His Secret Baby: The Agent's Secret Baby

About to open the rear passenger door, he stopped and looked at her. “For what?” he asked incredulously. “For the ride home?”

“No, for the infant seat.” She felt remiss in being caught so unprepared. But then, this whole pregnancy had caught her unprepared. “I was going to pick one up this weekend.”

“And now you have one,” he told her. “You don’t owe me anything, Eve. The baby’s half-mine, remember?”

Her mouth curved in amusement. “Which half are you claiming?”

“It’s too early to tell,” he quipped. “I’ll get back to you on that.”

After removing the belts from around his daughter, he picked her up and then gently tucked the baby into the crook of his arm as if he’d been doing this all his life. There was no need for Eve to know that he had bought a life-size baby doll at the toy store and had been practicing this since yesterday.

Adam slipped his free hand around her waist, ready to help guide her up the front walk. “Okay, let’s get you both into the house.”

The short distance seemed to stretch out before her like a twenty-mile run. Pressing her lips together, Eve walked up the path on shaky legs. She surrendered her key to Adam and waited for him to unlock the door. Once inside, she headed toward the sofa, relieved to be able to rest.

As she sank down on the sofa, she could feel Adam watching her. She hated letting him see her like this. It wasn’t part of her self-image.

“This is just temporary,” she assured him.

He shifted Brooklyn to his other side. “No reason to believe it’s not,” he agreed.

Under the pretext of closing the door, he looked out and saw the car he’d thought was tailing them pass by in the opposite direction. It was quite possible that the driver was lost, looking for an address in an unfamiliar neighborhood. But he hadn’t lived this long in a dangerous field by being lax. He remained on his guard. The stakes were higher now than they had ever been.

Crossing to the sofa, he laid the baby down in the bassinette that stood beside the sofa. He’d purchased the item yesterday when he’d gone to get the infant seat.

“Look, I have to get back to the shop for a little while.” Sederholm was going to call him this afternoon and he didn’t want to have to take the phone call around her. “But I’ll be back later.”

He had already done more than enough. She needed to process things, to find a way to get used to dealing with all this—without becoming used to having him around.

“You don’t—”

“—have to,” he completed the sentence for her, banking down a wave of impatience. “Yes, I know. But you’re obviously not yourself yet, and taking care of a newborn isn’t a walk in the park.” He remembered how exhausted his mother had been when his baby sister was first born. “It’s demanding. So, unless you have some kind of support system in place, I’ll be hanging around for a week or so until you can get on your feet again.”

“A week?” she echoed.

“Or so,” he added again.

“Or so,” she whispered in disbelief.

She knew her hormones were in flux and she could always blame this roller-coaster ride on them. But right at this moment, sitting in the shade of Adam’s unexpected offer, Eve wasn’t sure if she wanted to laugh—or cry.

Chapter 8 (#ulink_58f4f70c-8bc2-593b-a16b-4f46627d2d60)

“What’s this?”

The question Eve asked pertained to the eight-by-eleven manila envelope Adam had handed her on his way to the kitchen.

Having taken care of business both at New Again, the rare first-edition bookstore in Newport Beach he supposedly owned, and with Sederholm, the latter involving humoring the college student, Adam had made a quick stop to pick up dinner for Eve and himself. He’d gone to an actual Mexican restaurant that had takeout on the side, rather than going to one of the numerous fast-food places that touted familiar Mexican meals. Time might be at a premium, but taste didn’t necessarily have to suffer because of it.

“Dinner,” he answered, assuming that she was asking about the two large white bags he carried into the kitchen. Adam turned to look at her over his shoulder as he deposited the bags on the counter. “Don’t worry, I made sure your portion wasn’t too spicy, in case you’re—you know.” His voice trailed off as he avoided her eyes.

Considering the incredibly intimate contact they’d already shared, not just when they’d made love months ago, but during the far more recent process of bringing their daughter into the world, Eve found it strangely amusing and perhaps more than a little touching and sweet that Adam had turned suddenly shy.

“Well, just for the record, I am ‘you knowing,’” she told him, making no attempt to hide her smile at his polite reference to her breastfeeding, “so that was very thoughtful of you, but I was actually referring to this.” She held up the manila envelope. “What is it?” she asked again.

His back to her, Adam began to take their dinners out of the bags and placed the various wrapped selections on the granite counter. “Insurance.”

She glanced back at the envelope, not sure if she even wanted to open the clasp and peer inside. “Against what?” she asked slowly.

“No, insurance,” he repeated, turning around. She was still holding the envelope in her hands. Most women would have already ripped it open. That made her incredibly devoid of curiosity, he thought. “Life insurance,” he emphasized, adding, “on me,” when her expression remained bewildered.

Eve turned the envelope over in her hands, regarding it the way someone might a brand-new alien life-form—and finding it displeasing.

“Okay. Again, why?” This was completely out of the blue and it made her feel uncomfortable without really understanding why. “Is there something wrong with you?” Even as she asked, the dark suspicion behind the words hit her. “You’re not going to …?”

“Die?” he supplied with a touch of amusement. “Well, I’m not planning on it, but you never know.” Especially considering his real line of work and the kinds of people he found himself dealing with on almost a regular basis. “And if something should happen to me, I want to make sure that Brooklyn’s taken care of.” He’d almost included her in the statement, but his gut told him that she would balk at that. He had more of a chance of her going along with this if she thought only the baby was named as a beneficiary.

Not that she seemed exactly thrilled with this revised version, either.

The expression that came over her face was like a dark storm rolling over the prairie, swallowing the terrain whole.

“What’s the matter?” he prodded. “I’m just doing the responsible thing,” he added when Eve didn’t answer his question.

It hit her then. She knew why he was doing this. If he had really become a responsible person, he would have abandoned the life that had initially caused their separation.

“You’re still involved, aren’t you?” The evenly worded accusation was the only conclusion she could draw. Men his age didn’t ordinarily think about death—unless they dealt with people who could make that sort of thing a reality. “In the drug world,” she emphasized when he raised his eyebrows quizzically. She wasn’t taken in by his act. “You didn’t quit dealing,” she cried angrily. “You lied to me,” she accused, lightning all but flashing from her eyes. How stupid could she have been, believing him when he’d told her dealing was all in his past and he was here for a fresh start without the old ties.

Lies had always come easily to him. He considered them a necessary defense mechanism that he had to use in order to remain alive. What was lying but another form of pretense? Actors “lied” all the time when they assumed a role, pretending to be someone else on the screen or on the stage.

He was merely being a good, convincing actor, that’s all.

But lying to this woman who had borne his child, who had managed to turn his world upside down, that was something else again. For reasons he didn’t have time to fully explore, he found it difficult to continue deceiving her.

However, he had no choice. Far more people were involved than just him. Consequently, it wasn’t entirely his secret to share.

So he twisted around her words. “Are you going to stand there and tell me that everyone who has a life insurance policy is a drug dealer?”

“No, but—”

“But I am, is that it?” His voice was low, quietly echoing barely controlled anger. Adam borrowed a few facts from his life, augmenting them to suit the occasion. “I originally took out this policy so that if anything happened to me, Mona, my kid sister, would be able to take care of herself.” Mentioning his sister, even in passing, brought a wave of irate sadness to him. “Mona was never much good at hanging on to a job. I just wanted to be sure she’d be okay.”

Then why had he given this to her for Brooklyn? She didn’t have to open the envelope to know that he had obviously changed the designated beneficiary. “Where is your sister now?” she asked. An uneasy feeling slipped over her the moment the words were out of her mouth.

She saw his jaw clench. “She died.”

“Oh.” Sympathy flooded her. She knew what it was like to lose someone. More than one someone. “I’m sorry.” Eve bit her lower lip. “What did your sister die of?”

“It doesn’t matter. She’s dead,” he said with such dark finality, Eve felt as if she’d literally been pushed away. He began opening the top drawers that ran along the underside of the counter, looking for utensils. “I changed the beneficiary. The policy’s in trust for Brooklyn until she turns twenty-one.” He spared her a glance. “Until then, if the occasion arises, you manage it for her.” He nodded toward the envelope. “Put that in a safe place.”