label and identify it, so she could deal with it as straightforwardly as she paid invoices or balanced a checkbook, it irked her that he might have answers that she herself did not.

“Everything okay?” Sharon Lynn asked, studying her worriedly. “You’re not too tired, are you? After all, it’s only been a couple of months since you had the baby. You’ve been pushing yourself to get ready for this.”

“It’s okay,” Trish told her. “I’m fine. I just have a lot on my mind.”

“A lot or one particular man?” Sharon Lynn asked.

“A lot,” Trish insisted.

Sharon Lynn grinned, her expression filled with skepticism. “Whatever you say, but I saw that kiss. If it had been me on the receiving end of it, I’d still be weak-kneed.”

Before Trish could respond to that, Sharon Lynn patted her hand. “Don’t worry. People are starting to leave. I’ll stick around and help you clean up.”

“No,” Trish said a little too emphatically.

Sharon Lynn’s eyes widened. “Someone else coming back to help?”

“No, of course not. I just meant it can wait till morning. Since I’m not officially opening until next Friday, I’ll have plenty of time to put things back in order.”

“Cleaning up is part of the caterer’s responsibility,” Sharon Lynn countered.

“But you’re not a real caterer, so it doesn’t count,” Trish said, trumping her argument. “Don’t fight me on this. You and your family have done more than enough to help out today.”

“Okay. Then I’ll just go and try to shoo everyone else out of here, graciously, of course.”

Trish wasn’t about to argue with that plan. “Thank you,” she said fervently.

She forced herself to say goodbye to the last of the well-wishers. As soon as Sharon Lynn was gone, Trish brought the still-sleeping baby into the front
so she could keep an eye on her. Then she sank down in a chair in front of the fireplace and kicked off her shoes with a sigh of relief.

She closed her eyes and allowed herself to savor the sweet success of the event. If half the people who’d said they’d be back on Friday came, she would do a booming business on her first day. Her first catalogue for this new location would go into the mail tomorrow. And the next day she would get her Web page up and running so that Internet orders could start coming in. By this time next week, she would have the first indications of whether her decision to stay here had been a sound one, at least from a business perspective.

On a personal level the jury was still definitely out. As if just thinking that had conjured him up, Hardy returned, pausing in the doorway.

“All clear?”

“The meddlers have pretty well vanished, content with their day’s work,” she said wryly.

He closed the door, then turned the lock, his gaze never once leaving her face. On his way across the room, he seemed to make himself look away, then paused by the food.

“Can I bring you something?”

“Any scones left?”

“A few. Orange, cinnamon-raisin and plain.”

“One of each.”

“With this fancy cream stuff?”

She grinned at his description of the very expensive clotted Devonshire cream that Sharon Lynn had
somehow tracked down. “Of course. A little raspberry jam, too.”

“You’ve got it.”

He handed her a plate loaded down with the bite-size scones. His own plate had a half-dozen little ham and biscuit sandwiches and miniature barbeques. He’d even poured them each a glass of the still-cold punch.

“You look beat,” he said, studying her worriedly.

“It’s a good kind of beat,” she said.

“Today was a triumph, wasn’t it?”

“I don’t know if I’d go that far, but it did surpass my wildest expectations.”

He finished his sandwiches, then leaned forward, his elbows propped on his knees, and regarded her intently. “Now what, Trish? What’s the game plan?”

“Game plan?”

He gestured toward her and then the baby. “Will you stay at Kelly’s so she can baby-sit? Find that house you talked about? Move on?”

He said the last as if he fully expected her to seize that option, despite today’s success.

“Why would you think I’d be moving on? Especially after today? This is it, Hardy. The store’s about to open. I intend to become a part of the community here. I’ll probably start to look for my own place this week.”

He nodded, again with that vaguely relieved expression that she’d caught once or twice before.

“Hardy, tell me about your family.” She had the
feeling that once she knew about his past, she could finally unravel the mystery of Hardy Jones.

His head snapped up. “My family? Why would you bring them up?”

“Because you never talk about them. I know you must have one. You reacted pretty violently when I brought up your mother. You mentioned your grandmother when we named Laura, but beyond that you’ve never said a word. Where’s your father?”

“Dead,” he said tersely and with no obvious sign of regret.

“And your mother?”

He shrugged indifferently. “No idea.”

Trish stared at him. “You have no idea where your mother is?”

“She left when I was a kid. She took my sister with her. I haven’t heard from either of them since. End of story. Can we talk about something else?”

With a sudden flash of insight Trish began to see the pattern that had been established in his life at a very early age. She wanted to talk about this, wanted to make him see that that early abandonment was probably the reason he never dated the same woman for more than a few weeks. He always wanted to be the one to go, rather than start to care and face another desertion. Suddenly she understood as she never had before why he kept asking if she intended to move on, despite all the evidence to the contrary. Her heart broke for him.

She sat forward and impulsively reached for his hand. Only when his gaze finally locked with hers
did she say softly, “I’m not going anywhere, cowboy. I’m here to stay.”

Rather than reassuring him, her words had him jerking away. “You can’t make a promise like that,” he retorted. “Things change.” He struggled visibly until his temper cooled. “Life goes on.”

Trish wanted to reassure him, almost pressed the point, but in the end she fell silent. Maybe she shouldn’t make promises she had no way of knowing if she’d keep in the long run. She’d made a commitment to staying in Los Piños, but beyond that? Would she allow a full-blown relationship to develop with Hardy, a man who embodied all the traits she’d come to distrust in a man? Or would she, too, abandon him as too great a risk? She couldn’t bear the thought of being one more in a string of women to hurt him so cruelly.

And so she stayed silent.

The only sound in the room was the crackling of the fire and the baby’s soft whimpers as she finally stirred. Hardy reached for Laura before she was fully awake, settling her in his arms as naturally as if she belonged there. Only then did some of the tension in his face finally fade.

It was ironic, Trish thought, watching the two of them. Her daughter might well be the only female on the face of the earth that Hardy truly trusted, the only one he allowed himself to love. Seeing them together, some of Trish’s reservations began to crack. How could she not fall a little bit in love with a man who was so obviously infatuated with her
daughter, a man who’d put aside his own fears to bring her safely into this world?

“You’re so wonderful with her,” she said softly.

“Maybe it’s because she’s so beautiful, so completely innocent. It makes a man want to conquer the world just to make it safe for her. That must be what it feels like to be a real father, not the kind I had, but the kind a kid is supposed to grow up with.” He met Trish’s gaze. “Laura deserves a father like that.”

“I know.”

“Do you ever think about getting in touch with her biological father?”

“Absolutely not,” she insisted fiercely. “I guess that means you’ll just have to step into the role. You’ll have to be her surrogate dad and do all the things that a real dad would do.”

Stuck by a sudden inspiration, she added, “Her godfather. That’s what you can be. Would you, Hardy? I should have her baptized soon, and nothing would please me more than to have you be her godfather. Please.”

He looked tempted. His gaze, which was fastened on Laura’s face, was filled with tenderness.

“I don’t know,” he said. “That’s a big responsibility.”

“No bigger than delivering her in the middle of nowhere,” she reminded him.

“But this is something that lasts forever,” he protested. “What if I mess it up?”

“All you have to do is love her, be there to guide her when she needs it. Please, Hardy. I’ll ask Kelly
to be her godmother, so you’ll have back-up. And one of my brothers, too. You won’t be in it alone.”

He nodded at last. “I’d be honored,” he said finally. He grazed a knuckle lightly over Laura’s cheek, a ghost of a smile on his lips. “You and me, kid. We’re going to be a helluva team.”

In that instant Trish realized that she didn’t want Hardy merely as Laura’s godfather, as important as that role was. She wanted him as the baby’s father. She knew she would never find a better one.

And despite the nagging doubts about Hardy’s frequent-dating miles, she had a feeling she’d never find a better husband for herself. Because once a man like Hardy—who’d been on the receiving end of too many broken promises—finally made one himself, she suspected he would never, ever break it.

Hardy wasn’t sure when he finally admitted to himself that he might be falling in love with Trish.

It wasn’t the first time he kissed her. He’d kissed a hundred women at least, and none of them had made him think about forever.

It wasn’t when she stared at him so earnestly and apologized for the way people were throwing them together. In fact, at that precise moment he recalled being just a little insulted that she hadn’t seemed interested in pursuing a relationship with him.

It surely wasn’t when he found her sitting by the creek with the moonlight turning her hair gold and tears streaming down her face. She’d looked so lost
and lonely it had almost ripped his heart out, but that wasn’t love.

No, when he thought back really hard over the few months she’d been in Los Piños, he was pretty sure he could pinpoint the precise moment when he’d realized she was going to be the one woman he’d never forget. It had happened on a lonely stretch of Texas highway, when she’d been cursing a blue streak and having a baby with only him to help. She had trusted him with something incredibly precious. Without even recognizing the feelings, he’d been a goner from that moment on.

Since she was so darned set on staying single, on proving that she could be mother-of-the-year all alone, he figured it was going to be a while longer before he got around to sharing the news of his feelings with her.

When she’d asked him the night before to be Laura’s godfather, he’d been taken aback. On the one hand, he’d been honored that she would consider him a fit role model for the baby. On the other, he’d cursed the fact that she didn’t see him as actual daddy material. The realization that that was where his head was had stunned him. He’d never expected to want to have his own family, never anticipated that there would be a woman who would overcome all of his emotional roadblocks and sneak into his heart.

Trish had. That she was the one who’d done it—a woman who had run out on another man, on an entire family—was equally startling. Funny how he had never blamed her for that, never held it against
her but had assumed she’d had legitimate reasons for going, even before he’d heard the whole story.

Maybe he’d sold his own mother short all these years. Maybe she, too, had seen leaving as the only choice. He’d probably never know, but maybe it was time to forgive her, anyway.

He’d tried for a long time to tell himself his attraction to Trish was about nothing more than sex. She was off-limits, so naturally he wanted her. He’d lived his entire adult life making conquests, then moving on. With Trish there had been no conquest. Honor and circumstances had forbidden it, so there had been no urgency to move on. Only now, when it was too late, did he realize he’d stuck around just a little too long, and the impossible—the inevitable, probably—had happened. He’d fallen for her.

Now what, though? None of his past experiences had prepared him for this. He had absolutely no idea how to catch and keep a woman who really mattered. Charm alone wouldn’t do it. Trish had pretty well made that clear. She seemed to like seeing him with the baby, which suited him just fine since there was a powerful connection between him and the little munchkin. Was it possible that the way to Trish’s heart was through her daughter?