the others, inside the folder.
She looked at her watch and hoped the nurse came by soon with her release. She didn’t believe for one minute that Kyle Montgomery would be returning as he’d said that morning. Why would he?
He had money. He had incredible looks. He could find a make-believe wife wherever he wanted, making it worthwhile for some other woman. Personally Emma had had enough of rich men who thought they could either buy her presence or buy her absence.
The only man she was interested in was the tiny one sleeping in his carrier right beside her.
She looked down at Chandler, feeling tears threaten. Tears of gratitude for his sweet perfection she could happily shed. But tears filled with worry and fear about the days ahead, of managing, getting by—those tears she refused to indulge.
She was twenty-six years old. When her mama was that age, she had five kids. All daughters. Another year and she had six. The year after that, Hattie Valentine had stopped having babies, because her husband went off one night and didn’t come back.
A soft knock on the door caught her attention, and she pushed to her feet, tugging the hem of her cotton maternity top over her hips. Nell Hastings smiled and pushed the door wide until it stayed open on its own. “I’ve got your ride here, Emma.” She patted the bright blue wheelchair, her eyes twinkling. “Is that all your stuff in that bag?”
She didn’t wait for an answer, but tucked the handles of the big plastic sack that held bottles of water, formula samples and diapers over the back of the wheelchair.
Emma handed the motherly nurse the folder of paperwork and sat in the chair, holding Chandler in his carrier on her lap as Nell pushed her to the sidewalk outside the small hospital. Emma could see her orange car in the parking lot. She swallowed, thinking it was stupid to feel nervous about leaving the hospital. She could do this. She looked down at her sleeping son. She would do this. She climbed out of the wheelchair. It wasn’t as if she had no friends to support her decisions. To laugh with. To cry with. She just didn’t have a husband. And she’d turned down the offers of a ride home from the hospital. She’d start out as she intended to continue. Depending on herself.
“Emma, you and Chandler are going to be just fine. But you get nervous about anything, you just call. Okay?”
“Thanks, Nell. When I’m back at work, I’ll treat you to pie and coffee.”
The nurse patted her ample hips. “I don’t need pie, but I’ll take you up on that.” She helped Emma with the plastic bag and overnight case before turning the wheelchair around and heading back inside.
“We can do this, right, Chandler?” With the plastic sack slung over one shoulder, the strap of her overnight bag over the other and Chandler’s carrier cradled between her arms, Emma slowly headed toward her car.
When she reached it, she had to set everything down on the ground, though, because her keys were buried somewhere in the overnight bag. Chandler was starting to stir, and she moved his carrier onto the hood of her car, humming to him while she dug blindly through her bag.
“Looks like you could use an extra hand.”
Emma gasped, automatically closing her arm over the carrier. She looked across the hood of her ancient car to the gleaming late-model sports car against which Kyle Montgomery leaned lazily. Her heart was thudding only because he’d startled her, she assured herself.
“My two hands are quite sufficient,” she said, flushing when the words came out sounding breathless. She swept her hand once more through the interior of her case searching, searching.
He tilted his head slightly, his eyes crinkling at the corners. Emma swallowed and pulled the case in front of her, pushing aside the clothing she’d worn to the hospital in her search. She was certain she’d dumped the keys in the bottom of the case.
“You’re overflowing there.”
She frowned, looking up. Right there, large as life, was her white cotton bra, D cup and all, hanging drunkenly over the side of the case. She hastily shoved it back inside, finally encountered the sharp edge of a key with her fingertip and pulled the set out triumphantly. Without bothering to refasten the zipper of the case, she hurriedly unlocked the car and dumped the two bags inside, rolled the car window halfway down and reached for the baby carrier. From the corner of her eye, she could see Kyle still leaning against his car.
He’d added the tie that had been missing that morning. Looking just as spit-polished as she’d figured he’d look. She swallowed and tried blocking him from her sight as she bent over her baby.
Though she’d practiced fastening the baby carrier into the stationary base that was already in the car, she fumbled the job. Chandler started whimpering and Emma crooned soothingly to him as she tried again. But the latch wouldn’t connect.
Painfully aware of Kyle’s gaze, which she couldn’t seem to ignore no matter how hard she tried, she worked at the carrier again. And again. Chandler started crying in earnest. “Oh, pumpkin, don’t,” she murmured, trying to distract him with the pacifier the nurse had sent with them. But Chandler wasn’t interested in the pacifier, and his newborn wail rose.
The panic rose in her far too easily. Her knees felt wobbly and all she wanted to do was lie down. She took a deep breath and tried fitting the carrier into place once more. What was wrong with the thing?
“Let me give it a try.”
Emma looked over her shoulder at Kyle, who’d moved to stand behind her. His wide shoulders blocked the bright afternoon sun in a way that no man wearing a silk tie should be able to do. “I can do it.”
“I’m sure you can,” he said mildly. “But that’s the same model I bought my sister when she had her baby. Remember, the one I told you—”
“I remember.” Feeling cross, she pulled the carrier back out of the car and propped it between her hip and the open car door while she tried coaxing Chandler to take the pacifier. At last he did, his cries ceasing as his lips worked rhythmically.
“He’s hungry.”
“I’m aware of that.” And her breasts positively ached for relief. But she wasn’t going to tell this man that. Not that she needed to, she realized with a hot flush, because his eyes had definitely been eyeing her there. “Don’t you have planes to fly somewhere or something?”
His eyes crinkled and he gently, firmly, nudged her out of the way, easily replacing her hands on the carrier with his own. “I am a pilot,” he said as he leaned into the car. “But unfortunately the business end of things keeps me on the ground pretty much these days. There. All set.”
He straightened and Emma could see the carrier had been transformed into a secure car seat. Naturally. She felt like bawling. “I…Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He looked at her, not smiling, just being male and competent and calmly accepting the tears collecting in her eyes. This last made the urge to cry magically fade. “I’ll follow you home.”
His statement was oddly appealing. And as such, completely out of the question. She blinked, moved away from him and his hypnotic scent, and pushed the door closed. He either had to move or have his hip banged.
“What for? To see if I can release the carrier once I get there?” She knew she was being rude. He had helped her with the carrier, after all. But criminy, the man seemed incapable of taking no for an answer. “I don’t know how to get it through to you, Mr. Montgomery, but you cannot buy me into playing your pretend-marriage game.”
His eyebrows peaked. “Buy?”
“So please just go make your offer to some other woman.” Some other woman who can think straight when you look at her with those green eyes.
“Buy?” he repeated.
Emma propped a steadying hand on the car, her attention veering from Chandler to Kyle and back again. Chandler, for the moment, seemed satisfied with his