My Baby, Your Son

Cover Page

Excerpt

Dear Reader

Title Page

About the Author

Dear Reader

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Epilogue

Copyright

Dear Reader,

Love is always in the air at Silhouette Romance. But this month, it might take a while for the characters of May’s stunning lineup to figure that out! Here’s what some of them have to say:

“I’ve just found out the birth mother of my son is back in town. What’s a protective single dad to do?”—FABULOUS FATHER Jared O’Neal in Anne Peters’s My Baby, Your Son

“What was I thinking, inviting a perfect—albeit beautiful—stranger to stay at my house?”—member of THE SINGLE DADDY CLUB, Reece Newton, from Beauty and the Bachelor Dad by Donna Clayton

“I’ve got one last chance to keep my ranch but it means agreeing to marry a man I hardly know!”—Rose Murdock from The Rancher’s Bride by Stella Bagwell, part of her TWINS ON THE DOORSTEP miniseries

“Would you believe my little white lie of a fiancé just showed up—and he’s better than I ever imagined!” —Ellen Rhoades, one of our SURPRISE BRIDES in Myrna Mackenzie’s The Secret Groom

“I will not allow my search for a bride to be waylaid by that attractive, but totally unsuitable, redhead again!”—sexy rancher Rafe McMasters in Cowboy Seeks Perfect Wife by Linda Lewis

“We know Sabrina would be the perfect mom for us—we just have to convince Dad to marry her!”—the precocious twins from Gayle Kaye’s Daddyhood

Happy Reading!

Melissa Senate

Senior Editor

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

My Baby, Your Son

Anne Peters

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ANNE PETERS

shares her Pacific Northwest home with her husband, Manfred, and their aged dog, Adrienne. Anne treasures her family and friends, her private times, her creativity and, last but by no means least, her readers.

Dear Reader,

I wasn’t even twenty-one the first time I held Tyler. It had only been seven months since April told me she was pregnant, seven months since I panicked and she’d left, seven months to get used to the idea of fatherhood. But I hadn’t thought about it because though I knew I had fathered a child, I could pretend it hadn’t really happened because April was gone. I didn’t see the baby grow inside of her, didn’t feel his first kick, didn’t bond with him the way other expectant fathers get a chance to do.

All of which made the reality of fatherhood, of actually holding in my arms the life I’d helped to create, more overwhelming and powerful than I have words to describe. I was thrilled, I was awed, I was scared. And, just like that, I grew up.

He, not I, became my reason for being. His happiness, not mine, came first Selflessness, I learned, is part of fatherhood. But so is jealousy, I came to find out when April reappeared on the scene. And fear, fear of loss.

It took me a while to realize that fatherhood combined with motherhood results in parenthood. And that since parenthood is the natural order of things, there can be no losses, only wins.

Fatherhood—I guess it made a man out of me.

Regards,

Jared O’Neal

Prologue

New York City

“Excuse me, Miz Bingham…”

“Yes?” With a sigh, April turned her attention from the stunning view of Central Park in June to the shriveled- potato features of Spuds Miller, her twin brother Marcus’s portly factotum. “Is the limo here?”

“No, ma’am.” The old man extended a bulky manila envelope. “This just came for you by messenger.”

“Oh?” April accepted the package without enthusiasm. One of the drawbacks of being a renowned concert pianist was being inundated with a barrage of musical scores from struggling composers and wannabes. Usually, though, there were people around to intercept them. “Where’s my mother?”

“Miz Rhinegold and Mr. Marcus are in the den, having one of their…uh, discussions.”

“I see.” April grimaced. “And here I thought we’d for once be able to make an uneventful getaway.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

With an inward smile at the old man’s pointedly non- committal attitude, April glanced down at the envelope. “‘Harper and Tymes, Attorneys At Law,’” she read, and asked Spuds with a frown, “Isn’t that the firm that handled Aunt Marje’s will?”

“I believe so, yes.” Much more than a servant, Spuds Miller was up on everything that concerned the Bingham family, but believed in keeping a low profile. “A Mr. Cur- tis, I believe.”

“Exactly.” Puzzled, April tore open the envelope. Let- ting it drift to the floor, she stared at the leather-bound volume in her hands. The initials M.B.S. were stenciled on the front in faded gold.

“Marjorie Bingham Smythe.” A small catch roughened her voice. “Oh, Spuds, I can’t count the times I’ve watched my aunt write in this journal.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Spuds bent to retrieve the discarded en- velope, peered inside and extracted a folded sheet of vel- lum. “It appears there’s a letter to go with it.”

“Thank you.” One-handedly, April shook it open. In an undertone she read, “Darling April, by the time this reaches you, I’ll be dead and buried. Cliff House and the rest of my estate will have been settled, divided equally between Marcus and you. I’ve kept aside this diary for your eyes only….”

April’s voice faltered. In silence she rapidly scanned the few lines that followed and looked up. “I need to sit down.”

She groped for the nearest chair. Spuds rushed to pull it close. “Shall I—”

“No,” April interrupted with an emphatic shake of the head. “Just leave me. Please, I—”

“Of course.” Ever discreet, Spuds was already on his way. “Not to worry.”

Her gaze once again on the letter, April made no reply. From its pages, she read with eyes gone gritty and with the blood pounding in her ears, you will learn that a terrible secret has been kept from you, a secret I find I cannot bear to take with me to the grave. Darling April, your baby, your son, is alive….

Chapter One

Capstan, WA. One week later…

April hadn’t meant to stop at the school. She was on her way to Cliff House, which was to be her home for the next several months, at least. But driving by the school yard she’d noticed the Little League baseball game in progress and something had urged her to pull over and watch.

Nostalgia? Yes, but something else, too. Something less definable but more compelling. Something that had her threading her fingers through the chain-link fence and straining to see.

Just to the left of her, a scattering of spectating friends and family dotted the bleachers behind the backstop. Shouts of encouragement and advice for the batter blended with the twhack of the ball connecting with the catcher’s mitt and the umpire’s gravel-voiced call. “Steeerike!”

It was all so familiar, so very much like those other ball games during those other summers a decade and more ago, that April half expected to see her brother Mark in the dugout and Jared O’Neal winding up for the pitch. Why, even the blue-and-white uniforms of the Capstan Gulls hadn’t changed.

“Strike two!”

As jeers and cheers from the bleachers followed the um- pire’s cry, April stared transfixed at the young Capstan pitcher going through his spiel. Posturing and posing, look- ing this way and that before tucking his knee against his chest, he wound up for the next killer pitch. Watching, April experienced a sense of déjà vu so acute, she blinked to dispel the illusion that it was young Jared up there on the mound. The way the boy stood, moved, the way he tugged on the bill of his cap and cocked his head just that little bit…

Oh, God. Realization struck like a slap, making her body actually jerk away from the fence before her knees turned to mush and her fingers clung more tightly to the cutting cold wire for support. It was him, she thought wildly. It was Tyler. Her son. And Jared’s.

As if to confirm it, a raucous shout drew her attention to the left and she saw Jared O’Neal surge to his feet on the bleacher at the far side of the backstop. Cupping his mouth, he yelled something else to the boy, something April was too unnerved to try to decipher. Riveted, she watched him bend to the smiling woman next to him who had remained seated. He made some kind of comment and the woman nodded, smiling agreement.

Jared O’Neal. Betrayer of her love. Co-conspirator in the theft of her child. Still, seeing him unexpectedly like this, tanned and virile in frayed cutoffs and faded T-shirt with a Seattle Mariners’ cap covering most of his dark, wavy hair, April’s heart twisted painfully in her chest. He was grinning that crooked little grin that tugged one corner of his mouth up and the other down.

That grin, that she noticed with another painful tug on the heartstrings, was matched by an identical one from the boy on the field. Their son. Her baby…

The image blurred. April closed her eyes and willed back the tears. Pouring over Marje Bingham’s diary these past few days, she had done more crying than she’d known she had tears for.

The enormity of the crime that had been committed against her—for there could be no other way to describe it—had all but annihilated her emotionally. She had yet to deal with the ramifications, had yet to confront her mother and demand…what? To have the clock turned back? And herself made whole again?

It was the knowledge that it was too late, that something precious was irretrievably lost, that had had her crying all those tears until she was sick. But in the course of that grief she had come to realize that, for now, concerns of the pres- ent and the future—namely, getting her son back into her life—had to take precedence over those grievances of the past.

She had confided in no one but her attorney the real reason she would be staying at Cliff House. Let Grace think it was merely for the purpose of the good long rest Dr. Shimon had prescribed. Not even Marcus knew, for he would have felt compelled to come and take charge. And she was done with that, done with depending on anyone but herself. Done being a pawn of those who, for all their protests that they meant well and knew what was best for her, had run her life for far too long. Her mother. Her pub- lic. Her handlers. Her muse.

The time had come to take charge.

But, oh…April pressed her forehead to the backs of her hands still clutching the fence and let out a shivery breath. Here and now, confronted by the man and the boy in the flesh, she was forced to acknowledge that taking charge was not going to be as uncomplicated and straightforward as she had imagined.

For one thing, she hadn’t counted on the twist of pain and, worse, that tug of attraction she felt at her first sight of Jared O’Neal after nearly ten years. With everything that stood between them, all the hurt and the betrayal, she had convinced herself she hated him. Or, at the least, felt in- difference. Why, before reading the diary, she had barely even thought of him in years. Yet now….

Now she knew that they had a son. It was as simple and as complicated as that.

Tyler. Eagerly, hungrily, April’s eyes sought him out once again. He was standing next to another boy who was stockier, shorter. He was off the field. Her heart swelled at the beauty of him. Her child. She caressed him with her gaze. How fine he looked. How perfect.

As perfect as his father had seemed to her once upon a time. And yet, not really so much like Jared at all. Except perhaps in his mannerisms, his posture and his…attitude.

April smiled to herself with a surge of something she thrilled to realize was maternal pride. That boy had attitude, all right. Out there on that playing field he was cocksure and all male, just like his father had been as a boy.

How incredible to think that this fine boy was something she and Jared had created. Together. And how much stranger still to have shared the ultimate intimacy with a man and to now realize that she had never really known him at all.

Disturbed by her curious thoughts and feelings, April redirected her attention to Jared once again. She saw that he was still on his feet, conversing now with a man on his right who looked familiar. Another face from the past— Conan O’Neal, Jared’s older brother. Jared was using his hands to make a point and April remembered that this had always been his way. She was struck by how large he seemed. Had he always been this tall? This…imposing?

Surely not. Though he’d always been athletic and well- muscled, maturity had filled him out. Life and the elements had carved lines into a face that was still handsome. More handsome than it used to be, if she were honest. Sunglasses shaded his eyes.

Wishing she were wearing hers, too, April knew the ex- act moment he became aware of her scrutiny. He stopped talking and abruptly swung his head in her direction. They stared at each other for what seemed to April like forever but was probably no more than a second or two.

April’s fingers grew numb, so tightly were they clutching the fence. Her heart beat so hard, she shook. Her breath became trapped in her chest as she watched an expression of outraged disbelief replace the shock of recognition on Jared’s face before, with a jerk, he turned away.

April stayed frozen for another heartbeat or two. And then, with an involuntary gasp of dismay, she spun away and blindly strode back to her car.

Jared O’Neal felt blood roaring in his ears, hazing his eyes. He couldn’t recall ever having been this shaken. April Bingham? Here?

Unwilling to accept what his eyes had seen, he gave his head a hard shake. And then he spun around to look for her once more. She was gone. If she had even been there in the first place.

“You all right?”

“Huh?” Jared blinked at his brother as if he’d forgotten the other man was there.

“You act like you’ve seen a ghost,” Conan said, follow- ing suit when Jared rather abruptly sat down.

“Maybe I did.” Propping his elbows on his knees, Jared blew into his nested fists as he struggled to put a lid on emotions that roiled and bubbled like lava in a volcano, ready to erupt. Get a grip, man, his mind cautioned, as fear and anger and—God help him—a lingering surge of heat threatened to completely unravel him. It couldn’t have been her. And even if it was, didn’t you always know she’d show up here one of these days? It doesn’t mean anything. She doesn’t know anything….

“Jared?”

“Yeah.” Jared slanted his brother a glance. He managed a semblance of a grin. “I’m probably crazy, but I thought I saw—Nah.”

He shook his head. He wouldn’t say it, wouldn’t even breathe her name. He took a deep breath, slapped his hands on his knees and sat upright. “Forget it. The heat must be getting to me or something.”

He turned to Addie Mansfield, sitting on his left. “Got any more sodas in that cooler of yours?”

“Sure.”

Inwardly wincing at her eager rush to dig out a can of pop and hand it to him, Jared forced another quick smile. “Thanks, Ad.”

Watching her hand another cold can to his brother, he almost wished he could fall in love with her. Addie was a good woman, a good mother to her boy, and with that mane of flaxen hair framing her wholesome girl-next-door face she wasn’t too hard on the eyes, either. In fact, she looked a whole lot like Regina.

And nothing at all like…April Bingham.

Suddenly the cola tasted like bile. He set it down on the floor boards so hard, it sloshed all over his runners. “Damn,” he muttered fiercely.

Only to hear his brother say, “Kid’s a pitcher, not a hitter.”

“What?” Jared stared at him, uncomprehending.

“Tyler.” Conan gestured impatiently toward the game. “So he struck out. That’s no reason for you to sit here cussing.”

“Oh, for—” Thoroughly exasperated, with himself most of all, Jared choked back the rest of the expletive and forced himself to watch the game. Or, at least, to look as if he were watching it. They were in the ninth inning. The Gulls were at bat. Tyler was back in the dugout…

And what the hell would April Bingham be doing back in town?

The question intruded on his honest desire to concentrate on the game because, when it came right down to it, Jared knew he hadn’t seen a ghost. It had been April, all right, over there by the fence. Ten years hadn’t really changed her much. She still wore that hair of hers—shades of ash streaked with gold—falling in waves from a middle part to halfway down her back.

And anyway, over the years he’d caught her on TV a few times. Concert specials with the likes of Pavarotti and other opera greats. The kind that took place in cities like London and Paris and Rome.

So what in blue blazes would the kind of star she had become want in a backwater like Capstan? To take stock of her recent inheritance? Behind the dark shades, Jared squeezed his eyes shut. Grinding his back teeth, he thought, Fat chance. The woman’s presence spelled trouble, pure and simple. He could feel it in his gut.

The feeling stayed with him through sundaes and banana splits with the team at the Dairy Queen. And it lingered during the subsequent drive home with his nine-sometimes- going-on-thirty-year-old son who seemed to have a weighty problem of his own to deal with, if his fidgeting was any- thing to go by.

“Dad?”

“Hmm?” Taking his eyes off the road a moment, and dragging his dark thoughts away from the subject of April Bingham, Jared sliced an inquiring glance toward his son.

“Tommy’s mom is real nice, isn’t she?”

“Real nice,” Jared concurred, wondering what was up. He didn’t have long to wait to find out.

“Any chance you’d wanna marry her?”

“Addie?” What the hell? Jared tossed his son another look. This one from beneath raised eyebrows. “Any, er, special reason you feel that I should?”

“Well…” Tyler, sprawled in a position only someone of his young years could assume, squinted into the sun. “Tommy’n me’ve been talkin’…”

“S’that so?”

“Mom’s been dead almost a year…”

“That’s true.” If only thoughts about Regina’s fatal car accident still haunted every waking hour of his days.

“An’ Tommy says his mom really likes you.”

“I like her, too.” Jared kept his eyes on the road and his face straight. The conversation and his son’s unsubtle efforts at matchmaking might seem amusing to him, but this was obviously something very close to Tyler’s heart. The question was how to make it clear to the boy— gently—that as far as he was concerned, he and Addie Mansfield were just good friends. Being single parents— and not by choice in either of their cases—they had a lot to talk about, a lot of notes to compare. And he really did like her.

But who knew better than he that, in the long run—or even in the short—friendship and affection were poor sub- stitutes for what his younger brother Sean called the “Big L”?

“It’d be kinda neat, havin’ a brother,” Tyler said wist- fully.

“I can see how you’d feel that way.” Being the middle child of a mixed bunch of six, Jared certainly could sym- pathize. “Having brothers and sisters is a lot o’ fun. Most of the time. On the other hand—”

“Tommy’d really like a brother, too,” Tyler interrupted Jared’s attempt at rationalization through platitudes. “An’ he says his dad wouldn’t mind if you married his mom on account of he divorced her to go farmin’.”

“Farming?” Jared frowned. Last he’d heard, Thomas Mansfield, Sr., was a traveling salesman out of Seattle. “You sure?”

“Yup.” Tyler’s nod was emphatic. “Miz Mansfield even said. She said, ‘That man’s always lookin’ for greener pas- tures.’”

“Oh. I see…” Jared cleared his throat. He briefly de- bated setting Tyler straight on those “greener pastures,” but decided to leave well enough alone. “You guys sure’ve been talking, haven’t you?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Trouble is—” Jared cleared his throat once again “—people don’t just up and marry somebody just because their kids think it would be a good idea. I mean, I like Tommy’s mom a whole lot, but—”

“Tommy says she really likes you, too.”

Jared acknowledged the interjection with a smile and a nod, but continued to make his point as though Tyler hadn’t interrupted. “Like I said, it takes a heck of a lot more than liking each other for two people to get married.”

“Oh,” Tyler said dejectedly. “You mean like you gotta be in love, right?”

“That’s right.” Jared affectionately rubbed his son’s bristly short fair hair. “How’d you get so smart, anyway?”

But Tyler wasn’t to be diverted. He ducked away from his father’s hand, angling around in the seat and facing Jared with arms folded across his chest and his chin stuck out. “I know that Mom wasn’t my real mom.”

“So?” Puzzled as to where this unexpected turn of the conversation was leading, and unaccountably wary, too, Jared sent his son a frowning glance. “That’s never been a secret in our family, so what’s your point?”

Tyler returned the frown in spades. “I heard Grammy and Auntie Colleen talkin’ in the kitchen a while ago and Grammy said how sad it was that you weren’t ever really in love with Mom. So how come now you say people oughta be?”