Excuse Me? Whose Baby?: Excuse Me? Whose Baby? / Follow That Baby!

It was true that Dex had given him the brush-off when he asked to see her again. That didn’t excuse his rushing to propose to someone else.

“Just because you might or might not be engaged has no bearing on custody,” she said. “Annie needs parenting now, not whenever your fiancée gets around to giving you an answer.”

Jim’s dark eyes probed hers. She felt, as she had at the Christmas party, the intensity of his will. “I think we should hold this discussion over lunch,” he said. “In private.”

Burt glanced at his watch. “Good idea. I don’t mean to hurry you, but I have another client arriving in a few minutes. By the way, I can have Ayoka’s furnishings and clothes delivered to your house this afternoon if you like, Jim.”

“That would be fine. Dex?”

She hated the sense of being herded like a wandering sheep. Also, she wasn’t crazy about the prospect of spending time alone with Jim Bonderoff, even if it involved free food.

But she had a responsibility to make sure Annie found a proper family. Dex lifted her chin defiantly. “Sure,” she said. “I’d be happy to talk.”

3

JIM ALMOST WISHED he’d brought his European sedan instead of his sports car. It was hard fitting Annie’s car seat into the back, and a real challenge wedging and strapping the stroller and Dex’s bike half in and half out of the trunk.

Nevertheless, once he got into the driver’s seat, he enjoyed squeezing his long legs against Dex’s soft warmth. There were advantages to being cramped.

He chose not to question his physical response to her too closely. That night of the faculty party, he’d blamed it on a few too many drinks. Today, he ascribed his reaction to that delirious spring fever known locally as Clair De Lunacy.

All this had nothing to do with Nancy Verano, his soon-to-be fiancée. She was a special case, apart from day-to-day reality.

“So,” he said as he whipped out of the parking garage into a break in traffic, “what was that business about you going away? When you told me that, I got the idea you were moving. Otherwise I’d have called.”

“I meant I was going away for Christmas vacation.” She squirmed as far to the right as possible. His knee still grazed her thigh, and he didn’t bother to move it.

“You’re sure you weren’t trying to get rid of me?” he persisted.

“Would you be angry if the answer’s yes?”

“Not angry,” he answered. “Puzzled.”

They flared through a yellow light and picked up speed, heading toward the town’s outskirts. The wind coming through the window made Dex’s mane dance around her head like a living thing. “Puzzled as to why I didn’t utterly succumb to your charms?”

“Actually, you did,” Jim reminded her.

“It was the eggnog,” she said. “President Martin made it himself. He loads it with booze.”

Jim had made the same excuse to himself, but hearing it from Dex bothered him. Not that his ego was bruised by the possibility that a woman might embrace him while drunk and reject him when sober.

Still, he’d experienced blissful sexual abandon with this woman, and all indications had been that she’d felt the same way. So why didn’t she want a rematch?

“It wasn’t necessary to make excuses,” he said. “I can take no for an answer.”

She frowned. “I don’t know why I misled you. It’s just that you’re not my type.”

She wasn’t his type, either. At least, he hadn’t thought so until he got to know her.

For someone so small, Dex had a luscious body, full-breasted and slim-waisted. Jim recalled one particular position, when he’d lain on the floor while she lowered herself onto him. They’d both cried out in pure agonized pleasure.

“We certainly fit together well enough,” he said.

“I’m not like the women you usually date,” she said.

They roared through the arching wrought-iron gates of Villa Bonderoff. “How would you know?”

“I’ve seen your picture in the paper at society goings-on,” said the unwitting mother of his child. “Your dates are always tall and skinny.”

“Really? I hadn’t noticed.” Jim tried to picture Nancy. His former high-school sweetheart was taller than Dex, definitely, and he didn’t think her breasts were as big, although they’d never gone far enough for him to find out for sure.

He couldn’t see her very clearly in his mind. It was odd, since they’d known each other for twenty years.

The driveway swooped uphill, winding between low trees. Although he’d built the house four years ago, Jim never lost his awe at veering around a corner and catching sight of the white Mediterranean-style swirl of rooms and balconies.

“Wow.” The syllable burst from Dex, followed by the dry comment, “Not exactly cozy.”

“Annie will have plenty of space and lots of toys.” He swung to the right, bypassing the front guest-parking bay. “The best schools and camps, and a horse if she wants one.”

“Is that what you think makes a kid happy? Possessions?” Dex demanded.

“I realize we have different lifestyles.” Jim chose not to harp on the shabby state of her apartment. “But wealth doesn’t preclude love, you know.”

She sat in silence as the car turned into a side driveway that led to the six garages. The butler had left the station wagon outside in one of the striped parking spaces, and Jim slotted the sports car next to it.

He wondered if Dex’s reticence meant he’d scored a point. He hoped so, because he wanted this child more than he’d ever wanted anything, and that was saying a lot.

Annie bubbled with glee as he got out and lifted her from the car seat. Those big brown peepers of hers darted from his face to Dex’s, and then across the sweep of pink bougainvillea tumbling over a retaining wall.

“I called ahead to have my butler fix lunch,” he told Dex as she joined him and Annie on the pavement. “He promised he’d send someone out for formula and baby food.”

“Someone?” Dex trooped alongside as Jim strolled toward the house, taking three steps for every two he made. “How many people work here?”

“Not many,” he said. “There’s Rocky, the butler. And the gardener and the maid.”

“Do they live here?”

“They have apartments over the garages.”

“They sound like kindred spirits,” she said.

Unaccountably, Jim felt a prick of jealousy.

They mounted a curving stone staircase from the driveway to the garden above. The many levels of the site had been one of its primary appeals, although Jim had experienced some regrets later when he saw the problems it created for Rocky. His butler had lost a leg while serving in the Marines.

Still physically fit at forty-one, Rocky hated having anyone give him special treatment, though. He’d always been tough, and he still was.

Come to think of it, Rocky probably figured kids ought to be treated like Marine recruits. For the first time, Jim felt a twinge of worry at the possibility that Annie might not fit into his household quite as easily as he’d assumed.