Unexpected Gifts

When it’s more than just friends…

“I have a long weekend for the holiday,” Zac said.

“I’ve got to check in at the market tomorrow morning, but the rest of the day is mine. What if I come pick you up and take you to lunch?”

“Zac, you must have better things to do,” Eli insisted.

“You say that every time I ask to spend time with you. Since my sister is convinced we can talk without actually speaking, just like my parents can, want to guess what I’m saying without saying?”

Eli tried to look serious, but all she could do was laugh. That seemed to be a common theme with Zac. They talked, they enjoyed each other’s company and they both laughed a lot.

“Okay, tomorrow for lunch.” She opened the car door.

Before she got out, Zac leaned over and kissed her cheek. It was light, platonic even, and yet she felt a bit breathless in a way that had nothing to do with the blast of cold air that flooded the car.

“Uh, well, thanks for a lovely day, Zac. I’d really best get going.”

And in his eyes, without him saying a word, she could see that he knew his light kiss on the cheek had flustered her, and that he was pleased.

She brushed a fingertip over the spot.

What was she going to do about Zac Keller?

Dear Reader,

This year is Harlequin’s 60th Anniversary! Being part of the Harlequin family always was and is a dream of mine.

As my youngest child got older, I realized that one day soon she would go to school…and I’d need to go back to work. The question was, what did I want to do? This very quiet little whisper niggled around the edges of my mind…I’d like to write. And so I started writing. And submitting. And being rejected. In January of 2000 I was ready to admit defeat. I told my husband it was time to go look for a job. He told me no. We were fine financially and he was positive I’d sell to Harlequin Books. I just had to keep trying, and he was willing to do whatever it took to help. (Is it any wonder I write romance, with him as an example of what a hero should be?)

Two months later a woman called and introduced herself as Kathryn Lye…and bought my first Harlequin book, I Waxed My Legs for This? Three months after that, Allison Lyons from Silhouette Romance bought Do You Hear What I Hear? Nine years later this book, my twenty-eighth romance for Harlequin, is hitting the shelves and I’m struck by the fact that I am living my dream. That’s such a rare and wonderful thing.

So many dreams don’t live up to their hype, but my dream of working with Harlequin Books has been so much more than I ever imagined it could be. I’ve encountered the most amazing people, traveled all over the country and met so many truly lovely readers and other writers. I am so lucky.

So happy anniversary, Harlequin! May your stories of love keep touching the hearts of readers for years and years to come!

Holly Jacobs

Unexpected Gifts

Holly Jacobs

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

In 2000, Holly Jacobs sold her first book to Harlequin Enterprises. She’s since sold more than twenty-five novels to the publisher. Her romances have won numerous awards and made the Waldenbooks bestseller list. In 2005, Holly won a prestigious Career Achievement Award from Romantic Times BOOKreviews. In her nonwriting life Holly is married to a police captain, and together they have four children. Visit Holly at www.HollyJacobs.com, or you can snail-mail her at P.O. Box 11102, Erie, PA 16514–1102.

For all the amazing teachers who work in the

Erie School District’s Teen Parenting Program,

especially Jeanne Bender, Mary Fuhrmann,

Connie Sementilli and Bonnie Sobeck. Thanks

for letting me be a part of the amazing work

you do. You have touched so many students’

lives, and the ripple effects from your work

will be felt for years to come.

And for Sharon Lorei, who was an

“Eli Cartwright” sort of teacher in my life.

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

EPILOGUE

PROLOGUE

“There’s no way to cheat nature.”

—Pregnancy, Childbirth and Parenting for Teens, by Mary Jeanne Lorei

ARIEL MAYORS KNEW that, until recently, she’d been teacher’s pet. A favorite. The student who could do no wrong.

She’d cultivated that status with the same care that a gardener used looking after prized orchids. By the time Ariel had reached her senior year of high school she’d practically perfected the art of perfect. She was always the first one to raise her hand, the first one to volunteer and almost always the best student in class.

Popularity was a game that she didn’t just play with the teachers, she played it with fellow students as well.

To garner the girls’ admiration she made sure she never poached boyfriends, that she always offered a shoulder in any cry-worthy moment and that she was never without an extra Tampax in her purse for those time-of-the-month emergencies.

She’d discovered the basic truth that once you’d borrowed a tampon from someone, it was hard to hate them.

Ariel was a cheerleader, which provided her a readymade social group, and also meant she was one of the girls all the boys wanted to date. She knew this part of her popularity didn’t stem from any planning of hers. Biology had blessed her with blond hair and a long, lithe body. But she’d worked at the rest—worked on knowing what clothes to wear, how to apply makeup flawlessly. She worked at knowing when to laugh, when to draw closer, when to pull back.

Well, she thought, she’d known when to pull back until that one night in Charlie Markowski’s Lumina van.

She stood in front of Ms. Cartwright’s desk. Her teacher wasn’t beautiful, but there was something appealing about her averageness. Brown shoulder-length hair, blue eyes. A little shorter than Ariel’s five feet, six inches. Ms. Cartwright was the kind of person who was so normal-looking she could easily get lost in a crowd in a way Ariel never could. That was, until she smiled. Then Ms. Cartwright was beautiful. Ariel wasn’t sure how that worked, she just knew it did. She wanted to be like Ms. Cartwright someday. Calm, collected—a woman in charge of her own destiny. Someone who got more beautiful when they smiled.

Only Ms. Cartwright wasn’t smiling today.

“Ariel,” Ms. Cartwright said, disappointment right there in that one word and echoing so fiercely in her favorite teacher’s expression.

Ariel had disappointed so many people in the last few weeks. She’d worked so hard to please this one woman, and now, she’d disappointed her, too.

“Ariel, Mrs. Brown came to see me. She says she found this in your book.” Ms. Cartwright slid the small piece of paper across the desk. “Is this crib note yours?”

“Yes,” Ariel whispered.

“Pardon?”

“Yes.”

“Do you have an explanation?”

“I worked at the restaurant last night and planned on studying during my break but Dale, the dork manager at Barney’s, wouldn’t give me one. We had a bus come in and…” She simply shrugged. What more was there to say? She’d done it—she’d cheated. She could add that to her growing list of descriptions.

Cheerleader.

Student council rep.

Straight A student.

Pregnant teen.

Cheater.

Ms. Cartwright didn’t yell, didn’t scream. She just shook her head sadly and asked, “Do you really think this is the way to handle things? By taking the easy way out?”

“I just didn’t know what else to do.”

“Did it occur to you that you could go to Mrs. Brown and explain the situation to her. Or, you could have come to me. It’s part of my job description…helping you find options. There are always some. I know you’re new to the program, but it’s pretty much our mantra—finding options.” She sighed. “Listen, Ariel, this stopped being about you when you became pregnant. You will be this baby’s role model. He or she will look to you to see how to live. Is this what you’d want your child to do? Do you want them to take the easy way out?”

“No. I didn’t think of it like that.”

“You have to learn to think about everything you do in that way—how it will affect your baby. You need to do what’s best for them, always. Even when it’s difficult for you. Now, how do you think we should handle this?”

“You know, those are the kinds of questions all us kids hate. You make us decide on a fair punishment.”

“I make you take responsibility for your actions. Most teens have a few more years to learn about actions and consequences—the girls in this program don’t have the luxury of time. You don’t have that luxury.”

She looked pointedly at Ariel’s stomach and the barely there baby bump.

“Ariel, I see so much potential in you. Don’t blow it. If you have a problem, come see me, see Mrs. Brown. There are people here for you. Don’t forget that.”

“Maybe I should start by writing an apology to Mrs. Brown?”

“I think that’s an excellent place to begin. Come see me tomorrow and we’ll talk about what else you think is required in order to make this right.”

Darn. Ariel had hoped that a letter of apology would be all that she had to do to smooth this over. Obviously, it wasn’t.

“Okay, I’ll think about it and see you tomorrow.” She practically sprang for the door, anxious to escape Ms. Cartwright’s sympathetic gaze. It would be easier if the teacher would get pissed off and yell. But no, not her, she only looked as if her girls screwing up hurt her.

Ariel turned the doorknob, and pushed at the door, ready to make her escape when Ms. Cartwright’s voice stopped her. “And Ariel?”

She turned back and saw pain in Ms. Cartwright’s smile. She’d do almost anything to replace that look of disappointment with one of pride.

“You can’t cheat nature. You are going to be a mother in a few months and there are no crib notes that will let you fake your way through being a good parent. And that’s what you owe this baby. Being the best parent, the best example you can be.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And for that matter, Ariel, life happens. You can’t cheat your way through it, either. There are no crib notes. You have to live each day as well as you can. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Finally, dismissed, Ariel hurried away before Ms. Cartwright could say anything else profoundly painful.

There were no crib notes for being a parent. For being an adult.

Ariel desperately wished there were.

CHAPTER ONE

“There are four stages of mourning. Denial. Sadness. Anger. Acceptance. Becoming pregnant in your teens means that some dreams have to be put away, others altered. It’s a death of one future. You have to mourn that loss before you can move ahead and plan a new future…one that includes the baby you’re carrying.”

—Pregnancy, Childbirth and Parenting for

Teens, by Mary Jeanne Lorei

THERE WAS SOMETHING completely undignified about peeing in a cup. It took a certain knack that Elinore Cartwright didn’t feel she had acquired and, to be honest, she didn’t know that she wanted to be presented too many more opportunities to develop it.

Despite the fact she was nowhere near a master, she managed the fill the little paper cup. She washed her hands and then, clutching the paper gown at the back, hurried across the hall to her assigned examination room. She hoisted herself back onto the table.

Sitting on paper, wearing paper, covering herself with a square piece of quilted paper. Every movement was a festival noise.

The only nonpaper item she was wearing for her less-than-happily anticipated annual checkup was her wildly striped toe socks. She’d left them on partly because now that it was the end of October, her feet wouldn’t be warm again for at least eight months, and partly because she felt they dressed up her paper ensemble.

She sank back onto her paper-shrouded shrine and waited. Right on cue, as her body relaxed, her thoughts picked up steam, tumbling over themselves. There was no flitting involved, just a terrible tangled twist of to-do items and worries.

To-do: Call Zac Keller and set up a meeting for the end of the week.

Ariel Mayor. She replayed their talk from earlier this afternoon. It had seemed to go well. She saw a lot of potential in the girl. As a matter of fact…

To-do: Pull together Ariel’s information and see if Zac would agree that she’d make an excellent test-run for the new Community Action, Teen-parent Apprentice Project.

It had been almost fifteen years since Eli had started the George County School District’s teen parenting program. George County was a large, primarily rural county just south of Erie, Pennsylvania. Her job was to find ways to cut the county’s number of teen parents, and help those who were pregnant or already parents graduate and go on to be worthwhile members of the community.

The statistics said her program was working. She experienced that warm glow of pride she always felt when she thought about the inroads she’d made.

The number of teen mothers in the county was falling, the number of teen moms who graduated was climbing. And there had been a nice bump in the number of her mothers who went on to college or some type of vocational training after graduation.

This new project was just another way of helping her girls. Partnering local businesses with the students in the program. Giving the teens jobs with flexibility, jobs that would provide crucial work experience.

It sounded as if Ariel was already working hard, too hard, at that restaurant. This program might be just the ticket for her.

And despite Ariel Mayor’s slight bump in the road, Eli was determined that this girl would be one of her successes.

Her to-do list was replaced as a niggle of worry crept into the forefront of her thoughts. She’d figured passing so easily from fertility to menopause was a good thing. After half a year of erratic cycles, her periods had just stopped a few months ago with no other problems arising. No hot flashes, mood swings, trouble sleeping.

Eli took this as another sign that her life was pretty much perfect. She had Arthur, who, although he was a little less than exciting, was good company and a dependable boyfriend. She had a job she loved, a great family and good friends. And now, she’d had a pain-free transition into menopause at the ripe old age of forty-four.

At least, that’s what she thought until Dr. Benton had asked to run a few tests. One of which involved peeing in that stupid cup.

How long did it take to do whatever voodoo test he was doing? And what did he think was wrong?

Cancer?

That horrible C word.

Cancer of what? Cervix, uterus, ovaries? Maybe that was it, cancer had eaten all her eggs, so her periods had stopped.

She tried to force her thoughts back to her long to-do list. It was much more pleasant.

Okay. To-do…

Her mind was blank. She was saved from trying to fill it though when Dr. Benton opened the door.

“Go ahead and just tell me. Cancer has eaten all my eggs, right?”

He laughed.

Hmm, doctors didn’t normally laugh when telling someone they had a cancer, right?

She took a deep breath and let it out slowly, feeling better. She sat up and all the paper crinkled merrily. “I have an active imagination. So what’s the news?”

“You’re not in menopause—”

“Then it is cancer. Cancer of the uterus? That’s why my period stopped.”

“You’re pregnant.”

“Cancer of the cervix?”

“Pregnant. As in going to have a baby.”

She laughed. “Funny. Ha ha. You can tell me. Just say the words, I can take it.”

“Eli, you’re not sick, there’s nothing wrong with you that I’ve found. Although you are pregnant.”

“But…I can’t be. I mean, Arthur always uses condoms, and…” She paused, trying to process what Dr. Benton was saying. “You can’t get pregnant if you’re in menopause, so I’m not pregnant.”

“You’re not in menopause. You’re pregnant. Some of those missed periods were because you’re going to have a baby, not because of menopause. You’re going to have a baby in around six or seven months. Somewhere around May or June would be my guess. We’ll have to do some tests to be sure.”

“But—”

“Listen, Eli, I’ve been your doctor for a long time, and I know this comes as a shock. Why don’t you go home, take some time and process it all, then come see me again next week and we’ll talk? We’ll do a few more tests. I want to do a sonogram so we’ll have a more accurate idea of your due date since you have been experiencing erratic cycles.”

“But—”

“And here.” He reached into his pocket and handed her a prescription. “Prenatal, prescription vitamins. Get it filled and start taking one a day.”

“But—”

He patted her hand. “It’s going to be all right.”

Eli went into a type of brain-fogged automatic pilot. That was the only way to explain how she managed to dress and check in with the receptionist. She agreed to the first appointment that was offered without consulting her calendar, bundled into her jacket, and made her way to her car—her brand-new MINI Cooper. A more nonbaby car couldn’t be found. She drove a MINI, so there was no way she was pregnant.

The fog started to clear.

Dr. Benton, bless his heart, was wrong. That was the only explanation. She’d seen one of those news shows about doctors and their inaccurate tests. That’s what this was. The test was faulty.

Or, since Dr. Benton was getting on in age and probably needed reading glasses, he’d misread the results.

Either way, he was wrong. She was not pregnant.

With a newly found, albeit fuzzy, plan, Eli put her foot to the floor and hurried to her neighborhood pharmacy. While she waited for them to fill the prescription that she probably wouldn’t need, she grabbed a basket, then walked up and down the aisles until she found the pregnancy test section.

Six.

There were six different brands of pregnancy tests.

She read the boxes. Digital tests. Plus or minus tests. One box had three individual tests in it…for people who thought they were pregnant frequently? There was no way she would want to go through this sinking feeling more than once.

She studied the boxes. All claimed to be ninety-nine percent accurate.

She took the first box and threw it in her basket.

Just to be on the safe side, she grabbed a second brand and added it.

She started down the aisle. Surely, the tests would prove Dr. Benton was wrong.

But what if they were faulty as well?

She turned back and hurried to the display. She put one of each brand of test in her basket.

There. She’d take all of these and when all six told her she wasn’t pregnant, she’d call Dr. Benton and insist he either check the expiration dates on his tests at the office, or that he make an appointment for an eye exam.

Maybe both.

He was going to be embarrassed, she was sure. But she’d laugh it off, and make certain he understood she didn’t blame him.

Yes, tell him no harm, no foul.

By the time she got home she was feeling a surreal sense of calm. Everything would be fine once she peed on the six small wands. All of them promised results in three to five minutes.

She glanced at the clock. Dr. Benton would probably still be at his office. She’d call him right away so he could figure out what the problem was…faulty test or aging eyes.

She hurried into the bathroom and discovered peeing on sticks was infinitely easier than peeing in a cup.

She lined them all up on the counter and left, determined not to watch them. She didn’t need to. She knew what they were going to show—she wasn’t pregnant.

She stood outside the bathroom door, trying to decide what to do while she waited. Aimlessly, she went down the hall and thumbed through her mail that she’d set on the antique washstand she’d found last summer on her New England vacation with Arthur. They’d meandered with no real destination in mind, stopping in small towns and villages along the way.

She ran a finger over the stand, and couldn’t help it if her sleeve slipped up, exposing her watch. She didn’t mean to check the time and was disappointed to discover that only one minute had passed.

She walked through the house, feeling slightly removed—as if she were a visitor seeing it for the first time. She remembered every item, its history and any sentiment it carried.

Everything was orderly in her tiny, perfect-for-one-person, but not-for-a-baby house. There was her bedroom, with the froufrou pillows on the bed. Arthur hated them and felt that the few seconds she spent putting them in place every day were wasted time. It probably added up to an hour or more a year, he’d told her. Arthur was a big fan of time management, and try as she might, she couldn’t seem to convince him that time spent on aesthetics wasn’t wasted at all. She liked how the pillows looked on the bed, how the entire room’s decor came together. That was worth an hour of her year.

She peeked in her equally neat and appealing office. She’d spent three weekends stripping, then refinishing the oak floor. She’d used a high gloss on them and they truly shone. The deep red walls, the pulled back curtains…her office was an oasis.

This time she didn’t try to convince herself that glancing at her watch was an accident.

Two minutes to go.

She went to the kitchen, hoping she’d left a glass or plate in the sink, something she could rinse, but there was nothing.

Her house was too small, too settled for a baby.

She couldn’t be pregnant because she’d built a single person’s home.

She glanced at her watch again.

Finally knowing beyond any doubt just how Marie Antoinette had felt as she marched toward the chopping block, Eli opened the bathroom door, then one by one picked up the wands.

Pregnant.

Pregnant.

Pregnant.

Pregnant.

Pregnant.

Her hands trembled as she picked up the last one. One little stick of hope, which was the only branch she had left to hang on to.

Pregnant.

Shit.

Eli wasn’t sure how long she sat on the bathroom floor staring at that last stick. It was long enough for the realization to begin to penetrate, long enough that the ramifications of that stick, along with the other five, hit home.

She was pregnant.

Her feet were numb and tingling. One of the changes she’d noticed since hitting her forties was that she could only kneel for so long before all the blood stopped pumping into her legs.

She was well beyond her blood pumping limit.

And she was pregnant.

She wasn’t sure what to do. Who to turn to.

She wanted to cry, but had preached to her girls that news of a baby should never be greeted with tears. She’d had so many young moms in her office, crying their eyes out. She understood their feelings, but it struck her as a very sad way to welcome a child into existence, so she wasn’t going to cry.

But if she wasn’t going to cry, that left her nothing to do with the huge lump that was sitting squarely in the center of her throat.

What to do?

Call Tucker.

She made her wobbly feet walk into the living room and dialed her friend’s number. “Could you come over? I need you.” She’d known that would be all it took.