Lydia tried to swallow past the sudden lump in her throat at his admission. What would it be like to have a son or daughter to cherish as he so clearly did Casey? Her hand shook slightly as she raised the picture because she already had a sense that what she saw there was going to change everything. She studied the little girl who was a miniature version of her daddy with his dark hair and eyes. But what really captivated her was the girl’s sweet smile complete with a missing front tooth. That was all it took—she was a goner. Right there in that kitchen without ever having met Casey, she fell in love with her. And because of that and the sappy smile that still lingered on Jake’s lips, Lydia shocked herself when she said, “I’d like to help you. I agree, your daughter doesn’t deserve to be put through a drawn-out custody battle if it can be avoided.”
Jake’s mouth dropped open and he gawked at her in disbelief. “I . . . you’ll—what?” he stammered, clearly thinking he’d misheard her.
She looked one more time at the picture she was clutching before handing it back to him. “Your daughter is beautiful, Jake, and I can tell how much you love her. The circumstances in which we got together are so unreal that just maybe it was fate. Since we’re already married, if there’s a way I can help you, I will. I can’t let you lose time with your daughter.”
She was shocked speechless when his eyes teared up and he made no move to hide it from her. The fact that her offer deeply moved him was readily apparent. “I don’t know what to say,” he finally admitted huskily. “I never dared to even hope you’d be anything other than furious with me. But here you are wanting to help me instead. I’m just . . . blown away by you, Lydia. If possible, you’re even more beautiful on the inside than you are on the outside. I don’t want to take advantage of you, though. I feel as if I’ve already done far too much of that. Say the word and I will contact my lawyer and have annulment proceedings started immediately with no ill will toward you whatsoever. Actually, I should insist upon that anyway. This is far too much to ask of you and I’m afraid—”
“Jake,” she interrupted. “I want to do this so stop trying to talk me out of it. Unless you’ve changed your mind and want to end the marriage. If that’s the case, then please say so.”
“That’s not it at all,” he said quickly. “I’d have you moved in here tonight if it were up to me.”
Lydia squared her shoulders and moved toward the door they’d come through earlier. “Then let’s go. I’ll keep my apartment, of course, but we can get some of my clothes tonight and anything else over the weekend.” As she hurried toward Jake’s truck, she had to wonder if she’d completely taken leave of her senses this time. He’d given her an engraved invitation to an annulment and she’d insisted on being his fake wife for the foreseeable future because of a little girl’s smile? Even as she tried to convince herself it was selfless on her part, she knew that was a lie. For reasons that even she couldn’t begin to comprehend, she longed to experience as much time with Jake as she could before this fake relationship self-combusted, even though her attraction to him scared the hell out of her. He was so damn irresistible, though. That she was willing to do something like this showed her how truly lonely she’d been without Brett.
You’re in over your head here. Lydia did her best to push that negative thought aside. She was helping a friend just as anyone would—right?
* * *
Jake could hardly believe it. They had gone to Lydia’s apartment, where she had packed enough outfit changes to get her through several days, along with her toiletries. He was leading her down the hallway and into his guest room now. He’d fully expected her to rip into him when he’d confessed everything from that night, and she had been angry—at first. Then she’d appeared almost despondent.
He’d wanted to see her again sooner, but Chris had been calling him and dropping by unannounced for the last two days. She insisted that if he would only agree to marry her, all of their problems could go away. He wondered if she knew just how insane that sounded. He’d finally told her the night before that he’d had enough, and surprisingly she’d actually listened and had backed off today. He knew it wouldn’t last, but he was enjoying the peace while he could. If not for dealing with that since he’d been home, he would have been on Lydia’s doorstep—once he actually figured out where that was.
Parts of their night together in Las Vegas were still fuzzy, but the desire he’d felt for her wasn’t one of them. It had haunted him since coming home. That night, as they’d sat together in the hotel bar after their friends had left, they had bonded over their shared misery. He hadn’t revealed his as she had, but it had been there, choking him. The last thing he’d been thinking when he took the seat beside her was getting into a serious relationship. Hell, he’d been trying to avoid marriage with Chris for months. But as Lydia had told him about losing her fiancé and how it had crushed her dreams of sharing her life with someone, suddenly it had been as if a lightbulb had gone off in his head. Each of them was longing to have someone special in their life. He certainly couldn’t replace the fiancé she had lost, but he could give her the husband she longed for and she could be the noncrazy wife he needed for his daughter. No doubt about it, the beer goggles had truly been on and his idea had seemed absolutely perfect. The fact that he was drawn to Lydia in a way he couldn’t explain hadn’t hurt either.
In the sober light of the next day, he was still very attracted to her, but that was overridden by the guilt he felt at what had seemed much more like deception than friends helping each other. So the fact that she was here with him now was more than he would have thought possible. It also pushed the point home that he hadn’t planned what would happen beyond their I do’s. Did they live together as roommates? Split the household chores down the middle and have separate lives? Or did they attempt to form some kind of relationship—at the very least they could probably manage a friendship. If he was honest with himself, he wouldn’t mind something more. He’d like to get to know her better. It’d been a while since he’d had any interest in a woman that ran deeper than a bedmate for a night. Dealing with Chris and her demands had left him quite cynical where the opposite sex was concerned. But Lydia was so different from the mother of his child.