One Night Standoff - By Delores Fossen Page 0,54

been there, I wouldn’t have met my brothers. Or Kirby. I wouldn’t be here at the ranch.”

“Your home.” Yes, it was stating the obvious, but she hated to see the past still able to hurt him this way.

“What about you?” he asked. “Would you go back and change things?”

“Absolutely.” And she didn’t even have to think about that. “I would have loved to have known my father. Even if he turned out to be, well, like yours. At least I’d know who he was.”

Clayton stayed quiet a moment. “That’s why you didn’t keep the pregnancy a secret from me.”

“That was a big part of it, yes,” she admitted. And how could she say this without making it sound like an invitation for more? “But I also thought you’d be a good father.”

“I will be,” he promised her. But almost immediately he shook his head. “Better than I’ve been so far. I’ve done a lousy job of keeping you and the baby safe.”

“Not so lousy. We’re all alive.” Sheesh. That sounded a little invitational, too. Best to move on to something not so personal.

Lenora stood. “How bad is your headache?”

He didn’t get up from the desk, but that brought his gaze to hers. “Is it that obvious?”

Now it was her turn to shrug. “You haven’t taken any meds in hours, so I figured there was pain.”

“It’s manageable,” he said, and he caught her hand and eased her in front of him.

For a moment she thought Clayton might take her up on one of those invitations and pull her into his arms, but he didn’t. He just stared at her. “You might find this hard to believe, since we had a one-night stand, but I’m pretty old-school when it comes to relationships and family.”

Now she was the one who was surprised. She wasn’t exactly sure where this conversation was going, but judging from the way Clayton was staring at her, it was going in a direction she might not like.

“You’re not planning to challenge me for custody?” she asked.

“No.” He repeated it, as if the idea hadn’t even occurred to him.

While that was a relief, there was no relief in that it took him the longest moments in history to continue. “I’ve been giving this a lot of thought, and I feel the best thing is for us to get married and raise this baby together.”

Lenora’s mouth dropped open.

“Just hear me out,” Clayton said before she could speak. Not that she would have known what to say, anyway. There were only a few times when she’d been rendered speechless, but this was one of those times.

“You and I both had some strikes against us right from the start,” he explained. “Broken homes and bad breaks. Well, I don’t want that for our baby. I want him or her to have chances we didn’t get by being raised in a home with both parents.”

She replayed every word in her head, but she still wasn’t sure where to start. Obviously, Clayton expected her to give him a resounding yes.

Something she couldn’t do.

“You want a marriage of convenience?” Lenora clarified.

He opened his mouth, closed it, then mumbled some profanity. “You make it sound like it’s something bad. We’re attracted to each other. If we hadn’t been, we would have never landed in bed.”

No way could she argue with the attraction part, and Clayton had enough proof of the attraction by the intensity and frequency of their kisses. When close to each other, they had zero resistance.

And that was why Lenora stepped back and put some space between them.

If she allowed him to pull her into his arms, her brain would turn to toast, and this was too important a decision to be thinking with parts of her body that shouldn’t have a say in this.

But Clayton obviously had other ideas.

He slid his hand around her waist and kissed her. Really kissed her. So hard and so long that when he finally pulled back, Lenora was speechless for a different reason. She didn’t have the breath to form the words. Good thing words weren’t needed when he returned to her mouth for another kiss.

Oh, no.

This was exactly what she was trying to avoid. Her body just melted. So did any resolve she had to resist him, and Lenora felt herself leaning in closer. Closer. Until, yes, she was once again in his arms. And worse, she kissed him right back.

She let that dreamy feel of pleasure slide right into her. It excited her body and soothed