Her Baby's First Christmas

“She sits in the baby seat in the bathroom, so I can peek at her occasionally and hear her if she cries.”

“Why not just bring her out here once she’s had her bath and is in her pajamas?”

“I don’t want to bother you.”

He met her gaze. “Aren’t we past that yet?”

His usually stormy-gray eyes were no less troubled tonight. If anything, they seemed to be churning with even more emotion. Or maybe a new emotion. He needed her to trust him. Their situation was awkward but they were both honest, decent people. If she didn’t know at least that about him, how could he stay in the same room with her for an entire night? And if he couldn’t sleep in the only room left in the hotel, where would he sleep? The SUV? The hotel lobby?

They’d been handing the baby back and forth enough already that it really did seem ridiculous to have Molly sit in the baby seat on the floor of the bathroom. Surely she could muster that much trust.

“I guess.”

“So when you’re done with her, bring her out and tell me what to do.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

He picked up the television remote control from the dresser, and Elise took Molly, her clean clothes and her baby soaps and lotions into the bathroom. She didn’t have any accessories like a baby tub, so she had to hold Molly with one hand and scrub her with the other. By the time she was done, Elise was nearly as wet as Molly.

She walked the baby into the bedroom. Jared sat on the bed, pillow propped behind him, watching the news. He met her gaze. “What do you want me to do with Molly?”

She could have happily drowned in his pretty gray eyes. But except for the fleeting attraction she’d felt from him the time they loaded her things into the SUV at the bus stop, the only emotion she’d gotten from him was his need to be trusted. The physical attraction appeared to be only her battle. And it was a stupid battle. Really. Her being worried that a rich guy who worked with celebrities wanted her so much he wouldn’t be able to control himself? Now that was wishful thinking.

So she looked away, pretending great interest in stowing Molly’s dirty clothes in the plastic bag she kept in her suitcase for laundry. “She’s eaten and she’s clean. So she’s probably sleepy. Usually I would hold her or play with her until she rubs her eyes, then I’d put her in bed.”

“Then, that’s what I’ll do.”

“Crib’s not here yet.”

“It’s a busy night. I’m sure it will be here by the time Molly’s ready to go to sleep. If not, we’ll watch TV.”

She took a breath, suddenly uncomfortable. Deep down, she knew he wouldn’t do anything to hurt Molly. Yet part of her shimmied with fear over leaving her with him. “I don’t feel right about this.”

“Afraid I’ll wait until you’re occupied and steal her the way I was afraid you’d steal my SUV if I left you with the keys?”

She laughed uneasily. “No. But—”

“But you don’t think I’m capable of entertaining Molly?”

“I know you are.”

“Then what?”

It seemed foolish to lump him in with her untrustworthy dad and equally untrustworthy Patrick, when all Jared was asking to do was watch her baby for a few minutes. Still, now that the moment was here it felt wrong to simply trust him. To trust anybody.

“I just don’t like anybody doing the things I’m supposed to be doing.”

“Why?”

“Why?”

“Yeah, why?”

She remembered being about ten, sitting by the window of the little house she shared with her mom, praying her dad would come back—wishing her mom wouldn’t have to worry anymore, but he never did. Not even for a visit.

She thought of Patrick. Thought of how much easier the first months of her pregnancy would have been if he’d simply stuck with her. But when the going got tough, Patrick definitely got going. It never even occurred to him to stay with her. To help her.

Was it any wonder she didn’t believe any man would follow through?

“Just go shower. We have to be on the road early.”

The faint amusement in Jared’s voice brought her back to reality. He thought she was silly to argue. He’d been doing things like this all along. Taking the baby while she registered in the hotel the night before or paid restaurant checks when they stopped to eat. He didn’t understand that this time she wouldn’t be a few feet away. She’d be in another room. In a stream of water too loud to hear what was going on with her baby in the bedroom. And even if there was a noise loud enough to reach her, she couldn’t run out to check because she’d be naked—

Oh Lord, maybe she knew what her problem was. She didn’t so much fear leaving Molly with Jared, as she feared that she’d hear a noise and she’d bolt out of the bathroom half-dressed. And it was ridiculous. Not only was Jared capable of keeping something earth-shattering from happening in the five or ten minutes she’d need to shower, but also she wouldn’t come running out of the bathroom without at least grabbing a towel.

There was nothing to worry about.

After one quick glance to be sure Molly was okay, she turned and went into the bathroom.

She came out a few minutes later clean and dry, wearing sweatpants and a huge T-shirt to sleep in—the most unsexual outfit she could find in her suitcase. The crib had arrived and was set up in a corner of the room. Molly slept soundly surrounded by her familiar blankets. Jared still sat on the bed, propped on the pillow that leaned against the headboard, looking casual and comfortable and oh, so sexy.

She told herself to stop thinking that, but the very quiet, very private room with only one bed, and the intimacy of doing things like shower, seemed to multiply his sexuality. His disheveled hair and whisker-stubbled chin gave him a dark, rebellious look that spoke to everything feminine in her.

She tugged on the hem of the shirt, nervously pulling it down as far as it would go, twisting it in her hands, wishing with all her might that she would stop noticing him this way.

“Thanks for…um…taking care of Molly.”

“You’re welcome.” He rolled off the bed and grabbed his duffel, heading for the bathroom, either blissfully unaware of her ridiculous attraction or ignoring it.

When he was behind the closed bathroom door, Elise squeezed her eyes shut. She wished she could just run away. But she couldn’t. He was her driver. She wasn’t even sure where they were or where she could find a bus. And how could she take Molly out in this storm? They were stuck in this room together for the night.

Worse, in a few seconds, Jared would be the one beyond the thin wall naked under the stream of water. She grabbed the remote control and found a television station. She desperately needed to divert her attention.

Jared stepped into the bathroom confused about Elise. Her very evident physical attraction to him would have made him nervous, except he knew there was no way in hell she’d ever act on it. Mostly because she didn’t trust him and he sincerely doubted she ever would.

It infuriated him that after all the time they’d spent together he still had to coax her to let him watch Molly while she showered. He could believe Michael paid her well to housesit for six months. He could believe Elise saved all her money. Both of which were good reasons she could afford to pay her own expenses. So he hadn’t realized just how stubborn she was until the disagreement over him watching Molly.

That had shown him something he should have paid more attention to before, but had glossed over. She wasn’t simply independent about paying her own way; she didn’t really like him doing anything for her. She was the first woman he’d met in five years who didn’t see him as the source of every answer to all of her troubles. Of course, the only women he dealt with were clients, so he couldn’t be too hard on them for expecting him to do his job. But having to fight Elise for the “privilege” of helping her really wore on him.

He turned on the shower, stripped and stepped under the hot spray. He was so accustomed to people depending on him that he had to reach the whole way back to his days as an assistant district attorney to remember the last time he’d met a woman this distrustful. Those were the women he’d interviewed who had been battered and abused. He wondered again about the man who had left Elise and fought back the urge to find the guy and knock him into tomorrow. It wasn’t his business, but right at this moment that didn’t matter. Any time he had prepared a woman to testify against an abusive man he’d fought these same urges—

He froze under the hot spray. Shampoo bubbles slid down his forehead and into his eyes. He’d just thought of the past and his chest hadn’t tightened. He’d remembered being an assistant district attorney without reliving the pain.

Before he had a chance to really delve into what that meant, the shampoo stung his eyes and he shoved his head under the water. He washed himself, dried and put on the same kind of outfit Elise had. Sweatpants and a black T-shirt. If her outfit was intended to tell him she was off-limits, he’d use his to show her he got the message and agreed.

But as he squeezed paste onto his toothbrush, he suddenly realized she would fight him about who would sleep on the bed and he groaned in frustration. Everything with this woman turned into a battle.

Ready to simply tell her she was sleeping on the bed and he was sleeping on the floor, he marched out of the bathroom only to find her standing in his path, holding a coin, ready to flip it.

He stopped dead in his tracks. Her pretty red hair glistened in the light of the lamp on the dresser. Her T-shirt skimmed her breasts and hinted at the curve of her waist, the swell of her hips. The sharp, spicy scent of her shampoo mixed with remnants of the soap or shower gel she’d used and floated to his nostrils.

Reaction ricocheted through him. And again his brain sort of froze, unable to believe what was happening. He hadn’t felt an actual attraction to a woman in so long that the responses rolling through him right now were foreign, novel. Yearnings and needs that had lain dormant burst to life. For the first time in five years his hormones demanded control.

But Elise was the absolutely worst woman to be awakening his sexual urges. Not just because they were traveling together, but because she reminded him of the abused women he’d prepped for trial as an assistant district attorney.

What if Elise had been abused?

She probably wouldn’t have trusted him enough to ride across the country with him if she’d been physically abused. But from his two years as an A.D.A., he did know that emotional abuse could make a person antisocial. Overly independent.

Yeah. Something was definitely up with Elise and he wouldn’t do anything to make it worse.

He snatched the coin from her fingers before she realized what he was doing. He tossed it in the air, caught it and set it on the back of his hand with a smack. “Heads or tails?”

“Tails.”

He peered down. Saw the tails side of the coin and said, “Too bad. It’s heads. I sleep on the floor.” Then he tossed her coin back to her.

She caught it deftly. “Wait! I didn’t see the coin.”

“You have it in your hand.”

“You know what I mean. I didn’t see that it really was heads. You can’t just bully me…”

“Bully you into sleeping on the bed?” He laughed and walked to the closet, where he extracted the extra pillow and blanket. “Wow. What a horrible man I am for giving you the bed.”

“But I—”

“—Won the toss and get to sleep on the bed,” he said, walking to the open space at the other side of the room where he could spread out a blanket and drop his pillow. No matter how far away he walked, he could still smell her.

Yeah, it was better for him to sleep on the floor.

CHAPTER THREE

JARED awakened to the sound of laughter. He bounced up quickly and groaned. Not only was it still dark, but sleeping on the floor had played hell with his back.

He turned and saw a small strip of light coming from the bathroom, then heard Elise say, “Oh, you like that, do you?”

Her soft, feminine voice reminded him of how much trouble he’d had falling asleep while surrounded by her scents and listening to her rustle the bed sheets as she tossed and turned.

He pulled in a breath to banish all that from his mind and called, “Everything okay in there?”

“What?”

“I said—” He stopped, hauled himself off the floor and went to the bathroom door. Though it was partially open, he turned his head, not venturing to look inside. “I asked if everything was okay in there.”

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