Page 8 of Miracles and Marriage
“I’m always nice,” he said as he prepared to leave.
He touched her shoulder. Zoe resisted the impulse to lean against him for strength. She wanted to keep their relationship normal. She couldn’t take any more distractions at this point.
Zoe watched as he drove away. Nice was not the word she’d use to describe her boss. But sometimes he could be kind. She walked back out to the beach, wishing the sun was shining brightly and children were playing on the sand. Instead she had the lonely cry of the gulls to keep her company on a blustery day.
Cal drove back to the city reviewing the business awaiting his attention. Maybe he hadn’t needed to seek out Zoe, but he’d wanted to see for himself that she was all right. Finding out she wasn’t had shaken him. She’d always seemed indestructible. He never remembered her sick before.
These past two days had shown a vulnerability that startled him. And brought out protective instincts he hadn’t known he had.
Meeting her sister had also been a surprise. She looked exactly like Zoe. At first, he’d thought his assistant had gotten married and planned to quit her job. He’d been relieved and intrigued to discover the twin connection. What other surprises would he discover if he hung around her longer?
The revelation that she might not be able to have children—and longed to have them—had been another. Not that they’d ever discussed lifelong dreams, but she was devoted to work. Of course she had a private life. She didn’t go into hibernation at night and reappear at the office the next morning.
Yet he felt he was seeing Zoe in three dimension for the first time.
Life was so unfair. He’d known that since he’d been a small boy bewildered when he learned of the death of his mother and his father’s abandonment. But it still astounded him sometimes.
Like now. Zoe wanted a baby so badly and had no one to make one with. While Suzanne had been pregnant with their child and ended its chance before it was born.
Chapter Two
Zoe arrived at work early Thursday morning. She had her coffee in hand and was prioritizing her phone calls when Cal entered her small office and looked at her.
“I hoped you’d be back today. How are you feeling?”
“Back to normal, thank you.”
She felt awkward and embarrassed remembering him seeing her at her worst and preparing her meals.
“Good. Mark’s meeting me for lunch. I thought the three of us could go together.”
“Today?” she asked, surprised Cal had acted so quickly in lining someone up.
She half thought he’d been giving her lip service.
“No time like the present. Mark will be here at noon.”
With that he disappeared down the hall.
The phone rang and Zoe’s day began.
As noon approached, Zoe grew more and more nervous. She’d never met anyone before with the deliberate intent of seeing if they could hit it off enough to get involved. How far would it go—to marriage?
She thought when the right man came along she’d recognize him immediately and be swept off her feet. Now she felt like some of the man-hungry women she’d read about out for only a meal ticket. Only in her case it was a baby ticket. Was she wrong to try for a family? She’d miss so much from life if she never had a child of her own.
She made a good income. She didn’t need a man to support her. But she did need a man if she wanted a baby before it was too late. One who would be a good father—and loving husband?
Cal and a tall man with sandy hair entered her office promptly at noon. She looked up and smiled at them both,feeling like an actress getting ready to go on stage who couldn’t remember her lines. The visitor smiled easily when Cal introduced him.
“Join us for lunch,” Cal said as if it wasn’t already planned.
“Thanks, I’d like to.”
She pretended she didn’t see the surprised look Mark had given Cal. This was never going to work.
Zoe felt awkward at the lunch table. For one wild moment she considered refusing when Cal had issued the invitation, but her boss had gone to all this trouble for her, she had to hold up her end.
Soon, however, the awkwardness began to ease when Mark proved to be entertaining and personable. Probably needed to be for his job, she thought skeptically. She couldn’t help compare the two men. Cal was dark, quiet, intense. Mark had a sunnier disposition and seemed interested in her. Maybe they would hit it off.
