What a Woman Wants

He watched his hand reach out and grasp her arm, halting her, though he had no knowledge of sending the command. “That’s not possible.”

Darby slowly turned her head to look at him, her large green eyes filled with disappointment. “Trust me, John. It is.”

His grip tightened. “I didn’t mean…well, you know, that it’s not possible. What I meant to say is…” What had he meant to say? That it wasn’t possible because he didn’t want it to be? That she was Erick’s girl, always had been? That now she was Erick’s widow and it wasn’t possible that he had gotten her pregnant? Or maybe he should tell her that fatherhood was down so low on his priority list it was almost nonexistent?

Given the expression on her face, he suspected it would have been better if he hadn’t said anything at all. And he certainly wasn’t about to voice the rest of the thought fragments trailing through his mind.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

Darby blinked at him, as if his question was the last she expected to hear. The disappointment eased from her face, although he wasn’t certain he was happier with its replacement. She looked…well, as confused as he felt. “I’m fine. Or as well as can be expected, I guess.”

Good. That was good. Right? “How?” he asked.

Her brow furrowed.

He swallowed hard. “I don’t mean how did it happen. I mean how do you know? Have you been to a doctor?”

She shook her head. “No. I did a couple of those home pregnancy tests. Both came up positive.” She glanced down to where his hand still lay against her jacket. “I guess I should have warned you that I have a tendency to get pregnant at the mere mention of sex.”

John’s gaze moved beyond her to the twins, who sat in the truck cab watching them curiously. He remembered when Darby had been pregnant with them. Her condition had been the reason her and Erick’s wedding had been moved up six months. Rumor even had it that it was the reason the twosome had married at all.

“I was on birth control, you know, until…”

Until Erick died. She didn’t need to complete the sentence. They both knew all too well why when there was no reason for her to be on birth control. Or should have been no reason. And he…well, he hadn’t exactly thought, hey, I’m going out to Darby’s, I’d better take some protection. Somehow he’d always thought that if it came down to it, he’d have enough self-control to protect them both.

“Are they reliable? The tests?” he asked, his voice sounding unfamiliar to his own ears.

“As reliable as can be expected, I guess.” Darby cleared her throat. “But they only confirmed what I already suspected.” She offered up a small smile. “I’ve been pregnant before. I know the signs.”

John’s hand slid from her sleeve, almost as if on its own accord, as the news slowly seeped through his shock.

“Look, John,” Darby said quietly. “I didn’t come here asking for anything. When I verified the results this morning, I just thought you should be the first to know. I really…um, haven’t thought things out beyond that. Not yet.”

He scanned her face, trying to make sense out of her words.

“Do the twins know?”

“Oh, dear God, no,” she whispered.

The blare of the truck horn made her jump. John swung his gaze to the giggling girls.

Darby blew out a long breath, obviously as anxious about her news as he was. She tucked her hair behind her ear and gestured toward the truck. “The only thing I told the twins was that I’d take them to breakfast this morning.” Hope backlit her eyes. “Would you like to join us?”

John took an automatic step backward. The idea of sitting with Darby and her girls for any amount of time knowing she was pregnant with his baby…well, scared him absolutely spitless. “I, um, don’t think that’s a good idea right now. I…” He glanced over his shoulder, almost surprised to find they were standing outside his office. He supposed he expected to be in some parallel, other reality. A place he was unfamiliar with that would take as much getting used to as the situation he was trying to absorb.

“Okay,” Darby said. “I understand.”

John squinted at her. Could she really be that understanding? Her expression was anxious but soft, no hint of accusation in her eyes, no expectation in her shaky smile. Which made him hate himself all the more.

He laughed humorlessly. “This doesn’t seem real somehow, you know? I keep feeling like someone should jump from the shadows and cry, ‘Candid Camera!’”

She nodded. “I know.”

Only, if anyone leaped from the shadows right now, John was convinced he’d draw his gun and shoot him.

He winced, his thoughts only dancing along the edge of what would happen when the town found out what he’d done.

He glanced first one way, then the other, down the street. Everything moved along much as it should on a weekday in Old Orchard. The shops and buildings that had been destroyed by the Devil’s Night fires last October had been rebuilt to their former, old-style glory and warmly reflected the morning sun. People went about their business as much as they normally did, a wave here, a greeting there. No one had a clue that Darby had just ripped the rug of John’s life out from under him.

The veracity of his position slammed home when he spotted old Mrs. Noonan slowly crossing the two-lane avenue, heading their way. And if she wasn’t bad enough, next to her walked the new pastor, Jonas Noble.

“Good morning, Sheriff Sparks. Morning, Darby,” Mrs. Noonan said, drawing to a stop beside them, a gnarled hand tucked into Jonas’s arm.

“Hello, Mrs. Noonan. Pastor,” John said, reaching up to tip a hat that he’d left inside. He eyed the other man, thinking of the gossip swirling around town about Old Orchard’s newest addition. As sheriff, he’d had no fewer than three requests that he check into Noble’s background, and he’d refused all of them. As far as he was concerned, keeping to oneself was no crime. Even if there was a somber, almost dangerous look to the pastor, a demeanor his pure black garb and longish dark hair only added to.

“Beautiful morning, isn’t it?” Jonas said now, his voice low and even.

Darby smiled but didn’t answer. Mrs. Noonan homed in on her. “Is everything all right, Darby?”

Darby blinked. “Pardon me?”

“The girls? The farm? I trust all is well?”

If Darby’s nod seemed a little too emphatic, John prayed he was the only one who noticed. “Oh, yes. Everything’s fine. Thanks for asking.”

Mrs. Noonan smiled. “That’s reassuring. Seeing as you’re in town so early and standing in front of the sheriff’s office talking to our young sheriff…well, I was afraid something might be amiss.”

Amiss. Now there was a word, John thought. Something was amiss. But if he had his way, Mrs. Noonan, Pastor Noble and George Johnson would be the last three to know about it.

Darby started backing up toward her truck. “Well, I’d better be going. You know, before the twins decide to leave without me.”

John lifted a stiff hand in a wave. “I’ll talk to you later, Darby.”

She avoided his gaze, concentrating, instead, on Mrs. Noonan and the pastor. “It was good to see you both. Give my best to the women’s club, Mrs. Noonan.”

“I will, dear.”

“Good. Good.” Darby backed straight into the truck bed, then turned around and virtually ran to the driver’s door. Within moments, the truck was rolling away, a short beep signaling a farewell.

Mrs. Noonan sighed and pulled on the ends of her crocheted sweater. “Pretty girl, our Widow Conrad. Wouldn’t you say, Sheriff Sparks?”

John tugged his gaze from the truck’s disappearing taillights. “Huh?”

The old woman smiled at him, then bid him a nice day and continued on down the sidewalk, Pastor Jonas Noble at her side.

Darby didn’t even have to close her eyes to envision John’s reaction to her news. His face seemed to be etched into her corneas, coloring everything she looked at. The sizzling heat his eyes held whenever he looked at her. The way he tilted his head just so in a teasing, cautious way. His full-on grin when he forgot what they were supposed to be and, instead, enjoyed what they were.

Given the sharp turn their lives had taken, what were they?