ending with an ultrapolite kiss-off from Tom. Not that the relationship had gone beyond dinner and the theater but still, it wasn’t pleasant, getting an earnest speech about how she was a wonderful woman, an intelligent woman…
What he’d meant was that they weren’t getting anywhere. She didn’t make men think about white picket fences and wedding rings. Other men had given her the same message, and she thought about that while she waited for the snow to let up.
She knew Tom was right. She had nothing against men. Maybe she was a little cool, a little distant. She’d been told that by a couple of guys. Maybe she didn’t think sex was the mind-blowing experience other women did, but so what? She liked men well enough.
It was just that marriage was something else. In her heart, she knew she really didn’t want to be anybody’s wife. She was self-sufficient and independent, and she’d seen, firsthand, what a mess a man could make of a woman’s life. Her mother, and now her sister, could have been advertisements extolling the benefits of spinsterhood.
No, marriage wasn’t for her, but motherhood was. She’d known that ever since her teens, when she’d earned pocket money baby-sitting. Having babies was more than a biological need: it was a need of the heart. There was something indescribably wonderful about children. Their trust in you. Their innocence. The way they gave their love, unconditionally, and accepted yours in return.
Lara had all the love in the world to give, but her time was running out. She was thirty, and she figured she had about as much chance of having a child as an Eskimo had of getting conked on the head by a falling coconut. Thirty was far from middle-aged but there were times she felt as if she were the only woman in the world who didn’t have a baby in her arms or in her belly, and that most of the women who did were years her junior.
Like the two girls she worked with. Goodness knew she wished both of them well but watching their excitement at their baby showers, she’d felt an awful emptiness because she’d suddenly known she’d never share that special joy. She knew single women adopted babies all the time but, perhaps selfishly, Lara yearned for a child of her own. She knew about artificial insemination, too, but the thought of knowing little about the prospective father made her uneasy. She’d even considered asking someone like Tom, someone she liked and respected, to make her pregnant, but there’d been an item on the TV news about a man who’d agreed to just such an arrangement until he saw his son. All of a sudden, he’d changed his mind. Now, he was suing for joint custody.
“If I’d picked up a stranger in a bar,” the girl had said, her eyes red and teary, “some guy with looks and enough brains to carry on an intelligent conversation, I’d have my baby but I wouldn’t be in this mess.”
Lara sat thinking all these things on that fateful afternoon in Denver, while she waited for the snow to stop.
The public address system bleated out guarded encouragement from time to time, but you didn’t need a degree in meteorology to see that the storm was getting worse instead of better. After a while, she collected her computer and her carry-on, made her way to the first-class lounge, found a seat and settled in. Her mood was as foul as the weather. She took out her computer and turned it on. Solitaire was mindless; she could play it until her brain went numb.
Except that her computer wouldn’t start. The battery was dead. It was the final straw, and she glared at the damned thing, contemplated hurling it to the floor, then settled for telling it what she thought of it, under her breath.
She heard a soft, masculine chuckle, and then a man’s voice.
“Here you go, darling,” he said.
Lara looked up. A man was standing in front of her. He was tall, he was probably what some women would call handsome, and if he thought she was in the mood for some fun and games, he was about to have his smug little smile stuffed right up his nose.
She drew herself up and looked at him as coldly as she could.
“I beg your pardon?”
But not coldly enough, apparently. His smile broadened and he shot a pointed look at the person seated in the chair next to hers. Lara lifted her brows. Obviously he was accustomed to having things his way. Well, she thought as the wimp beside her gave up his seat, this bozo was in for a big surprise.
“I am the answer to your prayers, Sugar,” her unwanted visitor said. He had a drawl of some kind. Not Southern; she knew Southern drawls. Western, maybe. That would explain the lean, rangy look to him, and those ridiculous cowboy boots.
“I am not named ‘Sugar,’” she said coldly. “You’re out of your league, cowboy. If those boots of yours are made for walking, you’d better let them walk.”
He grinned. It was, she had to admit, a nice grin on a nice face. Definitely handsome, if you liked men who looked as if they’d just ridden down from the hills, despite what had to be a hand-tailored suit and a Burberry raincoat. Not that any of that changed the fact that she wasn’t interested.
“Ah,” he said, “I see. You think this is just an old-fashioned pickup.”
Lara gave a wide-eyed stare. “My goodness,” she said sweetly, “isn’t it?”
The stranger sighed, as if she’d wounded him deeply. Then he opened his computer case and took out a battery. She saw, right away, it was the duplicate of hers.
“It’s painful to be misjudged, Sugar,” he said. “You need a battery for your computer and I just happen to have an extra. Now, does that sound like a pickup line to you?”
Of course it did. Lara started to tell him he was wasting his time. But his eyes were twinkling, and what was the harm in admitting she saw the humor in the situation? A few minutes of conversation might make the interminable delay seem less onerous.
“Yes,” she said, and smiled, to show she wasn’t really offended.
“Well, you’re right. But you have to admit, it’s creative.”
She laughed, and he laughed, and that was the way it all began.
“Hi,” he said, and held out his hand. “I’m Slade.”
She hesitated, then took his hand. “I’m Lara.”
A tiny electric jolt passed between them.
“Static electricity,” she said quickly, and pulled back her hand.
“Or something.” He smiled again. “I couldn’t help but overhear your, uh, your conversation. The one you were having with yourself. I didn’t actually hear what you called your dead battery, but I have a pretty good imagination.”
She laughed. “I’m afraid I wasn’t being very polite.”
“I’m serious about giving you that extra battery.”
“Thanks, but I can do without it.”
“Well, I’ll lend it to you, then. So you can check your e-mail, or whatever.”
“I did that, just before the stupid thing died. Actually it’s the ‘whatever’ part that I was going for.” She smiled. “I was going to play solitaire.”
His brows lifted. They were dark brows, winged a little at the ends, and went nicely with his black,
