The Boss's Baby Affair (14 page)

He shook his head. “I didn't. Jilly told me she was three weeks off her due date, that it would be a good time to take a trip to meet three new suppliers…and on the way home I attended a gardeners' conference. I thought there was still plenty of time.”

“Oh.” It put paid to another assumption she'd made. “It was fortunate for Jilly the timing worked out.”

“Yes.” He was still watching her, but the flat line of his mouth had softened.

Candace found she was breathing easier. “When you failed to turn up at Jennie's birth, I started to grow truly worried about what kind of father you would be. I told Jilly I wished I hadn't signed away my right to stay in contact with the baby after the birth. Jilly was quick to point out that she'd always made it clear that you didn't really want to know about the surrogate, that you wanted to pretend the baby was Jilly's. But I couldn't understand how any father would want to miss such a momentous occasion.”

“It certainly wasn't part of Jilly's plan for you to stay in the picture. I discovered from my reading that Jilly bribed the midwife to list her as the mother on the birth certificate.”

“I never knew that.” Candace thought about it as she watched Jennie toss the ring down, then pick it up again and shove it back in her mouth. “But it makes sense. That's why she wanted a home birth with a midwife?” Sadness swept her.
“I would've been happier at the hospital, given that Jennie was my first child and anything could've gone wrong. But it was so important to her that I gave in.”

“Is there anything else you want to tell me?”

Even over the two yards separating them, she could sense his tension.

It was hardly a good time to confess the one aspect of her behavior she wasn't proud of. It would be better to wait for a time when Nick was more open to discussion. Candace knew she was putting it off. When would there ever be an easy time?

She drew a deep breath and squarely met Nick's indigo gaze. “Yes. Jilly gave me money.”

Nick's almost black gaze bored into her. “You lied to me. You told me you weren't paid for being a surrogate.”

“I wasn't,” she said automatically. “You—I mean Jilly—paid for the medical expenses and she covered my other expenses. The one thing she did pay for that I didn't want was the stay in the resort when the IVF was done. And she spoiled me with gifts when she visited during the pregnancy…I didn't have the heart to refuse because it gave her such pleasure. But this payment was different.”

“How?” He gave a snort.

“It was a large sum.”

“Okay.” He nodded. “So when did she give you money? Did you call her?”

“No! I wasn't ever supposed to make contact again.” Candace glanced down at Jennie again, remembering how the despair in the empty days after Jennie's birth had sapped her. “After I'd given Jennie up, she called to see how I was.”

Then she lifted her gaze to Nick's, hoping he couldn't sense her inner shaking or recognize the fear and vulnerability. “I was a mess. Jilly came around to see me—she didn't bring Jennie. When I first heard her car pull up, I hoped with a desperate yearning I can't even begin to describe to you
that she'd reconsidered, that she was prepared to relax the noncontact clause in the surrogate contract. But she was alone. I told her that my mother was in the hospital after falling off a ladder in the pantry. She was unconscious, and brain damage was suspected. I started to cry. I couldn't stop. I didn't know what I was going to do. You probably won't believe me, but Jilly gave me comfort.”

“I do believe you. Jilly liked to be needed. Too many of the people in her life didn't need her at all,” Nick said slowly. “It may be part of the reason she was so eager for a baby.”

“When it became clear that my mother was going to need care, Jilly offered to pay for her place at Apple Orchards.”

“So in the end you did accept payment for Jennie.”

Candace shook her head frantically. “
No.
It was never meant to be like that! How could you think that I'd accept a womb-for-hire arrangement?” It hurt that he'd assumed the worst. “I kept saying no, but Jilly insisted. I gave in, because it made my life, and Mom's, easier.”

Nick didn't say anything. He just stared at her with a blank expression, the muscle high on his cheek pulsing furiously.

“You know what?” The shaking had taken over her whole body. “I'll tell you something I haven't even admitted to myself. I felt so guilty later. Because deep down I feel like I traded Jennie for my mother's comfort. And even telling Jilly I would try to pay her back didn't help ease the guilt. We both knew it was far beyond my means.”

“I'm sorry.” Nick rose to his feet and settled himself beside her on the lounger, and groped awkwardly for her hand. “I found reference to the payment she'd made—and I jumped to the conclusion you'd taken money in exchange for Jennie. Jilly liked you,” he added after a small silence. “There was an entry after one of the times she'd spoken to you at the hospital, saying how sympathetic you were. She worked hard to become friendly with you.”

Candace gripped his hand, and the trembling started to
subside. “I liked her, too. But I felt a little sorry for her…she was so desperate for the child she couldn't have.”

“She sensed that she could manipulate you…I suspect she might have helped your mother because she felt remorse about it.”

“How awful.”

“Not that awful.” Nick tipped his head in the direction of the baby sitting on the towel in front of them. “It gave us both Jennie.”

The distance she'd sensed between them when he first came out had gone.

“And I met you.” Nick gave her a bittersweet smile. “That would never have happened if not for Jilly.”

Before Candace could respond, he'd risen to his feet.

“I'd better get back to work. I have several appointments this afternoon about the company's expansion into the South Island and the sooner I get them over, the sooner I can be home again.” He paused, and then said, “Perhaps we can go and see your mother on the weekend. I'd like to meet her.”

“O
h, you've brought Jennie back for a visit.” Catherine Morrison stood in the open doorway of her large sunny bedroom. “Come, bring her stroller in.”

The first thought Nick had on meeting Candace's mother was that Jennie had been here before. The second was that he could see where Candace had gotten her lovely gray eyes. And that led him to realize that Jennie would, in all probability, be blessed with a pair of angel eyes, too.

His final realization was that Catherine had no idea Jennie was her granddaughter.

“Jennie fell asleep in the car, and we managed to get her into the stroller without her waking. Mom, this is Nick Valentine,” said Candace.

Catherine inspected him curiously, and then smiled, a lovely gentle smile that reminded him immeasurably of Candace. “I'm pleased to meet you.”

“Sit by the window, Nick.” Candace pointed to a sofa covered with roses. “Mom can sit next to you. I'll sit on the bed.”

“We could go down to the lounge,” suggested her mother. “There's a lot more space down there.”

Candace wrinkled her nose.

“The lounge was full of people playing bingo.” Nick grinned conspiratorially at Catherine. “It will be too noisy to talk.”

Catherine nodded slowly. “I'd forgotten about the bingo.”

“We'll take a walk down to the roses a bit later.” Candace perched herself on the bed, Jennie's stroller beside her.

“You like roses,” Nick said to the older woman.

Her eyes lit up. “Oh, yes…but you could've guessed that from my room.”

Glancing around, Nick took in the design of the sofa, the creamy white roses in the vase on the dresser and the photo of a pale pink, old-fashioned damask rose printed onto a canvas block that hung above the bed. Jilly's work. He studied it. The photograph revealed all the best sides of Jilly. Her femininity. Her passion for beauty. He could see why Candace had chosen it for her mother.

“That was my birthday present. Candace chose it for me.”

“Yes, I know.”

“Do you know Candace well?”

“Mom—”

“Are you…” Catherine's voice trailed away and she glanced at Candace. “What does one call it these days? He's too sophisticated to be called a boyfriend.”

Candace had gone bright red, and Nick started to smile. Then he took pity on her. “You can tell your mom if you want.”

“He
is
your boyfriend.” Catherine looked delighted. “You were so sad when you came back from your trip, I thought you'd had your heart broken.” She clapped her hand over her mouth. “Sorry.”

Nick quickly reassured her. “I didn't break her heart.”

“Mom—” Candace got up from the bed and crossed over
to perch herself on the arm of the sofa beside her mother. “I have to apologize to you. I've been keeping a secret from you. There was no trip. I agreed to help a woman—have a baby. I agreed to donate my eggs and carry the baby for her. Part of the agreement was that I'd keep it a secret. I should've told you.”

Catherine made the connection immediately; she glanced at the stroller and back to Candace. “Jennie is your daughter.”

She touched Candace's hand, and Nick's throat closed at the tender empathy in the gesture. How different Jilly's life could've been with a mother like Catherine.

“It must've hurt terribly to give her up,” she was saying.

Candace's eyes glimmered with unshed tears. “It did. But she had parents who wanted her.”

Nick thanked her silently for that.

“But you're looking after her…is that a good idea, darling?”

“Her mom died. She needs me.”

The simple words rang out in the room.

Nick faced the truth of them. Jennie needed Candace. So did Catherine. And so did he. Candace brought light and sunshine into all their lives.

He loved her.

The knowledge settled over him without any sense of shock. In his heart he'd known it all along. The special qualities she possessed—her loyalty, her patience, her generosity—made her easy to love.

But he'd been too afraid to face up to it and admit it. So he'd hidden behind emotions he'd called desire and passion, want and even lust…

But he loved her. And that admission freed him.

Catherine was watching him with gentle understanding in her eyes. “You will make sure Candace doesn't get hurt?”

“Mom!”

“Of course,” Nick assured Catherine, ignoring Candace's horrified expression.

“You will take care of her if anything happens to me?”

For a split second, Nick glimpsed stark fear in the eyes so like Candace's. “I'll take care of her—and Jennie. But be assured nothing's going to happen to you. Not for a very long time.”

“Thank you.” The smile was sweet. Then Catherine looked down at the baby in the pram. “Look, Jennie's waking up—”

A cross gurgle of complaint made them all laugh.

“I think the time has come for that walk in the garden,” said Nick.

 

They'd gotten back to the house—Candace didn't think it could ever be called a home—and she'd bathed and fed Jennie. Nick walked into the nursery as she was putting a sleepy Jennie into the crib.

Restlessness seized Candace. Excusing herself on a pretext, she'd gone downstairs to make herself a cup of chamomile tea and had just settled down in the upstairs sitting room with the hot drink and a magazine when Nick came out of the nursery.

“She's fast asleep.” He sat down on the love seat opposite her and stretched back, folding his arms behind his head.

She shifted, aware of him watching her, conscious that night was falling and that the two of them were alone with so much unspoken between them.

“I liked your mother,” he said at last.

Candace set the magazine down on a lamp table beside her cooling tea. “Thank you.”

“But I will admit that I was surprised today,” he added.

“Why?”

“Your mother had met Jennie before.”

“Once. She had a fall and the staff called me to come and see her because she was badly shaken.” She looked at him
through her lashes. “It was the day you thought I'd kidnapped Jennie—and you almost filed a missing persons report.”

“Ah, that day.”

“I didn't want to call you for help…so I took her with me. I'm sorry, Nick, I should've told you.”

“But then you would've had to explain about your mother.”

Nodding, she agreed, “Exactly.”

There was a long pause.

“You're going to marry me,” he said with such a lack of fanfare that for a second Candace thought she'd misheard. But the leap of her heart, coupled with the determined resolve in his eyes, told her that she'd heard right.

“Nick…” She sat forward on the edge of the love seat, and searched for the right words.

This was exactly what she didn't need. She might love Nick until it hurt. But she wasn't marrying him, because she wasn't prepared to confine him in a trap he would come to resent.

Sex would never be enough…

If there was one thing Candace was certain of by now, it was that Nick had an overdeveloped sense of responsibility. He'd done everything in his power to save Henry and Bertha's garden center because they'd offered a young rebel a job; he'd been prepared to do everything in his power to help Jilly have the baby she desperately desired, even though he'd never loved her.

Now Candace couldn't rid herself of the memory of the expression on Nick's face when he'd all but promised her mother he would take care of her, too.

“You can't just say things like that,” she said at last.

“I'm not just saying it…we're getting married.”

“Why? So that you can take care of me?”

His eyes grew slumberous. “Among other things.”

“I don't need you to take care of me!”

Candace wasn't going to allow him to distract her. Sex would never be enough. Not without love. And she wasn't
about to fool herself that her love would be enough for both of them. Nick had been down that road once before, and it had brought nothing but unhappiness to everyone concerned.

Finally, she had no choice but to tell him the truth. “I have no intention of trapping you into a loveless marriage.”

“You're not Jilly.” Nick got to his feet and came around the glass coffee table to sit beside her. “You wouldn't be trapping me. I want to marry you. Trust me to know the difference.”

He was too close.

Help!

If she said yes, all her problems would be solved. It would be so easy to throw herself into his arms and accept his proposal. She'd be able to live with her daughter; she'd have Nick at her side, her partner by day, her lover by night.

It was too tempting.

Fear that he'd talk her into a marriage she wanted so badly made her say, “You're only doing this because my mother said I needed to be taken care of.”

He took her hand.

“Not true.” Nick tugged her toward him. “I've already asked you to marry me once, so I certainly didn't need Catherine to come up with the idea.”

She let him draw her closer, inch by breathtaking inch. “I hadn't forgotten. But last time you asked me for Jennie's sake…because you love your daughter.”

“Clearly I've been doing it all wrong.” Nick had maneuvered her right next to him, now he bent his head and kissed her. Her lips parted. But instead of deepening the kiss, he murmured, “What I should have been saying was that you need to marry me for
my
sake.”

Candace was too scared to breathe. “What do you mean?”

Then he kissed her. This time it was deep and dark and sexy, none of the light butterfly wings that he'd been tormenting her with for the past few seconds.

When he'd finished, he raised his head and his eyes met hers. “Haven't you figured it out yet?”

His expression was gentle, and Candace could feel her throat tightening with emotion.

But she didn't dare hope…so she waited.

“I love you.”

It felt like her birthday and Christmas had come at the same time. Candace closed her eyes and offered a prayer of thanks.

When she opened them again, he was still gazing down at her, his expression quizzical. “If you marry me, we would be a family. You, me and Jennie. Then there's Catherine and my sister and her family.” He smiled at her. “That's more family than I ever dreamed of having.”

“Oh, Nick. I love you, too.”

“So you will marry me?” Uncertainty flickered in his eyes, and then it was gone. “I'm not going to allow you to say no again.”

“I have no intention of saying no.” Candace found herself smiling. “All those noes…it sounds ridiculous. So I'll just have to say yes.”

He punched the air. “Yes!”

That made Candace burst out laughing, but she stopped abruptly as he kissed her again. Her arms crept up around his neck, and she leaned into him.

“Let's go to bed.” Nick's heart was thudding against her chest.

She pulled away and gave him a demure smile. “Why not?”

Rising swiftly, Nick helped her to her feet. Then, arm in arm, they made their way to his suite.

This time they made love with slow intensity. Every touch counted. Every kiss brought a burst of new emotion. By the time Nick finally pulled her over him and they united, both of
them were ready for the hot glow that waited. The heat built and built until the world spun.

Afterward, Nick pulled her into his arms, and pressed a kiss on her forehead. “That was fantastic.”

“I'd have to agree,” she said.

“One more thing.” Nick shifted the pillows before leaning back, and arranging her into the crook of his arm. “There's a house that's come up for sale that I want to show you.”

She turned her head, and looked up at him. “Oh, good, does this mean you're going to sell the marble mausoleum?” A weight she didn't know existed lifted.

“Mausoleum?” he sounded affronted.

“It's not a home,” said Candace. “It's too cold.”

“Cold? The heating system is spectacular.”

“I don't mean the temperature—it doesn't have a heart.”

Nick gave her a secret smile. “Wait until you see what I have to show you. I think you'll want to call it home.”

 

“You might have to consider trading the Ferrari in for a family model,” Candace told Nick as he throttled the Ferrari back and slowed down. They'd left Jennie with Alison and her sons while Nick took her to see the secret house he'd been so tantalizingly closemouthed about.

A Realtor's For Sale sign leaned drunkenly against a large pohutukawa tree.

“Is this it?” she asked.

Nick swung the sports car into an overgrown tree-lined driveway. “It's a jungle in here,” he commented. “Let's see what state the house is in.”

Puzzled, Candace turned her head to look at him, and her heart constricted at the sight of his beloved profile. He would forever have this effect on her. She must be the most fortunate woman in the world. She pulled her thoughts together and tried to remember what she'd wanted to ask. It came to her. “I thought you'd already seen the house.”

“A long time ago. Seven years ago to be exact.”

And then she knew. She placed her hand on his thigh, and dug her fingers in. “Nick!”

Laughing, he trod on the brake. The car came to a stop. “Careful where you grab me, woman.”

“I don't care what state the house is in, this is where I want to live.”

“Hang on, we need to take a look first. The house might no longer be a good investment.”

Candace said a rude word. “I don't care if it's a bad investment, if you still love this place we're living here.”

His eyes softened. “You'd make that great a sacrifice?”