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“Can we do anything?” Cari asked. “I could tell Tara all your good qualities.”
Nick stood. “No, Matt should stay clear of the woman and let his lawyer handle it.”
Matt didn’t say anything. He didn’t want to tell them that he’d already ignored his lawyer’s advice. “I can’t. Tara might be able to help me find the man impersonating me.”
“All this has got to be hard on her, too,” Cari said, “Especially after losing her sister so recently and now having the responsibility of a baby.”
A pain tore at Matt’s chest. No one ever thought about how this affected the child. “The baby isn’t mine.”
Cari smiled. “I know you would never walk away from your child, Matt. I take it you’re running a blood test?”
Matt nodded again. “Since we’re both O positive, my lawyer suggested a DNA test, just for insurance.” He sighed tiredly, thinking about the hospital administrator. “If Harry finds out he won’t be too happy about the news.”
“No, he won’t,” Cari agreed. “Especially with the hospital’s charity auction coming up in a month.” Surprisingly, she laughed. “It would be fun just to see his face when he heard about—”
“No!” Matt almost shouted. “I don’t want any of this to get out. It’s bad enough my credit is in a shambles. My career is too important to me.” It was the only thing he had in his life.
Nick stepped in. “Hey, you don’t have to worry about Harry and your job at Riverhaven. Hell, Dad’s money nearly built the heart wing, and I can just as easily stop any future donations.”
Cari patted her husband’s arm. “Don’t worry, honey, Harry isn’t going to do anything crazy. He needs Matt more than Matt needs him.”
Right now, Matt had more to worry about than his own skin. “We have to think about the innocent baby in all this. She’s the one who’ll be hurt. Damn this jerk for causing these problems.” And for causing him to long for something he could never have.
“Then just sit tight for awhile,” Nick said. “You’ll be cleared of everything. And your life can get back to normal.”
Matt didn’t know if he wanted his life normal again. The memory of Tara McNeal’s face wasn’t going to go away easily, nor was the thought of having a child. Forgetting them might take a lifetime.
It was nearly ten o’clock when Matt knocked on Tara’s motel room door. He knew it was late, but he couldn’t take the chance and wait until tomorrow. She could be gone by then.
“Who is it?” Her voice was muffled through the door.
“It’s Matt…Matt Landers.”
The door opened slightly, and Tara’s face appeared, her short hair mussed. She was wearing an oversize T-shirt. Damn, she’d been asleep. He blinked away the picture of her curled up in bed.
“May I come inside and talk to you?”
Tara opened the door, and he stepped inside.
The first thing he saw was the bed. The sheets were rumpled, and the pillow had an imprint where Tara had lain her head.
“I’m sorry I woke you.” He turned to look at her. A big mistake. Her T-shirt might have been oversize, but there was plenty of leg revealed. Long, gorgeous leg. “But I…I wanted to make sure I saw you before you left. I wanted to thank you for talking with Jim Sloan.” He glanced around nervously. “And I was hoping to give it one more shot and try to convince you to stay.”
Having Matt in her room made Tara nervous. She grabbed her cotton robe from the end of the bed and slipped it on. “I told you earlier, I can’t. It’s best that I take Erin back to Phoenix.”
“And what? Wait?” he asked. “I thought you wanted to find her father.” He went to the baby’s bed and glanced at Erin. She was asleep on her side, her little mouth moving occasionally in a sucking motion. He moved away from the crib.
“She’s a beautiful child,” he said.
Tara nodded. She was confused by this man. He seemed to have everything. A successful career, money, a beautiful home. But she’d caught a twinge of loneliness in his eyes that mirrored hers. “You would think any man would want her.” Tara hadn’t realized she’d spoken until she saw Matt tense.
“Then don’t give up on finding her father.”
“I’m not giving up. I loved my sister,” she whispered tersely as she fought the tears flooding her eyes. “I would have done anything for her, and I’ll do anything for Erin. But I don’t have the time or the money to run around the country.”
“Stay in Santa Cruz, and we’ll find out the truth together,” he challenged.
She didn’t want to argue with this man, not anymore. Not to mention she was half-dressed. Nervously she tucked her hair behind her ear. “I can’t—”
“Yes, you can. What’s to stop you?”
Tara turned away. “I have a home, a job and a life, Dr. Landers. I can’t just drop everything.” Her biggest problem was the good-looking man standing too close. Making her want things that she only dreamed about. She couldn’t let herself depend on him, lean on him. He could hurt her and Erin with his good looks and easy charm. The type of man who made her feel things… She pushed away the thought. No, she was safer back home.
The phone rang, and Tara hurried to pick it up before it woke the baby. “Hello.”
“Tara.” The familiar voice of her Phoenix neighbor came across the line.
“Mrs. Lynch. Is there something wrong?” Tara asked as she turned away from Matt.
“No, child,” the sixty-year-old woman said. “I wanted to let you know that I sent off the things you asked for. Your sister’s things, the black address book and jewelry box.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Lynch. You’ve helped so much.”
“Well, I want to help. I know this has been a rough time for you and the little one. Just don’t worry about the house, I’ll take care of things here.”
Tara smiled at the woman’s kindness. The small, two-bedroom house Tara rented was the same stucco structure she and Briana had lived in all their lives. And Mrs. Lynch had been her neighbor all that time. “I appreciate that so much. Erin and I will be home in a few days.”
She heard a deep sigh on the line. “Well, that is good news. I sure miss that little girl. How is she doing? I bet she’s grown.”
“I’ll let you measure her when we get back.” She glanced at Matt. “I better go. Thank you for all your help. Goodbye.” She hung up the phone.
She rose and crossed the room to where Matt was waiting. “That was my neighbor in Phoenix. She found the address book and jewelry box. She sent them off today. You should have them in a couple of days.”
“Good. After Jim goes over them, I’ll make sure he returns your property. Just give me your address.” He cocked an eyebrow. “Unless you’re going to take me up on my offer to stay until either we get this thing solved or you have to start back for the new school year.”
She studied him for awhile and fought taking him up on the offer. She shook her head. “I can’t.”
His look of disappointment surprised her. Tara knew she should just go home and call him with the information, but she had to admit she was curious, and that was dangerous. “Why do you want us to stay?”
Matt shrugged. “First, I want to find the man who stole my name. And you might remember something your sister told you that could help us. So, if you think I’m grasping at straws, maybe I am. I’m grasping at anything to get my life back.” He shot a glance at the crib. The longing in his eyes gripped her heart. “And for the baby’s sake, too. I know what it’s like to be abandoned.”
All the way home in the car, Matt cursed himself for revealing so much. Tara McNeal didn’t need to know about his past. No one did.
He’d always been a private person. He’d grown up an only child, adopted by an older couple who’d waited years for a baby. So he’d been on display all the time, something he hated. He’d been a shy kid, had trouble making friends. In high school, he tried sports but was growing so fast his coordination was almost nonexistent. So he spent his evenings at the library, studying. He strove to excel, to be as good as he could be. To be awarded a scholarship to a prestigious college and medical school.
But in the back of his mind, what had always driven him was the fact that his birth mother had rejected him. A familiar tremor surged through him, making him feel isolated and vulnerable. He’d never forget the questions that had haunted him as a child. What had been the imperfection in him that made his mother discard her newborn son in a bus station rest room? Matt gripped the steering wheel tighter and cursed. Why was he thinking about this now? He had come to terms with his past long ago. Immediately a picture of little Erin came into his head.
And along with the baby came the beautiful aunt. Was that the reason he wanted Tara McNeal to stay?
He groaned. He was doing exactly what Ed Podesta advised him not to do. Was he insane? Or just so lonely that he wanted to spend time with the woman? But why Tara McNeal? She wasn’t even his type. What was his type? Any woman who didn’t get too close or want a permanent relationship.
Matt’s demanding career always came first, and that didn’t leave him much time for a personal life, he thought as he drove his car off the highway onto the narrow road. That had been the choice he’d made years ago.
He thought back to when he’d been accepted as a surgical resident at San Francisco University Hospital, his first time on the West Coast and the first time he’d ever fallen in love.
Matt drove through the gate and parked in the garage. He got out but instead of going inside walked around to the back of the house. The cool breeze was refreshing but didn’t wash away the memories. Memories he’d pushed aside for years while he built his career as one of the best pediatric heart surgeons on the coast.
But after meeting Tara and Erin, he realized how vulnerable he was to his past…and to his own human flaws.
Would his life have taken a different turn if Julie, the woman he’d fallen in love with in medical residency, hadn’t left him?
He crossed the lawn to the bluff. The cool evening breeze brushed against his skin as he looked down the five-foot drop to the surf. The crashing waves were loud, but the rhythmic movement had always been soothing to him.
Matt shut his eyes and thought about the baby he’d seen in the crib tonight. Every time he picked up a child, held one, performed delicate surgery on their precious bodies, his pain only grew. The pain and loneliness in his heart never went away. He knew that being adopted added to his emotional inadequacies. The constant desire to know where he’d come from…and the knowledge that he would never leave a part of himself behind in a child.
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