"We would still be making love."
"And it would be wrong."
"How can you say that when we've just admitted we love each other?"
"There's someone else involved."
"Hal?"
"Hal's child," she answered softly.
Cage was quiet for a long time before he said thickly, "The child is yours, too, Jenny, a living part of you. I love you. I love the child. It's as simple as that."
"Hardly simple." She returned her head to his shoulder and after several moments she confessed, "I wanted to make love with you tonight. But even that confuses me."
"Why?"
"I can't honestly say. Is it you I want, or just another night of loving like the one I spent with Hal? That sounds shabby and sordid, I know, but somehow when it comes to lovemaking, I can't separate the two of you in my mind."
Cage's heart soared. "It will be incredible with us. I promise. It'll be exactly what you want it to be. But once I have you, I won't ever let you go." He had had to give her up for Hal's sake. He wasn't willing to give her up again. "Be sure you're ready to make a commitment before you make love with me."
She smiled up at him, a shy, sexy smile that made his heart accelerate. But instead of pressing down harder on the gas pedal, he applied brakes and slowed the car to a halt on the shoulder of the highway.
"What are we stopping for?" Gary asked groggily from the backseat.
"I'm hungry," Cage said.
"Who can think of food at a time like this?" Roxy complained.
"I wasn't thinking of food." Cage pulled Jenny into his arms and lowered his mouth to hers.
It was awhile before the Lincoln was once again under way.
* * *
"I thought it was extremely romantic," Jenny said with a huge yawn she unsuccessfully tried to cover with her hand.
"I thought we looked like the seediest bunch since the Barrow gang," Cage said. "If I'd been that justice of the peace, I'd have barred my door."
They had routed the public official out of bed, and he had grudgingly consented to perform the wedding ceremony. The bride and groom had then been driven to a hotel where they would spend a few hours before leaving for the airport. After drinking several cups of coffee in a twenty-four-hour diner and refueling the Lincoln, Cage had turned it toward home.
"We could get a room and sleep a few hours," he had suggested to Jenny.
"No. I feel so gritty. I think I'd rather just go the distance, then crash."
Cage looked at her now and laughed. At some point during the night she had surrendered the losing battle of keeping her hair up and had removed all the pins. The caramel-colored strands hung around her shoulders in tumbled disarray. Her new skirt and blouse were hopelessly wrinkled. She looked like the starlet of a sexy French movie during the morning-after scene.
"That funny looking, am I?"
"That adorable. Stretch out and go to sleep," he said, patting his thigh to indicate she should lay her head on it.
"I'm afraid you'll fall asleep if I'm not keeping you company."
"No, I won't. The coffee will keep me awake. Besides, I'm used to doing wild and reckless things like this." She made a face at him and he laughed. "Come on," he urged.
"Are you sure?"
"Positive."