From Here to Paternity Read online

  Soothing.

  The bedroom door was open and so was the door to the bathroom. He could hear water running in there. The water stopped. He closed his eyes, imagined what she might be doing now: rubbing lotion on one of those pretty legs—or maybe brushing that gold hair, her breasts lifting under her robe as she raised her arms to stroke the long, silky strands.

  It turned him on, just thinking about her in the other room, getting ready to join him in bed. She turned him on. Always had. Even all those years when she hated him, just the thought of her could get him aching, longing for the touch of her, for the sweet, fresh scent of her…for everything he was never going to have again.

  Or so he’d always thought. Until Sissy left her baby on the couch and vanished. And all at once, out of nowhere, when he’d given up all hope it could ever happen, he was getting his second chance with Charlene.

  He heard the whisper of bare feet and opened one eye to see her hovering in the doorway, her face scrubbed clean of makeup, all dewy and pink, her hair brushed smooth, shining on her shoulders.

  “Come to bed.” His voice was husky, betraying his eagerness to have her in his arms.

  Still, she held back. “You look so peaceful, lying there…”

  He cast a significant glance along the length of his body—down to the bulge in the blankets over his hips. “Not all that peaceful—get over here.”

  With a soft laugh, she came and stood by the side of the bed. He ached all the harder as she untied the sash of her robe, gathered it into a ball and stuck it in a pocket. The robe, hanging loose now, revealed a tempting section of her—the middle section—from her smooth upper chest, down between the twin swells of her breasts, to the hollow beneath her ribs and the sexy indentation of navel. Below that, there was the shining tangle of dark-gold curls, the matching sweeps of inner thigh….

  He scooted higher against the headboard to get a look at the rest—at the tempting inside curves of her knees and calves. The robe ended just above her ankles. He admired her well-shaped, slender feet. Her toenails were painted hot pink.

  “Take the robe off,” he said. “Real slow.”

  Charlene was an independent woman. But, damn, she could follow instructions when she wanted to. She teased him a little first, laying her hand at the base of her throat, rubbing the silky skin above her breasts, stroking with her fingers, so lightly.

  Brand dragged in one slow, deep breath. The scent of her came to him. So sweet. Clean. As arousing as the sight of her.

  She traced a slow path down one side of the robe, skimming her own flesh with the movement, but somehow managing not to ease the robe open any wider…

  “You’re killing me,” he told her.

  “In a good way?”

  “Oh, yeah…”

  At last she took a little pity on him. She grasped one side of the robe and guided it over her shoulder. It slipped down her arm. One full, ripe breast, the nipple temptingly puckered, came into view.

  Brand considered the possibility that he might just explode. Right then and there, without even touching her. “Let it slip off…only on that one side.”

  She obeyed, easing her arm free. The robe dropped away down her back, anchored now on her left shoulder. She was so beautiful. So shapely. He admired the sleek swell of her hip, that singing inward curve of her waist.

  The covers weighed on him. He pushed them away, swung his legs over the edge of the mattress and sat on the side of the bed.

  Her full, wide mouth was softly parted. She licked her upper lip, shy pink tongue darting out, swiftly vanishing again behind those lips he would soon be kissing.

  “Come closer,” he whispered.

  She took a step.

  “One more…”

  She complied.

  That brought her near enough that he could reach out and touch her. At last.

  He did, with an index finger, tracing the line of that robe on the left side, following it down…

  Her belly tightened as he skimmed it. He smiled up into her eyes and took his finger lower.

  She gasped.

  Good. He wanted her gasping. He wanted her pliant and willing and wild.

  He touched the nest of shining curls where her thighs met. She sighed. He eased his finger downward, within the curls, finding her cleft.

  She was wet. Real wet. Ready-wet. They were so attuned to each other now, after all the nights of pleasure they’d shared. She didn’t need a lot of foreplay.

  Though they both enjoyed a lot of foreplay. Often.

  Right now what he needed was for her to come even closer.

  He grasped her waist with his other hand and pulled her to him. The robe slipped from her shoulder and plopped to the rug.

  Fine with him.

  “Kiss me, Charlene…”

  She put her hands on his shoulders and lowered that wide mouth.

  Oh, yeah. Kissing Charlene. Nothing like it. The taste of her, all sweet and wet. And her silky hair so warm to touch, flowing forward, brushing his chest. He speared his fingers up into the thick waves, making a fist, getting a big handful of it, so fine to touch…

  All of her.

  Fine to touch.

  He pulled her closer. She came to him, keeping her mouth locked with his, hitching one slim leg up, shifting, lifting the other.

  She straddled his lap, her weight to either side of him, up on her knees on the edge of the mattress. Since she’d gone on the pill a month ago, they didn’t have to worry anymore about the hassles of on-the-spot contraception. He was real glad about that at the moment. He was enjoying the erotic agony of straining upward toward her, seeking the soft, hungry heat of her body, knowing he wouldn’t have to stop to deal with a condom.

  Never once breaking their wet, hot kiss, she reached down between them and wrapped her hand around him.

  He couldn’t hold back his deep, pleasured groan. “Charlene…”

  She stroked him. She knew just the way to drive him crazy, tightening her grip at the base, easing it in the middle, and then tightening again as she reached the top, rubbing the crown with her thumb, spreading the thick moisture that wept from the tip, until he was dropping his head back, lifting his hips to her, begging her with his body to give him what he sought.

  At last, she did, positioning him, then lowering herself by slow degrees. He thought he would die.

  And he didn’t care—he was happy to go.

  He groaned into her mouth as she settled onto him fully, so wet and hot and tight, all around him. And then he caught her hips and lifted her. She groaned then, as he pulled her back down onto him—all the way down.

  From there on he was lost. Cast adrift in a lapping wet sea of overwhelming sensation. He kissed her mouth and her breasts, sucking the nipples in, circling his tongue on them, as she held his head to her chest, riding him, whispering frantically, “Oh, yes. Brand. Yes…”

  She lifted those fine hips of hers and lowered them, the sweet, wet friction so maddening, so perfect, so exactly what he craved.

  He felt his body rising, felt the slow heat thickening, brimming—and finally spilling over.

  She took him, her body milking him, holding him tight, crying out her completion as she came, too.

  He collapsed back across the bed, pulling her with him. She landed limp on top of him, curled against his chest, her fragrant hair spread over his shoulders, sliding like warm satin against his throat.

  What was it that happened then? Something…broke wide open inside him.

  It was like a light blinking on in a pitch-black room, blinding in its sudden brightness.

  The light of knowing. Of understanding.

  What he wanted.

  What he needed.

  What, at last, against all odds, he finally realized he could do. And do well.

  Amazing. But he could. He knew it now. With this woman. He could do it. He could do anything.

  He smoothed her hair back over her shoulders. “Charlene?”

  “Umm?”


  “Charlene.”

  She dragged her head up and looked at him through lazy-lidded eyes. “What?”

  He took her beautiful face in both his hands, pressed a quick kiss on her full lips. “Charlene…” He reveled in the simple sound of her name on his lips, in the weight of her body on top of him, in the musky, sexy scent of her after lovemaking.

  She looked a little worried now. “Brand. What? What’s the matter?”

  “Not a thing.”

  “Then what’s going on?”

  And he said it. The impossible. The one thing he’d always known he could never say. He said it.

  “Marry me, Charlene.”

  “Oh, Brand.” She looked as if she might burst into tears. He grinned up at her, waiting for the answer he knew was coming. And then she said, “No.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Brand repeated blankly, “No?”

  Rather than answer, she slipped away from him. He lay there, on his back on the bed, feeling like an idiot, like a hundred kinds of total fool.

  She scooted to the edge of the bed, scooped up her robe and put it on again. He sat up as she was wrapping the sash around herself, pulling it snug, tying it tight.

  “I’m sorry,” she told him, and he could see in those blue eyes that she really was.

  Sorry.

  And certain.

  He hadn’t even tried to argue yet, but he knew already that there was no way he would get her to change her mind. And he felt pretty damn stupid lying there buck-naked in the wake of such a flat-out refusal.

  Never ask a question to which you don’t know the answer. Primary lawyer’s rule.

  He’d gone ahead and done it, anyway. What a dumb-ass, blind fool.

  He sat up—and she jumped back, as if afraid he would touch her, hold her, do something terrible…like pressure her to change her mind.

  Okay, he needed a moment. He really did.

  He went to the bureau and got a fresh pair of boxers. He turned his back to her, shook them out and shoved his legs into them. Once he had them on, he rested an arm on the bureau top and stared at the wall for a solid count of ten.

  When he finally faced her again, she hadn’t moved. She stood a few feet from the bed, wrapped in her robe, hands at her sides. “Brand. I’m sor—”

  He put up a hand. “I heard you the first time.”

  “I’m…” She caught herself before she said it again. “I just can’t, okay?”

  He knew he shouldn’t ask—but he did want to know. He wanted to understand. “You can’t because…?”

  “I’m just…used to it, you know?”

  “It.” He repeated the pronoun and waited for her to tell him what it stood for.

  “I’m used to…taking care of myself, to counting on myself. Marriage, to me, means forever. And I’m not…I mean, I can’t…” The awkward explanation died away unfinished.

  And all at once, he understood. He got it. “You don’t trust me. You still don’t trust me.”

  “No. I didn’t say—”

  “You didn’t have to say it. You don’t trust me, Charlene. You’ve forgiven me, maybe. You don’t hate me anymore. You even like me. You want me. But you’re afraid to take any big chances with me. Day to day with me is okay. You just don’t want to let yourself count on me. You’re afraid I’ll let you down again.”

  “I’m not afraid,” she insisted. But all at once she was looking everywhere but at him: at the floor; at the rumpled bed; at the wall behind him.

  If he’d had any doubt as to his assessment of the situation, they vanished. He knew from her refusal to meet his eyes that he’d hit that nail squarely on the head.

  “You are afraid,” he said.

  Still, she tried to deny it. “No. Really. It’s not that.” She looked at him then. But not in his eyes—more like in the general vicinity of his chin. “It’s not that.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “It is that.” And wondered what, exactly, he was going to do about it—if there was anything he could do about it. Should he swear he would stick by her, get down on one knee and beg her to give him a chance? Declare undying love and unending devotion?

  He’d done a lot of that—of swearing he loved her, would love her forever—back when they were kids. And look how he’d ended up proving it.

  By leaving her flat.

  “I just can’t,” she said again, softly. Hopelessly.

  From the monitor there came a tiny cry. And then a louder one.

  Charlene said, “I should—”

  “I’ll get her,” he said. “Go on back to bed.”

  Charlene did get in bed. And then she waited, sitting up against the headboard with the light on, for him to return.

  When he came back in, she made a point to meet his eyes. “Okay,” she admitted. “You’re right. I’m afraid. I’m scared to death that if let myself start thinking this is permanent…”

  “Then what?”

  “You’ll dump me again.”

  He stood in the doorway, so gorgeous and manly, wearing only his boxers, and he shook his head at her. “But I won’t dump you.”

  “I hear you. I even…believe you.” She touched her forehead. “In here—but in here?” She brought her hand over her heart. “I just…well, I’m too scared. I truly am. I…I appreciate everything you’ve done. You’ve been wonderful, truly. And, Brand, I’m so grateful.”

  “Charlene. Take my word for it. I don’t want to hear how damn grateful you are.”

  “I…okay.”

  “What else, then?” he bleakly demanded.

  Oh, how to tell him? How to get him to see…

  “I’m crazy for you, Brand. Just wild over you. I think…I always have been. Even when I hated you, I couldn’t get you off my mind. It’s what you said to me that night we made love again for the first time. About the opposite of love being indifference, about how I’ve never been indifferent to you. I haven’t been indifferent, not ever. I hated you to keep myself from admitting I was still crazy over you. I have been, am and probably always will be nuts over you.”

  He folded his big arms over that amazing, smooth, muscular chest of his. “But you’re not going to marry me.” It wasn’t a question.

  “That’s right. I’m not.”

  “Because you still don’t trust me—not really. Not in your heart, where it counts.”

  Her throat had a lump the size of a boulder in it. She gulped that boulder down. And she confessed, “You’re right. I don’t trust you not to…turn your back on me again. I don’t trust you to stick by me forever. I’ve…lost too many people I love. My parents, my sister. You.”

  “But you haven’t lost me,” he told her so softly. “I’m right here.”

  She shook her head. “I know I should be braver. Stronger. I should be willing to take another chance. But I think it would kill me, Brand, if you stomped on my heart again.”

  He didn’t answer for a moment. He stood there by the door, unmoving, his handsome face closed to her. Finally he said kind of wryly, “I’m guessing my swearing that you can count on me, that I will stick by you, just isn’t going to cut it.”

  She almost said she was sorry—again—but shut her mouth over the words in the nick of time. “No. It’s not going to cut it.”

  “I figured as much.”

  There was a silence. One that seemed endless and echoing. They stared at each other. The short distance between them was a chasm, miles and miles wide.

  Then he spoke again. “The truth is, Charlene, you can count on me. You’ve been counting on me in the past two months. And whether you can get beyond all those crippling fears of yours or not and say yes to me, you’re still going to be able to count on me. I’m going to see to that. I’m not the mixed-up, fatherless boy I was ten years ago. I know who I am now. And I know what I want. And that’s to live my life with you.”

  She pressed her lips together to make them stop quivering. “But?”

  A sad smile flitted across his wonderful mouth—and
was quickly gone. “I’m not quite to the buts yet.”

  “I see.”

  “I don’t think you do.”

  “I…”

  “Charlene. I still want to help you any way I can. Legally. Or if you need money. Anything. Whatever you need, just say so. Just let me know. I mean that. Sincerely.”

  Her throat was clutching again. She gulped, asked him for the second time, “But?”

  “Fine. Bottom line? I know we said we’d take it day by day. And I was okay with that. For a few weeks. A month. But I’m not willing to hang around here, playing house with you, counting on the fact that maybe someday you’ll be ready to try again for real with me. I’m just…not up for that. I’m too proud. And even more than my pride, I know it would hurt too damn much. I guess it’s my turn to say I’m sorry now. And I am. Damn sorry. I’m also heading on back to my own big, expensive, empty house.”

  Her heart thudded heavily under her breastbone. And she ached—to jump up, run to him, throw her arms around him. To beg him to stay, to promise him anything.

  Anything. Even the lifetime he said he wanted, the forever that they’d lost before, the happily-ever-after that scared her to death.

  If he’d only stay with her. If he just wouldn’t go.

  She didn’t jump up, though. She sat right where she was, alone in her bed, hands folded tight on top of the covers, waiting…

  As he went to the bureau and got out a T-shirt, pulled it on over his head. He got jeans, socks, boots from the closet…

  In no time at all, he was dressed.

  He said, “I’ll come by tomorrow, when you’re at the diner. I’ll get all my things. I’ll leave the key on the kitchen table.”

  She made herself nod. “Yes. Of course. That will be fine.”

  “And I mean it, Charlene. I’m not angry at you. Believe that, okay? Even if you can’t believe in the two of us, in what we could have together, in what we could be.”

  “I understand. I know you’re not angry.” She coughed to clear the tears that were clogging her throat and she told him, “I do. I believe that. I honestly do.”

  “If you need me for anything, you call me. You hear me?”

  She nodded again. “I will.”