Righteous Lies (Book 1: Dancing Moon Ranch Series) (5 page)

"The car
will be warm," Jack said, setting her down at the curb.

Grace looked
inside the vehicle, and said to Sam, "Where is Susan?"

"She and
Ricky are with Susan's folks in Portland while Ricky has some tests run and
gets his treatment at the children's hospital," Sam explained.

Grace was
curious about the boy's illness but didn't think it her place to ask after what
Sam and Susan had gone through earlier, learning that the clinic botched their
chances for finding a genetic match with the child growing inside Susan, a
child that was also Marc's son. A child that should be
hers
. For some reason, that hadn't settled in. But it was. Slowly.

Until a few
hours ago, she'd imagined the child inside her to one day be a towheaded
toddler with mischievous blue eyes and a sweet disposition, and someday have
his father's droll sense of humor. Somehow she'd have to morph that image into that
of a dark eyed, dark haired child who would one day tower over her. She looked
at Jack, a preview of the man her child might one day be. At least he'd be
handsome. Willful and inflexible, but most definitely handsome...
 

A thud in her
tummy brought her hands pressing against it.

"You
okay?" Jack asked.

She nodded.
"Just a solid kick in the belly. He's active right now."

To her
surprise, Jack slipped his hand beneath her jacket and put it on her tummy, and
Grace didn't stop him. His broad palm was warm. Their son would also have big
hands, and that didn't seem so bad. A whole new image of the child growing
inside her was beginning to take hold...

"I hate to
break up this father-son bonding," Sam said, "but the cat's
fussing."

"Her name
is Mei Ling," Grace insisted.

Sam looked at
the cat, then at Jack, who shrugged, and said, "Get used to it."

Forty-five
minutes later, they turned off the main highway to the Oregon coast onto a
snow-covered county road with ruts where other cars had passed. After following
it for about another fifteen minutes, they turned onto yet another snow-covered
road, a narrow one, and passed through a tall ranch gateway made of upright
timbers with a cross bar. Hanging from the cross piece was a sign with the
words, DANCING MOON RANCH, along with the vague image of a moon, which Grace
assumed was the ranch brand. A few hundred feet further was a compound that
included several barns with attached corrals, numerous outbuildings, a string
of log cabins along a creek, several log homes belonging to Jack, Sam, and
their widowed mother, as Jack pointed out, and a huge guest lodge.

As they
approached the lodge, Grace stared at the place that would be home for the next
week. The large two-story building was made of massive logs, with front-facing gables
on both ends, and a steep roof for shedding snow. A porch ran the full length
of the front of the lodge, terminating at an immense stone chimney.

After pulling
up to the front entrance, Jack helped Grace out and up the front steps to the
porch then started to unload. Jack had just set the last of the cat
paraphernalia onto the porch when a woman dressed in jeans and a denim shirt,
with a quilted vest over it, stepped out of the lodge. Appearing in her late-forties,
Grace assumed the woman was Flo. She looked at Grace with curiosity, then eyed
the cat in the cat carrier with an expression that said,
that
cat won't be staying
inside
, then looked at Jack for confirmation. Jack took Grace's elbow and
said to Flo, "This is Grace Templeton, the mother of my son. She's staying
here for a couple of weeks. She needs bed rest, and the cat will be with her in
the bedroom off the kitchen. Give Grace whatever she needs. She'll let you know
what it is."

Flo said
nothing, her eyes shifting between Jack, and Grace's belly, and the cat in the
carrier, and fixing on Grace's belly again. "When's the baby due?"
she asked, her brow creased in a frown, her eyes holding a myriad of unspoken questions.

"Next
month," Jack replied. "And don't try to figure it out right now, Flo.
It's a long story." He handed the cat carrier to Sam then scooped Grace up
in his arms and carried her through the entry. Grace couldn't help but be aware
of the rock-hard arms holding her. Jack was all lean, solid muscle, and he
carried her with no effort.

Once inside,
what struck Grace first was the musky odor of wood from the massive log walls,
intermingled with smoke from years of logs burning on the hearth of the immense
stone fireplace at the far end of the great room. A rustic iron chandelier made
of several concentric circular iron bands, and held together by welded interlocking
horseshoes, hung from beams that crisscrossed above, forming a cathedral
ceiling over the entry, and straight ahead rose a bank of stairs to a balcony
above, which was lined with guest rooms. At the far end of the room, near the
fireplace, were overstuffed chairs and leather sofas, which were arranged in
groups, inviting conversation, and several wooden card tables stood ready for game
players. Through a double-wide opening was a dining room, with one long table
lined with a couple dozen chairs.

Grace saw no
sign of guests. "I assume this is your off season?" she said to Jack,
whose face was not more than a breath away from hers.

"Yeah,"
Jack replied, as he headed across the great room toward a hallway, while still
carrying Grace. "Guests start filling the place on Easter weekend and they’re
here through New Years. We shut down for repairs after that, so winters are
quiet."

Sam, holding
the cat in the cat carrier, followed behind Jack, who passed the kitchen on the
right and Flo's room on the left. When the hallway made a turn, Jack carried
Grace straight ahead and through a doorway and set her down in a bedroom
outfitted in peeled-pole furniture with Indian-motif upholstery.

"You
should have everything you need here," he said. "If not, just ask
Flo."

"I'll be
fine," Grace replied, while taking in the surroundings. Being a corner
room, it had large windows on two walls that looked out onto a scene covered in
snow. From the window on the end wall, and across an expanse of snowy grounds, she
saw the stables with its corral enclosed by a peeled-pole fence. The other window
looked out the front wall of the lodge, where she could see hills dotted with
evergreens, everything cloaked in newly-fallen snow. On the interior wall was a
large-screen TV and a cabinet with DVD's, and beside the cabinet, a door opened
to a bathroom. In it was a modern footed tub with a sloping back, the perfect
place to sit with water up to her chin and soak, Grace decided. And after the
long distressing day, that was exactly where she wanted to be.

Jack walked up
to stand behind her, and said, over the top of her head, "The tub's a
little high off the floor so if you want, Flo can help you get in and out for
the next two weeks."

That's when it
dawned on Grace that Jack told Flo she'd be there for two weeks. "I only
packed for a week," she said. She wasn't protesting, just surprised Jack
hadn't consulted her first. Then maybe she shouldn't be surprised at this
point. Jack seemed to be a man who pretty much did things the way he wanted.
Period!

"You won't
need much in the way of clothes since you'll be in bed," Jack said.

"I can't
sit in bed for two weeks," Grace replied. "I'll go crazy."

"Are you
interested in carrying our child to full term?" Jack asked.

"I've been
carrying
my
child for almost eight
months now," Grace emphasized the my. "Of course I want to carry him
to full term."

"You can
word it anyway you want," Jack said, "but the baby you're carrying is
half you and half me. Not mostly you and a little bit me. He's got my DNA, and
there's a good chance he'll be built like me and look like me. He's not just
yours, Grace. He's every bit as much mine, and you might as well get used to
the idea. But I'll see about renting a motorized wheelchair so you can get
around without walking."

Jack's unyielding
face prompted a question that had been nagging Grace from the start.
"You're not married," she said, "so why is it so important for
you to have a son? Most men in your situation would be glad to get out of any
responsibility, yet you're ready to give me five-hundred dollars a month to
make your claim."

Jack said
nothing, and when the silence became awkward, Grace said, "Alright.
Obviously you don't want to talk about it so forget I asked. Just curious."

"Yeah,
well, don't try to figure it out," Jack said. "I'll get the rest of
your stuff." He turned and walked away.

And Grace was
more determined than ever to learn what was behind what she was coming to view
as Jack's obsession with having a son. Not a wife. He gave no indication that she
and her baby were a package deal. Jack wanted his son, and he wanted control of
what happened to him. And that scared Grace more than she cared to think.

Jack insisted that
Grace stay in bed while he set up the cat's gear, which he'd done under Grace's
direction. The cat bed beside Grace's bed, even though the cat was on the bed.
The scratching post inside the door to the bedroom. The sky room under the
window so the cat could look out. The post with the pole and feathers where the
cat could swat it when she came out of the bathroom after using the litter box.
The cat had taken up the whole damn bedroom. But Grace looked content, sitting
in bed while stroking the cat. Stroking Mei Ling, Jack conceded. Grace got
pissed when he referred to her as
the cat
.

It seemed odd
having a pregnant woman to fuss over again. He'd been watching Sam hovering
over Susan the entire length of her pregnancy, and although it hadn't been an
issue, he couldn't deny it had bothered him that Sam and Susan would be raising
his son. And although he'd been resigned to it, he knew that watching his boy
grow up as his nephew wouldn't fill the void. But the child Grace was carrying
would. And someday, half the ranch would be his. He'd get the boy an older
settled pony when he was around three so they could ride in the mountains.
Before then, he'd put him in the saddle in front of him and let him hold the
reins...

"Is there
something you want?" Grace asked, and Jack realized he'd been staring at
her stomach for an inordinate amount of time. He'd been looking for a chance to
bring up the cord blood transplant. Grace's due date could be less than a month
away if contractions were an indication so there was little time for her to get
adjusted to the idea of flying to New Jersey to have the baby. He wouldn't hit
her with it yet, just slip into it gradually. That was the key he realized,
after knowing Grace for less than a day. Slip into things gradually...

"Maybe we
could talk for a few minutes," he said.

Grace gave a
little shrug. "If you'd like."

Jack pulled up
a chair and sat facing her. "Susan and Ricky will be back in a couple of
days so things will pick up," he said, starting with the obvious. Women
liked to talk, and two pregnant woman would bond.

"Then
Ricky's like a normal boy?" Grace asked, while her eyes moved almost
imperceptibly from his eyes... down his nose... across his mouth... Imagining
what their son would look like, Jack guessed. Like he was doing with Grace. But
when he thought about his son, he didn't care whether he had Grace's lighter
brown eyes and hair, or the Hansen darker ones. What he thought about was
having a healthy, sturdy boy. Good lungs. A strong heart...

Realizing she was
waiting for his response, he said, "Ricky's like a normal three-year-old
after his treatments, which are steroids and transfusions. Then he gradually
goes downhill until the next treatment. If he can get a cord blood transplant he'll
lead a normal life, but the odds of finding a match outside the family are slim
to none. Siblings have the best chance for a match, and with Sam and me being
identical twins, the chance of a match from my gene pool is as good as from
Sam's, even if the child doesn't come through Susan."

Grace stared at
him for a few moments, and from the pinched frown on her brow, he knew she
understood and was mulling it over. Then the frown flattened, and he said, "Don't
expect my baby to be used for this. I'm afraid of flying and I'm not flying to
New Jersey."

"There's nothing
to flying and there's no risk to the baby," Jack said, knowing it wasn't
the time to press the issue, but frustrated that Grace was unwilling to listen
to reason. "Ricky will die without a transplant, and even though there's
no guarantee of a match from my son, if you don't have him at the hospital in
New Jersey we'll never know. But the doctors think there's a better-than-likely
chance any child I father could be a match."

"So
because of you I'm expected to fly off to New Jersey to have my child." Grace
folded her arms and glared at him, as if everything was his fault.

Which pissed
the hell out of Jack. "Look," he said, "let's get one thing
straight. I'm not responsible for getting you pregnant with my child. I didn't
rape you, and I didn't pressure you into having sex with me. You're pregnant
from no fault of mine. But that's my son you're carrying, and Susan's carrying
your husband's son, and there's not a damn thing any of us can do to about
it." He stood and left the room. Trying to reason with the stubborn, inflexible
woman seemed pointless.

***

After storming
out the room and leaving Grace alone for the rest of the evening and the entire
next day, with instructions to Flo to get her whatever she needed, Jack was
back. This time with a couple of plastic shopping bags in his hands. He stood
in the doorway looking in, like he didn't know what to do. Grace could make a
suggestion. Go away and don't come back until she was gone. But she had
something Jack wanted, and he wasn't about to go away, at least not for the next
eighteen years. And Grace felt angry at being boxed in a corner. This was her
child. A baby boy who'd been growing inside her for nearly eight months, and she
didn't want Jack telling her what she should or shouldn't do regarding her baby
and some stem cell transplant.