Buch lesen: «Fletcher's Baby!»

CHAPTER ONE

SAM FLETCHER was no stranger to jet lag.

He knew all about the gritty, bloodshot eyes, the general lethargy, the tendency to yawn at inopportune moments. But he’d never had it affect his hearing before.

“Hattie did what?” He stared at his mother, who had pounced on him the moment he opened his apartment door.

That in itself was odd. Amelia Fletcher lived in the same Upper East Side building as her son, Sam, but she made it a point never to impose. Imposing was bad manners. Amelia Fletcher had never been accused of bad manners in her life.

Yet here she was at—what was it?—one p.m. (three a.m. Tokyo time, which was what Sam was on)—standing in the foyer of his Fifth Avenue apartment with a list in her hand.

“The lawyer said he couldn’t wait until you got back in the States to read the will,” she told him. “And since I had power of attorney while you were gone, it was entirely legal to do so without you.”

“Of course, but—” More than his hearing must be going. He knew his devoted, eccentric aunt Harriet had died last week, and, while he regretted being abroad and unable to come to her funeral, he didn’t see what the will had to do with him.

“She left you everything,” his mother said again.

That was what he thought he’d heard the first time. Sam gave a quick, sharp shake of his head. “Everything? You mean the...” His voice died as he contem- plated what exactly Hattie’s “everything” might imply.

In case his contemplation missed something, his mother, consulting the list again, spelled it out for him. “The house—the inn, that is—and all the furnishings, including her Ming vases, her Tiffany glass, her entire collection of Stickley oak, her Grant Wood sketches and her Frank Lloyd Wright elevations.” Her voice slowed slightly as she continued, “She also left you three cats: Clark Gable, Errol Flynn and Wallace Beery by name.” She shot Sam an amused glance over the top of her glasses. “A dog called—”

“Humphrey Bogart,” Sam said heavily at the same time his mother did. He propped himself against the wall and shook his head. It was only marginally funny.

Amelia kept smiling. “Just so.” She glanced down at the list again. “A parakeet.”

Sam sighed and sagged. “Fred Astaire.”

“And,” his mother finished with a flourish, “an unidentified object simply called Josephine Nolan.”

Sam jerked upright “What?”

At the vehemence of his response Amelia took a step back, then looked at the list and nodded. “It’s the last item on the list the lawyer faxed me. Josephine Nolan.” She dimpled slightly as her lips curved in amusement. “I’ve never heard of a Josephine Nolan. What do you suppose it is? A rabbit? A hamster? A turtle?”

Sam didn’t think it was funny at all. He knew exactly what a Josephine Nolan was.

“What in the hell is Hattie doing leaving me a woman?”

Shakespeare was undoubtedly right. First they ought to kill all the lawyers. Starting with Herman Zupper, Hattie’s faithful retainer.

“What do you mean he’s gone on vacation?” Sam demanded when Zupper’s secretary said her boss was unavailable.

“For a month,” she said calmly. “He and his wife are in Germany for their fiftieth wedding anniversary. That’s why he had to call and speak with your mother before he left.”

Sam grunted. He rubbed a hand over his hair. It was too short to tug which was what he wanted to do. “It’s absurd,” he muttered. “What the hell would Hattie do a thing like that for?”

It wasn’t that he didn’t have enough on his plate. He was the sole director of Fletcher’s Imports, one of the most exclusive businesses of its kind in the world. Places like Gumps and Neiman-Marcus would die to offer some of the goods he imported for sale. But having such goods didn’t mean he sat on his laurels. On the contrary, he flew all over the world, seeking out treasures, negotiating multi-million dollar deals. He did not have time to drop everything to run a little bed and breakfast inn in Dubuque, Iowa!

“I assure you, everything is in top-notch condition,” the secretary said, apparently under the illusion that he thought he was being saddled with a slum.

Sam grunted again. He knew Hattie’s bed and breakfast was a profitable business. Housed in a twenty-odd-room late Victorian mansion situated on a bluff overlooking the town of Dubuque and the Mississippi River, it was a charming place. It had even become a sort of bolt-hole for him when the pressures in his life became too much. Hattie, a childless widow, had always welcomed him with open arms.

She welcomed the whole world with open arms, Sam recalled grimly. As successful as Hattie’s inn, The Shields House, was commercially, it was also the site of the biggest collection of white elephants Sam had ever seen.

The cats were just one indication of her lamentable tendency to collect things other people tossed out. He supposed he ought to count himself fortunate that she hadn’t had more than three cats when she died. And a dog. And a parakeet.

And Josie Nolan.

And that was another thing! He’d assumed that Hattie, having no children of her own, would leave everything to Josie, whom she loved as if she were her daughter. What the hell was she doing leaving Josie to him?

He cleared his throat. “What’s that, um, business about, um, Josephine Nolan?” he asked the secretary now.

“Josephine Nolan?” The secretary sounded baffled.

“In the will,” Sam explained, feeling foolish. “Hattie left me the cats and the dog and the bird—” he grimaced as he said the word, all too aware of its appropriateness “—and Josephine Nolan.”

“I’m sorry, but I’m not conversant with the exact items in the bequest. I only know we ran the property through a title check. I could enquire, if you wish.”

“Never mind. I’ll do it.” He hung up, sank back against the sofa and stared up at the ceiling.

His mother, thank heaven, had delivered her bombshell and departed. Amelia had never much liked messy situations, and the look on his face and the words out of his mouth when she’d mentioned Josie had not promised tranquility, so she’d brushed a kiss across his lips, waggled her fingers at him and headed for the door.

“I’ll just see you when you’re rested, dear,” she’d said. “Don’t worry. You know Hattie. It’s probably just her idea of a little joke.”

Some joke.

Josie Nolan.

Josie Nolan was Hattie’s innkeeper. Long ago she had been one of Hattie’s white elephants. As a teenage foster-child living nearby, she had spent so much time gazing longingly at Hattie and her husband, Walter’s, big house, that Hattie had invited her in. A few weeks later she’d invited Josie to work for her. Eventually she’d supported Josie through college. When she’d graduated, Josie had come back to help Hattie out.

Sam had first met Josie when she was a big-eyed, dark-haired child of fifteen and he’d been a worldly man of twenty-two. He’d teased her and chatted with her and forgotten her the moment he’d gone away.

Of course he’d heard “Josie stories” from Hattie over the years, and he’d always pictured the big-eyed, dark-haired girl who’d blushed every time he’d looked at her. But he hadn’t seen Josie again until last fall, when he’d used Hattie’s as a bolt-hole to avoid having to be best man at his ex-fiancée’s wedding.

He hadn’t even recognized her. Of course, she still had big eyes and dark hair, but she’d developed curves and a bosom—and legs.

Sam had been astonished at the length of Josie Nolan’s legs. He hadn’t ever thought of himself as a leg man. Hell, he couldn’t even remember Izzy’s, his ex-fiancée’s, legs!

He’d hardly been able to put Josie Nolan’s out of his mind.

Only, he assured himself, because he was still edgy about having been dumped. He’d noticed her because he was noticing women. Trying to regain his equilibrium after Izzy had thrown him over.

He actually thought she’d been right to break the engagement. So he’d been nice about it He’d even understood He had only to look at Izzy to see how much more deeply she felt about Finn, the man she had since married, than she’d ever felt about him.

But being nice hadn’t been easy. And “nice” had its limits. He couldn’t have faced standing at the front of the church and watching her walk down the aisle to marry another man.

So he’d gone to Dubuque and had spent a week doing wiring, painting and wallpapering...and other things.

It was the “other things” he was concerned about now.

Had Josie told Hattie what had happened that last night?

Sam wished to hell someone would tell him.

Or maybe he didn’t.

He remembered parts of it. If he shut his eyes, he could see again the tear-streaked face of Josie Nolan when she’d opened her door to his light knock. He shouldn’t have been knocking at all. He should have shut his ears to her soft, muffled sobs back then rather than try to be a good Samaritan.

God knew he’d been in no shape to comfort someone else on a night he’d wanted only to be comforted himself. It had been the night Izzy and Finn were getting married. And though he was happy for Izzy, and knew she was marrying the right man, it didn’t help to know he’d been the wrong one.

He’d retired to his room with a bottle of his dead uncle Walter’s best Irish whiskey right after dinner, hoping perhaps that a little Irish companionship could make him forget.

Maybe the whiskey had sharpened his hearing. Or maybe the walls were thinner than he’d remembered. Or maybe his tolerance for tears had been at an all-time low. Whichever, he’d heard sounds that surprised him. He’d known Josie was waiting for her fiancé, Kurt, to come and take her out for her birthday. He’d seen her pacing the floor of the parlor, then standing on the porch and looking hopefully down the road. Hadn’t the bastard ever shown up?

Sam hadn’t known. Then.

But then he went and tapped on her door, to have it opened by Josie, in a robe and nightgown and a tear-streaked face. He should have turned and run. Instead, he’d sympathized. He’d smiled gently and said, “They say that misery loves company. Come have a drink with me.”

And she never should have come.

He didn’t remember a lot about what had happened after that.

There had been soft sounds and sad smiles and touches. He remembered vaguely tangling his fingers in her long dark hair. He remembered breathing deeply of the scent of cinnamon and shampoo that over the past week he’d come to associate so strongly with Josie. He remembered running his hands up the length of those very long, very smooth legs. Later, after another toast to lost fiancés and missing ones, there had been more touches and more kisses, and then he remembered—oh, God, yes, he remembered—those long legs wrapped around him.

And then...

He remembered waking up in the morning with a splitting headache and his cellular phone ringing and his secretary Elinor telling him that Mr. Nakamura was flying in this afternoon to talk with him about that shipment of teak furniture he’d promised.

Hungover, numb, Sam had promised to be there.

Then he’d looked around to see if he’d dreamed the whole thing. Josie, of course, because she was the innkeeper and made breakfast for the guests, was gone.

She might never even have been there at all—except there were two dirty glasses on the table next to the fireplace. And when Sam had looked further, he’d found her panties tangled in the sheet at the bottom of the bed.

He’d packed his bags before he went downstairs. He’d known he had to talk to her. But he hadn’t known what to say.

He’d found Hattie in the kitchen, but no Josie.

“Kurt called,” Hattie had reported. “He wanted to see her this morning. Since he missed last night with her, I said, go ahead.” She’d smiled. “She’ll be sorry to have missed you.”

Sam had doubted that very much.

She was probably regretting last night had ever happened. She’d certainly gone running back to Kurt the moment he’d called. Well, fine, Sam thought. It had saved him making an even bigger fool of himself as he babbled his apologies.

But only for seven months.

He’d have to make them now.

And he would have to sort out this nonsense of Hattie’s, leaving the inn to him. Josie was the one who had made it the success that it was. She was the one who deserved it. Not Sam. He didn’t want anything to do with it.

So, fine, he’d give it to her.

No, he couldn’t, damn it. There would be tax problems. For him. For her. His cash flow might permit him to cope with them, but hers wouldn’t. If he gave the inn to her, Josie wouldn’t thank him. She wouldn’t be able to afford to keep it.

Maybe, he thought, she wouldn’t even want it. Maybe she was already married to Kurt.

Stuffy, irritating Kurt certainly wouldn’t want it. He didn’t want Josie to have anything to distract her from him.

Sam groaned again, trying to figure it all out. He was sure it would be completely straightforward and logical if he weren’t so damned jet lagged. He was sure it would all make sense in the morning. Whenever morning was.

He was too tired to haul himself up off the sofa and go into the bedroom to sleep. He curled up where he was and folded a pillow over his head. His last conscious thought was a question he sent winging its way to whatever spot his great-aunt was holding down in the hereafter.

“Hattie,” he muttered, “what the hell are you up to?”

He gave himself twenty-four hours to fly to Dubuque, sort out the business with the inn, come to some sort of deal with Josie about running it until he found a buyer, and get back to New York to meet with a group of Thai businessmen he couldn’t afford to miss.

He would have preferred to wait until Herman Zupper was back and dump the problem of the inn on him. He would have preferred to handle the whole mess by mail or telephone or fax.

He would, in fact, have preferred not to inherit—or go—at all.

But he would go, because Hattie had been good to him, because she’d always loved him and sheltered him and supported him even when—especially when—being the only son and heir to the Fletcher empire got to be too much for him.

He wished now he hadn’t put her off back at Christ-mastime when she’d called and encouraged him to come for a visit. He’d been surprised to hear her voice on the phone that cold December afternoon. Hattie ordinarily sent him telegrams when she wanted to say something. But that time, uncharacteristically, she had called.

“You really ought to come, Sam,” she’d said. But she hadn’t been her normally abrupt self, and it had been easy to say no.

He’d told her he was busy. Really busy. It was only the truth: he had been.

But too busy to spend her last Christmas with her? No, not that busy. He could have taken a few days, brought Amelia, and spent Hattie’s last Christmas with her.

He hadn’t. Because of the situation with Josie.

It would have been awkward. Uncomfortable. Hell, she and Kurt were supposed to be getting married in December, right after he got his degree.

For all Sam knew, he might have had to go to her wedding and give her away!

No, thanks. So he had said no to Hattie’s last request. He hadn’t seen Hattie during the last months of her life.

It was too late for that now. But he’d go anyway because he loved her—and he owed her.

And Sam Fletcher always paid his debts.

“Yo, Sam.” The white-haired old man sitting on the porch swing hailed Sam as soon as he got out of his rental car and headed up the walk that crossed the broad lawn in front of The Shields House bed and breakfast. ‘“Bout time you got here!”

“Hey, Benjamin.” Sam grinned as he gave the old man a wave and quickened his pace. He took the porch steps two at a time, holding out his hand. “How’ve you been?”

The old man reached out and shook it, then sighed and slumped back against the swing. “Missin’ Hattie, you want to know the truth,” he said. He gave a shove against the porch with his foot and set the swing to rocking.

“Yes.” Sam commiserated. He’d expected that. Benjamin Blocker owed Hattie a lot. Like Josie, he was one of Hattie’s strays. Only not a waif, a man with a past.

Once upon a time Benjamin had worked for her husband on the towboat Walter had plied up and down the Mississippi, but he’d drunk too much to be reliable and got himself fired. He’d vowed to dry out and put himself in various programs to do so. None ever seemed to work, and he’d go off again. Periodically, though, he would show up on Walter’s doorstep, have a meal and take off again.

Then, the year Walter died, Benjamin had showed up on the doorstep when Hattie was in the midst of a plumbing crisis. Benjamin knew about plumbing. He’d saved the day.

Hattie, in her gratitude, had said, “Why don’t you stay around? There’s lots of work to be done.”

Sam had thought she was asking for trouble, and had cautioned her against it.

But Hattie had just shrugged. “Let him have a chance.”

“You mean it?” Sam remembered the old man saying.

Hattie had nodded. “I could use a man around to help out.”

Benjamin stayed. Being needed—really needed—did something that all the well-meaning programs he’d tried couldn’t do. Benjamin grabbed the chance Hattie gave him with both hands and hung on for dear life. Sam didn’t think he’d ever taken a drink again. He’d certainly never turned up drunk as far as Sam had ever heard. From then on, Benjamin kept the plumbing in perfect running order, installed whirlpool baths in four of the rooms, and definitely earned his keep.

Later that year, when Hattie bought a little house halfway down the bluff, intending to use it for long-term rentals, Benjamin had helped her restore it, then moved into the bottom floor as an on-site caretaker. A little over a year ago Hattie had deeded the house to him. He was taken care of.

Which was probably, Sam reflected, the only reason he hadn’t got left Benjamin in the will.

Or Cletus, another of Hattie’s “projects,” who came ambling up the walk now. Cletus was perhaps seventy-five to Benjamin’s eighty, and he, too, had been aimless when Hattie had met him at the soup kitchen. They’d talked about how nice the lilacs were that year, and Hattie had invited him up to see hers.

He’d arrived on a bicycle, looking a bit shabby but clean in a threadbare navy blazer and khakis, with a distinctive sprig of lilac in his buttonhole.

He thought hers needed pruning. “Have to do it in the fall,” he’d told her. Then he’d surveyed the lawn and gardens critically. “Got to get wire props for those peonies,” he had told her. “And a better arbor for the grapes.”

“Can you make an arbor?” Hattie had asked.

Cletus had made the arbor and had been here ever since.

Now he set the wheelbarrow full of potting plants down and stood looking Sam up and down.

“How you doing, Cletus?” Sam offered his hand.

Cletus grunted and took Sam’s hand, but the shake he gave it was little more than a jerk. “Took you long enough.”

Sam frowned. “I got here as soon as I could I was in the Orient when Hattie died. I couldn’t get back in time for the funeral.”

He got another grunt. Two in fact. One from each of them.

He frowned. “I’m here now. Don’t worry. Everything will be fine. I’ll get things sorted out.”

Cletus looked stern. “Damn right you will.”

“I’m sure you’ll do the right thing.” Benjamin gave Cletus a satisfied nod.

Sam was glad someone had faith in him. “Of course I will,” he said stoutly. He looked at Clews to see how he’d taken Benjamin’s support. The glance netted him an uncompromisingly steely stare.

“We’re counting on you,” Cletus said at last. What the hell was going on here? Did they think he was going to sell the place out from under them?

“I’ll see that you’re both taken care of,” he promised.

“Tain’t us we’re worried about,” Cletus said. “It’s Josie.”

“I’ll take care of Josie,” Sam promised.

It was apparently the right thing to say. Both men beamed.

“Knew it,” Benjamin said.

“Good lad,” Cletus agreed, and clapped him on the back.

Sam allowed himself a moment to bask in their approval, then asked, “Where is she?”

“In the kitchen. She didn’t say you were comin’.”

Sam shifted from one foot to the other. “I didn’t call.” And he wasn’t explaining why. But there was one thing he wanted to know before he saw her. “Is...she married?”

Benjamin stared at him. “Married?”

Cletus took off his spectacles and wiped them. Then, setting them back on his nose, he looked squarely at Sam. “Not yet.”

Sam sighed. He supposed he shouldn’t be surprised. He’d never had much appreciation for Kurt’s finer qualities. He might be God’s gift to deep thinkers everywhere, but he seemed entirely too cavalier about the woman he loved for Sam’s taste.

“I’ll go talk to her now.” He started around the house toward the back door.

He could have gone to the front, but that would have meant ringing the bell and waiting for Josie to let him in. It would have meant she could see him before she opened the double leaded glass doors. The advantage would have been hers.

He wanted the advantage to be his.

He saw her through the kitchen window. There was a long island counter just inside the door and she was behind it, arranging flowers. Josie was tall, a good four inches taller than Izzy, with long, lush brown hair that had always glinted red in the sun. Sam remembered wanting to run his fingers through her hair from the first day he’d met her when she was barely more than a child. He’d always restrained himself until—

He jammed his hands in his pockets.

She could have seen him coming if she’d been looking up. But she was concentrating on putting flowers in a variety of vases. Daffodils, baby’s breath, carnations—bright fresh bouquets that brought the outdoors into each room, as she’d once told him. Sam remembered the drill.

She’d been doing it the day of her birthday, the day Kurt had stood her up, the day he’d invited her to his room for a drink, the day—

Hell! The only thing now was to apologize, admit he’d made a mistake—that they’d both made a mistake—then, like the civilized individuals they were, they could put it behind them. And go on.

He opened the door.

Josie looked up over the vases, a smile on her face. It faded at the sight of him. All the color in her face faded, too.

Sam’s jaw clenched. He drew a careful breath. “Josie,” he said, with what he hoped was the right blend of distance and camaraderie.

She swallowed. “Sam.”

He felt as if he’d been slapped.

He was used to seeing Josie’s face light up when he came in the room. He was used to a sparkle in her eyes, a grin on her face. There was no grin now, no sparkle. The look she gave him was shuttered. As remote as if she were standing behind a steel wall. He wasn’t even entitled to the cheerful innkeeper persona that so endeared her to The Shields House clientele.

Well, fine. Sam pressed his lips together, then gave a curt jerk of his head, acknowledging the distance she’d put between them.

If that was the way she wanted it, so be it.

“I came as soon as I could,” he said briskly. “I’m sorry I couldn’t get to the funeral. I was in Hong Kong and I had to go to Japan before I came home.”

“Of course.” Josie picked up a carnation and with great care added it to one of the bouquets. She didn’t look at him. She didn’t say anything else. Not, How are you? Not, I’ve missed you.

The clock ticked. An airplane thrummed overhead. Sam drummed his fingers against his thigh.

“I should have been here for her. I should have come at Christmas. I didn’t because...because...” Of you.

No, he couldn’t say that. He sucked in a breath and tried again. “The last time I was here... I’m sorry about...”

He stopped there, too.

He owed her an apology, certainly. But she hadn’t exactly been unwilling! He remembered that much. He wished to hell she’d look at him now, give him some indication of what she was thinking.

Sam Fletcher, who had once been told he “oozed charm through every pore,” felt that at the moment he was oozing only sweat.

“About that night,” he said finally, deciding that bluntness was the best policy. “It was a mistake. A big mistake...asking you to have a drink with me. And af ter...well, after...” He paused. Damn it, at least look at me.

She did. It was no help. Her face was so expressionless he didn’t have a clue what she thought. Still, whatever he’d said so far, clearly it wasn’t enough.

“I didn’t mean... I never meant for what happened to... to happen.” He stopped, flushing in the face of her total silence. “It was the whiskey talking...”

“I assumed as much.” Josie’s voice was flat. toneless. She turned to stare out the window.

“I tried to see you the next morning. I got a call from Elinor. I went to see you then, to tell you, before I left...but Hattie said you’d gone out with Kurt...” He looked at her for confirmation.

Her profile nodded.

So he hadn’t screwed up her life. Thank God for that. He grinned shakily and breathed an enormous sigh of relief. “I’m glad.”

“Are you?” She picked up the two vases in front of her and moved to put them on a cart. Sam watched, hoping she was wearing shorts so he could see those long, wonderful long legs—legs that had once wrapped around him and—

He didn’t even notice her legs.

Only her belly.

Josie was pregnant!

And not just a little pregnant, either. She was huge.

“You’re having a baby!”

Josie set the vases on the cart.

She was having a baby and—“And Kurt still hasn’t married you?”

Suddenly Sam was furious. It was bad enough the jerk stood her up all the time! It was worse that he expected her to drop everything to type his damn papers! But this was ridiculous! “Just exactly how irresponsible is he?”

Josie turned to face him. “Why should he marry me? It’s not his child.”

“Not—?” Sam gaped, stunned. Not Kurt’s child?

He scowled furiously, his mind ticking over, processing this new bit of information, trying desperately to sort things out, to put it together with what he knew about Josie Nolan.

He hadn’t thought she was the type to sleep around! She’d always seemed so quiet, so dedicated. Sweet. He’d always liked Josie Nolan, respected her, had always thought she’d got the short end of the stick in life and even in her choice of fiancés.

He’d felt sorry for her that night last autumn, had wanted to comfort her. Maybe he’d been wrong. His jaw locked. Just how the hell promiscuous was she?

“I trust you know who the father is?” be said acidly.

Josie’s eyes widened. She went rigid. Her chin tipped up and Sam saw color flush her no longer expressionless face.

“As a matter of fact, I do,” she said flatly. “You.”