Heart of a Hero (12 page)

“Beautiful,” he breathed against her skin. He brought up a hand and cupped one breast in his palm, lightly brushing his thumb across the nipple through the thin fabric of the shirt.

She made a small sound and her head fell back.

“The baby was fussing so I—” Reston stopped halfway down the stairs with Bridget in his arms. Even in the dim light, Wade could see his father’s eyebrows rising.

Phoebe jerked upright with a startled sound, but when she tried to pull away, Wade refused to let her go. She buried her face in the front of his shirt as Wade met his father’s speculative gaze over her head.

“You do know this is how you got the first one, right?”

Wade couldn’t prevent the snort of laughter that escaped. “No, Dad,” he said. “This is absolutely, positively
not
it.”

It was Reston’s turn to grin while Phoebe made a quiet moan of mortification. “So,” he said. “You gettin’ married?”

“Yes,” said Wade.

“No,” said Phoebe.

If his father’s eyebrows had moved any higher they’d have merged with his hairline. “I see.” He turned and started back up the stairs with the baby, who appeared to have gone back to sleep. But just before he disappeared, he stopped and looked back, and his shadowed eyes held a sober expression that contrasted sharply with the grin of a moment ago. “That would please your mother,” he said quietly to Wade. Then he looked at Phoebe, who still hadn’t moved. He shook his head and his shoulders slumped. “Sometimes I still can’t believe she’s not here. She’d be tickled down to her toes with that baby girl.”

“Old manipulator,” Wade said quietly when he was sure his father was out of earshot.

Phoebe lifted her head from Wade’s chest, although she couldn’t bring herself to meet his eyes. His father’s final words echoed in her ears,
awakening all the guilt and remorse she felt for keeping the news of Wade’s child to herself.

Looking down the path her life was about to follow, it didn’t take a fortune-teller to predict heartbreak. Then again, if she didn’t marry him, that was a given.

She knew she was going to say yes, even before she opened her mouth. She’d rather live with Wade, knowing he didn’t love her the way she craved, than live without him. She’d thought he was dead and gone forever and it had felt as if half of her had died, too. She was going to take him any way she could get him, regardless of the pain she knew lay in wait.

“All right,” she said quietly.

“What?” Wade looked puzzled. He was still staring at the doorway where his father had been a moment ago.

“All right, I’ll marry you.”

That got his attention. Wade’s gaze shot to hers again and his gray eyes focused on her with a blazing intensity that made her cringe inwardly. “My father catching us kissing made you change your mind?”

She shrugged. “I just—I know Bridget deserves a family. An intact family,” she amended. He’d been right. A child
was
a good reason to get married. Every child deserved a set of parents.

And grandparents. I will never forgive myself for depriving her of knowing her paternal grandmother. If it was for a day, or a month, or even years and years, I should have thought about how they would feel.

Wade was looking down at her and his eyes still felt like two lasers examining her soul.

God, had she really just agreed to marry this man? This man whom she’d loved since she’d been a child on the playground? She had reasons, she reminded herself. Bridget needed a father; she deserved a stable childhood with two parents. Raising a family on a teacher’s salary could be done, but it wouldn’t be easy. With Wade’s help, they’d be able to give their daughter the things Phoebe wanted for her: music or dance lessons, sports opportunities, all the myriad activities that children of the modern world pursued.

Phoebe, on the other hand, only needed one reason to marry Wade: love. She’d loved him for what seemed like forever. And then he’d died and she’d had to accept it, though it had felt as if her heart had been permanently shattered.

And then…then she’d found out he hadn’t died at all.

Her stupid heart had bounced back a lot faster than her head. She was still having trouble believing
that all this was real. But her heart was having no trouble at all loving Wade with even more intensity than she had when she was seventeen years old and he’d belonged to her sister.

“Good,” Wade finally said, startling Phoebe out of whatever internal argument she was having with herself. The expressions fleeting across her face ranged from tenderness to the deepest sadness he’d ever seen. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know what she was thinking about. “When?”

“I don’t know!” She looked startled again. “Do we have to decide tonight?”

He nodded. “Yeah. Before you change your mind.” He snapped his finger. “I know. We could stop in Vegas on the way home.”

Phoebe’s expression was horrified; he almost laughed out loud. “I am
not
getting married in a quickie wedding chapel in the gambling capital of the world! Besides, what would we do with Bridget?”

He shrugged. “Take her with us?”

“No,” she said. “Absolutely, positively no way. We go back to New York and apply for a license like normal people, wait until we get it, and do this right. I have no intention of telling Bridget we got married in Las Vegas on the spur of the moment.”

“Or our other children.” He tried to make it sound innocent; he couldn’t resist teasing her.

“Our other—” She stopped and narrowed her eyes. “You said that just to rattle me,” she accused.

He grinned. “Did it work?”

A wry smile lifted the corners of her mouth. “I guess it did.”

He was still embracing her, still deeply aware of the pounding of his pulse, of her soft curves and the way her hips cradled him. Holding her gaze, he put both hands on her hips and pulled her more firmly against him. Then he shifted his hips slightly, pressing himself so snugly against her that he nearly groaned aloud. “I want you,” he said quietly.

She closed her eyes. “Not here.” Her voice was so soft he could barely hear her.

“No.” He pressed a short, hard kiss to her full pink lips. “Not here. But soon.”

T
hey were off the plane in New York and heading away from the airport. Bridget had just fallen asleep in her car seat when Wade said, “Thank you for letting me bring Bridget out to meet Dad. He adored her.”

He glanced over to see Phoebe smiling a little uncertainly. “You don’t have to thank me.” The smile faded. “I should have gotten in touch with you as soon as I found out I was pregnant.”

Unspoken between them was the knowledge that his mother had never known she had a grandchild on the way, or a granddaughter.

“You should have,” he agreed.

Even from the driver’s side, not looking right at her, he could tell that Phoebe’s body went stiff. The temperature in the car dropped about ten degrees. If he’d been looking to pick a fight, he’d have been satisfied with the first volley. But…

“But I understand why you didn’t. And maybe it wouldn’t have mattered,” he said, and with the words, the hard knot of anger that had hidden deep inside him finally uncoiled. “My mother’s body was giving out. After she had the first stroke, I learned a lot more about strokes, what causes them, what kind of progress stroke patients make, what therapies are used…. It’s probably a blessing for both her and my dad that she didn’t live for years with minimal function.”

“How can you say that? Don’t you think your dad would rather have had her alive in any condition—”

“I’m sure he thinks he would have. But while I was recuperating I saw a lot of victims of head injury and soldiers who’d had strokes after other catastrophic injuries. And I know my mother never would have wanted to live like that.” He paused. “There’s no dignity in some kinds of living. I wouldn’t have liked that for either of them.”

She nodded and her silky hair slid over the back
of his hand. It felt like cool silk and his one-track mind instantly shot ahead to the night looming before them. The night when they would put Bridget to bed and then it would just be the two of them. Alone.

The next few hours crawled by. They arrived back at Phoebe’s house and unpacked the car, then had a late dinner. They’d lost three hours on the trip east but it was still only eight o’clock when Bridget went down for the night.

Wade followed Phoebe into the room as she laid the baby in her crib, and they looked down at her together.

“She’s incredible,” he said softly.

Phoebe smiled. “She is, isn’t she?”

He put his arm around her shoulders and led her from the room. Phoebe tugged the door nearly shut as they entered the hallway. When she turned back to him, she met his eyes with a wry smile and blew out a breath. “I’m nervous,” she said with a laugh.

He smiled. “You don’t have to be.” He took her hand and led her into the bedroom and across to the big bed in which she slept. Setting his hands on her shoulders, he drew her to him and slid his arms around her, simply holding her, absorbing the amazing sensation of having Phoebe in his arms.
She slipped her arms around his waist and snuggled close.

It was a sweet, sweet moment. Wade felt his heart swell with emotion.
I love you.

He nearly said it aloud. Might have, except that he was a coward. Plain and simple, a coward.

The night they’d danced, he thought Phoebe had indicated she could care for him. But was it long-term? Sure, she’d made love with him—after her sister’s funeral when no one in their right mind could say her judgment was sound. And she’d clearly been overwhelmed to see him again after she’d thought he was dead. But he was the father of her child. And they’d been friends since their own childhood. She didn’t have to love him to be thrilled that he was alive.

She got so quiet every time Melanie’s name came up that he could barely stand it. Did she blame him? God knew, she wouldn’t be wrong. He should never have let Mel leave alone that night.

So he didn’t speak aloud. Her very silence suggested that her heart wasn’t entirely in this relationship and that made him nervous as hell. She might never forgive him for Melanie’s death but there was no way he was going to let her shove him out of her life. He loved her, even if he could never tell her.

Tonight, he would show her.

He stopped beside the bed and took her into his arms. After a moment, she lifted her face to him and his heart leaped as he lowered his mouth to hers. Whatever else was between them, there was no arguing with the chemistry they created together. He kissed her for a long, long time, using his lips and tongue to show her how he felt, simply made love to her mouth until they both were breathing hard and his blood was pounding through his veins.

When he lifted the hem of her T-shirt, she raised her arms and let him pull it over her head. She shook her head as he tossed the shirt aside and her hair fell around her shoulders, emphasizing the lacy white bra she wore.

“You’re beautiful.” He reached around her and dispensed with the bra, and wanted to howl at the moon when the full, firm mounds of her breasts, capped by rosy nipples, were revealed. He cupped them in his hands and smoothed his thumbs over the taut tips as she lifted her hands to the buttons of his shirt.

She managed to get about half the buttons undone before she threw her head back with a half laugh and said, “I can’t concentrate.”

He smiled, lowering his head to the slope of her breast and tasting the tender flesh. “Can I help?”

He quickly tore the shirt open and shrugged it off, then unfastened his pants as well and pushed them off along with his boxers. Turning his attention to her pants, he unzipped them and put his thumbs at the sides, pushing until she, too, had kicked the last of her clothing away.

Then he urged her onto the mattress.

As he followed her down, he said, “Do you have any idea how many times I dreamed about this?” He cupped her breast again, pulling her close with one arm beneath her head. “You kept me warm on a lot of damn cold nights halfway around the world.”

To his shock, her eyes filled with tears. “I was so mad at you for leaving,” she said. “For not coming to say goodbye. And then—and then—”

And then she’d thought he was dead. Gone forever. He read the anguish in her eyes.

“Shh,” he said. “I’m here, and I’m never leaving again.” He smoothed a hand down over the silky skin of her belly as he bent his head and took one nipple into his mouth. Suckling strongly, his own body pulsed in response as her back arched off the bed and her hands threaded through his hair to hold him to her.

He eased his weight over her, settling himself into the heated cove between her thighs, feeling
the damp curls and the soft, soft flesh below. He couldn’t wait.

Slowly, he pushed into her, groaning at the tight, slick feel of her body clasping his. Too tight, he realized belatedly.

“Relax, baby, you’re okay.” He stopped moving and held every muscle still, though his body was screaming at him to move. Guilt ate at him. He should have been thinking of her, and instead all he’d been able to do was think about how badly he wanted to be inside her. It wasn’t even completely sexual, but something more, instinct urging him to stamp every inch of her with his scent and feel, to make her his again in the most basic way there was.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, squirming with discomfort. “I had a couple of stitches after Bridget was born and—”

“Shh,” he said, kissing away a tear that trailed from the corner of her eye. “It’ll be okay. We’re in no hurry here.”

She was taking deep, fast breaths, her breasts heaving as she fought to cooperate, and he knew he needed to help her. He didn’t want her first time after Bridget’s birth to be something she just wanted to forget.

He lifted himself a little away from her and stroked one hand between them, down her belly
to the spot where they were joined. His fingers found the tiny, tender button hidden in her curls. Lightly, hoping that she would enjoy his touch, he rubbed a finger over her. And nearly had a heart attack when her body jolted involuntarily beneath his, driving him even deeper into her tight sheath.