“I can’t believe this,” Seton murmured. “I’m going to be an aunt.”
“Not if you give away my secret,” her sister said. “I’ll revoke aunt privileges.”
Seton frowned. “I think your pregnancy will be obvious when you come back to Diablo, Sabrina.”
“I don’t plan on coming back. Ever.”
“You have to tell him sometime.” Seton felt as if the tables had been turned between the older sister and the younger, and now she was in charge of the scolding. “It’s not fair to the baby not to know his father.”
“That comes later,” Sabrina said. “Trust me, I have a plan. After the baby is born, I’ll tell him.”
Seton frowned again. “Why after?”
“Because all the Callahans have managed to get married
before
their babies were born, as I recall, or very shortly thereafter. I don’t want Jonas suffering a similar attack of conscience.”
“That’s terrible,” Seton said. “What about the poor child?”
“The poor child will be fine. I’m sure that he or she will later appreciate that I didn’t try to tie Dad down.”
“I don’t know,” Seton murmured slowly, and Sabrina said, “Back to your question.”
“What question?”
“About Sam’s proposal.”
“Actually, the question that got us here was what would you say if Jonas offered you the same proposal. You said you’d accept!” Seton exclaimed with delight. “Therefore, it only makes sense for you to tell him.”
“The proposal under consideration,” Sabrina reminded her, “is ‘marry me, Seton, and it’ll be a name-only thing, just to satisfy the family requirements.’ I would take that deal. But I’m not being offered anything by Jonas.”
“But you might be!” Seton felt compelled to fight for her niece or nephew’s sake. After all, aunts were meant to be advocates, weren’t they? “If you’d tell him!”
“The difference is, your deal is that there’ll be no babies, no sex,” Sabrina pointed out. “I can assure you that Jonas and I could never strike that bargain. Obviously, we’ve already had sex, and if we got within a mile of each other, we probably would again. But you and Sam—”
“Never would,” Seton said, somewhat morosely. “He made that pretty clear.”
“Exactly. So you’re in a stronger position.”
“Why?” Seton flexed her feet and shoved them back into her pumps. Her head was spinning, and she was ready to head out into the already dark street of Diablo. “You’re having a baby. I want a baby, and won’t get one from Sam.”
“I’ll leave you to figure out those details,” Sabrina said.
Seton flipped off her office lights and locked the door, stuffing her keys into her briefcase as she walked down the hall, cell phone to her ear. “Don’t you want to wear the magic wedding gown? It’s yours, Sabrina, after all.”
“No, I don’t. It was Mom’s, Seton. It’s only magic because it was Mom’s. I had nothing to do with that. I’ve been thrilled for other women to wear it and know their true love. Me? I’m just happy I’m going to be a mother, to be honest.”
Seton headed out into the brisk night air and glanced up at the stars. “I miss you. I can’t bear that you won’t ever come back to Diablo. Why didn’t you tell me that when I was in D.C. with you?”
“Because I had a strong feeling there was someplace else you belonged. And I’ve really gotten into this animal activist stuff,” Sabrina said. “That undercover investigation we did with the circus really fired me up. There’s a whole lot I can do, Seton. Next week, I get to speak before a committee on animal abuse. I like it here in D.C. And it’ll be a great place to raise a child.”
“Sure,” Seton said, not convinced. “Thanks for the chat, sis.”
“No problem. Go get him, is my advice.”
“I don’t want—” Seton began, but Sabrina had already hung up. “I don’t want him,” she murmured, walking to her car, not noticing the figure leaning against the door.
“Working late?” Sam asked, and Seton gasped.
“Sam!” She tossed her cell into her briefcase, feeling a little guilty about talking about him. She hoped he hadn’t heard anything she’d said. “What are you doing?”
“Waiting on you. How about we discuss things over a drink at Banger’s?”
Seton looked at Sam, thinking about her sister’s pregnancy. She couldn’t have a drink with Sam. If she did, she might start talking and unload Sabrina’s secret. It weighed so heavily on her now. “I don’t think so.”
“C’mon,” Sam said, “you look like you could use a chardonnay.”
“I could,” Seton said, “but I think Aunt Corinne is waiting on me with tea and cookies.”
“Nah. She’s playing bingo. I just saw her at the Books’n’Bingo with the blue-haired crowd. That means,” Sam said, with his trademark Callahan smile, “that I’m all yours for the evening, doll.”
Chapter Three
“I owe you an apology for my behavior earlier,” Sam said. Seton rattled him more easily than anyone he could remember, and that included judges and fellow lawyers.
“No need to apologize. I shouldn’t have looked for your family records.”
“You were trying to help. I appreciate that. Like you said, anyone could have found the same information,” Sam stated, ignoring her reluctance to accompany him by placing a hand under her elbow and guiding her toward Banger’s. “However, I need a wife more than a P.I. now.”
Seton pulled her arm away from his grasp and gave him a stern look. “I absolutely refuse to discuss weddings, marriage or proposals of any kind.”
“Suit yourself, doll,” Sam said as he led her into Banger’s. “Let me take that suitcase from you. It looks so heavy for such a delicate lady.”
She snatched her briefcase away. “Don’t patronize me, you ape. Or you’ll be sipping chardonnay with someone else tonight.”
He grinned. “I like a woman with spirit. I’m sure that’s obvious.”
“Well, I don’t like you,” she returned as she slid into a booth. “So don’t push your luck.”
Sam grinned and told himself that if he took things real slow with Seton, maybe, just maybe, he’d end up with her in his bed eventually. Of course, that would throw off the marriage-in-name-only angle. He studied her more carefully, and wondered if marriage-in-bed-only was more his game, anyway.
S
ETON
FELT
AS
IF
a wolf was watching her all night long. Okay, maybe she and Sam had been at Banger’s for only two hours, but she felt as if he was waiting to pounce on her. He watched her every move. She drank her wine faster, and didn’t decline when he ordered taquitos and Southwestern wraps. And more wine.
Somewhere along the way, she found herself having fun. “I’ve had enough,” Seton finally said, waving away the waiter with the liberal hand at pouring. “No more for me or I’m going to sprout grapevines.”
“The night’s still young.”
Young enough to get in trouble.
“I’d better be going, Sam.” But she didn’t move. It was cozy in Banger’s, and the booth they’d been given was private and lit by candles. Seton told herself to relax; Sam wasn’t going to spring on her. And the fact that her sister was pregnant by his brother shouldn’t make her uneasy.
Of course, it did. She was worried for Sabrina, and Jonas, and the baby. The situation gnawed at her. Seton sipped at her wine, reminding herself that her sister’s life was her own.
“Jonas is driving me nuts,” Sam said. “He spends all his time hanging around the ranch. He won’t go out. He’s about as much fun as wet socks. I don’t know what his problem is.”
Seton shook her head. “Ask him.”
“He grunts by way of pleasantries these days.” Sam gazed at her. “How’s Sabrina, anyway?”
“Enjoying what she’s doing, I think.” Seton stared at Sam’s mouth and fleetingly wished they were kissing and not talking as if they were just friends.
He drummed his fingers on the table. “I don’t suppose she’ll be coming back to Diablo anytime soon.”
“I don’t think so.”
“That’s too bad. A little female companionship might be good for Jonas.”
Sam seemed genuinely worried about his brother. Seton had nothing to say that would relieve either of them, so she shrugged. “Thank you for a lovely meal, but I—”
He put a hand over hers as she clutched her purse. “Don’t go just yet.”
“Sam.” The temptation was too strong. His warm fingers on hers sent waves of longing through her. She didn’t want to acknowledge any feelings she might have for him at this point. Those feelings she’d had before—the questions that had brought her back to Diablo—simply couldn’t exist any longer. Even if everything else could be waved away with a magic wand—such as his reluctance to have children and her strong wish for a baby—Seton couldn’t date Sam in good conscience, knowing that Sabrina was pregnant with Jonas’s child. “I really have to go.”
She stood, surprised when Sam pressed her hand to his lips.
“Thank you for spending this evening with me,” he said, his tone agreeable and a little wistful. “I really didn’t want to go back to the ranch to look at Jonas’s sour puss another night.” Sam laid money on the table and put his hand against the curve of her back to guide her from the restaurant.
As they walked out, he waved to people he knew, and Seton was uncomfortably aware of the interested glances following them, especially from women. She wished Sam didn’t have his palm against her back; it felt so possessive. Yet wasn’t this why she’d returned to Diablo? To see if there could be anything between them?
“I’ll walk you to your car.”
Sam and Seton headed that way, crisp March breezes making them hurry faster than she would have liked. The thought made her feel a little guilty. She liked spending time with Sam, more than she should.
Sam waited while she unlocked her car. “Good night,” he said. “Thanks again for having dinner with me.”
Seton hesitated. “Sam, I really am sorry about digging into your family history.”
He looked at her. “I think you were meant to do it,” he said. “Why else would I decide I needed Nancy Drew in my life?”
Seton gazed back at him. “You mean all that proposal stuff was a ruse to get me checking into your family past?”
“No,” Sam said, “the offer’s still on the table. What I meant was that there are a ton of other single ladies around. I had to pick the one with a nose for solving mysteries. Maybe it was my subconscious directing me.”
Seton let herself sink into the driver’s seat. “Glad you weren’t attracted to me or anything.”
“Yeah,” Sam said, “physical attraction usually has a short shelf life.”
“What would you have done if I’d said yes?” she asked, curious in spite of herself. “Given that you’re not attracted to me for anything except my curiosity.”
“Well,” Sam said, “first, I would have married you.”
She wrinkled her nose. “And then?”
“We would have stayed married until you got sick of ranch life, or decided that the long hours working as a lawyer got on your nerves.” He shrugged. “But you didn’t say yes, so you’re off the hook, lady.”
“Good thing, that,” Seton said, thinking about Sabrina.
“I guess that means you don’t plan to change your mind.”
She thought he actually looked hopeful that she might. “No,” Seton said softly. “I won’t.”
He grinned at her. “Too bad. I would probably have shown you a good time.”
She raised an eyebrow. “After we were married? Why not before? You have such a strange way of going about things.”
“That’s what makes me a successful lawyer,” Sam said cheerfully. “I never do what the opposition expects.”
“Nice to know. Good night, Sam.” Seton closed the car door and pulled out of the parking lot, somewhat disappointed that he hadn’t tried to kiss her good-night. He hadn’t even looked as if he wanted to.
Maybe he really wasn’t attracted to her. Could his proposal about a marriage-in-name-only have been sincere?
“It doesn’t matter,” she muttered to herself. The Callahans were already adding another baby to the clan—they just didn’t know it.
Even if she’d wanted to accept Sam’s proposal, she couldn’t have done it while keeping Sabrina’s secret.
A small part of Seton regretted that she and Sam could never be anything at all to each other. That secret would always be between them.
“
H
OW
’
S
THE
MARRIAGE
proposal going?” Jonas asked when Sam made it back to the ranch. Since it was just the two of them, they’d taken to living in the main house now, giving up the bunkhouse almost for good. Sam missed the days when Fiona and Burke had been living upstairs, taking care of the massive, seven-chimneyed house. He missed them in general. Now he just had Jonas to look at.
“Slowly,” Sam said, “but not as slowly as your proposal is going.”
His brother waved a hand expansively as he sat in front of the fireplace, where he was reading the
New York Times
. “I’m not getting married. I tried it, remember? Got to the altar and everything went south. I’m not doing that again. It’s not as easy as it looks, bro.”
Sam thought his older brother was being a wienie. Despite the years between them, he felt he was the mature one, and Jonas the lagging runt. “You and Nancy were a hundred years ago. She’s been married with kids for the last ten, and you haven’t mentioned that old flame in five. Are you planning to sit here for the rest of your life reading newspapers on your iPad?”
Jonas nodded, his expression serene. “Yep.”
Sam sighed. “I’m going to bed. I have to be in court tomorrow.”
Jonas glanced up, removing his gaze from his stupid screen long enough to regard Sam with something like interest. “Anything about the ranch?”
“Bode’s lawyers want another continuance. At the rate they’re going, surely Bode’ll be in his grave before this lawsuit is over. Either that or I will.”
“You know,” Jonas said, his tone reflective, “I would have thought once Rafe caught Bode’s daughter and dragged her to the altar, the old coot would have seen that his granddaughters are going to get part of this joint, anyway.”
“Yeah,” Sam said. “He’s pretty much disowned Julie, though.”
“He’s a fool.” Jonas shrugged and went back to his virtual newspaper.
Sam started to say that Bode wasn’t the only fool in Diablo, then decided he didn’t care if Jonas turned into a pile of salt. If his brother wanted to sit in front of that fireplace like a doddering old man, that was his problem, not Sam’s.
“Not me,” he muttered. “There’s got to be something more than a court case and Jonas in my world.”
“Did you say something?” his brother yelled after him.
“No!” Sam went on up the stairs and wondered if he could talk Seton into having dinner with him again tomorrow night.
Anything to keep him from ending up like the Odd Couple with his brother.
“
D
INNER
TONIGHT
?” Sam asked, poking his head into Seton’s office at five o’clock Monday afternoon.
She closed up her briefcase and shook her head. “It’s probably not a good idea, Sam.”
“I’m in the mood for Chinese,” he said. “Surely you can’t resist that?”
She looked at him, tempted in spite of herself. “I really must resist.”
You and the Chinese food.