Page 69 of Miracles and Marriage
“If you came every weekend, you could finish in a couple of months,” she said, jotting some more notes.
“I do have a company to run,” he said.
“Delegate.”
She looked over at him and met his gaze.
He stared at her for a moment. “Maybe.” He closed his eyes again.
Zoe was happy to doodle on her paper, capturing different tasks and listing the order she’d prioritize things.
“We need to get a hotel room,” Cal said a few moments later.
He’d been thinking about taking Zoe to bed ever since they sat down. It was for the sake of the baby, he told himself. He lied. He wanted her.
“A hotel? I thought we’d stay here,” Zoe said.
“There’s only a single bed in my old room. The guest room’s bed is equally small as you know from your last visit. And I don’t feel right about using Uncle Hal’s.”
She nodded.
“That makes sense. But we can’t stay at a hotel every time we come, that would be silly when you own this house. Maybe you should get a bigger bed in your room.”
“You won’t be coming every time. Just when we need to try for the baby,” he said.
She went still. He opened his eyes and looked at her. She was staring at the list she’d just made.
“You’re right—what was I thinking,” she said in a quiet voice.
Had he said something wrong?
“You can come if you want,” he said.
Her smile looked phony and she wouldn’t look at him.
“Don’t be silly. This is your family home. I’ll get the list of tasks printed out and give it to you. I’ll have lots to do on other weekends. No time to come down every week.”
She carefully wrote another line on her tablet.
Cal wished he knew what was going through her mind. Did she actually want to come with him? The sooner he got the house fixed up, the sooner he could rent it out and have one less thing to worry about.
Could Zoe already be pregnant? Once they knew for sure, would the nights together stop? Cal studied her as she kept her gaze on the tablet. He’d never had such a close relationship with another woman. He’d never lived with anyone but his uncle. Never considered moving in together with any women he’d dated. They’d been dates, not possible mates.
He was startled. Was he thinking of Zoe as a possible mate?
If she became pregnant, if she had his child, he was willing to make a family unit—for the sake of the child.
Or was it also for his sake? He hadn’t spent a lot of time with Uncle Hal in the years after he graduated from high school. First there was the army, then college, getting Protection, Inc, started. Would he do better with a family of his own?
Try as he might, he couldn’t picture himself as a father. Did that foreshadow the future? He didn’t want to think so. To make up for the lost baby, he wanted to be the best father possible to this child. He wished he could have held his baby. Told it just once he loved it.
Zoe rose and, holding the tablet like a shield, headed out of the room.
“I want to check on something,” she said.
Something was definitely wrong. He hated it when women wouldn’t talk about a problem. How could he fix things if he didn’t know what was wrong in her world?
Zoe walked through the kitchen and out onto the back porch. It was dark already, and growing colder. She didn’t care. Blinking hard, she kept back tears. Cal couldn’t have said anything more blatant to remind her theirs was an arrangement to have a baby, not a relationship. He wasn’t growing to love her. She was living in a fool’s paradise if she hoped for a happy-ever-after ending. Life didn’t work that way.
