He put his hands on his hips. “Then the only thing to do is accompany you home on the bus.”
He watched her swallow nervously. “Why would you do that?”
“Because flu can cause a person to pass out. If you start to feel lightheaded, I want to be there with my cell phone to call 911. Admit you’re about ready to collapse.”
Tears moistened her eyes. “I—I admit it,” she stammered.
Through with this nonsense, he walked over to the door and turned out the light. “Come on. My car’s right outside the back steps of the building. I’m taking you home. Now.”
In those last seconds of hesitation, he knew she was fighting more than her desire not to be a burden.
His world changed the moment she moved past him in acquiescence. Like a lick of flame, the accidental brush of her hip against his sealed his fate.
As the sign for Warwick came into view, Alik’s torturous thoughts returned to the present with a jerk.
A long time ago he’d consigned Blaire Regan to the devil. Such a beautiful, treacherous coward, she’d ended their love affair long distance proffering no explanation he could live with. To compound the pain, she’d run away where he couldn’t find her. By refusing to face him, her cruel actions had denied him any possibility of permanent closure.
His jaw hardened.
She’d made a fatal mistake by daring to show up at his trailer this morning. Before the night was out she would learn the definition of cruelty. Then it would be she who rued the day their paths had ever crossed.
The knuckles of his hand gleamed white as he turned the steering wheel to enter the parking area in front of the Bluebird Inn.
CHAPTER TWO
WITH the bulk of the ten o’clock television news coverage over, Blaire realized she’d been waiting for something that was never going to happen.
She looked down at her adorable baby who was still wide-awake on one of the double beds, almost as if he knew this day and night had been different from all the others. His fingers clung to her pinky.
“How sad Alik’s never going to know you, my little love.” One salty tear dropped, then another. “You have no idea what a wonderful man he is, Nicky. There’s no one his equal, except for you. I pray you’ll grow up to be exactly like him.”
She used the edge of the baby quilt she’d made for him to wipe her eyes. “I’m not talking about the angry man I confronted this morning. I’m afraid that man is the result of what I did to him. He’ll never forgive me, I can see that now. Why should he? If he’d done the same thing to me, I’m not sure I’d even be alive.
“When he walked in his trailer this morning and saw me, he had every right to throw me out bodily. But he didn’t. He could have called me a liar. In fact he could have called me every cruel name he could think of. He could have shouted loud enough for everyone at the site to hear him. Yet he restrained himself, because he’s a real man.”
The lump lodged in her throat refused to move. “I did an awful thing to him, Nicky. I hurt him the worst way you can hurt a man. It destroyed me, too. But I had no choice. None…”
She leaned over to kiss the top of his nose. Every time she looked at his precious face, it was Alik all over again. Just in miniature.
“I believe it was destiny the day I came down with that bout of flu in college. I was already halfway in love with your father, the brilliant, famous, drop-dead gorgeous Dr. Jarman. Every woman in class had fantasies about him. Yet I was the lucky one who had to go to his office to take my test.
“He was unbelievably tender with me.” A delicious shiver ran through her as she relived the feel of his hand on her face to check her temperature. “After driving me home, he brought me dinner and flowers. I didn’t have to take the test until I was better. By then I so madly in love with him, I forgot I had any other classes.
“We spent every waking moment together. Most evenings we walked along the beach talking about our lives, then ended up in each other’s arms. He shared his dreams with me. Imagine. Me. I told him mine. You were part of those dreams, Nicky. You and the rest of the family we were going to rear one day.
“Your father has led such a fascinating life. His privileged background has given him the best education in the best schools. He’s gone on adventures that have taken him all over the world. What’s so amazing about all this is that he became my world, and I became his.
“Though I was forced to break up with him—” her voice shook in remembered pain of that ghastly time when he was away giving a seminar “—I’ll always be thankful he made me pregnant with you. You’re all I have left of him. When we get home, I’m never looking back again. What I am going to do is raise you to be the same, magnificent man he is. I plan to devote my life to you, my sweet love.
“Come on. Let’s get you undressed and ready for bed. We have a long flight home to San Diego tomorrow. You need your sleep. So do I.”
As she got up from the bed to find his nightgown in the diaper bag, the phone rang. The baby’s arms flailed in the air.
That would be Blaire’s mother calling to find out how things had gone today.
Not so well, Mom.
Blaire walked around to the bedside table to pick up the receiver and said hello.
“Ms. Regan? This is the front desk. There’s a Dr. Jarman here who said you were expecting him.”
The receiver slipped from her fingers. It clanked against the wood. With trembling hands she grasped for it.
“Y-yes. I am. Please send him up.”
Dear God.
“Very good.”
After hearing the click, she replaced the receiver and dashed to the bathroom to retouch her lipstick. Her hair needed a good brushing after playing with the baby who had started to reach for the strands. She probably ought to cut it, but it was too thick to wear short.
The blue cotton sweater and designer jeans she’d chosen to wear no longer seemed right, but it was too late now. She could hear his familiar tap on the door. He didn’t do it like anyone else. Her heart skipped a beat. Some things never changed.
She hurried out of the bathroom toward the door to the hotel room. But she was so frightened and excited all at the same time, she had to stop and try to pull herself together before she opened it.
This morning Alik had been breathtaking enough in a T-shirt and jeans. Tonight he was shaven and dressed in a navy polo shirt and cargo pants, the kind of clothes that revealed his devastating masculinity. He put every other man to shame.
Embarrassed because she’d been feasting her eyes, she quickly lifted her gaze to his face, fearful of seeing the same chilling look in his green eyes he’d directed at her earlier in the day. But for once something else had caught his attention. He stared past her shoulder to the baby still dressed in his adorable yellow suit who happened to be in Alik’s direct line of vision.
She noticed the sharp rise and fall of his chest before he swept past her in a few long strides to reach the bed. In his haste, he’d forgotten to shut the door. Blaire closed it, then walked slowly toward him waiting for his reaction.
With that effortless male grace, which was unconscious on his part, he sank down on the bed next to the baby. Her breath caught as she watched him lean over Nicky and run a hand through his curly black hair.
Their son didn’t seem particularly disturbed that a total stranger had started to undress him. Nicky’s sweet temperament allowed Alik to examine every part of his anatomy, from his broad shoulders to his square-tipped fingers and long legs without making a fuss.
While he lay there