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Then she leaned back and groaned. “God, I can’t believe I ate so much of this. I feel like I’m going to burst.”
Mace looked at where they’d nearly polished off all four pies. “I can’t believe it, either. Although I think I have a ways to go before I reach bursting stage.”
She smiled. “I may have room for a bite or two more.”
Geneva Davis was unlike any woman he’d met in a good long while. By now, most of the women he usually dated would have checked their lipstick at least twice and made one run to the ladies’ room to check on the rest of their appearance.
Of course, he allowed that this wasn’t much like a date, either.
Still …
“Are you career?” she asked.
“Military? Nah. Six months to go.”
He found it interesting he’d answered in the negative. When had he made the decision not to sign up for another tour?
Just then, he realized. No matter what happened at Lazarus this week, he knew he didn’t want to exchange active duty for a desk job in Washington.
“Thank you,” he said.
“For what?”
“For asking me that. I didn’t know what my answer would be until you did.”
“You were considering staying longer?”
“I was.”
“But not anymore.”
He took in her pretty face. “Not anymore.”
His cell phone vibrated at the same time hers rang.
They laughed. Mace took his out of his pocket even as she consulted hers.
Janine.
Damn.
He refused the late-hour call and put the cell back into his pocket, watching as she pretty much did the same thing.
Then she began toying with the crust again.
“Someone you don’t want to hear from?” he asked.
She nodded. “You?”
“Yeah.”
Then, surprisingly, he found himself telling her all about Janine and what had gone down eight months earlier.
He couldn’t be sure how long he’d talked, or exactly how much he’d revealed, but she’d patiently listened, nodding when the situation called for it, making encouraging sounds when he needed them.
“So … just to be sure I’m following you,” she said once he finally stopped talking and teetered on the verge of regret for having said too much. “She not only left you for someone else because you were gone too long … She was messing around with him while you were still a couple, even introducing him as a friend to you during your last leave and including him in things you did together…. And now that you’re back, she wants to see you again?”
He grimaced. “That would be the long and the short of it, yes.”
“How do you feel about that?”
He raised his brows and leaned back. “I don’t know.”
And he didn’t. Not really.
He did know he didn’t want to get involved with her again.
She fell silent.
“And your phone call?” he asked.
She blinked up at him. “Huh?”
He repeated the question.
“Oh. Dustin.”
“Ah. The panter.”
“The mooner.” She rested her chin in her hand, her elbow propped against the counter. “Or, as the rest of the diner staff like to call him, my baby daddy.”
She tilted her head slightly to look at him as if waiting for his response.
“Oh. You have a child together.”
“No. Not yet.”
He squinted at her. “Now I’m not sure I’m following you.”
She looked away as if weighing whether or not to continue, then met his gaze fully, her chin coming up a tad higher than before. “I’m pregnant … and he’s the father….”
4
THERE. SSHE’D said it.
Geneva paid an inordinate amount of attention to the crust she was pushing in and out of the whipped cream that remained in the chocolate marshmallow pie pan. By rights, she should have said something much sooner. The minute they’d sat down at the counter. Maybe even found a way to casually mention it early on. Something along the lines of, “Gee, I can’t remember my feet ever hurting this badly when I wasn’t pregnant,” or “Boy, if I wasn’t pregnant, I’d take you back to my place and do all the naughty things I see playing out behind your sexy eyes.”
She couldn’t be sure why she’d been hesitant to say anything.
Yes, she could; she knew exactly why she hadn’t shared the news: because for that short time, she’d enjoyed being just her. Just a single woman enjoying flirting with a hot, single man.
“You’re … pregnant?”
The two words broke through her reverie. She tried to decide whether the emotion behind them was more of shock or regret, but all she seemed capable of concentrating on was now that the proverbial cat was out of the bag, there was no getting it back in. You couldn’t exactly retract something like that. Pretend you were joking.
And why would she? For a frivolous, albeit surely hot night between the sheets with a handsome stranger?
Wasn’t that how she’d ended up as a single, expectant mother in the first place?
She grimaced and found herself eating the crust, even though she hadn’t intended to.
Comparing what had happened between her and Dustin two months ago and … well, tonight, was like saying the satin of a wedding dress and the satin that lined a coffin were the same.
She drank the rest of her milk to help wash the crumbs down.
“Yes,” she said simply.
Mace sat back as if stepping out of the path of a speeding truck. Not that she could blame him. Essentially, that’s what she was, wasn’t she?
Not that she viewed her baby in that light. While unexpected, she’d instantly grown attached to the idea of having a child growing within her. Her son or daughter. And meeting him or her topped the list of things she most looked forward to.
When it came to the opposite sex seeing her as dating material, however … well, she could understand how that would come as a major deterrent.
Was there such a thing as a pregnant-woman fetish?
She nearly laughed at the ridiculous thought.
What man in his right mind would want to make love to a woman already pregnant with another man’s child.
“So, you two were … are a couple?”
She blinked to look at him. “Dustin and I? No. We’ve always been just friends.”
He nodded slowly but she could tell he was not only not following her, he was so far behind he couldn’t make her out in the distance.
She propped her chin in her hand and tried to explain. Not that the confusing story was all that clear to her.
Taking care of her mother while her illness had slowly ultimately robbed her of the tiniest breath had hollowed Geneva out until sometimes it seemed only her beating, hurting heart remained. Her friends and everyone at the diner had been a tremendous source of support, but only she knew how deep her pain went. How watching her mom die by millimeters had profoundly impacted her.
Yes, she could have put her mom in a hospice. But she’d wanted to spend every moment with her that she could. And the only way she could work out how to do that was by having Hospice come to them at her apartment.
Then, suddenly, her mother was gone.
It still seemed … strange, somehow. The shock she’d felt at not having her mother there anymore. She’d been moving toward that end agonizing moment by agonizing moment, yet the moment she was finally released, Geneva hadn’t wanted to let her go.
And Dustin had been there to hold on to instead.
“We met when I first started taking graphic design years ago at University of Colorado, Colorado Springs,” she offered. “We’d always been friends and had never even considered dating,” she said quietly. “And I know he doesn’t want anything more now. Not really. He’s projecting what he thinks traditionally should happen on to our untraditional circumstances. Trying to do what’s right.”
She looked to find Mace still nodding … and still somewhat behind her.
Finally, he smiled awkwardly and shook his head. “I’m sorry. My response probably falls just shy of rude … or is maybe full-out rude. It’s just that I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that you’re pregnant.”
She smiled. “Stick around. It won’t be hard in a month or so when I start showing.”
She caught herself. Of course, he wouldn’t be around in a month or so. He’d be off somewhere on his final six-month deployment. And even if he wasn’t, there was no chance he’d stick around anyway.
She squinted at him. Was there?
Behind him, the jukebox clicked on B-17.
They both laughed.
“Okay,” he said. “Time for me to stop acting like an idiot and accept the fact that I misread the signs.”
“Signs?”
His gaze moved over her face and she felt herself blush. “Yes. The regular girl-guy stuff.”
She smiled. “You didn’t misread anything. I’m pregnant, not dead, Mace.”
He wore that “speeding truck coming toward him” look again.
She reached over and touched his arm. “Sorry. You’re obviously having a hard time with this. So why don’t we just keep this simple.” She held out her hand. “Hi, I’m Geneva Davis and I’m pregnant. Would you like to be friends?”
He stared at her hand, then her face, then her hand again. He slowly took it. “I’d love to be friends, Geneva Davis.”
FRIENDS …
A good ten hours had passed since his late-night conversation with Geneva in the deserted diner, the jukebox playing in the background, whipped cream, pie plates and glasses of milk littering the counter in front of them, and all he could think of was, despite everything she told him, he wanted to be much more than friends.
“Sir?”
Mace looked at Jonathon Reece, one of Lazarus’s personnel.
“Darius would like to speak with you.” He held out a cell.
He took the phone. “Thanks.”
He stepped away from the table in the downtown Denver hotel conference room. He’d been in there for an hour going over the sketchy schedule of the visiting dignitary with Lazarus reps and sheriff’s deputies, waiting for Darius to arrive.
“Hey,” he said into the phone.
“Hey, yourself. Look, I got called in on an urgent matter back at the office. Would you mind taking the lead?”
Mace glanced at the ten Lazarus reps, nine men and one woman, who were looking expectantly at him.
“I’m afraid it looks like it would be for the duration. I’ve got a kidnapping/ransom case out of L.A. that just came in….” Darius continued.
