What The Nursery Needs...

“Catherine, are you pregnant with somebody’s baby?” Letter to Reader Title Page Dedication About the Author Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Copyright

“Catherine, are you pregnant with somebody’s baby?”

She blinked, startled. “What? For heaven’s sake. No. Of course not.”

Jason observed her carefully. “Then what’s with the nursery? That’s a lot of work to go through for nothing. I know you mentioned wanting to become a mother. Maybe you’re planning on adopting?”

Catherine twirled her hair. “Not exactly.” She took a deep breath. “Funny you should bring this up, Jason, because I’ve been meaning to ask you something.”

His eyes never left her face. “What?”

She sipped her coffee and studied the inside of the mug as though it held the secret of life. Finally she blurted out what she’d been holding inside all these weeks. “Jason, would you consider giving me a baby?”

Dear Reader,

To ring in 1998—Romance-style!—we’ve got some new voices and some exciting new love stories from the authors you love.

Valerie Parv is best known for her Harlequin Romance and Presents novels, but The Billionaire’s Baby Chase, this month’s compelling FABULOUS FEATHERS title, marks her commanding return to Silhouette! This billionaire daddy is pure alpha male...and no one—not even the heroine!—will keep him from his long-lost daughter....

Doreen Roberts’s sparkling new title, In Love with the Boss, features the classic boss/secretary theme. Discover how a no-nonsense temp catches the eye—and heart—of her wealthy brooding boss. If you want to laugh out loud, don’t miss Terry Essig’s What the Nursery Needs... In this charming story, what the heroine needs is the right man to make a baby! Hmm...

A disillusioned rancher finds himself thinking, Say You’ll Stay and Marry Me, when he falls for the beautiful wanderer who is stranded on his ranch in this emotional tale by Patti Standard. And, believe me, if you think The Bride, the Trucker and the Great Escape sounds fun, just wait till you read this engaging romantic adventure by Suzanne McMinn. And in The Sheriff with the Wyoming-Size Heart by Kathy Jacobson, emotions run high as a small-town lawman and a woman with secrets try to give romance a chance....

And there’s much more to come in 1998! I hope you enjoy our selections this month—and every month.

Happy New Year!

Joan Marlow Golan

Senior Editor

Silhouette Books

Please address questions and book requests to:

Silhouette Reader Service

U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269

Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To Stephanie Scharf,

for all those long drives to Chicago’s Inner City

to help me teach art. And to her husband, David Taber,

for his help and support.

You’re both the best.

TERRY ESSIG

lives in northern Indiana. She has six children, a wonderful husband and a crazy English setter. (Better the dog than the husband, although with all the music lessons, sport activities and general mayhem, the husband may more than occasionally feel like he’s losing his mind.) Terry finds it all, uh, good inspiration for her writing?

Chapter One

The dark blue sedan drew up to the curb, its speed slowing to match the pace of the young preadolescent girl walking down the sidewalk. With a near silent whisper, the passenger side window slid down. The driver leaned over to call out through the opening, “Hey, you with the snazzy earrings, want a ride? I’ve got candy.” He let the temptation dangle in the air between them.

The child, temporarily forgetting the embarrassment of her barely burgeoning breasts, pulled her shoulders back and glared in the direction of the car. “No, thanks,” she said, adjusting her backpack strap on her shoulder and picking up her pace. “My father doesn’t want me talking to strange men.”

The man behind the wheel slumped briefly. The emphasis on the word father didn’t bode well. Whatever happened to daddy? He sighed and stepped slightly on the gas. The car surged just enough to keep him abreast of the girl. “Oh, come on. Don’t be like that. I’ve got a ton of candy in here. Wouldn’t you like a treat after a hard day at school?”

The girl stopped in her tracks and turned to face the car. “What kind of candy?” she asked.

“Get in the car and I’ll show you.”

“It’s probably something I don’t even like.”

“Bet it’s not. I bet it’s your favorite.”

At that, the girl flipped her ponytail and left the safety of the sidewalk. She approached the car. “Oh, yeah? Let’s see.” Her eyes widened at the variety of candy bars displayed on the front seat. Without hesitating any further, she opened the passenger door and slid in. The car gunned away from the curb to merge seemlessly back into traffic.

Her favorite was indeed there, but when the girl made to take it, the man’s hand stayed hers. “The deal is if you take that, it means the snit is officially over and you have to start talking to me again.”

The preadolescent’s eyes narrowed as she considered the catch. “Will you let Connie and me go to the mall together?”

“No. Not without an adult. My answer to that won’t change. I work with somebody whose name is forever sealed behind my lips, so don’t ask, whose niece runs in that same group. She tells me Connie and another girl were picked up for shoplifting some makeup—lipstick and stuff like that. The manager of the store let it drop when Connie’s mother made her apologize and pay double, but she might not be so lucky next time. If you’re out with somebody like that, even if you haven’t taken anything yourself, you could get picked up as an accessory, to say nothing of the fact that it just isn’t safe for two young girls to be at the mall by themselves. And don’t start on how nothing ever happens in South Bend or even the entire state of Indiana. You’ve said it all before and I still say there are too many weirdos out there.”

“Connie said she didn’t know how that lipstick got in her pocket. She thinks maybe it rolled off the shelf while she was standing there. Or else maybe Angie slipped it into her shorts pocket at the checkout when she was waiting to pay for her gum, just to get her in trouble. They had a fight that day.”

The disbelieving adult snort was loud and prolonged. “Yeah, right. How stupid do I look?”

“Besides, lots of other kids I know have tried shoplifting. They just didn’t get caught.”

“Let me put it to you this way, sweetie. You even think about trying it and you won’t set so much as a big toe outside your bedroom door for a month of Sundays. Understand?”

“But, Dad...”

Jason John Engel silently ground his teeth at his daughter’s whining tone. “I mean it, Maura, issues like this are nonnegotiable. The candy doesn’t mean I’m weakening, just that I’m willing to sweeten the refusal. Like I told you before, I can probably take you and a friend, preferably not Connie, to the mall this weekend, if you want.”

“No. Everybody else gets to go to the mall by themselves. It would be too embarrassing if anybody saw. I’d never be able to face my friends again.”

Jason shrugged, knowing he shouldn’t take her rejection personally, but doing so, anyway. “Fine. Then you don’t go.”

His twelve-year-old daughter, he noticed, ground her teeth exactly the way he did when frustrated. But she did take the candy bar. He waited until after her first bite. “So we’re talking again, right?”

Maura’s mouth stilled briefly as she stopped chewing and eyed him. Jason just hoped she wasn’t going to spit the candy all over him. He was wearing a good suit. Eventually she nodded her head in the affirmative.

Jason was afraid his relief was palpable in the car. It was scary how much control a twelve-year-old could wield with her moods and whims. It amounted . to emotional blackmail at times.

“By the way,” he said. “I want you to walk home from school on the opposite side of the street from now on. Did you see how easy it was for me to stay next to you and talk to you? If I’d have had a mind to, I could have easily hopped out of the car and grabbed you. On the other side of the street, you’d be walking against traffic, and it would be much harder for anybody in a car to harrass you.”

“Dad,” Maura began kindly, too kindly for Jason’s peace of mind. In his experience, that kind of patient tone boded nothing but ill for what followed.

“Maura, please, let’s not argue about this, too. Just do it, all right? Just do it.”

“Okay, fine, whatever.”

“Thank you,” Jason said fervently and meant it. He was so grateful, he pretended not to notice the heavy-duty eye rolling that accompanied the exasperated agreement. “Thank you very much.” He pulled around a corner onto his own street, and three blocks later pulled into his driveway.

Maura leaned forward interestedly as the car stopped next to the house. “Look, Dad, there’s somebody moving in next door.”

“Hmm?” Jason glanced up from collecting his briefcase and newspaper to see what had caught his daughter’s attention. “Oh. that’s nice. That house has been empty for so long I didn’t think anybody would ever buy it. Vacant houses lower the property values in an area. And, I suppose it’ll be good to have neighbors again, eh, Maura?”

“I wonder if there’s anybody my age.”

“Could be,” her father mumbled noncommittally as he fumbled with the door handle. “We’ll have to wait and see.”

Maura’s shoulders slumped more than usual as she walked around the rear of the car. “Look, they’re moving in a crib and a bassinet. I guess that means no friend for me.”

“Not necessarily,” Jason said as he pushed his key into the front door lock. “The baby could have an older sister and if not, think about the baby-sitting jobs that could come your way.” Money always appealed at this age. The thought of it should perk Maura right up.

It did, too. Her shoulders briefly straightened before she remembered to round them again. “Yes, Annie O’Connor had the cutest sweatshirt on at school yesterday, but she said it cost $38 and I knew you’d never pay that much for a sweatshirt. If I earn half baby-sitting, do you think you’d pay the other half, Dad?”

Jason set his briefcase down on the wooden floor of the front foyer and balanced his newspaper on top of it before tiredly rubbing his eye. “Uh, I’ll think about it, okay? Don’t eat any more of those candy bars before dinner, Maura,” he instructed as he noticed the fistful she clasped. “I don’t want you filling up on junk. Do me a favor and ration them over the next few days so I don’t feel so guilty about buying you such swill.”

Maura shrugged and crossed her fingers behind her back. “Okay, no problem, Dad.”

“Terrific,” Jason said, not believing a word of it. “I’m going to change, then see what I can put together for dinner. You’re in charge of a salad.”

“No prob.”

Jason merely grunted on his way up the stairs. Man, what a day. But at least Maura was more or less speaking to him again—if you could call this communicating.

Next door, Catherine Marie Nicholson let out a grunt. “There,” she said as she hefted another heavy cardboard box onto a stack of similar boxes in her new kitchen. “That’s the last of the dish boxes I think. Next time I move, I’m going to remember not to put so much in the boxes. These suckers are heavy!”

“Next time you move,” her sister Monica responded as she leaned against the countertops while she caught her breath, “you’ll have to give me more of an advance notice so I can be sure to have other plans for the day.”

“You don’t mean that,” Catherine assured her as she filled two cups with tap water and handed one to Monica.

“Oh, yes I do.”

“I’ll make it up to you. How about if I take Amy all day Saturday? You can spend it pottering around doing whatever you feel like.”

Monica set her cup down after chugging the liquid. “What kind of deal is that? You adore Amy. You’re always trying to get your grimy little mitts on her so that you can have your monthly ‘kid fix.’ When are you going to break down and have one of your own?”

“Actually, I’ve been giving that a great deal of thought lately,” Catherine admitted to her sister.

“Yeah? Come to any earth-shattering conclusions? Like time to stop being so dam picky and marry Gerald?”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Catherine made a dismissing gesture. “I’ll never be that hard up. Gerald and I had already been out looking for a diamond when I discovered he was seeing Caroline Neeley on the sly. That poor girl had no idea Gerald had proposed to me, the dirtbag. No, forget Gerald. Forget men. I’ve come up with a different approach entirely.” She reached for the cleaning supplies she’d stacked in one corner. “Help me wipe out the cabinets and lay some shelf paper so I can start emptying these boxes, will you?”

“Having a baby is not exactly a do-it-yourself kind of project, you know. You’re a natural nurturer. It’s why you keep borrowing Amy. It’s why you keep falling in love with the cribs you sell in your kids’ resale shop. You need children of your own to feel fulfilled. You know that and I know that. You’ve been looking for Mr. Right for close to five years now,” Monica said as she grudgingly picked up a sponge. “Why give up now? Twenty-seven isn’t that old. You’ve still got time.”

“Nope. Gerald was the last straw. I give up. I’m throwing in the towel. I decided just last night, as a matter of fact, that it was time to move on to plan B.”

“I didn’t know there was a plan B.”

“There wasn’t. Now there is. It’s simple. Go to a sperm bank.”

Monica almost fell off the ladder she was standing on. “What?”

“You heard me. Cut out the middle man, go directly to the source. From what I understand, people do it all the time.”

Catherine dunked her sponge in her bucket and began to wipe out the interior of a bottom cabinet. Her plan made perfect sense to her. One had to be flexible in this life. A determined person could always find a way to achieve her goal.

Monica, however, was not convinced. “That doesn’t make any sense at all. You’d be adding a middle man, not taking one away. The man is the source.”

Catherine pulled her head out of the cabinet she’d been scrubbing and threw her sponge into the bucket, splashing soapsuds on the floor. “Fine, if you want to play word games, be that way, but you know what I mean. If I really want a baby, which I do, I need to start rethinking the whole project. Otherwise it’s going to remain nothing but an unattainable dream.” She squeezed out the sponge and attacked the next cabinet in line.

Monica opened the cabinet next to the one she’d just finished. Her voice was muffled now and echoed slightly, but her disapproval was still clear. “You were always daydreaming and playing pretend as a kid. You’ve gotten a lot better about getting real. We’re all so proud of the way you’ve made your business succeed, but there’s such a thing as taking it too far. Just be patient. Some guy will turn up, and I’d hate to have you miss all the fun involved in creating a baby naturally. I meant what I said about you being a natural candidate for motherhood, Cath, but I know you like I know the back of my own hand, and I’m telling you I don’t think you’ll be happy doing it this way. You crave family. The whole shebang. You need the husband to go along with the kiddies. I know.”

“Yes, well, unfortunately, Prince Charming is taken, Monica. Cinderella got her claws into him before I even had a chance. I almost made a very bad mistake out of what I now see was desperation. I’m not going to risk it again.”

Monica sat heavily on the third step of her ladder. “But a sperm bank? It seems so cold—so impersonal. Your baby’s not going to know its daddy?” she asked weakly.

Catherine backed out of the cabinet and shrugged at her sister. “Desperate times call for desperate measures. A lady brought in the most beautiful four-poster canopy crib for me to sell for her last week. I brought it home. As a matter of fact, last night I also decided to decorate the spare bedroom as a nursery instead of an office. What do you think of that?”

“Oh, my God, you’re really serious about this.”

Catherine nodded emphatically. “You bet I am. I’m going to decorate that room, set up the crib, then fill it. I am not about to go sit in there every evening and get maudlin over the empty crib. I’ve got my college degree, my resale shop is doing fantastically well, and now I’ve even got my own home. Things aren’t going to get much more orderly than that, and so I’m going to bite the bullet. No time like the present, and all of that. I’m going for it, Mon.”

Monica stared at her sister. “I can’t believe this.”

Catherine nodded firmly. “Believe it.”

“Do you even know where there is a sperm bank?”

“No, but how difficult can they be to find? You read about people using them all the time in the newspaper.”

“Usually because there’s been a problem. All the sperm defrosted or somebody’s is missing. Something awful like that.”

Catherine shrugged off Monica’s concern. “Well, they’re not going to publish the normal day-to-day success cases, are they? You know the press. They only publish the grimmest of the grim.”

“I don’t know, Cath. I mean, what if you got overfertilized and ended up with sextuplets or something? I hear that happens all the time at those places. How would you handle a multiple birth all by yourself? You’d be too tired to run the shop.

“And besides, I bet you don’t have even the foggiest idea how to find a sperm bank or what to do or say if you did. Do you know anybody who knows anything about this? Outside of the newspaper stories, I mean. Those all seemed to be in California, as I recall, and you don’t want a baby born with a need to go surfing. He’d be in for a real disappointment here in South Bend.”

“All right, so I’ll rule out any sperm that might have originated in California.” Catherine agreed with a shrug. “It’s a big country, even without California. I’m sure there are plenty of other sperm out there. And think about this, Mon. Doing it this way I can have the absolute baby of my dreams. I can probably just give them a checklist of attributes I want. Blond hair, blue eyes, IQ over 120.”

Monica rolled her eyes, and Catherine gave her a disapproving look.

“Quit being so discouraging. I’m telling you, my plan is scientifically sound. I’d have a say in all that stuff, whereas if I sit around waiting to fall in love, I’d have to take whatever I’ve fallen for. Gerald wasn’t all that hot looking, but he was smart and seemed nice enough—or so I thought. This way, I can have it all. Oops, we’ll have to finish talking about this later. Here comes dinner.”

And in fact, before Catherine could even pull herself to her feet, the back door opened to admit Monica’s husband and their twelve-year-old daughter, both carrying bags brimming over with small white cartons of Chinese takeout.

“We’re back,” Don Davies announced as though a broad-shouldered six-foot-two man stood a chance of going unnoticed. “And we’ve got supper with us. You two find the plates and silverware yet?”

“We’re not quite ready,” Catherine said as she emptied her bucket into the sink. “We got kind of distracted,” she confessed with a glare at her sister. “But I know what box they’re in.” Catherine had known Donald a long time. The man got cranky when he got hungry. It was best to keep him fed. “Everything go okay?” she asked as she began to rearrange boxes to get at what she hoped was the right one.

“Yep,” Don assured her as he began pulling cartons from the bags and setting them on the kitchen table. “This smells good. I’m starving. We returned the rented van—you owe me an extra twenty-seven bucks, by the way—dropped off John, picked up the food and came right back. Todd and Mary Fran take off?” he asked, naming several more relatives who had helped with the move.

“Yes,” Monica confirmed before Catherine had a chance. “Just a little while ago.”

Don moved all the boxes and papers that had been stacked all over the table and onto the countertop. “There, now we’ve got some room. You find those forks yet?”

“I think so—yes! Here they are.” Catherine looked up from the carton she’d just pulled the flap up from to successfully wave an eating implement.

There was an unexpected knock and all four heads turned to glance curiously at the back door.

“You expecting anybody?” Don asked Catherine, immediately slipping into the role of protective brother-in-law.

Catherine shook her head.

“Well,” Monica huffed, but at least she kept her voice down, “you’d think the neighbors would at least give you a day or two to unpack before they descend on you.”

“Amy, honey, would you get that for me?” Catherine asked. “I’ve still got to find the box with the dinner plates.”

A few moments later Amy returned with a girl about her age. “Aunt Cath,” Amy said, drawing the girl into the room, “this is my friend from school, Maura. Guess what?”

“What?”

“Maura lives right next door to you.”

Catherine said, “Awesome. You can see each other when you’re over, Amy.”

Amy nodded wisely. “I know.”

“And maybe sometimes when I borrow you from your mom so we can go out and do girl stuff, Maura’s mom will let me borrow her, too, and all three of us can go. What do you think?”

“Cool. Isn’t that the best, Maura?” Amy asked.

“Oh, I hardly ever see my mom,” Maura informed Catherine. “She sends me cards and stuff, but she’s too busy with her new family in Chicago and can’t get away to see me too much anymore. But I could ask my dad.” Maura, who’d been looking quite pleased and eager over this new development in her life, appeared suddenly doubtful. “Maybe he’d let me.”

Catherine smiled, briefly flashing her dimples. “It can’t hurt to ask, right?” she said to her new neighbor. But she couldn’t help wondering what kind of father wouldn’t let a child go out on a well-chaperoned excursion to such a nearby and unexotic destination as the local mall. “Amy, has Maura met your mom and dad? Maybe you’d better introduce them.”

Maura turned to beam a smile at Monica and Don. “Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Davies, remember me? I met you at the girls’ basketball game the other night.”

Before Monica or Don had a chance to respond, there was another knock on the door.

Don eyed the cartons of takeout in long-suffering martyrdom. “Good grief, this is turning into Grand Central Station. We’re never going to get to eat.” He groaned as Monica gave him an elbow in the ribs and a warning frown.

Catherine opened the back door to find a large and rather handsome, albeit frantic-looking, male on her back patio.

“Excuse me,” the stranger began before Catherine could get out a single word, “I live right next door,” and he pointed right next door to illustrate his claim. “My daughter seems to be missing, and I was wondering if by any remote possibility—Maura, there you are. My God, child, you almost put me into an early grave. Don’t ever just take off like that again, do you hear me?”

Catherine looked over her shoulder to see how Maura was taking this parental outburst. The child wore a long-suffering expression that made Catherine smile.

“Daaad,” his progeny moaned in despair. “What did you think, that I got kidnapped or something? I was making a salad like you said for me to do. I looked out the window and saw my friend Amy. I ran over to see if this was her new house, but it’s not. I’m just saying hello, and I’ll be back in a couple of minutes to finish the salad, okay?”