Twin Expectations

“You’re not going to sue me, are you?”

“Sue you? Good heavens, what for?” She nibbled on a corner of toast.

“I’m an easy target. And you were talking about suing my brother—”

“I never said I was going to sue your brother. I never even met your brother! That was my sister.”

“She’s pregnant, too?” he asked, faintly amused.

Bridget slumped back on the sofa. “No. She’s not pregnant. She was referring to me, but she was only making a joke. Not a very good one, I’m—”

“A joke? I wouldn’t think an unplanned pregnancy is something to joke about.”

Now he was getting personal. “You think I should hide myself away like I’ve done something shameful?”

“Forgive me for saying so, but some people might think that sleeping with so many men that you don’t even know your child’s parentage is shameful. There, I’ve said it. I’m an old-fashioned, fossilized dinosaur. I know it. I can’t help it.”

Bridget knew she should be furious by the assumptions he’d made about her. But there was something pretty funny about a studly guy like Nick Raines talking about family values like a blue-haired old lady.

She folded her arms. “So, that’s what this hostility is all about. It’s not the baby that bothers you. It’s my sleeping habits.”

“It’s both. I don’t understand how you, a seemingly intelligent, successful woman, could so thoughtlessly conceive a child.”

Okay. It was time to put that particular misconception to rest. “For your information, Nick—not that it’s any of your business—I put a great deal of thought into conceiving this child. I love children. I want to raise a family more than anything in the world. I just don’t happen to have a husband.”

“How would you have time for a husband?” he grumbled.

What seemed humorous a moment ago suddenly didn’t. Bridget felt tears coming on—her raging hormones had turned her into an emotional wreck—but she ruthlessly swallowed back the lump in her throat. “I was artificially inseminated.”

She almost enjoyed the look of consternation on his handsome face. Then she promptly burst into tears.

“Oh…oh, here, now, stop that. There’s no need…” Nick waved his hands around helplessly. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Bridget sniffed. “I’m just overemotional.”

He held the glass of water out to her. “Here.” When she didn’t take it right away, he set it down, dashed out of the room, then back again with a box of tissues. “Here.”

She took the tissue and dabbed at her eyes, then blew her nose in a most unladylike fashion. After a few more sniffs, she had herself under control.

“I’m really sorry,” he said again, though he looked relieved. “I didn’t mean to make you cry. But you have to admit, you did lead me to believe—”

“I didn’t lead you anywhere. You assumed.”

“I assumed the most likely scenario, given the limited information you gave me. I don’t think I’ve ever known or even heard of a single woman having herself artificially inseminated.”

“But you’ve known lots of women who slept around and got pregnant.”

That stumped him for a moment. “Well, no. A couple in college, maybe.”

Bridget took a deep breath. The crisis was over, and with it all of her hostility. Maybe she had deliberately led him to the unfair assumption. She was willing to let bygones be bygones if he was. “So, let’s set up a schedule for our work together. Can you spare me an hour in the morning, three or four times a week for the next couple of weeks, then once a week thereafter?”

“You still want to do the portrait?”

“Yes, of course.”

“That’s generous of you, considering I all but called you a slut.” He almost let himself smile, and Bridget was reminded of exactly how handsome a man Nicholas Raines was, particularly when he wasn’t showing off his sardonic wit at her expense.

“Can we please put the misunderstanding behind us and start fresh?”

“Okay. I think I can spare a few hours a week. I’ll even buy some tea and honey and soda crackers, just in case.”

“Sounds like a plan.” She stood up, feeling vastly better. “I think I should go home now.”

A couple of minutes later, as Nick opened Bridget’s driver’s door as if it were Cinderella’s coach, she felt optimistic about the coming portrait. She always enjoyed committing a client’s personality to canvas, but it had been a long time since a subject had so excited her creative juices. And maybe a few other types of juices as well.

“Just one more question,” Nick said as he helped her into the car.

“Sure.”

“Don’t you think your kid ought to have a father?”

Something in Bridget’s imagination snapped shut. “A bit judgmental today, are we?”

“Just curious.”

Since the question hadn’t been asked with the intention to antagonize, she decided to give him an honest answer. “I would dearly love for my child to have a father. But good husbands don’t grow on trees. I’ve had several dating relationships over the past few years, but most of those guys, once I really got to know them, I couldn’t picture as fathers. And the few ‘maybes’ flipped out if I even hinted at possible long-term goals.”

“You mean they wigged when you said you wanted a baby.”

“Something like that.”

“Can you blame them? Most men aren’t like women when it comes to children. They have to get used to being husbands first. Then they gradually grow into the idea of having kids.”

“You know all about this, huh?”

“I know that if a lady I was dating suddenly started talking babies, I’d run as far and as fast as I could.”

“You’ve just made my point for me.” Bridget gave him a steely-eyed look. “I’m thirty years old. The old biological clock thing isn’t just an old wives’ tale.”

“It’s no fun growing up without a father,” he said, making his point in a different way.

“What would you know about it? You were raised by Eric Statler, Jr.”

“That’s not exactly correct. My mother, who had me out of wedlock, by the way, met and married Statler when I was five. But he was never, ever my father.”

Bridget realized she’d struck a sore spot. Nick’s feelings on this subject ran much deeper than she would have guessed. She felt for him. But the way he was raised had nothing to do with how she would bring up her child. She wouldn’t allow any man into her life who didn’t accept her son or daughter 100 percent.

“My sister and I were raised without a father, too,” she said quietly. “Ours died when we were two and my mother never remarried. She loved us more than enough to make up for it. And we turned out okay.”