Adopt-A-Dad

“No, but…”

“Do you have somewhere to go?”

“Mexico,” she said softly, only a tiny tremor in her voice spoiling the bravado of her words.

“You have friends in Mexico?”

“No, but…”

He sighed. “You know, you can’t go back to your apartment. They’ll expect you there.”

“I know that.”

“So you’re heading for Mexico without baggage, without friends. And how do you expect to get over the border? They’ll have immigration checks there, as well.”

“I’ll manage.” Her words were an angry, defensive snap, but there was fear behind them. “The border’s hardly heavily policed. I can do it.”

“What, by hiking through the desert in the dead of night? Very clever.”

Silence.

He shouldn’t get involved. No way! But how could he not? Michael sighed, took a deep breath and jumped right in. He grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair and opened the door.

“Let’s get out of here,” he said.

“But…”

“But what?”

“You don’t need to come.” She glared. “I’m on my own.”

“I can see you’re on your own. That’s what I don’t like.”

“It’s none of your business.”

“You know, if you said it was my business, then I’d fight you every inch of the way,” he said sourly. “But damn it, woman, I have enough moral fiber to think I can’t allow you to sneak over the border with nothing except the clothes you’re wearing. And no friends to meet you.”

She glowered again, trapped. She didn’t want his help. She didn’t want anyone’s help. “I don’t need your morals.”

“Neither do I,” he said dryly. “I don’t need ’em at all. Unfortunately I have ’em, and so does Ellie. She’ll want to know what the heck I’ve done with you, and if I tell her what you intend doing and that I’ve allowed it, she’ll be after me with a horsewhip. So you can say I’m doing this because the Maitlands are head of this place and I work for the Maitlands. Good enough for you?”

She glowered again. “No.”

“It’d better be.” He took her arm. “Because that’s the way it is. Like it or lump it, lady. Let’s go.”

CHAPTER TWO

HE TOOK HER to her apartment first.

“We have maybe twenty minutes,” he told her. “Ellie will hold them that long. So we move fast.”

“You don’t have to—”

“Just shut up,” he told her kindly. “Like it or not, I’m embroiled in this mess, so I might as well be embroiled all the way.”

Which wasn’t exactly true, he decided as he drove fast through Austin’s afternoon traffic. He wasn’t really embroiled in this mess—yet. At this stage he could put her out of the car and walk away.

But there was no way he could do that, and it wasn’t the thought of Ellie’s anger that was keeping him in here. It was the set look on Jenny’s face, the look of despair combined with that stubborn look of pride. She’d go to the wall alone, he thought as he watched her. She had sheer, raw courage. Whatever mess she was in…

She wasn’t facing it alone, he decided. Not while Michael Lord was around to help her. But why he felt that way, he didn’t have a clue. He didn’t get involved with women. Not ever.

A very pregnant secretary didn’t really count as a woman, he told himself. Did she?

He couldn’t answer that question. Instead, he concentrated on driving fast and outmaneuvering the Suits.

Some questions were just too hard to answer.

THE PLACE she lived in was the pits. Michael stopped in front of a run-down apartment block in the poorest part of town and grimaced, then steered his Corvette around the corner and out of sight. The neighborhood was no better around the corner. It wasn’t the sort of place to leave a Corvette, much less a pregnant woman.

“You’ve been living here all the time you’ve worked for me?” he demanded.

“Why shouldn’t I?” Jenny’s voice was defensive. “What’s wrong with it?”

“It’s a dump.”

“Can we spare the thoughts on my taste in housing for some other time?” she asked with asperity, worry replaced by indignation. “Anyway, I like it. It’s friendly. You try being a poverty-stricken single mom in a rich neighborhood and see how many friends you make. So if you really are going to help me…”

“Yeah, right.” He sighed. The place he’d put the car was deserted and well out of sight. Jenny would have to stay in the car. He didn’t like leaving her, but there was hardly a choice. He had to move fast, and if there was one thing Jenny’s bulk didn’t let her do, it was that. “Tell me which is your apartment and give me the keys.”

“I’m coming.” She was still crabby.

“No, Jenny, you’re not.” He put his hands on her shoulders and propelled her onto her seat. “I’m going in fast. I’m staying out of sight, which is something I’ve been trained to be good at. I’m getting out of there even faster, and if there’s a knock on the door while I’m in there, then I’ll be out the back window like a rat down the drainpipe. Assuming there’s a back window.”

“There’s a back window, but—”

“No buts. Can you shinny down a drainpipe?”

That brought a grin. She glanced at her pregnant bulge, and her eyes twinkled with sudden laughter. She looked better that way, Michael thought. “Maybe not, but—”

“Then leave the shinnying to me.” He hesitated. “I can’t bring everything. I’ll just grab what I can. I may only have a few minutes.”

“I don’t have much. There’s a bag under the bed. You’ll hardly fill it.”

Funny—why had he known she’d say something like that?

THE LADY WAS RIGHT. There sure wasn’t much. Michael stared around her dreary apartment in stunned silence.

He had two sisters, and Lana and Shelby nested. In fact, when they’d lived together, his sisters had nested all over the house. He was used to masses of clothes, bathrooms cluttered with toiletries, bedrooms with bright fabrics and huge cushions—the sort of place where a girl could come home and relax with style.