Fletcher's Baby Read online

  “Yes. I mean, is it? True? You are going to have a...?”

  “It’s true.”

  There was a moment’s silence. Then Izzy said, awed, “You work very fast.”

  “It only takes once,” Sam said, then could have bit his tongue off. It was no business of Izzy’s how many times he’d taken Josie to bed! “So, what’s up?”

  “Well, I had a favor to ask. And it’s really serendipitous, this favor...and you being in Dubuque and all. I couldn’t believe it when your mother told me.” The awkwardness was gone. She was Izzy again, talking fast and furious, expecting him to keep up and fill in the gaps for himself.

  “What’s serendipitous?” he asked her. “What favor? What about Dubuque?”

  “Finn’s looking for an inn.”

  “Finn wants to buy an inn?”

  “Of course not. He needs to shoot a catalog at an inn—and environs. Sort of an Americana setting. Fourth of July. Bands and gazebos. That sort of thing.”

  “It’s May.”

  “They work ahead,” Izzy told him. “It’s for a spring-summer collection next year. And he was trying to think of someplace different. They always do Puget Sound and Newport and Jackson Hole and places like that. So we were brainstorming last week, and I happened to remember your aunt’s place in Dubuque.”

  “My place in Dubuque now,” Sam said.

  “Right. I was so sorry to hear about your aunt.”

  “Thanks. It’s Josie’s place, really,” Sam qualified.

  “That’s your wife?”

  He still hadn’t got used to having one, and he hesitated a split second. Then, “Yes,” he said firmly. “Yes.”

  “Well, do you suppose Josie would like to put us up for a week? They’d rent the whole place, give credit to the inn in the catalog. Feature it in some shots. It’d be great publicity. Great for tourism. Put Dubuque on the map.”

  “When did you go to PR school?” Sam grinned.

  Izzy laughed. “You know me. When I think of a good idea, I go with it.”

  “Like Finn.”

  There was a jolt of silence. A long pause. Then, “Yes. Like Finn.” Another pause. “You aren’t angry about that, are you, Sam? You said you weren’t. You sent him to me!”

  He had. He hadn’t wanted to, but Sam Fletcher always played fair. And he knew enough to know he didn’t want to marry a woman who wanted someone else.

  So he’d told Finn MacCauley a few home truths, then pointed him toward San Francisco.

  “I know. I know.” Sam rubbed a hand through his hair. “And no, I’m not angry. It’s just that...” He sighed. “I don’t know. You caught me by surprise, that’s all.”

  “If you’d rather he didn’t... Finn said you probably wouldn’t want him there.”

  “No,” Sam said quickly. “It’s a good idea.”

  The more he thought about it, the better it was. “Be good for Josie. She could use some distraction. She’s... due in a month, and she’s having a hard time. She has to take it easy.”

  Izzy groaned. “Sam, having a houseful of guests is hardly easy.”

  “Easier if they’re the same people for a week,” Sam said firmly. “And she won’t shut the place down. Believe me, I’ve suggested it.”

  “And she turned you down?” Izzy sounded amazed.

  “You did,” he reminded her.

  “We’re not going to talk about that anymore,” Izzy said briskly. “Are you sure about this?”

  “Yes. Like you say, it will be good for business. Put the place on the map.”

  “All the better for when you sell it?”

  His brows drew down. “What?”

  “Well, I mean, you are, aren’t you? Or she is. Josie. Your wife. You can hardly be going to move to Dubuque permanently,” Izzy said impatiently.

  Sam banged his forehead lightly against the doorjamb. “No. Of course not.”

  He wouldn’t be staying. But Josie would. He shut his eyes. “When does he want to come?”

  “Sunday.”

  He straightened abruptly. “As in two days from now?”

  “Uh-huh. He’d have gone to Newport again if this hadn’t worked out. This is so much better! So much fun. I’ll get to see you, and meet your wife, and—”

  “Whoa. Hang on. What do you mean, ‘I’? You’re coming, too?”

  “Of course! And the girls, too.” Finn’s nieces, she meant. Pansy and Tansy. “We thought we’d take a little holiday—all of us together—the way we did when Finn took us to Jackson Hole. Only with better results,” Izzy said a little wryly.

  Sam remembered Jackson Hole. Izzy had come home and broken off their engagement. And left Sam in the lurch. Sam’s mind began working overtime.

  “Izzy, I don’t know—”

  “Oh, it will be fine,” she assured him. “I promise. I’m so looking forward to meeting your wife. See you Sunday.”

  “Uh-huh,” Sam mumbled into a dead phone. “I’m sure she’ll look forward to meeting you, too.”

  Josie blinked back the tears that had threatened to spill over ever since Sam had told her the news.

  Good news, he’d called it. Good news?

  She should have known.

  Isobel was coming. He hadn’t got over her. Not at all.

  A part of Josie was hurt. No. Devastated was closer to the mark. A part of her was furious.

  How dared he bring the woman he loved—and had lost—to stay with them here! Did he expect to cavort with her under the noses of Isobel’s husband and his own wife?

  Probably. She could just imagine how appealing Isobel would be compared to his very pregnant wife. His very pregnant unloved wife! Josie swiped at the tears which had stopped threatening and actually spilled down her cheeks now. Damn Sam Fletcher anyway!

  Well, fine. If that was the way he wanted things, so be it. She’d leave him to it. There was nothing to say she had to come out of the library at all. It would be just what the doctor ordered—this week of rest.

  A week of rest! That was what he’d called it when he told her he’d agreed to having them come—Isobel and her photographer husband and whoever else was involved with this catalog shoot. He’d even dared to say he’d thought she’d be pleased.

  Josie had said frostily, “How nice,” and shut the door in his face. Locked it, too.

  When he came to the library that evening, he had to knock, not just walk in.

  She hadn’t been going to let him in at all. She hadn’t wanted him to see her bloodshot eyes or the tell-tale tracks of tears down her cheeks. In the end, she did, though, keeping the light off when she answered the door, then going back silently to get into bed.

  “If you don’t want them here,” he told her, “I’ll send them away.”

  And he’d probably go with them. She couldn’t tell him to do that. Besides, she didn’t want him thinking she was jealous, didn’t want him knowing how much she cared.

  “It’s fine,” she said tonelessly, and turned her back.

  “You all right?” Sam asked as he slid in beside her and put his arms around her, drawing her close.

  Josie swallowed, then nodded because she didn’t trust her voice anymore.

  But she wasn’t all right. Not at all.

  Josie had no trouble envisioning Isobel Rule. She was sure Sam’s ex-fiancée would be tall and model-thin, with Audrey Hepburn cheekbones and a Mona Lisa smile.

  So she had a hard time equating her vision with the reality of the short, bouncy young woman who threw her arms around Sam and gave him a hug, then turned to Josie and beamed.

  “So you’re the lucky lady,” she said, giving Josie a hug, too. “I’m Izzy. I’m so glad to meet you.”

  Izzy.

  Josie had heard Sam call her that, but she’d always thought of it as a sort of pet name that a fiancé would use. Now she saw that the name fit. Izzy didn’t look like an Isobel. She wasn’t tall, she wasn’t reed-slender, and if there were cheekbones beneath those cheeks, Josie doubted they’d been seen in ye
ars.

  Seeing Isobel should have made things better. Knowing that, even if she herself looked like a cow, Izzy was no femme fatale, either, should have improved Josie’s mood.

  It didn’t—because Izzy was so obviously wonderful.

  She was funny, she was sweet, she was thoughtful, she was kind. She charmed all the crazy technicians, hairstylists, wardrobe personnel and models. She doted on her little nieces. She was clearly in love with her dark, intense husband. And yet she seemed also to have a soft spot for Sam.

  Izzy even—and this troubled Josie even more—seemed to want to be friends with her!

  “Come sit by me,” Izzy said when Josie appeared on the porch Sunday evening. She had just been going to check and see where Sam was—and hoped that Izzy was nowhere in the vicinity—when Izzy beamed up at her from the porch swing and beckoned.

  “I can’t,” Josie said, backing away. “I have work to do.”

  “No work,” Izzy said firmly, patting a spot on the swing. “Sam says no work. He says I’m supposed to distract you from work. That’s what we’re here for. To entertain you.” She grinned.

  “What?”

  “Sit,” Izzy commanded. “Sam says,” she added firmly, as if there would be no discussion after that.

  “Sam doesn’t run my life,” Josie muttered. But she came out and let the screen door bang behind her.

  “No,” Izzy agreed, but still she moved over to give Josie room to sit next to her. “He’s much too nice.”

  “He’s not nice!”

  Now it was Izzy’s turn to goggle. “He’s not?” She looked genuinely surprised. “Sam?”

  “He’s a bully,” Josie said truculently. But she came and sat down next to Izzy. She was cranky. Her back hurt and the baby was using her as a punching bag. It felt good to sit down. She shoved her hair back away from her face and wished she looked as cool and composed as Izzy.

  The other woman tilted her head and smiled a little at her. “A bully,” she said conversationally.

  It wasn’t precisely a question, but Josie answered her anyway. “Yes.”

  She stared straight ahead. She could see Finn and Izzy’s little red-headed twin nieces playing catch on the front lawn. They had commandeered Finn and Sam into playing with them. Reluctantly Josie watched. Finn was certainly the more striking of the two men. He looked piratical even when he laughed. But Sam—

  “Sam doesn’t look like a bully,” Izzy said softly.

  No, he didn’t. The wind was ruffling his sun-streaked hair. His shirttails were flapping in the breeze. He was laughing, too, as he stretched desperately to catch a wild throw by one of the girls. He made the catch and flipped the ball back to her, still grinning. Then when she deliberately threw it high and wide again, instead of throwing it back after he caught it, he made a growling noise and ran at her.

  She laughed and ran, shrieking as Sam picked her up and swung her around, making her giggle.

  “Now me!” the other twin cried, clamoring at him. “Swing me!”

  Finn picked her up and swung her. Then, as Josie watched, the two men rearranged the twins so that each had a girl on his shoulders. One had her fingers tangled in Finn’s hair, hanging on. The other gripped Sam’s ears. They were all laughing.

  No, Sam didn’t look like a bully, Josie thought, swallowing against the painful lump in her throat.

  He looked like a father.

  “I like your wife,” Izzy said to Sam.

  They were sitting on the porch swing in the dark.

  Finn was in the parlor going over some ideas with the catalog company rep. The models were wowing the locals down at the riverboat casino or one of Dubuque’s more scenic nightspots. The twins were asleep.

  Josie, too, had gone to bed early. Sam had hoped she’d come and sit with them on the porch and get to know Izzy. But shortly after dinner she had pleaded tiredness and retired to the library. He glanced over his shoulder now, through the window toward the library door. It was shut tight.

  He looked down at his hands. “I like her, too.”

  “Of course you do,” Izzy said with a light laugh.

  “You married her.” She smiled at him.

  He didn’t quite smile back.

  Izzy rocked them gently in the swing. “It’s why I had to come,” she said.

  Frowning, Sam turned to look at her. “What’s why?”

  “I had to make sure you were happy.” She gave a little satisfied bounce. “You are.”

  He looked at her. “How can you tell?”

  “I’ve only got to look at you.”

  He looked happy? Sam was amazed.

  “You’re nervous,” Izzy told him. “This is all new to you. And obviously you jumped the gun a bit. So you’ve got a bit of getting used to it to do.”

  “Oh, yeah,” Sam said, deadpan.

  “I’m not being critical. Finn wasn’t exactly...reticent when it came to, um, bed.” He could hear the blush in her voice.

  A few months ago hearing about Finn’s eagerness to take Izzy to bed would have annoyed the hell out of him. Now he was indifferent. He shrugged.

  Izzy smiled. She reached out and patted his knee. “So...it all worked out, didn’t it? My marrying Finn and you marrying your Josie.”

  “I don’t know as I’d call her ‘my’ Josie.”

  “Of course she is.” There was clearly no doubt in Izzy’s mind. But then Izzy saw the world in black and white. She would never tolerate the muddled gray mess Sam seemed to be making of it.

  Suddenly he couldn’t sit here and talk about it anymore. He didn’t feel right talking to Izzy about his marriage. The only person he should be talking to was Josie.

  Not that he could talk to her. But he could be in bed with her.

  Who knew how many more nights he would have?

  He got to his feet and stretched his arms over his head, then dropped them and rocked back on his heels. Slowly and deliberately he yawned. “I’m pretty tired. Guess I’ll turn in.”

  Izzy looked up at him and smiled. “Do that.”

  Her smile broadened and she looked up to see Finn coming out to look for her. She pushed herself up out of the swing and reached out to take his hands and look deeply into her husband’s eyes. “I think I will, too.”

  She wondered if he was wishing he was in bed with Izzy.

  He’d come in quietly and far sooner than she’d thought he would. She had already turned off the light and was lying in bed. But she wasn’t asleep. She was thinking how nice Izzy was and how much she wished she could dislike Sam’s ex-fiancée, but she couldn’t. On the other hand, she couldn’t sit out on the porch with them and make small talk, either.

  It was beyond her tonight.

  Let Sam do it. Let him eat his heart out if he had to.

  She just didn’t want to be there to watch.

  But the light hadn’t been out more than fifteen minutes before the door opened and he came in.

  She heard him move around quietly. She half wondered if he might be getting his things and leaving again. Not to try to sleep with Izzy. She knew very well that Izzy was in love with her husband.

  But just so he didn’t have to sleep with her.

  He didn’t leave again. He went into the bathroom. She heard the water running, heard him brushing his teeth. And then he was back—and slipping into bed beside her.

  She didn’t move. Held herself absolutely still. Barely breathed. Waited for him to roll on his side away from her and go to sleep.

  He didn’t move, either. Not at first. Then he rolled over, but toward her, not away from her. His arm went around her, curving close to her belly. He brushed his hand over its roundness in a gesture that felt almost possessive. Then slowly he drew her back against him into the warmth of his body. For an instant Josie tensed, resisted... gave in.

  She wanted this. She wanted him.

  A tear slid across her nose and fell onto the pillow. She closed her eyes and prayed no more would fall.

  A steady draw
ing ache across her lower back woke her.

  Nothing intense. Just...there. The ache had been a part of her so long that she couldn’t remember when it had stopped feeling normal and begun to be something more. She turned a little, still caught in Sam’s embrace.

  He didn’t wake as she shifted in his arms, but he turned, too, accommodating her. In the moonlight that cascaded through the window she watched him sleep, his firm mouth gentle now, lips slightly parted.

  He looked beautiful. Silvery. Perfect. A corner of her mouth lifted. He didn’t even snore.

  The ache persisted, tightening a bit more as she lay looking at him. The baby stirred in her womb, pushing back.

  She felt sometimes as if she was an unlucky bystander dragged into the battle for her body between her child and the organs it was pushing around. She tried to shift again, as if doing so would give one or the other of them more room.

  It didn’t.

  She moved again.

  Sam’s eyes flicked open. “What’s up?” His voice was soft and slightly gravelly.

  Josie loved to listen to him when he first woke up. She loved to look at him then, too. For an instant he would look at her, unguarded and vulnerable, and she would wish he looked at her like that all the time. And then he would remember who he was—who she was—and the wall between them would fall back into place.

  Her teeth closed lightly on her lower lip. “I think I may be having the baby.”

  He thought he was going to faint.

  Last time he’d coped just fine. He’d bustled her off to the hospital, had been a tower of strength and fortitude.

  This time, lying there in bed, flat on his back, hearing the words “...I may be having the baby” was enough to rattle him. He started to sit up and ended up lying back down again. He took a deep breath, then another, and another, while Josie watched him with wide, astonished eyes.

  He felt like an idiot. He struggled to sit up and made it this time. “I’m sorry,” he muttered. “It’s just that—just that—” He looked at her closely. “This is it?”