Austin and live under the Blakemores’ thumbs until the baby’s birth, insisting he drive her to the doctor’s office.
Of course, driving her to the doctor’s had been a good idea, but none of the rest of it was. She didn’t want the Blakemores running her life—or worse, taking control of her baby.
“It’s a great idea,” Garrett persisted. “You need to rest, and I need a place to stay.”
“You could drive back to the city,” Lanie pointed out, pushing back the temptation he offered.
Help sounded awfully good, whether she wanted it to or not. She was just so tired.
She pulled herself together. “It’s not that far to Austin,” she dismissed. She turned her back on him and his help, trudging up the walk.
He came up behind her. “Are you always this stubborn?” he asked.
“Stubborn! Me?” Lanie stopped long enough to cast Garrett an arch look as he reached her side. “You’re the one who can’t take no for an answer.”
She arrived at the front door and scoured her handbag for her housekeys. She found them, then immediately proceeded to drop them on the ground.
Garrett started to retrieve the keys for her, but Lanie knelt, awkwardly, and snatched them before he could.
“Please leave me alone.” Tears stung at the back of her eyes again. Bending wasn’t her best event these days, but she shook off Garrett’s arm as he tried to help her straighten.
She felt as if she were teetering on the edge. Her exhaustion combined with the stress of the afternoon had been too much, and the last thing she wanted to do was break into one of those sudden bouts of hormonal tears that had plagued her throughout her pregnancy—right in front of Garrett.
She fumbled with the key, wiggling it into the hole, struggling with the old lock. Blinking back traitorous tears, she gratefully pushed the door open. A few more seconds and she could shut it in his face.
“Are you crying?”
She tried to ignore him as she moved through the doorway. He stuck his foot in the door and prevented her from closing it.
She didn’t want to look at him, but he reached out and turned her face toward him, the touch strong and gentle at the same time. Lifting her eyes, she met his reluctantly. She dashed a hand at the moisture on her cheeks and lifted her chin a notch.
“You are crying.” He sounded confused. He dropped his hand from her face, but not his stare. “Look, I don’t know if this is pride or stubbornness or just that you don’t like me much.” An odd, almost painful light flickered in his eyes for a second, then disappeared. “But I think you need some help tonight.” His voice was soft. “Will you let me stay?”
Lanie thought about going to the backyard and dragging the sheets off the line, hauling them upstairs and making up the bed, then greeting the guests with the customary refreshments. Her feet, her knees, her hips—every place where the baby’s weight put unaccustomed pressure—ached like she carried a two-ton truck instead of a tiny human being.
She wanted nothing more than to drop into bed and let someone help her. But it wasn’t safe for Garrett Blakemore to be that someone. She knew that.
But she said, “All right,” anyway.
Garrett knocked lightly on the closed door to Lanie’s bedroom. “Lanie?”
“Come in,” she called.
He poked his head around the doorjamb in time to see her sitting up in bed, a fat pillow propped behind her back. She was still dressed, her long legs stretched out on a colorful quilt decorated in a pattern of interlocking rings. A white lace curtain blew softly at the open window, bringing the warm afternoon inside.
Despite the obvious reluctance with which she’d agreed to let him help her out for the evening, she’d acquiesced with surprising ease when he’d insisted she go straight upstairs to rest. He knew this was more likely an indication of the true state of her exhaustion than any sign of surrender on her part.
She’d given him brief instructions about making up two rooms with sheets from the line outside, and had explained where to find the refreshments she had prepared She’d asked him to call her when the guests arrived so she could come down to greet them. But before he tended to any of the other preparations, he’d decided to fix her something to eat.
“I brought you a sandwich and a glass of milk,” Garret said. He came around the side of the antique spool bed and placed a tray on the end table near her. Her wary gaze never left him. “And some cookies.” He held out the glass of milk.
“You shouldn’t have done that.” Surprise widened her eyes as she took in the tray.
“Of course I should have,” Garrett said. Her aversion to his assistance was really starting to annoy him.
He kept holding out the glass, and she finally took it, her slender fingers lightly brushing his in the exchange. A small electrical charge zinged up Garrett’s arm, filtering through his irritation.
He backed up slightly in reaction, putting a little distance between himself and Lanie. It was just the oddness of being in her bedroom, he told himself. The situation was overly intimate, considering they’d only known each other a few hours.
“I don’t want you waiting on me,” Lanie protested. She set the glass down on the tray.
Garrett shrugged. “It’s just a little something to eat. It’s not a big deal. You need to keep up your strength.”
She looked wan, and he didn’t like it. He didn’t like how it made him feel. He didn’t like how he was worrying about this woman he’d only just met and had no reason to trust or even like.
Of course, he reminded himself, he did have one good reason for caring. The sooner she rested up, the sooner he could tackle the business at hand—getting her to agree to come back to Austin with him. He worked to focus on the reason he was in Deer Creek, and to forget how pale and defenseless Lame looked, propped in bed, surrounded by all this soft lace and patchwork simplicity.
The scene was a false picture, making her seem more maternal than small-town schemer. The whole setup was what was throwing him off balance, he decided. The sooner he got out of her bedroom, the better.
He strode to the door, determined to get the sheets and make up the guest rooms. And put as much distance as he possibly could between himself and Lanie’s sweet, vulnerable eyes.
“Garrett?”
He stopped in the doorway and turned to look at her. She chewed her lip, hesitating, the glow from the sunset lighting her fine features. Her hands moved over the rounding of her belly in a seemingly unconscious gesture.
Garrett’s gaze followed the movement of her hands, lured by the slow caressing motion that spoke of tender care for her unborn child. He wondered if the baby was moving, what it would feel like to place his hand there and feel the tiny life inside her kick....
He jerked his attention back to her face. “What?” he prompted curtly. He really needed to get out of her
