Before she could even feel relief, he pinned her with another of his cold stares.
“Just remember this is temporary. And I’m not letting you out of my sight.”
Thirty minutes later, Lucy steered her car onto the Dallas tollway toward her condo. Normally she was a fairly calm driver—if perhaps overly cautious. But who wouldn’t be in her profession? After all, she spent her days crunching numbers, calculating the odds of a person dying in a fiery car crash. In general, actuaries were very safe drivers. Today, however, she was a nervous wreck.No doubt it had something to do with the fact that Dex was seated beside her. Since she and Isabella were going to be living in his house for at least the next few days, they needed clothes, formula, diapers…the gazillion things an infant needed. When she’d pointed this out to Dex, his first reaction had been to call the local baby superstore and have one of everything delivered. She’d quickly vetoed that idea.
No, if they were going through with this ridiculous plan, then Lucy wanted to retain what little control she had. And the very last thing she wanted was to make any of this easier on Dex. She certainly wasn’t going to help him outfit a nursery for Isabella at his house. At the end of the two weeks—if not before—she intended to walk out of his life, taking Isabella and all of her stuff with her.
As she navigated the busy Dallas traffic, she kept up a constant mental litany of reasons why he should trust her with Isabella.
The second he’d gotten into the car, he’d shoved the seat back as far as it could go, stretched his denim-covered legs out in front of him, tipped his head back and closed his eyes. Unless she was mistaken, he’d fallen asleep. Probably taking advantage of the few blessed minutes of silence.
She remembered all too well the few nights she’d been up all night long with Isabella. They were as frustrating as they were exhausting.
Perhaps fatigue explained his behavior so far, which had ranged from rude to suspicious to downright insulting. Or perhaps he just thought she had it coming, after abandoning Isabella on his doorstep. But she couldn’t feel sorry for Dex, despite what Jewel had put him through in the past twenty-four hours. Her first concern had to be Isabella’s welfare.
Before showing up at his house, only two possible scenarios had occurred to her. Either he would have immediately contacted child protective services or he would have been so eager to get rid of Isabella, he wouldn’t have questioned Lucy when she came to take her off his hands.
She’d never considered the possibility that he wouldn’t want to give up the baby.
After all, from what she knew about Dex Messina, he was the jet set, playboy, black sheep of the Messina family.
As soon as she’d found out Jewel was pregnant with his child, Lucy had given in to her curiosity and run a Google search him. As wealthy and powerful as the Messina family was, it wasn’t hard to find information about him.
What she’d learned had only been confirmed this morning when she’d met him in person. He was surly, unapproachable and…just difficult. More importantly, he didn’t want to be a father. His rush to take the paternity test proved that, didn’t it? And how could she help but resent being accused of being irresponsible by a man with Dex’s reputation?
By the time she pulled her car into the spot outside her condo, she was practically fuming.
No one loved Isabella like she did. She was the best person to care for her. She knew it in her heart. Now, she just had to convince Dex.
Three
“I s all this really necessary?” Dex eyed the growing pile of baby accoutrements, which had begun to collect by the door.
“Babies need a lot of things,” she called from the upstairs bedroom. “This is why I didn’t want you to buy all new things.”Isabella—no doubt exhausted from her earlier rampage—lay asleep in her car seat on the living room floor.
The woman—and, damn it, why couldn’t he remember her name?—emerged from the stairs carrying a suitcase. She dropped it by the door and immediately moved on to the kitchen. She’d changed from the miniskirt and heels into jeans and white Keds, a combination that took her skimpy pink tank top from tawdry to tomboy. The effect was oddly appealing in its wholesomeness. He half expected her to pull a baseball glove out of her back pocket and suggest they toss a few around in the backyard, or maybe offer him a slice of apple pie and a glass of lemonade.
Dex followed her into the kitchen, propped his shoulder against the doorway and watched as she moved about the tiny room.
She wasn’t the sort of woman whose company he normally sought out. Despite the bright hair, there was nothing exotic about her. Nothing overtly sexual and enticing. Nothing flamboyant. Nothing that screamed, “For a good time, call…”
Instead, there was an efficiency about her, a sort of no-frills, no-nonsense simplicity that made her a pleasure to watch.
It wasn’t that he was only attracted to party-girl bimbos. But he wasn’t a long-term relationship kind of guy. He traveled a lot and didn’t have the time or energy to devote to relationships. When he was in the country, his business commitments kept him busy enough without adding a needy girlfriend into the mix.
So how had he ended up sleeping with…“Damn it, what is your name?”
She looked up, her eyes wide and startled. “Lucy.” Then she looked back down to frantically dig through the cupboard. “I mean, my legal name is Jewel. But I go by Lucy. Lucy Alwin.”
She dropped a handful of plastic baby bottles into a paper grocery sack and rubbed her palms on her jeans.
“I make you nervous.”
She started to lick her lips, but seemed to realize that only proved his point and pressed them firmly together. “Yes, you do.”
“Why?”
She giggled. “You have to ask? You hold the fate of my child in your hands.”
“Our child,” he corrected. As he said the words, he felt something shift deep inside him.
That infant in the other room—the one who had frustrated and annoyed him so, who had thrown his life into upheaval—had been created when he’d had sex with this woman. When he’d stripped off her clothes, caressed her skin and plunged his seed deep into her body.
Almost as if she could read his thoughts, Lucy’s eyes grew wider and she took a step backward. Her chest was rising and falling rapidly and the movement drew his gaze to the soft curve of her br**sts.
He willed himself to remember what her br**sts looked like, how they’d felt in his palms, but the memory didn’t surface.
It had been so long ago. His memories of her were just snatches. Her enticing smile, the sway of her hips, the taste of tequila on her breath.
None of those images jived with the woman standing before him.
Maybe it was the way her simple jeans and tank top minimized the luscious curves of her body without hiding them. Or maybe it was the way she’d rocked Isabella in her arms, the very icon of maternity. Or the way she smelled faintly of baby powder.
Combined, they made her seem so wholesome. Almost innocent.
He might even buy it, if he hadn’t picked her up in a bar and slept with her.
But because he had, he couldn’t help wondering what it would be like to do so again. Without the liquor this time. With his senses fully intact. And he couldn’t think of a damn reason not to.
Other than the fact that she’d already deceived him. She may not have lied outright, but wasn’t having his child without telling him the worst lie of omission? But of course, sleeping with her and trusting her weren’t the same thing at all.
He smiled wickedly at her. “I do hold your fate in my hands. You should remember that.”
Part of him expected her to balk or shy away from him. Instead, she bumped her chin up and met his gaze straight on.
“Yes, you do. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to let you bully me.”
“Bully you?”
“Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about.” She faced him with her hands on her hips. There was the faintest tremble in her voice, but he could tell she struggled to control it. “There you are, looming in my kitchen doorway, leering at me like the big bad wolf, ready to gobble me up if I make one wrong move.”
He closed the distance between them. “If I’m the big bad wolf, what does that make you?” He tweaked a lock of bright red hair. “Little red riding hood?”
She swatted his hand away and narrowed her gaze at him. “Just remember how that story ended. Little Red Riding Hood learned her lesson and the wolf came to a bad end.”
“Don’t worry, red. I have no doubt you know how to take care of yourself. You’ve done a bang-up job so far.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“The elaborate show of maternal care. The wide-eyed innocence. The sorrowful regret for your mistakes. It’s all very touching. But don’t think for a minute I’ve fallen for it.”
“All very touching?” The pitch of her voice rose sharply and her chin bumped up another notch.
She stepped closer to him, hands still propped on her h*ps defiantly as she got right in his face. Or as close to his face as she could get, considering she had to be close to a foot shorter than him.
“You think I’m somehow faking my emotions? That my concern for Isabella, that my regret, is somehow planned? Is part of some scheme? Why would I do that? What could I possibly hope to achieve?”
“I don’t know. You tell me.”
For a moment, her mouth opened and closed rapidly, like a fish gaping in the air. Then she snapped it closed and shook her head. “What kind of person do you think I am?”
He stared down into her green eyes and felt bitter anger coil through his gut.
“I think you’re the kind of woman to have a baby without letting the father know it’s his.”
Her face went white, then she threw up her hands in frustration as she turned away from him. “Well, that’s hardly my fault.”
He grabbed her arm and spun her back around to face him, surprised by his sudden burst of anger and looking for a way to vent it. “Then whose fault is it?”