One Mother Wanted. Jeanne Allan

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СКАЧАТЬ stop him from doing what he thought was right. Zane Peters prided himself on doing what he thought was right.

      He wrested the flowers from his daughter’s grasp and awkwardly wiped a tear from her cheek. “We can buy yellow flowers. You like yellow flowers.” Desperation edged his voice.

      Red curls bounced as the little girl shook her head. “Don’t want yellow flowers. Want these.”

      Without stopping to think, Allie leaned over and jerked the bouquet from Zane. Turning her back to him, she offered the flowers to the little girl. “Here. You caught them.”

      The little girl put her hands behind her back. “Daddy said I can’t have ’em.”

      Allie wanted nothing to do with Zane’s daughter, but the girl had caught the bouquet and should be allowed to keep it. Allie knelt on the floor. “Your daddy is a man, and men know nothing about weddings. Whoever catches the bouquet keeps it. It’s a rule, and I know your daddy doesn’t believe in breaking rules.” Allie coated the last sentence with deliberate mockery.

      The little girl looked at the floor and shook her head. Her hands stayed behind her. “Daddy said flowers for a big lady.”

      “I’m a big lady. May I have the flowers?”

      The little girl hesitated, then nodded sadly.

      “All right, if they are my flowers, I may give them to someone else, and I’m giving them to you.” Allie held out the bouquet, proving she could act with dignity and fairness, no matter the circumstances.

      The little girl started to bring her hands forward, stopped and looked past Allie in her father’s direction. Then, smiling shyly, she accepted the bouquet and buried her face in a large lily. “Pretty.” She held the bouquet to Allie’s face. “Smell.”

      Hoping compliance would make the child and her father go away, Allie sniffed.

      “What do you say, Hannah?” Zane prompted.

      “Thank you.”

      Hannah. Unbelievable pain slashed through Allie. The child had been named after his grandmother. They’d planned to name their first daughter Hannah. This little girl could be, should be, Allie’s daughter. Allie’s throat ached with the effort not to cry, then hot, burning anger replaced the pain. He’d taken “their name” and used it for that woman’s daughter. Not that it mattered anymore. He didn’t matter anymore.

      “Allie, aren’t you ready yet?”

      Davy’s impatient voice rescued her. She smiled gratefully at him. “Ready and raring to go.”

      The child’s hand tugging on her arm kept Allie from rising. “You his mommy?”

      Allie shook her head as Davy pointed to Cheyenne and said proudly, “She’s my mom now. That makes Allie my aunt.”

      “Whose mommy?” Zane’s daughter asked.

      “I don’t have any children,” Allie said stiffly.

      “How come? They playing with angels?”

      “Let’s go, Hannah,” Zane said in a rough voice.

      “But Daddy, maybe her kids know Mommy.”

      Zane snatched up his daughter and walked away.

      A hand gripped Allie’s shoulder. “You okay?” Worth asked.

      “Why does everyone keep asking me that?”

      “Davy said you looked funny.”

      “Davy thinks I look funny every time he sees me in a dress,” Allie said to her brother, trying to make a joke of it. “He says I look like a girl.” She mimicked the disgusted tone of Davy’s voice. “He wants me in jeans because I promised him we’d ride horses after the wedding. Where’d Davy go? He was in such a hurry to leave.”

      “Last minute hugs and kisses from the bride and groom.”

      Loud voices caught Allie’s attention. “They must be leav...” Her voice died as she spotted the cause of the commotion.

      Zane’s daughter was throwing a grade-A tantrum in her father’s arms. Hanging on to her bouquet with one hand, she used her other hand to cling to one of the stylized metal Art Nouveau pillars. Zane’s face turned the shade of cooked beets as onlookers tittered with laughter. The child drummed his side with her feet. “I want down,” she howled.

      Setting his daughter on the floor, Zane grabbed in vain for her hand as she darted across the ballroom. The little girl skidded to a stop in front of Allie, still kneeling on the floor. Throwing her arms around Allie’s neck, Zane’s daughter pressed an enthusiastic kiss on Allie’s cheek. “Bye.” The little girl spun around and dashed back to her father, her childish voice floating across the ballroom. “I had to tell Allie bye.”

      

      The rest of his life without Allie. How long must he pay? Hadn’t he been punished enough? Zane had had five long years to think about the answers to those questions. No punishment, no matter how severe or how long, could wipe out what he’d done. Allie’s face when he’d told her would forever haunt him.

      He’d thought he’d reconciled himself to the devastation he’d wrought. Accepted that Allie would never be part of his life. The minute he saw her at Cheyenne’s wedding, he knew he’d been deluding himself.

      The crazy idea came to him on the way home from the wedding. There must have been too much sugar in the wedding cake. Or else the smell of those damned flowers had rotted his brain.

      For about the hundredth time, Zane picked up the telephone. And put it back down. If he drank, he’d pour himself a huge glass of courage. Except he no longer drank alcohol, and no one knew better than he that drinking made a man stupid, not brave.

      At the wedding reception, Allie had avoided looking at him. Not that he was any great shakes to look at. An ordinary guy with black hair and a square jaw. Allie had never seemed to mind the ridiculous dent in his chin.

      Smart about everything else, Allie had been stupid when it came to him. Stupid enough to love him. She wouldn’t be stupid enough to fall for his pitiful scheme. She wouldn’t believe it for a second. She wouldn’t do it.

      He’d searched long and diligently for the right horse.

      Zane rubbed one thumb over the other and eyed the phone. Think about the filly. Damn it, even if he’d royally screwed up his life, the filly deserved help. He’d call.

      Allie would hang up on him.

      Angrily he pushed the phone aside and rose. Allie roamed through his mind the way she used to roam around his family’s ranch. At the uncurtained window, he stared into the black night. Nights were the worst. Thinking about Allie. Remembering. Little things. Like the way she stuck her tongue out of the corner of her mouth when she concentrated. He used to tease her that one day she’d be on a horse, concentrating, and the horse would buck and she’d bite off the end of her tongue.

      His body tensed with need. He wanted to nibble that tongue. Gently. Lovingly.

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