Secret Baby, Second Chance

Other than telling her Giovanna had left when he was a baby, he’d never talked to Beth about his mother, but she must have known there was a twisted branch in the Delaney family tree. It didn’t take much imagination to work out that Giovanna’s abandonment was at the root of Vincente’s issues. The loss of a parent had impacted his whole life. Yet Beth had repeated the pattern with Lia?

He wanted to storm and rage at Beth for what she’d done, but he also needed to find out why she’d done it. This was Beth. Beth, to whom he had been closer than any other person in his whole life. There had to be a reason why she had deprived him of almost a year of his daughter’s life. He had to get this right, for all they’d once been to each other, but also for the innocent child who was caught up in the middle of this.

The innocent child who was sliding from his knee with a purposeful glint in her eye. Vincente had never realized it was possible to move so fast at a crawl. Before he knew it, she had reached a vase of flowers and toppled it onto the floor. As he stooped to pick them up, she launched herself at the dog, grabbing him by the tail. Melon let out a yowl and ran for the door. That was the moment when Vincente decided it was probably a good idea to postpone the soul-searching and concentrate on the babysitting.

As he watched Lia and tried to keep up with her, some of the negative emotion coursing through him melted away. It was replaced by a new warmth as he felt an immediate connection to his daughter.

She was his. As well as the physical similarities, he could see other traits they had in common. When he tried to take something from her, a militant light entered her eye and she thrust out her chin, mirroring his own stubbornness. As he sat with her and tried to help her stack her blocks, she brushed his hand away, determined to try it for herself.

Although he’d been consumed by rage and shock as he’d crossed the threshold of this house, he’d resolved to do his duty. He had a child and he would take care of her. What he hadn’t expected was this rush of pure joy he felt every time he looked at her.

Lia might look like him, but her smile was all Beth...or the Beth he’d once known.

He hadn’t been exaggerating when he told Beth he was worried about her. Physically, she had barely changed, but there were other differences that became more apparent the longer he was with her. She was wound as tight as a coiled spring, tension apparent in every part of her slender body. The way she held herself taut as though poised for flight, the tilt of her head as if she was listening for a subtle sound and the way those glorious denim-blue eyes refused to settle on one thing. He had thought at first it was because she was unable to make eye contact with him. Gradually, he realized her gaze was constantly moving, checking her territory, seeking reassurance that everything was normal.

She was exhausted. That had been apparent the moment he set eyes on her. And he had used it to his advantage. By offering to look after Lia while she got some rest, he supposed he had been manipulative, but wasn’t he entitled to be devious in the circumstances? He had just come face-to-face with the daughter he didn’t know he had. And he hadn’t been entirely underhanded. Although, after the initial shock had worn off, his first emotion had been simmering rage, he could sense Beth’s turmoil. Offering to look after Lia while she got some rest served a number of purposes. He got the chance to spend precious time with his daughter—a tiny fraction of the eleven months I’ve lost—Beth could recoup some of her strength for what promised to be the ordeal of the conversation they needed to have and Vincente could catch his breath.

He suspected he and Laurie were the only visitors this house had seen in a long time. Lia was immaculately dressed, but, like Beth herself, the house was clean without being exactly cared for. It was far from being a hovel, but her nervousness, together with the way she fussed around, picking up toys and plucking at the stain on her shirt, drew his attention to the details. She was clearly focused on appearances and finding them lacking. What had happened to the happy, sociable woman he’d known in Stillwater? Yes, Beth had a baby now, but would that turn her into a recluse? He didn’t know enough about these things. Maybe it would.

But what worried him more than anything was the feeling he got that all this was about more than being protective of her child. No, it wasn’t a feeling. He knew her too well. It was a certainty. Beth was scared. More than scared. She was terrified.

* * *

Beth woke abruptly with a rising sense of panic. She was fully dressed, lying on top of the bedclothes. How could she be asleep during the day? What about Lia? Gradually, the events of the morning came back to her and she heaved a sigh of relief. The sensation of contentment soon dissipated when she realized what she had done. I left Lia with Vincente. Today might be the day I actually took leave of my senses. She sat up abruptly. After sixteen months in hiding, she had not only opened her door to the man she had decided never to see again, she had blithely handed her daughter over to him.

Our daughter, she reminded herself. Lia would be safe with Vincente; there was no question about that. The problem was, now Vincente knew he had a daughter, there could be no going back. He would want to be involved in her life. That was a conversation that was going to take every ounce of Beth’s considerably depleted energy.

Pausing only to run a brush through her hair, drag it back into its ponytail and slip her ballet flats back on, she made her way back down the stairs. When she reached the family room, a scene of total devastation greeted her. Vincente was seated on the floor, half reclining against the sofa. His shirt was pulled out of his jeans and his hair and beard were smeared with something that looked suspiciously like dried banana. Lia was asleep with her head on his shoulder.

“She trashed the place,” he whispered. His expression was stunned. “As soon as you left the room, she just went for it.”

Every toy Lia owned was scattered across the floor. The wildflowers Beth had picked the day before were shredded into tiny pieces. The vase they had been in lay on its side and water formed a pool on the carpet around it. Cushions and throws had been dragged from the sofas and piled in a heap on the floor. It looked like a whirlwind had been through the room. And it had. Beth knew what Whirlwind Lia at full force could do. Vincente would not have stood a chance.

“I think she wore herself out.” Vincente smiled ruefully as he indicated the sleeping figure in his arms.

Although she had only just woken up, Beth felt weariness crowding in on her once more. Stooping, she lifted her slumbering daughter into her arms. “I’ll take her upstairs.”

As she carried Lia from the room, she was aware of Vincente watching her intently. Once upstairs, she settled the warm, sleeping bundle into her crib, pulling a blanket over her. There was a draft coming through the open window, which she closed before returning to the crib. Bending to kiss Lia’s soft cheek, she studied her face for a moment or two. Sleeping or waking, she could watch her forever. Right now, she supposed she should go and get the less attractive task of talking to Vincente over with.

When she reached the den, Vincente had picked up the throws and cushions and placed them back on the sofas. He paused in the act of placing Lia’s toys back in their box. “No wonder you look tired.”

“Laurie said she wouldn’t tell you where I lived.”

“She didn’t.” His expression was half wary, half apologetic. “I followed her without her knowledge.” He ran a hand over his face and, feeling the residue of the banana, grimaced. “Is there somewhere I can clean up?”

Beth directed him to the bathroom and went into the kitchen to fix coffee, shaking her head at the normality of the situation. This was Vincente. The thought was on a loop inside her head. They didn’t do polite conversation. They’d never needed words. The last time she’d seen him, she had kicked his apartment door shut and torn his shirt off. They hadn’t exchanged more than a few sentences that night. It had almost killed her to sneak out of his apartment without saying goodbye. She had left his apartment, gotten into the car that was already loaded with her luggage and driven out of Stillwater for good. The ultimate irony had come two weeks later, when she realized that the recurring stomach bug that had been bothering her was actually a four-month pregnancy.

Vincente reappeared with his shirt tucked in and the banana removed. As Beth poured the coffee, she was conscious of those melting dark eyes watching her face. “When were you planning on eating lunch?”

“Don’t do this, Vincente.” She handed him his coffee and took her own to the table, grimacing as she viewed the paperwork that she still hadn’t touched. If she pulled another all-nighter, she might just meet the deadline.

“Do what?” He came to sit opposite her.

“I know these tactics. This is where you soften me up before you go for the kill.” She took a deep breath. “I know how angry you are. Just say what you have to say.”

He didn’t speak for a moment or two and she took in the tight set of his jaw, the glitter in the dark depths of his eyes and the way his clenched fist rested on his muscled thigh. “You think angry comes close to describing what I’m feeling right now? I’m so far beyond that it’s not true. But I want to understand why you cheated me out of almost a year of Lia’s life. I’m trying to contain my feelings so we can have some sort of rational dialogue for the sake of that little girl upstairs, and because I’m concerned about you—”

“Oh, no.” Beth sprang to her feet. “I see where this is going. You think you can walk in here and pull a stunt like that?”

“What the hell are you talking about? What stunt?” Vincente looked up at her, his expression bemused.

“Get some rest, Beth. Let me do this for you, Beth. For old times’ sake?” Her voice quivered as she mimicked his concerned tone. “What will you tell the judge when you try to take my daughter away? You turned up here and found I was incapable of looking after her? Depressed? Unstable? An unfit mother?”

Vincente got to his feet, facing her across the width of the table. “Is that what you think?” His voice was harsh. “That I’ve changed so much I would do that to you?”

“I’m sorry. It’s just that losing her...it’s my worst nightmare.” He didn’t know—couldn’t know—what she’d been through. The debilitating anxiety and isolation of post-partum depression was something she still found hard to come to terms with, even now she was over the worst of it. At times like this, when she felt under pressure, some of the symptoms resurfaced. She no longer needed medication, but she did occasionally keep in touch with her counselor. Right now, she focused on regulating her breathing. It was one of the techniques she had learned for coping with stress.

“Beth, no matter what I’m feeling, I would never try to take Lia from you.”

Beth knew Vincente well enough to sense when she could trust him. He couldn’t be trusted to turn up on time to a date. She couldn’t trust him to remember birthdays and anniversaries. No matter how many times she told him, trusting him to remember that she hated anchovies on her pizza never worked. But when it came to the big things? She knew he would never lie to her. This was one of those times. There was nothing but truth in those dark eyes.

“I still want an answer to my question. Why did you leave Stillwater without telling me you were pregnant?”

She took her seat again, making an effort to relax the tension in her limbs. Following her lead, Vincente sat down, as well. How could she tell this story without telling him all of it? Vincente wasn’t a fool. He was the smartest person she knew. Not only was he the most quick-witted, well-read, articulate person to have made her acquaintance, but he was also the most perceptive. And where Beth was concerned, he was incredibly intuitive. He had always been able to tell when she was lying.

“It wasn’t like that.” She took a sip of her coffee, buying a little time. “I didn’t know I was expecting a baby when I left Stillwater.”

“Math is my job, Beth. I’ve already done the calculations. Lia is eleven months old. That means you must have been four months pregnant when you ran away—” she nodded in confirmation “—yet you didn’t know?” His voice said it all. She hadn’t been some kid who didn’t know her own body. She had been a twenty-seven-year-old attorney with a promising career.

“I had a lot on my mind.” God, those words sounded so lame. But it was true. The newspaper report had arrived two months before she left Stillwater. She hadn’t known that Lia had already been growing inside her, hadn’t noticed the missed periods and the changes in her body. Her whole focus had been on the nagging worry at the back of her mind. The worry that had ratcheted up to a whole new level a month later with the arrival of the letter and the first photograph. By the time the next one turned up in her mailbox a week before she left Stillwater, she had been half-crazy with worry. Any physical symptoms her body had been displaying had come second to the turmoil of her emotions.

Receiving anonymous threats had been bad enough. When those warnings became directed at anyone close to her, she had panicked. Because there was only one person close to her. Whether he liked it or not, Vincente had been the one who meant the most to her. Even though it had broken her heart to leave, even though missing him had been a constant ache ever since, it had seemed like the only way she could protect him.

Now he was here, and she couldn’t tell him the truth. I’ll come after the ones you love... Even the thought of those words made her shiver.

Vincente frowned. Clearly, he wasn’t buying her explanation. Beth didn’t blame him. She wouldn’t herself if she was the one listening to it. A lot on my mind. It was a classic fobbing-off phrase. His lips parted in preparation to ask more just as a cry from the baby monitor, for the second time that day, provided an interruption.

This cry was different. This wasn’t one of Lia’s usual noises. It was a high-pitched scream that brought Beth straight to her feet and had her running for the door. At the same time, out in the yard, Melon went into a frenzy of barking.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” Picking up on her panic, Vincente was right behind her as she dashed up the stairs.

“Someone is in Lia’s room.”

Chapter 3

Vincente got all the confirmation he needed about Beth’s state of mind when she hurtled from the kitchen and charged up the stairs. “Someone is in Lia’s room? What the hell do you mean?” How had she reached that conclusion from the noise she had heard Lia make through the baby monitor?

Beth didn’t answer. He could hear her breath catching in her throat in a series of gasps as she reached the top of the stairs and burst through a door to her left. To Vincente’s relief, Lia was lying on her side in her crib with a pink-and-white blanket pulled up to her chin. Her long lashes shadowed her cheeks and her breathing was rhythmic.

Beth made a sound that was somewhere between a sigh and a sob. She raised a hand to her lips, but it was shaking so wildly she couldn’t complete the action and she lowered it back to her side. When she turned to look at Vincente, her eyes were urgent and haunted, their blue depths awash with unshed tears.

“Beth—” just what was going on with her? “—she’s fine. No one has been in here.”

The tears spilled over as she blinked, and she brushed them impatiently away with the back of her hand. “She cried out as if someone had touched her.” He could see doubt creeping in now as she turned back to look at Lia. “That’s how she cries when a stranger tries to hold her.”

She shivered slightly as if a chill had caught her unawares. Turning slowly, she looked at the open window. “No. I closed that when I brought her up here. I know I did.”

“Maybe you forgot. It’s easily done.”

The uncertainty and trembling were gone now. Momentarily, he was looking at the old Beth. “I know I closed the window. I felt a draft and I moved across here to close it before I came downstairs.” There was a militant look in her eye. One he remembered well. “I’m not wrong about this, Vincente.”

She moved to the window and leaned out. “Look.” She pointed. “Someone has placed a ladder up against the side of the house, right below this window. That’s how he got in.”

Vincente was still skeptical. “In broad daylight? And why didn’t that mad dog of yours attack whoever it was that was setting a ladder up against the side of the house and climbing in through one of the windows?”

“Because this room is at the side of the house.” Beth was pacing now, wrapping her arms around her waist as though hugging herself. “Melon is in the backyard. He was barking to warn me, but he couldn’t get around to this side.”

“So, this person, whoever it was, climbed in, touched Lia and made her cry, climbed out again and ran off?” Vincente said. “Why? What did he, or she, hope to gain from it?”

“He wanted to frighten me. He said if I told anyone...if I involved the police...” She struggled to regulate her breathing. “Now you and Laurie have been here. This is his way of warning me.”

Vincente was about to pursue the subject further when Lia stirred and rolled onto her back. The action revealed an item that had been hidden under the blanket. Although Vincente could see it was a photograph, he couldn’t make out the detail, and he didn’t get a chance to look too closely. His attention was taken up by the remarkable effect the picture had on Beth.

As soon as she saw the photograph, she gave a little cry and ran from the room. Picking up the picture, Vincente straightened the blanket over Lia before following her. When he found Beth, she was on her knees beside a bed. Presumably this was her own bedroom.

As he watched in surprise, she hauled a suitcase out from under the bed and opened it. Pulling open the closet, she began to throw clothes into the suitcase.

“What are you doing?” Apart from losing your mind?

“Getting out of here.” She brushed past him and, opening a drawer in the dresser, carried an armful of underwear over to the case. “Right now.”

* * *

Beth’s heart was beating so fast it felt like it was going to burst right out of her body. Her chest grew tighter as if her ribs and lungs had expanded beyond their capacity and, with nowhere to go, they were forced to stay inside her. One minute she couldn’t inhale. The next, her breath was coming in great, whooping gasps as though she’d just finished running a marathon.

Then her stomach decided to join the party, giving a huge backflip that sent sick bile rising up into her throat, making her gag. And the whole time her mind was playing one thought on a loop, over and over.

Get out.

She raced wildly around her bedroom, scarcely aware of Vincente until he blocked her way, forcing her to stop what she was doing and look at him.

“You have to tell me what this is about.”

“No.” Don’t tell. That was what the letter had said. I’ll know if you do. “I can’t.”

“Beth.” He caught hold of her hands, and his touch slowed some of the madness in her heart. “I am not letting you leave here like this. You may have run from me once, but it’s not happening again. I will keep following you until you tell me what is scaring the hell out of you.” He lowered his voice, so it became softer and more persuasive. “You have always been able to tell me anything.”

She looked into those midnight eyes. He was right. No matter what crazy point they had been at in their relationship—midfight, making up, wildly in love, just friends—Vincente was the one person to whom she could always take a problem. Even when she was mad at him, she used to go to him for advice. That was before I had a madman on my tail. And now he’s after my daughter.

The thought sent a renewed flare of panic storming through her and she tried to tug her hands away. “I can’t.”

Vincente pointed to the picture he’d placed on the bed. “That was placed in my daughter’s crib. If you won’t tell me what it’s about, do I need to take it to the police?”

Beth felt the color, what little there was left of it, drain from her face. “No. Please don’t.”

“Then talk to me, Beth.” He released one of her hands and picked up the picture. “We can go to Lia’s room, if you feel more comfortable there.”

She nodded. “Give me a minute to get something.”

While Vincente returned to the nursery, Beth withdrew the envelope containing the letter, newspaper report, and the other photographs from the drawer in her bedside table. Was she really going to do this? She had run from Stillwater because of this. She had left her old life behind, partly because she had been in danger, but also because any people to whom she was close had been in danger. And Vincente had been the closest of all. Oh, he didn’t know that. Or maybe he did...but he would never admit it. Vincente didn’t do close. He was great at the physical stuff. But emotionally? No. We never went there. Every time things strayed close to the L word, we’d find ourselves breaking up again.

But this was no longer just about Beth. Someone had been in Lia’s room today, and that someone had already killed two people. Beth was determined to do all she could to protect Lia, but maybe she needed help. And what better person was there to help her than Lia’s father?

Even so, this wasn’t going to be easy. She’d been keeping this secret for two long years and it felt like part of her. Opening up, even to Vincente, was going to be tough, particularly as there were parts of the story that were so hard to tell.

When she reached Lia’s room, she leaned over the crib. The sight of that little figure always restored her equanimity and she smiled as she breathed in that unique Lia-smell. Looking up, she was aware of Vincente’s eyes on her. There was only one chair in the room, and he indicated for Beth to take it while he sat on the floor nearby.

Okay, let’s do this. She sat down, gripping the envelope tightly. “This started way back when I was eighteen. You know what happened the summer before I went away to college, right?”

They had both lived in Stillwater all their lives, but Vincente was five years older than Beth. She was closer in age to his younger brother, Bryce. As a teenager, she had been increasingly aware of the dark, broodingly handsome oldest Delaney brother, but it was only when she came back after college and started working for a law firm in town that the attraction had ignited between them.

“I remember what you told me, and I saw the news reports. I know people in Stillwater still talk about it now and then. But I was in Italy that summer visiting my mother.” His lips twisted into a smile that was both bitter and affectionate. “It was one of her weddings, possibly the fourth. I’ve lost count. I always thought you told me a shortened version of what happened on the mountain because you couldn’t bear to talk about it. Although I know some of the detail, if it’s important to this story, tell me about it again.”

“You’re right. Even though I couldn’t forget it, I tried to avoid discussing it. At that time, I loved rock climbing.” At that time. Those words held a world of memories and meaning. “I belonged to the West County Climbing Club. It was run by a group of experienced climbers, who encouraged those of us who were new to the sport. We traveled all over the state, climbing the Tetons, Ten Sleep and Sinks Canyon. That summer, they organized an expedition to climb the Devil’s Peak, the highest point on the Stillwater Trail.”

“How many of you went on the climb?”

It still didn’t seem real that Vincente was here in Lia’s pink-and-white room. He was seated with his back against the closet—the one on which Beth had carefully stenciled teddies and bunnies—with his knees drawn up and his clasped hands resting loosely between them. He looked so big and masculine. That should be reassuring, right? His presence should make her feel safe and protected. Maybe it would...if it wasn’t for the contents of the envelope she held in her hands.