Kings of California: Bargaining for King's Baby. Maureen Child

at the waist before slipping out of the bedroom. She couldn’t seem to fall asleep no matter how long she lay there in the darkness. So why not get up, make some tea and have a few of Esperanza’s cookies?

      At the doorway, she looked back at her husband and her heart turned over as she studied him in the dim light. Even in sleep, Adam managed to look powerful, aloof. As if his emotions were closed up so tightly they couldn’t even find the surface when he wasn’t actively guarding them. Apparently she would have to do battle with his subconscious, as well.

      She sighed a little, shut the door quietly behind her and wandered down the hall toward the stairs. The house was quiet, tucked up for the night, resting after a long day. Gina only wished she could rest, too. But her mind was just too busy. She couldn’t stop thinking about Adam, their argument earlier and the way he’d watched her from afar as she settled the Gypsies into their new home.

      Why had she thought she’d be able to reach him easily when he’d spent the last five years sealing himself off from the entire world? What if he didn’t want to be reached? Would she be able to outlast him? Would he guess there was something going on when she didn’t get pregnant right away? A headache burst into life behind her eyes and she blew out a breath as she headed downstairs.

      There were no lights on, but moonlight shone through the skylights, illuminating the dark staircase in a pale silver glow. Her bare feet made no sound on the carpet runner and as she walked downstairs, she looked at the framed photographs lining the wall.

      Pictures of the King brothers from infancy to adulthood stared back at her. There was a smiling Jackson, boasting a black eye, standing between his older brothers, each of them with an arm draped over his shoulders. There was Travis, holding the trophy the high school football team had won when he was the quarterback. There was even a twenty-year-old photo taken at a Fourth of July picnic. The King brothers were there, but so were Gina and her brothers. Adam was the tallest and he was standing right behind a ten-year-old Gina. As if even then, she’d been arranging things so she could be close to him. Had he noticed? Smiling to herself, her gaze continued over the faces frozen in time and as she looked, she noticed that there weren’t any pictures of Monica, Adam’s late wife. Or even of his lost son, Jeremy.

      That made her frown thoughtfully for a minute and think about the other photographs she’d noticed throughout the house. Now that she was considering it, she realized there weren’t any pictures of the family Adam had lost five years ago. Strange. Why would he not want to see them? Remember them?

      Then she pushed those thoughts aside and went back to studying the framed photographs on the wall. She blurred her vision to all but the shots of Adam.

      Gina studied them, one at a time, remembering some, wondering about others. There was Adam as a kid, with torn blue jeans and a baseball cap shading his eyes. Adam as captain of the high school baseball team. Adam at his prom. Adam with a blue ribbon won at a local rodeo. Adam smiling. God, he should do that more often, she thought.

      Reaching out, Gina touched her fingertips to that captured smile and wished she could reach the man as easily. He was so close to her now, yet he felt even further away from her than ever.

      A chill swept along her spine and she hunched deeper into the soft folds of the green cashmere robe. But this chill came from her heart, not the temperature of the room, so nothing she did helped with it. She took the last of the stairs and stopped in the foyer.

      In the silence, she looked down the long hall toward the kitchen and Esperanza’s cookies—-then to the front door and the night beyond. She made up her mind quickly and opened the door to step outside.

      The night air was cold and damp and still. Not a breath of wind moved. Overhead, the sky was clear and spatter-shot with bright stars. The moon was half-full and the light that shone down was bright enough to cast shadows across the ground.

      Gina stepped onto the dirt driveway and walked quietly across the yard toward the corral where the Gypsies slept. Tomorrow, they’d be assigned stalls in the barn, but for tonight, they were here, getting used to their new home.

      She leaned her forearms on the topmost rail and whispered, “I hope you guys catch on faster than I am.”

      One of the mares whickered softly and moved to her. Gina reached out, stroked the horse’s nose with a gentle touch and smiled when the animal moved in closer for more. “Hi, Rosie. Did you miss me?” The horse shifted from foot to foot, the long, delicate feathers about its hooves waving lightly. Gina looked from Rosie to the other horses beyond and then back to the mare that had been her very first Gypsy.

      “Feeling a little out of your element?” she asked, fingers stroking through the mare’s silky mane. “Yeah, I know just how you feel. But we’ll get used to it here. You know, Adam’s not a bad guy at all. He just acts crabby.”

      “I am crabby.”

      His voice came directly behind her and Gina jolted so hard, the mare skipped away, dancing back from the fence to join the rest of the horses on the far side of the corral. Gina caught her breath and turned around to face him.

      “You could have said something instead of sneaking up on me and giving me a heart attack!” Her hand slapped to her chest and she felt her heartbeat thundering hard and fast. “Jeez, Adam.”

      “What the hell are you doing out here in the middle of the night?”

      Gina fought back the last of the adrenaline pumping through her and took her first good look at him. His naked chest gleamed gold in the soft light. His hair was rumpled from sleep and his jaw carried the shadow of a dark beard. Barefoot, he wore a pair of threadbare jeans that he’d apparently dragged on in a hurry. The top couple of buttons were undone and her gaze tracked the narrow line of dark hair that disappeared beneath the denim fabric.

      He looked way too good.

      Shaking her head, though, Gina asked, “Is this another rule, Adam? Do I have to ask permission to come outside, too?”

      “That’s not what I meant.”

      “Then what?”

      He came closer and the scent of him, soap and male, drifted to her and seemed to coil in the pit of her stomach. She took a breath, hoping to steady herself, but all she succeeded in doing was dragging more of that scent deeper inside.

      “I woke up and you were gone.” He said it with a shrug.

      A small note of hope lifted inside her. “You were worried about me?”

      He glanced at her, then shifted his gaze to the animals wandering the corral enclosure. “I wouldn’t go that far,” he said. “I…wondered about you.”

      That was a start, Gina thought.

      “You were sleeping and I couldn’t,” she said, turning to lean on the railing again and watch the horses moving through moonlight. “I was going to go for some of Esperanza’s cookies, then I decided to come out and check on the Gypsies.”

      He shook his head and took up a spot beside her at the fence. Amusement colored his voice when he said, “What is it about these horses that’s so damn special?”

      She shot him a quick look, smiled and said, “Everything.”

      “Care to vague that up for me?”

      “Wow. A joke?” She laid one hand on his forearm and when he didn’t flinch and pull away, Gina considered it a win. “This is a real moment for me, Adam.”

      “Very funny.” He turned to look down at her. “But that doesn’t tell me why you’re so nuts about these horses.”

      “They’re gentle. And smart. And so good with kids, its nearly eerie.” She blew out a breath and watched as one of the foals jolted into a one-horse race around the corral. Smiling as she watched the spindly legged baby run, she said, “They’ve been bred for centuries to become part of a family. They’re strong and loyal. I admire that.”

      “Me, too,” he said and when she looked at him, she noticed