Drive-By Daddy. Cheryl Anne Porter
He smiled. “It’s not as bad as all that, Darcy. I imagine you’re scared right now, maybe a little unsure of things. You’ve been through a hell of a lot, it sounds like. I can’t blame you for being a little wary.”
Darcy stared at this Tom Elliott, more and more convinced he was some wonderfully put-together animated robot programmed to say everything a woman wanted to hear. She felt certain she could go to a toy store and find a whole row of Tom Elliott look-alikes in bright, shiny packages. If she did, she intended to buy one for every female friend she had. “Are you always this wonderful?” she asked.
He shrugged and looked embarrassed. “No. Not usually. In fact,” he said, “I expect there are some lawyers and land brokers over in Phoenix who are tacking up Wanted posters of me this minute.”
“Really? Who’d you kill?”
He grinned. “Nobody yet. I’m down here on my late grandfather’s business. He owned—and now I do—a piece of land outside of Phoenix that some developers are interested in. I’ve been looking it over.” He sat up straighter and pointed at her. “As a matter of fact, I’d been looking at it when I came across you yesterday.”
“Well, thank God for your grandfather and his land, then. Or I’d have been scorpion bait. But you must have been really lost because Phoenix is a pretty good ride from here.”
He nodded. “Yeah, I know. I’d already found the land. I just wanted to take a look around a little farther out, maybe see why my granddad had hung on to it for so long. Periodically he’d have to make a trip down here and deal with some paperwork. So did my father. It was always a hassle for them. And now, it is for me, too.”
Darcy could see where this was going. “So you’re thinking if you unload this land, you won’t have to come back here, right?”
His gaze met hers and held. He nodded. “Pretty much. Yeah. This is my last trip here. If I sell it.”
“I see.” Darcy suddenly felt like crying. She’d never see him again. And that bothered her. Because she felt herself really starting to like this man—this man who’d delivered another man’s baby and saved her life. “So,” she said out loud, struggling to sound conversational, “is that why they’re taking out Wanted posters on you? You won’t sell?”
He shrugged those broad shoulders of his. “No. I’ll sell it. Just not at their price. I’m sticking around a while, letting them stew some. See how bad they want it.”
Darcy didn’t know what to think. Well, she knew what she should be thinking. She should be hoping they made a counteroffer today, one he could accept and so he would leave. Because here she was…liking him. Really liking him. He needed to go away—and now. But that wasn’t what she was thinking. She wanted him to stay. And that wasn’t good. Or even logical.
Then she thought of something else, something she hadn’t considered before. As she watched him, he reached into his white and starched Western-style shirt and pulled out two tiny envelopes. Before he could make his intentions known, Darcy blurted her belated thought. “Are you married?”
Tom Elliott froze, his hand poised in midair. Sober as a rodeo judge, he assured her, “No, ma’am. Why do you ask?”
You heard the man, Darcy—why’d you ask? “Well, I was just wondering, with all this latitude you have about staying here or going home whenever you choose…I wondered if there was someone…waiting, is all.” Lame, lame, lame.
Cool as a mountain breeze, his neutral expression never changing, he handed her the tiny envelopes. “I meant to give you these earlier. They go with the flowers.”
Darcy reached for the envelopes. His hand closed over hers making her mouth go dry. “And no, there’s nobody waiting. Just some cattle and several thousand acres of land.”
Darcy swallowed, then smiled…lopsidedly. “Oh. Thanks. For the cards. Not the explanation. You don’t have to explain yourself to me. I—”
“I wanted to.” With that, he released her hand and sat back.
He wanted to? What does that mean? Why did he want to? Is he interested? Darcy did her best to keep her expression in check as she opened the first little envelope. She could see him watching her…and wondered what he was thinking. She sure wasn’t anything to look at. No makeup. In a hospital gown and robe. Her hair a fright. Her body wrung out from delivering a baby. Why, it was a wonder the man hadn’t run for the hills already.
Then, as the silence stretched out, Darcy concentrated on reading each card. Finally, she looked up, grinning. “Thank you, again. And Montana’s card…that’s cute. The Lone Ranger and Silver. I like that.”
His face actually reddened. He shifted in his chair and tried to look tough. But he failed—miserably. “It was stupid.”
“No, it wasn’t. I think it’s cute.”
“It was stupid.”
“Seriously. It’s not. It’s cute.”
“Yeah? I’m not usually so…” He seemed to be casting about for the right word.
“Stupid?” Darcy finished for him, the conspiratorial grin she wore letting him know she was joking.
He chuckled and shook his head. “I deserved that.”
Darcy shook her head. The man was perfect. And would make some deserving woman a wonderful husband. Some unknown and deserving woman up in Montana…whom Darcy already hated. But that reminded her… “Hey, you want to see Montana?”
His grin died. “I already have. I live there.”
“What?” Then she realized his mistake. “No. Montana Skye. Remember? My baby. You know…the one you delivered?”
He threw his hands up in the air. “Oh, hell. There’s that stupid gene again.” Then he sat forward and braced his hands on his knees. “Yeah. I’d love to see how that little lady cleaned up.”
“Okay. We’ll have to go down to the nursery.” Self-consciously, she started getting off the bed, realizing she was out of shape, her ankles were still swollen and she really looked a fright. She’d probably put the man off sex for the rest of his life. Why hadn’t she shaved her legs the other day?
Tom Elliott jumped up, coming to her bedside and gently gripping her arm. “Here. Let me help you. You got your land legs yet?”
His touch ignited her heart. And a few other related parts. “Yeah,” Darcy said around her bottom lip…which she was biting in penance for that momentary burst of lust as her intense soreness fairly shrieked here’s why you don’t need to be thinking about sex right now. “My slippers. Can you put them right there—” He moved them in place and she slipped them on her feet. “Thanks.”
She stood slowly and carefully, holding on to his rock-solid arm with one hand as she used her other to straighten out her gown and robe. His other hand covered hers on his arm.
It was a small gesture, but one so intensely intimate—especially here in the maternity ward—that Darcy looked up at him, felt her aloneness, and struggled with tears. As she straightened her robe and tried to cover her roiling emotions, she quipped, “I guess it’s a little late for me to stand on decorum with you, isn’t it?”
He reached out, wiping at a tear that spilled over. “You just had something on your face,” he said, covering for her. Then, he ran his booted toe dramatically over the flooring. “You say this is decorum we’re standing on? And here I thought it was linoleum.”
The man was killing her. Darcy fought to mortar up the bricks in her emotional wall that he kept knocking down with every kind word and thoughtful gesture. She just couldn’t feel this way toward him. She just couldn’t.
Then he winked at her and set them in motion…slow motion…as they headed for the opened doorway. “Come on, Darcy. Keep me from