Firefly Glen: Winter Baby (Harlequin Signature Select) (16 page)

It was ironic, wasn't it, that he could read her so well after such a short acquaintance? Ironic, too, that he found the simple, tailored green dress on Sarah sexier than the skimpiest lingerie would be on any other woman?

Yes, it was ironic, all right. In a hundred ways she seemed to be the perfect woman. The one he'd been looking for, dreaming of, ever since the fiasco with Tina.

They could still hear Madeline in the kitchen, so Sarah turned left. She avoided the library, too, though they passed right by it. Instead she took him to Ward's personal den, a small room with an alcove formed by the square front bay window.

During the day, Parker knew, that alcove was brilliant with a gold and green light, which streamed in through the stained glass panes. At night, though, the windows were black, and the only illumination in the room came from several small Tiffany-style reading lamps.

He knew she had chosen this room for privacy, and because it was as close to the front door as she could get without actually throwing him out of the house. He felt her tension growing by the second. This was going to be a tricky conversation. He hoped he could find the right words to say what he needed to say.

“My uncle tells me that he isn't going to press charges against the boy who broke the window.” Sarah had started talking even before they were fully in the room, obviously rushing into a topic that would keep the conversation safely impersonal. “I'm not sure I understand why.”

“I'm not sure I do, either. Mike Frome could use a good scare. He says he threw that rock because he thought it would impress his girlfriend, Justine. She's Mayor Millner's daughter. The mayor's whole family
is furious that Ward has tried to sabotage the festival. I guess they like the idea of ruling an ever-expanding kingdom.”

Sarah frowned. “So Mike thought what? That a little vandalism would enhance his stock with this Justine?”

“Apparently. And the worst part is, I think maybe he was right.”

“Sounds as if Mike could use a different girlfriend.”

“Definitely.” Parker sighed. “Or a couple of days in court. Ward likes Mike, though. We all do. Maybe that's part of the problem. We've always cut the kid a lot of slack.” He shrugged. “So anyhow, Ward is going to make Mike work off the window, but otherwise his record will still be clean.”

She nodded. She stood awkwardly in front of Ward's big floor globe. Parker thought he could safely assume that she'd rather be anywhere on that globe right now than here in this room with him.

She seemed to be out of small talk. She looked at him, and she swallowed, squaring her jaw even further.

“Listen, Parker, maybe I should start. I want you to know that you don't need to feel uncomfortable around me. I know you're not interested in getting mixed up in anything this complicated. I never expected you to. You're a very nice man, but please, don't worry about how you're going to explain it to me. I already understand.” She smiled. “And it's really okay.”

He looked at her, helplessly caught in an inner debate. He ought to just nod his head and walk out of here. He'd spent two whole days trying to persuade himself to do exactly that.

Because Sarah Lennox was
not
the perfect woman. Not even close.

And he knew from experience how miserable two badly matched people could make each other. He knew that once the initial fog of sexual chemistry burned off, all the molehill flaws in the relationship stood out like mountains.

He wasn't going to do that again. He'd rather be single forever. That was a simple, unchangeable fact.

And yet he couldn't walk out of here right now.

That was a fact, too.

He couldn't explain it, but something in Sarah spoke to him. Maybe her beautiful face, or her gorgeous body. Maybe her passionate empathy for the underdog, or her stubborn loyalty to her uncle. Maybe the way she made friends everywhere, whether it was with boozing loggers, gossiping matrons or his own insufferable sister. Maybe her Madonna grace when she cradled a sleepy puppy, or her circus-clown clumsiness when she crawled, laughing and unashamed, toward him across the ice.

Which was all probably just another way of saying that Sarah Lennox was full of love, and full of life. Was it any wonder that her amazing vitality had found a physical expression? Could he really be surprised that someone so brimming with life was in the process of creating life, as well?

“I need to ask you two questions,” he said. “If you don't want to answer them, you don't have to. But I have to ask.”

She looked at him, a question in her hazel eyes. “All right,” she said.

“Do you still love the father of this child?”

She lifted her chin. “No. I already told you. No.”

He took a deep breath. “Okay. One more. Do you think that, even without love, there's any chance you and he will get back together? For the sake of the baby?”

He hated to ask. He could see the hurt flicker behind her eyes. “No,” she said quietly. “Not because I wouldn't try. I might. I might try anything to make a good life for my child. But Ed isn't interested. He made that perfectly clear.”

Parker tried not to be relieved. He tried not to put his own personal desires ahead of needs of this innocent life. But he
was
relieved. He had been so afraid she would say yes.

“Then I can't give up,” he said. “I can't stop wanting to see you.”

She looked at him. “But Parker, we—”

“I know it doesn't make any sense,” he interrupted. He didn't want to hear her answer yet. Not before he had made his case. “But I can't just give up on us. Not without at least trying. Not without doing everything we can to see if we can make it work.”

She shook her head. “We can't.”

“You don't know that.” He took a step closer to
her. She backed up, but she hit Ward's armchair, and there was nowhere else to go. “There's something happening between us. Something powerful.”

She was still shaking her head. “Yes, it's called sex. We're attracted to each other, Parker. It would be nice if I could stop being a woman just because I'm becoming a mother, but apparently I can't. When you kiss me, I…” She looked away. “It's just sex.”

“You're wrong. It's sex, all right. But it's not
just
sex. Believe me, I've been there. This is different. This is more.”

She couldn't put any distance between them, but her head was tilted away from him, and the dragonfly light from the Tiffany lamp spilled across her hair, onto her cheek. She was breathing raggedly under that soft green wool.

“You want the perfect woman, the perfect family,” she said, her voice roughly trembling. “And why shouldn't you? I wanted that, too. Everyone does. But that's not what I am, Parker. I'm definitely not the perfect woman.”

“Then I don't want her anymore, whoever she is. I want you, Sarah. I need you.” He touched her cheek. “Give me a chance to see if I can be what
you
need.”

She turned toward him. Her eyes were bright, as luminous and trembling as dragonfly wings.

“I'm not sure I can trust my own feelings right now,” she said. “My body—my emotions—what if I'm just feeling unbearably vulnerable? What if I'm just a coward? What if I'm trying to trap someone
into helping me, into being a substitute father for this baby?”

He smiled. “You're not a coward.”

“I am.” Her eyes widened. “I'm scared, Parker. Sometimes I'm so scared I can hardly breathe.”

“I think that's normal,” he said, feeling his heartbeat quicken with the need to comfort her. “But you are certainly not trying to trap anyone. Look at yourself. For weeks now, you've been trying desperately to keep me at arm's length. And yet you can't, not quite. Doesn't that tell you something, Sarah?”

“Yes.” She took a ragged breath. “It tells me I'm in danger. It tells me I could get hurt.”

“We both could,” he said simply. He put his hands on her shoulders and met her gaze with a straightforward honesty, trying not to think of what he would do if she gave the wrong answer.

“It's a risk. A big risk, one I probably haven't got any right to ask you to take. But I am asking, Sarah. I don't know what lies ahead for us. I don't know if what we feel is—enough. But I want to find out. I want to keep seeing you, even knowing that one of us, or both of us, could get hurt. Will you take that risk with me?”

She stared without speaking. He could see the questions hanging between them like a cloud. He couldn't answer them. He didn't have the answers yet. So, almost without breathing, he waited.

She studied his face. Finally she nodded slowly.

“Yes,” she said, lifting her chin in that way so like her uncle's. “I will.”

A
T THE CITY COUNCIL MEETING
, the citizens of Firefly Glen had taken a solemn vow to create an ice festival, no matter what dragons stood in their way. And so, beginning the very next day, they went about keeping that vow with a vengeance.

The streets were suddenly full of bustling purpose. Signs advertising the event hung in every window. Ballot boxes for King Frosty and his Snow Queen stood in every store. That contest quickly eclipsed the Parker-Harry showdown as the most entertaining election in town.

And, overnight, everything turned white. White garlands replaced the green ones from Christmas, looped between streetlights, across storefronts, around the central town square. Frog's Folly Children's Fashions displayed an enchanted window of white velvet dresses and suits, ivory hats and alabaster muffs, amid a flurry of silver snowflakes.

With the costume ball only two weeks away, the fabric store had a run on white satins and silks. The craft store ran out of silver glitter, opalescent sequins and seed pearls. Sewing machines hummed as everyone rushed to create snowmen, snowflakes, snow queens, ice fairies and polar bears.

And behind it all, from sunup to dusk, and sometimes late into the night by spotlight, the hammers pounded as workmen hurried to build the frame for King Frosty's magnificent ice palace.

Though Ward still refused to admit he had lost, Sarah had to agree with Parker. Nothing could stop this festival from coming.

Meanwhile, Sarah and Parker had their own vow to keep, the vow to give this relationship, whatever it was, whatever it might become, a chance. During these two weeks, they honored their vow, too. It was as if somehow, that night, they had stumbled onto the magical phrase that caused the wall of resistance between them to blink and vanish. They hesitated…they smiled…they touched, and then they abandoned themselves completely to the sheer joy of being together.

For the whole fourteen days, she didn't sleep much, and neither did he, as if they resented any hours apart. They lunched at the Candlelight Café, holding hands. They borrowed the green sleigh from the Autumn House and took it into the woods in search of wide-eyed deer. They played chess with Ward, but even two against one they always lost because they couldn't concentrate on anything but each other.

One snowy afternoon, Parker taught her how to eat thick, sweet icicles cut from the Winter House cornices. They fell laughing onto the snow and made angels.

Parker even tried to teach her to skate, though after a few minutes he realized it was hopeless and decided
he'd rather sit on the bench and kiss her until the heat they generated nearly melted the three feet of lake ice down to nothing.

And they talked. They talked about everything—work and family, friendship and food, politics and pirates and porcupines. But they didn't talk about tomorrow. She had a ticket on her dresser back at Winter House, a seat on an airplane that left the day after the ice festival ended, winging its way back to Florida, where it was already eighty degrees and sweltering. Parker knew about the ticket. She knew he knew. But neither of them mentioned it.

For the first time in her life, Sarah didn't try to look ahead. Instead, she accepted each day as if it were an ice crystal, a thing of beauty shot through with deep rainbows, but so fragile she had to cup it carefully in both hands and speak softly in its presence.

Even at such a glorious time, Parker did occasionally have to work. And then, slightly guilty, Sarah would finally attend one of the Gravity Gladiator meetings. These were rarely held at the exercise class anymore. It was too cold, and everyone felt too torpid, lulled into a semi-hibernation by the weather.

More often, the women met for lunch at the Candlelight Café and seriously considered changing their name to Emma's earlier suggestion: the Calorie Cowards.

“Well, what an honor!” Emma grinned as Sarah sat down that Thursday, the last day before the festival officially opened. She picked up Sarah's left
hand. “Why, Heather, look. It's a miracle! They were able to surgically remove Parker's hand from Sarah's!”

Heather chuckled. “Leave the woman alone, Emma. We were just saying how nice it was to see
someone's
romance working out, remember?” She raised her water glass in a welcoming salute. “I'm glad you were able to come, Sarah. We've missed you.”

Nice to see someone's romance working out? That didn't sound promising. Sarah squeezed Emma's hand before she let it go. Then, as she unfolded her napkin, she quickly scanned the other woman's face. Emma looked thinner, and the sparkle in her blue Tremaine eyes had all but disappeared.

“I guess that means Harry hasn't come back,” Sarah said softly.

Emma shook her head. “He's the stubbornest man alive. I've just about decided to kidnap him from that stupid motel room and tie him up in our cellar until he comes to his senses.”

Theo came by, and Sarah placed her usual order. When they were alone again, she turned to Emma. “I know it's not really any of my business, but…is there anything I can do?”

“No.” Emma's voice was uncharacteristically harsh, and she toyed with her wineglass in a way that suggested it might not be her first today.

“No,” she said again. She sighed from the bottom of her diaphragm and turned her tense, drawn face toward Sarah. “Not unless you can convince dumb
Harry Dunbar that a woman marries a
man.
She doesn't marry a goddamn sperm count.”

Heather's eyes widened. “Well, okay.” She dragged the word out in a wry drawl. “I guess that got right to the point. But now let's see if we can employ some civilized euphemisms here, Em. Just for the sake of the other customers, who might be trying to eat.”

Sarah kept her eyes on Emma. “You mean you and Harry can't have a baby? Is that what you're saying?”

“I'm saying
Harry
can't. As he's forever pointing out,
I
could, with someone else.” She closed her eyes and tilted her head back, breathing deeply. “Only problem is, I don't
want
to. Not with someone else.”

Sarah didn't know what to say. This problem was bigger than she had imagined, and far beyond the reach of mere friendly advice.

However, the irony of their two dilemmas didn't escape her. Here Sarah sat, struggling to cope with the fact that she would be a mother much too soon. And next to her, Emma, who was trying to cope with the possibility that she might never be a mother at all.

Mute with distress, Sarah met Heather's gentle, understanding gaze across the table. And she knew that the irony had occurred to her, too. Heather shook her head once, solemnly, and raised her shoulders, as if to say,
Life!

“Okay, no more wine for you.” Heather slid the glass toward the center of the table. “Don't get drunk, Em. Get mad. Go kidnap that handsome husband of yours, like you said. And when you've got him all
trussed up in the basement, just keep saying one word to him, over and over.”

“Oh, yeah? What word is that?
Homicide?
”

“No.” Heather smiled.
“Adoption.”

Emma shook her head. “I've said that word a million times. Frankly, I like
homicide
better.”

“Hello, ladies. Sorry to interrupt, especially just when the conversation was getting interesting. Who are you going to kill?”

Sarah looked up, a little sunburst of warmth spreading through her as she saw Parker. She hadn't noticed him come in, though he must have taken a while winding his way through the crowded café to their table at the back.

“Oh, good grief.” Emma tossed up her hands, looking thoroughly disgusted. “I thought we finally got rid of you.”

“I'll just be a minute.” He didn't even look at his sister. He kept his eyes fixed on Sarah. “I think I may have left something here,” he said, smiling.

“Well, what? Get it and go. We're having some quality girl time.”

“What did you leave?” Sarah tilted her head.

“This.” Parker leaned over and kissed her, a soft touch of heat that made its way through her veins like slow white wine.

“Oh, give me a
break!
Heather, have you ever seen anything so sappy as my idiot brother?”

But Parker just kissed Sarah again, waving Emma to silence with one hand. Sarah heard her two friends begin to chuckle, but she couldn't help herself. She
hadn't kissed Parker in hours, and she simply couldn't resist.

“Damn it, Sheriff,” a man's voice broke in suddenly. “I've been looking for you. What the heck is this? Aren't you supposed to be on duty?”

Parker let go of Sarah reluctantly. As he straightened and turned, she could see the man who had come up so rudely behind them. He was short and snub-nosed, probably in his early seventies, with a few sparse white strands of hair combed desperately over a large pink scalp. He reminded Sarah of a Pekinese dog. His eyes were black and shiny and small, and he was obviously so mad his face was holly-berry red.

“Hello, Bourke,” Parker said mildly. “As you can see, I'm at lunch right now. If you've got an emergency, take it to Dunbar.”

So this was Bourke Waitely. Sarah had been wondering about the man behind the name—a name her uncle couldn't even utter without a growl of fury. Parker had told her that the two old men had been feuding for so long no one could quite remember why. Something to do with Roberta, he thought.

And suddenly she remembered where she had seen this man before. On her first day in Firefly Glen, in the coat store, talking to Parker. Warning him to get Ward Winters under control.

“I'm talking to
you,
Tremaine. I want you to do something about Winters once and for all. It's criminal, the trouble he's causing. And all to spite me. You know what's really wrong with the old coot, don't you?”

Parker looked impassive. “Why don't you tell me, Bourke?”

“This is his first festival without Roberta, that's what. He can't stand the thought of it. He can't stand it because he's eaten up with guilt. He knows he killed her.”

Sarah half rose, nearly knocking over her water.
“What?”

Parker put his hand on her shoulder. “What the hell are you talking about, Bourke? Roberta Winters died of pneumonia. You know that.”

The little man's face was so dark it looked downright dangerous. Sarah wondered if he might be going to have a stroke.

“I know that's what the death certificate says. But Ward is responsible, you can be sure of that. If he hadn't driven their car into a ditch that night, she wouldn't have broken her hip. And if she hadn't broken her hip…”

He took a few deep breaths, as if he had to push back the emotion a little before he could go on. “He killed her, all right. And I told him so.”

“When?”

“Over Christmas. He got to talking all big about how much she had loved him, and…well, anyhow, he's been after me ever since. That's what this festival thing's all about. I told him the truth, and now he hates me for it.”

Sarah was on her feet.

“Let me get this straight.” Parker's voice was
darkly controlled. “You told Ward Winters that he killed his wife?”

Bourke nodded, pulling out his handkerchief and wiping his half-bald head, which was covered in perspiration. “Yes, sir,” he said belligerently. “I damn sure did.”

Parker and Sarah exchanged glances.

She picked up her purse blindly, touching Parker's arm with her other hand.

“It's okay,” she said. “I'll go to him.”

 

H
ER UNCLE WAS STANDING
at the upstairs oriel window, staring out onto the undulating white landscape below. It had begun to snow again, light but fast. The chaotic flakes flew crazily past the window, in all directions at once.

Sarah came in behind him quietly. On the ride home, she'd been trying to come up with something useful to say.

He heard her, but he didn't turn around. “Hi, Short Stuff,” he said. “You finally finished fraternizing with the enemy?”

She put down her purse on the marble-topped table. “I was having lunch with Emma and Heather,” she said. She paused. “But while I was there, Bourke Waitely came by.”

Her uncle's head half turned, but then he stopped himself and continued gazing out the window. “I guess that was enough to ruin your appetite.”

“He seemed pretty upset. He said some…some ridiculous things.”

Ward snorted. “Well, that could have been predicted. Every time Bourke Waitely opens his mouth, something ridiculous comes out.”

She moved up behind him, and put her hand on his arm. “You know what I mean,” she said. “He was talking about Aunt Roberta. And you.”

His arm was as tight as a brick. “You know, I think I'll sue the bastard for slander.” He nodded firmly. “Yeah. I'll sue him for every penny he has. That would be amusing.”

Sarah's heart twisted. “You don't need to do that,” she said quietly. “Everyone knows he's talking crazy.” She put her head on the back of Ward's shoulder. “Parker says Bourke was in love with Roberta once, too. But she married
you.
So the things he's saying now—everyone knows they're just a bunch of bitter, jealous lies.”

Ward was silent for a moment. Then, still without turning around, he reached over and patted Sarah's hand. “He
was
jealous, poor devil. It made him just about crazy to lose her.” He shook his head slightly. “I can't blame him for that. I would have gone crazy, too, if she'd chosen him.”

“But she didn't.” Sarah tightened her grip on his arm. “She chose you. And she never regretted that choice. Never.”

“No, I really don't think she did, Short Stuff. I think she was happy with me.” He inhaled raggedly. “But does that make it any better, if I killed her at the end? If she died because I made a stupid mistake at the wheel?”