she fit to be a mother?
He sat with his back to the bay this time, and his sunglasses lay on the table next to his notepad. He didn’t look like a reporter, she thought.
“Sorry about being late, again. But Dr. Hyde needed me to fill out a few extra forms this visit.”
“For insurance.”
“Yes,” she said. A waiter approached and Sabrina ordered herbal tea before Reese could order for her. He lifted one eyebrow in question, but she ignored him. The waiter left and she toyed with the ring her parents had given her on her twenty-fifth birthday. A pretty emerald heart set in white gold.
“You seem a little pale,” he said.
Damn, she’d hoped he wouldn’t notice. “Must be from ordering for myself. All the pressure.”
His mouth crinkled, and she thought he’d laugh but he didn’t. “Next time I’ll order for you.”
She’d always enjoyed banter, and now she’d found a safe partner to do it with. And the escape she’d been seeking from her own doubts. “That’s okay, I think I better start getting used to it. After all, I’m almost thirty.”
He paused, leaned across the table and gestured for her to come closer. She did.
“It might be too late to teach an old dog a new trick,” he said softly.
“Who are you calling an old dog?” she demanded.
He laughed out loud this time, and she’d never seen anything more beautiful. Laughter actually changed this man’s visage from almost uncivilized to enchanting.
He shrugged. “No one. It’s a saying.”
“Not a nice one,” she said. But she wasn’t offended. He’d made her forget her worries for a few minutes. It wasn’t her hopes for a baby that woke her up nights in a sweat, but her past. The agreement she’d made with the magazine that sometimes she wished she hadn’t.
“So…” He leaned back in his chair, crossed his arms over his well-developed chest and waited.
“So?”
“Why are you pale? Having second thoughts?”
She should have known he’d come back to the heart of the matter. He wasn’t the type to give up. Why couldn’t he be? This interview process would be so much better if she’d been able to control the reporter. If he’d been the kind of guy she could distract with her legs or a bit of cleavage. Okay, that wasn’t the best way to operate, but it worked. Men usually were easily distracted by her looks, but not this guy.
His gaze probed hers, and irrationally she thought he might have read her thoughts. Might have ascertained that she’d been thinking of lying. Don’t lie, she thought. Honesty is always better, even when it’s painful.
“Second and third and fourth thoughts,” she said.
“And?”
“It always comes back to wanting a baby more than anything else.”
“Anything?”
She felt his gaze slip over her body and her nerve endings tingled. No, there were other things she wanted. But the baby was the safest thing to discuss with him.
“Yes,” she said, and the word sounded weak to her ears.
“More than a man in your life?”
“Yes,” she said a little stronger.
“More than—”
“Yes, I want a baby—a family—more than anything else in this world.”
“Very well. Then stop having doubts.”
“It’s not that easy,” she said.
His eyes shuttered. “I know.”
Sabrina stared at him. She’d taken him at face value and never wondered if anything kept him up at night, if demons crept out from his past and haunted him. But she saw now that they did.
The happy gurgle of a child’s laugh drew her attention. A mother and baby walking past the café had stopped. The mother bent double to her child, tied his shoe and tickled the precious, fat little leg. A wave of envy swept through her. She wanted to be that woman so badly her heart felt like it skipped a beat.
Tears stung her eyes before she could cover her face with her hands. She no longer saw the small child in the stroller, but the unborn child she’d miscarried at nineteen. A baby whom she’d wanted badly, but through her own carelessness had lost.
She started to cry in earnest. Reese placed his hands on her shoulders and kneaded deeply, trying in vain to relax her. She had to get away. To escape from the pressure she’d invited by agreeing to these interviews. She’d thought she’d gotten past her guilt and the anger and fear. Obviously she hadn’t.
Reese tugged her to her feet, wrapped his arms around her and rocked gently. Why was he doing everything she’d always dreamed a man could do? Why was he fulfilling her fantasies of Mr. Right when she knew he wasn’t even close to being that mythical man?
“Don’t worry. Fears are natural in first-time mothers. You’ll be a great mom.”
His words made her feel worse. How could she be? Yet it was what she wanted. It was her secret dream. The one that made her save her money and sit home nights instead of going out with her friends. The one that made her work two jobs and hoard her money like a miser. The one that had shaped who she was so completely that without it she was afraid she wouldn’t exist.
“How do you know?” she asked.
“My secretary had the same reactions when she first learned she was pregnant.”
“How did she deal with it?”
“That’s where a man comes in handy. Her husband distracted her.”
“How?” she asked. Reese Howard was a nice man, she thought.
“Well, let’s just say she wouldn’t give me all the details.”
“Oh.” She hated the out-of-control feelings coursing through her.
“I have an idea. Why don’t we take my boat out on the bay and forget about this story for the afternoon.”
It sounded like paradise. And his arms around her felt forbidden. “I don’t know.”
“Come on. Pretend we’re friends.”
She didn’t want to pretend. She wanted a real friendship with Reese, but knew that could never happen. He had a job to do and she was the job. “I don’t have any male friends.”
“You do now.”
A sense of rightness assailed her. For the first time since her parents’ deaths she didn’t feel alone.
