A Very Special Delivery

They were purely functional—a little bit of illumination so that they could see what they were eating. And yet, there was something about dining over candlelight—even if the meal was nothing more than soup and sandwiches and the lighting was necessity rather than mood—that infused the scene with a romantic ambiance he did not want to be feeling. But somehow the simple dishes and everyday glassware looked elegant in candlelight. And when he glanced across the table, he couldn’t help but notice that Julie looked even more beautiful.

“Dig in before it gets cold,” he advised.

She dipped her spoon into the bowl, and brought it up to her mouth. Before her lips parted to sample the soup, they curved upward and her gaze shifted to him. “Chicken and Stars?”

“So?” he said, just a little defensively.

“So it’s an unusual choice for a grown man,” she said.

“It’s my niece’s favorite.”

“How old is your niece?”

“I have two nieces,” he told her. “Two nieces and two nephews. Matt’s daughter, Pippa, is only a baby. Jack’s daughter, Ava, is twelve going on twenty.”

Her brows drew together, creating a slight furrow between them. “Is Jack short for Jackson?”

“Yeah,” he admitted. “Why?”

“Your brother is Jackson Garrett?”

Now it was his turn to frown. “You know Jack?”

“Actually, he’s the reason I came to Pinehurst,” she admitted.

Luke carefully set his spoon down in his bowl, the few mouthfuls he’d consumed settling like a lead weight in the pit of his stomach. “Please tell me that he isn’t the father of your baby.”

Chapter Four

“What?” Julie lifted her head to look at him, her blue-gray eyes wide. “No. Oh, my God, no! I’ve never even met the man.”

Luke exhaled a long, slow breath. “Okay,” he finally said. “So why were you coming to Pinehurst for a man you’ve never met?”

“Because my brother, Daniel, knows him. They went to law school together.” She picked up half of her sandwich, nibbled on the corner. “Why would you ask if your brother was the father of my baby?”

“Because it was only a few months ago that I found out Ava—the niece who likes Chicken and Stars soup—was Jack’s daughter.”

“She’s twelve and you only met her a few months ago?”

“No—I’ve actually known her since she was a baby,” he clarified. “But I didn’t know that my brother was her father.”

“I’m having a little trouble following,” she admitted.

“Ava’s mother, Kelly, was one of my best friends growing up. When she was in college, she had a fling with some guy and got pregnant, but she never told me who that guy was.”

Julie’s gaze dropped to her bowl again. “She must have had her reasons.”

“She had reasons,” he acknowledged. “But I’m not sure anything can justify that kind of deception.”

“Is your brother still as upset about it as you are?”

His smile was wry. “Is it that obvious?”

“There was a bit of an edge to your tone.”

“I was—maybe still am—upset,” he admitted. “I was the first person she told when she found out she was pregnant, because I was her best friend. When Ava was born, Kelly asked me to be the godfather, but she never told me that her baby was actually my niece.”

“And you didn’t even suspect the connection?”

“No, I didn’t suspect anything. Because I didn’t know that Jack and Kelly had been involved, however briefly.”

“So why didn’t your brother guess that the child she was carrying might be his?”

“Because he didn’t know she was pregnant. Kelly made me promise not to tell anyone,” he confided. “I thought she’d met someone when she was away to school, fallen for the wrong guy and ended up pregnant. So I promised, because I never suspected that her baby was my brother’s baby.”

“Why didn’t she tell him that she was pregnant?” Julie asked curiously.

“I guess she was planning to tell him, but by the time she knew about the baby, he was engaged to someone else.”

She winced. “That would hurt.”

“Yeah.” He could acknowledge that fact without accepting it as justification.

“How did his wife react to the news that he had a child with someone else?”

“She never knew. They were divorced more than five years ago,” he told her. “And now Jack and Kelly are engaged.”

“Apparently your brother has forgiven her for keeping their child a secret.”

“It took him a while, but he did. And Ava is thrilled that she’s finally going to have a mother and a father.”

“In a perfect world, every child would have two parents who loved him or her and one another,” she said.

Which told him absolutely nothing about her situation. Where was Caden’s father? Was he part of their lives? Luke didn’t think so, considering that she hadn’t wanted to contact anyone to let them know that she was in labor, or even later to share the news that she’d had her baby.

“I feel fortunate that I grew up in that kind of home,” he said, in the hope that offering information to Julie would encourage her to reciprocate.

But all she said was, “That is lucky.”

And then, in what seemed an obvious attempt to change the topic of conversation, “How long do you think the power will be out?”

Or maybe she was genuinely worried. He heard the concern in her voice and wished he could reassure her, but he didn’t want to give her false hope. “I don’t know. I think it depends on what caused the outage.”

“So it could be a while,” she acknowledged.

“It could,” he agreed. “But we’ve got the fireplace and lots of blankets, candles and flashlights, and a pantry full of canned goods. I promise—you might be bored, but you won’t freeze, get lost in the halls or starve.”

Her lips curved. “If nothing else, today has proven to me that there’s no point in worrying about things I can’t control.”