“So this baby’s father isn’t going to be in the picture?” he said.

“That’s right. I’m on my own.”

And it won’t be the first time. Liz didn’t say the words. She didn’t need to; her expression said it all.

“I want to talk about that,” Matt said softly. “You shouldn’t be standing around.” He set his hand in the small of her back and steered her firmly across the foyer and into the sitting room. “I want you to rest on the patio, in the shade, while I make our dinner.”

She came to a sudden halt. “I’m perfectly able to make my own din—”

He pressed a fingertip against her lips. “No slaving over a hot stove for you. Doctor’s orders.” Her full lips were soft and warm; he had to fight a sudden impulse to run his fingertip over the upper curve—

What happens when you suddenly discover your happy twosome is about to be turned into a…family?

Do you panic?

Do you laugh?

Do you cry?

Or…do you get married?

The answer is all of the above—and plenty more!

Share the laughter and the tears as these unsuspecting couples are plunged into parenthood! Whether it’s a baby on the way, or the creation of a brand-new instant family, these men and women have no choice but to be

When parenthood takes you by surprise!

The Bachelor’s Baby

by Liz Fielding

#3666

Twins Included!

Grace Green

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MILLS & BOON

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CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER ONE

“YOU’RE pregnant?”

Liz Rossiter felt a stab of apprehension as she saw angry crimson color mottle the face of the man seated across from her. “Yes, darling, I—”

“Dammit, Liz!” Colin Airdrie lurched forward in his chair and punched a fist down on the surface of their elegant Horrocks & Vine patio table. “You know I don’t want any more kids. I’ve been there, done that. What the devil are you trying to do? Trap me?”

Déjà vu.

A fragment of memory—from the past that Liz had buried so carefully thirteen years before—suddenly broke free and surfaced, chilling her to the bone despite the sun beating down on their rooftop garden from a hazy New York sky.

This couldn’t be happening.

Not now.

Not again.

“Colin,” she said pleadingly, “it was an accident. I don’t know how it happened.” She tugged at her filigreed platinum choker, which all at once seemed to be strangling her. “But now that I am pregnant, I want this baby!”

Colin shoved back his chair and swung to his feet, his expression grim.

“Liz, I’m forty-five, as you well know. You also know that I have an ex-wife to support and three children to put through university—Amy’s already there, the twins go next year. There’s no way I want to start another family—”

“But…we love each other.”

“Right. And we’ve been in a committed relationship for more than five years. But you’ll recall,” he added tersely, “that before we moved in together, we agreed that it would be just the two of us. And I haven’t changed my mind. I don’t want this baby. That’s final.”

She stared at him, and it was like looking at a stranger. “Surely,” she whispered, “surely you’re not suggesting I should…should…”

She couldn’t even bring herself to think it, far less say it. But she didn’t need to. She could tell by the curt nod of his head that the unthinkable was exactly what he was suggesting.

“The choice is yours.” Stepping behind his chair, he curled his fingers tightly around the top slat and fixed her with a hard implacable gaze. “You can have either me or this child, Liz. You can’t have both.”

Matthew Garvock flicked up his umbrella as he emerged from his Main Street law office in the small town of Tradition, British Columbia. Heavy rain had been pelting down all day and showed no signs of letting up.

He’d had a hectic week—and he rarely worked on Friday evenings but business was booming and he wasn’t about to complain. The harder he worked, the more money he earned.

And it was money he could put to good use, he reflected as he strode along the rain-splashed sidewalk toward the brightly lit Pizza Palace in the next block. The down payment for his new home had taken a huge chunk out of his savings—

A passing car suddenly veered too close to the gutter and sluiced muddy water in his direction. He jumped back, but it was too late. The damage was done. His pants were soaked, he could feel the fabric stick unpleasantly to his legs.

He glowered through the lashing rain and caught a glimpse of the offending vehicle just before it disappeared around the corner. It was a midnight-blue Porsche.

Didn’t belong to anyone in town, he decided as he tugged sopping wet fabric from his knees before continuing on his way. Most folks in this neck of the woods drove pickup trucks. A Porsche was a city car—and this particular one had been driven by someone with city manners…which meant no manners.

He had occasion to visit Vancouver on business several times a year and was always glad to get home. People down on the Lower Mainland were all so damned busy going where they were going, they didn’t care a hoot about anybody else.

He pressed his thumb against the top spring of his umbrella and shook the umbrella out as he walked into the Pizza Palace. It wasn’t a place he regularly frequented—he didn’t have to, Molly and his mother were forever bringing him casseroles or inviting him over for meals.

But tonight, because Molly had taken the kids to a movie, and his mother had gone to Kelowna for the weekend, he was on his own.

And he was looking forward to having the house to himself. Stressed-out after his hectic week, he needed some time alone. What he planned to do as soon as he got home was have a quick shower and change into dry clothes. Then he’d pour himself a beer and take it—along with a few slices of steaming Hawaiian pizza—through to the sitting room where he would spend a couple of mindless hours flaked out in front of the TV.

“Well, hallelujah, it’s still here!”

Despite her aching fatigue and her screaming muscles, Liz managed a shaky smile as she dug up her old house key from among the clothes pegs stored in a wooden box by the back door of Laurel House.

Huddling under her hooded black slicker, she slipped the key into the lock, and held her breath. For a second, she met resistance…and then the dead bolt slid back.

Her breath seeped out in a relieved hiss and she slumped weakly against the door, heedless of the rain lashing down on her…

Then realizing she was in danger of falling asleep where she stood, she jerked herself upright. She had to stay awake…at least till she had faced her father.

She’d phoned him ten days ago, before setting off from New York, but he hadn’t picked up the phone. She’d listened to his abrasive voice bark: “Max Rossiter here, leave a message after the beep!” but she hadn’t wanted to leave a message. She had just wanted to confirm that he was still living in the family home.

Apparently he was…but this evening he was out.

She’d stood at the front door for a good five minutes, ringing the bell, over and over again. Finally she’d given up.

But she hadn’t left.

On her long drive west, she’d had time to think. And she had made some decisions. One of those decisions was that she was going to stand up to him. She wasn’t going to let him intimidate her, the way he had when she was a teenager. Laurel House was his home…but it was also—legally—her home. And if he tried to throw her out, she would take him to court over it.

She opened the door and stepped inside.

Nothing had changed.

That was her first thought.

But after she’d taken a second look, she saw that some things had indeed changed. The appliances she remembered had been gold. The appliances she saw now were black. Gleaming black stove, dishwasher, fridge, microwave…

Yawning, she walked through the kitchen, out into the corridor and along to the foyer.

The doors to all the rooms were open, and she peeked in every one but they were all empty.

Yawning again, she turned away and ascended the stairs.

“Dad?” she called out as she reached the landing. Her voice echoed back. It had a hollow sound.

She checked his bedroom. He wasn’t there. But everything was just as she remembered it, even to the blue-and-white antique quilt with its log cabin design.

She moved on to her old room. She was surprised but pleased to see that here, too, nothing had changed.

And never had the bed seemed more inviting.

Shrugging off her slicker, she tossed it over a chair. She would lie down, she decided exhaustedly, and have a short nap. But she’d leave the door open to make sure that when her father came home, she would hear him.

She woke from a deep sleep to the sound of movement. The thud of heavy footsteps, someone going down the stairs.

She pushed herself up to a sitting position, and felt her fingers tremble as she brushed her long sleep-mussed hair back. Her father was home. And she had to go down and face him. It was a moment she’d dreaded.

She edged off the bed and crept to the door. And hesitated.

The courage she’d built up during her journey now threatened to desert her. Her father’s rages…they had always terrified her.

But she had to confront him sometime. And what was to be gained by putting it off?

Swallowing down her dread, she made her decision. And before she could change her mind, she walked out of her room, across the landing and then—forcing one foot after the other—she descended the stairs.

Matt had just gulped a mouthful of beer from his can when he heard a sound behind him.

Swiveling around, he spluttered when he saw the pale apparition standing unsteadily in the doorway—a wraithlike figure with long flaxen hair and a perfect oval face.

“What the…?” Wondering if he was dreaming, he stared incredulously. Then shaking his head vehemently, he tried to jar the vision from his head. But…when he looked again, it was still there. She was still there.

And she was staring at him as incredulously as if he, too, were a ghost. Her eyes were starkly wide, her full lips parted in dismay, her oval face as pale as the crumpled ecru suit that hung so loosely on her thin body.

“There must,” he said, “be some explanation for this. Tell me—” he attempted to inject some humor into his tone “—please tell me that you’re not the Phantom Lady of Laurel House!”

“What,” she asked in a voice as insubstantial as her appearance, “are you doing here?”

She was real. No doubt about it. Ghosts didn’t wear perfume and this one was wearing something that made him think of pink roses and summer kisses. Raising his beer can to his mouth again, he regarded her with great interest as he took another long swig.

Then wiping the froth from his lips, he set the can on the counter and settled his fists lightly on his hips.

“I’m here,” he said in an amused tone, “because this is my home.”

Her eyes, if that were possible, widened even further. “Since when?” One of her hands had crept to her throat and she was pulling her delicately fashioned platinum choker from her neck as if trying to keep it from strangling her.

Who the devil was she? And what did she want?

“Since when?” she demanded.

“Since I bought it.”

“You’ve bought it? Bought Laurel House? But you can’t have! What happened to—”

“The previous owner? Max Rossiter?” He shrugged. “He’d been ill for a long time and he passed away a couple of months ago—”

She made an odd sound, like the croak of a parched frog.

Intrigued by her reaction, he kept talking and watched her with fast-growing curiosity. “Shortly before that, he’d put the house up for sale—it’s only two miles out of town and it has the greatest view, so I bought it. It had been mortgaged to the hilt—the old guy had had a stroke several years back and he just couldn’t keep up with his extra expenses so in the end he was forced to sell…”

If she’d been pale before, she was ashen now. Alarmingly so.

He walked over to her. “You need to sit down.” He reached out a hand to take her arm in support, but she tried to twist away and his fingertips accidentally brushed her breasts before he cupped her elbow. “You look all in—”

She wrenched herself free and stumbled back. “Don’t touch me!” She glared at him. “Don’t you dare touch me!”

Stunned by her hostility, he stepped back, his palms up. “Whoa, hold on, lady. You’ve got the wrong idea. I’m not looking to ravish you.”

Her eyes had become icy cold, but her cheeks were fiery red. “If you were, Matthew Garvock, it wouldn’t be the first time.”

Jolted more by the bitterness of her tone than the fact that she knew his name, he gaped at her. Had they met somewhere before? If so, he had no memory of it. He tried to see beyond the pale skin and the pale hair and the pale clothes, to the person vibrating with such blatant antagonism behind them.

And finally, just as he was about to give up, he recognized her.

“Good Lord.” He felt his heart tremble. “It’s Beth.” Emotion threatened to close his throat. “I can’t believe you’ve come back. After all this time.”

She had regained her composure. And she fixed him with a gaze so stony it tore him apart.

“Yes, it’s me, Matt. I’m back…and I’m here to stay. As to Laurel House being your ‘home’—”

At last he’d found his voice again. “You’re welcome to stay here, for as long as you want—”

Her laugh was harsh. “Oh, I plan to. You see, Matt, this is rightfully my home, despite what my father may have led you and his lawyer to believe—”

He was hardly listening to her. He could scarcely believe she’d come back after all these years. Thirteen years. Thirteen years during which he’d never managed to shake free of the racking guilt and the aching regrets—

“…so tomorrow,” she was saying, “I’ll go see Judd Anstruther, my father’s lawyer, and I’ll sort everything out.”

With an effort, he focused on what she was saying.

“Judd’s retired,” he said.

“Who took over his practice?”

“I did. Whatever you decide to do, I’ll be involved.” Agitatedly he raked a hand through his shower-damp hair. “Beth, we have to talk. About…what happened, thirteen years ago—”

“No.” Her throat rippled convulsively. “You have nothing to say to me that I would want to listen to. But I have two things to say to you. And I want you to listen, because I don’t want to say them twice. The first is, don’t call me Beth. I’m no longer that naive teenager, and I no longer go by that name. If you have to call me anything, call me Liz. Or Ms. Rossiter. Either will do and I answer to both…but in your case, I’d prefer the latter.”

He had slipped the pizza into the oven to keep it warm while he had his shower; now he noticed the steamy smell of pepperoni and grilled cheese, and he knew he would always associate that specific aroma with this specific moment.

“And the second thing?” he asked.

The faint lines bracketing her mouth deepened. “Don’t ever,” she said, “try to talk to me about the past.”

Uh-uh. No way. He wasn’t about to go along with that. “But I want to t—”

“You want to what? To say you’re sorry?”

“I want you to know that afterward I tried to—”

“Afterward?” Her mocking tone made him wince. “Matthew, I have absolutely no interest in what happened afterward.”

“But—”

She stopped him by slashing a hand between them. “But what?” she asked fiercely. “Do you have anything to say that can change what happened? Can you change the past?”

She had broken his heart when she’d disappeared out of his life. But he knew he must have broken her heart, too. And while he had deserved all the agony he’d suffered, she had not.

“No,” he said wearily. “No, I can’t.”

“Then please don’t try.” Her tone was crisp. “And please don’t ever bring up the subject again. I’ve put the past behind me. And you,” she said as she turned away, and started toward the door, “would be wise to do the same.”

He moved fast and got to the door before she did. Blocking her exit, he said, “Where are you going?”

“To bed.”

“I’m not budging from the house. I paid good money for it. And I have all the papers to prove it.”

As soon as he’d spoken, he felt like a heel. Now that he was close to her, he realized she was even more fragile than she’d seemed. Fragile and vulnerable.

And here he was, confronting her, in the way a school bully would challenge a weaker child. Remorse poured through him like bile.

“So what are we going to do now?” he asked gruffly. “It looks as if we’ve reached an impasse.”

Fragile and vulnerable she might be, and bone-tired by the looks of her, but she was one thing, he saw as she straightened her spine, that she hadn’t been as a teenager.

Liz Rossiter was a fighter.

She looked up at him, and in her beautiful khaki eyes he could have sworn he saw a spark of cynical humor.

“You’re bigger than I am,” she said, “and as I recall you were a champion amateur boxer, so I won’t even try to throw you out. At least, not bodily. But you’d better start looking for another place to stay, because I promise you, Matthew Garvock, I’m going to win back this house.”

“Is that,” he asked softly, “a declaration of war?”

“Oh, yes,” she said, in a tone that was equally soft—as soft as steel, he thought, sheathed in a velvet glove!— “a declaration of war is exactly what it is!”

CHAPTER TWO

LIZ slept badly.

Her father had been a difficult man to love but still her pillow had been drenched with the tears she had shed for him before she finally drifted off. Then her dreams had been racked by images of him in one of his rages, so that when she woke up in the morning, it was with a feeling of guilty relief that she would never have to face him again.

Later, as she stood under the hot spray of the shower, her thoughts slid inexorably to Matt.

She’d been stunned to find him in the kitchen—although of course she hadn’t at first recognized him. At some time during the thirteen years she’d been away, someone had—to put it politely!—rearranged his face.

The Matt she remembered had been attractive in a clean-cut way, his lean features symmetrically sculpted and his face unscarred despite his many bouts as an amateur boxer.

“Pretty Boy.” That’s what his university buddies had called him, and he’d accepted the nickname with good humor. But he’d confided to Liz that keeping his face unmarked was a point of honor with him. As a fifteen-year-old, he’d promised his concerned mother that if she gave him permission to join the school boxing club, he’d never hurt her by coming home with his face battered. He’d kept that promise.

At least while Liz knew him. But now…no one would ever call him Pretty Boy again. His hair was the same—black with copper highlights; his eyes still dark-lashed and the incredibly rich green of a glacial lake. But his nose had been broken and was markedly ridged; one cheekbone had been flattened; and his lower lip sported a thin, long scar.

He looked tough now, and he looked rugged.

And he still—heaven help her!—made her heart beat faster.

But he must never know it.

And he must never know that she’d lied when she said she never thought about the past. Now that she was pregnant again, she thought about it all the time. Thought about him, and the sweet love they had shared, and the child they had so passionately, yet so tenderly, created together.

Stepping out of the shower, she reached for a towel and swiped it over the mirror. She stared at herself, her reflection shimmering in the wet glass. It was no wonder, she mused ironically, that he hadn’t recognized her. She barely recognized herself, she looked so colorless. The girl he knew had been vibrant and pretty, with bouncy blond curls and a healthy pink glow in her cheeks.

She sighed as she blow-dried her hair. She and Matt had both changed. And they would never again be the same. They were different people now, with different lives.

And though Tradition was a small town, it was big enough for both of them. It would have to be, she decided resolutely, because she had no intention of leaving.

And once she’d ousted him from Laurel House, she would burrow in and make it her home. A warm and comfortable home, for herself and her new baby…the baby that was now the only important thing in her life.

“You, Ms. Rossiter, are one very careless driver!”

Seated alone at the kitchen table, Liz was startled by the sound of Matt’s voice as he came in through the back door. She jumped, and almost spilled her coffee.

Putting down the mug, she dropped her hands to her lap, and hoped she looked calmer than she felt. She wasn’t used to this new Matt—wasn’t used to the hard, craggy face, wasn’t used to the maturity of his bearing.

In the moments before he shut the door, a draft of morning air swept into the room, making her shiver. Or had she shivered because his powerful tanned body was so blatantly revealed in jogging shorts and a black tank top?

“Careless? Really?” She kept her tone casual. And not unfriendly. “Why would you think that?”

A wary expression flickered in his eyes, causing her nervousness to dissipate in a surge of satisfaction. Her amicable attitude had thrown him off balance…and she liked the feeling of control!

He scowled at her. “The Porsche parked out back is yours?”

She nodded, and quirked a quizzical eyebrow.

“Then you owe me.”

“For what?”

“For splashing mud over my suit,” he growled. “Last night, on Main Street—”

“Oh, that was you!”

“You knew you’d soaked me?” Indignation resonated in his husky voice. “But you didn’t stop to apologize?”

“Sorry. I knew I’d splashed somebody…and if I’d known it was a lawyer…” She chuckled. “So…sue me!”

His scowl deepened. Before he could say anything, she added contritely, “Look, I really am sorry. But truly I couldn’t help it. A cat darted in front of the car and I had to swerve to avoid it. If I’d had time to think,” she added, dead-pan, “I would of course have chosen to kill the cat rather than splatter your suit. I mean, let’s get our priorities straight here. What is it, by the way…just as a matter of interest? An Armani? A Canali?”

He glared at her for a further moment…and then his laughter rolled out, free and easy as an eagle on the wing.

“Sears,” he said. “Off-the-rack.”

She leaned back in her chair, her expression mocking. “Whatever happened,” she asked, “to the teenager who swore that when he graduated from law school, he’d never buy off-the-rack clothes again?”

“What happened,” he retorted, “was that he found much better ways to spend his money. Besides—” he threw her a lazy smile that curled her toes “—most of my clients are from the local farming community. They come into my office in their working clothes—oftimes reeking of manure, if not trailing it in on their boots!—and we all feel more comfortable if I’m not dressed up like some city slicker.”

“But yesterday—”

“Yesterday I had to go to court with a client, but normally I wear jeans to the office.” He wiped a forearm over his brow, leaving a glaze of sweat. “So…did you sleep well?”

“Yes,” she fibbed. “I did. I’d been on the road for over a week and I was bushed. Besides, there’s nothing to beat sleeping in one’s own bed.”

A green-and-white striped hand towel dangled from a hook on the wall by the door. Reaching for it, he said in a teasing voice, “You think?”

She felt her cheeks grow warm. The last thing she wanted was to get in a conversation with this man about sleeping in any bed other than her own. “Yes.”

“Ah, well,” he drawled, “to each his…or her…own.” He rubbed the towel over his damp hair and then ran it over his neck and arms. Slinging it back on the hook, he glanced at the carafe of coffee she’d made earlier. “Can I have some of that?” Without waiting for an answer, he poured himself a mug, and pulling out the chair across from her, he sat down.

“So,” he said, “you’d been on the road for over a week. Where’d you come from?”

“New York.”

“Ah, a city gal. So, city gal, how about filling me in on what you’ve been doing the past thirteen years. That’s one expensive vehicle you’re running. You must either have a good job…or you married into money.”

“Neither,” she said. “I don’t have a job and I don’t have a husband.”

Silence swelled between them, broken only by the hum of the refrigerator. He was the first to speak.

“You’re on your own?”

She hesitated. Eventually he—and everybody else in Tradition—would learn that she was pregnant. But for the time being, she wanted to keep that secret to herself.

“Yes,” she said. Then, to divert him, she said, “I want to go and visit my father’s grave. Is he at Fairlawn?”

“No, they built a new cemetery ten years ago—it’s out past Miller’s Farm, take the second road on your left…or is it the third?” He scratched a hand through his tousled hair. “I know how to get there but—tell you what, I’ll drive you—”

“Thanks, I’d like to drive myself. I’ll buy a map.”

“You didn’t use to be so independent!”

He’d said it without thinking, but when he saw a shadow darken her eyes, he could have kicked himself. If she was independent now, it was because she’d had to be. When she’d most needed support, when she had most desperately needed support, she’d been let down by those she should have been able to depend on the most.

She pushed back her chair and got to her feet. “I am independent, Matt.” She spoke quietly. “And I cherish my independence. I’ve learned the hard way that the only person I can count on is myself.”

He stood, too, and fisting his hands by his sides, faced her steadily across the table. “You’re wrong, Beth. If there’s ever anything I can do for you, just say the word.”

She looked at him, for the longest time. And then she said, with a twisted little half smile. “There is one thing you can do for me, Matt.”

“Sure.” His heart leaped in anticipation. “What?”

“Please,” she said, “don’t call me ‘Beth.’”

And without another word, she flicked back her long flaxen hair and stalked regally out of the kitchen.

Liz bought a recently published map of the area, in the London Drugs on Jefferson Street.

She asked the obliging clerk to mark the position of the new cemetery, and fifteen minutes after leaving the store, she was pulling the Porsche up in the carpark of the Greenvale Burial Grounds.

“Way to go, kid!”

“Thanks, Uncle Matt!”

“Well done, Stuart.” Molly Martin gave her breathless eight-year-old son a warm hug. “That was a great game and you were a star!”

“Where’s Iain?” Stuart whipped off his baseball cap and sent a searching look around for his younger brother.

“He’s gone to book us one of the picnic tables.” Matt popped open the can of lemonade he was holding, and gave it to the flushed youngster. “You ready for lunch?”

“Am I ever!”

“Then let’s get this show on the road.”

As the threesome made their way from the baseball field to the adjoining park, Stuart ran on ahead while Molly tucked her arm through Matt’s.

“Too bad you couldn’t have come to that movie with us last night,” she said. “You’d really have enjoyed it.”

“Yeah. But I didn’t get out of the office till after seven. I don’t remember when I was ever quite so busy.”

They stopped by Matt’s dusty black Taurus, which he’d left in the carpark adjacent to the street, and he hefted his picnic cooler from the trunk. Molly slammed the lid.

“I hope,” she said as they headed into the park, “that you took time to eat dinner.”

“I took home a pizza.”

“There’s lots of nourishment in a good pizza.”

“I guess.”

What he didn’t tell her was that he hadn’t eaten one crumb of the takeout pizza. By the time he and Beth—he and Liz!—had finished talking—had finished arguing!—the last thing on his mind had been food.

Frowning, he mulled over his present situation.

He knew he had to tell Molly that Max Rossiter’s daughter had turned up and had moved back into her old home.

His home, now.

Although she was, apparently, determined to battle him for it.

He hadn’t found quite the right moment to tell Molly of this new development; and he wasn’t sure he knew why he was so reluctant to bring it up.

“Hey, Mom, over here!” Iain waved to them from a picnic table. “Let’s get that cooler open, I’m starving!”

“Hold your horses, young man!” Matt placed the cooler on the table, and the two boys immediately set themselves to unlatching the lid.

Matt helped Molly to her seat, but as he sat down beside her, his eyes were on the two brown-haired boys kneeling on the bench at the other side of the table as they eagerly unpacked the food and set it out.

He’d made a point of spending as much time as he could with them after they lost their dad. And with Molly, too. Unknown to Molly, before Dave died he’d asked Matt to take care of her after he’d gone. And that promise, made to his longtime best friend, was sacred to Matt.

“You seem a bit distracted,” Molly said. “Is something wrong?”

“Sorry. My mind just wandered for a bit. Everything’s fine.” He made an effort to concentrate, and kept up his part in the conversation during their lunch.

After they were finished, they packed up, and the boys ran over to a set of swings by the nearby tennis courts.

He and Molly walked back to the car, and as he put the cooler in the trunk, she said,

“I’m going to pop over to the washrooms. Be right back.”

Matt strolled over to the swings. Leaning against one of the uprights, he smiled as he watched the boys fly high.

After a couple of minutes, they jumped off, and they all three walked back to the Taurus.

As the boys got in, Matt saw Molly come running toward him, the sun dancing in her brown hair.

She’d had it cut last week.

“Very short,” she’d told him that evening, over the phone. “For the summer!” And short it was. But it suited her dainty features, and emphasized her large hazel eyes.

She’d lost a lot of weight in the months following Dave’s death, but now he noticed how nicely she was filling out her T-shirt again, and how attractively her denim skirt lay over her trim hips.

When she came to a breathless stop beside him, he smiled. “You’ve put on a bit of weight. It suits you.”

“If I keep eating the way I’ve been doing lately, I’ll soon be ‘deliciously plump’ again!”

Matt laughed with her as they recalled the teasing words Dave had always used to describe his wife’s curves.

“Yeah,” he said. “Dave would be pleased.”

“You know, Matt, if someone had told me, just after Dave was killed, that one day I’d be laughing again, I wouldn’t have believed them. But now…”

“Yeah. Time heals. I guess it’s really true.”

She put a hand on his arm and looked up at him. “I don’t know if I’d have survived, if it hadn’t been for you.”

“It works both ways, sweetie. I’ve missed Dave, too.” He put an arm around her, and as he embraced her, he inhaled her floral scent, which was as familiar to him now as the feel of her soft body in his arms. He had comforted her—as she had comforted him—so many times…but never in any sexual way. Nor was there anything sexual in their embrace now.

“Come on, you guys!” Stuart said. “Iain’s gonna be late for his chess lesson!”

Once Matt had settled Molly in the car, he walked around to his own side, but before he opened his door, he heard a car idling in the street and got the feeling that someone was watching him.

He glanced across and saw that the vehicle with the idling engine was hovering at the far side of the road.

It was a midnight-blue Porsche. The driver was Liz.

Their eyes met. Her expression was startled.

And that was all he had time to see before she rammed her foot down on the accelerator and raced away.

Liz’s thoughts were in turmoil as she drove home.

She could have kicked herself for pausing at the park. She’d been passing by it and when she’d chanced to see Matt stroll from his car, alone, she had—on an impulse—slowed her own car down.

It had occurred to her that she might join him. She had some questions she wanted to ask him, about her father. Then he’d started chatting with a couple of boys who’d been playing on the swings.

She decided to wait till he was alone again, but all three walked over to his car. Then a woman ran up. It was immediately obvious that she was with Matt. And when Matt took her in his arms and held her close, it was just as obvious that they were in a relationship.

Knowing she should move on but unable to drag her gaze away, Liz had felt a heavy ache in her heart. She had assumed that Matt lived alone. Well, perhaps he lived alone…but he wasn’t unattached.

She herself wanted nothing to do with him…yet why did seeing him with someone else upset her so?

She’d been about to drive on when he’d spotted her.

Their eyes had locked, and even from the distance she had seen the surprise in his. What had he seen in hers? she wondered. She only hoped he hadn’t seen her distress.

It was going to be intolerable living at Laurel House with him. Even if he and the stranger weren’t actually cohabiting, she would surely be a frequent visitor.

And Liz knew she couldn’t bear to see them together. Just the sight of him with another woman in his arms had torn every old scar off her heart. And she knew, with a sinking feeling of despair, that even after all these years, Matt Garvock still had the power to hurt her.

He didn’t come home that night till well after nine.

Liz was upstairs in the small room which had been her study as a teenager. She’d spent the evening sorting old correspondence and school papers, tossing out most of it, saving only items that had special meaning for her. The task had kept her busy; had kept her from thinking about Matt, and she’d succeeded…till she tugged the faded liner from the bottom drawer and found a scrap of paper that had been tucked underneath.

On the scrap she saw the words she’d printed there the day she’d realized she was pregnant with Matt’s baby:

Beth Garvock

Mrs. Matthew Garvock

Mr. and Mrs. Matt Garvock

As she looked at the words now, a torrent of memories brought tears to her eyes. She’d been so naively trusting, so sure Matt would ask her to marry him…

Instead he’d let her down badly.

But his failure to stand by her hadn’t dimmed the joy and wonder she’d felt at the prospect of being a mother.

And this time around, her wonder and her joy were just as intense.

Sometimes, though, she worried in case anything went wrong with her pregnancy. And sometimes she felt totally overwhelmed by the responsibility of being a single mom.

But over and above her anxieties was an unwavering determination to be the best parent she could possibly be…in a way that her own father had never been for her. More than anything, a baby needed love. And she already loved this child more than words could express—

A light double tap on the door made her jump. Automatically she crushed the scrap of paper into a ball and threw it into the garbage pail where it got lost in a jumble of scribblers and Teen magazines and exam papers.

“Liz?” Matt’s voice was tired. “May I come in?”

She sat frozen, not answering, her heart thudding wildly.

“Liz?” This time his voice had a hard edge. “I need to talk to you. I’m coming in now.”

CHAPTER THREE

MATT pushed the door open.

And saw Liz scrambling up from her chair.

She stood facing him, leaning back against the edge of the desk. She seemed actually to be trying to press into it, as if desperate to get away from him.

“You can’t come bursting in here anytime you want,” she said. “Please respect my right to some privacy.”

“Liz.” He moved forward but stopped a few feet from her when he met the wall of hostility she’d erected between them. With a pleading gesture, he said, “I’m not your enemy. You seem to think of me as some kind of a threat—”

“You’re wrong, Matt. I don’t think of you at all.”

He sighed. This conversation was going nowhere. Or at least, it wasn’t going in the direction he wanted it to.

He started again. “All I wanted to ask was…did you find the cemetery?”

“Yes.”

“And your father’s grave?”

“Yes.”

“I know,” he said, “that you and your dad never got along…but still, it must have been tough.”

To his dismay, he saw a mist of tears in her eyes. Tears which she quickly blinked away.

“What was tough,” she said levelly, “was finding out from the caretaker that in the weeks before he died, my father was…incarcerated—for want of a better word!—in Blackwells Nursing Home.”

“Incarcerated…that’s kind of harsh, Liz.”

“Harsh? I don’t think so! That place, as I recall, was like something out of a Dickens’ novel. The only people who ended up at Blackwells were people who couldn’t afford anything better. So tell me, has it changed?” she demanded.

“No, it hasn’t.”

“I don’t understand how my father ended up there then. He had pots of money.”

“Most of it was apparently invested in the stock market and a few years after you left, he lost it. It was the news of that loss that brought on his stroke.”

She swallowed hard, and her voice shook a little as she asked, “How did he cope…after the stroke?”

He knew she was finding this conversation difficult, but there was no way he could make it any easier for her. The facts were the facts, and he wouldn’t be doing her any favors by sugarcoating them. If she didn’t hear them from him, she would hear them from someone else. “He had to have a round-the-clock attendant.”

“Where did he get the money for that?”

“It was a costly business and as I mentioned before, that’s why he eventually had to mortgage the house. In the end, just before he went into Blackwells, he had to put the place up for sale to pay his debts. The day before I put in my offer, he had another stroke. And then a few weeks later, he had his fatal heart attack…”

“How sad to end up like that. With no family around, and in a place like Blackwells. I should have come home years ago.” Liz hid her face in her hands and started to sob, muffled little sounds seeping out between her fingers.

He couldn’t bear to see her so distressed.

With a groan, he closed the space between them and drew her tenderly into his arms. “I knew this would be tough for you,” he murmured. “That’s why I wanted to drive you to the cemetery. But you didn’t want me around. You wanted no part of me.”

She felt so fragile he was afraid she might snap in his embrace. Like the most delicate of crystal. Anguish twisted his heart. She had once been his, and through a moment of stupidity and immaturity, he had lost her.

He looked down at her as she leaned against him, weeping gently.

And he felt a ray of hope.

She’d wasted no time last night in telling him she was independent, but…was she really so independent? She wasn’t fighting him now, was she? Maybe this was the time to press his case again. He so desperately wanted the opportunity to make amends.

“Liz, please let me help you,” he begged. “I’d do anything to—”

She jerked away from him, and with a little hiccuping sob, glared at him through eyes that shone with tears.

“I don’t need help.” She dashed a hand over her eyes. “And if I did, you’d be the last person in the world I’d turn to. I can handle this on my own!”

She was a fighter. Once again, the word came into his mind. Liz Rossiter was no longer the easily intimidated girl she’d been at seventeen; she was strong and she was determined.

And she didn’t need him in her life. He was going to have to accept that; but it wasn’t going to be easy.

“Just tell me one more thing,” she said. “About this house.”

“Anything.”

“My father was under great pressure to sell.”

“Yeah, he was—”

“So you got yourself a good deal? I mean, if he was under pressure—”

“I’m not sure what you’re implying, Liz.” But he knew damned well what she implying. She was implying that he had taken advantage of an old man’s desperate financial plight; whereas, in actual fact, he’d had to stretch himself to the limit to come up with the asking price.

“So tell me,” she said, with a careless shrug of one shoulder, “were you happy with the deal you made?”

He somehow managed to hide the anger he felt at her insinuating tone. “Happy?” He lifted one shoulder, mimicking her careless shrug. “I wouldn’t have used the word ‘happy.’ But I was certainly more than satisfied.”

“I’ll bet!” Her scorn was blatant. And it didn’t sit prettily on her face.

He wanted to wipe that contemptuous expression away, he burned to tell her exactly why he had bought Laurel House, but his pride wouldn’t let him.

And what did it matter anyway? He could never redeem himself, in her eyes, for the wrong he’d done her thirteen years ago. He could live with her believing he had screwed her father. He’d lived with worse.

“Okay.” He rubbed a hand wearily over his jaw. “I’ll let you get back to whatever you were doing.”

He left her standing there, and he didn’t look back.

Next day was sunny and very warm, and Liz decided to attend the eleven o’clock service at the Presbyterian Church.

But when she tried to start the car she found she had carelessly let it run out of gas.

Even if she’d wanted to—which she didn’t!—she couldn’t have asked Matt for a drive as she’d heard him leave the house an hour before. So she took off at a brisk pace and walked the couple of miles into town.

By the time she got to the church, it was five after eleven. As she ran up the steps and across the deserted narthex, she could hear the congregation singing.

The music faded to an end as she pushed open the swing doors, and in the bustle of movement as everyone sat down, she slipped unnoticed into one of the back pews.

“Matt, will you pop down to the basement and pick up the boys from Sunday School?” Molly adjusted the brim of her straw hat as she looked up at Matt. They were standing in the narthex, jostled together by the jovial crowd making its way out to the street on this lovely sunny Sunday.

“You’re not coming down?”

“No, I need to dash home…the service was longer than usual and I want to check on the roast. Will you pick up the boys and take them to my place?”

“Sure, no problem. But Molly—”

“Mmm?” She was impatient as a horse at the starting gate. “What is it, Matt? I really must dash.”

“Okay, honey. Go ahead. But—” he rested his hand lightly on her shoulder “—I need to have a talk with you. Today.”

Her hazel eyes took on a luminous glow. “The boys have been invited over to Jamie’s after lunch. We’ll be on our own and we can talk privately.” She ran a hand down his striped silk tie. And let her fingertips linger for a moment. “Hurry home, Matt. I’ll be waiting.”

Liz walked along Fourth Avenue, the echo of her steps a rather lonely sound on the Sunday-quiet street.

She’d slipped away as the congregation sang the last hymn. She knew she’d have to face everyone eventually, but she’d decided to put it off till another day. She still felt drained after her visit to the cemetery; and her confrontation with Matt last night hadn’t helped.

Nor had it helped when he’d pulled her into his arms.

For a moment—only a moment though it had seemed like an eternity—she’d allowed herself the luxury of leaning on him. But when he’d offered, in that husky sexy voice, to help her, to do anything—

His words had jerked her back to reality as surely as if he’d slapped her face.

She could not depend on this man. And she must never forget it.

Picking up her step, she was almost at the corner of the block, when a sudden squeal of tires grabbed her attention. A white Honda Civic had braked in the road just ahead…and was backing up toward her.

When it stopped, she saw that the driver was a woman—a stranger wearing a floral dress, a wide-brimmed straw hat and sunglasses that hid her eyes.

“Beth?” The car window was open, the woman’s tone high with astonishment. “Beth Rossiter? Is it really you?”

Liz frowned. “I’m sorry,” she murmured, walking over to the car. “I don’t—”

The stranger’s laugh gurgled out. “Oh, Beth. It’s me!” She whisked off her hat and her sunglasses and tossed them onto the passenger seat. “There, is that better?” She ruffled a hand through her short brown hair and poked her head out the window. “Recognize me now?”

It was Molly White. Liz felt a surge of delight. She and Molly had been buddies all the way up through school until they were fourteen, at which time Molly’s father—a policeman—had been transferred to Vancouver and the family had moved away. She and Molly had lost touch after that.

“Molly!” Leaning over, she brushed a kiss over her friend’s warm cheek, and smelled her light floral fragrance. “It’s wonderful to see you again. When did you come back to Tradition? And how have you been, what are you doing now?”

“It’s a long story and I’d love for us to get together and catch up on each other’s news but I don’t have time right now. I’m on my way home to rescue a roast from the oven. I’m making a special lunch for my crew.”

“Your crew?”

“I’m a widow, with two little boys. And—” Molly’s cheeks colored prettily “—there’s a man in my life—you wouldn’t know him, he was three years ahead of us in high school.” She didn’t wait for Liz to respond, but just barreled on. “Anyway, he and I have been seeing each other for a while now and we have an…understanding. And before very long, I expect—” She broke off with a vexed “Tsk!” And gushed on, “Oh, I shouldn’t have said that! Matt—Matt Garvock, that’s his name—prob’ly wouldn’t want me to be talking about it. Not yet. You won’t say anything to a soul, will you?”

Liz hoped she didn’t look as numb as she felt. “No,” she somehow managed to say, “I won’t say a word.” Molly and Matt. Molly was the woman he’d been with in the park, though Liz hadn’t recognized her at the time.

“Thanks, I really appreciate it!” Molly set the Honda in motion again, and as she pulled away she called back merrily, “Give me a call, Beth, my number’s in the book. It’s under my married name…Martin. Molly Martin. We’ll have coffee together soon…and by then I should have some lovely news to share with you!”

Matt took off his suit jacket and slung it over one of the Adirondack chairs arranged on Molly’s front veranda. Then tugging open the top button of his dress shirt, he loosened the knot of his tie as he followed the boys into the house.

Iain and Stuart ran upstairs to change out of their best clothes, and Matt went looking for Molly.

He followed the aroma of roasting beef and found her in the kitchen, pouring gravy into a gravy boat.

“Hi,” he said. “We’re back.”

She turned, and he saw that her face was flushed from the heat of the oven. She set the gravy boat on the table, and said, “You’ll never guess what happened on my way home!”

“You got a ticket for speeding?” he teased.

“If I did, it would be a first! No, Matt. I was driving along Fourth when I spotted a friend I hadn’t seen in…oh, must be close to sixteen years! She’d changed a bit…but I knew her by the way she walked…that hadn’t changed. And her legs, of course! Beth Rossiter always did have the most fabulous legs. In high school, we were all pea-green with envy! Anyway,” she said, beaming at him, “you’ll meet her soon because—”

“I’ve met her, Molly.”

Molly did a double take. “You have? But…where?”

He should have told her yesterday and he could kick himself now that he hadn’t. It wasn’t as if there hadn’t been plenty opportunity. They’d been together all day—first at the baseball game, then after Iain’s chess lesson he’d driven them all the fifty miles to Crestville for the Farmers’ Fair, and they hadn’t got back till late evening.

“Matt? Do you know Beth Rossiter?”

“Honey, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”

Her brow wrinkled, and she looked at him as if she didn’t quite understand what he’d said.

“At the church,” he reminded her. “When I told you I needed to talk to you? It was about—”

“About Beth?”

He couldn’t understand why she suddenly looked so disappointed. What had she thought he wanted to discuss with her?

“Liz,” he said. “She goes by the name of Liz now. She turned up at Laurel House on Friday night. She didn’t know her father had died…didn’t know he’d sold the family home.”

“Oh, my! What a dreadful shock she must have had when you told her—although, as I recall, she and her father didn’t get along at all well. He was a frightful man, prone to the most awful rages. So…is she here on holiday? And where is she staying? Did she book in at Sandford’s Inn?”

“I believe the move’s permanent. And no, she’s not booked in at Sandford’s. She’s staying at the house.”

“You surely don’t mean Laurel House?”

“Yeah,” he said. “She’s there. With me. For the present, at any rate, till we sort things out.”

“But…what things?”

“She says she has papers that prove her father had no right to sell the property—”

“But everything was legal, wasn’t it? I mean, you’re a lawyer, for heaven’s sake! You’d have checked everything out—”

“Oh, it’s legal all right. No question about that.”

“Then…she’ll have to leave. Find another place to stay. Won’t she?”

“It’s not all that simple, Molly—”

Matt broke off as he heard the boys clattering downstairs.

He put a hand on Molly’s shoulder.

“Let’s leave it for now,” he said quietly. “We’ll talk some more, after lunch.”

Liz had always loved Laurel House.

She knew it was partly because the rambling old place had such character, but it was also because of the memories it held of her mother, and the love they had shared until her mother’s death when Liz was twelve.

Now on this Sunday afternoon, knowing Matt wouldn’t be back for a while, Liz was free to roam around the place at will—not that she wanted to poke around among his things; she just wanted to reacquaint herself with her old home.

On the night of her arrival, she’d noticed the new appliances in the kitchen; and in the morning, she’d seen that the cupboards were new, too. But apart from that, everything seemed much as she remembered. And on her tour of the main floor, she found little had changed there, either. Even the furniture was the same. Matt’s deal with her father must have included the contents of the house.

A deal which, she had already decided cynically, had probably been very sweet indeed. For Matt.

Upstairs, she found the first of the two guest rooms had obviously been taken over by the new owner, and it had been refurbished with a king-size oak bedroom suite, cobalt-blue drapes and a blue-and-cream striped duvet.

From there she moved on to the other guest room, where she found that the twin beds were draped with sheets, and the floorboards were bare, the bay window uncurtained. Three pristine cans of paint were stacked by the closet, along with paintbrushes, a roller and a paint tray.

Matt, it seemed, was planning to redecorate.

It hurt, to have an outsider brashly take possession of her home. And added to the hurt, was a spurt of anger. By rights, this house didn’t even belong to Matt.

She marched into her own bedroom and irritably gathered up a pile of clothing that needed to be washed, items she’d accumulated during her cross-country car trip.

The laundry room was in the basement, and she found it just as tidy as the rest of the house. The white-tiled floor was spotless, the washer and dryer gleamed and a pile of folded but unironed clothing sat on the ironing board.

On a shelf above the ironing board was a box of Tide. Liz moved over to get it, but when she glanced absently at the pile of folded clothing, she came to an abrupt halt.

And with lips compressed she glared at the wispy lace bra so brazenly snuggled up to a pair of navy cotton boxer shorts.

It didn’t take an Einstein to figure out what this meant. It couldn’t have been more obvious, Liz reflected scornfully, if Matt had put a sign above his bed that read:

Molly Martin Has Slept Here!

Matt leaned against the veranda railing and looked down at Molly, who was lounging back in one of her Adirondack chairs. “You never mentioned,” he said, “that you and Max Rossiter’s daughter had been school friends.”

“It just never came up.” Molly put a hand over her eyes to block out the sun as she squinted up at him. “After Dad was transferred and our family moved to Vancouver, she and I did keep in touch a while but our letters eventually dribbled off. It wasn’t till after my Dave was posted here four years ago that I really thought about her again. I did mean to get in touch once we were settled, but then I heard that after high school her dad had sent her off to some fancy college back east and she’d never come home again. Nobody seemed to know where she was…so…I let it slide.”

Beth’s father hadn’t sent Beth off to college—at least if he had, it hadn’t been straight away; but he’d come up with that story because he hadn’t wanted his family name besmirched. The truth was, he’d sent her somewhere else, and though he’d refused to tell Matt where, he’d taken a vicious delight in telling him why.

“Did you think,” Max Rossiter had shouted at him on that black, never-to-be-forgotten autumn night, “that I would allow my daughter to let her pregnancy run its course so she could give birth to a child by the likes of you? You think I’d have let you ruin her life, her future? She’s a Rossiter, boy, and you’re nothing. You’re nobody!”

Matt would never forget the hatred in the man’s eyes. It had reminded him of the bloodshot frenzy of a raging bull.

Molly had been right, though; none of the townsfolk knew where “the rich Rossiter girl” had gone. And as far as he was aware, only four local people had ever known of her pregnancy—Beth, himself, his mother…and Beth’s father.

“Matt?” Molly prodded his ankle with the toe of her sandal. “What is it? What are you thinking?”

He dragged his thoughts to the present. “I knew her, too, Molly. I knew Max Rossiter’s daughter years ago…when she was seventeen.”

“But…how? You would have been away at law school!”

“I came home to work in Judd Anstruther’s law offices in the summer break and I met her a few weeks before she graduated from high school. In early June. And we hung around together, till I went back to UBC in the Fall.”

“You and Beth Rossiter…you dated?”

“Yeah.”

“But…nobody has ever mentioned it—you’d think that in all this time somebody would have mentioned it to me.”

“Nobody knew. We had to keep it quiet, meet in secret. Because of her father. He didn’t think any of us locals were good enough for his daughter. He had bigger—and better—plans for her.”

For a minute or two, neither of them spoke. From down the street, Matt could hear Iain and Stuart shouting as they played with their friend Jamie.

Finally Molly said, “If you let her stay on at Laurel House, I’m afraid you’re going to have your hands full.”

“I’m not sure I…know what you mean…”

“I’m a nurse, Matt—or at least I was, and I know all the signs. I know that…look.”

He stared at her, and felt a growing sense of dread that chilled him. “She…Liz…she isn’t ill, is she?”

Molly closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the slats of the chair. “No, she isn’t ill, Matt…She’s pregnant.”

Pregnant!

The word was still rolling around in Matt’s head when he left Molly’s an hour later.

But maybe Molly was mistaken. He latched onto the possibility…then reluctantly dismissed it when he recalled the confident tone she’d used when she’d added that she was very rarely wrong in such matters.

So Liz was—very likely—pregnant.

What should he do? Should he ask her outright if she was expecting a baby? Or should he give her an opening and wait for her to volunteer the information?

By the time he got back to Laurel House, he still hadn’t made up his mind what to do, so in the end he decided to play it by ear.

He parked the car and went inside. He was shutting the front door behind him when he heard her footsteps on the stairs. And by the time he’d walked into the foyer, she was almost at the bottom.

She stopped on the last step and looked at him warily.

“Hi,” he said, assessing her with new eyes in light of what Molly had told him. “How’s it going?”

She was all skin and bone and long arms and longer legs, but if her waist had thickened at all he had no way of telling because the pink silk blouson top she was wearing over her cream miniskirt gave nothing away.

He scrutinized her face, searching for whatever tell-tale signs Molly had seen. Was it the heaviness of her eyes? The tightly drawn skin over her nose? The tiny break-out of a rash on one smooth temple?

Dammit, he didn’t know what the first signs of pregnancy were!

Liz put a hand on the newel post and frowned across at him.

“What’s the matter?” Her voice rang with challenge. “Why on earth are you staring at me like that?”

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