Loe raamatut: «The Baby Chronicles»

Chapter One

Colleen Stewart shifted uneasily on the hard chair across from her editor’s large, metal desk, holding back a ragged sigh.

Cold, hard dread inched through her. She had to find a way to get out of writing this article. She would never, ever be able to write “The Baby Chronicles” without letting all of those smiling, cooing, bald little toothless angels turn her heart to mush.

Mush she didn’t need.

“I don’t see what the problem is,” Joe said, yanking his stained yellow-and-red tie loose. “All you have to do is write about cute babies. Piece of cake.”

Cute babies a piece of cake? Hardly. “Joe, I turned down this assignment a week ago,” she said, deliberately excluding the reason she’d talked her way out of the job in the first place. Joe would laugh his head off. “Nothing has changed. I still don’t want to do it. Can’t you get someone else?”

He waved a hand in the air. “No can do. Rudy left town for a family emergency and Christy has her hands full covering the budget cuts at the school district. You’re it.”

Colleen bit her lip. “What about Angela?”

“On maternity leave.”

“Steve?”

“I fired him this morning.”

She flinched but kept at it, leaning forward. “Zack?”

“You’re it, Colleen.” He pulled his bushy, gray eyebrows together and scowled. “What’s the big deal, anyway? Just supervise the shoot and write the story, all right?”

She’d love to tell Joe why this seemingly harmless assignment was a big deal for her. But she couldn’t. Joe was a hard-line journalist and a traditional family man from way back. He would never understand her need to stay away from things like endearing babies, cute little animals, large, close-knit families and nice, lovable men. She’d learned long ago that there was no sense in hanging around things she could never have.

Things that made her ache inside.

She opened her mouth to refuse, but Joe’s ice-hard glare stopped her and she clamped her lips closed. Further argument was useless. She prided herself on her ability to get through tough situations with strength and self-control, just as she’d made it through her neglected childhood all by herself. She’d write this article while remaining unengaged and unfazed by the undoubtedly adorable babies. She had to. Her job as a reporter at the Beacon and her protected little world here in Portland, Oregon, depended on it.

“Anything else?” she asked, trying to sound up-beat. She glanced out the window, hoping the blue-skied, puffy-clouded summer day would cheer her up.

“Yeah, actually there is one more thing. We’re bringing in a freelance photographer for this spread.”

A psychological cloud moved across the sun. Her gut tightened. Ever since she’d been shuffled through the foster-care system, meeting knew people always made her feel off balance and vulnerable. “Really? Why?”

Joe shrugged. “The guy’s good, and he offered his talent for dirt cheap. Wants to build a career photographing kids. Thought this would be a good opportunity.” He looked over her head and smiled. “Ah. Here he is now.”

A barely perceptible, woodsy scent drifted across the air, teasing Colleen’s nose. She froze, momentarily confused, and a long, heart-pounding second later, recognition thudded into place. Only one person she’d ever known had smelled like a combination of trees and wind and the great outdoors.

Aiden.

But that was impossible. Aiden was overseas in some godforsaken, war-torn country taking pictures.

“Taking pictures,” she mouthed.

No. No way. She was imagining that outdoorsy, distinctive, heart-stopping scent, right? Aiden Forbes was thousands of miles away right now. He was absolutely, positively not standing behind her, ready to take over his new, unlikely job as baby photographer.

Almost incapable of movement, she somehow pressed a shaking hand to her fluttering stomach. A chill rushed up her spine, scattering goose bumps over her entire body.

Please don’t let it be him, please don’t let it be him. She’d broken up with Aiden eight years ago because he’d shown her, by loving her so completely, how incapable of loving she was.

Aiden was just a painful reminder of the unfixable flaw inside her and of all of the ramifications that flaw had had in her life. With Aiden around, she’d never been able to forget the defect that had made her parents ditch her into the foster-care system.

A deep, hauntingly familiar voice scraped across her raw nerves like a rusty chainsaw on metal, dashing her stupid hopes. “You must be Joe Capriati.” From the corner of her eye she saw a large, tanned hand reach to Joe over her shoulder. “I’m Aiden Forbes.”

Time slowed to a crawl. In the millisecond it took Colleen to draw a choked, desperate breath, her world tilted on its axis and almost sputtered to a stop.

She pressed her other quivering hand to the side of her face and bent her head, ridiculously trying to hide, even though she was dying to look at Aiden and see how the years had changed him. But she didn’t look, she couldn’t even move. Maybe he wouldn’t recognize her.

Of course he would. He wasn’t popping his head in for just a moment. He was the photographer on the story she’d just been assigned. She was going to have to work with him. Side by side. Photographing precious babies.

She closed her eyes and shook her head, wishing the floor would open up and swallow her whole.

Aiden Forbes, the only man who had ever been able to crack open the door to her flawed, vulnerable heart, was back.

Shaking Joe’s beefy hand, Aiden’s attention remained stuck on the seated woman he’d had to reach over, her blond, curly hair spilling down her back like wavy, near-white gold. She had a hand pressed to the side of her face, trying to…hide?

Something in the set of her shoulders seemed familiar, but he couldn’t put his finger on why. He’d only been back from Bosnia for a week, and he certainly hadn’t met anyone with that kind of hair.

Only one woman he’d ever known had had hair like that…

Nah. Couldn’t be her. Colleen had always said she’d blow this town as soon as she could. She was long gone by now, out of his life forever.

His curiosity and male awareness got the best of him, though. Would this woman have a face to match those long, perfect curls? As he pulled his hand away from Joe, he leaned sideways to get a look at her.

His heart stalled.

It was Colleen.

A jolt of stunned surprise exploded in him like a Scud missile going to ground, and the day she’d busted his heart into a million pieces flashed in his brain. Surprisingly sharp pain knifed him, as if she’d walked out on him yesterday instead of eight years ago.

I don’t love you, Aiden. I never will.

Her parting words still ripped through him like a tropical typhoon, jabbing at the rough scar she’d carved in his heart.

He mentally recoiled from that burning ache, hating the bitter reminder of the love she hadn’t returned, of how she’d walked away, leaving his dreams of a home and family in the dust.

The hellish years he’d spent photographing things most people saw only in their nightmares had honed his recovery skills to a fine point. But recovering from the shock of unexpectedly seeing the only woman he’d ever loved sitting right here, bringing all of the old pain and gagging bitterness to the surface, was damn hard.

She dropped her hand and looked the way he felt when he’d blown a whole roll of film. Tiny lines had formed between her delicate eyebrows and her plump, perfectly made-up mouth—painted in the same pink, totally hot shade she’d always worn—was pressed into a tight line.

“Colleen Stewart,” he drawled, hoping to keep the clawing pain inside him from showing. “That glad to see me?”

She slanted a gaze up at him and smiled a fake little familiar smile, the one she used when she didn’t want to talk, the one he’d seen often and always dreaded. Her intense blue eyes, which reminded him of the sky on a perfect summer day, sparked. “You have no idea.”

He lifted an eyebrow and tightened his jaw. What the hell was her problem? She’d dumped him on his butt, not the other way around.

Even though they’d only dated for two months, he’d been ready to sacrifice his dreams of being an international photojournalist to settle down and marry her, wanting the kind of traditional family he’d grown up in. But she’d blithely shredded his heart. In pain, he’d dived headfirst into another life, which had only led to more pain.

Images of suffering children exploded in his brain. Doggedly, Aiden held the horrific memories at bay, not wanting to go down that familiar, ache-filled road right now. But he would eventually. Oh, yeah, he would. For years while overseas, and even now, his nights had been reserved for that particular torture.

Eventually, his sleepless nights spent in the throes of nightmares had caught up with him and he’d begun to make tactical mistakes, putting his own life at risk. His best friend had given it to him straight—it was time to head home to a job that wasn’t going to cost him, or someone else, their life. Aiden had agreed, unable to function, and came home to something more life-affirming, something meant to eradicate the memories of the babies he couldn’t save.

Joe cleared his throat, dragging Aiden away from his awful memories. Joe looked back and forth between Aiden and Colleen. “You know each other?” He plopped his rotund body back down into his creaky leather chair.

“Oh, yeah,” Colleen muttered, pressing her mouth into a tight smile. “We go way back. Don’t we, Aiden?”

Even though he was bugged by her flip tone, he managed to smile at Joe, not wanting to come off as difficult. He needed this job. Badly. “Colleen and I went to journalism school together.” And I was stupid enough to fall in love with her.

“Ah. Well, good,” Joe said, inclining his head. “Saves the getting-to-know process.” He looked at Colleen. “Colleen, since you’re familiar with how we put these articles together, why don’t you take Aiden to your office and fill him in.” He looked back to Aiden. “And you fill her in on the plans we discussed on the phone.”

Aiden’s stomach plummeted. He jumped his gaze to Joe. “She’s the reporter?”

Joe nodded. “Yup. Is that a problem? She did a great job on ‘The Bridal Chronicles.”’

Damn. Colleen was the last person Aiden wanted to work with, the last person he’d ever wanted to see again. The bone-deep bitterness he’d felt when she’d thrown his proposal back into his face and ended their relationship reared up like a cobra and bit him hard.

There was no way he was going to stir up and relive all kinds of bad feelings—pain, betrayal, bitterness—by working with her.

Slow down, Forbes. This job was his best shot in Portland to gain some attention as a baby photographer. No, he wasn’t about to make waves and come across as difficult to Joe and he wasn’t about to let Colleen take control of his life again. He would find a way to work with her, even if it killed him.

Aiden arranged his mouth into a smile. “No, not at all.”

Joe smiled. “Good. Hey, one more thing. I have to tell you, the photos of the kids you sent in with your portfolio blew me away. Got any more?”

Aiden suppressed a shudder at the mention of the graphic black-and-white pictures of children he’d taken, unable to stop remembering their haunting poignancy. He’d only brought them out to snag this job and never intended to look at or deal with them again. “I gave them to my mom,” he said truthfully. “I have no idea what she’s done with them.” He hoped his tone conveyed how final that explanation was. Nothing could convince him to haul out those photos again.

Joe nodded. “Ah. All right.”

Aiden looked at Colleen, needing to move on to getting started. “You ready?”

Colleen widened her blue eyes, apparently surprised that he was agreeing to work with her. Hell, he was surprised he was agreeing. But this job would be worth it.

After a long pause, she tersely nodded and stood, smoothing her skirt. Aiden couldn’t help giving her a quick once-over. He had to admit she’d matured well. Her once slender college-girl’s body had blossomed into a curvy, womanly shape, displayed perfectly by the figure-hugging, knee-length navy blue skirt and jacket she wore.

He stepped back and gestured for her to pass him. “Ladies first.”

She scooted past, her eyes averted.

Her scent washed over him—fresh, tangy peaches—stirring up his senses as it always had. His male radar kicked into high gear and he watched her walk away, appreciating her long, willowy legs and the way her rounded hips moved beneath her tight skirt.

His blood began to percolate. Great. The absolute last thing he wanted was to get a renewed case of the hots for Colleen. Bad, bad idea.

But, boy, did she look good…

What the hell am I thinking?

He’d returned to Portland to reestablish ties with his large family and to get rid of the guilt and dark memories his time overseas had embedded in his brain. He hadn’t come back to get tangled up in a mess like Colleen. She might call to him on a male level he didn’t have much control over, but there was no damn way he was ever going to let her get close enough to knife him in the heart again.

Feeling marginally better, he said goodbye to Joe and left his office. Nope, Colleen didn’t have the power to affect him any longer.

After the anguish and searing heartache she’d put him through, he’d make sure of it.

“I can’t let him get to me,” Colleen said to herself, a bad habit she’d picked up during her early childhood, before foster care, when her parents were always gone and she hadn’t had anyone else to talk to.

She repeated the words over and over again as she hightailed it toward her office, desperately hoping that if she said the words she would magically be successful.

But she was a realist. She’d quit believing in magic when she was six and her mother had chosen to spend Christmas with her boyfriend in a hotel room, and her father had taken his new wife on a cruise rather than spend the day with Colleen. She’d been left alone for the day and most of the night, huddled on the couch, watching Christmas movies, tears streaming down her cheeks. She’d been forever changed on that cold, gray day.

Her innocent love and faith in her parents, along with her little girl’s belief in magic, had died a quick, inevitable death, only to die all over again when they abandoned her to the foster-care system when she was nine. One thought had cemented itself in her brain then, and had a profound influence on the rest of her life. There was something missing inside her, some flaw that kept her from being able to love and nurture a relationship, even with the two people who were supposed to love her no matter what—her mom and dad.

No, there was no use hoping for a magical solution. She was going to have to deal with Aiden—which meant getting rid of him. He was going to step into her office and she would be sucked back into his appeal. Oh, how she remembered his heart-stopping green eyes, keen sense of humor and wide, generous smile.

And how cherished she’d felt when she was wrapped in his arms.

She jerked her thoughts away from useless memories. Feeling warm, she pulled off her jacket and flung it on a pile of overfilled file folders in the corner, then gave in to her wobbly knees and sat down behind her paper-strewn desk.

Aware that he would arrive any second, she pressed a shaking hand to her chest to calm her jumpy heart, took a deep, cleansing breath and closed her eyes for a moment, summoning up her trustworthy control. She could get through this if she remained calm, cool and unaffected.

She sat up straight a mere second before Aiden stepped into her cube, instantly filling the drab, messy little space with his large, vibrant self. She forced herself to look directly at him instead of fooling with the voluminous stacks of papers on her desk as she was inclined to do.

He simply stood in the doorway with his hands in his pockets. His shadowed eyes reflected a shrewd perceptiveness that sent a weird, hot, shivery chill down her spine.

Of course, he looked too darn good. He always had. It wasn’t surprising that he was still absolutely gorgeous, the epitome, in fact, of her concept of the ideal male. Physically, at least. There was no such thing as an emotionally ideal male for someone like her.

His tall, once-rangy body had filled out very, very nicely since the last time she’d seen him. His shoulders seemed broader, his arms thicker. An impossibly wide chest, perfectly displayed by the short-sleeved, forest-green knit shirt he wore, looked firmer and more muscled, and tapered down into a taut waist and legs that were long and solid-looking beneath his khaki trousers.

His mahogany-shaded hair was shorter than she remembered, and he’d gelled the longer hair on top into a funky, spiky texture that somehow complemented his chiseled, masculine features and lightly tanned face.

But it was his sea-green eyes that, true to her memories, got to her the most. He looked at her, pinning her in place, and she was unable to move a muscle or form a coherent thought. Yes, those incredible eyes had always been able to see into her soul.

Why can’t you love me, Colly?

His old question echoed in her head, reminding her of the wall he’d tried to tear down inside her, the love he’d seemed determined to wring from her barren heart.

The love she didn’t know how to return.

Her shaky control almost splintered, but she gathered her composure around her like an old lady’s tattered shawl, determined to act normal and calm around him even if she dropped dead from the effort, which at the moment seemed highly likely. She folded her damp hands on the top of her desk, noticing how hollow his cheeks seemed.

He spoke first. “So I guess you’re not too happy to see me,” he said, his voice harsh and low.

She frowned, surprised by his cold tone. Mercy, was he still mad about their breakup? “Are you still upset about…what happened?”

He pressed his mouth into a harsh line. “Of course not.”

She wasn’t going to argue with him, but his tone and expression suggested he wasn’t being truthful. Even so, it wouldn’t hurt to apologize. She’d always felt guilty for breaking up with him, even though it was the only option open to her. “Good. But for the record, I’m sorry for what I did…walking out on you.”

He snorted. “Yeah, right.”

She pulled in her chin. “You don’t think I’m sorry?” Figured. They had never been on the same wavelength emotionally.

“What I think about what happened eight years ago doesn’t matter.” He pierced her with those intense, emerald eyes. “You just look damn unhappy to see me.”

He always was too perceptive. “Why would you say that?” she asked, cursing the hitch in her voice.

“Oh, come on.” He stepped closer. “You look like you have a stick up your…uh, well, you just look pretty unhappy.”

“I’m not particularly happy or unhappy to see you,” she said, lying. At this moment, she would have been happier to see Jack the Ripper, who would spare her and just kill her. But Aiden, well, Aiden had the ability to make her bleed inside, just as her parents had, and that terrified her.

He snorted under his breath and rolled his eyes. “Still the same old Colleen.”

She bristled, but then reminded herself whom she was dealing with here. This was Aiden, for goodness’ sake. He’d always had the amazing, frightening ability to turn her inside out. She would go to her grave before she’d let that happen again.

A slow, hot burn started in her chest. Thankfully, anger was the one emotion she could handle right now. Embracing her anger, she deliberately stood, placing her hands on her desk. She stared him down. “How dare you sashay in here after eight years and take up where you left off, badgering me. You don’t have a clue about me.”

He didn’t flinch from her caustic tone. Instead, he looked at her for a long, significant moment, and then leaned in so that only inches separated their faces. His pine-clean scent hit her like a Mack truck and his nearness sent hot tingles of awareness shooting through her body. And darn if her hair didn’t almost catch fire.

He drilled her with sharp, assessing eyes. “I know you well enough to tell when you’re royally pissed off. You never were very good at hiding that, were you?”

Her cheeks warmed even more and she jerked away, needing to breathe in air that wasn’t tainted by the big man in front of her. She took a deep, shaky breath and fought the urge to check her hair.

Mercy, she didn’t want to deal with Aiden and his unwanted emotional analysis, she never had. The day he’d asked her to marry him and she’d had to walk away, her flaw oozing like acid inside her, she’d realized that she was so emotionally incomplete she’d never have a normal life with a family of her own and a man who loved her.

Over the years, she’d learned to deal with that harsh reality, but here Aiden was, picking her apart, dredging up memories that were best forgotten, pain that she didn’t want to go through again.

She tore her gaze from his and sat down, swallowing a huge, burning lump that had grown in her throat. “Look, none of this is relevant,” she said, her voice quivering. “Let’s just talk about ‘The Baby Chronicles,’ okay?” She tried to smile to cover up the turmoil inside her, but all that she could manage was a half grin that made her eyes twitch.

He searched her face, then his expression softened ever so slightly. “Hey, I didn’t mean to upset you.” He rubbed his neck and cast a quick glance at the ceiling. “I was just a little ticked off that you couldn’t even manage to give me a cordial greeting.”

Now she felt like a total louse. She had given him a pretty shabby reception. She met his gaze and gave him a genuine smile. “I’m glad you’re okay,” she said, unwilling to say she was glad to see him when she really wasn’t. “You just…threw me off guard. I was upset about having to take on this assignment, and your showing up when you did was just a bit too much to deal with all at once.”

“Hey, I’m not that happy about the situation, either.” He frowned and his mouth thinned. “Are you upset about having to take this assignment because you have to work with me?”

Of course. “I didn’t know I’d be working with you until you walked in,” she said, uncomfortable with sharing the truth about needing to put a wall between herself and things like cute babies and…him.

“Then what’s the problem? From what I’ve been told, the last two features, on—what were they—?” He dropped into the rickety metal and plastic chair jammed in the corner of her cube. “Brides and bachelors?”

She nodded.

“Apparently those features were hugely popular and increased readership for the Beacon. I would think you’d want the byline.”

“Yeah, well, you’d be wrong,” she muttered, gathering up the usual assortment of paper clips and pens that lay scattered across her desk.

As she sorted the paper clips and shoved the pens into her desk drawer he said nothing, just sat and stared, and she could almost hear the gears turning inside his head while he tried to figure her out.

Boy, did she wish she’d kept her mouth shut about not wanting this assignment. Aiden would undoubtedly pick her motivation apart the way he always had, in hopes of making everything “all better.” And that was impossible. She couldn’t be fixed—her flaw ran too deep and too wide—and she couldn’t bear the sadness that would overcome her when she was reminded of that over and over again.

And was reminded of how she’d had to walk away from someone as special as Aiden.

He leaned forward, his eyes reflecting a resigned unhappiness that tugged on her heart in a way that always filled her with a dull sense of despair.

He broke the nerve-racking silence and said, “Look, Colleen, obviously you’re upset about something, but I’m not going to waste my time trying to get you to tell me about it.” He shook his head. “I know from experience that that would be a waste of time. So we’ll skip the small talk and get down to business. All I want is to take pictures of babies. Okay?”

No, it wasn’t okay. Being near him again, the possibility that he might be able to get under her skin again, absolutely terrified her. “Why do you want this job in the first place?” she asked, hoping to come up with something to get out of working with him.

He sat back, his eyes suddenly shuttered, and crossed his arms over his broad chest. “I’m a photographer. I want to take pictures of babies.”

“And?”

“And what?” He looked away. When he looked back, a dark shadow lingered in the depths of his green eyes. “That’s it.”