Another Man's Child

Relieved far beyond what she should have been, Lisa knocked lightly once and opened the door.

She started to speak, words of greeting on her lips, but no sound came out. Beth wasn’t alone. And she wasn’t working.

Lisa closed the door before either person in Beth’s office even knew it had been opened, so involved were they in what they were doing. Cold all over, Lisa walked away as quickly as she could without attracting attention to herself. She felt like a fool. And alone. And heartsick. She couldn’t believe what she’d just seen. She kept trying to convince herself that it wasn’t true, that it wasn’t what it seemed.

Except that there was no way it could have been anything else.

She tried not to think about it, tried to concentrate on finding her car in the parking lot, counting how many red cars there were in the row in which she was walking. Or blue ones. Or green. But all she could see, over and over again, was Beth, sitting on her desk, her blouse halfway undone, kissing a man.

A man Lisa had thought she knew very well.

Her father.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

“YOU’RE A GOOD MAN, Marcus Cartwright. If I’d ever had a son, I’d have wanted him to be just like you,” George Blake said, shaking Marcus’s hand as the two men left the conference room long after everyone else on Friday afternoon. They’d just finished going over the best quarterly reports Blake’s had ever known.

“I imagine I’d have grown up a little happier if I’d had you for a father,” Marcus said, uncharacteristically open with the older man. He’d had a soft spot for George Blake since the moment he’d met him.

George walked with him down to the elevator, as straightbacked as a much younger man. “Your father was a little rough on you, huh?” he asked.

Marcus shook his head. “He never lifted a hand to me. He just wasn’t ever there.”

George nodded. “He had a business to run.”

“Something like that.”

“Yeah, me, too. If I regret anything in my life, it’s not taking the time to watch my daughters grow. Girls are baffling little creatures, but they’ll leave a mark on you that you’ll cherish till the day you die.”

Marcus reached out and pushed the button for the elevator. “My wife just had a little girl a couple of months ago. Her name’s Sara.”

“Well, congratulations, boy! Why didn’t I hear anything about it? It wasn’t even in the paper, was it?”

“We’ve kept things quiet for Lisa’s sake. The baby was more than two months premature. It’s been touch and go. I’m on my way to Thornton Memorial to see her now.”

George’s brows drew together in a frown, and his eyes filled with compassion. “I’ll be praying for her, son. For all of you,” he said, clasping Marcus on the shoulder just as the elevator doors slid open.

“Thanks, George.”

“I’d like to keep in touch, Marcus, other than to discuss Blake’s, if you can find the time.”

Marcus didn’t hesitate. “I can find the time.”

George nodded again and Marcus watched the elevator close on his new friend. He couldn’t remember a time when he’d felt so contented.

LISA HAD ONLY BEEN HOME a few minutes when Marcus called from his car to say he was on his way and asked that she put on a pair of jeans and a warm sweater. But he wouldn’t say where he was taking her. It had been so long since he’d planned one of the mysterious dates she’d always loved that she’d forgotten how magical they could be. It was just what she needed to take her mind off the rest of her life.

She was ready and waiting when he strode through the door and even had his jeans and pullover sweater laid out on the bed for him. She called the hospital with instructions to call her on her cellular if there was any change in Sara’s condition, while he got ready. She was looking forward to whatever diversion he had in mind.

When she climbed into the Ferrari beside Marcus, Lisa caught sight of a couple of bags from Berelli’s. Her favorite deli. Things were looking better every minute.

“So where we going on our picnic?” she asked, grinning at her husband.

He merely grinned back, put the Ferrari in gear and roared out of the drive. But Lisa knew where they were going almost immediately. She couldn’t have chosen better herself.

She followed him across the dock to Sara’s slip, then took his hand as he helped her aboard. It was a beautiful evening, not cold, though there was a nippy breeze blowing in from the ocean. The water was too rough to take the boat out, but Lisa wouldn’t have wanted to be away from shore and the hospital, anyway. She was content to sit with Marcus, enjoying the night, with the waves lapping at the boat, away from it all, and yet close enough to not be away at all.

“I went by Beth’s office on my way home this afternoon,” she said once they were sitting together on the deck, a blanket from down below wrapped around her. Marcus had a glass of wine for his predinner drink. He’d brought her a couple of nonalcoholic wine coolers in deference to her breast feeding.