Lucky 7 Bad Boys Contemporary Romance Boxed Set (81 page)

A wistful smile slid over Rini's annoyed face, and she relaxed a bit. "You love your mother very much."

"My mom, yeah. I do." His mom and her damned cookies.

"Do you look more like her or your dad?"

Cole turned up the walkway to her sister's front door and adjusted her weight before mounting the steps. "Neither. I'm adopted." On the porch, he set her on her feet.

"Ah. Now I understand," she whispered, closing her eyes. One hand went to her temple as the other dug into his shoulder.

"Rini!" The door flew open and a woman shrieked as Rini slumped against him. The sister, Alexa, he presumed. "What have you done to her?" she cried.

Cole hooked one arm around Rini's limp form and another under her knees, then scowled at the hysterical woman. "Where can I take her?"

Alexa pointed frantically. "The sofa."

He laid Rini out on the couch, going down on his knees beside her. Her eyes opened and she struggled to sit up, but Cole put a hand on her shoulder. "No way. You stay put."

Alexa pushed her way next to Rini and glared at him. "Just who the hell are you, anyway? Can't you see she's having a baby soon?"

"My name is Colton Lonetree."

"Cole—" Alexa stared at him, eyes narrowed in fury. "
You!
" She turned to Rini, stroking her hair. "What has he done to you, honey? Did he threaten—"

Rini interrupted. "Alexa, I'm all right. I'm just having contractions and stood up too fast."

"You're not needed here, Mr. Lonetree," Alexa snapped at him. "I'll thank you to leave my home."

Rini held out her hand to him. "No, wait."

Rising, he looked at her hand. He shouldn't take it. It would just complicate things. Even more than they already were. He shouldn't even be here. She'd
abandoned
him. She was nothing but trouble.

And all he wanted was to pull her into his arms and hold her tight. He was so scared. Scared something was wrong.

More scared something was very right.

He took her hand. "What?"

"Do you still want to go to childbirth class Friday, or have I scared you off?"

He cleared his throat. "Scared? Me? Not a chance. What time shall I be here?"

Chapter Seven

Cole watched in the mirror over the bar as two mean-looking, leather-clad Mohawks parted the Christmas revelers like the Red Sea. He squinted over his tequila and lime, and the two Mohawks merged into one mean-looking Paiute with really bad hair. "Renegade," he greeted his friend.

"Hey,
compadre.
Merry Christmas."

Cole grunted. "Warrior." He tossed back the rest of his shot.

Renegade looked at him quizzically as he climbed onto the stool next to him and ordered a mulled wine.

"Not
compadre.
Warrior. My new name."

"Warrior, eh? Soundum like heap bad script to me."

Cole snorted. "This coming from a man who calls himself Renegade."

Roman "Renegade" Santangelo was Cole's best friend, right after Tanya. The three of them, along with RaeAnne Sommarby, had been inseparable those teenage years back at Rincon Rez.

The other man chuckled. "Hey, the name Renegade was
your
idea, remember?" He straightened his leather motorcycle jacket and flicked one of the chains dangling from it. "At least I look the part."

"I'm wearing the anthropopologicully correct garb for an
urban
warrior," Cole countered, managing not to slur any of the big words. Much.

"Anthrop—" Renegade squinted at the empty glass in front of Cole. "Jeez, Cole, how many of those have you had?"

He shrugged. "I'm shel— celebrating."

His friend glanced around. "Alone?"

"Not anymore." Cole motioned for the bartender to bring him another round. "I'm thirty-two, about to have a damn baby, it's Christmas fucking Eve, and I'm completely, un— une
quib
ocally alone." He grabbed the empty glass and waved it at Renegade. "Present company exh-cluded."

"Ho-kay." Renegade was a special agent with the FBI, currently undercover, and not easily thrown for a loop.

Cole propped his elbows on the bar and leaned his chin on one hand. "Pathetic, isn't it? How'd you find me, anyhow?"

Renegade's brow lifted. "Seriously?"

"You tracked the GPS on my shell phone? Isn't that illegal?"

Renegade made a face.

The bartender brought the drinks, and Renegade sipped his mulled wine appreciatively. "No, I called your office. Someone named Charlie told me you'd had a run-in with a batch of your mom's cookies. He suggested I try the bars in the area."

"An excellent judge of character, that Charlie," Cole muttered.

"What's this about a baby?"

He sighed deeply, and suddenly felt stone cold sober. He told his friend the whole, wretched story.

"So let me see if I've got this straight," Renegade mused. "You fall for this
chica
at the powwow, but she runs away from you. When you finally find her, she doesn't want to know you. But you've still got it bad.
Hmm
. Why does this story sound so familiar?"

Cole snorted. "We're not talking about you and RaeAnne, here, brother."

Renegade took another sip. "You want the kid?"

"I'm ready for a family, Roman." He pushed out a frustrated breath. "You know, it's weird. You spend fifteen years trying to prevent this from happening, but when it does, all you can think about is how terrific it'll be when you're a father. When you're holding your own kid on your knee. You've got no idea how incredible it is to look at a woman who is big with a child and know it's yours. Your blood. Your body. Your future."

Renegade stared at him. "
Whew
. Heavy stuff, man. What about the woman?"

Cole squeezed lime into his untouched drink. "What about her?"

"You going to marry her?"

"Nope."

"Because she ran away?"

"Yeah. Among other things."

"Thanks a lot, pal," Renegade muttered, clearly thinking about his own situation with RaeAnne.

"You had damn good reasons when you ran away," Cole said.

Renegade spun his stool to face the crowded room. "Yeah. Well, so did Rini, I'm betting."

Cole blew out a breath, shaking his head. "So she claims."

"
Hmm
." Renegade swirled his wine, watching a pair of legs in a green spangled miniskirt saunter by. "This woman of yours, she pretty?"

Cole licked the lime off his fingers and smiled dreamily at his friend's reflection in the mirror as he turned back to meet his gaze. "Pretty as a goddamn picture. Her eyes are gorgeous—like brilliant blue opals. I call her Fire Eyes. You should have seen her that day at the powwow." He frowned. "On second thought, I'm glad you didn't. Women never could resist your nasty, bad boy image."

Renegade grinned and flicked the end of a braid. "It's the hair. I'm convinced of it."

Surveying the unruly strands of raven black coursing down the man's back—long on top and cropped short on the sides except for a thin braid above one ear—Cole made a disgusted sound. Even at its longest, his own hair had never looked quite that disreputable.

"If you say so. Doesn't the Bureau have rules about weird hair?" Renegade might look like a badass from the Road Warrior movies, but working for the FBI was as legit as it got.

"Not as long as I get my job done. So, you're telling me you don't want this pretty woman who's having your baby?"

Light sparkled like fire off his shot glass as Cole lifted it to his lips. "Oh, I want her, all right. Every damn time I look at her. But I'll deal with it."

Renegade hiked an eyebrow. "She want you, too?"

Cole laughed. "She wants my head on a platter."

"Sounds like you're going to have yourself an interesting couple of months...or years." He crossed his arms over his leather jacket. "Me, I'm hittin' the road tonight. Got a job up north."

"Why don't you stick around for a day? Have Christmas dinner at my folks' place tomorrow."

An indecipherable look crept into his friend's eyes. "Thanks, but I'd rather get moving. Give your mom a big hug for me."

"Still looking for RaeAnne?"

Renegade threw back the rest of his wine and gave Cole a world-weary smile. "I'll find her sooner or later."

"I know you will,
compadre."

Motorcycle boots hit the floor and Cole felt a warm hand press onto his shoulder. "I hope it works out with the baby and your woman. Do me a favor, give her a second chance. We all deserve one. See you in a few months."

Cole swung his stool around and watched Renegade disappear through the crowd as quickly as he had appeared. The man was a specter, coming and going at the oddest times and places. He was also a romantic fool.

His woman.
Ha! No way. Cole would not claim Rini Herelius as his woman. Sure, he might lust after Fire Eyes in a weak moment, but lust was where he drew the line. Clearly and unmistakably.

As for giving her a second chance, well, his friend would just have to understand. He couldn't do it. He'd been burned going down that road one too many times.

He tossed a twenty on the bar and headed for the door.

She was not his woman, and she would not be getting a second chance. And going to some harmless childbirth class with her would not change that one bit.

No sir. Not one little bit.

* * *

"Are you out of your everlovin'
mind
?"

Rini winced. Alexa always did cut right to the chase.

"
You're
the one who wanted me to be nice to him," Rini reminded her.

After a call to Dr. Morris just to be sure her spell wasn't something to worry about, Rini had gone upstairs for a nap. Afterward, she had managed to get through Christmas Eve dinner and opening half the presents under the tree without Cole being mentioned once. But now she and Alexa were in the kitchen washing up while the boys played with their new toys, and Rini knew she was in for a grilling.

"Temporary insanity. After the way that despicable man treated you at his office, I can't believe you would even speak to him, let alone take a walk with him. What were you
thinking
?" Alexa's angry tone demanded an explanation.

The familiar pain of wanting to please and not make waves stabbed through Rini's chest. She'd grown up with that feeling, always trying so hard to keep from doing or saying anything that would vex Mama. Never being a bother, always doing what would please her—so Mama would love her. The hurt felt so natural to her, she'd never even noticed when David had started making her feel the same way, always finding fault, never giving support.

But, finally, she'd seen what was happening and had begun to heal herself by leaving David and breaking the dysfunctional pattern, even with her mother. She wasn't about to back down with Alex.

Composing herself, Rini carefully shook a dash of nutmeg into a glass of eggnog. "He just brought me cookies, for crying out loud. And
I
picked the fight at his office, not him."

Alexa huffed. "So what changed your mind?"

"I thought it was best to patch things up. For the baby's sake."

"I see." Her sister slammed the dishwasher door shut and spun the dial. "What did you two talk about?"

She stirred her eggnog absently, thinking about Cole. "Oh, this and that. What I'm studying. You know."

"No, I don't know." Alexa stood ramrod straight, her arms crossed tightly over her chest. "I don't like the idea of him sniffing around you, Rini. It's some sort of lawyer's trick. I swear—"

Rini looked up when the words suddenly halted in midstream. The expression on Alexa's face could only be described as scandalized. "My God! You think you're still in love with him, don't you?" Her sister's eyes widened. "You're hoping he'll— Oh, Rini!"

"Love? Don't be ridiculous," Rini snapped crankily, staring into her eggnog to avoid her sister's suspicious gaze. "Besides, he doesn't want any part of me. Except this part." She put a hand on the baby. "Cole told me tonight he's adopted. I imagine that's why he's so adamant about being part of the baby's life, regardless of his feelings for me."

"Oh, Sis." Alexa dropped into a chair, her expression filled with understanding. "What are you going to do?"

Laughter echoed through the kitchen door from the living room, where Brad and Kenny were engaged in a rowdy new game on the computer. "I'm going to let him."

Her sister set her jaw stubbornly. "Then, please for the love of God, will you at least make him help you financially? So you can finish your degree?"

Rini shook her head. "You know I can't ask him for money. Maybe that degree just isn't meant to be."