“Couldn’t all this have waited until I returned to the office?”
“I don’t see any reason that it should.” Walking farther into the room, he shook his head. “I only made my choice a few minutes ago. On the way over here.”
“Good for you,” she said, sounding less than enthusiastic.
He pointed to her couch. “Have a seat and I’ll explain.”
“Fine.” Clearly running out of patience, she sat and looked up at him expectantly. “Let’s get this over with.”
“I had several requirements in mind when I made the decision to hire a surrogate. There is only one woman I know who meets all my expectations and who I can trust with something this important,” he summarized.
“I know I’m going to be sorry that I asked, but what are you looking for?”
“I want an intelligent woman with excellent business instincts.” When it looked as if Haley intended to speak again, he held up his hand to stop her. “I also want her to be reasonably nice looking and in excellent physical condition.”
“It sounds to me like you want a superhero,” she offered, rolling her eyes.
“I didn’t think of it quite that way, but in a sense you might be right,” he mused, chuckling at her evaluation. She had no idea that as far as he was concerned she was assessing herself.
He’d always admired Haley’s quick wit and he was more confident now than ever that he’d made the right choice. She was definitely the woman he was looking for.
“And you think you’ve found this paragon?” she prodded.
“Yes.” Before she could react, he walked over, took her hands in his and asked, “Haley Rollins, will you have my baby?”
Time stood still and Haley wasn’t entirely certain that her heart hadn’t come to a complete halt as well. Luke was asking her to be his surrogate? He actually wanted her to have his child?
She opened her mouth, closed it, then opened it again as she desperately tried to find her nonexistent voice. The fact that he saw her as the perfect means to produce his heir rendered her utterly speechless.
“I can tell by your reaction that you weren’t expecting this,” he laughed.
Never in a million years.
“And I don’t need your answer right now,” he added.
Good. Because that would require words and right now I couldn’t put two words together to save my own soul.
He gave her hands a gentle squeeze, then reached for his suit jacket. “I want you to sleep on it tonight and, since you’re taking tomorrow off, spend the day thinking about it. I’ll pick you up around seven tomorrow evening for dinner. You can give me your answer then.”
In a total state of shock, all Haley could do was stare at him. When he pulled her to her feet and led her to the door, she couldn’t have protested no matter how hard she tried.
Opening the door, he turned and, reaching out, lightly touched her unruly curls. “By the way, you should wear your hair like this more often. It looks very nice.” Then, without another word, he stepped out onto the sidewalk and pulled the door shut.
Haley felt as if she’d fallen down the rabbit hole and landed squarely in the middle of Wonderland. When she’d gotten up yesterday morning, she’d had no idea that in a little over twenty-four hours, her life would take such an unexpected turn. Nor would she have ever thought the man she’d dreamed about for the past five years would get some wild notion that he needed an heir and that she was the only woman to make that happen.
Slowly returning to the couch, she plopped down and let her gaze wander aimlessly around the room. How could everything look the same when the whole world had been turned completely upside down?
As the gravity of Luke’s request began to sink in, she shook her head. There was no way on God’s green earth that she could help him with his cockamamy plan. She couldn’t—wouldn’t—do that to a child. To her child.
Her child.
She was pretty sure that, as her father’s housekeeper used to say whenever someone expressed a desire to procreate, she had “baby fever.” Not because she didn’t have plenty of time to have a child. She did.
At twenty-eight years old, she certainly hadn’t heard the ominous ticking of her biological clock. Nor did she anticipate that happening for quite some time.
She had, however, watched several of her friends find love, get married and have babies. In fact, just last week Haley had received an announcement from her college roommate about the birth of her second child. And that seemed to intensify the void, her desire that she wanted more than anything else in life—a family of her own.
Just the idea of holding her own baby, of watching him or her take the first steps, of hearing the first words and seeing a sweet toothless grin brought tears to her eyes. She wanted a baby to love and be loved by in return.
But that wasn’t what Luke had in mind. He wanted an heir to carry on at Garnier Construction, not a close family who loved, laughed and together weathered whatever storms life sent their way. And she was old-fashioned enough to believe that the choice to conceive should be based on the desire to love and nurture, not a good business decision. If she went along with his ludicrous plan, he’d raise their child alone and she’d be completely out of the picture. She’d lived that type of existence and she couldn’t do that to a child, couldn’t bring an innocent baby into a childhood like hers. Although the circumstances weren’t exactly the same, she knew all too well how it felt to have a workaholic father who always put business first, who relied on nannies and his housekeeper to raise his motherless daughter.
Nor could she do that to herself. Unlike her own mother who abandoned her shortly after birth, nothing would ever keep Haley from being part of her child’s life. She had every intention of being there each day to love and guide him or her as they made the journey to a happy, productive adulthood.
Unfortunately, Luke Garnier was a formidable negotiator. She knew as sure as she knew her own name that he would not stop until she agreed to his crazy scheme.
Luckily for her, she knew him well enough to know exactly how to deter him from his mission. But in doing so, it meant effectively ending any romantic fantasies of being more than his glorified secretary. Her chest tightened with intense emotion. It saddened her deeply, but she couldn’t see any other option.
Taking a fortifying breath, she rose to her feet and walked into the spare bedroom she’d turned into her home office. As she seated herself at the desk, she took a tablet and pen from the drawer and began compiling her list of conditions. Demands that she was certain Luke would find to be deal-breakers and send him running away from her as fast and far as he could possibly get.
The feel of Luke’s hand at the small of her back as the hostess led them to their table
