And what about a child they may have made? Images of Lori swelling with his baby, giving birth into his waiting hands, stirred a protectiveness so fierce it astounded him. He'd attended deliveries in training and had found the experience—simply awesome. Replacing the mother with an image of Lori was beyond anything he could imagine.
He had placed his foot squarely on a mammoth land mine, blowing to pieces all his plans to keep it simple and leave town.
Gray stood and yanked up the blanket. A scrap of red satin fluttered to the ground. Memories of his and Lori's total lack of control rolled back over him like a tank. Would it always he that way between them?
He jammed the panties into his pocket and sprinted after her. He caught up with her just as she came back out his parents' door with Magda in her arms, the child an excellent chaperone and armor. Lori called her farewell and thanks to Gray's mother and patently avoided him. She wouldn't even look at him.
Instinct told him it would be a long, quiet ride back to her place. Experience from the past year told him that the silence could reach past dropping her off.
The thought of losing her again panicked him almost as much as the idea of marriage.
How far would he go to keep her?
* * *
Could she be pregnant? Lori drummed her fingers against the box of crayons on the kitchen table. She was late enough for it to be a possibility. Although she'd never been regular, and stress had been beyond normal the past two weeks.
No rationale could reason away a totally irrational wish for it to be true. She wanted Gray's baby inside her.
Had she subconsciously risked pregnancy to keep a part of Gray with her? She honestly didn't think so. That didn't stop her from cherishing a tiny dream face just as she cherished the little face across the table from her.
A CD of kiddie tunes chirped in the background, "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" repeating. Magda bobbed her head in time while concentrating on an ABC coloring book. Lori picked up a blue crayon and forced herself to color the picture beside Magda's.
Blue. Like Grayson's apartment. His old apartment. What would his new one in Washington look like?
She flung aside the crayon and selected a pink one.
Pink, for another little girl in her life.
That crayon snapped in her fingers.
Lori carefully chose a green crayon and began filling in the capital T. A towering tree waited beneath the letter, a big oak packed with memories of when she might have made that baby.
She sighed. With her luck, Magda would be coloring "stars" for the S on the other page.
Lori dared a look.
S for soap.
Thank goodness.
She checked her watch for the tenth time. Another two minutes and her home-pregnancy test would be complete. Meanwhile she needed to focus on having fun with the child she already had, a child as dear to her as any she might carry below her heart for nine months. No matter how the test turned out, Lori wouldn't be giving up Magda. She wanted to be Magda's legal mother. The paperwork had already been filed.
"Tree." Lori pointed to her T page. "Tree."
"Twee," Magda repeated.
"Good girl, Magda! Good girl." She gathered her close, smiling down at Magda's precious, healthy face. Lori folded two fingers, leaving her pinky, pointer and thumb extended. "I love you."
Magda repeated the gesture, if not the words, without hesitation. Lori hugged her tighter. She didn't know whether to attribute the sting of tears to pregnancy or PMS. Either way, her throat clogged, and she wanted to share this moment with Gray so much it hurt.
Picking away at Lori's already crumbling defenses, the CD shifted to "Old MacDonald."
With the unerring timing of a child, Magda looked around the kitchen. "Doc?"
The lone word sucker punched Lori. She stroked Magda's mussed hair back. "Sorry, Magda. Doc's not here."
Why hadn't he called before leaving? Of course she'd told him she would contact him if she had "news" when he'd dropped her off after the day at his parents' house. But she'd been scared then, not by the thought of pregnancy, but by how much making love to Gray had shaken her.
Why hadn't she made the first move to phone him even once the past week? She told herself it was because she wanted definite news when they spoke—one way or the other.
A prideful part of her insisted she needed him to come to her this time in spite of what she'd said.
Lori checked her watch again, eyeing the sweep of the second hand as it ticked away the last … two seconds.
She bolted from her chair to the bathroom. The little indicator stick rested on the edge of the marble vanity. Lon shuffled forward.
A single diagonal line glared back at her. Negative.
She squeezed her eyes shut as if that would change the results. It didn't. Dreams of impish little boys and dimple-checked little girls slipped farther away, leaving behind a hollow disappointment that had nothing to do with PMS.
Lori flung the test into the trash and reminded herself she had Magda and couldn't love that little girl any more if she was her own child. But that failed pregnancy test severed the last tie to Gray.
She returned to the kitchen and found Magda intent on dragging out all the pots and pans. Lori passed her a wooden spoon—the one Gray had used as a microphone when he'd sung "Old MacDonald." Of its own volition, her mouth curved into a smile at the memory.
Should she call him or wait for the definite sign when she started … or finally received a positive test? Lori fingered the phone on the wall and considered calling his parents for his new number. Of course, she had his cell phone number, too. She lifted the receiver.Damn him, if he wanted to know, he would call her.
She slammed it on the cradle.
Ring. The phone vibrated under her hand.
Lori startled back a step, then yanked it off the wall, uncaring if she sounded too eager. She had been waiting by the phone after all, and since he'd finally been the one to call she didn't care if he knew.
"Hello." Her voice sounded breathless and eager even to her own ears.
"Lori, this is Barbara."
Her attorney? With the evidentiary hearing a week away, they weren't scheduled to check in for another few days. Why would she call now? Foreboding gripped Lori by the throat. "Yes, Barbara, what can I do for you?"
"Lori, I hate to tell you this. But we've got a problem."
"What's the problem with this house, Major Clark?"
Gray stared back at the matronly real estate agent, a stack of house listing printouts gripped in his hand. "I'm not sure."
He circled the empty family room, searching for some flaw. They'd started with apartments, and he'd quickly known that wouldn't work for him anymore, not enough room and strangely too generic.
He'd asked the agent to pull house listings, having since plowed through about forty. The last had too small a backyard. The one before was located on a busy street. Another didn't have hardwood floors like Lori preferred.
And that was just it.
Every house he looked at fell short of what Lori and Magda needed. Of course, he wasn't sure he measured up any better than the houses. But if she was carrying his kid, then they would just have to make the best of it.
Husband. Father. He forced himself to think the words and not overlay images of his own childhood.
Each day that Lori didn't call increased the probability she could be pregnant. What kind of parents would they make with so much unresolved mess starting them off with two strikes? Their last parting hadn't been any better than the one a year ago.
He'd waited around in Charleston an extra few days to give her time to cool down, but no luck. She hadn't called. Two weeks had passed since she'd walked out of his life again, and he wasn't having any more luck getting her out of his system than last time.
Gray looked around the room, through the windows. It was a good house. A great family home, with sidewalks and a cul-de-sac for Magda to ride her Big Wheel. He could already envision Lori and Magda in the airy sunroom with the dollhouse and Barbies scattered around. The yard stretched for half an acre, with a gentle slope for sledding in the winter, flower beds in the summer.
And there was a deep, inviting hot tub in the master bath for after the kids went to sleep.
He couldn't stop the irrational hope that she was pregnant. Then neither of them would have to make a decision. Yeah, real honorable, pal. Force the woman to marry you.
God, he missed her even more than the past year.
Gray sifted the through stack of house listings in his hand. What a waste of time when he didn't know if he would be putting a family in one or not. Whether he and Lori had any future or not. The papers crumpled in his fist.
Time to find out.
He started to reach for his cell phone in his back pocket. His hand stalled midreach. Some things were better said in person, when she couldn't hang up on him or hide her eyes. He'd made a mistake in not going after her a year ago and talking it out. He wouldn't make the same one now.
A half hour to stop by the hotel to pack and he would be gone. And he would be bringing his service dress uniform, because if Lori was pregnant, they would be in front of a judge by morning.
Whether they ended up in front of a preacher or not, they would resolve this face-to-face.
Gray folded the listing for the current house into quarters and slid it in his pocket. He passed the rest of the stack to the sales agent. "I'll get back to you on this one later. I've got a plane to catch."
* * *
"Time to get a blood test."
"What?" A blood test? For a marriage license? Lori couldn't believe that's all Dr. Charming had to say after two endless weeks of silence.
Lori grabbed her doorknob for support and looked for a shotgun at Gray's back, because he certainly couldn't have said what she thought, of his own free will. There wasn't a rifle in sight, just a determined thrust to his stubborn jaw as he brushed past into her living room.
"Come on. Find your shoes. Purse. Whatever." He snagged a Raggedy Ann doll from the floor just before he stepped on it and placed it gently across a cradle. "We're going to the clinic to get a blood test."
Her anger sparked and ignited. She spun away from him to keep from indulging in a totally unproductive shouting match.
She stared at that babydoll in the cradle and couldn't stop thinking of it resting in Gray's hands, how natural it looked. She gave herself a moment to bundle her tattered nerves while kneeling to scoop up three stray Cheerios from the rug. "If that's your idea of a proposal, it needs a little polishing, Major."
Gray's gaze followed her as she stood, his eyes resting on those three little Os in her palm. "To see if you're pregnant."
"Oh." A surprise wave of sadness threatened to fold her knees.
She should have understood his meaning straight off, and probably would have if she hadn't been so distracted. Magda's approaching evidentiary hearing added more stress to Lori's already taut nerves. Glitches in the paperwork had her scrambling during what should have been a smooth transition to place Magda in her foster care long-term, adoption pending. "I'm not. Pregnant, I mean. I'm not. I'm sure now."
His eyes closed. A long, slow swallow slid down his throat before he stared at her again.
Lori stifled a twinge of irritation. Of course he was relieved. Why wouldn't he be? But some crazy part of her brain insisted she saw a hit of disappointment on his face.
Gray's eyes opened, and he pinned her with a laser stare. "How long have you known?"
"A few days. I, uh, spotted for a while and wasn't sure." She winced at discussing specifics, but reminded herself he was a doctor. "But now I'm done and I'm sure."
Anger snapped in his eyes, the green glittering like jewels tossed in a fire. "It might have been nice if you would have shared that with me."