Book: Paper Rose
Quotes of Book: Paper Rose
His hand felt odd against her swollen belly. She started to speak at the same moment that the baby suddenly moved.
Tate's hand jerked back as if it had been stung. He stared at her stomach with pure horror as it fluttered again.
She couldn't help it. She burst out laughing.
"Is that…normal?" he wanted to know.
"It's a baby," she said softly. "They move around. He kicks a little. Not much, just yet, but as he grows, he'll get stronger."
"I never realized…" He drew in a long breath and put his hand back against her body. "Cecily, does it hurt you when he…" He hesitated. His black, stunned eyes met hers. "He?"
She nodded.
"They can tell, so soon?"
"Yes," she said simply. "They did an ultrasound."
His fingers became caressing. A son. He was going to have a son. He swallowed. It was a shock. He hadn't thought past her pregnancy, but now he realized that there was going to be a miniature version of himself and Cecily, a child who would embody the traits of all his ancestors. All his ancestors. It made him feel humble.
"How did you find me?" she asked.
He glared into her eyes. "Not with any help from you, let me tell you! It took me forever to track down the driver who brought you to Nashville. He was off on extended sick leave, and it wasn't until this week that anybody remembered he'd worked that route before Christmas."
She averted her eyes. "I didn't want to be found."
"So I noticed. But you have been, and you're damned well coming home," he said furiously. "I'm damned if I'm going to leave you here at the mercy of people who go nuts over an inch of snow!"
She sat up, displacing his hand, noticed that she was too close to him for comfort, swung her legs off the sofa and got up. "I'm not going as far as the mailbox with you!" she told him flatly. "I've made a new life for myself here, and I'm staying!"
"That's what you think." He got up, too, and went toward the bedroom. He found her suitcase minutes later, threw it open on the bed and started filling it.
"I'm not going with you," she told him flatly. "You can pack. You can even take the suitcase and all my clothes. But I'm not leaving. This is my life now. You have no place in it!"
He whirled. He was furious. "You're carrying my child!"
The sight of him was killing her. She loved him, wanted him, needed him, but he was here only out of a sense of duty, maybe even out of guilt. She knew he didn't want ties or commitments; he'd said so often enough. He didn't love her, either, and that was the coldest knowledge of all.
"Colby asked me to marry him for the baby's sake," she said bitterly. "Maybe I should have."
"Over my dead body," he assured her. book-quoteColby was quietly shocked to find Tate not only at his door the next morning, but smiling. He was expecting an armed assault following their recent telephone conversation. "I'm here with a job offer."
Colby's dark eyes narrowed. "Does it come with a cyanide capsule?" he asked warily.
Tate clapped the other man on the shoulder. "I'm sorry about the way I've treated you. I haven't been thinking straight. I'm obliged to you for telling me the truth about Cecily."
"You know the baby's yours, I gather?"
Tate nodded. "I'm on my way to Tennessee to bring her home," he replied.
Colby's eyes twinkled. "Does she know this?"
"Not yet. I'm saving it for a surprise."
"I imagine you're the one who's going to get the surprise," Colby informed him. "She's changed a lot in the past few weeks."
"I noticed." Tate leaned against the wall near the door. "I've got a job for you."
"You want me to go to Tennessee?" Colby murmured dryly.
"In your dreams, Lane," Tate returned. "No, not that. I want you to head up my security force for Pierce Hutton while I'm away."
Colby looked around the room. "Maybe I'm hallucinating."
"You and my father," Tate muttered, shaking his head. "Listen, I've changed."
"Into what?"
"Pay attention. It's a good job. You'll have regular hours. You can learn to sleep without a gun under your pillow. You won't lose any more arms." He added thoughtfully, "I've been a bad friend. I was jealous of you."
"But why?" Colby wanted to know. "Cecily is special. I look out for her, period. There's never been a day since I met her when she wasn't in love with you, or a time when I didn't know it."
Tate felt warmth spread through his body at the remark. "I've given her hell. She may not feel that way, now."
"You can't kill love," Colby said heavily. "I know. I've tried."
Tate felt sorry for the man. He didn't know how to put it into words.
Colby shrugged. "Anyway, I've learned to live with my ghosts, thanks to that psychologist Cecily pushed me into seeing." He scowled. "She keeps snakes, can you imagine? I used to see mine crawling out of whiskey bottles, but hers are real."
"Maybe she's allergic to fur," Tate pointed out.
Colby chuckled. "Who knows. When do I start?" he added.
"Today." He produced a mobile phone and dialed a number. "I'm sending Colby Lane over. He's my relief while I'm away. If you have any problems, report them to him."
He nodded as the person on the other end of the line replied in the affirmative. He closed up the phone. "Okay, here's what you need to do… book-quotePierce Hutton gave him a highly amused smile as they went over updated security information from the oil rig in the Caspian Sea."So you've finally decided to do something about Cecily," Peirce murmured. "It's about time. I was beginning to get used to that permanent scowl."Tate glanced at him wryly. "I thought I was doing a great job of keeping her at arm's length. She's pregnant, now, of course," he volunteered.The older man chuckled helplessly. "So much for keeping her at arm's length. When's the wedding?"Tate's smile faded. "That's premature. She ran. I finally tracked her down, but now I have to convince her that I want to get married without having her think it's only because of the baby.""I don't envy you the job," Pierce replied, his black eyes twinkling. "I had my own rocky road to marriage, if you recall.""How's the baby these days?" he asked.Pierce laughed with wholehearted delight. "We watch him instead of television. I never expected fatherhood to make such changes in me, in my life." He shook his head, with a faraway look claiming his eyes. "Sometimes I'm afraid it's all a dream and I'll wake up alone." He shifted, embarrassed. "You can have the time off. But who's going to handle your job while you're gone?""I thought I'd get you to put Colby Lane on the payroll." He held up his hand when Pierce looked thunderous. "He's stopped drinking," he hold him. "Cecily got him into therapy. He's not the man he was.""You're sure of that?" Pierce wanted to know.Tate smiled. "I'm sure."Okay. But if he ever throws a punch at me again, he'll be smiling on the inside of his mouth!"Tate chuckled. "Fair enough. I'll give him a call before I leave town." book-quoteGuilt. Torment. Sorrow. Shock. Which?" she asked against his chest.
"I'm trying," he murmured on a weary chuckle. "But all I can manage is pride," he added softly. "I satisfied you completely, didn't I?"
"More than completely," she murmured against his damp shoulder. Her hand traced his chest, feeling the coolness of his skin, the ripple of muscle. "Hold me close."
He wrapped both arms around her and drew her on top of him, holding her hungrily to him, their legs lazily entwined. "I seduced you."
She pressed a soft kiss to his collarbone. "Mmm-hmm."
He caught his breath as the tiny, insignificant movement produced a sudden, raging arousal.
She lifted her head. "Did I do something wrong?"
He lifted an eyebrow and nodded toward his flat stomach. She followed his amused glance and caught her breath.
He drew her mouth down over his and kissed her ferociously before he sat up and moved off the bed.
"Where are you going?" she asked, startled.
He drew on his briefs and his slacks, glancing down at her with amused delight. "One of us has to be sensible," he told her. "Colby's probably on his way back right now."
"But he just left…"
"Almost an hour ago," he finished for her, nodding toward the clock on the bedside table.
She sat up, her eyes wide with surprise.
"I took a long time with you," he said gently. "Didn't you notice?"
She laughed self-consciously. "Well, yes, but I didn't realize it was that long."
He drew her off the bed and bent to kiss her tenderly, nuzzling her face with his. "Was I worth waiting for?" he asked.
She smiled. "What a silly question."
He kissed her again, but when he lifted his head he wasn't smiling. "I loved what we did together," he said quietly. "But I should have been more responsible."
She knew what he was thinking. He hadn't used anything, and he surely knew that she wasn't. She flattened her hand against his bare chest. "There's a morning-after pill. I'll drive into the city tomorrow and get one," she said, lying like a sailor. She had no intention of doing that, but it would comfort him.
He found that he didn't like that idea. It hurt something deeply primitive in him. He scowled. "That could be dangerous."
"No, it's not.
He traced her fingernails while he tried to think. It seemed like a fantasy, a dream. He'd never had such an experience with a woman in his life.
She closed her eyes and moved closer to him. "I could never have done that with anyone else," she whispered. "It was more beautiful than my dreams."
His heart jumped. That was how it felt to him, too. He tilted her face so that he could search her soft eyes. She was radiant; she almost glowed. "Kiss me," he murmured softly.
She did. But he wasn't smiling. She could almost see the thoughts in his face. "You didn't force me, Tate," she said gently. "I made a conscious decision. I made a choice. I needed to know if what had happened to me had destroyed me as a woman. I found out in the most wonderful way that it hadn't. I'm not ashamed of what we did together."
"Neither am I." He turned, his face still tormented. "But it wasn't my right."
"To be the first?" She smiled gently. "It would have been you eight years ago or eight years from now. I don't want anyone else-not that way. I never did."
He actually winced. "Cecily…"
"I'm not asking for declarations of undying love. I won't cling. I'm not the type. book-quoteSeen Tate lately?" Colby asked carelessly.She stiffened. "No."He looked down at her with a wry grin. "It was a boring banquet, anyway. You made all the news shows that night, and I hear one of the bigger late-night television hosts did a monologue about it!""Go ahead," she invited with a gesture. "Rub it in.""I can't help myself," he said with an involuntary chuckle. "I believe it's the first time in American political history that an ex-CIA agent was baptized with a tureen of crab bisque right in the middle of a televised political affair." Colby had to work hard not to crack a smile. He sipped his coffee instead. Before he met Cecily, he couldn't have imagined any woman doing that to tall, handsome, elegant Tate Winthrop. "Matt Holden seems to have forgiven you," he added.She smiled wickedly. "He loved it," she said. "Just between you and me, he thrives on publicity."Colby's dark eyes went to Holden. "You might also have been invited because he likes embarrassing Tate," he mused. "Talk about natural enemies! book-quoteColby Lane and Pierce Hutton had the manager of Tate's apartment building open his door for them. They knew that Tate had come back from Tennessee, and that he'd saved Cecily from Gabrini, but nobody had seen him for almost a week. His answering machine was left on permanently. He didn't answer knocks at the door. It was such odd behavior that his colleague and his boss became actually concerned. They were more concerned when they saw him passed out on the couch in a forest of beer cans and discarded pizza boxes. He hadn't shaved or, apparently, bathed since his return.
"Good God," Pierce said gruffly.
"That's a familiar sight," Colby murmured. "He's turned into me."
Pierce glared at him. "Don't be insulting." He moved to the sofa and shook Tate. "Wake up!" he snapped.
Tate didn't open his eyes. He shifted, groaning. "She won't come back," he mumbled. "Won't come. Hates me…"
He drifted off again. Pierce and Colby exchanged knowing glances. Without a word, they rolled up their sleeves and set to work, first on the apartment, and then on Tate. book-quoteThe ambulance arrived when the police cars did. They were accompanied by a man in a black suit who had the look of a federal agent. It didn't surprise Cecily that he went right up to Tate and drew him to one side.While Cecily was being checked over by a paramedic, Gabrini, who'd already been loaded onto a gurney, was being watched by two police officers.Tate came back to Cecily while the federal agent paused by the police officers."You can take him to the hospital to have his ribs strapped," the man told the ambulance attendant. "But we'll have transport for him to New Jersey with two federal marshals.""Marshals!" Gabrini exclaimed, holding his side, because the outburst had hurt."Marshals," the federal agent replied. There was something menacing about the smile that accompanied the words. "It seems that you're wanted in Jersey for much more serious crimes than breaking an entering and assault with a deadly weapon, Mr. Gabrini.""Not in Jersey," Gabrini began. "No, those other charges, they're in D.C.""You'll get to D.C. eventually," the federal agent murmured, then the dark man smiled. And Gabrini knew at once that he wasn't connected in any way at all to the government.Gabrini was suddenly yelling his head off, begging for federal protection, but nobody paid him much attention. He was carried off in the ambulance with the sedan following close behind. book-quote
