A Baby of Her Own (Dundee, Idaho #1)(56)
Author: Brenda Novak

“I appreciate the fact that you’re here,” Millie said, nodding stiffly like an old schoolteacher about to rap his knuckles with a ruler. “We thought it would be prudent to discuss what should be done about this situation.”

“I told them it’s none of their business, but they won’t listen to me,” Rebecca piped up.

Delaney was moaning something about living in a small town and how maybe she should’ve grown up a ward of the state, but Millie was clearly too provoked by Rebecca’s challenging tone to pay Delaney much attention.

“This baby is my grandchild, which definitely makes what happens here my business.”

The waitress delivered some chips and salsa, and Rebecca began eating, but no one else seemed interested. Delaney stopped muttering, but she looked too ill to eat, and too tired to deal with a conversation as potentially upsetting as this one. Conner felt a sudden impulse to tell them all that she needed to go home and rest, that they could handle this later. But then he reminded himself that she was the reason they were all here in the first place—and that maybe he could use Millie and Ralph’s help.

“So, what do you have to say?” he asked, directing his question to Millie. It was Delaney who answered. “Nothing. She has nothing to say. Aunt Millie and Uncle Ralph are just…To understand what they’re doing, you’d have to know them. They mean well. Just keep telling yourself they mean well. It’ll help.”

“We’re trying to make sure you do the right thing,” Aunt Millie said.

“And what is that?” Rebecca muttered between chips. “You think he should marry her even though he doesn’t like her?”

“A child needs a mother and a father,” Ralph said. “What’s wrong with the younger generation, anyway?” he asked Millie.

“I’m not that young. I’m thirty years old,” Delaney said.

No one responded.

“Marriage might sound like a great solution, but it’ll never work,” Rebecca argued.

“Is anyone listening to me?” Delaney cried.

“Then, they should’ve thought of that before they—” Ralph glanced at Millie “—before.”

Delaney sat up taller. “This is my life and my baby.”

Rebecca leaned forward, crunching chips as she talked. “Don’t you think putting a child through a painful divorce would be more harmful than never giving that child a father to begin with, Ralph?”

“My baby will have its father,” Conner stated in no uncertain terms.

“See?” Rebecca drew the salsa closer to her. “Problem solved. He’s going to be a father to the baby.”

Millie levered her upper body halfway across the table, coming almost nose to nose with Rebecca. “Why don’t you just stay out of this?”

“Why don’t you let Delaney—”

Delaney stood up, the decisiveness of her movements finally catching everyone’s attention. “Time out,” she said. “That’s it. Conner and I are leaving.”

Millie and Ralph blinked up at her. Even Rebecca looked mildly surprised. “What is it, dear?” Millie asked.

“This is between Conner and me. We’ll decide what’s going to happen with our baby and what isn’t. Then we’ll let you know.”

Our baby. The words alone felt like someone had just dumped a bucket of ice water over his head. And here he was trying to make matters worse by adding a wife!

Millie wore an injured expression, but Delaney gathered her purse and slipped out of the booth.

“I’m going with you,” Rebecca said, sounding equally indignant.

Delaney shook her head. “No, like I said, this is between Conner and me. We’ll talk, then I’ll call you all later.”

Rebecca assumed the same injured expression Millie wore, but Delaney ignored it and turned to him. “Are you coming with me or not?”

He watched her staring down at him, her dark hair pulled back, her face scrubbed clean of makeup, and wondered, for the first time, if marriage, even a convenient marriage like this, would really be so bad. He wanted more for his child than what he’d experienced in his own life. He wanted legitimacy, a conventional home, a strong marriage, a complete family. It was all just a little premature.

And he wasn’t sure he could get there working backward….

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

DELANEY SAT in the old white pickup, refusing to look at Conner as he drove, even when he pulled off the main highway onto a side street that ended in a cul-de-sac of unfinished lots.

“This okay?” he asked, stopping in front of a mustard-yellow subdivision map that announced the sale of five quarter-acre lots.

She nodded. He shifted into park and let the truck idle, and she turned to face him, wondering what in the world they were going to say to each other after this morning.

At first they said nothing. They sat staring at each other as though the silence was too profound to break.

“You’re still not gaining any weight,” Conner finally said.

“Not yet,” she responded. “But I will.”

“When?”

She shrugged. “Soon.”

“What happens if you don’t?”

“I could miscarry. Then all your problems would be solved, right?”

He slung one arm over the steering wheel and squinted into the distance, toward the mountains. “I’m not hoping you’ll miscarry,” he said gruffly.

“Then, what are you hoping for? We can’t go back in time.”

He didn’t answer her question, but he asked one of his own. “Why did you go to Boise in the first place? What happened to falling in love before making a baby? You’re a beautiful woman with a—” he hesitated “—great body. You’re well-liked around here. What were you thinking?”

Uncomfortable with his scrutiny, she turned back to the window, which overlooked green, waving grass and, farther off, a stand of shady trees. “I’m thirty years old and I haven’t met anyone special. I wanted a baby before it was too late, and I was afraid it would never happen.” She looked at him again. “Haven’t you ever done anything wrong, not out of some diabolical urge to hurt and destroy, but simply because you wanted something so badly?”

He sighed. “Actually, I’ve done plenty of things wrong, but I’ve always erred on the side of giving up too soon. I’ve never really fought for anything—until now.”