Her Motherhood Wish (Parent Portal 3)

“I’ll add a clause that offers you a forty-eight-hour right to rescind, for any reason,” she said.

He wasn’t rescinding anything. “Do what you have to do.”

She grinned. Nodded. He nodded back.

Picking up her cell phone from the arm of the chair where she’d laid it when she sat down, she pushed one button.

“Marilyn? You can come in now,” she said. And then to Wood, “My paralegal. I asked her to stop by on her way home from dinner with her husband, unless she heard from me not to bother.”

He broke into a full-out smile. Glad as hell she was as thorough as she was. He was a signature away from being a father.

And being legally linked to his son and to Cassie for the rest of his life.

* * *

Cassie called her mother as soon as she got home that night. She didn’t change. Didn’t even kick off her shoes. Sitting on her sofa, she just dialed. Susan was a night person and Richard wasn’t, so she figured they could have a private conversation. And she needed one. Telling her mother about dinner with Wood, leaving out the bit about their physical situation and the sexual solution they’d chosen together, she did tell her mother about the binding legal agreement they’d signed, and finished with, “I’m excited, like I just got married, and all he did was sign a joint parenting agreement,” she said. “Do you think that could mean that I have real feelings for him? Beyond the pregnancy and hormones and all that?”

A short silence followed her words, and Cassie waited, half holding her breath.

“I don’t have that answer.” Susan’s disappointing response took a while in coming.

“What I do know is this...” Cassie sat upright, fully focused as her mother continued, “It’s not a mistake, sweetie. I can’t tell you why it’s happening this way for you. I can only tell you that things happen for reasons. And that how you handle the seemingly impossible is what defines you.”

“I can’t sleep with him.”

“I’m not saying that.”

“I know. I am. I can’t take a chance with a man’s life. Wood isn’t the type of guy who’d move on if it didn’t work out. He’d stick around and continue to be a great dad to Alan, and our friendship would be ruined. Or at least stilted. Like you and Dad were. How do I know I’m not just feeling so strongly toward him because of what he’s doing for me? And because I really want a traditional family? And maybe even a second child?”

“I feel like I’m failing you, sweetie, but I just don’t have that answer.”

“So what do I do?”

“What would your father say? He was about the wisest man I ever knew when it came to dealing with the problems life left on the doorstep.”

“He’d say to be grateful for what I have.” Alan. Wood’s friendship for life. A career she loved. The support of family and friends...

“Sounds right to me.”

Chapter Nineteen

Wood waited for Elaina to get home that night. He needed to tell her about the agreement he’d signed with Cassie. In the first place, Alan was officially a part of their family. In the second, he had nothing to hide.

And in the third, he felt like celebrating.

He was going to tell his men at work the next day, too.

And probably anyone else with whom he happened to come in contact who’d listen to him babble about it.

Elaina didn’t pull in until after midnight, had unsavory-looking marks staining her scrubs and exhaustion all over her face. She smiled when she saw him by the door leading into the kitchen. Gave him a wave as she entered her suite from her own door, and that was that.

His news was too huge for him to accept an exhausted reaction. Too huge to put o

n her when she’d obviously had a long hard day and just needed to rest.

Elaina would approve. He already knew that. Not that he needed her approval. He just needed his friend—and ex-wife—to know. It didn’t seem real until she—his only family—knew.

That thought in mind, when the crew broke for lunch the next day, he grabbed his bagged sandwich and ate it in his truck on the way to the hospital. He didn’t visit Elaina often at work, but he knew which floor to go to, whom to see to find out where she was. Maybe it would have been better if he’d waited, rather than appearing in dusty jeans and a sweaty T-shirt at his sister-in-law’s place of employment, but there was no guarantee she’d be home that night. If something happened to him, she needed to know he’d changed his trust papers, giving everything to Alan, not her.