Page 36 of Taming a Heartbreaker

Maybe it was time she did her own research. Specifically, on how to stop loving a man who would never love her back.

Chapter Fifteen

Redford knocked on Carmen’s bedroom door and then took a deep breath before slowly exhaling.

“Come in.”

He entered and his gaze immediately went to her. Instead of being in bed, she was sitting on the love seat with her laptop and studying whatever was on the screen. She didn’t even glance up at him.

The brightness from the light in the ceiling seemed to highlight her radiant features. He could imagine having a daughter who looked just like her.

She was wearing a different gown from the one she’d had on earlier. This one had a matching robe. He recalled she had mentioned when he’d brought her dinner that she would shower and go to bed early. Obviously, she had changed her mind about sleep and was on her laptop.

“I just wanted to see if you need anything else before I retire for the night.”

She glanced over at him and smiled. “No, but you might want to key your phone number into my phone. That’s how Leslie and I communicated with each other. It’s over there on the nightstand. The passcode is my birthday.”

He looked at her when he picked up the cell phone. “When is your birthday?”

“August the twenty-first.”

“That’s next month.”

“Yes, and I’m hoping my health improves since Chandra and her family will be back from South Africa by then.”

“Have you told your sister or parents that you’re pregnant?” he asked, glancing over at her while adding his phone number to her contacts.

“No. My parents will be happy to have another grandchild, and my sister would love a niece or nephew.”

He nodded. “Any reason you’ve put off telling them?” He happened to notice on her phone, when the call list popped up, that she talked to them daily.

She crinkled her nose and her brow furrowed before she said, “Yes, there is definitely a reason. There’s no way I could tell them about my pregnancy without mentioning how sick I am. Chandra would shorten her trip and come home immediately if she knew. And my parents would come, too. The last thing I need is to have all of them here making me feel helpless. I’m hoping by the time I tell them I’ll be back to my old self. Have you told your parents?” she asked him.

He placed her phone back down on the nightstand and eased into the chair beside her bed. He saw she had closed her laptop so he figured she was finished with it for tonight. “No, I haven’t told them for basically the same reason you haven’t told yours. This will be their first grandchild. A grandchild they never thought they would have.”

He shook his head and chuckled. “It would not have mattered if your pregnancy had been smooth sailing the entire nine months. My mother would have shown up on your doorstep anyway. Just to get to know you, the future mother of her grandchild. Trust me, you would never have gotten rid of Lorelei St. James.”

He watched her smile spread and couldn’t help thinking for the umpteenth time just how kissable her lips looked. “What about your father?”

He chuckled again. “Dad would have waited for an official invitation. But not Mom.”

“I have a feeling I’m really going to like her.”

He had a feeling his mother would like Carmen as well. Already he knew there would be problems. He didn’t know about her parents but he knew his would expect them to marry, which wouldn’t be happening. “How will your parents handle the fact that we won’t be getting married, Carmen?”

“They will handle it just fine. They stopped meddling in my and Chandra’s lives when we left home for college. That’s the one thing I’ve always appreciated about them. Besides, I will assure them I will be married when I have my second child.”

Why was tension suddenly building in his body? There was no way he could be jealous of the thought of her marrying one day. Any man would appreciate a woman like her. Even him, if he was the marrying kind. But he wasn’t. He figured the tension was the result of thinking that the man she would marry might assume that his child would be more important in their family dynamics than hers and Redford’s.

All it took was for him to recall David Lattimer, a guy who went to college with him, Sloan and Tyler. David lived across the hall in their dorm and when they noticed he never went home during the holidays or school breaks, they’d inquired why. That’s when he’d told them all the horror stories of the torment he’d endured with a stepfather while growing up.

Redford refused to let his child go through such a thing. He would demand custody of him or her before anything like that happened. There was no need to get Carmen upset by telling her that now. Besides, for all he knew, the guy she eventually married might be swell. If Redford thought that, then why was even more tension building inside of him?

“Can I get you anything before I leave, Carmen?”

Hadn’t he asked her that already? Why was he asking again? And why had he suddenly become aware of her outfit when she stood? Because she’d been sitting down, he hadn’t realized just how short the nightgown and robe were. The hem fell halfway down her thighs. The yellow silk robe seemed to hug every curve on her body and the color seemed to make her skin glow.

He wanted to call himself all kinds of names when lust invaded his thoughts. His gaze roamed all over her, and it took every ounce of willpower he could muster to hold back the desire permeating his body. Why did her legs look so sleek? The fit of the top of the gown did a good job exposing the shape of her breasts. She definitely looked too sexy for his peace of mind.

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