Another Man's Child

“I lied to you.”

His heart started to pound with dread. “When?”

“Remember that first time we made love?”

“At the cabin? Of course. I’d thought I’d died and gone to heaven.”

Lisa smiled, though a little nervously. “Remember, right before, when you asked me if I was a virgin?”

“Sure.” Marcus wondered if this was another one of those pregnancy things, where she got a little irrational for no reason he could figure out. “You explained about that other guy, Lis. It was only once. You were of age. I’ve never thought anything of it.”

“There was no other guy, Marcus.” She looked away again, as if embarrassed. “I lied to you. I was afraid you’d go all noble on me and stop if you knew it was my first time.”

Marcus propped himself up on one elbow. “You should have told me, Lisa. I wouldn’t have stopped—we’d come too far for that—but I could’ve made it easier on you. I must’ve hurt you.” He didn’t know whether to feel angry with her for putting herself through that, or elated that she’d never been with another man.

Lisa shrugged. “It hurt a little, but at that point, I didn’t care. And you made me forget about the pain soon enough.”

He leaned over, wondering what he’d ever done to deserve this woman. “I’m still sorry I hurt you,” he said, running his hand along her brow and down over her cheek. “But, God, Lis—I’m the only one?”

Her tentative nod freed something inside of him, a sense of security he’d never known before. His fingers brushed the sensitive spot on the side of her neck. She’d just given him the best Christmas present he’d ever had.

Lisa shivered, and Marcus continued the caress, down over her shoulders to her breasts and below. Lisa’s belly had expanded to the size of a small basketball, and he caressed the taut skin. She was his Madonna. She was his angel sent from above.

Marcus began to make love to Lisa again, his movements more careful than usual—as if she were a virgin, showing her how it should it have been for her all those years ago. When it was time, he entered her slowly, with the ease of familiarity, but also with a hesitant exploration, learning her anew.

He loved her as slowly as he could, until he was certain he wasn’t going to last another second. And then he plunged into her fully. But just as he reached his hilt, something jerked against him, from within her, as if protesting his invasion.

Marcus flew off Lisa and away from the bed so fast he almost hurt himself, staring at his wife as if he’d never met her before. He couldn’t believe what had just happened.

Lisa’s baby had kicked him. Where it counted. Another man’s baby was inside his wife telling him to go away.

What if the baby did that after he was born, too? Told him to go away? Would it come in between him and Lisa? Force her to choose between the two of them?

“Marcus?” She sounded close to tears as she sat up, staring back at him.

Lisa’s baby had kicked him.

There really was a little human being growing inside her. One she was going to give birth to in the not-too-distant future. And he’d felt it move. In the most intimate way possible.

He knew her baby in a way no other man ever would.

Yet…it changed nothing. Still didn’t make Marcus the father of Lisa’s baby. But suddenly he found that he was no longer jealous of the man who had fathered her child. Envious as hell, yes. Definitely. Always. But no longer jealous. Marcus knew that baby far more intimately than that man did.

LISA SLEPT LITTLE that night, tormented by the look of horror she’d seen on Marcus’s face when the baby had kicked him. He’d come back to her, finished what he’d started, tenderly drawing a response from her as he always could, but the minute he’d fallen asleep, her tears had come, sliding silently down her cheeks to sink into the pillow beneath her head. So much for a merry Christmas.

Lying in bed beside Marcus, listening to his steady breathing, she despaired of their future. How could she raise a child with a man who hated it? What would it do to their son or daughter to live in a house with a man who was repulsed by the child’s touch? What right did she have to subject any child to that kind of life?

Getting out of bed, Lisa wrapped herself in the big furry bathrobe Marcus had given her for Christmas that morning and sat in the bathroom trying to make sense of the tangle that had become her life. The man she adored hated her baby. What was she going to do, torn as she was between the baby she’d come to love so dearly, the baby she needed so badly, and the man who was her other half? How could she possibly keep all three of them happy?

She didn’t know, but she could no longer hide from the fact that something had to be done. She couldn’t raise her baby in a house full of resentment or indifference. The poor child would grow up feeling unloved.

Much as Marcus had done.

And as confident as he was, when it came to loving, Marcus still blamed himself for the fact that his parents hadn’t loved him enough to find time for him. He believed that he was lacking, that he was unlovable. And, God help her, she didn’t think she could ever leave him and, in his mind, confirm that belief.

CHAPTER TEN

OLIVER WAS CONCERNED about Lisa. She’d invited him to dinner one Sunday in the middle of January, and by the end of the afternoon, she looked awful. Her skin was white, her eyes dull, and she had almost no energy at all.