Her Secret, His Child

He was whistling as he juggled his leather briefcase, along with the couple of texts that hadn’t fit inside, to unlock his door. If his luck held out, he’d even have time to check over the paperwork he’d thrown in a manila folder before he’d left home that morning. Just to make sure he hadn’t forgotten anything. Now, where was the blasted thing?

Five minutes later, Ms. Archer still hadn’t arrived, but neither had Kyle found the folder he was looking for.

“I know it’s here,” he mumbled, tossing aside the class planner he’d forgotten to take with him to his American lit class. Not that it mattered. He could conduct his classes blindfolded and textless if he had to.

Finding a couple more folders beneath his personal daily planner, he glanced through them. Nope. One was filled with maps of literary tourist spots on the East Coast The other was his gas-receipt file. Or what would be his gas-receipt file, if he’d ever get around to putting them all in there. He really needed to stick labels on his folders. That’d save him a lot of time. If he could only find the time to do it.

He’d been through every folder on his desk twice, and none of them contained the tax receipts and W-2 forms he needed to give his new accountant. Looking up at the clock on his office wall, he frowned. They’d said 9:30. It was almost 9:45. He wasn’t going to be able to wait much longer.

“The satchel!” He practically sang the words as he remembered where he’d put the tax folder. He’d shoved it in his satchel on the way out to his garage that morning, then promptly forgotten about it when faced with the more important matter of whether or not he’d heard a forecast of snow. He hadn’t driven his beloved mint-condition 1957 Thunderbird in more than a month. Not that he’d taken out the ‘64 T-Bird lately, either. No, he’d only risked the new and easily replaceable ’98 Bird with the maniacal winter drivers of Larkspur Grove.

A quick search proved him correct—the tax papers were in his satchel—after which Kyle paced back and forth in front of his desk for another couple of minutes, waiting. Richard P. Adams. He was the critic who’d written so convincingly about Huck’s moral growth. Two minutes later, Kyle was seated at his desk poring over a text, anxious to meet again with his debaters.

As he reached for a pen, Kyle’s gaze fell on the corner of an envelope that had come in yesterday’s mail. Jamie Archer. Tomorrow, 10:00.

He read the note a second time, and, of course, remembered that he’d called her and asked to change their meeting from 9:30 to 10:00 when he’d realized how close he’d be cutting it to get from class back across campus to his office. He just hadn’t remembered to make a note of the time change on any of his calendars.

In an attempt to make being a slave to his planner a habit, Kyle dutifully zipped open the leather book and flipped to the tabbed page marking that week. He was immensely relieved to find that he had changed the time after all. Hey, maybe he was getting the hang of this time-management thing.

He’d covered a full sheet of the yellow legal pad on his lap, when he heard a light knock at his door.

“Come in,” he called, his head bent as he hurriedly finished the note he’d been writing.

In his peripheral vision he saw a slim figure enter the room. Judging by the way she hovered on the threshold of his office, like an intimidated freshman, he quickly determined that Ms. Archer was the shyest accountant he’d ever met.

“Finished!” he said, looking up with a welcoming smile. He tossed the legal pad on his desk.

Half in and half out of his chair, intending to offer his hand in greeting, Kyle froze. And stared.

“I can’t believe it.” He didn’t realize he’d said the words out loud until he heard his voice mirror his thoughts. “It’s you....”

Based on the shock in her lovely gray eyes, she’d been no more prepared than he.

“You’ve changed.” He said the first thing that came to mind. Her face was older, more mature, though beautifully so. She’d filled out a bit, but only in her breasts and hips. Her hair wasn’t permed anymore, either, and it was a little darker, falling in soft curls down her back. She wasn’t wearing near the amount of makeup she used to wear. And her clothes were completely different, merely hinting at the beautiful body beneath rather than broadcasting her assets. But he’d have known her anywhere. Those eyes had been haunting him for years.

Kyle came around the desk quickly, grabbing her arm as she turned to leave.

“You obviously aren’t as pleased to see me as I am to have finally found you again,” he said.

She still hadn’t spoken a single word. Just stared at him like a trapped bird. Her reaction puzzled him—a lot. The last time he’d seen her had been in that Las Vegas hotel. She’d been sleeping in his bed, a half smile on her face.

What on earth had gone wrong?

“Do you have any idea how many Jarnies I’ve chased down trying to find you?” he asked, smiling at her. Putting people at ease was something he did well. One of his few natural talents.

Had he suddenly lost his touch? She was still staring at him like he was a dead man come to life.

“Wouldn’t you know it.” He continued to hold her arm, though not so tightly that she couldn’t get away from him if she wanted to. “The first time I hear the name and I don’t wonder if just maybe... And it’s the one time it turns out to really be you!”

Okay, so maybe he was rambling. But he couldn’t believe he’d finally found her. The woman of his dreams. Literally.

“I—” She broke off, swallowed, tried again. “You looked for me?”

“Of course!” Kyle couldn’t believe she had to ask. They’d shared some pretty emotional moments, not to mention the best sex he’d ever had.

“Why?”

“Why what?” He was still holding her arm, but only because she felt so good. So warm.

“Why did you look for me?”

Kyle grinned at her, cocking his eyebrows a time or two. Trying desperately to find the warm, funny woman he’d spent the best night of his life with. “Need you ask?”

His answer must have disappointed her somehow. She looked away, down at the floor. He could almost feel her gathering her strength. He just had no idea why she felt she needed it.

“I’d never talked to a woman as openly as I talked to you that night,” he said, forgoing light and easy for complete honesty.

That was better. She was looking up at him again, a question hovering over the panic in her gaze.

“I’ve never met anyone since then that I wanted to repeat the experience with.”

“Talking, you mean?”

Well, the sex, too, but... “Yes.”

Feeling the muscles beneath his hand relax, Kyle took his first full breath since he’d glanced up and seen her standing there. Phew. He’d finally said something right.

“I should probably go,” she said, nodding toward the door. But she still didn’t pull out of his light grasp. Kyle found her passivity rather odd.

“We haven’t even discussed my records yet.” He had to keep her there. At least long enough to be sure that he’d see her again. That she wasn’t going to just disappear the way she had the last time he’d been with her.

“Surely you don’t still want me to do your taxes.”

He frowned, truly puzzled. “Why not?” He could understand a certain reluctance to follow him home and climb with him into his unmade bed—though there was nothing he’d like more at that moment. But what was so alarming—or intimate, for that matter—about taxes? IRS agents would be going over them pretty carefully and he’d never even met them. Not even once....

“Well...because...surely you don’t.”

Now probably wasn’t the time to ask her out to dinner. “Of course I do. Dean Patterson says you’re the best.”

She took a full minute to digest that remark. Or at least Kyle figured that was what she was doing while she stood there silently gazing at him. During the brief time he’d known her, she’d been a woman of few words, a woman who kept most of herself locked away. But by the end of that night, he thought he’d been admitted inside—though just inside—the locked corridors of her mind. He’d been looking forward to exploring those corridors much more fully.

And then she’d vanished.

Jamie’s next comment had nothing to do with taxes. “You cut your hair.”

Ridiculously pleased that she’d given him that much notice, Kyle shrugged. “Made me look older.” He’d worn a ponytail the night she’d met him.

“Looking older’s important?”