“With you, I feel as if we’re a partnership,” he continued. “So you can stop sighing. It’s great with you. I know we’re on the same page.”
“Are you sure you’re not going to be…”
“Bored?”
His knack for reading her mind never ceased to surprise her. “You might miss all the drama.”
A slow smile spread across his lips. “I’ll take your brand of passion over Vicky’s love of chaos any day.”
And the hot, sexy kiss he planted on her demonstrated just how true that was.
*
Bella expected a mob scene when she arrived at her parents’ farm and her family didn’t disappoint her. The last time she’d been home was for a week at Christmas. The crowded, noisy farmhouse had seemed claustrophobic after her quiet apartment in New York. Plus, she’d been unable to answer their questions about what she’d been doing during the year since she’d last visited.
More than anything she’d wanted to be able to share the truth with her mother. Giving up Drew had been an open wound and she longed for nothing more than to sob out her pain in her mother’s arms. But taking comfort was something she’d never learned how to do. It was always her supporting others. So she’d put on a brave face and bottled up her sadness.
“You’re home.” Jess was the first to reach her. As soon as Blake stopped the car, Bella’s sister yanked open the door and wrapped her arms around Bella, practically falling into her lap as she did so. “I missed you,” she said softly.
“Me, too,” Bella whispered back.
Blake stuck close to her side as they entered the house, his fingers entwined with hers. He was a solid buffer against her boisterous family as they pummeled her with dozens of questions she didn’t know how to answer.
“I’d like to see Drew,” she told him, angling toward the stairs.
“Your mother put him in your old room. When Drew and I arrived, she insisted we spend the night here rather than in town.”
Bella nodded. “There’s only two motels and neither one is up to your standards.” She entered her old room and saw immediately that Jess had taken over the space. As the oldest girl still living at home, it made sense that she would get it. “Oh, look. He’s awake.”
Drew was standing in the crib, his chubby fists gripping the railing. He bounced excitedly when he spotted her.
“He looks none the worse for wear,” Blake said. “Your family didn’t play too rough.”
It wasn’t until Bella had him in her arms that the tension of the past week melted away. How had she been stupid enough to walk away from Drew twice? “I’ll never leave you again,” she murmured into the baby’s soft neck.
“Blake, would it be all right if I had a moment alone with my daughter?”
“Certainly.”
Turning around, Bella saw her mother in the doorway. Remembering what Blake had told her as they boarded the plane, her stomach twisted into knots of dread. As soon as they were alone, Bella sat down on the bed, Drew cradled against her chest like a shield.
“I know what you’re going to say,” she began.
“Do you?” Her mother sat down on the bed beside her. “What exactly am I going to say?”
“You are going to tell me what I did was thoughtless and wrong.”
“Since I’m not exactly sure what you did, that’s not what I was going to say at all.” Her mother cupped Drew’s head with gentle fingers. “How did all this come to be?”
“When I went to New York, I went there to answer an ad placed by a firm that matched infertile couples with surrogates.” When her mother didn’t react, Bella continued. “That’s where I met Blake. He and his wife were having trouble conceiving and so they decided to use a surrogate.”
“But usually a surrogate doesn’t supply the egg, correct?”
“Victoria told me her eggs were no good.”
“She told you?” Bella’s mother echoed. “Was that the case?”
Bella shook her head. “At the time all I knew was that she was desperate to save her marriage by having a baby. I felt sorry for her so I…helped.”
“Bella.” Her mother sounded aghast. “That was your child you were giving up.”
“You didn’t see the expression on Blake’s face the day he took me for the ultrasound. He was thrilled I was carrying his son. I knew at that moment that I would do anything to make him happy, even sacrifice my own happiness by never seeing Drew ever again so that Blake and Victoria could be the happy family he wanted.” Bella kissed Drew’s head. “Besides, I’d never planned on having any children. It never occurred to me I would get so attached.”