Читать книгу My Secret Wife - Cathy Gillen Thacker - Страница 11

“What are you doing here?” Maggie asked in surprise as Gabe walked up to her in the crowded fertility clinic waiting room.

She made room for him and he sat down beside her, his expression as tense and serious as her own. “I thought you might want some help screening prospective donors,” he said.

Maggie wasn’t thrilled to be picking out a father for her baby at a sperm bank, but if she wanted to have a baby of her own, and she did, it was something that had to be done, before she lost her ability to have a child forever. She turned slightly so she could see the expression on Gabe’s face. Seating was tight, and her knee nudged his in the process. “Does that mean you approve of what I’m doing?” She studied him warily.

Gabe shrugged his broad shoulders casually. “It’s not up to me to approve or disapprove,” he said quietly. “It’s your decision. I’m just here to support you in any way I can.”

His words certainly seemed sincere enough, Maggie thought. Nevertheless, her gut feeling told her that Gabe wasn’t any happier about her plan than anyone else who knew about it. Everyone thought she should wait. Give love and the prospect of marriage another try. Unfortunately, Maggie sighed to herself, it wasn’t that easy finding a man she was attracted to physically, emotionally and intellectually. In fact, to date, there had only been one man who had caught her attention in all three ways, and that had been Gabe.

Not that it mattered, since Gabe’s attention span when it came to women was notoriously short. According to those who knew him, Gabe hadn’t dated any women for longer than a few weeks, if that, since high school. These days, he got involved with women—like Penny Stringfield—who needed help. Which he selflessly gave. When they were okay again, he moved on to the next damsel in distress.

Maggie had been one of those damsels in distress once, just prior to her wedding to Chase. She’d been having a lot of doubts leading up to the wedding that wasn’t. But only Gabe had seen those qualms for what they really were—the gut-wrenching realization that she couldn’t marry Chase because she didn’t really love Chase any more than Chase really loved her.

She just hadn’t known how to tell everyone that, including—and especially—Chase.

Had Gabe not seen her conundrum and stepped in to her rescue, encouraging her to speak what was in her heart and mind and then act on it, well…Maggie might well have married—and eventually been divorced from—his brother. Or at least she might have made it all the way down the aisle before coming to her senses and bolting.

But Gabe had come to her rescue.

And stood by her during all the social and family hubbub afterward, even going so far as to date her—twice—before deciding that that wasn’t such a good idea after all.

Maggie had been deeply disappointed—for by then she had developed quite a crush on Gabe—but she had known, intellectually anyway, that Gabe was right. His brother Chase had been humiliated enough by Maggie’s actions, without Gabe and Maggie making the situation worse by dating. Or even being friends.

So, for the next two years, they had pretty much steered clear of each other, seeing each other only occasionally and by accident. Until the afternoon almost a month ago when Maggie had realized her increasingly severe physical symptoms were not going to go away, and that she had to do something about her physical problem fast. So she had called Gabe, and instead of returning her phone call, he had dropped by her beach house in person to hear her dilemma and offer his professional medical advice. One thing had led to another. The next thing she had known, she had been weeping in his arms, and then they were kissing. Nearly three weeks later, Maggie was still thinking about that breathtaking kiss. For no one—no one—had ever made her feel like that. Nor did she think anyone else ever would. Which was, bottom line, exactly what had brought her to the decision she had made. She wasn’t going to marry anyone if she didn’t love him the way she should. And the only person she could envision ever falling in love with was Gabe Deveraux.

Unfortunately, Gabe did not feel the same.

Although he had recently professed a desire to date her again, she suspected that his urge was grounded in her recent troubles and would fade as soon as she landed on her feet. Then, as always, he would be off to rescue the next damsel in distress that came his way.

Maggie had been dumped by Gabe once, albeit for the noblest of reasons—his brother’s feelings, and Deveraux family unity. She wasn’t setting herself up to get dumped again.

Not that Gabe realized, even subliminally, that’s what he was doing. No, she was pretty sure he just looked at each problem—or damsel—as they came into his life, and then acted from his heart, without even thinking about the future. But it was the future, and her baby’s future, that Maggie was concerned with now. And in that sense, she knew, Gabe could assist her, the same way he had recently assisted her in finding a specialist to diagnose her medical problems.

“Well, I could use your medical knowledge,” Maggie reluctantly conceded, after a moment.

Gabe looked satisfied. “Then let’s go through the books together,” he said.

A few minutes later, they were in a cozy room, with a round table and two chairs. They sat shoulder to shoulder, elbows on the table, as they pored over each page. “Here’s a good one,” Maggie said. “The guy is six-four, 220 pounds, with blond hair and blue eyes.”

“He also has a history of arthritis in his extended family,” Gabe pointed out.

“Okay, what about this one?” Maggie moved on to the next possibility. “Five-eleven, brown hair, green eyes. College-educated.”

“He has an aunt on his mother’s side who died of breast cancer.”

Maggie threw her hands up in exasperation. “Well, everyone is going to have relatives who died of something!”

Gabe leaned back in his chair and folded his arms against his chest. “It would be different if you were talking about marrying someone you were in love with,” he explained patiently. “Of course then you would just take your chances and hope for the best. But since you are doing this methodically and you do have a choice, you want to steer away from anyone who has a history of illnesses that can be inherited.”

“Fine.” Maggie flipped through more pages, wishing she could disagree with him, knowing she couldn’t, because everything he said made too much sense. Eventually, she sighed, leaned back and said, “How do we even know these people are being truthful, anyway?”

“Beats me.” Gabe shrugged his broad shoulders restively as his gaze meshed with hers. “I suppose you’re taking it on faith that they fill out the forms accurately. I mean, as conscientious as the people here at the fertility clinic are, they can’t personally look into the family health backgrounds of each donor.”

“There would be privacy concerns—”

“As well as prohibitive costs.”

“So there could be things that aren’t on the list,” Maggie theorized, worried.

“Probably,” Gabe agreed seriously. “Either because a candidate doesn’t know about a relative’s medical history. Or because he feels he would be disqualified from being a donor if the truth were known.”

Maggie swallowed as the implications of that sank in, beginning to feel a little sick at the idea that she might be trying to bring a child into the world who was destined—because of heredity—to suffer from some terrible disease. “You’re not making me feel any better here, Gabe,” she said.

Gabe refused to back down, despite her nervousness. “You brought it up. Besides,” he regarded her steadily, “I thought you wanted me here to assess the situation—medically speaking.”

Actually, Maggie thought, she hadn’t wanted him here at all, because his presence was making her have doubts. And yet, because of the seriousness of the situation, she couldn’t ignore what he was saying, either. Not when the fate of her as-yet-to-be-conceived child hung in the balance.

The nurse knocked and popped her head in. “Settle on one yet?” she asked with a smile.

“No,” Maggie said.

“Not even close,” Gabe added.

“Well, that’s too bad,” the nurse said, glancing at her watch. “Because we were supposed to close up five minutes ago. I hate to ask you to come back, but—my son is playing in a soccer game at five-thirty and I’m in a hurry to close up.”

“No problem,” Gabe said, already rising.

Easy for you to say, Maggie thought darkly, as she closed the book and stood.

“You can make another appointment on the way out,” the nurse hastened to add.

With Gabe watching her, Maggie did.

They walked out into the parking lot. “Where to now?” Gabe asked casually, looking once again as if he were about to ask her out on another date.

Deciding that that was the last thing they needed after the unsatisfactory appointment she had just suffered through, Maggie focused on her old standby: her work. “I don’t know about you,” Maggie said with a smile, “but I’m going out to your beach house. I want to see how the debris removal is coming.”

Gabe followed her in his sports car. It was nearly six by the time they arrived. Luis, Manuel and Enrico had already knocked off for the day. But their work was complete. All the burned material and the damaged cabinets had been torn out. The kitchen was ready for rebuilding.

“It looks like they even took out all the wiring,” Gabe said.

Maggie propped both hands on her hips as she continued to look around. “They have to, for safety’s sake.” She slanted Gabe a glance over her shoulder. “I assume you want everything built back pretty much the way it was.”

Gabe strolled the length of the downstairs, stroking the rugged line of his jaw, with the backs of his fingers as he moved. “Actually I thought I’d like to take the opportunity to tear down the wall between the kitchen and the living room and just open it up.”

That was a pretty expensive and time-consuming change, more than Maggie had bargained on. She frowned. “It’ll take a lot longer and be a lot more expensive,” Maggie warned, hoping he’d change his mind.

No such luck.

Gabe drifted near. “I don’t mind,” he told her lazily, studying her upturned face.

“Spending time with me?” Maggie tilted her head back and sized him up with a considering look of her own, wondering what the ultimate Good Samaritan was up to now. Had he planned this extra request, or was he just winging it, asking to make things much more complicated, on a whim? “Or the extra construction mess?”

“Both,” Gabe said curtly.

Maggie fell silent as she studied the half-hidden apology in his eyes.

She turned away from him, trying not to think about how handsome he looked in his sage-green shirt, coordinating tie and khaki slacks. “You don’t owe me anything, Gabe.” Least of all this.

“Maybe I think I do.”

Maggie turned back in time to see the flicker of guilt in Gabe’s expression. It didn’t take a genius to know where it had originated. “You’ve been talking to Enrico, Luis and Manuel, haven’t you?” She had known better than to leave the four men alone. Especially since the three Chavez brothers had never forgiven Gabe for his part in her breakup with Chase.

Gabe shrugged, obviously respecting her too much to try and tell her otherwise. “The guys are right,” he said quietly. “If not for me, you would be married and have a baby by now.”

Maggie rolled her eyes and thrust her hands in the pockets of her jeans. “They’re hopelessly overprotective of me. They always have been, and it’s gotten worse since my mom and dad died.”

“They want you to have it all.” Gabe closed the distance between them in three long strides. “Not just a child.”

Maggie studied the scuffed toes of her dark-brown work boots. “Suppose that’s not possible?”

“Suppose it is?” Gabe put his hands on her shoulders and kept them there. “At least take another few days to think about this.”

Heart racing, mouth dry, Maggie looked up at him. “I can’t,” she said, doing her best not to tremble at his touch.

“Why not?” Gabe asked, so gently she wanted to cry.

Maggie drew a deep breath, extricated herself gracefully from his light, detaining grip and wheeled away. “Because my monthly ovulation window is in three to five days,” she told him grimly as she paced back and forth. “And, given the fact my endometriosis has already made me damn near infertile and I may not conceive on the first try, I can’t afford to waste any time.”

Gabe’s eyes darkened with emotion. “I understand all that,” he told her quietly.

Maggie squared off with him contentiously. “But?”

“I still don’t like the idea of you using an anonymous donor.”

“Why not?” At his firm insistence, it was all Maggie could do not to clench her teeth.

“Because I think you should know your baby’s father.”

So did Maggie, if the truth be known. But that wasn’t possible, either, she thought. Furthermore, Gabe should know it, too, instead of pretending otherwise. She shook her head and asked wryly, “And what guy would say yes to a request like that?”

Gabe angled a thumb at his chest. “Me.”

FOR A MOMENT, both of them were silent, Gabe every bit as speechless and stunned by his impetuous offer as Maggie looked. Finally, she pulled herself together, shoved a hand through her wavy hair and regaled him with the fiery Irish temperament she had inherited from her dad. “Look, Gabe, I think it’s great that you are the Good Samaritan of Charleston, South Carolina, always volunteering to help women out, but this is just too much!”

Gabe drank in the husky vehemence of her voice and the bloom of new color in her fair cheeks, as a car pulled up outside. “So you won’t even consider it?” He was stunned by the intensity of his disappointment. Since when had he considered fatherhood? he wondered in shocked amazement. Never mind with a woman who generally speaking wouldn’t give him the time of day! And yet, the thought of Maggie having a baby with someone else—anyone else—even someone anonymous who meant nothing at all to her was even worse. Gabe couldn’t say why he felt the way he did, he just knew he didn’t want Maggie Callaway to be having anyone’s baby but his. End of story.

“For you to be the sperm donor of my baby?” Maggie gaped at Gabe, as a younger woman got out of the car and made her way toward the house. “I hardly think so!” she said vehemently.

“I have to tell you,” Daisy Templeton said, as she strolled casually in to join them. “But I have to go with Maggie there. Having a baby via artificial insemination is not the way to go.”

Not the opinion Gabe would’ve expected from Charleston society’s wild child and most sought after new photographer. The twenty-three-year-old heiress had been kicked out of seven colleges in five years. Now, Daisy was telling everyone she had no intention of ever going back, and was instead going to devote herself to becoming a professional photographer. Fortunately for the spirited and beautiful young heiress, she had the talent, if perhaps not the discipline, to make her boast a reality, Gabe thought.

“As it happens,” Maggie said stiffly, turning to face Daisy, “in my opinion, artificial insemination of donor sperm is exactly the way to go.”

Daisy raised her pale blond brows in inquiry, looked at Gabe, then Maggie. “Are you planning to tell the baby who his or her father is?” she asked Maggie carefully.

Maggie shrugged and looked, Gabe noted, even more defensive in light of Daisy’s disapproval. “Probably not,” Maggie said.

Daisy popped her gum and got her camera out of the case. “Big mistake,” Daisy said, shooting Maggie a sober glance. “And I mean gargantuan. I should know because I’m adopted.”

That stopped Maggie in her tracks, Gabe noted.

“You have no idea who your parents are?” Maggie asked.

Daisy shrugged as she set up to take the Before pictures for Chase’s magazine, Modern Man. “No, I don’t,” Daisy admitted with a troubled look, as she loaded film into her camera, “although I’m working on finding that out.”

“It was a problem for you?” Maggie asked.

“More than that,” Daisy admitted as she got down on one knee to photograph the burned-out shell of the kitchen. “It was a never-ending source of shame and mystery, frustration and unhappiness.”

This surprised Gabe.

“Why?” Gabe asked, brow furrowing as he struggled to understand. Daisy had been adopted by one of Charleston’s wealthiest families and had grown up in a privileged home.

Daisy bit her lower lip and looked even more distressed as she related, “Because there had to be some reason for my parents to give me up. And I wondered why my parents abandoned me. My birth mother obviously wanted to carry me to term, but what about my birth father? Why did he walk out on my birth mother or even allow my birth mother to give me up for adoption? I’ve always wondered why my father didn’t love me. And just who the heck is he, anyway? Was he some terrible person or just plain selfish? Did he even know about me? Did my birth mother tell him she was pregnant or did she have me and give me up in secret?”

Good questions, Gabe thought. And ones he had no answers for.

“She must have loved you if she gave you up for adoption,” Maggie said gently, doing her best to comfort Daisy.

“I’ve always told myself that was the case,” Daisy said sadly, as she got slowly to her feet and walked to the opposite side of the room, to shoot photos from another angle. “But deep down I wonder if it’s true,” Daisy continued sadly, “if my birth mother ever really cared about me at all. The bottom line here is that it’s a terrible thing for a child to have to grow up knowing that there’s something weird or different or secret about the circumstances of his or her birth. And if you have a choice, as you two clearly do now, you shouldn’t do anything to bring a child into the world that you wouldn’t want the child eventually to know about.”

“I HAD NO IDEA Daisy was that deep,” Gabe mused, after Daisy Templeton had finished taking her photos and driven off once again.

“I didn’t either,” Maggie said. She sat down on the steps looking out over the ocean and glumly plucked at the stone-washed fabric of her jeans. “As much as I hate to admit it, she had a point. I mean, how is my baby going to feel when he’s old enough to learn his birth father is just a stranger from a sperm bank?”

Gabe sighed as he walked over and settled beside her on the steps. “Probably not very good,” he said, trying hard not to think about the way her yellow shirt molded the soft, sexy curves of her breasts.

She brought her legs up and wrapped her arms around her bent legs. Resting her head on her knees, she turned her face to look at him and said in a low voice laced with remorse, “I’m not sure that it would be any better to accept a sperm donation from you as a friend, either, though.”

Gabe was silent. Thinking Maggie needed more comfort than she realized, he curved his arm around her shoulders and returned, just as soberly, “I’d hate it if our kid were embarrassed at how he or she had come into this world, or at me or you for our parts in it.”

Maggie drew a deep breath and slowly let it out. “And now that I think about it, I can’t see a child who was old enough to understand the clinical procedure involved in artificial insemination thinking of our decision to procreate with anything but embarrassment and loathing,” Maggie said.

Gabe nodded and admitted just as freely, “The last thing a kid wants is to be different from everybody else. It’s one thing when there’s no helping it. But when you can help it….” He stopped, shook his head at the emotion welling up inside him. “Daisy’s right,” he concurred in a low, choked voice as he looked deep into Maggie’s light-green eyes. “It isn’t fair.”

“So what am I going to do?” Maggie asked unhappily, burying her face in her hands.

Gabe, in an attempt to comfort her, rubbed some of the tension from her slender shoulders. “You could always go the conventional route and get married,” he said as he massaged his way down her spine.

Maggie bounded to her feet and dashed the rest of the way down the steps. She shoved both hands in the pockets of her jeans and stared at the constantly shifting ocean. Her lips set in a stubborn pout. “I can’t marry someone just because he lusts after me.” She turned and shot him an angry look over her shoulder. “I almost did that with your brother Chase and look what happened.”

Without warning, jealousy stabbed his heart. Gabe swallowed, stood, and followed her down to the bottom of the steps. “Was that what was between the two of you?” he asked, squaring off with her and finding he really needed—wanted—to know. “Lust?”

At his bluntness, Maggie’s cheeks flooded with embarrassed color. She turned her eyes away evasively, kicked at the sand with the toe of her work boot. “Let’s just say your older brother knows how to court a woman aggressively,” she said gruffly. “And there isn’t a woman on this earth who doesn’t want to be hotly pursued.”

Was that where he’d made his big mistake? Not pursuing Maggie aggressively enough?

Suddenly, Gabe knew he couldn’t let Maggie get away again. Not when her biological clock was ticking, and she wanted a baby. “Look, this doesn’t have to be this complicated,” he said urgently, wishing like heck she weren’t behaving in a way that made her vulnerable. And whether Maggie realized it or not, her actions were putting her in a place where she was very much at risk of being hurt or taken advantage of. Now, later, it didn’t really matter. All he knew was that he was determined not to see that happen.

Maggie lifted her brow. “It doesn’t?”

“No, it doesn’t,” Gabe said firmly, as the solution to her problem quickly became evident to him. “Because I’ll marry you and give you the baby you want via artificial insemination.” In fact, the more he thought about it, the more he knew it was the right path to take.

Maggie blinked at him in surprise. “Why would you do that?” she demanded hoarsely, as all the color drained from her face.

“Because Daisy’s right.” Afraid she was going to bolt if he didn’t hang on to her, Gabe took both her hands in his. Wanting her to know how serious he was, he looked deep into her eyes. “If you are going to do this, you should go about it the right and proper way. And I want to help you.” More than he had ever wanted to help anyone in his life!

“But we don’t love each other,” Maggie protested, twin spots of delicate pink color staining her cheeks.

Gabe shrugged off her worries. “That doesn’t really matter, given the way you’re going to get pregnant,” he said, finding the idea of her having artificial insemination was not nearly as repugnant to him if it was with his sperm. “What will matter,” Gabe emphasized bluntly now that he had her full attention, “is that we will be officially married when you are getting pregnant and having the baby.”

Maggie took a half step back but then gripped his hands all the tighter. “And then what?” she demanded in a soft, wary voice that sent shivers across his skin.

“When the time is right, later,” Gabe soothed, knowing it was the only practical solution as well as what Maggie wanted to hear, “we’ll divorce.”

Maggie looked even more amazed. “And you think it’s a workable plan?”

Gabe nodded confidently. “The most workable one so far.” He leaned toward her urgently, not stopping until he was close enough to inhale the intoxicating hyacinth fragrance of her skin. “Think about it, Maggie. This way our baby will know who both his or her parents are. I only have one stipulation.”

“And that is—?” The hesitation in her eyes was back.

“That I be allowed to be the baby’s father while he or she is growing up and that the baby be brought up as a Deveraux as well as a Callaway,” Gabe said firmly, knowing he was right about this. “Because every baby deserves both a father and a mother and if possible a loving extended family.”

Maggie swallowed. “Well, I can’t give my baby that on my own, so…all right,” she conceded eventually. “I’ll do this your way.”

Silence fell between them once again. Maggie furrowed her brow.

“What?” Gabe prodded.

Maggie frowned, stepped back, let go of his hands. “I can’t help but think that your family is not likely to approve of this plan of ours,” she said worriedly. “Nor are those close to me.”

Wishing he could just forget the clinical approach and make love to her, and impregnate her with his seed that way, Gabe shrugged off her concerns. He knew they could work out whatever problems came up. The important thing was that Maggie not go off half-cocked and have some stranger’s baby, and then spend the rest of her life—and her baby’s, too—regretting it. “They don’t even have to know the details,” Gabe argued resolutely. “We’ll tell them that you’re pregnant later, after we’ve already been secretly married for a few months. That way,” he reasoned, “we’ll likely get a lot less grief, since people are less inclined to weigh in about a fait accompli.”

“All right,” Maggie said tremulously. Her chest rose and fell as she breathed in deeply and then released an enormous sigh of relief. “I agree.” She shot him a stern, warning glance. “But with my ovulation window ready to hit by the end of the week, we don’t have much time.”