Adopt-a-Dad

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

MICHAEL didn’t come near her after that. He must have waited outside, taken Gloria to her hotel and then returned to Maitland Maternity. For the next couple of hours Jenny lay in baffled bewilderment, going over the events of the last few hours in her mind.

Michael had gone to see Gloria. Michael had taken Gary to see her.

Why?

And she knew. She knew!

Where was he? Why didn’t he come? As the afternoon wore on, so did Jenny’s patience. Finally at five o’clock, Shelby bounced in to see her, having given Socks his daily constitutional. Socks led the way, towing Shelby, and both dog and woman stopped in astonishment at the sight of Jenny dressed-in her gorgeous golden dress-and packing her bags. “Where,” Shelby said carefully. “are you thinking of going?”

“Home,” Jenny told her. “It’s time.”

“Does Megan know?”

“Megan’s right behind her.” Megan came into the bedroom carrying a pile of clean diapers. “Of course I know. Like Jenny says, it’s time.”

An hour later, Michael came home from work to dump the paperwork he had to do that evening, before heading around to Megan’s to see Jenny. When he arrived he found his wife and his son and his dog sitting before the living room fire, waiting for him.

“JEN?”

“Michael.” To any onlooker it would appear to be a normal evening after work. Gary was fast asleep in his infant seat by the fire. Jenny looked placidly at her husband as Socks bounded over to greet him. “Welcome home.”

But Michael didn’t feel normal. He put Socks aside with a halfhearted pat and focused on his wife. “Why are you here?”

“Waiting for my husband to return.” She smiled at him. “Like a good and dutiful wife. Socks, go fetch your master’s slippers.”

Socks gave a goofy grin and just sat there. Jenny sighed. “Rats. Some things will never change. Sorry, Michael, you don’t seem to have a docile dog. Will a docile wife do?”

Michael had stopped at the door. Now he felt as if he’d stopped breathing. The world seemed to stand still, waiting.

“I don’t think I’d know what a docile wife was,” he said carefully, and she smiled that gorgeous, blindingly brilliant smile of hers, and rose and came over to him. She was wearing her wonderful dress, he thought, dazed. She was looking just…

Just too desirable for words.

“Michael, thank you,” she said softly, and she caught his hands. The faint scent of her perfume drifted into his orbit.

“Thank you?”

“For seeing Gloria,” she said simply. And then she took a deep breath. “And by doing so…making it possible for me to move forward. To bury Peter.”

“It means you can go home,” he said, and his voice sounded harsh even to him. “The way Gloria is, given some cast-iron guarantees, I’d imagine you could go back to England. She won’t threaten you now.”

“Why would I go back to England?”

“It’s your home.”

“Home is where the heart is,” she said softly, and her hands held his. They were smooth against the roughness of his male skin, and it was all he could do not to pull her forward and gather her into his arms. It was more than a body could stand.

But he must. Still he held himself rigid. Waiting.

“You’ve grown attached,” he said, trying to keep the sudden burgeoning of hope from surging into something he couldn’t control. “I guess.”

She tilted her chin and met his look with the clear-eyed gaze he loved so much. “You guess right. I have.”

“To Socks. To Lana and Shelby and Megan.”

“Yep.”

“And to this place, maybe.” He looked at the fire. “It’s a good place to live.”

“The white furniture has to go.”

“The white furniture can go.” Hell, he sounded like a zombie. “You just say the word.”

“Michael?”

“Mmm.”

“We’re talking around the point here.” She hesitated. All the courage she had deserted her.

But he needed to know. She had to say it. “And the point is?”

There was a long, long silence. He didn’t take his eyes from hers, and their gazes linked and held.

Then, suddenly, Jenny had all the courage she needed right there in her heart. All the courage she needed was written plain on his face. She only had to reach out and take it from him. Use it herself. He’d done so much for her. He’d committed himself so far. It wouldn’t hurt her to take this one last step of trust.

“I couldn’t bear to go back to England, Michael Lord,” she whispered, “and you want to know why not?”

“I… Yes.” It came out a gravelly croak and brought a smile to her lovely eyes. She stood on tiptoes, and she kissed him ever so lightly on the mouth. And still he stood motionless.

“Because I love you, you great ninny,” she scolded. “I think I have for months but I couldn’t admit it, even to myself. But now… Now you’ve unlocked the chains, and you are my own darling husband and I have fallen so in love with you that I can’t bear to think of leaving your side for a moment. Ever. And I’m sorry if you can’t bear to be hemmed in and domesticated, but you did say you were in love with me and that’s what you get when you- Michael!”

The last word was a squeak as she was swept off the floor and spun around the room with a great shout of joyous laughter. “Michael!”

“What?” She stared into his laughing, triumphant eyes as he spun her still. “What, my love?”

“Put me down this instant,” she demanded. “I have more to say.”

“I’m not putting you down.”

“I’ll sic the dog onto you.”

“Yeah, right.” He spun her again. “Really, Jenny? You really love me?”

“How can I know what I feel when I’m so dizzy?” she asked, her gorgeous dress flaring as he spun her around and around. “Michael, put me down!”

And he did.

But it was no help at all. When he whirled her around she was dizzy, but when he set her down, he began to kiss her, and her world tilted so crazily she knew she’d never be in control of it again.

A KNOCK drove them apart.

In fact, it was the fourth knock that did it. Or maybe even the fifth. It was hard to be sure when one set of ears was asleep, two sets heard nothing, and even Socks was too interested in the proceedings to worry about a small thing like visitors. But finally Socks noticed, barked his dire warnings and drew their reluctant attention to the intrusion.

“We’re not home,” Michael said, but Jenny chuckled and pushed herself away to go open the door.

“It’ll be your family-and I love your family almost as much as I love you,” she said serenely. “So learn to share.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

It wasn’t his family. It was the Suits.

Michael groaned.

“Is anything wrong, sir?” Once again, these were different officials, and Michael recognized neither of them. The older one was a woman in neat black, the younger a string bean of a male with a large protruding Adam’s apple. They walked in as Jenny stood aside, and they looked around the living room as if they were inspecting for termites.

“Don’t tell me,” Michael said. “You’re from immigration and are here to kick Jenny out of the country. Gloria changed her mind?”

“I’m sorry?” The woman-Delia, according to her name tag-set her briefcase down with a definite thump. “I don’t know any Gloria. But yes, we’re here to do a check on your wife’s immigration. There was an order that said as soon as the baby’s birth was registered, we needed to make a follow-up visit.”

“That figures.” Gloria had insisted on as much, and she wouldn’t have been able to rescind a request like that. Oh, well. The officials had driven Jenny to him in the first place. He could afford to be civil.

He could afford to be nice to anyone right at this minute, he decided, because Jenny was still looking at him with hungry eyes, and he had a whole lifetime to get to know how to appease that look.

“Okay, let’s do it,” he said firmly, and reached for Jenny’s hand.

“We really just need to check that your wife and child are home now, and we’ll make an interview time later,” the woman said, startled. “I gather the baby’s not very old.”

“Five days. Do it now.”

“Do it…”

“Let’s get this over with.” Michael’s arm came around his wife and held her close. “We have better things to do than answer questions. Like consolidate our marriage. And consolidate and consolidate and consolidate for the next fifty years.”

IN THE END it was a weirdly intimate affirmation of their marriage.

“When did you meet?” Delia asked, while her associate tried to look efficient. As an immigration officer, he made a very good onlooker.

“At work,” Jenny said, but she was hushed by her husband. He held her tight and grinned.

“Nope, Jen. They don’t want to hear that. They want the real story.”

“Real story?”

“There was this slipper,” he said promptly, turning confidentially to the astonished Delia. “Made of glass. Gorgeous, it was. Who could resist a slipper like that-or the girl who was wearing it? It’s taken me ages to find her.” He turned to look at Jenny, and the smile in his eyes lit her from the toes up. “Excuse me, but I just have,” he said softly. “If you two will turn the other way…”

“This is serious,” Delia snapped, while the string bean goggled.

“So are we.” Michael didn’t even bother looking at her. He had eyes only for Jenny. “This is the first evening we’ve been together as a family,” he explained. “I have everyone right where I want them to be. My wife. My son. My dog. If you knew the trouble I’ve had with that darned slipper…”

“The dog won’t fetch it like he’s supposed to,” Jenny explained, joining in with a giggle. “The bother of slippers! To say nothing about pumpkins! Whew. Pumpkins were nearly the end of our marriage. Do you know, my husband expects me to make pumpkin pies! I won’t, of course. That’s my best carriage he’s expecting me to cook.” Then she faltered, turning laughing eyes to Michael. “Whoops. Maybe that was the wrong thing to say? If I refuse to make pumpkin pies, does that mean I can’t be a U.S. citizen?”

“Just answer the questions, please,” Delia said, a trifle desperately, and Michael gave dates and times and places with such aplomb that Jenny could only stare. It was as if he really had been planning to marry her from the very start.

“Are you married?” Michael demanded as Delia paused for breath on page six of her prepared questionnaire.

“Yes, I-”

“What does your husband drink for morning break when he’s at work?”

“I-” The woman stared. “That’s hardly relevant.”

“Yes, it’s relevant. What does he drink?”

“Coffee, I guess,” she said doubtfully, and her partner coughed.

“Actually, Mrs. Lavorn, Stewart always has soda water and a mud cake,” he said apologetically, and cast an embarrassed glance at Michael. “Mr. Lavorn works in my department.”

“Ha!” Michael shook his head. “He’ll have to be deported.”

“What?” Delia cried.

“If you really loved him, you’d notice,” Michael said solemnly. “I watched Jen drink chocolate milk every day for six months. I loved her then and I love her now.” He smiled and took both her hands. “I love the way that curl just twists a little bit across her forehead and bounces. And the fact that she sleeps with her hand curled under her cheek like a child. And she sneezes three times every morning.”

“And he eats his cereal straight from the box when he thinks I’m not watching,” Jenny said with loving severity.

“I do not!”

“You do, too. I caught you,” she said triumphantly. “Just because Socks cleaned up the dropped evidence, you figured I’d never know.”

“And yet you love me!” There was real wonder in his voice.

The laughter died.

“And yet I love you,” she whispered. “Of course I do. Oh, Michael, my love, how could I not?”

“Harrumph,” said Delia, and her partner cleared his throat.

They didn’t notice.

“I love you, too,” Michael murmured into her hair. He’d pulled her close to him, against his heart, right where he intended to hold her for all time. “Jenny, my love, I love you now and I love you forever and forever and forever.”

“I think we might go.” Delia managed to interrupt, and there was a glimmer of a tear in her authoritarian eyes. “I think we have enough to satisfy our needs.”

“If you’ll excuse us,” her partner muttered apologetically.

But there was no need for any excuse. They left, and Michael and Jenny and Gary and Socks didn’t even notice their departure.