seen him. “I’m scared to death.”
From that moment, they’d become friends. “I remember,” he said again.
“You seemed so calm,” she said. “And friendly. You told me things to pay attention to...oh, you gave me a load of good advice for doing well and getting through it. But I never told you something.”
He waited the way he waited in a courtroom, knowing that important information was coming his way.
“I didn’t want to be there,” she said. “And I don’t just mean the first weeks, or the overwhelmed feeling. I didn’t want to be in law school at all.”
That shocked him. He’d never imagined that law school hadn’t been her choice. He’d spent three years surrounded by people who wanted to be no place else. “Then why did you apply?”
“Because of my parents. I didn’t graduate early because I wanted to. I didn’t go to college at sixteen because I wanted to. And I sure as hell didn’t go to law school because I wanted to. Although I have to admit, I started to like the law. I still enjoy the practice of it. Parts of it, anyway.”
But he saw her in an entirely different way now. So much suddenly became clear: her push for success, her moving up the ladder in firms that could tear the soul out of a person simply through overwork, client demands and the constant threat of losing your job if an important client grew unhappy. And he also understood something else. “So your parents don’t know anything about this...situation?”
“Not a thing. Mom passed away five years ago, but no, my father doesn’t know. I guess he’s going to have to know eventually, but not right now. He’ll be furious.”
Wyatt would have liked to argue with her, but how could he? He’d never met Amber’s father.
She sighed and reached for the napkin she had used to wipe her mouth and smoothed it out with her fingers. “I’ve been a wuss,” she said finally.
“That’s one thing I’d never call you.”
She lifted her head with a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “I let myself be used to fulfill their dreams for me. It only got worse when Dad told me after Mom’s funeral that she’d be so proud of all I’d accomplished.”
“More pressure.”
“Exactly. Evidently somewhere along the way I failed to grow a spine.”
He doubted that was a fair assessment, but he could understand where it came from. “Well,” he said finally, “you’re here now, you can stay as long as you like and the only thing I’m going to pressure you about is seeing a doctor.”
She nodded. “Fair enough.” After a moment she asked tentatively, “Did you feel pressured because your dad was a lawyer?”
“He didn’t pressure me,” Wyatt said truthfully. “Yeah, we talked about me going into the practice with him, but he didn’t offer a single objection when I took two years after I finished my undergrad degree to see if I liked something else.”
She shook her head a little. “I can’t imagine it.”
“Evidently not. It sounds to me like you never had a chance to take a deep breath.”
She closed her eyes briefly but didn’t answer. “I guess you’re saving my life again.”
Two things struck him in that. Offering her a place to stay was hardly saving her life. Over-the-top. But then... “Again? What do you mean?”
“You saved me that first year in law school. I was totally at sea, totally unprepared to be so much on my own. For the first time in my life, my parents weren’t watching my every move and helping me make every decision. I could have made some really big mistakes. But you were always there to remind me.”
“In short,” he said almost irritably, “I was another parent.”
“No!” That caused her eyes to widen. “No, that isn’t what I meant. I didn’t want to fail. I dreaded failing. I needed every bit of help you gave me. That’s all I meant.”
He wasn’t sure he was buying it. He had thought they were friends, that he was simply helping another student when she ran into trouble with her studies. The idea that he might have been in loco parentis for her didn’t sit well at all with him. He’d helped her with law issues. The most advice he’d given her apart from that was to never let herself fall behind. He’d hashed out legal arguments with her. But never, not once, could he remember giving her advice on how to live her life. Hell, he hadn’t even paid attention to who she was dating, if she dated anyone.
“I guess I said that wrong,” she offered. “I didn’t mean it the way you took it. I liked you as a friend. I admired a lot of things about you. I tried to be a little like you. But I never saw you as a parent figure. Ever.”
He hoped she wasn’t lying, because here they were in his house, her pregnant and unemployed, and if she was looking for a father figure, he wasn’t prepared to apply for the role. No way.
Finally he spoke again, seeking different ground. “In the midst of all this upset, have you had any chance at all to think about what you want to do next? I realize you’re probably still feeling sideswiped, but you must have had some impulses.”
“I have. But can I trust them when I’m so emotionally messed up? I’ve pretty much concluded I’m done with silk-stocking law firms, though. Even if gossip doesn’t get around, I’m not sure that I want to keep living that way. And then there’s this baby. Much as I seem to be in denial, it keeps popping into my head. How could I continue a job like that with a child? Turn it over to someone else to raise?” Her mouth drew down at the corners. “I don’t think I can do that, Wyatt.”
That statement eased some of the tension inside him. Why, he couldn’t say. Her life, her baby, her decision, but somehow he felt better about her knowing that she wasn’t going to dump the child on a full-time nanny.
“A lot of people might put it up for adoption,” he said, hating the words even as he spoke them. But it was his place to be logical, not emotional. Life had drilled that into him.
“No,” she said without hesitation. “I can’t do that. There’s like... I don’t know exactly how to explain it. But there was a moment, absolutely etched into my mind and heart, when I knew there wasn’t going to be an abortion and there wasn’t going to be an adoption. Everything in me clamped into a tight ball of resistance as soon as I thought of those things.”
He nodded and released a breath he hadn’t known he’d been holding. Why her decision should matter so much to him, he couldn’t begin to guess. “Then it appears you have a whole new life to build.”
“To put it mildly,” she agreed. Placing her chin in her hand, she smiled at him. “It’s been awful, Wyatt. Just awful. Everything blowing up around me, finding out I’d been lied to and used by someone I trusted, leaving my new job...it’s been terrible. But I feel the most ridiculous sense of freedom for the first time in my life.”
He nodded in understanding, but wondered how much of that was real and how much was a reaction to all the stress. He hoped it was real, because she sure as hell had blown up her bridges behind her.
