Rogue's Reform. Marilyn Pappano

planned to bring the playpen she’d bought at the same garage sale so the baby would be able to nap there, undisturbed by the activity in the store.

      Sometimes on her days off, Ginger joined her, and some days Shay Rafferty brought two daily specials from her café down the street to share. Though she enjoyed their company with all the saved-up pleasure of a woman who’d long been denied the companionship of other women, today she hoped no one dropped in, not even customers. Today she already had company, she thought, as she took her lunch out of the fridge and put it in the microwave to heat up.

      But she wasn’t sure if she wanted to keep Ethan to herself a bit longer, or if she was afraid that seeing him would make everyone remember his last visit home and put two and two together, or if she was…

      Stubbornly setting her jaw, she forced the word out. Ashamed. Just a little. He had such a reputation, and she didn’t want it tarnishing her baby before it was even born. Grace didn’t want people to look at her child and say, Oh, that’s Ethan James’s kid. She won’t amount to anything, that’s for sure. Grace didn’t want people shaking their heads when they saw her and repeating some version of what she’d heard plenty of times about Ethan’s mother. Poor Nadine. All she wanted was a father for her son, and all she got was a no-good husband who ran out on her and stuck her with his no-good brat.

      She’d gotten enough poor Graces in her life, thanks to her father. She didn’t want Ethan to supply her with more.

      The microwave dinged, demanding her attention. She removed the bowl of stew, spooned a portion into a large coffee mug for her lunch guest, then carried both to the table. There was also corn bread, reheated in a damp paper towel, steaming now as butter melted over it, and a half dozen of her favorite cookies for dessert. She believed in eating hearty these days, she thought with a suppressed smile as she realized how easily her lunch for one could feed two.

      Of course, she was eating for two and carrying more than enough weight for two.

      “So…what are your plans?” Ethan asked as she sat down across from him. The table was so small that her knees bumped his as she settled in. She swore she felt a tingle. He didn’t even seem to notice.

      “Plans for what?”

      “Living. Working. Making ends meet.” He pointed toward her midsection with a spoon. “After the baby’s born.”

      “I plan to continue doing what I’m doing now. There won’t be many changes.”

      “A baby changes everything,” he said, as if he knew from experience. Maybe he did. Maybe there were little blond-haired, blue-eyed kids with James blood flowing in their veins all over the country. Maybe that was a part of the trouble he was so famous for leaving in his wake.

      If that were the case, then he’d be accustomed to notifications of impending fatherhood, wouldn’t he? But when he’d come in yesterday morning, that definitely wasn’t the impression she’d gotten.

      “I can’t afford to let it change everything,” she said as she seasoned her stew. “I’ll still work six days a week. I’ll still live on a budget. I’ll still take care of myself. The only difference is I’ll be taking care of her, too.”

      “What about a baby-sitter?”

      “I can’t afford one. I’ll bring her to work with me. I’ve got a playpen that’ll fit in that corner. When she’s sleepy, she’ll stay in it. The rest of the time, she’ll be out there with me. It’ll be fine—no different from now, except I’ll have someone to keep me company when it’s slow.”

      “And, of course, when it’s not slow, she’ll patiently wait while you take care of customers, order supplies, do the books, straighten the shelves.” He sounded skeptical. “You haven’t spent much time around babies, have you?”

      She was embarrassed to admit that the answer was no. The closest she’d ever been to an infant was passing one with its mother in the aisles of the local grocery store. She’d never held one, never fed one, never changed a bottle, but she could learn. There were how-to books covering every subject under the sun, and Callie, the midwife, would teach her enough to get her started. The rest would come naturally. She had maternal instincts, didn’t she? Wouldn’t she give her life to protect this baby? Wasn’t she ready to devote the next twenty years to loving and caring for her?

      “And just how much do you know about babies?” she asked crossly. And had any of those babies he’d learned from been his?

      “I know that they cry and require a lot of attention. I know they disrupt everything around them when they’re not happy.” He scowled. “I know that raising one alone in a hardware store isn’t a great idea.”

      “But I am alone,” she pointed out quietly, “and I work in a hardware store, and I can’t change that.”

      “You could get married and give her a father.”

      Her spoon trembled and a chunk of potato slid back into the bowl, splashing broth. She darted a glance at him, but he was staring into his own bowl as if he could stir up a whirlpool that might suck him in and spit him out again someplace far away.

      Did he think she hadn’t thought about marriage at any time in the last seven months—heavens, in the last thirteen years? Ever since her mother had left her to bear her father’s oppression alone, marriage had been her fondest dream, as much for the escape it represented as for the love it promised. After that hot summer night, she’d spun unbearably romantic tales of Ethan: Unable to forget the most incredible one-night stand he’d ever experienced, he tracked her down against impossible odds like Prince Charming searching for his Cinderella. Once her pregnancy had become common knowledge, she’d fantasized a time or two about Reese Barnett discovering a distinctly unbrotherly side to his feelings for her, falling in love with both her and her baby and claiming them for his own. It could happen. It had happened in Ethan’s own family, with Guthrie and Elly and Emma Miles.

      But it wasn’t likely to happen again in his family. Ethan was the only man who’d ever given her a second look, and it wasn’t as if he were volunteering—

      Was he?

      She sneaked another glance at him. No, of course he wasn’t. Of all the single men in the state of Oklahoma, Ethan James was probably the least likely to transform into marriage material. He was a drifter, unable to stay in one place long enough to even think about putting down roots. He lived by his wits and did things as a matter of routine that were illegal, unthinkable and unforgivable. He used people until he got what he wanted, and then he disappeared from their lives. He may have had enough conscience to bring him back to Heartbreak, but it was a sure bet he didn’t have enough to make him stay. It certainly wasn’t enough to turn him into a husband or a devoted daddy.

      And a devoted father was the only kind she would accept in her baby’s life.

      “Well?” he prompted when the silence went on too long.

      His insistence on a response roused her temper. He wasn’t stupid. He knew she’d been a virgin until that night with him, knew that no man before him had ever paid her any notice. He’d made it clear that even he wouldn’t have gone near the real her. It was Melissa he’d wanted, Melissa he’d spent the night with. To his great disappointment, it was Grace he’d gotten pregnant, Grace he was now stuck with.

      Grace he would like to see married to someone else so he wouldn’t feel burdened.

      “Oh, I turn down two or three proposals every week,” she said, shooting for an airy lack of concern. “There’s just no end to the number of men who want to marry me and raise my illegitimate child as their own, but I’m holding out for that one truly special man to come along. Until he does, my child and I will do fine on our own.”

      “Too bad you didn’t hold out for Mr. Perfect last summer,” he said snidely. “Then we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

      “True,” she agreed. “But when your options are limited, you have to be satisfied with what you can get.”