To Catch A Wife

“That night when we were...together. Something sort of...um...unexpected happened.”

An uneasy sensation pooled in his gut.

“What do you mean by something un—” But his question wasn’t even fully formed when the answer hit him like a commuter train. Emily didn’t say anything. She simply waited as his scattered emotions became a single, coherent thought.

“Are you saying you’re...?”

She nodded.

Pregnant? His ability to think rationally had disappeared. No way. Not possible. It had been one night. One night. They’d been careful. He had been careful. These things were not supposed to happen to people who were careful.

“You’re sure?”

Another nod.

He walked to the door, taking in the street, the buildings, the people he knew so well. Everything looked as it always had. Perfectly normal. He swung around and took a long, hard look at Emily.

“Completely sure?”

“One hundred percent.”

Just this morning he had thought Emily Finnegan was the kind of woman he could possibly, someday, maybe fall in love with. Now she was having a baby. His baby. He was going to be a father. And then his mother’s unwelcome voice penetrated his thoughts. A father who isn’t married to the baby’s mother. What do you think people are going to say about that?

“We’ll get married,” he blurted. “Right away, as soon as you want.” The declaration caught him completely off guard.

Emily gaped at him. “Married? Are you out of your mind?”

“What did you expect me to say?”

Emily sprang to her feet. “I don’t know. ‘How did this happen?’ ‘What are you going to do about it?’”

He couldn’t help himself. He grinned. “I know how it happened. I was there, remember?” Then he sobered. Why would she think he would ask what she was going to do about it? Unless...no. He moved toward her, but she ducked out of reach.

Okay, not exactly the response he would have liked.

“Are you planning to do something about it?” he asked.

She nodded. “Have it, raise it.”

Her declaration was meant to be defiant, but it had him breathing a little better. She might not make this easy, but he had to do the right thing.

“Okay, then. We’ll raise it together.”

“Right.” Emily rolled her beautiful brown eyes. “That’ll be easy for two parents who live three hundred miles apart. Easy, until the next big case comes along, and you forget all about us for months on end. Yeah, that’s going to work.”

“Come on, Emily. I’m sorry I didn’t call. I know you think I’m a thoughtless jerk, but I’m not. Give me a chance to prove it.”

“And how do you plan to do that?”

He couldn’t believe he was about to say what he was about to say. “We’ll get married. You can move to Chicago. I’ll take care of you and the baby and...”

Horrified didn’t come close to describing her expression.

“What?” he asked.

“Oh, gee. Let me see. There is no way I’m moving to Chicago, and we hardly know one another, so I am not going to marry you.”

“Emily, we’ve known each other for years.”

“We’ve been acquainted for years. Big difference.”

“They’re basically the same things.”

“All right, then,” she said, offering up a challenge. “What’s my favorite color?”

He looked her up and down, as though her wardrobe might offer up a clue. “Yellow?”

“Wrong.”

“What’s my middle name?”

Hmm. Should he know this? Had it been mentioned during her nephew’s baptism, when the two of them had become godparents? Emily...? Emily...? He had no idea.

“When’s my birthday?” she asked, relentlessly hammering her point home.

Again, no idea. None whatsoever.

“See? You don’t know anything about me, but you think getting married is a good idea. You think I should walk away from my family and my job and everything I’ve ever known, follow you to Chicago and sit around in an apartment...or a house or wherever you live...waiting for you to get unbusy enough to be a husband and a father?”

“I don’t know, Emily. We’re about two minutes into a conversation I never expected to be having. We’re going to be parents, and I’m trying to do the right thing.”

“A marriage between two people who don’t know one another is not the right thing, so it can’t possibly be the best thing for the baby.”

Was she serious? “What do you suggest?” he prompted. “I ask you out on a date, so we can ‘get to know’ each other?”

“That would be a start.”

She was serious. “You want me to take you out to dinner and a movie? Drive you home? Leave you at the front door with a good-night kiss?”

She sucker-punched him with her smile. “That’s as good a place to start as any.”

Oh, man. She was dead serious. Women. Heaven help him. He would never understand them.

“Fine. We’ll do this your way. I’ll pick you up at six o’clock.”

“Tonight?”

“Tonight.”