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Yeah, he thought miserably. I'm a first-class bastard. Just like dear old Dad.

  Playfully he patted her bottom, as if there was nothing wrong. As if he were the man she needed, rather than the worst thing that could possibly happen to her. "Cody will be up and around any minute. Better get dressed."

  * * *

  Chapter 14

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  Tamara peeked in on Cody and saw that he still slept deeply in the snow-dimmed morning. She was relieved to have a little chance in which to collect herself before the day roared to a start.

  She ran a very hot shower, letting the bathroom fill with steam. It was very cold, and she shivered in her thin bathrobe. As the room filled with steam, she let the full knowledge of the night that had just passed fill her. She let the rich memories glide through her, gild the edges of her mind.

  And then, as she took off her robe and stepped into the hot spray, she let it go. As long as she lived, she would remember this night. It had been precious and she knew on some deep level that it had been right. As right as anything she'd ever done.

  But now she needed to face reality.

  First of all was that terrible moment when she had realized that she was way past being infatuated. She was in love with Lance Forrest, with his energy and cheer, with his sweetness and passion. Even, damn him, with his freedom.

  She didn't expect declarations of love this morning. She imagined he would be his usual cheery self when he emerged, and he would kiss her pleasantly, eat breakfast and be on his way. He might call her again—in fact, he probably would. He genuinely liked her. And last night, wounded and lonely, it had been to Tamara he'd come. She wasn't foolish enough to discount that.

  But as she dressed, she knew she couldn't see him again. She couldn't bear to be in some middle place with Lance, never knowing when he would tire of her. She would grow shrewish and jealous, and all the fine beauty they had shared last night would tarnish.

  Far better to accept last night as the rare jewel it was.

  She looked at her face in the mirror and saw how solemn she looked. Because she loved him, there was one more thing she had to do.

  Lance had to know the truth about Cody. It was way past time to tell him, to give him a chance to be a part of his son's life. She couldn't lie to him anymore. Before he left this morning, she would take him aside and tell him.

  Buoyed by the decision, she went to the kitchen and started a pot of coffee, shivering in the cold room. On the way to the living room, she turned up the furnace, then pulled the drapes.

  And gasped. It was still snowing, thick, fat flakes that seemed in no hurry. They fell from a leaden sky, floating dreamily in the windless air.

  But in spite of that airy look, everything was buried in the heavy, wet flakes—ground, street, houses. Her car was an unrecognizable lump. Trees drooped under the weight; the leaves that still clung to many branches held too much of the snow. Even as Tamara watched, a thick branch on the elm across the street gave way with a crack and joined several others on the ground nearby.

  They called these storms tree breakers for a reason. Every couple of years, an early-winter or late-spring storm blew through the state before the leaves had had a chance to fall or, in the spring, after they'd leafed out. The leaves caught far too much of the wet snow, and entire branches snapped like twigs. The falling limbs would take down power lines, block streets, crush cars and break windows. It wasn't much of a problem in the mountain communities, but the cities along the front range would clean up the mess for weeks.

  "Wow!" said an awed four-year-old voice behind her. "Is it Christmas?"

  Tamara chuckled. "Nope. But maybe we can have snow ice cream this afternoon. What do you think?"

  "Okay! And can I go sledding?"

  "This might be too wet for sledding, but we can try." She kissed her son's blond head. "Let's go get you some breakfast, huh? How about waffles and sausage and hot chocolate to get you warmed up to play outside?"

  "Cool," Cody said, doing a little gleeful dance in his footed flannel pajamas. There was something searingly like Lance in the quick exuberance, and a sharp pain pierced Tamara. She should have told Lance the minute he appeared. He shouldn't have to miss this boy's growing up. She could think of few things crueler.

  She was putting the first batch of waffles on the table for Cody when Lance ambled out. "Smells good in here."

  "Hi!" Cody said with delight. "Did you spend the night at our house?"

  Lance grinned at the boy. "I sure did. It's a secret though. Can you keep a secret?"

  Tamara took a breath against the acute pleasure of having him there, in her kitchen, on a snowy morning. He looked appealingly rumpled, and for one tiny heartbeat, she allowed herself to imagine how it would be if he were her husband, if she had washed that shirt and folded it to put in a drawer in a bedroom they shared. If he were her husband, he would be with her every morning before work, and she would cook for him, and every morning he would give her that bright, mischievous look he was giving her now, and bend over, and say, "Good morning," his mind clearly full of the night they had spent.

  As he did now. She held the mixing bowl in her hands, against her stomach, and imagined his hand would always curl around her neck and he would always give her a husbandly peck before breakfast.

  But the press of his lips was anything but a peck. He kissed her with more yearning that she would have expected to linger, with a heartbreaking sweetness. Slowly he lifted his head and she glimpsed in his eyes regret and longing in almost equal measures. "I always forget, between one minute and the next," he said, brushing his knuckles over her cheek, "how very beautiful you are."

  Before she could speak, he was moving away, taking up a place at the table, snitching strawberries from Cody's plate. Tamara stared at the wide expanse of his back beneath green-checked flannel and knew she had to get him out of her life as soon as possible. She had to find a way to rebuild her walls.

  * * *

  Lance hated the way she looked at him all through breakfast. Warily, as if he were a dangerous animal who'd wandered in during the storm.

  He hated the way she avoided his gaze, lowering her eyes quickly if he caught her looking at him. He hated the way she kept the food or the dishes or Cody between them like a veil. He could see through it, but couldn't reach her.

  It made it impossible for him to know what she was thinking, what she was feeling. What she thought about last night.

  Last night.

  He didn't know what had happened. How he'd gone from pacing in his faceless apartment to taking refuge in Tamara's arms. He didn't know why his feet had led him here, why it had seemed to be the only choice.

  All he knew this morning was that he'd never experienced anything like it. He hadn't know sex could feel like that, so rich and deep, so different.

  He also knew he'd done Tamara a great wrong. He'd lain in her bed, smelling the scent of her hair in the pillow, his hand roaming over the sheet where she'd lain, and told himself he had to let it all go. She wasn't the kind of woman who could play his game. She'd told him that in the bar last night.

  Lying there, unwilling to leave the warmth of her soft bed, he'd listened to her talking to Cody and clattering pans, and told himself he had to cut this as short and clean as he could. As gently as possible, he had to find a way to tell her it had been a mistake, him coming here last night.

  Then he'd come to the kitchen to see her standing against the sink, and everything had flown out of his head. All his resolves, all his careful planning. She had been so beautiful he couldn't resist her, and her eyes had carried such warning and suspicion, he'd wanted her to know he didn't take her lightly.

  With a growl of frustration, he bent his head to his fists, silently calling himself every name in the book.

  Cody rushed through, bundled like a teddy bear. "Bye!" he said, clomping through, "I'm going outside to build a snowman."

  Lance chuckled in spite of himself. "Build one for me, too."

  "I
will."

  Tamara called out a warning to him. "Don't stay out too long." She closed the back door, and flipped the curtain aside to keep an eye on him. "Thank goodness for fenced yards."

  She settled in the chair at the table and leaned over. "Lance, we need to talk," she said.

  "No," he said. "Don't take it all apart." He touched her hands and let go. "Just let it be."

  "Lance—"

  "I don't want to spoil it, Tamara. Please."

  A curious and fleeting vulnerability danced over her eyes and was gone. "Listen," she said.

  He looked down, feeling a thickness in his chest. Hadn't he been going to tell her himself that he thought it was a mistake? Hadn't that been in his mind all morning? So what difference did it make if she did it?

  "It's not about last night, Lance," she said. She cleared her throat. "It's about Valerie."

  "Valerie?" He frowned. "What does she—"

  She gripped his hands. "Please listen. It's important and I'm afraid to tell you, but you have to know."

  He learned forward, alerted by her somber tone. By her worry. "What?"

  Tamara looked out the window and back to him. "Cody is her son. I adopted him when she died."

  Lance lifted his eyebrows, but he was still puzzled. Why did she have to tell him this now? Right now, this morning, with that worried frown on her brow? "I don't—"

  And then suddenly, he thought he might. He remembered that Christmas when he'd come home. One cold December night, he'd run into Valerie at a bar, and one thing had led to another. She'd reminded him of a simpler time in his life. And although he'd told himself he shouldn't let himself fall under Valerie's spell, he'd gone ahead and done it anyway. When she was up, she was so wild and vibrant it was hard to resist her. It had been three weeks of up—then she'd crashed into one of her black moods. Rather than risk his health or his car to her rages this time, he'd headed back to Houston and never looked back.

  A creeping cold filled his limbs, freezing his organs and gut. He stared at Tamara, and everything about her seemed strangely acute: her green eyes, the fall of dark hair, her sober, serious mouth.

  It never had really made sense that she didn't speak of Cody's father. There had been, from the beginning, something off kilter about the whole business.

  "Why are you telling me this?" he asked. His voice was flat.

  Tamara swallowed. "Lance, Cody is your son."

  He closed his eyes. Even though he'd expected the words, the actual spoken sound of them was shattering. Before she said them aloud, his life was as it always had been. After they marked the air, everything was irrevocably changed. His whole life shifted.

  Everything.

  He couldn't look at her. "Why didn't you tell me before this?"

  "I—" she began. The pause lasted so long, he finally had to look at her, hard, to make her tell him. She met his gaze without flinching. "I honestly don't know."

  "So why did you pick this morning to tell me?"

  Her lids fluttered down over her eyes, hiding her expression. "Because it wasn't fair not to tell you."

  "But why now, Tamara?" Anger, pure and hot and unfocused, welled in him. "Why this morning, when you know it's going to change everything that happened last night? Why now?" He stood up so quickly, the chair tumbled backward. He caught it before it fell to the ground.

  "I don't know!" she cried. "I honestly don't. I haven't ever thought clearly about any of it. I took Cody because I loved him, and I thought you were so terrible for such a long time, but now—"

  There was such misery in her voice that he felt his anger seep away as quickly as it had come. "But now?"

  She took a breath and blew it out, and met his gaze. "Now I know you. And it isn't fair that you've been deprived all these years."

  No, it wasn't. But he didn't feel anything. Why was that? He couldn't feel anything except a howling sort of pain that had no roots or direction. Why did it hurt? And what hurt, exactly? That she hadn't trusted him? That she had saved it for this morning, then used it like a wedge to keep distance between them, when all he wanted was to get close again?

  All of it.

  "Damn her to hell and back," Lance said, finding a focus for his anger as Valerie came to mind. "Why didn't she let me know? She knew where I worked in Houston. She knew my folks. Was she just going to hide it forever?"

  Tamara shook her head sadly. "On that level, you should be thankful. She got … well … pretty bad toward the end. Pregnancy seemed to make her worse. And after Cody was born, she just wasn't in her right mind ever again."

  "Meaning she blamed me, that she planned to extract revenge," he guessed. "Am I right?"

  "Yes," Tamara said quietly. "She really hated you. And I … I guess I blamed you, too. For a long time."

  "Do you blame me now?"

  She raised her face. "No."

  Numbly he walked toward the back door and watched Cody romp in the snow, a blue bundle of stuffing. Your son. Lance remembered the night when he'd thought of Tyler, and how much Cody resembled him. And the night at the carnival, when everyone had made such a big deal about how much Curtis and Cody looked alike.

  No wonder.

  But he didn't feel a big swell of fatherhood come over him. He didn't feel immediate, fulsome love for the boy. He'd been fond of Cody since he'd met him—he was bright and sweet and adorable.

  He turned to Tamara. "I don't know what I'm supposed to feel right now."

  Her smile was kind. "There aren't any rules, Lance. And I didn't tell you so you'd have make some big decision right now." She sounded stronger now, clearer. "It's very important to me that you don't feel obligated to do anything. I just wanted you to know."

  He made an impatient noise. "How can you expect that I wouldn't feel obligated? Especially when I've hated how you had to struggle. It really doesn't seem fair that you've carried this load all this time, and he's not even your child."

  "Oh, but he is my child," she said. "I was there the day he was born, and I haven't been away from him for a day since. I'm the only mother he's ever known." She swallowed. "Don't take him away from me."

  And at last the fog cleared—or a little of it, anyway. Enough that it finally penetrated how frightened she was, how much it had cost her to tell him all this. He crossed the room in an instant and knelt before her.

  He took her small, work-worn hands in his own and kissed each one gently. A wave of emotion—something hot and jumbled and powerful—filled his throat, and he couldn't speak. He thought of her giving up all her dreams to come home to Red Creek and take care of his son. He thought of her poring over the hated accounting texts and working in the bar to make ends meet—because she loved Cody. "You're such a good mother, Tamara. I would never take him."

  He bent his head and put his brow against her hands. "You sacrificed so much, I can't stand to think of it."

  She freed one hand and put it on his head, in his hair. He sighed, feeling relief course through him. Maybe she wasn't using the whole thing to put a wedge between them, he thought. And then he was frightened because he wanted so much to come back tonight, and the next night, and the next.

  He really tried not to want things. Anything. It was a lesson he'd learned at his father's knee. Olan had showed up when he felt like it. He didn't remember promises to take his child fishing, or out on a hike, or for a drive to see the aspens. Lance had learned after too many bitter disappointments to accept whatever came.

  Lance had finally learned not to make plans, not to worry about the future—not expect anything. That way, he was never disappointed. When his father would appear with an open Saturday morning to take Lance fishing, Lance had been free to go with him, and enjoy it.

  Sitting now in Tamara's kitchen, smelling the lingering scent of golden waffles, he didn't want to think about coming back. He didn't want his heart all caught up in her dreams and wishes. He didn't want to disappoint her. And he didn't want to want her—

  He straightened. "I'll talk to my acc
ountants and work something out, so you don't have to live like this."

  "No, Lance, that's not necessary. I've done—"

  "Don't be ridiculous, Tamara. I've got money enough for ten people, and I don't want Cody to have to go without. Or his mother." He raised a warning hand as she opened her mouth. "I know you've done the best you could, and I'm amazed you've built the kind of life you have on the shoestring I know you're living on."

  She was blushing, deeply. "It's not that bad," she said, and he heard the humiliation in her voice. "I didn't tell you so you could throw money at us."

  "I know that." He sighed in impatience. "One thing you need to get over is feeling like you have to scale the walls of the world all by yourself. It's okay to have a little help. It would make me happy to do that much anyway."

  She nodded, reluctantly.

  Silence fell and grew. Tamara broke it by taking his hand. "There's one more thing, Lance."

  His gut clenched. Here it came.

  "What we had last night was precious and rare." She paused. "But it can't happen again. I like you too much to let myself fall in love with you."

  If she had said anything else, anything, he would have argued or cajoled, or even run away. But put like that, there was so much respect and honesty that he had no recourse. She was right to make this call—she saw him as he was, and he liked her for that.

  Still, something in him ached. He reached out and touched her cheek. "You're right," he said. "I like you, too. Too much to do you wrong—and I would, eventually." A small bitterness twisted his mouth. "The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, after all."

  He thought he glimpsed the faintest trace of tears shining against the brilliance of her irises, then it was gone. She simply nodded.

  Lance stood. "It's been quite a morning," he said. "I think I need a long walk to sort through everything. I'll call you when I've talked to the accountant." He cleared his throat and looked out to the churned snow in the backyard, where a roly-poly figure rolled. "I'd like to start getting to know him as soon as I can. I hope you won't mind working something out so I can be a part of his life." He looked at her. "My own father wasn't there for me, and I always vowed I'd be there for my own children. Not—" he grinned ruefully "—that I really thought I'd have any."