“Don’t believe everything you hear, Strickland,” she said, her tone reminding him of the friendly woman he’d known so briefly that weekend between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Very different from the self-conscious though still capable Caroline she’d been since arriving in Shelter Valley. “Kentucky women come from strong stock. Goodness, if they had to slow down the whole time they were pregnant, their families and farms would be in trouble. A small farm doesn’t run itself, you know.”

  An iguana—a desert lizard—scooted by an inch from John’s shoe. Caroline watched it go.

  “They’re kind of cute,” she said as it scurried away. “I read that they’re good to have around your yard at home because they eat crickets.”

  “And other bugs,” John agreed. He didn’t want to talk about desert plants or wildlife anymore.

  “Listen, Caroline,” he said, not even sure what she’d be listening to. Compelled by an uneasy feeling inside, he continued anyway. “As you say, that baby you’re carrying is as real as any other child conceived. He’s also my flesh and blood, and I’m not the type of man who can turn away from that responsibility. I don’t even want to.” He was surprised to find that much was true. “I’d like to be around to hear that first heartbeat. Or at least some of the heartbeats. I want to hear what the doctor has to say about his size and growth and overall health. I want to see the ultrasound that might tell us if he’s a boy or a girl.”

  God, he couldn’t breathe. And he didn’t know how in hell he was going to make any of this happen. Or follow through on it. They were discussing a new life. And his world revolved around the memory of a dead woman.

  “Okay.”

  He blinked. Stared at her. And then down into the ravine. He loved the browns and golds of the desert. But sometimes that green just looked so good. Cool and peaceful and…breathing.

  “Really?”

  She nodded. “You’re his father. I have no right to deny you access to his life. As long as you understand that except where it’s absolutely necessary, you have no role in my life.”

  That was that. Much easier than he’d expected.

  Then why did he feel so…out of his league? Why did he feel he wanted to start running and not stop until he collapsed on the ground?

  Meredith should be here. Spending the next months with him. Learning it all with him.

  But she wasn’t. The pain of that was almost unbearable. As he’d known it would be. When he’d lost Meredith, he’d vowed never to have children. She’d been too much a part of that dream.

  And now here he was, having a child with a woman he barely knew.

  He should resent Caroline.

  But he didn’t.

  “CAN I ASK YOU something?”

  Caroline glanced over at him, her auburn hair glinting in the light from the setting sun. “I guess.”

  John didn’t know how it had happened, but they’d been there for over an hour. Sometimes talking. A lot of the time lost in their own thoughts. There was so much to discuss, so many decisions to make. But he didn’t really feel like doing these things. And, perhaps, neither did she.

  He pulled out the bottles of water, opened one and handed it to her before taking a long swig from his own.

  “Why did you react so strongly when I referred to the pregnancy as a predicament?”

  She took a small sip of water. Recapped the bottle. Held it with both hands on the rock between her knees. He wasn’t used to spending time with women who didn’t wear makeup and was surprised by how much he liked the freshness of her natural beauty when she turned toward him.

  “Have you ever looked in the mirror and wondered where you belonged?”

  “No, I don’t think so,” John said slowly, watching her.

  “Or considered the idea that your life was worth less than the lives of those around you?”

  “No.” He’d had the usual teenage insecurities, of course. But his parents had always encouraged him to believe that the world was his to do with what he could. He’d been dreaming big his whole life.

  Until the dream came crashing down.

  “I have,” she said.

  And although he didn’t want to know, he had to ask. “Why?”

  She wasn’t going to tell him. He’d overstepped the boundaries she’d set less than an hour before. Her chin was set, her eyes showing very little of the emotion that he suspected must be roiling around inside her.

  And then her mouth softened, her eyes focusing on the distance, perhaps a farther distance than the vista spread before them.

  “For starters, I was an only child,” she began. “On a farm out in the country in Kentucky. That in itself is very isolating. And no matter what I did, I never fit in. Not at home with my folks. And not at school, either. I was different from everyone else. Saw the world differently. When it came time to make decisions, my opinions were almost always opposite to my parents’. Things that mattered to me didn’t seem to concern them, and a lot of the time, the reverse was true.”

  Caroline pulled her feet up on the rock, the worn, rounded toes of her brown leather boots hanging over the edge. Arms wrapped around her knees, she shifted back slightly. John wondered what she was thinking.

  “I had this insatiable need to know. Not what other people in town were doing, or who was marrying whom, but why the sun rose and how. And where air came from. I wanted to know who was in national office and I cared about every major decision out of Washington.” Her grin was a little sad. “My poor parents. They were worried about having enough fertilizer for the field and finding ways to make the equipment last another year while I went on about global warming. I’m sure I drove them crazy.”

  Mesmerized, John didn’t move. He didn’t want to do anything that might remind her he was still there, make her aware that she was opening up to him after just telling him he could play no part in her personal life. He didn’t want to lose this glimpse of her.

  When he’d first met Caroline Prater he’d found her an interesting enigma. And—not that he allowed himself to dwell on that night—she’d been a pretty decent lover, as well. Now he was just plain intrigued. He’d never known anyone with so many facets. All of them different. And all of them sparkling in their own way.

  “Anyhow, one day when I was about seven, I yelled at my mother in a fit of frustration, telling her I couldn’t possibly be her kid because she didn’t care that a popular hamburger chain—I’d only eaten out twice in my life and both times it had been there—was being accused of stealing characters from my favorite television show, H.R. Pufnstuf.”

  A quick grin accompanied her words before her focus turned once again to the desert. “You can imagine how surprised I was—and how little I suddenly cared about the company’s ad campaign—when my mother yelled back that I wasn’t her child. I was adopted.”

  Shit. What a way to tell a seven-year-old kid something as earth-shattering as that. John didn’t know what he could possibly say that would make any difference. So he said nothing.

  “I’d already been considering that I’d been planted in Grainville by aliens.” She laid her cheek on top of her knee. “From that point on, I quit fighting. I’d already been rejected by one set of parents. What would happen if the second set decided I was too much trouble?”

  John, not detecting even a note of self-pity in her tone, wondered for a split second what it would’ve been like if he’d met her at a different time. Say fifteen years before, when they were both starting out.

  He had a feeling he’d have liked her. A lot.

  “I spent the next ten years of my life feeling like I didn’t belong anywhere. In a town as small as Grainville, where everyone belongs to everyone else, feeling that way wasn’t easy.”

  He wondered what had happened to her at seventeen to change that but didn’t ask.

  She stood up, brushed herself off, gave a shaky laugh. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to go on like that,” she said, heading back the way they’d come. “Put it down to overprotectiveness. I just don’t want any child of mine feeling that way. Not if I can help it.”

  Propelled by something he didn’t dare analyze, John caught up to her, grabbing her hand only long enough to pull her to a stop. She turned, facing him. “I may not have chosen these circumstances,” he said, his eyes locked with hers. “But that baby will always know I love him and want him in my life.”

  Tears pooled in her eyes before she blinked them away, nodded and began walking again.

  “NOT TO KEEP HARPING on it, but I’d really like to know what you’re planning to do about medical care,” John said as they sped down the highway toward Shelter Valley. Caroline had said that Bea Howard served dinner at five-thirty sharp and they’d stayed longer in the desert than he’d intended.

  “I’ve called the clinic in Shelter Valley. The obstetrician there can take me.”

  “Do you have insurance?” She didn’t answer immediately and he continued. “Because under my insurance, the baby will be covered completely, but the pregnancy won’t. I’m prepared to handle that with cash.”

  “That won’t be necessary.”

  “Caroline,” John said, taking his eyes from the road for just a second and glimpsing the bland look on her face, “we’ve already established that I’m going to carry at least half the burden over the next seven or so months. Obviously we can’t divvy up the physical challenges, so I’ll have to do my share on a more, shall we say, detached level. Expenses would fall nicely into that category.”

  “Okay.”

  Another glance showed him that her expression hadn’t changed. More than ever, he wanted to know what went on behind that unrevealing look. He suspected it was the result of a lifetime spent hiding her curiosities and opinions.

  In any event, there was nothing for him to do about it.

  “So, when’s the first appointment?”

  “I haven’t made it yet.”

  “I’d like to be there.”

  And at the instant shake of her head, he quickly added, “Not for the examination part.” He didn’t want to embarrass her. “Just to sit in on the talk with the doctor afterward.”

  She hesitated too long. “Okay.”

  “You’ll let me know as soon as you have an appointment?” he pushed, not sure whether she’d acquiesced or was merely placating him.

  “I’m hoping to get in sometime during the next week, before school starts.”

  Okay, then, she’d meant it. Good. They were getting somewhere. “I can go any day but tomorrow.”

  “Fine.”

  “A large group of us are going to Phoenix tomorrow,” he explained when it occurred to him that she might think he was putting her off for a golf date or an appointment at work. “One of our young women is a witness in a court case and Shelter Valley plans to be there in full support.”

  “Ellen Moore’s rape case,” she said so softly he almost didn’t hear her. “I’m glad you’re all going.”

  Having just come off the ramp from the freeway, John kept his foot on the brake and stared. “How did you know about that?”

  “It was in the papers,” she said. “There was a lot of coverage, probably because someone rich and powerful is involved. Anyway, I’ve been following the story on the Internet and knew it was set for trial.”

  And she remembered the date? Impressive. John’s heart was pumping a little faster than normal as he pulled into town. He couldn’t afford to feel anything for this woman. Especially considering the responsibilities they were going to be sharing for the next eighteen years. Raising a child would be hard enough without personal tension between them.

  But damn, it wasn’t fair that a woman as intelligent and pretty and downright interesting as Caroline Prater—a woman almost thirty-five years of age—was still so desperate for a place to belong that she was developing bonds with people she’d never even met.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  SHELTER VALLEY WAS probably quieter on that second Thursday in January than any of the other days Caroline had been there. But as she walked downtown midafternoon, learning her way around, window-shopping for things she might never be able to afford, she certainly felt as though the town was drained of life. She didn’t need to turn her head to catch a glimpse of her sister or any of the other people she knew only from grainy newspaper photos. The town’s mayor, Becca Parsons, and her husband, Will, who was the president of Montford University. Or Cassie Montford, the vet who’d been in the news with her innovative pet-therapy program. Caroline had followed the story avidly, as Phyllis had collaborated with Cassie in the therapy portion of the program.

  There was no point in thinking the dark-haired woman on the corner was Bonnie Nielson, owner of the local day care, who’d made various Arizona newspapers because she’d developed a nationally known program for children and seniors together.

  Today Caroline didn’t have any chance of running into Beth Richards, wife of the local sheriff, Greg. She’d read an article about Beth when, as a fugitive, she’d turned state’s evidence in Texas on a cult she’d inadvertently been part of with her ex-husband. Nor was she going to see Martha Marks or her new husband, preacher David Cole Marks. Ellen’s mother and the minister who’d helped track down her rapist would undoubtedly be sitting on either side of her in that courtroom in Phoenix.

  With a hand on her still-flat stomach, Caroline smiled at an older woman who was entering into Weber’s Department Store and decided she should head home. If the online version of the Phoenix newspaper was going to report Ellen’s trial—and she suspected it would, since it involved some of Phoenix’s most powerful men and the breakup of a large prostitution ring—the link would probably be up before her fellow townspeople returned home.

  SHE HAD TO REFRESH her browser a couple of times, but before dinner that evening, and after her weekly call to her mother from the cell phone that didn’t charge extra for long-distance, Caroline was watching a video of the first day of jury selection online. Of course the clip was only a couple of minutes long. But it was enough to give a sense of being involved in something that meant so much to the people she was hoping would someday accept her as one of their own. The accompanying news story was fairly detailed, painting a courtroom picture that was both heartbreaking and inspiring.

  Later that evening, she turned to her journal.

  Thursday, January 13, 2005

  I wish I could’ve been there today! I saw all the Shelter Valley people outside the courthouse. Apparently the news reporter thought the town’s collective support noteworthy. It was just a glimpse and yet it affected me so deeply I can’t quite get away from the feeling. They were like one huge supportive family. In the clip I managed to see, Matt Sheffield, my sister’s husband, was holding Randi and Zack Foster’s son, Billy. Randi is Will Parsons’ youngest sister. I recently saw the little boy in a photo in the Shelter Valley paper. He’d been in his uncle Will’s arms at a university function over Christmas or I wouldn’t have known him. Outside the courthouse, Becca Parsons was standing with Ellen and her family. Ben Sanders’s adopted daughter, Alex, stood close beside her stepmother, Tory, who was with Phyllis.

  I couldn’t see Phyllis well—it was a side shot of her—but just getting confirmation that she’s really here made my stomach jump. It does somersaults every time I think about actually seeing her, speaking to her. Sometimes I think I can’t possibly wait until next week when school starts. And sometimes I think I won’t dare go to school for fear of meeting her. What if I act like a country hick and she can’t stand me? What if she somehow recognizes me and is livid that I’ve come here, disrupting her life? I’ve sure read enough about birth families to know that’s a very common response. Ohhh. One step at a time. And today’s step is to occupy the next few hours until bedtime.

  I saw John in the still. He was in the background, slightly apart from everyone else. Kind of odd that he’d go all that way to join in the town’s support, and then not stand with them. He was wearing a tie. I haven’t seen that since the first night I met him.

  And there was a woman there, behind John, that I think I recognized—she’s noteworthy only because I can’t place her! Silly, I know, but I’m kind of relieved about that. I’d begun to worry that I might be getting too obsessed with this crazy need to connect to Phyllis’s life. The woman’s probably someone’s sister.

  Mostly what I have to say is—I’m jealous of Tory Sanders and her obvious closeness with Phyllis. I know I shouldn’t be. But I am. I hate that about myself.

  STANDING AT THE EDGE of the crowd gathered outside the little Italian place in downtown Phoenix that the entire Shelter Valley crew had chosen for dinner after leaving court, John knew a moment that was as near perfect as he’d had in years. They were a family of sorts, all these neighbors and friends. Supporting each other.

  A wonderful thing for a man without loved ones. And the safety offered by their number was somehow pleasing, insuring a measure of distance. John could know them all—share his life with them all—without a single one of them getting too close.

  “John, congratulations on the new projects!” Sam Montford, Jr., grandson of Shelter Valley’s founder, said, holding out his hand for a friendly shake, as they all said their good-byes in the parking lot after dinner. “Will just told me you won the bid.”

  John nodded. “I—”

  “Oh, my God!”

  “He’s here someplace.”

  “Everyone look for Billy!”

  Sam and John turned together as the alarmed ripple spread around the crowd, whatever John had been about to say completely forgotten.

  “What’s going on?” Sam’s urgent question was directed at Greg Richards, Shelter Valley’s sheriff, as he pushed through the crowd, his expression grim.

  “Randi told Billy he could climb that little wall to the side of the front door. She turned to answer a question and when she turned back, Billy was gone.”

  Without a word, or another wasted second, John moved forward through the panicking crowd of friends. What they needed right now was a cool head—someone who wasn’t emotionally involved. They needed him.