“You look pretty good yourself, Lindsay.”
Dammit, she could feel her cheeks growing hot at the innocuous compliment.
Or maybe it wasn’t so innocuous.
She looked up to see that he had removed his black shades and was looking at her as though…
Well, as though he hadn’t forgotten what had happened between them that New Year’s Eve.
She hadn’t, either. Not for a second.
But not, apparently, for the same reason as him.
Oh, she definitely remembered what it had been like-Wyatt Goddard making love to her.
You don’t forget your first time.
But she had a feeling she wouldn’t have forgotten Wyatt even if he had been her hundredth lover, or her thousandth.
How ironic that after going out with Jake for so long-two years-she never could bring herself to sleep with him. Everyone assumed that they were. And he assumed that they would.
Right, and he pressured her from the start. Jake Marcott was used to getting what he wanted-including sex. He couldn’t believe his girlfriend wasn’t willing to provide it. Back then, Lindsay marveled that he stuck around anyway.
Now, having learned infinitely more about human psychology, she had a feeling that if she had given in, he wouldn’t have stayed with her for as long as he did.
You always want what you can’t have.
And, if you were Jake Marcott, you were hell bent on getting it.
That was what kept him around.
And it was why he finally got fed up and dumped her.
She wasn’t quite sure why she never gave in to Jake back then, she only knew that it wouldn’t be right. She loved him, yes-but there was something about him that she just didn’t trust.
How strange, then, that she instinctively trusted Wyatt Goddard from the moment they first connected. Really connected-at that New Year’s Eve party.
She knew who he was before that, of course. He was always around, on her peripheral radar, but she was with Jake. And even if she hadn’t been, Wyatt wasn’t her type. He had too much of an edge…or so she believed.
Maybe that was because she’d never gotten a good look at him. At his eyes. Not until that night.
Unless you were a rock star, you could hardly show up at an indoor party, in the evening, in the dead of winter, wearing sunglasses. So there he was, without his ever-present shades-looking at her. She could feel his stare long before she allowed herself to meet it. And when she did…
Well, it might just as well have been midnight. Fireworks and confetti seemed to erupt with fanfare somewhere inside her, heralding the beginning of something new and promising.
She was drawn to Wyatt Goddard as she had never been drawn to anyone before.
At the party-and afterward. When they were alone together.
Even now, twenty years later, she knew that if she closed her eyes, she’d see the look in Wyatt’s that night as he lay intimately above her, propped on his elbows, her face cupped in his hands…
So Lindsay didn’t dare close her eyes.
She didn’t want to remember that. Especially not now.
She didn’t want to remember the unexpected tenderness that lay beneath his rough exterior…
No, because she’d feel even guiltier for not telling him about the baby.
Back then, in the months that followed their brief connection, she had managed to convince herself that she was doing him a favor not revealing her pregnancy. That a guy like Wyatt Goddard wouldn’t have any interest in a child, not even his own.
It was only when it was too late, when Wyatt-and the baby-were long gone from her life, that the fog lifted. It had comforted her in that year-the numbing haze that had enveloped her like a protective cloak, shielding her from the icy reality of her pregnancy and the harsher one of Jake’s murder.
But when her head began to clear, the memories came back. She was forced to acknowledge, if only to herself, that there might have been more to Wyatt Goddard than met the eye. More than she was able to see before they got together, more than she was willing to recall after she left him.
I cheated him, she told herself now-not for the first time. Not by far.
But sitting here across from him, looking into his eyes, the knowledge hit her harder than ever before.
“Coffee?” a waitress asked briskly, appearing with a steaming glass pot and a couple of laminated menus.
Wyatt nodded and turned over the cup before him in its saucer.
Lindsay did the same, though she was sure that if she tried to take a sip of anything right now, she’d gag.
In fact, she might gag anyway. She might throw up right here and now, in front of Wyatt and the waitress and everyone else.
To distract herself from the wave of nausea washing over her, she focused on returning the waitress’s brief, efficient smile as she poured their coffee.
Good. That’s better. She focused on the middle-aged woman’s faded gray eyes that matched her faded gray hair. Her plastic name tag said Marissa. That was interesting. She didn’t look like a Marissa. She looked more like a Bea or a Madge.
“Are you okay, honey?” she asked, peering at Lindsay with motherly concern. “You look a little green.”
“I’m fine…just a little…” She trailed off, conscious of Wyatt’s eyes still on her.
“Green,” the woman supplied, and chuckled.
“Right.”
“I’m right there with ya. I’m still in my first trimester-this is my fifth kid-and I’ve got morning sickness every day.”
Morning sickness? She can’t be much older than me, then, Lindsay realized with a start. She had her pegged for at least a decade beyond.
Well, Marissa was a coffee-shop waitress in New York with four kids to support and another on the way. She’d probably led a difficult life, and her struggles had taken a physical toll.
Which would indicate, in turn, that Wyatt must have led a relatively easy one. He didn’t look a day over thirty.
“I’ve been scarfing down saltines all morning,” the waitress continued conversationally, lifting the small stainless steel creamer from their table and making sure it wasn’t empty. Nope. She set it back down. “Every damned time I get pregnant, pardon my French, I tell myself it’s going to be different. I tell myself I’m not going to throw up every morning for the first couple of months. And every damned time-pardon again-it happens worse than ever.”
Lindsay murmured something appropriately sympathetic, because the woman seemed to be mainly addressing her.
“Oh, I’ll be okay in the end. The reward is worth it. I just love my babies.”
Lindsay offered her a taut, queasy smile.
“How about you? Do you have children, hon?”
Talk about a loaded question.
It certainly wasn’t one she wanted to answer in front of Wyatt Goddard.
She merely shook her head.
The waitress looked from her to Wyatt and back again. As if she’d been assuming they were a couple-and now realized her mistake-her smile lost some of its cheer.
“I’ll be right back to take your order.”
With that, she was gone.
Wyatt picked up one of the menus and wordlessly handed it to Lindsay.
She glanced at it blindly, her thoughts rushing along like a swollen mountain stream in April.
I have to tell him.
Right now.
Just get it out there, in the open.
Just get it over with, for God’s sake.
But somehow, the words refused to come.
“Do you know what you want?”
Yes. I want to tell you that you have a son.
But I can’t seem to do it.
She glanced up to find him looking over his own menu.
“I’m just having toast,” she said, because she felt as though she’d have to order something.
“I’m having it, too.” He snapped his menu closed. “With eggs, bacon, and a side of sausage.”
She couldn’t help but grin. “Hungry?”
“Always. There are just some things I can’t resist.”
He’s talking about food, she reminded herself, even as she noted the provocative quirk in his brow.