Just Around The Corner

He wasn’t sure which he found sexier.

“I’m pregnant.”

Matt blinked. Froze inside. “Pardon?”

“I’m pregnant.”

He waited.

“I just thought you should know.” Dr. Langford, as he preferred to think of her, looked far too calm sitting there, her honey-colored purse, which matched her honey-colored shoes, still slung over her shoulder.

Her hair, a red version of Meg Ryan’s stylishly messy do, distracted him.

“I don’t understand why I’m the one you’re telling,” he said carefully, studying that hair. He knew it wasn’t polite to ask a woman who the father of her child was, but what did a guy say when it wasn’t him? He might have lost a good piece of his mind that Saturday in the theater, but not so much that he hadn’t protected himself, and her, from any and all consequences.

“Because you’re the only man I’ve had sex with since I divorced my husband four years ago.”

He shook his head, not thinking her a liar, just knowing his stuff. “I pulled on that condom before I got anywhere near you.”

“Condoms fail.”

“Not likely.”

“Read the box next time you pick some up,” she said, still appearing far too calm, too undemanding, to be telling him what he thought he was hearing. “They’re ninety-seven percent safe. Which leaves three percent for us to fall into.”

No.

“Added to the fact that, once I thought back on it, I realized the wrapper you took from your wallet didn’t look exactly new.”

It hadn’t been. But the damn things didn’t come with “use by” dates. For a reason.

“How long was it in there?” she asked.

He shrugged, uncomfortable. His private life was off-limits. Period.

Or it had been until last month, when he’d pulled down the zipper on the front of his jeans in the Performing Arts Center. Every swearword he could think of—his time in prison had given him quite a repertoire—passed through his mind. Attached to each one was a barb aimed directly at the guilty part of his anatomy.

“I don’t know,” he finally said. “A year, maybe more.”

Like, maybe three more. It’d been a long, long time since he’d relaxed enough to give in to a sexual urge.

“A year’s worth of being smooshed and sat on could definitely do it,” she said.

Damn, the woman sounded as though they were discussing nothing more earth-shattering than a rained-out game of Little League. Didn’t she get it? They had an untenable situation on their hands.

Matt didn’t even know how to be a friend. There was no way he could be a father.

“I…” He paused, wondering what to say to her, to make her understand.

“Don’t worry.” She jumped into the pause. “I’m not asking anything from you. I don’t want anything. What happened last month was a one-time, no-strings-attached episode. And that hasn’t changed.”

Episode. They’d had some of the most incredible sex of his life. They’d apparently made a baby. And she called it an episode?

Was that all the baby was to her, too? An episode? Easy come, easy go? The thought made him feel a little sick.

He opened his mouth to tell her so.

Whoa. He stopped just in time.

A few minutes ago he’d been looking for a way to bail. He could hardly blame her, a single woman with a prominent position at a prestigious college, for wanting to do the same.

Admittedly, bailing was a little more convenient for him than it would be for her.

“Do you mind if I ask what your plans are?” He’d pay whatever expenses she incurred. Money was the one thing he had to give.

For the first time since taking a seat, she looked down, and he saw the chink in her armor. Was oddly relieved to find it there.

“I haven’t really made any plans yet,” she told him. “I’m still getting used to the idea that I’m going to be a mother.”

Going to be a mother. Why did his mind keep repeating everything she said? You’d think he was dense or something.

“You’re planning to have the baby, then?”

Her head shot back up. “Of course. And before you ask, I’m not even considering the alternative, so you can save your breath.”

“I wasn’t going to ask.”

CHAPTER TWO

IT WAS GOING much better than she’d expected. And worse. She’d prepared herself for anger, denial, blame.

What she hadn’t prepared for was a thoughtful, concerned man. Inexplicably, his humanness made the whole thing so much harder to get through. He was supposed to be little more than a fly at her picnic. She’d swat him away and get on with it.

He wasn’t letting that happen—wasn’t letting her discount him as easily as she’d thought.

“So you’re definitely going to have the baby.” He was fooling with a paper clip on his desk. Bending it into odd shapes with two fingers of his left hand. Did that mean he was left-handed? She hadn’t noticed before.

Did that mean her baby might be left-handed, as well?

“Yes, I’m going to have it.” She swallowed. Her baby. And this man’s.

He looked up, head cocked to one side, eyes narrowed. “I can’t be a father.”

The sigh of relief escaped Phyllis before she could prevent it. “Who asked you to be?”

Back to his paper clip. She wondered if he was staring at it so intently because he was really trying to create some particular design—or because he didn’t want to look at her.

“I’ll pay for everything.”

“That won’t be necessary.”

A baby. A baby with her traits and his, all mixed together. Growing inside her body.

He raised his head, frowning. “Of course it’s necessary. I’m responsible. I pay.”

Two could play that game. “I’m responsible. I pay.”

“Well, then, we’re both responsible. We split the bills fifty-fifty.”

No! That wasn’t the plan. She was doing this alone.

But he had her. They were both responsible. She just hadn’t figured he’d care. How was she to know he had a streak of responsibility in his reclusive body?

“Have you been to the doctor yet?”

Phyllis shook her head. Don’t do this, she silently begged him. Don’t confuse me. Don’t weaken me by carrying any of my load, or I might not be able to carry it all when you walk away.

“You’ll let me know when your appointment is?”

She couldn’t breathe. Needed to get outside, let the cool October air chill her skin. Remind herself that she was okay.

“Why?” Somehow her voice sounded almost normal.

He shrugged. “I’m half-responsible. I should know stuff like that.”

“Just how much are you counting on here? What exactly will you want to know?”

“Not sure.” He’d picked up another paper clip. This one with his right hand. “I’m new at this, too. I guess when something costs money, I should know about it.”

That wasn’t as bad as she’d begun to think. It wasn’t personal. Merely financial.

“I’ll see that you get copies of the bills.”

His face expressionless, he nodded.

“There’s one other thing,” she added quickly.

Matt looked up at her, his eyes wary, questioning.

“Cassie Montford knows you’re the father—it seemed necessary that someone know in case something happens—but she’s been sworn to secrecy. I don’t want anyone else knowing.”

He seemed to consider that for several moments. “It would probably make things easier on both of us,” he said at last.

Phyllis stood, satisfied. “That’s what I thought.”

“Good.”

“Good.”

“Well, send me the bills.” Tossing the paper clip, he stood, too.

“I will.”

“Okay, see ya.” He’d followed her to the door.

“Goodbye.” Phyllis spoke with finality.

If she had her way, they’d never see each other again.

He made her tremble. He made her crazy and just a little angry. She absolutely refused to let him become part of her life.

She didn’t want or need his financial contributions.

This time it was the bills and not the check that would get mysteriously lost in the mail.

THE KICKING BAG went down. And came back up. Then went down again. Turning, Matt caught it with a perfectly placed side kick, knocking it into the corner of the wall. And, with hands properly angled in front of him, he turned and landed another perfect blow with the opposite foot.

Sweat dripped down the sides of his face. He didn’t bother wiping it off. It burned his eyes, but he ignored the pain, which was only the minutest portion of the punishment he deserved.

After more than an hour in his home gym, he wasn’t even close to the worn-out state he was working toward.

How could he have done it? He of all people?

Had life taught him nothing? The time he’d never be able to recapture. The humiliation and abuse. The lost dreams. Lost innocence. Had it all been for nothing?

Another smack on the bag, and the sand-weighted bottom scooted along the floor.

He just couldn’t believe what was happening. Couldn’t have imagined a worse day than the one he’d just had.

He’d made a woman pregnant. A perfectly respectable doctor of psychology was facing a complete and permanent upheaval in her life because of him.

Forgetting himself to the point of lost discipline, Matt hauled off and slugged the kicking bag with both fists, over and over, like a novice and completely unskilled boxer, rather than the Tae Kwon Do black belt he was. Logically he knew he was solving nothing. That he was probably going to hurt himself.

But he couldn’t stop. Couldn’t harness the anger, the despair and disappointment coursing through him. Didn’t know what to do next, except wear himself out, force himself into complete exhaustion. How was he going to live with himself?

He’d just begun to find a measure of internal peace. Maybe even forgiveness. And in the span of a ten-minute office visit, years of hard work, of unrelenting self-control and mental promises, had been shot to hell.

He’d been in Shelter Valley for four years. Pretending to himself that he was building a new life, becoming the man he’d always expected himself to be.

When instead, he was exactly what he’d been before Will Parsons had been kind enough to give him this job, this chance.

A man who’d spent years in prison. He hadn’t been guilty of the statutory rape of which he’d been convicted. But he hadn’t been entirely blameless, either. He’d allowed that girl—a student—to think he found her desirable. He hadn’t intended to; he’d only meant to offer a confused young girl a measure of confidence, a sense of approval. In his own idealistic ignorance, he’d tried to help someone and had only confused her more.

Slumping to the carpet, sweat dripping down his back and chest beneath the soaked T-shirt he was wearing, Matt grabbed his aching head between both fists.

The tears, when they dripped slowly from beneath tightly closed lids, mixed in with the sweat. Fell unnoticed. Forgotten. Allowing no forgiveness for a sin not committed—and then committed six years after the fact.

This was the second time he’d contributed to the ruin of a perfectly lovely woman’s life.

He deserved to rot in hell.

And that was just what he feared would happen to him. Only it would be a hell of his own making, right here on earth, in this place of shelter where everyone else had family and friends and knew the comforts afforded by love. It was going to be his own private hell. Even in this journey of everlasting destruction, he would be all alone.

IT WAS LATE on the first Tuesday night in November, and Phyllis had just arrived home from Phoenix when the phone rang. She’d been at a pet-therapy session with Cassie and a woman who’d been brutally raped by a colleague while working in a nursing home.

Sighing, she picked up the phone, a portable. “Surely you’ve seen a doctor by now.” The voice didn’t bother with introductions or hellos.

She considered lying, but that wasn’t her style.

“I have.”

“When? Today? Is that where you’ve been all evening?”

If he’d sounded like someone who was checking up on her—instead of like someone who was driving himself crazy with frustration—Phyllis would’ve been able to handle the conversation a lot more effectively.

“I went last week,” she admitted. “Today I’ve been in Phoenix with Cassie Montford, helping her with her pet therapy. We went to see a woman in Phoenix who’s crawled so deeply inside herself that she’ll respond to nothing but one of Cassie’s dogs. We’re using the dog Angel to help her learn how to trust enough to interact with human beings again. If we don’t succeed, she’s going to live the rest of her life shut away in an institution.”

Phyllis wasn’t usually a babbler, but it didn’t take a genius to figure out that she didn’t want to give Matt a chance to say what he’d called to say. She’d managed to put him out of her mind for hours at a time this past week. She didn’t need him back there.

“Have you had any success?” he asked when her words finally stopped.

Sinking into the couch in her tiny living room, Phyllis leaned back and stared at the ceiling. “Yeah, just tonight,” she told him, feeling strangely comforted.

Cassie had Sam at home, waiting to hear all about it. Phyllis had no one.

“She’s been petting Angel for weeks without reacting at all. Tonight, for the first time, she looked at her and there were tears in her eyes.”

“And that’s good?”

“It means she’s in there—and that she’s starting to come out. She’s going to need a whole lot of reassurance before that can happen, though.”

“She didn’t cry before?”

Phyllis said no, started a technical explanation of hysterical amnesia and paralysis, and her own understanding of the things she’d read in the abused woman’s eyes, and then abruptly stopped herself. She’d learned long ago that people didn’t want to hear any of these things. She must be more tired than she’d thought.

“And you could tell she was searching for reassurance just from that one look at a dog?” he asked.

“Yeah,” Phyllis said softly. “Her mind’s been protecting her for a long time. She’s lived inside a place that exists only in her own head, and she’s afraid to come out. She’s going to need constant reassurance that when she does, there’s a safe, protected environment waiting for her.”

“And you can provide that in weekly visits?”

“Of course not.” Kicking off her shoes, Phyllis pulled her feet onto the sofa, tucking them beneath her. “We’re just the door through which she’s going to travel. The environment is right there waiting for her. She has a team of counselors working with her. People who’ve been around her, speaking with her, for months. At least one of them is with her twenty-four hours a day.”

“What about her family? Do they come to see her?”

“Her sister does. Everyday. The two of them lived together before Ella was raped.”

“Isn’t it hard sometimes? Dealing with stuff like this?” He asked a question Phyllis rarely allowed herself to ask. “Seems like it could be…painful.”

“It is,” Phyllis said, remembering the year before, when she’d had Tory Sanders living with her. Under her guidance, Tory had been coming to terms with her abusive past, as well as grieving for her dead sister—Phyllis’s best friend, Christine. “But then the light goes on in someone’s eyes and suddenly I have all the energy in the world,” she continued. “I’ve learned that when I’m feeling discouraged about a patient’s recovery, I need to focus on the eventual appearance of that light, to look for it in the tiniest of signs, and I find myself getting little bursts of energy.”

“Like tonight.”

“Right.”

“You’re amazing.” There was wonderment in his tone, and Phyllis felt an impulse, irrational but overpowering, to dismiss Matt’s approval.

“I also spend most of my working hours in a classroom lecturing to healthy students,” she reminded him. “Cases like this happen much less frequently.”

“So what did the doctor have to say?”

She stiffened. He’d caught her off guard. Again.

“To take my vitamins.”

“Everything’s okay?”

He wasn’t supposed to ask. Or care.

“Yes.”

“I don’t think I saw a bill. An insurance deductible, maybe? Vitamins?”

They both knew he hadn’t.

Sitting up, Phyllis slipped back into her shoes and walked to her bedroom. She was tired. Needed a long soak in a hot tub. Just as soon as she got him off the phone.

“I’m a psychologist, Matt. I know about emotions and relationships, and I’m very sure that this will be much healthier for both of us if we agree to let this situation be mine.”

“I—”

“I don’t need your help. Not financially or in any other way,” she interrupted, lining up her shoes in her closet. She’d been doing this ever since she’d seen her friend Randi do it. Now her shoes were much easier to find. Besides, she found the effect visually pleasing—and any activity that created a sense of order was a good thing, in her view. “As a matter-of-fact, if you want to help me, then rest assured that what would help the most is if you’d just let me get on with my life. There’s no point including you when neither of us want you to be part of either my life or this child’s.”

“But—”

“I promise to call you if anything changes,” she said. “If I get into trouble or have any problems, I won’t hesitate to let you know.”

“You’d better mean that,” he said, his voice rougher then usual.

“I do.”

“Then I guess I’ll be seeing you.”

Not if she could avoid it.

The man confounded her. He jumbled her thoughts—and that was something Phyllis just could not tolerate. Her emotions she couldn’t always dictate, but her mind was the one thing she had to be able to count on. And Matt Sheffield threatened her mental clarity, her ability to analyze, to make rational, informed decisions. She hung up the phone with finality.

“Okay, baby,” she said, her voice several notches higher—and happier—as she bent to run her bath. “Let’s go play in the tub and then I’ll give you a nice long rubdown with the oil the doctor gave us. How does that sound?”

It was still far too early in her pregnancy for any response from the tiny fetus growing inside her, but Phyllis knew that somehow the baby heard her and was learning to recognize his mother’s voice.

That might not be a rational belief—more of an intuitive conviction—but Phyllis didn’t question it for a second.

MATT HAD NO REASON to be at the faculty meeting. He rarely attended them, preferring to have pressing business at the theater whenever Will Parsons called a meeting with his faculty and staff.

Will had never given him any crap about his inclination to steer clear of large groups—a bit of leftover discomfort from the claustrophobia he’d developed in prison. But he’d always made certain that Matt received whatever information he needed.

Matt suspected that the older man understood the more urgent reason he chose to keep his distance from his colleagues. The more time Matt spent in their company, the more chance they’d ask the kinds of personal questions he didn’t want to answer.

He caught Will’s raised eyebrow when he slipped into the back of the large lecture hall, where the university president was giving his mid-November faculty address.

If Matt wasn’t careful, he was going to be raising other questions he wasn’t prepared to answer.

He noticed Phyllis Langford sitting between an English professor and the head of the Psych Department, up near the front of the hall, and slid into the back corner seat. She was the reason he was there, the person he needed to speak to. He had no concrete ideas of what he was going to say to her, no suggestions to present. He only knew that, through her, he had to find some degree of absolution. He had to reach an understanding of his role in this whole baby thing, otherwise he’d never get rid of the guilt.

Will announced all the shows scheduled at the Performing Arts Center during the holidays. Mentally planning his crews, Matt felt a twinge of unease as Sophie Curtis topped the list on every show that mattered. As stage manager of the most recent show she’d worked, the girl had missed several cues, failed to get the props onstage in time, pulled the curtain too soon and left the house lights lowered for the first five minutes of intermission.

Matt couldn’t remember when he’d last seen her smile. She barely resembled the vivacious blonde of a year ago.

Will Parsons was speaking about a new promotional video the college was making. Matt would help with the shooting of some of the inside segments—and probably have a hand in the editing process, as well. He’d designed a couple of gobos—metal pieces placed in front of lights to throw shadows for special effect—they’d be using.

He was still finishing a note to himself when the meeting ended and his co-workers started filing past. A few nodded at him politely. The dance director smiled. No one stopped to speak.

He relaxed a bit.

And waited.

Phyllis Langford walked right past him, engrossed in conversation with her department head. She was wearing a navy suit today, with a navy-and-white polka-dot blouse. She looked great.

And not the least bit pregnant.

“Hi,” he said, stepping up behind her.

Swinging around, she knocked into him, her purse walloping him in the ribs. “Matt! Hi,” she said, smiling at him for a second. He hated how quickly her face sobered. “Did you need something?” she asked much more hesitantly, glancing at her superior.

Matt glanced at the older man, as well, wondering if Phyllis had any interest in him other than a professional one.

Wondering, too, if his baby was going to prevent her from pursuing that interest.

“I’d like to see you for a second, if you’ve got the time,” he said. She was the entire reason he was at the damn Friday-afternoon meeting. A carefully planned, casual running into each other, just to see how she was doing. He hadn’t spoken with her in almost two weeks.

Excusing herself to Dr. Ellington, Phyllis followed Matt out into the hall.

“What’s up?” She appeared to be very carefully keeping a distance between them as they walked out of the building and across campus toward the faculty lot where they’d both parked. Matt was grateful to her for that distance.

“Just wanted to make sure there were no problems.”

She frowned. “I told you I’d call if there were.”

“I know.”

“So?”

“I’m just making sure.”

“Matt, the whole idea is that I’m on my own here. That means you don’t check up on me.”

He nodded. Glad to hear she still seemed confident in her decision. And then he remembered the good Dr. Ellington.

“Have dinner with me this weekend,” he said before he could weigh the consequences of his words.

“No.”

“We can go to Phoenix, someplace no one we know will see us together.” Her refusal made him more determined. He was doing this for her. And for him, too, he guessed. Somehow he had to find a way to live with himself. He couldn’t allow the pregnancy to throw her whole social life, her career plans, off course.

“No.”

“I have something to discuss with you,” he said, thinking of ways she could have his child and still date and attend conferences and do all the things she’d done before. He hadn’t thought of one, but maybe together they could come up with something….

“What?”

There was no way she could be pregnant with his child and continue with her life as it had been. He just had to accept that fact—and accept his share of the blame.

“My family medical history,” he said, coming up with the idea at the last minute. “You should know my medical background. Your doctor should have it.”

“She did ask…” Phyllis said, and then stopped. Stopped speaking. Stopped walking. She looked up at Matt, her eyes serious, her lips firm.

“All right, one dinner, but that’s all,” she said. “And then I’m on my own.”

“Agreed.”

Matt meant what he said. But he didn’t feel good about it.