Expecting His Baby Read online

  What a laugh.

  Sally, who ran the kitchen, had put glasses of guava juice and a plate of roti and sliced pineapple on the teak table that was shaded by a huge beach umbrella near the pool house; further shade was cast by tulip trees and palms. Lise hauled the yellow coverup over her head and sat down, discovering that she was ravenous and that her shoulder felt not too bad at all. Judd told a couple of very amusing stories about flights he’d monitored in the early days of his airline company; not to be outdone, Lise described some of the trees she’d climbed to rescue cats who hadn’t wanted rescuing. And all the while she was aware of Judd watching her, of his eyes on her shoulders, her breasts, her thighs. He was very discreet; Emmy, she was sure, had no inkling of what he was doing. But she, Lise, knew. She felt as though he were undressing her. As though his eyes were stroking her as tangibly as his long, lean fingers would explore her flesh.

  He wasn’t laying a finger on her. Yet she felt seduced.

  She ate the last crumb of roti on her plate and finished her juice. Then she said brightly, “I’m going to have a nap. See you both later.”

  “Sleep well,” Judd said blandly.

  Lise hurried across the tiles in what was unquestionably a retreat. She showered in her luxuriously appointed bathroom, dried her hair, then lay down on the bed, wearing one of the two nightgowns Judd had chosen. Silk, again, sensual as a caress. Certain she was too keyed up to sleep, Lise closed her eyes; and opened them to the low slant of sunlight through the louvered windows.

  She’d slept for nearly five hours. Quickly she got up, dressing in the same pants and top she’d worn last night; they covered her more completely than any of the other garments Judd had chosen. Then she ventured out into the hallway. Emmy and Judd were sitting on the patio, playing checkers, and for a moment she observed them from the shadows. There was an ease between them, she thought painfully. A connection that was very real. Judd, in other words, was a good father.

  This didn’t fit Angeline’s description of him as an absentee father who had snatched his daughter away from her mother from motives of revenge and control. Or had Angeline simply implied all that, and Lise herself had filled in the gaps?

  He couldn’t fake being a good father. Certainly not with a child as astute as Emmy. Lise backed further into the shadows, then fled toward the library with its polished rosewood shelving, where she curled up in a deliciously comfortable bamboo chair and did her best to concentrate on the words on the page. She felt both lonely—or was excluded a more accurate word?—and frightened. She didn’t like either emotion.

  Half an hour later, Judd came looking for her. Dressed in cotton shorts and a T-shirt, his hair ruffled, he stationed himself in the doorway. “What’s up, Lise?” he said roughly. “What—or who—are you hiding from?”

  “I’m not hiding! I’m reading.”

  “Dinner’s ready.”

  “Fine. I’ll be right along.”

  “Don’t wait for me, in other words,” he said with dangerous quietness.

  “I need to brush my hair, put on some lipstick.”

  “You don’t need either one—you’re one hundred percent gorgeous just as you are.”

  Lise stood up, smiling in spite of herself. “You can stroke my ego anytime you like.”

  “Don’t you know how beautiful you are?”

  “Angeline’s beautiful. I’m average.”

  Judd ran his fingers through his hair. “Who told you that?”

  “Marthe. Over and over again, while I was growing up.”

  Judd said a very rude word under his breath. “Do something for me, will you? Repeat five times a day, I’m a beautiful woman. Judd says so. Got it?”

  “But I’m not sophisticated! Or elegant.”

  “You’re real,” he said.

  Lise swallowed hard. He meant it. Temporarily speechless, her throat tight, she heard him add, “There’s something else. You slept for five hours this afternoon—you’re exhausted, aren’t you?”

  “I’m not used to the heat.”

  He gave her a scathing look. “Give me a break. You’re worn-out, you think I can’t see that? So I’ve got a proposition for you. We’ll talk about it this evening after Emmy’s in bed.”

  “No proposition you can mention could possibly interest me and you sure are good at giving orders.”

  “I didn’t get where I am by letting people walk all over me. So don’t try it.”

  Her temper rising, Lise said, “I’ll do what I damn well please.”

  “You’re pushing your luck, sweetheart.”

  “Don’t call me that!”

  “I don’t mean it literally—trust me.”

  She didn’t know which was worse, his high-handedness or his sarcasm. In a voice smooth as cream, she said, “You did mention dinner, didn’t you?”

  “I pity the guys who have to share the fire truck with you,” Judd said pithily.

  Brushing the petals of the bronze lilies in a bowl on the table, an involuntary smile curving her mouth, Lise said, “Fire truck—what fire truck? It all seems a million miles away.”

  “Good,” said Judd. “Then I’ve achieved something at least.”

  Lise bit her lip. “I’m really grateful to be here, Judd, please don’t misunderstand me. And yes, I’m tired. But it’s more than that. I don’t want to get involved with you—even assuming you were willing, which I doubt. My life and yours are miles apart, and that’s the way they’ve got to stay. So if I’m keeping a certain distance between us, I’m acting out of self-preservation, that’s all.”

  He stepped nearer. “You speak your mind, don’t you?”

  “Saves trouble in the long run.”

  “You sure are different from any other woman I’ve ever met. And yes, I’m including Angeline,” Judd said with suppressed violence.

  He was standing so close she could see the dark curl of his lashes, and the curved line of his lower lip, so cleanly sculpted, so infinitely desirable. She wanted to run her fingertip along it. As her heart rate quickened, Judd grated, “I have no idea why I made that ridiculous promise.”

  “I made one, too. If it’s any help,” she said with a faint grin. “To keep my hands off you.”

  Twin devils danced in his eyes. “Did you indeed? But by mutual agreement promises can be broken.”

  “No, they can’t! We’re totally wrong for each other and I’ve never indulged in casual sex.”

  “Casual wasn’t exactly what I had in mind,” Judd responded. “And now, since Sally the cook is almost as quick-tempered as you, we’d better head for the dining room.”

  That was something else she’d noticed in the last twenty-four hours: the mutual respect between Judd and his employees. “You’re very good with your staff,” she said reluctantly.

  “I’m not an ogre!”

  Just the sexiest man I’ve ever laid eyes on. But fortunately Lise hadn’t said that. Walking around him, she headed for the dining room.

  After dinner Judd put Emmy to bed; then he and Lise played chess out on the patio. At five minutes after midnight, he said, lightly, “Checkmate.”

  “Ouch,” said Lise, “I should have blocked your bishop two moves ago.”

  “You play well.”

  “Stephan taught me—one of my buddies on the night shift. It’s a good way to stay awake.” She gave him a limpid smile. “As I’m not on the night shift now, I’m going to bed. Good night.”

  As she pushed back her chair, he got up. “You notice I haven’t mentioned my proposition,” he said lazily. “I’ve decided to save it for later.”

  “Good for you,” she responded amiably. “Saves us having another fight…I’m all for that.”

  “There’s more than one way to avert a fight.” His hands at his sides, Judd leaned forward and kissed her full on the mouth, a leisurely kiss of devastating intimacy. His tongue traced her lips; then he moved to her cheekbones, her closed lids, the long line of her throat. From a long way away Lise heard him murmur her n
ame.

  She felt boneless, weightless, ravaged by hunger, yet fed as she’d never been fed before. Nor had he laid a finger upon her. Frantically Lise drew back, her eyes like dark pools under the tropic sky. “No, Judd, please…”

  “Just kissing you good night.”

  Her nipples were thrusting against her silk shirt; her whole body felt on fire. “Don’t play games with me,” she begged. “I’m not in your league, don’t you see?”

  “I kissed you because I wanted to. And you stayed because you wanted to. Admit it, Lise.”

  His eyes seemed to drill their way through her skull. “Wanted?” she cried. “I had no choice!”

  With a whimper of pure distress, she whirled and ran for her room. She shut the door and jammed a fragile rattan chair under the handle, a ruse that couldn’t possibly keep Judd out were he determined to enter, but which made her feel minimally better. One kiss and she was a basket case, she thought despairingly. Never in her life had she responded to a man the way she did with Judd.

  She now understood why she’d never gone to bed with Dave. But years ago, when she was new at the job, she’d fallen in love with a firefighter from another district in Montreal, and had had a short-lived affair with him. The sex hadn’t been great, even to someone of her very limited experience; and the ending of the affair, when he’d discovered that her address in Outremont didn’t mean that she had old family money, could have been farcical if it hadn’t been both humiliating and hurtful.

  In the years that followed, the men she occasionally dated always got discouraged, sooner or later, by her dedication to a demanding and dangerous job with irregular hours. That was fine by her; her affair had destroyed something in her, a quality of trust that wasn’t easily reestablished.

  It was still fine by her, she thought fiercely. Meeting Judd hadn’t changed anything. On which not entirely truthful conclusion, Lise managed to get to sleep.

  The next day Lise, Judd and Emmy took off for the day, buying some lovely Carib baskets in Roseau, Dominica’s charming capital, then walking to Trafalgar Falls, where they swam in the pool at its foot. They were home in time for dinner; Lise went to bed early. No chess game. No kisses under a velvet sky. No proposition. Whatever that meant.

  Their final day, they hiked into the national park in the northern sector of the island. Lise loved the rain forest, so entangled, so deeply green, so shadowed by the huge buttressed chataignier trees. It smelled damp and fecund, and the small brightly colored birds that flickered through its branches entranced her.

  Judd carried Emmy on his shoulders a lot of the way; Emmy, Lise knew, had not had a single nightmare since they’d arrived on the island. If Angeline had been wrong about Judd’s capabilities as a father, had she also misled Lise about other facets of his life?

  This was a new thought for Lise. She’d learned something else as well: that Judd could keep a promise. He had indeed not laid a finger on her the last two days. In fact, he’d withdrawn today in a way she could scarcely pinpoint yet knew to be real. She should have been relieved. She wasn’t. Rather, his casual manner toward her made her intensely irritable. Perhaps he’d decided she wasn’t worth the trouble. After all, the world must be full of women who’d fall into bed with him at the slightest encouragement.

  One thing was clear, though: Judd had made her a promise and he’d kept it.

  For whatever the reason.

  When they got back to the villa, Emmy was packed off to bed with supper on a tray. Although she’d been nothing but polite to Lise the last three days, a few times Lise had caught the little girl simply staring at her, as though trying to fathom her; yet Lise felt no closer to her than she had when they’d set out. What had Judd told Emmy about the custody battle? Maybe he’d implied that Angeline didn’t want her own daughter; which would explain Emmy’s hesitancy to trust another woman. Or maybe, Lise thought more cynically, there’d been so many women in Judd’s life that Emmy no longer bothered.

  Her last dinner on the island. Tomorrow they were flying back to Montreal, to winter and normality, to her next shift at the fire station. Her bruises had faded beneath her carefully acquired tan; she was fit enough to go back to work. A prospect that gave her very little joy.

  She opened her closet door. The jade-green dress was hanging there; she had yet to wear it. Smoothing the fabric with her fingers, she laid the dress on the bed, then spent the better part of five minutes staring at it in much the same way that Emmy had stared at her. Judd buying this dress had brought Lise to his villa. So was she going to leave without wearing it? Was she going to opt for the safe cream trousers and yellow shirt once again?

  Was she a woman or a mouse?

  Lise rummaged in her own suitcase for her prettiest underwear and her gold sandals. Then she made up her face with care, painted her toenails and fastened gold hoops to her earlobes. Finally she eased her body into the jade silk, linking its gold chain link belt around her waist.

  The mirror showed her a stranger, a lissome creature with a cloud of red curls, whose eyes reflected the glorious hue of a garment that clung at hip and waist and breast. She looked sensual. Voluptuous. Available. Oh, no, thought Lise, I can’t wear this.

  A tap came at her door. “Dinner is served, missie.”

  It was Sally’s assistant, who came from Roseau. “I’ll be right there, Melanie,” Lise called, closing her eyes in panic. How could Judd construe her appearance as anything other than the most blatant of invitations? Yet intuitively he’d chosen for her an outfit she’d longed—hopelessly—to possess.

  Dammit, she was going to wear it. Even if walking into the dining room would require more courage than facing a three-alarm blaze. Squaring her shoulders, Lise left her room.

  CHAPTER SIX

  JUDD was gazing out at the darkened beach over the ledge of orchids in the dining room; because there was a local festival in town that evening, Sally and her assistant had the rest of the night off, and dinner had been served buffet-style on the vast mahogany sideboard. Emmy was already asleep. Perfect timing for seduction, he thought savagely. A seduction that wasn’t going to happen. All he had to do was keep that goddamned promise for one more night and then he’d be home free.

  Out of sight, out of mind? Would that work where Lise was concerned? He wasn’t so sure. But it was worth a try.

  What other option did he have?

  A whisper of footsteps crossed the tiled floor. Alerted to Lise’s presence, Judd turned around; his smile of welcome froze to his lips. For the space of five seconds he was struck dumb. Then he walked around the corner of the table, stopping only a few inches away from her and letting his gaze wander over her from head to foot. Her bare, rounded arms and creamy throat. The jut of her breasts and gentle indentation of her waist, clasped in gold. The smooth swell of her hips. Only when his eyes came back to her face did he realize that she was panic-stricken, the pulse fluttering at the base of her throat, and her spine rigid. Her expression that of a woman who knows she should be anywhere but where she was.

  Clearing his throat, he said huskily, “To tell you you’re beautiful is meaningless. Yet what else can I tell you? I—hell, Lise, I don’t know what to say.”

  To his horror he saw that tears were glittering in her eyes. Her temper he rather relished; her tears pierced all his defences. Because she’d told him she never cried? Craving to put his arms around her from the simple need to comfort her, knowing that if he did so he would have broken his promise, Judd stood still, his arms taut at his sides. He’d made that promise with very little thought for the consequences and as a means of getting Lise here to his villa: a manipulative promise, he thought stringently. But somehow over the last few days it had come to mean something. He had to keep it. For her sake and for his. And what the devil that meant, he didn’t know. Didn’t even want to know.

  Lise was watching him, her face as unreadable as Emmy’s. Then she drew a deep breath and reached out, taking his right hand in hers and very deliberately bringing it t
o rest on her shoulder. She said unsteadily, “All four fingers on me. How about that?”

  His heart was pounding in his chest like a drum. Lise was releasing him from his promise…what else could her gesture mean? Judd said hoarsely, “Lise, I—are you sure?”

  “No. Maybe. Oh God, I don’t know.”

  As always, her honesty knocked him off balance. Angeline, so he’d come to understand, had never lied to him wittingly; she’d simply adjusted the truth to suit her needs in the moment. At first, very much in love, he’d made allowances for this. Later, as the months and years passed, he’d lost the ability to trust her; and had come to realize that trust was the essential foundation for love.

  He said clumsily, “You always tell the truth, Lise, don’t you? You blurt it out. You throw it in my face. Or you simply say it. Because that’s how you live your life.”

  She didn’t pretend to misunderstand him. “Not much room for lies when you’re searching for a child who’s lost in smoke and flames.”

  He flinched. Then, in a voice he scarcely recognized as his own, he asked the obvious. “Why did you put my hand on your shoulder?”

  “Why did I wear this dress?”

  “Two unanswerable questions?”

  “You kept your promise—don’t think I didn’t notice. That’s got something to do with it.”

  “Yeah…that crazy promise came to mean something. Something important.”

  Briefly she looked terrified out of her wits; he could feel her shrinking from him beneath his fingertips. “I could always plead temporary insanity,” she faltered. “Maybe that’s the only reason that makes any sense.”

  With a muffled groan Judd took her in his arms, and was instantly and achingly aware of the slenderness of her waist and the warmth of her hips, of the way her breasts brushed his shirtfront. He wanted with all the impulsions of his sexuality to make love to her as she’d never been made love to before. To ravish her, delight her, give her the most intense pleasure he was capable of. Don’t, Judd, he thought ferociously. Don’t go there! She’s starting to trust you because you’ve kept a promise. Don’t blow it. Not now. She deserves better than that.