Adam (11 page)

Adam was equally aware of how much he had gained when he had moved Tate into his bedroom, and how little things had really changed between them. He found himself enchanted by her constant delight in the baby. He tried to be happy with each stage of her pregnancy. Mostly he was successful.

But he watched her and wondered if she ever thought of Buck. The cowboy hadn't been spending much of his free time around the ranch lately. But Adam was watching. Which meant that he still didn't trust her not to seek Buck out if she got the chance.

Meanwhile, he had waited for Tate to tell him again that she loved him. She hadn't said the words lately. Not once, in fact, since they had gotten married. And he found he wanted—needed—to hear those words.

Tate was in bed with Adam when she felt the baby move
for the first time. She grabbed his hand and placed it on her belly. “Can you feel that? Kind of a fluttery feeling.”

“No.” He tried to remove his hand.

“Wait. Maybe it'll happen again.”

“Feel here,” Adam said, putting her hand on his arousal. “I think I've got a little fluttery feeling of my own.”

Tate couldn't help giggling as Adam's body pulsed beneath her hand. “You've got a one track mind, Dr. Philips.”

“Oh, but what a lovely track it is,” he murmured, kissing his way down her body. His head lay against her belly when he felt a slight movement against his cheek. He came up off her like a scalded cat.

“I felt it! I felt the baby move!”

Tate smiled triumphantly. “I told you so!”

Adam found himself suddenly uncomfortable. As a doctor he had described the stages of pregnancy to his patients hundreds of times. Yet he found himself overwhelmed by the reality of it. That feather-light touch against his cheek had been an actual human being. Growing inside Tate. A baby that would have his name. A baby that Tate planned to take away with her when she divorced him.

Adam was reminded why he shouldn't let himself care too much about either Tate or the baby. It was going to be bad enough when Tate left him. He wouldn't be able to bear it if he got attached to the child, as well.

Adam didn't say anything about what he was thinking, but from that night onward Tate noticed a distinct difference in his behavior whenever she mentioned the baby. Adam seemed indifferent. Nothing she said got him excited or brought a
smile to his face. It was as if the baby had become a burden too heavy for him to bear.

Tate had conveniently forgotten that she had promised Adam a divorce as soon as the baby was born. So she was certain the only possible explanation why Adam wasn't allowing himself to get involved with anything having to do with the baby was because he believed it wasn't his child. She decided to try, once more, to convince him that he was the baby's father.

She chose her moment well. She and Adam had just made love and were lying with their bodies still tangled together. Their breathing had eased and Adam's nose was nuzzled against her throat. The baby was active now, and she pressed her belly against his, knowing Adam couldn't help but feel the movement.

“Adam?”

“Hmm.”

“The baby's kicking a lot tonight.”

“Hmm.”

She threaded her fingers through Adam's hair. “You know, I think he's going to be a lot like his father.”

She felt Adam stiffen.

“Like you, Adam. He's going to be a lot like you.”

Adam's voice was weary as he said, “You don't have to do this Tate. It's not necessary to try and make me believe the baby's mine. I—”
I'll love it anyway.
Adam bit his lip on that admission. No sense revealing the pain she would be causing him when she took the child away.

“But the baby
is
yours, Adam.”

“Tate, we've been through this before. I took tests—”

“What about your wife? Did she take tests, too? Maybe it was her fault and not yours.”

“Anne was tested. There was nothing wrong with her.”

“Maybe they got your test results mixed up with someone else's,” Tate persisted. “I mean, you're a doctor. You know those things happen. Did you see the results yourself?”

“Anne called me from the doctor's office,” Adam said.

“You mean you weren't there?”

“I had a medical emergency. I—”

“Then she could have lied!” Tate said.

“Why? She wanted children as much as I did. What earthly reason would she have had to lie?”

“I don't know,” Tate said. “All I do know is that a child is growing in my body, and the only man who's put his seed inside me is you!”

For an instant Adam felt a wild surge of hope. Maybe there had been some mistake. Maybe Anne had not lied, but been mistaken. He couldn't believe she would have lied about a thing like that. He had seen her tests himself. The problem did not lie with Anne. So something must have been wrong with him for them to remain childless for eight years.

He felt the hope die as painfully as it had been born. “You're making wishes that can't come true, Tate,” he said. “This child isn't mine. I'm sterile.”

Tate could have screamed, she was so frustrated. “Is that why you refuse to get involved with anything having to do with the baby?” she demanded. “Because you think it isn't yours?”

“Have you forgotten that you promised me a divorce as soon as it's born?” Adam reminded her.

“What if I said I didn't want a divorce? Would you feel differently about the baby then?” Tate persisted.

“What do you want me to say, Tate? That I'll be a father to
your child? I will. What more do you want from me?” The words seemed torn from someplace deep inside him.

Tate felt frozen inside. It was clear Adam wouldn't ever be able to accept the baby she carried as his own. And she wouldn't subject her child to a lifetime of rejection by its father, the one person who should love and protect it above all others. That knowledge, on top of her doubts about whether Adam loved her, made it plain that she would be better off away from here.

She didn't say another word, just allowed Adam to pull her into his embrace and hold her one last time. Once he was asleep, she carefully disentangled herself. She turned and looked at him once before she left the room—and his life—forever.

G
ARTH AND
F
ARON WERE SHOCKED
—to put it mildly—when Tate showed up on the doorstep at Hawk's Way.

“What happened?” Garth demanded. “What did that bastard do to you?”

“You look awful, Tate,” Faron said, putting an arm around her shoulder and leading her inside.

“If that man hurt you I'll—”

“Don't, Garth!” Tate pleaded. “Just leave it alone. Adam and I are both better off this way.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” Faron asked.

“I just want to go to bed and sleep for a week,” Tate said.

Faron and Garth exchanged a sober look. There were deep shadows under Tate's eyes. Her face looked gaunt and unhappy.

“He'll pay for the way he's treated you,” Garth said.

“No! Listen to me!” Tate said, her voice sharp with fatigue and anxiety. “You have to trust me to know what's best.” There it was again. That word
trust
. “This marriage was a horrible mistake. I'm going to file for a divorce.”

“Don't be hasty,” Faron urged.

“You're dead on your feet. You have no idea what you're saying,” Garth countered.

“Stop it! Both of you!
I'm a grown woman.
” She laughed hysterically. “Don't you see? I'm going to be a mother myself! Surely it's time for you to admit that I can manage my own life. You have to love me enough to let go.”

Tate didn't wait to hear whether they were willing to concede to her wishes. She was too distressed to deal with them anymore. She ran up the stairs to her bedroom, her rigid bearing defying either one of her brothers to come after her.

“She's changed,” Faron said.

“And not for the better,” Garth noted.

Faron frowned. “I'm not so sure about that. She's grown up, Garth. She's not a little girl anymore. Six months ago she wouldn't have stood up to you like that. I think she had to be in a lot of pain to leave here in the first place, and a helluva lot more pain to come back. I think maybe we're at least partly responsible.”

“I blame the bastard who got her pregnant,” Garth said.

“None of this would have happened if she hadn't run away from home. And she wouldn't have run away from home if we hadn't kept such a tight rein on her.”

“It was for her own good.”

“It doesn't seem that way now, does it?” Faron asked. “I think maybe our little sister grew up in spite of us. And I, for one, am not going to interfere anymore in her life.”

* * *

A
DAM HAD BEEN SCOWLING
ever since he had woken up to find Tate gone from his bed—and his life. The first thing he had done was to go hunting Buck. His fury had been boundless when the lanky cowboy was nowhere to be found. Finally, one
of the other hands told him Buck had been spending nights with his ex-wife.

That news had confounded Adam. He had doggedly made the trip to Velma's house and knocked on the door in the early hours of the morning. Buck had answered the door wearing low-slung jeans and scratching a head of auburn hair that stood out in all directions.

“Adam! What are you doing here this hour of the morning?”

“Where's Tate?”

“How the hell should I know?” Buck retorted.

By now Velma had joined him, wearing a flashy silk robe, and with her red tresses equally tangled. “What's going on, Adam?”

It was obvious to Adam that Tate wasn't here. But he didn't know where else to look. “Do you mind if I come in?”

“Come on in and I'll make us some coffee,” Velma said. “You can tell us what's got you running around at this hour like a chicken with its head cut off.”

While Velma was in the kitchen making coffee, Adam put his elbows on the table and wearily rubbed his forehead. Buck waited patiently for Adam to speak his piece.

“Tate's gone. Run away,” Adam said at last.

Buck whistled his surprise. “Thought that little filly loved you too much ever to leave you.”

Adam's head came up out of his hands. “What?”

“Sure. You and that baby of yours was all she ever talked about.”

“
My
baby?”

“Sure as hell wasn't mine!” Buck said.

Adam's eyes narrowed. “She spent nearly the whole night with you. Twice.”

Buck laughed in Adam's face. “We were here at Velma's house the first night. And we fell asleep on the banks of the Frio after Velma and I had an argument on the second. There's only been one woman for me. And that's my wife.”

“You mean your ex-wife.”

Buck grinned and held up his left hand, which bore a gold wedding band. “I mean my wife. Velma and I got married again last Sunday.”

“Congratulations. I guess.” Adam was confused. “But if you're not the father of Tate's baby, then who is?”

Buck pursed his lips and shook his head. “I would think that has to be pretty obvious even to a blind man.”

“But I—” Adam swallowed and admitted, “I can't father children.”

“Whoever told you that,” Buck said, “is a whopping liar.”

“But—” Adam shut his mouth over the protest he had been about to make. Was it really possible? Could Anne have lied to him? It was the only answer that would explain everything.

Adam jumped up from his chair just as Velma brought in the coffeepot.

“You're not staying?” she asked.

“I've got to get in touch with someone in San Antonio.” He was going to see the doctor who had done those fertility tests and find out the truth for himself.

“When you're ready to go after Tate, I have a suggestion where you might look,” Buck said.

“Where?”

“I figure she went home to her brothers. You'll probably find her at Hawk's Way.”

“Damn.”

Buck laughed. “I'd like to be a fly on the wall when you try to take her out of there.”

Adam wasn't able to think that far ahead. Right now he had a doctor to visit in San Antonio.

Early the next afternoon Adam came out of a glass-walled office building feeling like a man who had been poleaxed.

“Your sperm count was low,” the doctor had said. “But certainly still within the range that would allow you to father children.”

“But why didn't Anne and I ever conceive children?” he had demanded.

The doctor had shrugged. “It was just one of those things that happens with some couples.”

Anne had lied to him
. Whatever her reasons—maybe she just hadn't wanted to keep on trying—she had lied to him.

I'm going to be a father! Tate is pregnant with my child!

The realization was only just hitting him. Adam was floating on air. He had always intended to love the child because it was Tate's, but the knowledge that the baby Tate was carrying was a part of him filled his cup to overflowing.

There was only one problem. Tate was at Hawk's Way. And he was going to have to fight her brothers to get her back.

An hour later, he was in his pickup traveling north.

Adam shouldn't have been surprised when he discovered the vastness of Hawk's Way, but he was. The cliffs and canyons in northwest Texas were a startling contrast to the rolling prairies found on the Lazy S.

The ranch house was an imposing two-story white frame structure that looked a lot like an antebellum mansion with its four, twenty-foot-high fluted columns across the front and its
railed first- and second-story porches. The road leading to the house was lined with magnolias, but the house itself was shaded by the branches of a moss-laden live oak.

Adam was glad to see that the barn and outbuildings were a good distance from the house. He was hoping to catch Tate alone and talk with her before he had to confront her brothers. He went around to the kitchen door, knocked softly and let himself inside.

Tate was standing at the sink peeling potatoes. She was wearing an apron, and sweat from the heat of the kitchen made her hair curl damply at her nape.

“Hello, Tate.”

Tate dropped both potato and peeler in the sink and turned to face Adam. Once she had wiped her hands dry, she kept them hidden in the folds of the apron so Adam wouldn't see how much they were trembling.

“Hello, Adam,” she said at last. “I was just peeling potatoes for tonight's pot roast.”

“You look tired,” he said.

“I haven't been sleeping much the last couple of days.” She swallowed over the ache in her throat and asked, “What are you doing here, Adam?”

“I've come to get you. Go upstairs and pack your things. I'm taking you home with me.”

“I am home.”

“Like hell you are! This is where you grew up, Tate. It isn't your home. Your home is with me and our child.”

Tate felt her heart racing with excitement and with hope. Adam's words now were a far cry from what she had heard a
mere forty-eight hours ago. It appeared he intended to be a father to the baby after all.

Before Adam could say more, the kitchen door opened and Tate remembered she had told her brothers to come to the house early for lunch because she wanted to take a long afternoon nap. She quailed at the confrontation she knew was coming.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Garth demanded.

“I've come for my wife.”

“Tate's not going anywhere,” Garth said.

Adam wasn't about to be said nay. He grabbed Tate by the wrist. “Forget your things,” he said. “We can get them later.” He dragged her two steps, but could go no farther.

Faron and Garth were blocking the way out.

“Get out of my way,” Adam said.

“Look, Adam,” Faron began in a reasonable voice. “If you'll just—”

But Adam was in no mood to be reasonable. He twisted around to shove Tate out of the way, then reversed the arc with his fist. Faron was felled by the powerful blow, which caught him completely unprepared to defend himself.

Adam stood spread-legged, facing Tate's eldest brother. “I'm telling you to get out of my way.”

“You're welcome to leave,” Garth said. “But Tate stays here.”

“I'm taking her with me.”

“That remains to be seen.”

Tate knew her brother's strength. He had at least three inches of height and thirty more pounds of muscle than Adam. “Garth, please don't—”

“Shut up, Tate,” Adam ordered. “I can handle this on my
own.” He was fighting for his life—the right to cherish his wife and raise his child—and he had no intention of losing.

The fight that followed was vicious, but mercifully short. When it was finished, Adam was still standing, but it was a near thing. He grabbed Tate's wrist and helped her step over Garth's body on the way out, letting the screen door slam behind her.

Once Tate and Adam were gone, the two brothers, still sprawled on the floor where Adam had left them, had trouble meeting each other's eyes. Two against one and they were the ones dusting themselves off.

Garth cradled his ribs as he sat up and leaned back against the kitchen cupboards. He pulled his shirttail out and pressed the cloth against a cut over his cheekbone.

Faron stretched his legs out in front of him as he leaned back against the refrigerator. He rubbed his sore chin, then opened his mouth and moved his jaw around to make sure no bones were broken.

“Guess our little sister is married to a man who loves her after all,” Faron said.

“One with a damned fine right hook,” Garth agreed, dabbing gently with his shirttail at the bruised skin around his eye.

The two brothers looked at each other and grinned. Garth yelped when his split lip protested.

“Guess that's one suitor you couldn't scare off,” Faron said.

“I always said Tate would know the right man when he came along.”

“Seems you were the one needed convincing,” Faron said, eyeing Garth's battered face.

Garth guffawed, then moaned when his head protested. “By
the way, who do you think's going to be godfather to that baby of hers?”

“Me,” Faron said, hauling himself off the floor. “You get to be godfather to Jesse's firstborn.”

“Jesse's next oldest. It ought to be him.”

“Jesse and Adam don't get along. I'm a better choice,” Faron said.

The two brothers headed out to the barn, arguing all the way. Neither of them mentioned the fact that they had been relegated to a new role in Tate's life. Their little sister had found a new protector.

Meanwhile, Tate was aware of every move Adam made, every word he spoke. She had him stop at the first gas station they came to with the excuse she had to use the bathroom. She used the opportunity to clean the blood off his face and bought some bandages in the convenience store to put across the cuts on his cheek and chin.