Prescription: Baby

He blew out a sigh. “I didn’t want to worry you.”

“You didn’t want to worry me?” she echoed.

She knew the odds. “The chance of this happening is next to nil.” She hugged the coat even more tightly around her and shifted her weight as if she was getting colder. “What are we going to do, Ford?”

Hell if he knew. He shook his head. He’d fantasized about her coming back from Houston, then to his house with a bottle of burgundy and an invitation to bed. Now the vision included having a newborn curled against his chest. He glanced away, the globe of a streetlight capturing his attention, then some tree branches swaying in the wind. Frowning, he carefully considered all the options, then simply said what he’d sworn he never would. “Marry me.”

Katie was stunned into silence, then from between gritted teeth, she suddenly growled, “You can kiss my round Irish behind, Ford Carrington!”

His jaw slackened. He stared at her. Hadn’t he just offered the best possible solution? Shouldn’t a woman in her shoes want a husband right now? He’d never imagined proposing marriage, much less getting rebuffed. He was so taken aback, he couldn’t help but mutter, “I believe I did.”

Katie’s lips parted in shock. “Did what?”

“Kissed your round Irish behind,” he reminded her gruffly, edging closer. “Nearly three months ago. Gave you a smart little nip on the left cheek from what I recall, Carrot Top.”

As cold as the air was, Ford figured her response—a sharp, audible inhalation—had to hurt her lungs. “Uh, that was months ago, and we’ve got other things to talk about now, Ford.”

No kidding.

“I figure it might be best if I take another job,” she continued quickly, clasping her hands nervously, as if aware this wasn’t going very well. “At Texas General. Or in Houston. As Cecil told you, they offered me a job, but I wanted to come home….”

Maybe she simply hadn’t heard him. “I said, marry me, Katie.”

Angry tears filled her eyes, and even though he knew the barely concealed emotion was directed at him—or maybe because it was—he wanted to wrap her in his arms. The urge to kiss her was sudden, visceral. He wanted to lower his mouth to hers, not letting her breathe until all that anger turned to passion.

“Marry you?” she said in a furious tone. “Why? Because you’re afraid I won’t give you any rights to your baby otherwise? Is that it, Ford? You don’t trust me?”

“I admit,” he couldn’t help but say, “that after all the time we’ve worked together, Katie, I wouldn’t have suspected you could be pregnant with my child without telling me.”

“I’ve only known myself for a few weeks,” she said defensively. “And if you want to be involved, you can.”

He released a frustrated sigh. “If? You’re talking about my child here, Katie. Marry me.”

“Why?” she countered again. “Are you afraid of how people will react?” Suddenly, she nodded. “Oh, I see. Having a baby out of wedlock would be a strike against the Carrington family name.”

“Yes, it would,” he agreed. Not that he cared. “And it sounds as if it would be a strike against the Topper name, too.”

“We Toppers might not have much materially, but we have values, Ford. Marriage means something to me!”

He’d about had it. “And it doesn’t to me?”

“Your crowd marries for money and status,” she returned heatedly.

That much was true. “So?”

“So, I can’t talk about marriage in the way you do.”

“The way I do?”

“Yeah, in that calm, cool, collected voice, like it doesn’t mean anything more than sharing a house with a woman who keeps her own friends and bedroom.”

“I asked you to marry me, Katie,” he retorted. “I don’t recall saying anything about separate bedrooms.”

She gaped at him. “You’re not in love with me, Ford!”

He wasn’t even sure what love was. “No, I’m not.”

She pressed a hand to her forehead. “Look, this conversation is getting too personal.”

“Marriage is personal, Katie.” So was the energy current flowing between them as fast as a flooding river. Ford had no idea where it was taking them, only that the ride would be memorable.

“Marriage and childbirth are sacred to me, Ford,” she managed to say. “So is extended family. My mama died when I was kid, but I remember how it was with her, how close we were. My family’s still close. Family’s the most important thing in the world to me.” Color had flooded her cheeks. “I…” She paused, tightening her clasped hands. “Look, you’re not in love with me, so why are you doing this?”

He was still thinking about the tensions in his family, and he had to admit she was right. Marriages in his crowd were often cold. People made convenient, public matches, then had private affairs for other needs. But Katie was a warm woman. She needed more. She needed a loving man in her bed every night. “There’s more to the proposition,” he said.

She looked wary. “Really?”

“Really.” In a voice gone soft with seduction, he murmured, “There’s ten million dollars involved, Katie.”

She blinked, but to his surprise and her credit, she didn’t miss a beat. “You say that like you expect me to sell my soul to the devil, Ford Carrington.”

He smiled. “Not to the devil, Katie. To me.”

She looked as curious as she was cautious, and he suddenly wondered if he’d found a woman who really would marry only for love. “Hmm,” she said. “You and the devil. Why do I get the impression that at the moment there’s not much of a difference between the two?”

“Because there isn’t.” Now that he had her attention, he proceeded to explain the stipulation in his grandfather’s will. “I’ve always said I’m a committed bachelor, and my grandfather was worried I wouldn’t leave any Carrington heirs, so as an incentive, the next blood Carrington born gets a big chunk of change. Ten million. It comes out of the funds for the Carrington Foundation, which he started before he died.” So what if he’d also been lusting for Katie Topper? he thought. So what if having this baby excited him more than he wanted to admit? “It’s only practical. Think hard before you answer me, Katie.”

Her expression held equal parts frank curiosity and outraged fury. “And to think I’ve admired you,” she finally said stiffly. Raising her voice, she added, “Think? Oh, Ford, my mind’s running a million miles a minute.”

“Let it run ten million miles a minute, Katie. Because it’s in your hands right now to give our baby everything in the world. Summer houses. The best schools. Horses. Camps.” Everything Ford had been given—everything except the kind of love he imagined most kids got for free. His own baby would have it all.

She glanced away. She was thinking about how the money might affect the baby’s life, and how she would be able to tell her religious papa she wasn’t having it alone, but that a surgeon from a prestigious family wanted to marry her.

“You’d move into my place until the baby’s born,” he added reasonably, barely able to believe what he was suggesting. “After that, it’s up to you. After that, all the money belongs to the baby. But I can’t do it without you. The trust is set up so that I have to be married.”

“You never wanted it before?”

“I don’t care about money, Katie. It’s for the baby.”

“And later?” Her voice was suddenly so small, so resigned that Ford wanted to retract the words…to take back that damnable Carrington power that no one could ever stand up to.

“Later, we’d work out visitation arrangements.”

Her chin thrust upward a proud notch. “It would be for the baby. And, uh, I’d insist on my own bedroom.”

Not a point he’d wanted to negotiate. “You said you didn’t want to see me again, Katie,” he forced himself to say, stubborn pride stopping him from asking why she’d deny such insistent attraction. “Three months ago, we both agreed nothing more was going to happen between us.”

Swirling the coat from her shoulders, she held it out to him, and as he took it, she edged around him, managing to open her car door. She got in and slammed the door. As she started the engine, she rolled down the window.