“I know…” She hung her head, choking back a sob. “I’m sorry, Lance…I’m sorry I ever doubted you…”
She broke off her pleading when she saw the coldness overtake his expression again. He wasn’t listening.
Desperately Summer searched her mind for some way to get through to him. She stood near the bed, her hands tightly clasped over her stomach in an effort to calm herself. She would tell him about her hope that she was pregnant, that their baby would likely be born in the summer—except that Lance wouldn’t be here next summer, she realized dazedly. He had just said he was leaving…
“Lance…you can’t…you can’t leave. I…I think I’m pregnant.”
His head snapped up; his black gaze pierced her with startled awareness.
Summer flinched at his expression, all her words rushing together as she tried to explain. “I’m not certain, not really, but I’ve been sick the past several mornings, and Maritza says that’s what it is, that I’m breeding, and I know it’s true, I can’t really say how, but I’m sure of it…I’m going to have your baby.”
He didn’t reply. Didn’t make a sound. The ache that ripped through him had made his breath cease.
Summer swallowed, hard. “Lance…you can’t leave us. I don’t want to bear a child alone, the way your mother was forced to. You can’t leave now. It wouldn’t be fair to him…or to me, to make me rear him alone.”
“My…baby?” The word was scarcely a rasp of sound.
“Yes, your baby. And mine. Ours.” Summer dashed a stream of tears from her eyes, vaguely aware she was crying. “Do you want us to face the hardships your mother had to endure? Do you want your child to suffer the way you did?”
“No…”
“Neither do I. So you have to stay. It will be difficult enough with two of us protecting him. I want him to have a chance for a good life, not the terrible one you had to live. And I’ll do everything I can short of murder to see that he gets that chance.”
Lance stared, doubt scoring his features. “You…want my baby?”
“Yes, yes, of course I want him.” Her tearful expression grew indignant. “You can’t think I would abandon him?”
“A lot of women would.”
“That…has to be the cruelest thing you’ve ever said to me.” The tears spilled over again. “I would no more abandon my child than I would abandon you. I love you, Lance.”
He went totally still, his expression blank. Now who was being cruel? He didn’t believe her claim. Not for a second. But at least he understood now why she didn’t want him to leave. She didn’t want to be left alone with a half-breed kid to raise. That was why she’d professed to love him.
Summer could hear his disbelief in his silence. She wrung her hands, clenching her fingers so tightly, the knuckles showed white. She had gone about this all wrong. It had been a mistake to tell Lance about the baby, trying to force his hand without telling him what was in her heart. Perhaps he didn’t care what she felt for him, but he deserved to know. If he still wanted to leave her…No, she wouldn’t think in that defeatist vein. She would get down on her knees if that would make Lance listen.
“Last night…when I thought I had lost you…I thought I would die. But it was before then—when you walked out the last time—that I realized how much I loved you. I was wrong not to trust you, I know that. But even then…even when I thought you might be guilty, I still loved you. I do…I love you, Lance. I don’t care about anything else, anyone else. Lance, please…I’m begging you…don’t leave me.”
He couldn’t answer her. The oxygen seemed trapped in his lungs.
Summer took a gulping breath, trying to stop her tears. “All right. If you truly want to leave…if you can’t bear to live here any longer…then I’ll go with you. Wherever you want.”
“You’d leave here with me? You’d leave your ranch? Your family?”
“I’m your wife,” she said simply, her voice quavering. “My place is with you, beside you. You’re more important to me than anything, anyone.”
And she knew as she spoke the solemn words, they were true. She was willing to face a hostile world at Lance’s side, wherever he chose to go, whatever he chose to do. And yet they now had something else besides themselves to consider.
Her voice lowered to a shaken murmur. “I would like…our children to grow up here at Sky Valley. This land…the life we could have here together…are worth fighting for. But if that isn’t what you want, then I won’t ask you to stay. Just…don’t leave me behind.”
Blindly Lance turned his head toward the window, the disconnected emotions of hope and fear and joy crashing through his mind. Could he dare believe? Was Summer working her wiles on him for some ulterior purpose of her own, or was she telling the truth? Had she really come to love him, as in his most cherished fantasy?
A shadow passed in front of the window just then, blocking out the sunlight. Lance reached for his guns beside the bed, slipping his six-shooter into his palm with the ease of long practice, while Summer froze.
> A moment later they heard footsteps on the connecting porch, then a quiet knock on the front door. Summer could have screamed. Nothing short of an Indian raid should be able to interrupt this crucial, critical moment, when her future and Lance’s hung in the balance.
Spinning on her heel, she went into the other room and flung open the door. Reed was standing there, his arm around a subdued Amelia.
“Is he awake?” Reed asked quietly.