Playing House Or Playing For Keeps?

Motorcycle-riding judge Wyatt Carter runs his life by the book...mostly. But when his old friend Amber Towers calls him in need, he doesn’t hesitate to help her, even though inviting the single and secretly pregnant lawyer to stay in his house has suddenly made him the scandal of Conard County!

Wyatt is the port in Amber’s stormy situation. Even though their friendship sizzles with an underlying attraction, she has to steer clear, because she is pregnant—and he is headed into an important election! But why, this time, does it seem like Wyatt and Amber are willing—no, eager!—to give the town something to talk about?

“Maybe you just need a break from it all. There’s been a lot to deal with.”

“Maybe.”

“No maybe about it,” Wyatt said. “You were awfully clinical when you called me and told me you were in a mess.”

She gazed into his face, reading his concern but more, his kindness. He’d always accepted her just as she was, and he was doing it right now.

He touched her cheek, and a pleasant shiver ran through her. Well, at least she could still feel that. It would have been so easy to just fall into his arms. Because she wanted to know what it would feel like to rest her head on his shoulder. To feel his lips on hers. To feel his skin against hers. To feel him filling the emptiness inside her.

She’d always wanted to know.

* * *

Conard County: The Next Generation

His Pregnant Courthouse Bride

Rachel Lee

www.millsandboon.co.uk

RACHEL LEE was hooked on writing by the age of twelve and practiced her craft as she moved from place to place all over the United States. This New York Times bestselling author now resides in Florida and has the joy of writing full-time.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Title Page

About the Author

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

Extract

Copyright

Prologue

Circuit Judge Wyatt Carter had just finished a pleasant dinner at home, a too-rare occurrence, because he lived alone and was generally too busy to take the time to indulge in cooking. But this was a quiet Sunday evening after a comfortable day of catching up on his reading, and he’d made the effort to cook chicken Alfredo for himself and enjoyed it with a glass of pinot grigio. He felt somewhat self-indulgent, but considering how little time he had for indulgences, he didn’t feel guilty.

When the phone rang, he assumed it was his father. Earl Carter ran the family law practice, although lately it had shrunk because Earl was getting older and didn’t take as many cases. Earl seemed content enough to let the practice contract even though he’d once said it was his legacy to his son. Then Wyatt had become a circuit court judge, and the plans of a father-son practice had melted away.

But it was not his father, much to his surprise. It was a voice out of the past.

“Wyatt?”

He recognized Amber Towers’s voice. They’d kept in touch over the last decade, mostly by email and occasional phone calls. Amber had moved on from law school to a large firm in St. Louis, then recently to a much bigger firm in Chicago, headed for the heights. Wyatt, who had graduated two years ahead of her, had joined the military and spent three years in the judge advocate general’s office. Then he’d come back to out-of-the-way Conard County to fulfill his father’s dream of a shared practice.

He and Amber had once been very close friends, although nothing more than that, and since then they’d maintained a long-distance friendship, except for dinner or lunch at a bar association conference.

Now he heard her voice with astonishment, since she hadn’t called in ages, and concern popped into his mind. “Amber? What’s wrong?”

“You’re never going to believe it. I’m in a mess. Got an hour or so?”

“Of course.”

His mind dived down the byways of memory, recalling Amber as he had first seen her. She was young for a first-year law student, having gone to college two years early and finishing her bachelor’s degree in three years.

She had, in short, been barely nineteen. He’d been twenty-seven, because he’d taken a couple of years after college to try his hand at other things before going to law school. She’d been very pretty, so pretty that every guy who wasn’t already married—and some who were—chased her. He hadn’t chased. It wasn’t that he hadn’t found her attractive, but facing his tour with the military in exchange for them paying his law school expenses, he felt it was the wrong time to get involved, especially since the direction she wanted to take was far from his path. He’d also felt that given the difference in their ages, it might be close to cradle robbing. Amber had seemed so young to him then.

So they’d become friends over textbooks and in oral arguments. He’d mentored her, having already taken the classes she was in, and she’d challenged him with her sharp mind.

A lovely woman barely emerging from adolescence, with dark hair, a pleasant figure and a face that had been pretty but painfully young. Of one thing he had been sure, though: Amber would rise to the top. He wouldn’t have been surprised if she reached the Supreme Court.

But now she was in trouble?

He poured himself another glass of wine, carried it to his easy chair and prepared to listen.

It didn’t take an hour, either. Amber was indeed in a mess.

Chapter One

“I think this is a bad idea,” Earl Carter told his son, not for the first time in the last month.

“Amber needs a place to get her feet under her, Dad,” Wyatt answered. The two men were sharing a beer at the kitchen table as they had so many times over the years.

“People will talk, a strange woman moving in with you.”

“Dad, it’s the twenty-first century.”

Earl snorted. “Not in a lot of places in this county it isn’t, Wyatt. Dang, you’re a judge! Decorum and all that.”

Wyatt hid a smile behind his beer bottle. Clearly Earl was one of those who hadn’t quite come into the new century. But while he never would have admitted it to his father, he wasn’t so sure about having Amber here, either.

First off, she was a city gal, and Conard City was barely a blip on the map. Secondly, they’d been friends in law school over ten years ago. A bunch of keeping-in-touch emails and an occasional phone call didn’t mean he really knew the woman she had become. Nor could he know how all those years at huge law firms might have changed her.

“Maybe I should move back in,” Earl said. He’d moved out after Wyatt had come back from his years with the judge advocate general’s office, because—as he’d said at the time—he was tired of keeping up the huge old family house, and besides, what woman would want to marry a man who was living with his father?

“I don’t need a chaperone,” Wyatt said now.

“Maybe you need a headshrinker.” Earl leaned back, his comfortable belly stretching his white shirt. He’d come directly from his law office, where he still wore a suit every single day. A Western-cut suit with a bolo tie, to be sure, but still a suit. He often evinced disapproval of his son’s penchant for wearing jeans beneath his judicial robe. Of course, he voiced plenty of disapproval for Wyatt’s motorcycle, too. “Look, son, it hasn’t been that long since you broke it off with Ellie.”

“What does Ellie have to do with it? That was over a year ago, and you know why I broke it off.” Wyatt shifted irritably. “Any woman who expects me to dismiss charges against her cousin is a woman I don’t want in my life.”

“I get it. You were right, not saying you weren’t. But that isn’t the story she put around.”

“So? What does that have to do with now?”

“Ellie’s gonna make trouble, mark my words. Moving a big-city woman in with you?”

“Temporarily, Dad,” Wyatt said with as much patience as he could muster. “It’s nobody’s business.”

“You know better than that. You have an election coming up.”

“Retention only. And if folks around here don’t want me to be the judge anymore, you’ll have a partner in that law practice again.”

Earl sighed. “You never set your sights high enough.”

Wyatt almost laughed. “I remember a time you thought that the practice of Carter and Carter was as high I needed to set my sights.”

“But now you’re a judge! You could become a district judge, maybe even go to the state supreme court.”

Wyatt experienced a jolt of shock. He had never dreamed that his father envisioned that kind of future for him. It had been surprise enough when he’d been nominated to the bench as a circuit judge. Now this comment from a man whose highest ambition had once been to see his son’s name on the shingle beneath his. “What got into you, Dad?”

Earl shrugged and took another swig of beer. “After you were nominated for the bench, I started wondering if I was holding you back.” Then he winked. “Not that I want to see you taking off again. Hard enough when you were at school and in the military.”

Holding the icy bottle in one hand, listening to the autumn wind picking up outside, Wyatt wondered if his dad was serious. He himself cherished no great ambitions that would carry him far away. He’d done that already, seen his share of the world with the JAG, and had decided things were just dandy here at home among people he’d known all his life. If he wanted adventure, that was what vacations were for. As it was, the daily parade of humanity that passed before his bench was entertaining and challenging enough, as was his work with youthful offenders.

“You should be thinking of these things,” Earl said, returning to the whole point of his visit.

“I don’t see a political future for myself, Dad. It’s enough I can get away for a couple of weeks, that I can go hunting for a weekend or two in the fall...”

Earl snorted. “And when was the last time you brought home any meat?”

Wyatt stifled a grin. “Hunting is good for that image you’re worried about. Someone from the city council or county commission asks me every year. I go to the dang lodge, drink with the boys, and I can’t help it if I’m a lousy shot.”

“You weren’t always,” Earl retorted, but a twinkle came to his eyes. Then his expression darkened again. “I know you’re not going to listen to me. When’s that woman arriving?”

“Amber is arriving some time this evening. Hang around and you’ll meet her.”

“And you’re throwing a party for her, too?”

Wyatt smothered a sigh. He knew perfectly well his father wasn’t this dense and that Earl was giving him a hard time. “Not a party, Dad. I’m having a few people over next weekend so she can meet some other women. I’m not around much, and maybe she can find some friends while she’s here.”

“Hmm.” Earl drained the rest of his beer and tossed the bottle in the trash. “I think I’ll head on back to my place. Maybe give Alma a call.”

Alma was his father’s latest interest, a woman in her midfifties with a warm smile and a nicely plump figure. Wyatt often thought that Earl hadn’t moved out of the family house so that his son could date, but rather so Wyatt wouldn’t cramp his father’s style. Wyatt’s mother had been gone for nearly thirty years, but Earl had never remarried. He had, however, enjoyed a series of relationships.

Apparently, he wasn’t worried about appearances for himself. Wyatt just shook his head as his father grabbed his coat and left. Earl was no fool, obviously, but the way he’d been talking tonight? Wyatt wondered what was really behind it.

A short while later he stood at the front window, the large living room behind him, the lights out so he could see. Wind was ripping the last autumn leaves from the trees and sweeping them down the street.

No, Earl was no fool. So maybe he was right that having Amber here was a mistake. The thing was, Wyatt had never been one to turn away someone in need. Far from it. He always had an overwhelming desire to help.

Mistake or no mistake, Amber was going to have a place to stay while she sorted out her life and where she wanted to go from here. Because she was right: she was in a mess.

* * *

Amber Towers pulled into Conard City and wondered if she was about to drop off the map. It wasn’t that the town was clearly small—she’d been in a lot of small towns in her life—but after driving so many miles with nothing on either side of the road except rangeland and mountains, it felt like the ends of the earth.

The streetlamps had come on, casting sharp shadows beyond the pools of light. From inside most of the houses came a golden glow that somehow seemed to beckon, promising warmth, shelter and friendliness.

Just an illusion, she told herself. Her GPS audibly guided her to Front Street and right up to Wyatt’s door. She pulled up against the curb, not wanting to block him in his narrow driveway. Other cars scattered along the street told her that on-street parking wasn’t forbidden here.

Then she sat, her engine running, wondering what exactly she was doing. But she’d been wondering that for a while now. The whole situation stank, starting with her own naive stupidity and ending with her here, at an old friend’s house, unemployed and scared.

Yeah, she’d admitted she was scared. She’d never imagined that her rising boat and bright future could run aground. Certainly not this way. Not when everything had been going so well.

With both hands gripping the steering wheel, she continued to hesitate. Yes, she’d called someone who was totally outside her current circle, looking for objectivity and a true friend. Wyatt had sprung quickly to mind when she’d wanted a sounding board. Even back in law school, all those years ago, he’d been imbued with common sense, with a way of distancing himself that was excellent for a lawyer and something she’d had to learn. He could put feelings aside and see clearly.

So she had asked him to see clearly.

He had. He hadn’t told her what to do, not even indirectly, but he’d managed to draw the situation for her in sharp lines and propose several options for dealing with it.

She had chosen this one, and as soon as she had he’d said, “Well, then, you’ll need a place to stay while you make up your mind about what you want to do. I’ve got plenty of room.”

That was Wyatt. Always ready to help, a quality she had always admired in him, a quality she’d seen him display repeatedly during that year they’d been in law school at the same time. She’d accepted, but now she wondered if she was taking advantage of him. Even as she had qualms, she knew why Wyatt had been the only person she had told about her situation. She could count on him. Always. Other friends in her life had been nowhere near as steadfast.

It remained, however, this was her problem, her mess, and moving in on him and his life, even by invitation, had probably been a selfish thing to do.

Finally she quit arguing with herself and switched off her ignition. If she felt she was disrupting his life, that she was in the way somehow, she could leave tomorrow or the next day. After all, she was traveling light, most of her belongings packed away in storage for some better future day.

At last she climbed out of the car. The wind felt a little like Chicago, although considerably drier. It nipped through her jacket and gray slacks like a familiar bite. Not that she’d had that long to get used to it.

She watched the leaves blowing down the street and wondered if her life were blowing away with them. Big mistake, big consequences, and in an instant everything was different. She’d been a fool. Maybe that was the thing hardest to forgive in herself.

The porch light flipped on. Wyatt had seen her. The house itself was mostly dark, but he must have caught sight of her from somewhere. A fan window over the front door spilled warm light, and stained-glass insets on the front door glowed with color. His home. Inviting her.

The front door opened. She recognized his figure immediately, tall and straight with broad shoulders and narrow hips.

“Amber?”

“Coming,” she answered promptly, settling her purse over her shoulder. Her bags could wait. For later, for never—the next few hours would tell.

She strode up the walk, climbed three steps, crossed the wide covered porch and walked straight into his waiting arms.

She hadn’t expected this hug, but it felt so good she simply accepted it and fought down unwanted tears of relief. He’d never hugged her like this before, warm and tight, and reality proved to be far better than her youthful imaginings. She wished she could stay there forever. All too soon, he let her go.

“Come inside,” he said kindly. “It’s getting cold out here.”

The house was large, and the foyer bigger than she expected, designed in a very different age. A dark wooden staircase led to the upstairs, dark wood wainscoting lined the walls beneath walls painted Wedgwood blue and the floor itself was highly polished wood decorated with a few large oriental rugs.

But she was more interested in Wyatt himself. Time had changed him some. His face had sharper lines and seemed squarer than she remembered from four years ago at that convention. She thought she saw flecks of silver in his nearly black hair. Age had filled him out a bit, but in all the right places. He wore a dark gray sweater and jeans and was walking around in his stocking feet.

He smiled. “Come get comfortable,” he suggested, his dark eyes friendly. “You must be tired after all that driving.”

He helped her out of her jacket and hung it and her purse on the wooden coat tree beside the door. Glancing around again, she felt as if she’d wandered into a museum.

“Somehow,” she said, “I didn’t imagine you living in a place like this.”

“It’s been in the family for nearly a hundred years. A white elephant, but one I can’t let go of. Or should I say can’t get rid of.”

She laughed, feeling some of her tension ease. “I need to move around, if that’s okay. I haven’t been out from behind the wheel in five hours.”

“Pushed it, huh?”

“Very definitely.”

“Well, feel free to wander. Something to drink? Coffee, tea, cocoa or stronger?”

Stronger was out of the question now, although she would have loved a glass of wine. “Cocoa sounds great. Can I follow you around?”

“Be my guest.”

How awkward, she thought. For both of them. All those years between, and a bunch of emails, a few phone calls and a couple of meetings didn’t make up for it. And for all she’d recently bared her soul to him on the phone, being here still felt...like she didn’t belong?

The kitchen had been modernized, a shock after the foyer. The appliances were all new, stainless steel, and there was even a dishwasher. What she guessed were the original wood cabinets had glass-paned doors outlined in fresh white. Countertops had been covered in light gray granite that matched a tile floor.

“This is beautiful,” she said, taking it in. “Big.” Big enough for a nice-size island and a matching table.

“I have a secret chef somewhere inside,” Wyatt replied lightly. “He rarely gets the chance to come out and play, though. Too busy.”

“I love to cook, too, but I hear you. Ninety-hour weeks and I usually wind up at some restaurant.”

“Same here. Say, did anyone in law school ever warn you this profession wouldn’t leave time for a life?”

She had to laugh because it was so true. “Powder room?”

“Under the staircase in the foyer. Can’t miss it.”

She walked back into that amazing area and found the half bath without any problem. It, too, had been modernized with pleasant wallpaper and fixtures of recent vintage. She paused in front of the mirror, however, and stared at her reflection, realizing she appeared gaunt.

God. This had taken a lot out of her, maybe more than she had realized. She finger combed her short dark hair and tucked the bob behind her ears, but of course that didn’t hide the circles under her eyes, and she must have lost a few pounds. Desperate to look less like a corpse, she pinched her cheeks to bring some color into them. This couldn’t be good for the child she carried.

It was not the first time she’d thought about that, but mostly she had skimmed over it. Now she faced it, and felt her knees weakening. It was real, all of it was real, and the cloak of numbness she’d been wearing much of the time since everything had blown up simply vanished.

No longer an intellectual exercise, no longer a problem of humiliation, no longer a situation to be solved. It was her and the child growing inside her and nobody else. The reality was stark, the road ahead invisible.

A mess? It was more than a mess. She’d exploded her entire life into little pieces.

Chapter Two

Amber had headed to bed right after the cocoa. Wyatt had brought her suitcases in and showed her to the best guest room, then returned to his work before going to bed himself.

Last night had been uncomfortable, he thought as he made coffee in the morning and scrambled some eggs. They hadn’t talked at all, except superficially and briefly about her trip, about the room that was to be hers. Strangers. It felt like two strangers. He hadn’t really anticipated that. In his mind their friendship had remained as fresh as yesterday. Emails and other contacts didn’t quite bridge the years. Nor did it help his sense of awkwardness to discover that he still found her every bit as attractive as he ever had.

But he was worried about her, too. The stress of the past weeks had clearly worked on her. He’d expected her to look a bit older than she had when he’d run into her at that conference four years ago, but not this pinched and drained. Worn. Her situation was awful, so maybe he shouldn’t have been surprised.

He paused, looking out the window over the sink, noting that the wind was still blowing and leaves were still flying. By now, he thought with mild amusement, all the leaves in town should have been gone. But as he watched some of them eddy between the houses, he guessed they would hang around to be raked.

He heard steps behind him and turned to greet Amber. She looked a bit better this morning and was already dressed as if she were going to work in a navy blue pantsuit and white blouse. A bit much for hanging around the house.

“Well, good morning,” he said with a smile.

She smiled back. “Sorry I was so dead last night.”

“Long trip,” he said. “Eggs? Toast? Coffee?”

“All of the above, please.” She settled onto a stool on the far side of the island. “You have to work today, of course.”

“I cleared most of my schedule for the week,” he answered, turning back to the counter and cracking two more eggs into a bowl to whisk. “A few hours each day, rather than all day. Some hearings I can’t avoid, and a trial that’ll probably be over in a couple of hours after we finish jury selection.”

“Can I come watch?”

“Of course.” If she were in the courtroom with him, at least he wouldn’t be wondering if she were sitting here feeling like hell and unable to do a damn thing about it.

He gave her a cup of coffee and the eggs he’d already cooked. “Dig in.”

He started making his own eggs and heard her say, “You didn’t have to clear your schedule for me.”

“No, but I did anyway. You could have gone anywhere if solitude and four walls were all you wanted.”

He was pleased to hear a quiet laugh from her. “Sadly true,” she answered.

A minute later he carried his own plate and mug to the island and stood on the far side from her. “It’s okay, Amber,” he said before he started eating. “You’re welcome here and we’ll get over the awkwardness soon.”

“I didn’t expect it,” she admitted. “In some ways I felt as if all these years hadn’t passed.”

“In some ways they haven’t.” He sipped his coffee. “But even back then we didn’t share quarters.”

That drew another laugh from her, a small one.

“Look, this place is practically a hotel. Just do whatever you need to in order to feel comfortable. Spend as much time or as little as you want with me. Make your own ground rules. I’m pretty adaptable.”

She raised her face to smile at him. “Generous, too. Most of the problem is me, Wyatt. Everything is all messed up. Blown up. I feel as if I’m in a million pieces right now.”

“Hardly surprising. You want to talk some more?”

“Maybe after court. You must need to go soon.”

He glanced at the clock. Seven thirty. “Fifteen minutes. Can you be ready?”

“I am ready. But don’t you need time to change?”

Wyatt looked down at his jeans and polo shirt. “No.”

“Wow,” Amber breathed. “I might like this place.”

“Well, I do wear a robe. Most of the time.”

The sound of the laughter that pealed out of her warmed his heart. If she could still laugh like that, then everything would be okay. For her.

Because suddenly, for him, he wasn’t so sure. An attractive damsel in distress. Always his weak point, and more so for Amber.

* * *

The day was chilly and the wind whipped with ferocity. Amber almost felt like ducking as they left the house and walked to his car in the driveway. “Is this wind usual?” she asked once they were in the car.

“No. Usually we have a breeze, nothing bad, although it can get to be pretty constant if you get out onto the prairie. But here...” He shook his head as he turned over the ignition. “Some kind of front must be in the area, but I haven’t looked at the weather.”

“I was getting used to the wind in Chicago. I don’t think it ever stops. But this is pretty with the leaves tossing in the wind.”

“Until it comes time to rake,” he answered.

“Will there be anything left?” she wondered as he wove their way down the street toward where she presumed they’d find the courthouse.

It was only a few blocks away, and she was instantly charmed. She’d half expected some functional building that had been erected recently, but instead saw a gorgeous older redbrick building with impressive columns sitting in a square filled with concrete benches and tables and the remains of summer flowers. And the statue of a soldier, watching over it all.

“Did they transplant this from New England?” she asked, amazed.

“The folks who built it wanted something to remind them of home, I guess. We have a church that looks like it was snatched out of the jaws of Vermont, too.”

Amber was charmed. It might not be a large town, but what she had seen of it so far was gracious and inviting. Wyatt pulled around to the back of the courthouse and into a parking space labeled with his name: Hon. Wyatt Carter. Some of the other spaces had filled up, but they were all reserved—county attorney, court reporter and others.

“We finally emerged into the new century,” he remarked after they climbed out and headed for the back door.

“Meaning?”

“We had to build a new jail outside town. It wasn’t so long ago prisoners were kept in cells over the sheriff’s office, but six cells is just about enough to dry out the drunks overnight. So...big jail. And I do a lot of my hearings over closed-circuit TV. No big deal to you, I’m sure, but it was a very big deal when we transitioned here.”

She could almost imagine it. In a very short space of time he’d given her the feeling that this was an old Western town stepping very slowly into the modern era. She looked around just before he opened the door for her and saw that the entire square was surrounded by stores. She liked it.

She followed him into a narrow hallway painted institutional green with wood floors that creaked beneath their feet. They passed restrooms, the rear side of the county clerk’s office, then climbed some equally creaky stairs to the second floor, where they entered his chambers.

The walls in the outer office were lined with books of statutes, something that must be left over from earlier days, she decided. Everyone relied on online research these days, and law libraries were available at the touch of a key if you had a subscription. They’d certainly done that in law school. But she looked around the walls, admiring the books, their solid look and feel. Two desks sat in the middle of all this magnificence.

“My reporter and clerk work there,” he said.

Then they passed through to a chamber that was all dark wood, a massive desk and a few chairs. She thought she could detect old aromas of cigar smoke embedded in the walls. The only modernity was a multiple line phone and a computer.

“My home away from home,” he said, glancing at his watch. “I’ve got a few minutes. Do you want to stay here or go into the courtroom?”

She’d been in a judge’s chambers before, of course. It was inevitable for a lawyer. It didn’t look like a place to browse, and she’d come to see him in court anyway.

“Courtroom,” she answered decisively. A kind of tickled excitement awoke in her. She was going to see her old friend in the role of a judge. It was just cool enough to make her forget her other problems.

She walked through the door he pointed out and emerged in the courtroom, walking past the raised bench and past the attorney’s tables, which were already occupied, ignoring the curious looks as she took a seat in the front row. She had no idea what was on his docket for today or whether the people waiting in the gallery with her were here to deal with legal problems or just to watch, but the place was filling rapidly. The clock slipped past eight, almost as a courtesy to late arrivals, then a bailiff, in what appeared to be a deputy’s uniform, called the court to order and announced Wyatt. “All rise. The Tenth District Circuit Court of the state of Wyoming is now in session, the Honorable Wyatt Carter presiding.”

He came striding in, wearing a black robe, his jeans and boots flashing beneath it. She had to cover her mouth with her hand. She hadn’t expected to enjoy this so much.

Wyatt tapped the microphone in front of him, and the thump came across the speakers. “All right,” he said, looking out over the room. “Traffic court. Really, folks, don’t you know better?”

And thus it began.

* * *

Amber was soon amazed. Wyatt didn’t treat most of these people as if he just wanted them to pass out of his sight as soon as possible. He actually talked to them, and when he deemed it appropriate, he asked questions. He even postponed a few cases when the charges were serious and the accused claimed to be unable to afford an attorney. He promptly assigned them to the public defender on the spot.

“This is the second time you’ve come before this court for not having a driver’s license,” he said to a thirtysomething man in work clothes. “Didn’t I order you to get a license last time?”

“Yes, sir.”

“So why are you still driving without one?”

The man shuffled his feet. “I need to go to work.”

Wyatt leaned back a little and studied the notes on his desk. “It says here you can’t read. The state has an application for people who can’t read. Why didn’t you get one?”

“I tried.”

At that Wyatt leaned forward. “What kind of work do you do?”

“I work at the ranches. Hired hand.”

“No reading required for that, I suppose.”

“No, sir.”

“So why didn’t you get a license?”

“I keep calling but they’re busy. I can’t even talk to someone. Always busy.”

Wyatt turned to the clerk. “You get me the license people and you get this man an appointment with them before this day is over.”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

Wyatt turned back to the man in front of him. “Will you go to the test when my clerk tells you the time?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You’d better. And I’m suspending your case pending your getting that license. Crap, can’t get through?” He turned to the clerk again. “Let ’em know I’m not happy about this.”

The clerk almost grinned. “Absolutely.”

He looked at the man. “You stay here until she gets your appointment. And you’d better find somebody to drive you home, because you cannot drive without a license and I don’t want to see you here again. Understood?”

Amber was amazed. Wyatt took a lot of personal interest, sometimes waiving fines when people simply couldn’t pay them. But again and again, when something caught his attention, he zoomed in.

Then came the guy who was in front of him for the second time for driving on a suspended license.

“I told you to stop driving,” Wyatt said. “What makes you think you can ignore the law like this? Your license was suspended for DUI. Now you’re in front of me again for driving when you’re not allowed to?”

The amusing part came after Wyatt ruled, telling the guy that the next time he was going to jail and was being spared this time only because he had small children to support. Then he added, “I’m leaving here in another few minutes, so you’d better find someone to drive you home. Because I’ll recognize your face now and I’ll chase you down and arrest you myself. Got it?”

Amber had never guessed that traffic court could be so fascinating and even moving. And Wyatt broke the mold.

* * *

Amber waited in the court after everyone had departed. She didn’t feel free to just walk back into Wyatt’s chambers. He might be dealing with something that was none of her business, or he might just be busy. She only waited about twenty minutes, though, before he entered the courtroom again, this time wearing his jacket and no robe and carrying a briefcase. “Free for the rest of the day,” he said with a smile. “Do you want to go home or would you rather go down the block to the diner with excellent food and service that never comes with a smile?”

That surprised a little laugh from her. “Really?”

“Maude and her daughter are the local gorgons, but the food more than makes up for it.”

“Then by all means the diner.”

“Let’s walk,” he suggested, and this time they exited the courthouse by the grand front entrance. “I think these places were built to impress and intimidate,” he said as they walked down the wide marble steps.

“I think you’re right. It’s a beautiful building.”

“That it is. And you see the stone benches and tables scattered in the little park? When the weather allows we have people at nearly every one of them playing chess or checkers.” He pointed. “Over there is the sheriff’s office.”

It looked like a regular storefront, which surprised her. “No Corinthian columns for him?”

Wyatt laughed. “None. They used to be in the courthouse basement a couple of generations ago, but then they needed more room and were getting squeezed out by the records and clerks. So they took up one side of the street there, and their offices run back inside behind the storefronts. Bigger than it looks from out here.”

They crossed Main, which was right in front of the courthouse, to a side street where he pointed out other shops to her, one of them a craft shop in a house a little way past the diner, a dentist’s office, a dress store, a bail bondsman and a couple of lawyers, one of them with the name Carter painted in gold letters on the window.

“Your father?” she asked.

“The same.”

“So you practiced there for a while?”

“Yup.” Then into the diner, which was quite busy. She couldn’t miss the silence that fell suddenly as she walked in with Wyatt and felt like a bug under a microscope.

“Ignore it,” he said under his breath. “They’re just curious. Something new to talk about.”

She hadn’t considered that possibility. Being the subject of talk wasn’t something she wanted, but then she reminded herself that she was only visiting. A week, two weeks, whatever, but eventually she was going to have to figure out the next path she needed to walk. And after what had happened in Chicago, she figured large law firms were off her list for some time. People gossiped there, too, and that gossip spread. For her it would be the kind of gossip that would make another firm leery of hiring her.

All of a sudden a man in a sheriff’s uniform stood before them. He had a burn-scarred face and a gravelly voice. “Hey, Wyatt, we were just leaving. Take our booth.”

Wyatt smiled and held out his hand to shake the other man’s. “Amber, this is Gage Dalton, our sheriff. Gage, a lawyer friend of mine from Chicago, Amber Towers.”

Gage’s crooked smile was friendly as he shook Amber’s hand. “Welcome to Conard City, Ms. Towers. If you decide you want to get out of town and visit a ranch, let me know. I’ve got several deputies who’d be glad to oblige. Or you can take a trail ride.” He laughed. “Whole bunches of things to do, if you know where to look.”

She met three more deputies as they departed, one of them a woman who had the same last name as a much older man with a Native American face. They didn’t at all resemble each other, which raised her curiosity.

“The two named Parish,” she began after they sat and the table had been cleared by a scowling woman.

“Micah Parish and his daughter-in-law, Connie.”

Well, that explained a lot. “Family business, law enforcement?”

Wyatt flashed a grin. “Not exactly. Micah has a ranch, too, and his son, Ethan, left the sheriff’s department to help out there. Unfortunately, I think we’re going to see Micah retire before long. It’ll be the end of an era.”

“Meaning?”

Coffee cups slammed down in front of them and were filled by an older version of the woman who had cleared the table. Looking up at that face, Amber almost hesitated. But then she plunged in. “I can’t drink much coffee. Could I please have milk instead?”

She was answered with a grunt as the menus slapped onto the table.

“Was that a yes?” Amber asked Wyatt quietly as the woman stomped away.

“Mavis or Maude will bring your milk.” He winked. “I warned you about the service. Okay, end of an era. Micah’s been a deputy here ever since he mustered out of the army. Nearly a quarter century now. He started working for the old sheriff, Nate Tate, who retired a while back, which was another end-of-an-era event around here. Anyway, at first Micah wasn’t very well accepted.”

“Why? Because he’s Native American?”

“Bingo. A lot of those prejudices still exist. He’s become kind of iconic over the years, like the old sheriff. And folks still call Gage the new sheriff, even though it’s been years.”

“I’m beginning to get the picture.”

He nodded. “Things do change here, they just change slowly.”

She was also adding together her impressions and began to feel very uncomfortable. “Wyatt? Will my staying with you cause problems? Because people are bound to talk and you’re a judge...”

“God, you sound like my father,” he said with a hint of exasperation. “I don’t care what they say. If I did, I wouldn’t have invited you.”

But her stomach sank even more as she realized his father had objected to her visit. Wyatt had often struck her as the knight-errant type, willing to fight for what he thought was right, despite the consequences to himself. That could be an admirable thing at times, but sometimes not. Like possibly now.

She had to force herself to look at the menu and find something she thought she could eat. As self-absorbed as her problems had made her for the last six weeks, she hadn’t lost her ability to care. She didn’t want to cause this man any trouble, so she’d need to figure out something quickly.

At last she chose a grilled cheese sandwich with a side salad. Despite the lack of service, their orders were placed in front of them quickly, and Wyatt dug into what looked like a really juicy steak sandwich.

“You’re rather unconventional in your approach to being a judge,” she remarked. “I’m used to judges who don’t take an interest beyond the law.”

“I don’t know that I’m unconventional. I just know these are real people with real problems, and a lot of them are my neighbors. Some come from the next county over and I may never see them again, but they’re still human beings.”

She looked up from her sandwich with a smile. “You were always like that. I remember how much you wanted to be a defense attorney. And why. Still tilting at windmills, I see.”

He half smiled. “I don’t know if they’re windmills, but while there are some things justice should never see, I think she needs to take off that blindfold once in a while.”

“Mercy.”

“Maybe. Certainly everyone’s entitled to a fair shake, and by the time some of them come in front of me, they’ve hardly had a fair shake in their lives.”

She nodded and reached for the second half of her sandwich, glad her appetite had returned. “I worked in a different world at those big firms.”

“I’m sure you did.”

“Most of my clients had gotten more than their share of fair shakes in life. They were just looking for another one. Or maybe for a better-than-fair outcome.” She shrugged one shoulder. “Well-heeled, successful, mostly men who thought they had the world by a string. It came as a real shock when they found out they didn’t.”

Distasteful, she thought. Yes, it was the way up the ladder to maybe becoming a judge herself one day, but a lot of her clients...just because they had money didn’t mean she respected them.

But she did like the pro bono work she did when she could at the free legal clinic. She was going to miss that.

“Do you like chili?” Wyatt asked, drawing her out of her maunderings.

“Sure. Not the beans so much, though.”

“I make it without beans. How about we have that for dinner tonight?”

“You cooking?”

He laughed. “Absolutely. The chef is going to love having an excuse.”

Chapter Three

On the way home, he took a detour to the grocery. Despite having just driven all the way from Chicago, she opted to stay in the car. Instead she pulled her jacket snugly around her to wait, then decided to climb out and stroll around the parking lot.

The wind seemed to be dying a bit. To the west she saw brilliant blue sky right over the mountains, although it remained overcast overhead. The ends of the earth, she thought again, but this time with amusement. The town had some appeal to it, though, and she suspected if you lived your whole life here, you might get to know almost everyone. They wouldn’t necessarily be friends, but you’d recognize them.

Having been anonymous on crowded streets for so long, she wondered how that would feel. Good? Bad? Or maybe people here were so used to it they never even thought about it.

But she thought about it now.

He didn’t keep her waiting long, and as they drove back to his house, she leaned her head back and watched the passing houses. Some better kept than others, a whole mishmash of different designs, but lots of trees lining the streets. Pretty. A grace of its own.

But then they were home, and after he’d put his purchases in the refrigerator, he invited her to join him at the kitchen table.

Now, she thought edgily, he was going to want to talk. He had every right to bring up her mess. Every right to understand better. Hadn’t she basically thrown herself on his mercy by coming out here, by calling him in the first place? Of course she had, and she owed him the whole sordid story. And maybe the story of everything else she’d done since starting her career. It wasn’t like it was all bad.

But he surprised her with the direction he took. “What’s off-limits because of the baby?”

“Off-limits?” she asked, not following.

“Foods, beverages, that kind of thing.”

The question startled her a bit, because she hadn’t been thinking much about that aspect. She knew to avoid alcohol and over-the-counter meds, but other than that...

He frowned faintly. “Have you seen a doctor yet, Amber?”

“Well, my regular doctor. He said to make an appointment with an obstetrician, and he gave me some vitamins to take. He also advised me to limit myself to a couple of cups of coffee but...well, I think he was expecting the obstetrician to give me all the details.”

“But you haven’t gone.”

“Not yet.” She looked down, feeling inexplicably stupid. “I’m not an idiot,” she protested. “But with all that’s been going on... I was going to get to it. I’m not that far along...”

“Okay.” He brought her a glass of milk instead of coffee, which he made for himself. “I’m not criticizing you. You’ve been through a rough time. But maybe it wouldn’t hurt to see the obstetrician here. Just to be on the safe side.”

She didn’t answer. Instead of looking at him, she turned her head and stared out through the window at the gray day. Okay, she hadn’t really been dealing with the reality of this pregnancy. She’d hardly been thinking about it except in the vaguest of ways. Yes, she’d followed the directions she’d been given, but beyond that...beyond that, she didn’t want to face the fact that she was becoming a mother and that her whole life and all her dreams had changed. She might tell herself she wasn’t stupid, but stupidity had gotten her here, and now stupidity was keeping her from facing reality.

Too much, she thought. Too much. She didn’t know how she was going to deal with it all. No idea where to go, how to handle it. All she knew was that she’d had to get away from that law firm. Everyone knew she’d been seeing Tom. Everyone knew he’d lied about his divorce, because he’d done it before. But so far none of them knew she’d managed to get pregnant. The one humiliation in the whole affair that hadn’t become public.

But if she had stayed, it would have become very public. She suspected she wouldn’t be welcome there once everyone knew about the baby. Tom was a junior partner. She was no one. Time to get out before she felt as if she were in the public stocks.

Wyatt had agreed with her once she told him what had happened. Staying at the firm would have been very uncomfortable, and while she could have lied and said the baby was someone else’s...well, most people wouldn’t have believed it, and she’d have had Tom trying to make her life enough of a hell that she’d quit anyway.

At least that was her read, and Wyatt had agreed that she might not be able to convince everyone that the father was someone else. How much that would affect her future at the firm was anyone’s guess. Wyatt said he’d like to believe no one would give her trouble, but... He’d let that dangle.

It was her suspicion that the moment she became a potential embarrassment to Tom, her career would be in jeopardy. Maybe they’d have given her time to find another position, but she didn’t want the humiliation. There was already enough of that, knowing she’d had an affair with a married man, and that others knew it as well.

She sighed and returned her attention to Wyatt. “I guess I’ve been trying to ignore it. To deal with the nitty-gritty of quitting my job, packing up my life and heading into the unknown. But I couldn’t have stayed. I couldn’t.”

He nodded slowly. “You could have tried. It certainly would have been miserable, but if you said nothing, maybe they would have gotten past it.”

“You said that. I wasn’t buying it. If I hadn’t just joined the firm last spring, maybe. But my track record was so short...” She wrapped her hands around the glass of milk and stared into the liquid. “See if I ever trust a man again.”

His dark eyes turned suddenly inscrutable. “Ouch,” he said quietly.

She flushed. “I don’t mean you. You’re different.”

He merely gave her a half smile. “Of course, we all know who should be paying for this mess, but unfortunately life isn’t always fair. Kicking up a fuss would probably have bought you more trouble than you’d ever want. You think this guy Tom would have retaliated in some way?”

“Probably,” she said glumly. “Even if I never said a word, I’d have worried him. I’d be hanging there like a threat. I saw how he handled his cases. He’s not a man you want to cross swords with if he feels threatened.”

Wyatt nodded. “I accept your judgment. Never having met the guy, I have no idea what he’s capable of.” He paused. “Did I ever tell you about Ellie?”

She shook her head slowly, grateful for the change of subject. “Who’s she?”

“I dated her for a while about a year ago. Along about the time we started to get serious, she asked me to dismiss a bunch of charges against her cousin.”

Amber gasped, totally diverted from her problems. “No!”

“Oh, yes. That relationship ended instantly. So to get even, she told everyone she knows that I’m gay.”

“Oh! That must have made you angry.”

He grinned suddenly. “Why? I don’t care. That’s my business and nobody else’s. Anyway, it’s old news. I’m just saying, life throws curveballs. It’s what we do about them that matters. I chose the high road and she tried to get even. The point is, I understand why you worried about what Tom might do. He had a job and a marriage to protect. A reputation, even. He’d probably have done everything he could to submarine you. I’m not saying he would have succeeded, but it could have made you miserable for a long time. You decided how you wanted to handle it, and here we are.”

For the first time, she drank some of the milk he’d offered her. “Yes, here we are,” she said after she’d dabbed her mouth with a paper napkin. “Where is that?”

He laughed. “Just take some time to figure out whatever you need to. The only thing I ask is that you get to a proper doctor. Wherever you may be in seven or eight months, you don’t want to be with a baby that could have been healthier if you’d taken care of yourself.”

* * *

Right now, Wyatt thought as he studied her and listened to her, the pregnancy was a major concern whether she was ready to face it or not. While he was no expert and had no personal experience, he seemed to remember hearing that the first few months could be absolutely critical to a fetus. Were vitamins and avoiding coffee enough? He had no idea.

That was the point of doctors, and he had great respect for professionals. Amber needed one, and he was determined she see one before long.

She was a beautiful woman, a very smart woman, and it troubled him to see her in this situation. From all he’d heard from her over the years, he got the feeling that she’d been one of those people for whom everything went right. No major problems, a skyrocketing career, the world on a string.

But of course, nobody got through life without their share of troubles. She’d apparently lumped many of hers into one enormous mistake. And she was devastated. Everything she’d worked for had been taken from her by a lying jackass. He had plenty of questions to ask, basic ones like, hadn’t she been using protection? But it was none of his business.

His only business was to be supportive until she could figure out what she wanted to do. In the meantime, quashing his attraction to her would probably be very wise. She’d been through the wringer; she’d said she wouldn’t trust men again. Having her place him in a separate category meant she didn’t see him as an eligible man. Which was fine by him. Neither of them needed any complications, and she’d probably be moving on in a month or two.

Given Amber’s dreams, he couldn’t see her hanging around here for long.

But still, there was an errant part of him that had belonged to Amber ever since the first day they had talked. Friendship? Of course. Something more? No point in thinking about it, even though over the years he’d occasionally daydreamed about what life would have been like with her. Pointless fantasy, reawakened by phone calls and running into her at the convention. Fantasies he’d put aside again every time they rose.

She finished her milk and rose to rinse the glass at the sink. Standing there with her back to him, she began to speak. “I need to wake up,” she said.

“Wake up?” Curious, he twisted in his chair to better see her, even if it was only her back.

“Wake up,” she repeated. “This has been like a nightmare. Do you know how it started?”

“Which part?”

She shook her head, and a heavy sigh escaped her. “Which part? Good question. You know working for a firm like that doesn’t leave any room for a social life.”

“I’ve heard.” Not that being a judge was a whole lot better, unless he put his foot down as he had this week.

“Two thousand billable hours a year is forty hours a week for fifty weeks. Which doesn’t sound all that awful until you add all the hours that aren’t billable. I didn’t get a day off and I didn’t expect one. Not for many years to come. Your friends, such as they are, are people you work with. If you have a family, you might see them for a few minutes as you’re falling into bed or running out the door in the morning. I loved most of it.”

“Okay,” he said to show he was listening, but unsure if she was looking for a particular response from him.

“In a few more years, if I’d been lucky and continued to rise, I’d have reached the level where I could get out of the office to go golfing with clients. I might even have been able to take an occasional weekend. The point is, though, that your whole life revolves around the firm. They even arrange the social occasions. Dinner with the partner, a party at a partner’s house, where in theory you’d win some new clients. All business.”

For those who wanted to get ahead in that game, he thought. Plenty of others chose an easier path, but Amber had always been driven. Law school at nineteen?

“Human nature will have its way eventually,” she said. “Tom started to express interest. He was attractive, and considering we were pretty much working all the time, he was what was available. Office romances are dangerous. I knew it, but I took the chance anyway. He was in the middle of a messy divorce, he said. And I believed him.”

“Why wouldn’t you?”

She turned slowly to face him and folded her arms tightly. “I think that from working all the time I let parts of my development become stunted. The practice of law gave me a view of a lot of ugliness in life, but that ugliness didn’t include a coworker deliberately lying to me to get me into his bed. Regardless, in the last ten years I haven’t had time for a boyfriend. I only dated a couple of times, but my schedule blew everything up. So there I was, missing a massive part of life, and this coworker was suddenly pursuing me. I was flattered. I was stupid.”

“You’re not stupid. Some very smart people get conned, Amber.”

She smiled crookedly, without humor. “Well, I got conned. Funny, it never seemed odd to me that the only time we got together was in a hotel over our lunch hour. When we had a lunch hour. It’s not like I couldn’t have escaped the office sometimes just for dinner. There should have been red flags all over it.”

He couldn’t disagree. “I imagine you really liked him.”

“Of course. I thought I was falling in love. Maybe I was. But then I found out. God, that was awful. I caught one of the clerks drinking in the bathroom, and when I started to tell her she couldn’t do that, she stopped me dead in my tracks. It seems I wasn’t the first newbie Tom had taken advantage of, and if she hadn’t been drunk she probably wouldn’t have told me. Everyone kept quiet about it because they didn’t want to get fired.”

She shook her head, then held out one arm, almost a pleading gesture. “I broke it off immediately, of course. He started giving me a hard time, but there wasn’t a whole lot he could do except make me uncomfortable. I was uncomfortable enough that all my coworkers probably knew what had been happening. I felt so humiliated!”

“I’m sure your coworkers knew you had been used,” he offered quietly.

“I’m sure. At least that’s what I kept telling myself. Until I found out I was pregnant.” A bitter laugh escaped her. “Birth control fails sometimes. I was one of the minuscule percentage of failures. Ironic, huh?”

“I think it stinks. I don’t find it ironic at all.” He wished he could hug her, but he wasn’t sure that would help. If she needed to talk, the best thing he could do was listen.

“Anyway, that’s when I called you. I could stick out the knowing looks. I figured the whispers would go away. But a pregnancy? Everyone would know. And I have no doubt Tom would have used every bit of influence he had to get rid of me if he knew, because he could deny everything except a paternity test.”

As a lawyer and then a judge, Wyatt had learned to separate his emotions from his thinking. He had to. He was the one who had to remain objective as much as possible. He’d be no good to a client if feelings clouded his judgment, and that hadn’t changed much on the bench. He might dispense mercy when he could, but he still had to have an unemotional, clear grasp of the situation, the facts and the law.

He was finding that objectivity very difficult to achieve right now. In fact, damn near impossible. He looked at the young woman, his friend, nearly curled up on herself as she relived her nightmare, and he would have dearly loved to get his hands on this guy Tom. His fists had clenched, and he had to make an effort to relax them. He didn’t want to frighten Amber with the impulse to violence that was building in him now.

“Anyway,” she said presently, “it’s been a nightmare, especially since I found out I was pregnant. I couldn’t believe that on top of everything else. Maybe I still can’t believe it. It’s almost like if I close my eyes and pull the blankets over my head, the bad things will go away.” She shook her head. “I know better than that. And you’re right, whether I’m ready to accept it or not, I need to take care of the child growing inside me. That’s one thing I can still do right.”

His chest felt as if a steel band wrapped around it, and it tightened at those words. One thing she could do right?

“Amber...” Maybe he was wrong, but he remembered the woman he used to know. Had she entirely given up because of this? He wouldn’t have expected it.

Maybe she just needed time and space to get used to so much. It sure as hell had been a huge, shocking change.

It had been a month since she first phoned him. Back then the emotionless delivery he’d heard from her had been understandable. He’d believed she’d been merely discussing her options, ways to deal with an untenable situation. But now she seemed to be in some kind of shock. Maybe she had been when she first called, and her clinical attitude had been some kind of an emotional withdrawal. Did this mean it was now becoming emotionally real to her?

He’d thought he’d been offering refuge to a friend, a safe place where she could rest and decide what to do. Now he was wondering just exactly what she needed, and if he could even begin to help her deal with what was clearly a bigger trauma than he’d imagined.

A friend quitting her job because a relationship failed and she was pregnant hadn’t sounded so bad. Now that he was getting the dimensions of all this, he didn’t think nightmare was too strong a description.

“Anyway,” she said after a minute or so, “sorry for the dump.”

“Don’t be sorry. You needed to dump on someone. And maybe your friends weren’t listening.”

“Friends?” She shook her head and at last returned to sit at the table with him. “I had coworkers, colleagues. People I knew, but no one I was able to get intimate with. I was always on guard. You have to be careful what you tell a coworker.”

There was no arguing that. He went to pour himself some fresh coffee, asking her if she wanted anything.

“I’m full from lunch. Thanks.”

When he faced her across the table again, he was still trying to find something to say to her. She’d been unsparingly honest with him, telling him far more than she had on the phone, and in the process giving him a better view of the dimensions of all she faced. Come here for a few weeks to catch her breath and make a plan?

That’s what he’d thought, but now he wasn’t so sure it was going to work that easily. She was still having trouble believing she was pregnant. Maybe she still hadn’t really started to believe any of this.

If so, it would take more than a few weeks.

“Wyatt? Remember when we first met in law school? We were in the first week and I was already overwhelmed.”

“I remember.” He’d never forget it. He’d seen not only a pretty young woman, but someone who didn’t look old enough to be facing the fire of law school. He’d thought he’d detected a bit of panic in her gaze, so he’d wandered over to the bench where she was sitting beside a pile of books, handouts and notebooks, and introduced himself.

“L-1 is a hard year,” he’d offered. “I’m in my last year.”

Her head had swiveled then, and she’d truly seen him. “I’m scared to death.”

From that moment, they’d become friends. “I remember,” he said again.

“You seemed so calm,” she said. “And friendly. You told me things to pay attention to...oh, you gave me a load of good advice for doing well and getting through it. But I never told you something.”

He waited the way he waited in a courtroom, knowing that important information was coming his way.

“I didn’t want to be there,” she said. “And I don’t just mean the first weeks, or the overwhelmed feeling. I didn’t want to be in law school at all.”

That shocked him. He’d never imagined that law school hadn’t been her choice. He’d spent three years surrounded by people who wanted to be no place else. “Then why did you apply?”

“Because of my parents. I didn’t graduate early because I wanted to. I didn’t go to college at sixteen because I wanted to. And I sure as hell didn’t go to law school because I wanted to. Although I have to admit, I started to like the law. I still enjoy the practice of it. Parts of it, anyway.”

But he saw her in an entirely different way now. So much suddenly became clear: her push for success, her moving up the ladder in firms that could tear the soul out of a person simply through overwork, client demands and the constant threat of losing your job if an important client grew unhappy. And he also understood something else. “So your parents don’t know anything about this...situation?”

“Not a thing. Mom passed away five years ago, but no, my father doesn’t know. I guess he’s going to have to know eventually, but not right now. He’ll be furious.”

Wyatt would have liked to argue with her, but how could he? He’d never met Amber’s father.

She sighed and reached for the napkin she had used to wipe her mouth and smoothed it out with her fingers. “I’ve been a wuss,” she said finally.

“That’s one thing I’d never call you.”

She lifted her head with a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “I let myself be used to fulfill their dreams for me. It only got worse when Dad told me after Mom’s funeral that she’d be so proud of all I’d accomplished.”

“More pressure.”

“Exactly. Evidently somewhere along the way I failed to grow a spine.”

He doubted that was a fair assessment, but he could understand where it came from. “Well,” he said finally, “you’re here now, you can stay as long as you like and the only thing I’m going to pressure you about is seeing a doctor.”

She nodded. “Fair enough.” After a moment she asked tentatively, “Did you feel pressured because your dad was a lawyer?”

“He didn’t pressure me,” Wyatt said truthfully. “Yeah, we talked about me going into the practice with him, but he didn’t offer a single objection when I took two years after I finished my undergrad degree to see if I liked something else.”

She shook her head a little. “I can’t imagine it.”

“Evidently not. It sounds to me like you never had a chance to take a deep breath.”

She closed her eyes briefly but didn’t answer. “I guess you’re saving my life again.”

Two things struck him in that. Offering her a place to stay was hardly saving her life. Over-the-top. But then... “Again? What do you mean?”

“You saved me that first year in law school. I was totally at sea, totally unprepared to be so much on my own. For the first time in my life, my parents weren’t watching my every move and helping me make every decision. I could have made some really big mistakes. But you were always there to remind me.”

“In short,” he said almost irritably, “I was another parent.”

“No!” That caused her eyes to widen. “No, that isn’t what I meant. I didn’t want to fail. I dreaded failing. I needed every bit of help you gave me. That’s all I meant.”

He wasn’t sure he was buying it. He had thought they were friends, that he was simply helping another student when she ran into trouble with her studies. The idea that he might have been in loco parentis for her didn’t sit well at all with him. He’d helped her with law issues. The most advice he’d given her apart from that was to never let herself fall behind. He’d hashed out legal arguments with her. But never, not once, could he remember giving her advice on how to live her life. Hell, he hadn’t even paid attention to who she was dating, if she dated anyone.

“I guess I said that wrong,” she offered. “I didn’t mean it the way you took it. I liked you as a friend. I admired a lot of things about you. I tried to be a little like you. But I never saw you as a parent figure. Ever.”

He hoped she wasn’t lying, because here they were in his house, her pregnant and unemployed, and if she was looking for a father figure, he wasn’t prepared to apply for the role. No way.

Finally he spoke again, seeking different ground. “In the midst of all this upset, have you had any chance at all to think about what you want to do next? I realize you’re probably still feeling sideswiped, but you must have had some impulses.”

“I have. But can I trust them when I’m so emotionally messed up? I’ve pretty much concluded I’m done with silk-stocking law firms, though. Even if gossip doesn’t get around, I’m not sure that I want to keep living that way. And then there’s this baby. Much as I seem to be in denial, it keeps popping into my head. How could I continue a job like that with a child? Turn it over to someone else to raise?” Her mouth drew down at the corners. “I don’t think I can do that, Wyatt.”

That statement eased some of the tension inside him. Why, he couldn’t say. Her life, her baby, her decision, but somehow he felt better about her knowing that she wasn’t going to dump the child on a full-time nanny.

“A lot of people might put it up for adoption,” he said, hating the words even as he spoke them. But it was his place to be logical, not emotional. Life had drilled that into him.

“No,” she said without hesitation. “I can’t do that. There’s like... I don’t know exactly how to explain it. But there was a moment, absolutely etched into my mind and heart, when I knew there wasn’t going to be an abortion and there wasn’t going to be an adoption. Everything in me clamped into a tight ball of resistance as soon as I thought of those things.”

He nodded and released a breath he hadn’t known he’d been holding. Why her decision should matter so much to him, he couldn’t begin to guess. “Then it appears you have a whole new life to build.”

“To put it mildly,” she agreed. Placing her chin in her hand, she smiled at him. “It’s been awful, Wyatt. Just awful. Everything blowing up around me, finding out I’d been lied to and used by someone I trusted, leaving my new job...it’s been terrible. But I feel the most ridiculous sense of freedom for the first time in my life.”

He nodded in understanding, but wondered how much of that was real and how much was a reaction to all the stress. He hoped it was real, because she sure as hell had blown up her bridges behind her.

Chapter Four

The room Wyatt had given her was lovely, Amber thought. She hadn’t really seen much last night because she’d been so tired, but when she came upstairs to change into more comfortable clothes for the afternoon and evening, and maybe to grab a short nap, she took it all in.

A wide four-poster bed with its head against a wall covered in floral wallpaper. A rocking chair with comfortable pillows, a small writing desk, an armoire that looked like it was as old as the house and a surprisingly large walk-in closet.

A person could almost live in a room like this. Heavy rugs were scattered across the wood floor, their pastel colors matching the roses on the wall. It felt fresh and new, yet it retained the charm of an older age. When was the last time she’d seen wallpaper like that?

She changed into jeans. Her pregnancy hadn’t yet started expanding her middle, or at least not enough to affect what she wore. Over that, she pulled an off-white cotton sweater. Autumn was here and there was a slight chill in the house, but she couldn’t stand wool. She had occasionally thought with amusement that a lawyer without a wool suit was doomed to failure. So far she’d managed, though. There were enough cotton blends that she’d been able to look properly well-to-do. Once she’d found a tailor who got it, anyway.

She still felt tired from all the traveling, packing and stress, but lying down only sent her mind roaming anxious pathways. No good. Finally she rose, put on some ballet slippers and returned downstairs. She found Wyatt in the kitchen, doing something with beef in a frying pan that smelled absolutely delicious.

“Hi,” she said.

He glanced over his shoulder and smiled. “No nap?”

“Couldn’t quiet my mind. Is that for chili?”

“Yup. There must be a million recipes for it. I’ve tried a lot of them.”

She managed a small laugh. “Fond of it, are you?”

“My fondness for chili is so famous that I’ve been asked to judge the chili cook-off the last few years.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously. Grab a seat. If you want a cold drink there’s a choice in the fridge. If you want hot, I can make some more cocoa.”

She chose a soft drink and passed close to the stove to see what looked like cubes of high-quality meat browning, already aromatic with seasonings. “I always use hamburger.”

“Hamburger and beans. You can do a lot with those.”

“So how did your chili become famous?”

He laughed as she sat at the table. “My chili isn’t famous. My love of it is. When I have friends over, it’s chili. When I throw a bigger bash, it’s a bigger pot of chili. When I’m invited to a backyard barbecue, I bring some chili. Not always the same recipe, but it’s a great way to feed a crowd easily. And I do enjoy it.”

“So no fancy canapés?”

“No. Just hearty, stomach-filling food.” He chuckled quietly and pulled the frying pan off the burner. “How hot and spicy do you prefer? I don’t want to burn a hole in your tongue or stomach.”

“Medium.”

“Good enough.” He went back to adding ingredients to the pan—tomato sauce, some floury substance he said was masa and more seasonings. Then he put the chili on to simmer and joined her at the table.

“So, too anxious to nap?”

“That’ll wear off,” she said. “I guess I need to just settle things inside me. Get used to it. And you couldn’t possibly want to hear me talk endlessly about myself, Wyatt.” She shook her head a little. “I’ve got one topic and one topic only lately. As for everything before...well, most of that wasn’t very interesting, either.”

She watched him smile and remembered how much she had always liked his smile. Something about it seemed to radiate warmth and charm. “I think you’re very interesting,” he answered. “But...what else would you like to talk about?”

An answering smile was born on her own face. Despite everything, he could make her smile. After the last month, she appreciated what a wonder that was. All her smiles had been forced, required, and none of them had been real. Until she saw Wyatt again.

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