Читать книгу The Fertility Factor - Jennifer Mikels - Страница 9

“Y ou’re such a natural with them, Lara.”

Lara Mancini cradled the six-week-old girl in her arms and smiled. “I’ve had a lot of practice. Last count, I had ten nieces and nephews.”

Standing beside her, the beaming mom and dad of the triplets each held one infant.

In the three years since Lara had volunteered as a nurse at Manhattan Multiples, a center for multiple births, she’d held many babies, but she never lost interest or felt too tired to hold one. While still in her teens and baby-sitting for every neighbor on the block, she realized how much she loved being with children.

“You should be a mother, Lara,” the woman said.

“Someday. Your next appointment is in six months unless you need to see Dr. Cross sooner,” Lara said while placing the little one in an infant seat.

“No, I’m feeling great.” The young woman shot a meaningful look at her husband as they bent down to place the other two babies in car seats.

Lara assumed the silent exchange carried a definite message of intimacy since they’d received the all-clear to resume relations.

“Come on,” her husband urged. “Lara has other patients to care for.”

“I always enjoy being with these three,” Lara assured them. She smiled, watched them leave. The daddy carted out two infant seats, while his wife managed one and an oversize pink-and-blue diaper bag. Lara cast a look at the gallery clock on the half wall behind the appointment counter. The appointments on this Saturday morning had been lighter than usual.

Having promised to meet co-workers downstairs in the reception area a few minutes before noon, she hurried into the staff lounge, and rushed to her locker to change out of blue-colored scrubs. She slid on a deep-green, V-necked, sleeveless top and an ankle-length, silk floral skirt, released her hair from the tortoiseshell clasp and fluffed it. After snatching up her shoulder bag from her locker, she dashed to the elevator.

On the way down to the first floor, she attached small, gold hoop earrings and a gold chain to dress up the outfit. She thought about what the couple had said to her. Everyone said the same. She was a natural with babies.

You should be a mother. Her stomach knotted. She wasn’t one, might never be. Depressing thoughts had started at seven that morning. Over the phone a friend, fighting tears, had told her terrible news. Sadness had shadowed Lara ever since Gena’s call about her appointment at her gynecologist.

As the elevator doors swooshed open, Lara fought her sad mood. In the lobby she saw Eloise Vale, Manhattan Multiples’ director disappear into her office. Another nurse, Carrie Williamson, was waiting beside Josie Tate’s desk.

The center’s receptionist, Josie, was a cute, petite brunette with an abundance of blond streaks, who favored denim clothes. Her bright smile was the first thing people saw when they entered Manhattan Multiples.

“I’m sorry I’m late,” Lara said to both of them from a few feet away.

“No problem.” Carrie, a tall brunette with a slight build, led the way to the center’s entrance. “I’ve been telling Josie about my latest dating fiasco,” she said while pushing open one of the double glass doors. A man bumped shoulders with Carrie, as he plowed his way through the crowd. “I’m looking for a prince among frogs.”

Lara knew where there was one—Dr. Derek Cross. Handsome, rich, charming. She kept the thought to herself. Never had he indicated interest in her, but from day one, she’d felt a tightness in her chest whenever he was near. Her secret crush was her business, no one else’s. She liked her job, wanted to keep it.

“I can’t believe how hot it is,” Josie said.

“Neither can I,” Lara agreed when they stopped at a curb for a red light. A summer heat wave for the past two days had left New Yorkers cranky.

“That’s a great outfit, Lara.”

Josie nodded her agreement of Carrie’s comment.

“Thanks. I didn’t think scrubs would play well today.” For the upscale restaurant near the center’s Madison Avenue address, she and Carrie had changed outfits.

It was their splurge week. Instead of the deli nearby, the three women strolled to a pricey restaurant with rosewood paneled walls, crystal, linen and enormous flower arrangements. Inside, the buzz of conversation and the clink of silverware filled the room.

Even after they were seated at a table for four, Carrie continued to rattle on about her date two nights ago. “He bought me a hot dog. That was his idea of a big date. Then we took a taxi to the theater. He was out of money. I ask you. Why did he suggest the taxi if he couldn’t pay for it? Because he knew he couldn’t. How insulting.”

Lara sipped her water and absently listened to Josie offering sympathetic words to Carrie about her tale of woe.

Josie poked a fork into the shrimp salad just delivered, but paused with the fork in midair. “Lara, are you sick? You’re awfully quiet.”

“I’m in trouble,” Lara answered, frowning at her Caesar salad.

As if playing a child’s game of Red Light, Green Light, they both froze.

“You’re pregnant?” Carrie mumbled, her mouth full.

“You would have told us if you were, wouldn’t you?” Josie asked.

“I’m not pregnant,” Lara said, “and that’s what’s really wrong. Time is running out for me.”

“To get pregnant, you mean?” Josie asked.

Lara nodded. “I used to believe that I had plenty of time to think about a husband, about tying myself down, about children. But I’m thirty-eight. I feel pressure now to get pregnant soon, before it’s too late.”

Carrie shook her head. “Oh, you’ll be okay.”

Did they really understand? Lara wondered. Carrie perhaps did. She was thirty-two and divorced. But Josie might not understand her desperation. Often Josie had scoffed at the idea of having children. But then Josie was only twenty-five. She could afford to be a free spirit for a few more years.

“Anyone would want you,” Carrie said.

Lara laughed. How sweet she was. “No, they wouldn’t. Men my age want sexy young things with thighs of steel.”

“You have thighs of steel.”

Lara nearly snorted. “They’re not Jell-O—well, maybe firm Jell-O.”

“I’ve seen you in a bikini,” Josie cut in. “Most women would die for your figure, Lara. You’re pretty enough to be a movie star.”

“She was a movie star,” Carrie reminded her.

Lara had strived for a long time to earn her living doing something she loved—acting. But like others with “pie in the sky” dreams, she’d faced the truth several years ago. Though she’d known a more glamorous life, had acted in a Broadway play, even a few movies, she doubted she’d make it big as an actress.

“I don’t know how you could give all that up,” Carrie said.

“It wasn’t that glamorous. Where are you performing this week, Josie?”

“Goodfellows.” At night Josie hung out at coffee shops or smoky bars where she read her poetry. “It’s an upscale bar in the West Village. Will you come? It’s not far from your place.”

“I’ll try.” Lara had saved diligently and had invested well to afford a one-bedroom apartment in the West Village building, complete with a doorman.

“Me, too,” Carrie said between bites of her chicken sandwich.

They stayed longer than they should have and rushed back toward the center at Madison Avenue and Seventy-eighth Street. Lara said goodbye as the other women were about to enter the center, said she had an errand to run. She had time before the first afternoon appointment arrived. The truth was she wanted to be alone. She needed time to think.

She wandered into Central Park, found a bench. She’d been deadly serious with her co-workers. Her usual optimism had waned with her friend Gena’s early-morning, tearful phone call. Lara had ached for her. The news had stormed her with doubts and despair about her own ability to get pregnant.

In two years she’d celebrate her fortieth birthday. She didn’t have time anymore. She needed to get pregnant now.

“It’s lunchtime, Mancini. What are you doing sitting here, alone?”

The male voice jerked her head up. Even with sunlight in her eyes, she knew who stood before her. Light glowed around him, but she saw the easy, half smile tugging at a corner of his lips.

“Hi.” Mentally she prodded herself to act normal. That was no easy task. Derek Cross tripped every feminine instinct within her. “The park’s a good place to think.” He’s your boss, your boss, your boss, Lara repeated to herself like a mantra.

Beneath dark, straight brows, his deep-set, hazel eyes narrowed with concern. She ranked his eyes as one of his best features. Cool, unreadable—sometimes. Filled with unmeasurable warmth during other moments, like today. “Are you okay?”

The light breeze tossed his dark-brown hair. She thought he was even sexier with the strands slightly disturbed, mussed in much the way they’d look from a woman’s touch. “Yes, I’m fine.” The world is spinning, and I’m getting older. And all I can think about is how sexy you look. The black polo shirt clung to muscled biceps and a lean, flat belly. She’d just known he would have such a well-toned body. Denim curved around a tight butt and followed long, strong-looking legs. A shiver inched its way up her spine. She wouldn’t drool, she promised herself. It didn’t matter that she was much too old for such nonsense. He made her hot, all six-four of him. “Have you had your lunch yet?”

He tipped his head slightly in a questioning manner.

Mentally she moaned. Did he think she was asking him to have lunch with her? “I mean—” Oh, this was insane. She was an intelligent woman who managed to snag even a stranger’s attention with interesting conversation, so why was she acting like a ninny? “I just finished having it. My lunch.” Scintillating, Lara. This will undoubtedly be the last time he talked to her about anything except a patient. At the office he’d always been all business. “With Josie and Carrie.” She needed to get a grip. “Do you know them?”

His eyes held an amused smile. “Yes, I know them.”

“I—” She paused, vowed to drown herself if she blushed. She needed to pretend they were at work. Tongue-tied was not normal for her. If anything, she’d been accused, mainly by family, of being gabby.

“Do you need anything?”

Oh, what a question.

“Is there something I can do to help? If there is, tell me,” Derek added while he braced the bicycle he’d ridden to the park against the bench.

She shook her head, wished he’d stop asking. She might tell him that she was frightened. She wanted to hold a baby. She ached to hold her own baby. “Are you here with your son?” she asked, and strained for a smile. He’d make beautiful babies, she decided. The boys would have that long, straight nose, that strong, sharply angled face. They’d be as gorgeous as their father.

“Joey and I came to the park to play catch.”

From previous conversations with him, she knew that he and his son usually went to the park on the weekends. As Derek shifted his stance, she realized he’d angled his body while talking to her so he never lost sight of his son. She thought the boy with his dark-brown hair and blue eyes already had his father’s great looks.

“And we came for lunch. One of my son’s favorites. Hot dogs.”

Lara stood up to leave. “That’s a favorite of mine, too,” she said but didn’t move as he smiled. She liked his mouth, too. Firm looking with a full bottom lip. Then there were the slashing high cheekbones. She’d always been a sucker for a man with high cheekbones.

“I’ve heard you’re a fantastic cook. I wouldn’t think you’d touch a hot dog.”

She barely kept an idiotic grin from forming. What a perfect opportunity to say she’d be glad to cook him something some evening. Of course, she couldn’t. “I like cooking. Even hot dogs.”

“Anyone who can cook hot dogs rates high with my son. Is today special?” he asked, gesturing toward her clothes.

“We—” She paused. During her stint as an actress, she’d kissed a few heart-stopping, handsome males. Didn’t matter. She was sunk around Derek Cross. “We had an expensive lunch today—a once-a-month treat.”

“Nice.”

Dumbly she waited for him to say more.

Instead he shot a look at his son and beckoned him toward them. “Do you remember Ms. Mancini, Joey?”

“My name’s Lara.” She’d met him a few times before when Derek had brought him to the office, but he’d been younger, and she assumed he wouldn’t remember her. She gestured toward Joey’s baseball mitt. “Your dad told me that you love baseball.”

Derek frowned. “Did I?”

A twinge of disappointment whipped through her. She’d been so thrilled when he’d shared his celebratory mood and had told her about his son’s first home run on the previous day. “Yes, in passing.”

“I remember you. Do you want to play?” Joey asked.

Derek touched his slender shoulder. “Joey, she can’t—”

“I could, if I had more time. I love baseball, too.” Lara glanced at her watch, a serviceable round face with a black band. “Do you like the Yankees?”

“Yeah!”

“Me, too. I try never to miss a game.”

“There’s one on television today.”

“I know,” Lara said. “But I can’t watch it. I have to get back to work.” Maybe she was talking too much.

Derek sent her a questioning look. “I’d never have guessed you were a fan. Baseball seems too quiet for you.”

A laugh bubbled in her throat. “Too quiet?” Amusement stayed with her. She knew his background. The Cross family claimed a lineage that dated back to the American Colonies. How did Derek view her? Flighty? Eccentric? Because she’d been an actress? She’d learned from one man that the upper crust viewed theater people as a step above bohemians. James Braden III had made it clear that grease-paint and blue blood didn’t mix. “I have brothers. Quiet is not in the Mancini vocabulary.”

Derek flashed a smile. “They play ball?”

“One of them was always asking me to play catch.”

“I gather you come from a big family?”

“Three brothers, two sisters,” she said, feeling more at ease because Joey was near.

“I never knew that about you.”

Why would he? She was his nurse, nothing more. He’d have no reason to bother finding out anything about her. But he knew about her love of cooking? Why? Had he asked about her? Probably not, she decided. Someone might have said something, maybe at Christmastime when they’d had a potluck buffet at the center and everyone had brought a homemade dish. “Maybe some other time we can play,” she said, just to please the boy. She knew she’d never be with them again. “If that’s all right with your daddy,” she added.

Joey sent her a quick grin, obviously taking her words to heart. “Is it, Dad?”

With a gentle hand, Derek cupped his son’s shoulder. “We’ll see.”

A nice, noncommittal response, Lara mused.

“Daddy, can we go now?”

“I promised we’d watch the ball game until I have to leave,” Derek said to her.

During the three years since she’d begun working side by side with Derek, Lara had never seen him look so relaxed. It had nothing to do with the clothes. It was the way he looked at his son. No strain tightened his jawline. No annoyance narrowed his eyes. He looked so calm.

Joey took a step away, then halted, remembering her. “Bye, Lara.”

“See you, Joey.” She waited until he was out of hearing range. “He’s so adorable, Derek.”

“I think so. That was nice of you,” he said. “I owe you.”

She swung away, smiling. With excruciating honesty, she admitted her feelings for this man were like a teenage crush. That sounded incredibly immature for a thirty-eight-year-old woman, but she couldn’t ignore the emotions he stirred.

“Lara?”

In midstride, she paused, shot a look over her shoulder at him. She’d thought they were done.

His long, hard look nearly melted her bones. “You look terrific.”

Breathe, Lara, breathe. “Thank you.” During sensible moments she told herself that he’d probably drive her crazy with his inflexibility. She was a “wing it” person. Five siblings had forced her to have an easygoing nature. Adaptability was a must with a capital A. Derek definitely was intense, all wrong for her. He was also out of her league. But it didn’t matter a whit that they had nothing in common except a love for kids. She had the hots for him.

Derek watched her walk away and swore softly. She hadn’t told him what was wrong. He’d seen her sitting on the park bench. Head bent, she’d looked so alone. He’d never seen her alone. People gravitated toward her. At work someone—a patient’s family or a co-worker—was always talking to her.

“She’s pretty.”

Derek caught his son’s small hand and grabbed the handlebar of the bicycle. “Yes.”

More than one nurse had complained that he was aloof, detached, distant. He’d gone through several nurses before Lara had worked for him. He was too much of a perfectionist, people claimed. He expected too much, was tough on the people who worked with him. He didn’t think so. Babies, precious and innocent, were in his care. They deserved the best he and everyone he worked with could give them. He’d found that person when Lara Mancini had come to work with him. He’d be a fool to ruin the working relationship he had with her.

“She likes you. I can tell.”

Derek chuckled. “How can you tell?” he asked, interested in hearing his son’s observation.

“Because she smiled at you a lot. A real lot. Rylyn liked Adam and smiled at him all the time.”

“Who’s Rylyn?”

“The one with the pink lunch box at school.”

“Oh, okay.” Rylyn, a kindergarten classmate, was a dimpled redhead with freckles.

“When they like you, they smile a lot.”

Derek grinned. Was he really getting advice from his five-year-old son?

“And you smiled at her a lot, too.”

“We work together, Joey. Lara is my nurse.”

“Couldn’t she be your girlfriend?”

“I don’t think so.” No, she couldn’t. He knew she couldn’t be. Lara Mancini wanted everything he was rejecting—promises, commitment, love, marriage and children. Derek tightened his hand on his son’s. Joey had gone through everything that Derek had promised himself no child of his ever would. He’d never do that to another child.

“Daddy, you’re doing it again.”

“Doing what?”

“I’m talking to you, and you’re not listening.” Joey frowned. “In school, you get your name on the board if you do that.”

Derek pulled a silly face and whacked the side of his head. “Me? I did that. Again?” As Joey laughed at him, Derek dropped to his haunches. “Climb aboard.”

Joey placed one arm around Derek’s neck and gripped his shirt at the shoulder with his other hand. “Couldn’t she be?” he asked, straddling Derek’s back for a piggyback ride.

Derek paused in walking the bike and unhooked the water bottle from behind the seat to offer Joey a drink.

“I was thirsty.” He gulped a mouthful of water, then handed Derek the water bottle.

“Joey, what is this about?” Derek asked and took a hearty swallow of the water.

“You have to like her to make a baby, don’t you?”

The water spewed out of his mouth. “What? Who said anything about babies?” He’d have a long talk with his ex-wife if she was putting this stuff in Joey’s head.

“Rylyn said I need to be a big brother. Everyone in my class is having a baby.”

Rylyn again. “They are?”

“Even the turtle. They lay eggs. Mrs. Wolken has a big egg in her.”

Mrs. Wolken was a kindergarten teacher in her last trimester. “She doesn’t have an egg in her. She has a baby.”

“Uh-huh. A baby is inside an egg.”

They’d talk tonight at bedtime. Now wasn’t the time to have a discussion about the birds and bees. “Let’s get home. Dorothy is making your favorite cookies,” he said about Dorothy Donaldson, housekeeper, nanny, good friend. She wore a lot of hats for them. “She’s waiting for you to help.”

Joey leaned close and whispered in his ear. “Chocolate chip?”

“Aren’t they your favorite?”

“Uh-huh.” He hugged Derek’s neck tighter. “I like Lara,” he added.

So did he. She revved his motor, especially today in that outfit. Possibly he was thinking so much about her because she’d looked different today. Classy. Sexy.