LITMIR.BIZ

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research case law on this. We’ll go in there as prepared as we possibly can be.”

      “Rafe, I know I should give you a retainer or something—”

      “Right now I’m your lawyer because I’m your friend. If it gets drawn out, we’ll talk about retainers. Okay?”

      “I really don’t know how to thank you.”

      “I’ll tell you how you can thank me. This has been a rough day for you. Get yourself a lemonade, put your feet up and try to do something mindless until tomorrow. I’ll get back to you with the time of the meeting.”

      After Jenna had thanked Rafe again and given him her cell phone number, she hung up knowing she couldn’t stay here in the apartment in the heat. She’d stop at the ice cream parlor for a frozen lemonade and then go to the library. Maybe there in the air-conditioning, she could use their computers and do research concerning custody cases on her own. What bothered her the most about all of this was the quickening of her pulse and the roller coaster waves she’d felt when she’d looked into Blake Winston’s eyes. B.J. had been the salt of the earth, the consummate common man. He’d been a roofer and never aspired to more than that, living each day as it came. Through their years together, he’d convinced Jenna to do the same. She’d loved him with all her heart.

      But she’d never had the reaction to B.J. that she’d had to Blake Winston. This rich man, the father of her child, made her pulse race in a way that had nothing to do with her pregnancy. That troubled her, almost as much as Blake’s warning that she’d hear from his lawyer.

      As Rafe escorted Jenna on Tuesday afternoon into the same conference room where the bomb had been dropped on her yesterday, her gaze passed over her physician, Dr. Palmer, the clinic’s director, Thomas Franklin, the clinic’s counsel, Wayne Schlessinger, and a man she didn’t know. Then her gaze locked to Blake Winston’s. His smoky-gray eyes told her he was a complicated man. The fluttering of her stomach, which she’d like to attribute to anxiety and fear—but couldn’t if she wanted to be honest with herself—told her something else entirely. Seated at the end of the conference table, he was wearing a light blue polo shirt, navy casual slacks and supple leather loafers. Just noticing all of this made her feel as if she were betraying B.J.’s memory. Yet noticing Blake Winston’s clothes was a far better distraction than noticing the width of his shoulders, the beard line along his jaw, the vitality of his thick black hair.

      “Mrs. Winton,” Wayne Schlessinger said in greeting.

      “Mr. Schlessinger,” she acknowledged, and gave a little nod to everyone else, including her adversary.

      After Schlessinger shook hands with Rafe, he motioned Jenna and her lawyer to two chairs on the opposite side of the table from the clinic’s representatives. Jenna found herself seated beside Blake, and an uncomfortable situation became unbearable. She was too aware of his cologne, too aware of his appraising glance as his gaze passed over her white-and-blue smocked maternity dress.

      Schlessinger addressed Rafe. “I take it you’ve carefully read our settlement offer?”

      “Yes, I have. But I haven’t advised Jenna to sign it.”

      “May I ask why not?”

      “I want her to be sure that she’s ready to waive her rights to any future lawsuits before she signs anything. It was unfair of you to pressure her to take the offer yesterday.”

      “There was no pressure, Mr. Pierson.”

      Jenna clasped Rafe’s arm, telling him she wanted to speak for herself. “Having a $100,000 check ready for me to endorse was pressure in itself, Mr. Schlessinger.” She looked at Blake. “Are you taking their offer?”

      He repeated what he’d told her yesterday. “The clinic’s money isn’t the issue. My child is.”

      “Mr. Winston,” Schlessinger interrupted. “We’ve gathered everyone here today to try to resolve this.”

      “Resolve this?” Rafe asked wryly. “My client entered into a contract with you in good faith. She’s carried this child for six months. Do you think any amount of money is going to make up for the mistake your clinic made?” He directed his attention to Blake. “Do you think any amount of money will convince my client to give up her child?”

      There was frustration on Blake’s face as well as a blaze of anger in his eyes as he answered. “If money won’t do it, then the law might. I’m the biological father of this child and I have rights. Joint custody at the very least. You’re right about one thing, Mr. Pierson, this isn’t going to be resolved today. Not unless your client is willing to sign a surrogate agreement and give up rights to the child when it’s born.”

      Feeling as if she’d been struck by a lightning bolt, Jenna realized her child meant so much to this man that he’d use all of his power and influence to take away her baby. Although she’d been dealing with the situation since yesterday, she suddenly felt overwhelmed by it all. The information she’d read on the Internet hadn’t been encouraging, and the idea that she was having a child that wasn’t B.J.’s filled her with the same grief she’d experienced after he died. In the midst of the grief, she heard her father’s voice warning her against being artificially inseminated because it wasn’t natural.

      Now she was going to have to tell her father she wasn’t even carrying B.J.’s child! She was carrying a stranger’s child, and this stranger wanted to take her child away from her—or at the very least, share custody with her.

      Tears she’d been holding at bay for more than twenty-four hours sprang to the surface. There was no way she could hide them. Yet she wasn’t going to make a fool of herself in front of all these people.

      Pushing away from the table so fast her chair tipped over, she fled the conference room. She heard Rafe’s voice but didn’t stop, couldn’t stop, wouldn’t stop…not until she’d rushed through the waiting room, pushed open the door and fled around the corner of the building to the parking lot. There under the shade of a live oak, she let the tears freely fall while she covered her face with her hands, wishing against all odds that this was a nightmare and she’d soon awaken.

      When she felt a hand on her shoulder, she took a breath, choked back a sob and looked up, expecting to see Rafe. But it wasn’t Rafe who stood there. It was Blake Winston, the man who wanted her baby for his own, the man who’d replaced B.J. in her dreams last night.

      She turned away from him, trying to hide her tears, trying to hide feelings she didn’t understand.

      Chapter Two

      Blake hadn’t chased after a woman since he was eighteen. That escapade had ended in disaster with a sense of betrayal that yawned so wide he hadn’t been interested in a serious relationship since. Yet when Jenna Winton had run out of that conference room, he’d known he was the reason. What he’d seen on her face was genuine distress.

      Now, for the first time since his meeting with the director of the clinic yesterday, he tried to put himself in her shoes. She’d loved her husband—so much so that she wanted to carry his child even when he was gone. The news that she wasn’t carrying B.J. Winton’s child must have been devastating. Another woman might have wanted nothing to do with the baby. That’s fully what Blake had expected. Compensating Jenna Winton for her pregnancy and her services as a surrogate had seemed a reasonable and perfect solution to him.

      Yet apparently she’d formed a bond with this child already and didn’t want to let go. If she was that kind of woman, she would make a wonderful mother.

      “Jenna,” he murmured, using her given name as if it was his right. She was still turned away from him, and he realized she didn’t want him to see her tears.

      Women used tears to manipulate. They used tears to bring a man to his knees, didn’t they?

      Watching the sunlight play on the blond strands in Jenna’s light brown hair, seeing the tension in her small shoulders as she tried to keep her turmoil from him, compassion

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