“Whatcha doing?” Parker asked interestedly. His pajama bottoms sagging, he had one foot propped on the other in the doorway.
“We were…” Rafe took a rapid breath. He turned eyes glazed with horror on Zoe, but only for a second. In the next second, his hands were groping for her shirt. “I was…Snookums had a small hurt. I was fixing it.”
“Daddy did that for Mommy all the time.”
“Did he?”
Parker nodded. “He kissed her to make it better. Mommy did that for us, too. Except that most of the time she kissed our hurts on the kitchen counter. Daddy always took Mommy into the bedroom on Sunday mornings while we were supposed to be-”
“I get the picture,” Rafe said rapidly. He shot Zoe another look, an interesting blend of murderous frustration and mild amusement. She was too busy climbing back to the real world to ponder it. He was having problems closing the blouse over her breasts, mostly because his hands were distinctly unsteady. Finally, he appeared satisfied and straightened up.
He pushed a hand through his hair and stared for several seconds as if the child were a Martian. “Did you want something?”
The urchin nodded. “I’m thirsty.”
“Thirsty.” Rafe repeated the word as if he’d never heard it before. “Thirsty?”
“I’m milk thirsty. Not water thirsty. Otherwise-”
“You could have gotten it yourself.” Rafe muttered a fierce “Do not move, Zoe. Do not think, do not breathe, do not do anything,” and lurched to his feet.
Thoughts began to reel through her head the instant he and Parker were out of sight. Shakily, she got to her feet and pulled her blouse closed, buttoning fast. From the kitchen, she could hear the two talking, the refrigerator door closing, a glass being set on a counter.
It wasn’t long before the light flicked off in the kitchen and Rafe headed for the stairs with the little boy in his arms. Parker’s head was already lying on Rafe’s shoulder, and his eyelids were drooping.
Minutes later, Rafe came back downstairs. Waiting for him at the bottom of the steps, Zoe had her hands on her hips. His gaze seared on hers when he saw her expression. “You didn’t do a very good job of staying put,” he said softly.
“We both knew that either of them could have woken up at any time. And we were right there in plain sight on the living room carpet.”
“Yes,” he murmured. “And the wonder of it is that you forgot about the kids for a few minutes.”
“Rafe-”
“Yes, I heard you. We were way out of line.” He took the last step down, blocking her path to the stairway. Gently, he brushed her hot cheeks with his knuckles. “We’ll have to be more careful about choosing a time and place.”
“No,” she said simply.
He didn’t pretend any confusion about what she was saying no to. “It will happen again,” he said quietly. “I think you know that.”
She shook her head and stared at the blur just beyond his shoulder. To look in his eyes was to see things she didn’t want to see. To be touched by him was to feel things she shouldn’t feel. She took a breath. “If this happens again, I’ll leave. They’re better off with you anyway, Rafe; surely you can already see that?”
All he could see was that she ran scared whenever kids came into the picture. Time. He desperately needed time with her. “You can’t leave,” he said swiftly.
“I can.”
“But you wouldn’t, Zoe,” he said softly. “You wouldn’t leave the children stranded with me unless you were absolutely sure they’d be happy here. You agreed to give it three weeks in my place and another three at yours. I intend to hold you to that. At the end of that time, we’ll agree about where they’re better off, but you’ve got to give-” He almost said “the two of us,” and immediately corrected that. “You’ve got to give them that much time.”
She searched his eyes a long time before she said quietly, “You’re right. I won’t leave you stranded,” and sighed. “Rafe, we’ve both been thrown into this situation against our will, so maybe it’s natural for us to need each other, to turn to each other. And maybe we got temporarily carried away, but we’re not going to be together permanently. One of us is going to have the kids. The other one isn’t. And to start something-”
Rafe’s palms framed her face, forcing her to meet his eyes. “Nothing’s going to happen that you don’t want. No one’s going to push you into anything you can’t handle. Believe me?”
“No.”
Humor glinted in his blue eyes. For two cents, he’d kiss that stubborn chin until it melted. “Maybe you can believe something that’s far more important, then,” he whispered. “A man scraped your emotions pretty raw because he wanted a mother for his kids. You can be damned sure that what I feel for you has nothing to do with children. Any children.”
“That isn’t the point.”
“Yes, it is. I want you for you, Zoe. And what the two of us feel for each other is the only thing that matters.”
There was just no talking to him. Zoe shot him a look, and then ducked under his arm and hurried up the stairs. Inside his bedroom, she leaned back against the closed door, feeling her breath come quick and uneasy in the darkness.
Rafe was clearly an irrational man. Any sane human being would see that a relationship was impossible because of the kids. It was sheer selfishness for them to think of each other when they had to do what was right for the children.
Eventually, she moved away from the door and burrowed under the bed covers. And eventually, it occurred to her that, like a total idiot, she was lying there fully dressed. She pushed herself back up, rid herself of her clothes and tugged on a nightgown. Between soft sheets and the warm weight of a comforter again, she discovered her hands were annoyingly cold and trembly.
It seemed she was capable of being as irrational as Rafe. When he touched her, she felt as if she’d found something she’d thought irretrievably lost, the quality of feeling whole and good about herself and free and just…a woman. She wanted that feeling. She so badly wanted the man. In his arms, she’d never once thought of the kids.
Two people naturally turned to each other when they were thrown together in an emotional situation. That was all that was going on. She knew better than to involve herself in a relationship with a man who needed her only to care for children. She would never be sure she was loved for herself. And as far as the kids went, everything that had happened since they’d arrived had shown her she had no ideal-mother potential whatsoever.
She had to think of the twins. In her heart, she knew they would be better off with Rafe. Kids don’t matter to me, Zoe. They’ve never mattered to me. Yes, she’d heard that, but she also saw how he was with them. His job, his house, his whole life would be affected when he took the children; naturally, he felt unsure about his ability to handle it. He needed time. He was such terrific father material. He just didn’t know it yet.
Punching the pillow, Zoe settled down and determinedly closed her eyes. She’d stay because she had to stay. She’d stay until he saw how precious the twins were, and with time she had no doubt that would happen. The only thing that couldn’t happen was her falling in love with him.
Except that in the darkness, in the silence, she was terribly afraid that it had already happened.
Chapter Six
The next night, as soon she came downstairs after putting the boys to bed, Rafe was waiting for her at the bottom of the stairs with two pool cues in his hand. The balls had been racked, the game ready to play. They played, Zoe’s nerves hammering, but he never said a word about stakes or total dominion, nor did he protest when she announced that three games were enough and she was going to bed.