Читать книгу Rags To Riches: A Desire To Serve: The Paternity Promise / Stolen Kiss From a Prince / The Maid's Daughter - Джанис Мейнард, Merline Lovelace - Страница 10

Three

The melodic chimes of a doorbell pierced Grace’s groggy haze. When the chimes gave way to the hammer of an impatient fist, she propped herself up on one elbow and blinked at the digital clock beside the bed.

Oh, God! Seven-twenty! She’d slept right through Molly’s first feeding.

She threw the covers aside and was half out of bed before reality hit. One, this wasn’t her room in Delilah’s mansion. Two, she was wearing only the lavender lace bikini briefs she left on when she’d changed her maid of honor gown. And three, she was no longer Molly’s temporary nanny.

Last night’s agonizing events came crashing down on her as the fist hammered again. Scrambling, Grace snatched up her now hopelessly wrinkled khaki crops and white blouse. She got the pants zipped and buttoned the blouse on her way to the front door. She had a good idea whose fist was pounding away. She’d spent almost a month now with Blake Dalton’s often autocratic, occasionally irascible, always kindhearted mother.

So she expected to see the raven-haired matriarch. She didn’t expect to see the baby riding on Delilah’s chest, nested contentedly in a giraffe sling. Grace gripped the brass door latch, swamped by an avalanche of love and worry and guilt as she dragged her gaze from the infant to her grandmother.

“Delilah, I…”

“Don’t you Delilah me!” She stomped inside, the soles of her high-topped sneakers slapping the marble foyer. “Don’t you dare Delilah me!”

Grace closed the door and followed her into the living room. She wished she’d taken a few seconds to brush her hair and slap some water on her face before this showdown. And coffee! She needed coffee. Desperately.

She’d tossed and turned most of the night. The few hours she’d drifted into a doze, she’d dreamed of Anne. And Blake. Grace had been there, too, stunned when his fury at her swirled without warning into a passion that jerked her awake, breathless and wanting. Remnants of that mindless hunger still drifted like a steamy haze through her mind as Delilah slung a diaper bag from her shoulder onto the sofa and released Molly from the sling.

Grace couldn’t help but note that her employer had gone all jungle today. The diaper bag was zebra-striped. Grinning monkeys frolicked and swung from vines on the baby’s seersucker dress. Delilah herself was in knee-length leopard tights topped by an oversize black T-shirt with a neon message urging folks to come out and be amazed by Oklahoma City’s new gorilla habitat—a habitat she’d coaxed, cajoled and strong-armed her friends into funding.

“Don’t just stand there,” she snapped at Grace. “Get the blanket out of the diaper bag.”

Even the blanket was a riot of green and yellow and jungle red. Grace spread it a safe distance away from the glass coffee table. Molly was just learning to crawl. She could push herself onto her hands and knees and hold her head up to survey the world with bright, inquisitive eyes.

Delilah deposited the baby on the blanket and made sure she was centered before pointing an imperious finger at Grace.

“You. Sit.” The older woman plunked herself down in the opposite chair, keeping the baby between them. “Now talk.”

“You sure you wouldn’t like some coffee first?” Grace asked with a hopeful glance at the suite’s fully equipped kitchen. “I could make a quick pot.”

“Screw coffee. Talk.”

Grace blew out a sigh and raked her fingers through her unbrushed hair. Obviously Delilah had no intention of making this easy.

“I don’t know how much Blake told you…” She let that dangle for a moment. Got no response. “Okay, here’s the condensed version. Molly’s mother was my cousin. When Anne worked at Dalton International, she had a brief affair with your son. She died before she could tell me which son, so I brought Molly to you and finessed a job as her nanny while Alex and Blake sorted out the paternity issue.”

Delilah pinned Grace with a look that could have etched steel. “If one of my sons got this cousin of yours pregnant, why didn’t she have the guts or the decency to let him know about the baby?”

Grace stiffened. Shielding Hope—Anne!—had become as much a part of her as breathing. No one knew what her cousin had endured. And Grace was damned if she’d allow anyone, even the formidable Delilah Dalton, to put her down.

“I told Blake and I’ll tell you. Anne had good reasons for what she did, but she wanted those reasons to die with her. She didn’t, however, want her baby to grow up without knowing either of her parents.”

Delilah fired back with both barrels. “Don’t get uppity with me, girl!”

The fierce retort startled the baby. Molly swung her head toward her grandmother, wobbled and plopped down on one diapered hip. Both women instinctively bent toward her, but she was already pushing back onto her knees.

Delilah moderated her tone if not her message. “I’m the one who bought your out-of-work schoolteacher story, remember? I took you into my home. I trusted you, dammit.”

Grace didn’t see any use in pointing out that she hadn’t lied about being a teacher or temporarily out of work. The trust part stung enough.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you about my connection to Molly.”

“Ha!”

“I promised my cousin I would make sure her child was loved and cared for.” Her glance went again to the baby, happily drooling and rocking on hands and knees. Slowly, she brought her gaze back to Delilah. “And she is,” Grace said softly. “Well cared for and very much loved.”

Delilah huffed out something close to a snort but didn’t comment for long moments. “I pride myself on being a good judge of character,” she said at last. “Even that horny goat I married lived up to almost everything I’d expected of him.”

Grace didn’t touch that one. She’d heard Delilah say more than once she wished to hell Big Jake Dalton hadn’t died before she’d found out about his little gal pal. His passing would’ve been a lot less peaceful.

“Is all this you’ve just told me true?” the Dalton matriarch demanded.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Molly’s mother was really your cousin?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I guess we’ll have proof of that soon enough. Damned lab is making a fortune off all these rush DNA tests we’ve ordered lately.”

She pooched her lips and moved them from side to side before coming to an abrupt decision.

“I’ve watched you with Molly. I don’t believe you’re some schemer looking to extort big bucks from us. You’ll have to work to convince Blake of that, though.”

“I can’t tell him any more than I have.”

“You don’t know him like I do. He has his ways of getting what he wants. So do I,” she added as she pushed out of the chair and adjusted the sling. “So do I. C’mon, Mol, let’s go see your daddy.”

Without thinking Grace moved to help. Swooping the baby up, she planted wet, sloppy kisses on her cheeks before slipping the infant’s feet through the sling’s leg openings. While Delilah tightened the straps, Grace folded the jungle blanket back into the diaper bag and handed it to the older woman.

“I’m sorry Blake doesn’t want me to help with Molly.”

“We’ll manage until this mess gets sorted out.”

* * *

If it got sorted out. Grace grew more antsy as one day stretched into two, then three.

Blake had her things packed and delivered along with her purse. She tried to take that as a good sign. Apparently he wasn’t afraid she would pull a disappearing act like her cousin had.

He didn’t contact her personally, though, and that worried Grace. It also caused an annoyingly persistent ache. Only now that she’d been banished from their lives did she realize how attached she’d become to the Daltons, mother and son. And to Molly! Grace missed cooing to the baby and watching her count her toes and shampooing her soft, downy blond hair.

She’d known the time would come when she would have to drop out of Molly’s life. The longer she stayed here, the greater the risk Jack Petrie might trace her to Oklahoma City and wonder what she was doing here. Yet she felt a sharp pang of dismay when Blake finally condescended to call a little past 6:00 p.m. with a curt announcement.

“I need to talk to you.”

“All right.”

“I’m downstairs,” he informed her. “I’ll be up in a few minutes.”

At least she was a little better prepared for this face-to-face than she’d been for their last. Her hair was caught up in a smooth knot and she’d swiped on some lip gloss earlier. She debated whether to change her jeans and faded San Antonio SeaWorld T-shirt but decided to use the time to take deep, calming breaths.

Not that they did much good. The Blake Dalton she opened the door to wasn’t one she’d seen before. He’d always appeared at his mother’s house in suits or neatly pressed shirts and slacks sporting creases sharp enough to shave fuzz from a peach. Then, of course, there was the tux he’d donned for the wedding. Armani should wish for male models with builds like either of the Dalton twins.

This Blake was considerably less refined. Faded jeans rode low on his hips. A black T-shirt stretched across his taut shoulders. Bristles the same shade of amber as his hair shadowed his cheeks and chin. He looked tough and uncompromising, but the expression in his laser blues wasn’t as cold as the one he’d worn at their last meeting, thank God.

“We got the lab report back.”

Wordlessly she led the way into the living room. Electric screens shielded the wall of windows from the sun that hadn’t yet slipped down behind the skyscrapers. Without the endless view, the room seemed smaller, more intimate. Too intimate, she decided when she turned and found Blake had stopped mere inches away.

“Aren’t you going to ask the results?”

“I don’t need to,” she said with a shrug. “Unless the lab screwed up the samples, their report confirms Molly and I descend from the same family tree.”

“They didn’t screw up the samples.”

“Okay.” She crossed her arms. “Now what?”

Surprise flickered across his face.

“What’d you expect?” Grace asked, her chin angling. “That I would throw myself into your arms for finally acknowledging the truth?”

The surprise was still there, but then his gaze dropped to her mouth and it took on a different quality. Darker. More intense. As though the idea of Grace throwing herself at him was less of a shock than something to be considered, evaluated, assessed.

Now that the idea was out there, it didn’t particularly shock her, either. Just the opposite. In fact, the urge grew stronger with each second it floated around in the realm of possibility. All she had to do was step forward. Slide her palms over his shoulders. Lean into his strength.

As her cousin had.

Guilt sent Grace back a pace, not forward. He’d been Anne’s lover, she reminded herself fiercely. The father of her baby. At best, Grace was a problem he was being forced to solve.

“Now you know,” she said with a shrug that disguised her true feelings. “You’re Molly’s father. And I know you’ll be good with her. So it’s time for me to pack and head back to San Antonio. I’ll stop by to say goodbye to her on my way out of town.”

“That’s it?” His frown deepened. “You’re just going to drop out of her life?”

“I’ll see her when I can.”

After she was certain Jack Petrie hadn’t learned about her stay in Oklahoma City.

“There are legalities that have to be attended to,” Blake protested. “I’ll need Molly’s birth certificate. Her mother’s death certificate.”

Both contained the false name and SSN her cousin had used in California. Grace could only pray the documents would be sufficient for Blake’s needs. They should. With his legal connections and his family’s political clout here in Oklahoma, he ought to be able to push whatever he wanted through the courts.

“I’ll send you copies,” she promised.

“Right.” He paused, his jaw working. “I hope you know that whatever trouble Anne was in, I would have helped her.”

“Yes,” she said softly. “I know.”

His eyes searched hers. “Anne couldn’t bring herself to trust me, but you can, Grace.”

She wanted to. God, how she wanted to! Somehow she managed to swallow the hard lump in her throat.

“I trust you to cherish Molly.”

* * *

Saying goodbye to the baby was every bit as hard as it had been to say goodbye to Blake. Molly broke into delighted coos when she saw her nanny and lifted both arms, demanding to be cuddled.

Grace refused to cry until her rental car was on I-35 and heading south. Tears blurred the rolling Oklahoma countryside for the next fifty miles. By the time she crossed the Red River into Texas, her throat was raw and her eyes so puffy that she had to stop at the welcome center to douse them with cold water. Six hours later she hit the outskirts of San Antonio, still mourning her severed ties to Molly and the woman who’d been both cousin and best friend to her since earliest childhood.

Her tiny condo in one of the city’s older suburbs felt stale and stuffy when she let herself in. With a gulp, she glanced from the living room she’d painted a warm terra-cotta to the closet-size kitchen. She loved her place, but the entire two-bedroom unit could fit in the foyer of Delilah Dalton’s palatial mansion.

As soon as she’d unpacked and powered up her computer, Grace scanned the certificates she’d promised to send Blake. That done, she skimmed through the hundreds of emails that had piled up in her absence and tried to pick up the pieces of her life.

* * *

The next two weeks dragged interminably. School didn’t start until the end of month. Unfortunately, the open-ended leave of absence Grace had requested had forced her principal to shuffle teachers to cover the fall semester. The best he could promise was hopefully steady work as a substitute until after Christmas.

At loose ends until school started, Grace had to cut as many corners as possible to make up for her depleted bank account. Even worse, she missed Molly more than she would have believed possible. The baby had taken up permanent residence in her heart.

Only at odd moments would she admit she missed Molly’s father almost as much as she did the baby. Like everyone else swept up in the Daltons’ orbit, she’d been overwhelmed by Delilah’s forceful personality and dazzled by Alex’s wicked grin and audacious charm. Now that she viewed the Dalton clan from a distance, however, Grace recognized Blake as the brick and mortar keeping the family together. Always there when his mother needed him to pull together the financing on yet another of her charitable ventures. Holding the reins at Dalton International’s corporate headquarters while Alex jetted halfway around the world to consult with suppliers or customers. Grace missed seeing his tall form across the table at his mother’s house, missed hearing his delighted chuckle when he tickled Molly’s tummy and got her giggling.

The only bright spot in those last, endless days of summer was that she heard nothing from Jack Petrie. She began to breathe easy again, convinced she’d covered her tracks. That false sense of security lasted right up until she answered the doorbell on a rainy afternoon.

When she peered though the peephole, the shock of seeing who stood on the other side dropped her jaw. A second later, fear exploded in her chest. Her fingers scrabbled for the dead bolt. She got it unlocked and threw the door almost back on its hinges.

“Blake!”

He had to step back to keep from getting slammed by the glass storm door. Grace barely registered the neat black slacks, the white button-down shirt with the open collar and sleeves rolled up, the hair burnished to dark, gleaming gold by rain.

“Is…?” Her heart hammered. Her voice shook. “Is Molly okay?”

“No.”

“Oh, God!” A dozen horrific scenarios spun through her head. “What happened?”

“She misses you.”

Grace gaped at him stupidly. “What?”

“She misses you. She’s been fretting since you left. Mother says she’s teething.”

The disaster scenes faded. Molly wasn’t injured. She hadn’t been kidnapped. Almost reeling with relief, Grace sagged against the doorjamb.

“That’s what you came down to San Antonio to tell me?” she asked incredulously. “Molly’s teething?”

“That, and the fact that she said her first word.”

And Grace had missed both events! The loss hit like a blow as Blake’s glance went past her and swept the comfortable living room.

“May I come in?”

“Huh? Oh. Yes, of course.”

She moved inside, all too conscious now of her bare feet and the T-shirt hacked off to her midriff. The shirt topped a pair of ragged cutoffs that skimmed her butt cheeks.

The cutoffs were comfortable in the cozy privacy of her home but nothing she would have ever considered wearing while she’d worked for Delilah—or around her son. She caught Blake’s gaze tracking to her legs, moving upward. Disconcerted by the sudden heat that slow once-over generated, she gulped and snatched at his reason for being there.

“What did Molly say?”

“We thought it was just a ga-ga,” he said with a small, almost reluctant smile. “Mother insisted she was trying to say ga-ma, but it came out on a hiss.”

She sounded it out in her head, and felt her stomach go hard and tight.

“Gace? Molly said Gace?”

“Several times now.”

“I…uh…”

He waited a beat, but she couldn’t pull it together enough for coherence. She was too lost in the stinging regret of missing those first words.

“We want you to come back, Grace.”

Startled, she looked up to find Blake regarding her intently.

“Who’s we?” she stammered.

“All of us. Mother, me, Julie and Alex.”

“They’re back from their honeymoon?”

“They flew in last night.”

“And you…” She had to stop and suck in a shaky breath. “And you want me to come back and pick up where I left off as Molly’s nanny?”

“Not as her nanny. As my wife.”