LITMIR.BIZ

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didn’t read the article in the local paper?”

      She shook her head, and a frown of puzzlement etched his brow as if he had expected her to know and couldn’t understand why she didn’t. Was he mixing her up with another writer? The only way she could find out was by confessing her real purpose and now didn’t seem like the right time. “I’m afraid not. If you’d rather I went away and came back some other time.” She was gathering up her bag as she spoke.

      His hand on her arm stayed her. “You don’t have to leave. It still hurts to think about, but I’ve had time to come to terms with what happened.”

      The heat of his touch sent awareness flashing through her, as incandescent as a signal flare. Her eyes widened. Had Nicholas felt it, too? With an effort she met his eyes and made herself ask, “Was it an accident?”

      He nodded. “There was a signal failure at a railway crossing not far from here. My brother and sister-in-law were driving across when an express train slammed into their car without any warning. Maree was the only survivor because she was strapped into a baby seat. Even then, given the state of the car, it was a miracle she survived. There wasn’t a scratch on her.”

      This time when her eyes blurred she made no attempt to conceal it from him. “What a terrible tragedy.”

      “It was, but all we can do is go on.”

      “As you’re doing with your little niece?”

      He nodded. “I’m all she has in the world, and I mean to give her the best upbringing I possibly can.”

      The baby, her cheeks bulging with bananas, looked the picture of health and happiness as she bounced up and down in her high chair. Apart from the recent adornment of pureed spinach, she was spotlessly clean, dressed in a gorgeous romper suit decorated in teddy bears, with a pink ribbon adorning one of her baby curls.

      She was in far better condition than her uncle, Bethany decided. Nicholas looked as if he had thrown his pants on in haste and forgotten—or never had time—to shave this morning. A bluish tinge darkened the strong line of his jaw, giving him a rugged, almost-piratical appearance which was more appealing than it had any right to be. The fatigue darkening his eyes only added to his masculine appeal, and to her horror, Bethany found herself wishing she could do something to help.

      This would never do. She was here for one purpose and one only, to persuade him to let her write about the Frakes Baby House. But how could she come out and say so now, when he had just revealed the depths of a personal tragedy far greater than she had anticipated?

      She couldn’t, she decided. Her hand closed resolutely around her bag. “I should go. The interview can wait until another time.”

      “Dammit, you needn’t start feeling sorry for me,” he growled, startling her into freezing where she stood. “I’ve had enough of that from my neighbors around here. They act as if Maree and I have a contagious disease called tragedy. When you walked in knowing nothing about out situation, you treated us just like anybody else and it was like a breath of fresh air. At least stay and have a cup of coffee with me. You said yourself the best thing to do is keep busy in the kitchen while Maree feeds herself.”

      Bethany gave a wan smile. “All right, one cup of coffee. But only if it’s no trouble.”

      “After the morning I’ve had, coffee isn’t any trouble, it’s a medical necessity,” he assured her. “How do you take yours?”

      “Black with one sugar,” she supplied, settling herself on a high stool next to a breakfast counter. It was cluttered with the remains of what looked like his breakfast, and she smiled wryly at the sight of an open packet of chocolate flavored cereal, a milk carton and a plastic bowl, the twin of the one Maree was using. Evidently Nicholas didn’t believe in healthy breakfasts, for himself, anyway.

      As he spooned coffee into the pot, he looked up in time to catch her smile. “What?”

      “No wonder you look so tired if you’re existing on this stuff,” she observed.

      He shrugged. “Who has time to cook?”

      She surprised herself by saying, “If you keep an eye on the baby, I’ll make you an omelette that will make your mouth water.”

      His mouth looked as if it was watering at the very idea. His sweeping gesture took in the refrigerator and stove. “Be my guest. Everything you’re likely to need is here.”

      He moved aside to let her take over the food preparation area, and she surveyed the gleaming modern stove with apprehension. She must be crazy letting a misguided sense of compassion drive her to volunteer for this. Or was she simply delaying the moment when she had to disillusion him by admitting why she was really here?

      Whatever the reason, it was too late to back out now. Nicholas had thrown himself into a comfortable-looking oversize leather chair which flanked the stone fireplace. He watched with interest as she whipped up eggs and milk, shredded cheese and added a few leaves of parsley from a pot growing on the windowsill, then set the mixture sizzling in a large cast-iron pan.

      It did smell good, she thought with a flush of pride, as she placed a plate on a small table beside him a few minutes later. He eyed the golden creation hungrily. “You really are a miracle worker if you cook as well as you charm babies.”

      A perverse streak of pride prevented her from admitting that an omelette was the only thing she could cook, other than baby food. Her brother Sam called her the “Thrill Griller” because he never knew what was going to come out of her culinary efforts. More often than not it was a charred mess. In defiance, to avoid being the butt of any more family jokes whenever it was her turn to cook dinner, she had gritted her teeth and mastered the art of making omelettes. Served with a salad, her cheese omelette could pass any test.

      It was doing so now, she saw as Nicholas proceeded to demolish the six egg treat with total disdain for the risk to his arteries from all that cholesterol. She had loaded the omelette with extra cheese since he looked as if he could use the fuel. “This is good,” he mumbled around a forkful of food. He sounded so much like Maree with her banana that Bethany had to smother a laugh. She didn’t think he would appreciate the comparison.

      To distract herself while he ate, she tidied up the remains of the baby’s meal then draped a towel over her shoulder and lifted Maree out of the high chair, resting her against the towel. Several hearty burps later, one of which she would swear hadn’t come from the baby, Bethany handed Maree to her surrogate father. “Both of you look disgustingly satisfied,” she observed, feeing an unwilling frisson of pleasure at her own part in the achievement.

      Nicholas began to jiggle Maree on his knee, and the baby chortled happily. “I’d say we’re both in luck with our fairy godmother, don’t you agree, Mareedle-deedle-dumpling?” The baby gurgled what sounded like agreement. “There, you see? The expert in fairy godmothers agrees with me.”

      Bethany felt an ache so sharp and fierce that at first she didn’t connect it with the sight of the big man cradling the baby against the hard wall of his bare chest. But nothing else could explain the intensity of the pain which knifed through her. It had to be the image of Maree’s dark head nestled in the angle between Nicholas’s powerful jaw and his chest. He rested one hand lightly against Maree’s back while the other cupped her chubby hips as if holding a baby was the most natural thing in the world to him.

      Bethany was gripped by a need so powerful it threatened her breathing. She turned away and forced herself to say around a betraying huskiness, “I’ll finish making the coffee.”

      The simple act of locating cups and pouring the brewed coffee into them helped to anchor her so that by the time she turned to ask Nicholas how he preferred his coffee, her hands no longer trembled.

      She needn’t have worried. In the few minutes it took her to pour the coffee, both Nicholas and the baby resting on his chest were fast asleep.

      Chapter Two

      “Oh

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