An Act of Persuasion - By Stephanie Doyle Page 0,34

me fundamentally inside.”

She shook her head. “I don’t believe that. You’ve told me about your parents. How it was growing up. They sounded like warm, lovely people. You must have loved them.”

“Of course, yes.”

They’d been older. A couple who had found each other later in life. His father was a successful plumber and his mother was a quiet, soft-spoken woman. Having him had been an unplanned event, so Ben’s childhood was more about him fitting into their worlds rather than them accommodating his.

Fortunately, Ben had seemingly been born competent and mature so hadn’t required a lot of their attention and focus. His father was stern, but not harsh. He demanded discipline and he rewarded competence. Ben’s mother’s quiet demeanor hid a deep intellect that he admired and often sparred with.

Had he loved them? He’d been sad when they passed, of course. His father of a heart attack. His mother not two years after that of a sudden brain aneurism. Ben had been orphaned by age twenty-six.

From that moment on he had lived with the certainty that he was alone in the world. It hadn’t frightened him or worried him. He’d simply embraced his solitude and lived his life for his work.

Never once had he met a woman for whom he wanted to change that life.

Until Anna had left him. Because she loved him and was tired of not being loved back. Anna wasn’t prone to dramatics or tears, yet she’d cried when he asked her to come home.

Home.

The word should have registered with him. He knew what it meant to her. Knew what she sacrificed each pay period to put money aside so that she could finally have her own house someday. A house she declared would be the best home she could imagine, because it would be hers.

Those tears showed him how very serious she was about her feelings. She deserved to know how serious he was about making something work between them, as well.

He knew he wanted her in his life. She was probably his closest friend. The first one he’d really allowed himself to have when he returned to the states. Because of her he’d found himself becoming closer to the other people he worked with like Greg Chalmers, a man still struggling to overcome his own demons, who Ben found himself want to help. And Madeleine Kane, who had needed a kick on the bottom to jump start her life again. Would he have made those more personal connections without Anna having been there first? Doubtful.

“Loving your parents isn’t the same thing as loving a woman,” he said.

“No, it’s not. But don’t say you don’t know how to love someone.” Anna reached across the small table and laid her hand on top of his. “You’re not as coldhearted as you want to believe. You would have to choose it, Ben. Decide what path you wanted to take in life.”

He laughed without humor. “Choose my path? Sort of an ironic thing to say to a man who has had little choice for the past year. You want to talk about dropping bombshells, forget that I wasn’t sure if I was going to live or die, I broke a long-held, self-imposed rule and had sex with with an employee. Then my long-time employee and very close friend suddenly left me at a time when I desperately needed her. In the span of weeks I realized two things—I was going to live and I was sterile. I would never have my own children, which I didn’t even think I wanted, until...wait! You come back into my life to tell me you’re pregnant with my child and that you have, in fact, loved me for a very long time. However, immediately on the heels of that declaration you tell me there can be nothing between us. Those are some pretty big surprises, wouldn’t you say?”

She had the decency to blush. He hoped guilt motivated it. “I’m sorry. I guess, I was only thinking about...well, me. Yuck.”

He turned his hand under hers so that their fingers meshed and he squeezed it in shared commiseration. “You had a pretty rough few months, too.”

She nodded and he could see her eyes watering. This new pregnant Anna, he was coming to realize, was a crier.

“I was so afraid you were going to die,” she sobbed. “When the first round of chemo didn’t work, I didn’t know what to think. I couldn’t believe it could actually happen, that you might not live. I wouldn’t believe