She sucked in a breath of air. Of course, from the beginning, she had known that Simon was Nathan’s father. Sherry wouldn’t have lied about something like that. But Tula could understand that Simon, a demon for rules and order and logic, would have to wait to be convinced.
“And?” she prompted.
“He’s my son.” Three words, spoken with a sort of dazed wonder that sent a flutter of something warm racing along her spine.
He reached into the crib and cupped one side of Nathan’s face in the palm of his hand. The baby smiled up at him and Simon’s eyes went soft, molten with emotions too deep to speak. Tula watched it all and felt her own heart melt as a man recognized his son for the very first time.
Seconds ticked past and still it was as if the world had taken a breath and held it. As if the planet had stopped spinning and the population of the earth had been reduced to just the three of them.
This small moment was somehow so intense, so important, that the longer it went on the more Tula felt like an outsider. An intruder on a private scene. That thought hurt far more than she would have thought it could.
For weeks now, she alone had been the baby’s entire universe. When she was forced to share Nathan with Simon, she was still the central figure because Nathan’s father was, if nothing else, a stubborn man. Determined to hold himself emotionally apart even while making room in his life for the boy. Now she saw that Simon had accepted the truth. He knew Nathan was his and he would be determined to have his son for himself.
As it should be, Tula reminded herself, despite the pain ratcheting up in the center of her chest. This was what Sherry had wanted—that Nathan would know his father. That Simon and his son would make a family.
A family, she told herself sadly, of two.
With that thought echoing over and over through her mind, Tula stepped back from the crib, intending to leave the two of them alone. But Simon reached out and grabbed her arm, pulling her to a stop.
“Don’t go.”
She looked up at him. The room was dark but for the night-light that projected constellations of stars onto the ceiling. In the dim glow of those stars, she watched his eyes and shook her head. “Simon, you should have a minute alone with Nathan. It’s okay.”
“Stay, Tula.” His voice was low, hardly more than a dark rumble of sound.
“Simon…”
He pulled her closer until he could wrap one arm around her shoulders. Then he turned her toward the crib and they both looked down at the boy who had fallen asleep. There would be no story tonight. Nathan’s tiny features were perfect, the picture of innocence. His small hands were flung up over his head, his fingers curling and relaxing as if in his dreams he was playing catch with the angels.
“He’s beautiful,” Simon whispered.
Tula’s throat tightened even further. It was a miracle, she thought, that she could even breathe past the hard knot of emotion clogging her throat. “Yes, he is.”
“I knew he was mine, right from the first,” he admitted. “But I had to be sure.”
“I know.”
He turned his head to look down at her. Emotions charged his eyes with sparks that dazzled her. “I want my son, Tula.”
“Of course you do.” Her heart cracked a little further. He would have Nathan and she would have…Lonely Bunny.
“I want you, too,” he admitted.
“What?” Jolted out of her private misery, she could only stare up into brown eyes that shimmered with banked heat. This she hadn’t seen coming. She hadn’t expected. Something inside her woke up and shivered. Was he saying…
“Now,” he said, drawing her from the room into the hall, leaving the sleeping infant laying beneath his night-light of floating stars.
“Simon—”
“I want you now, Tula,” he repeated, drawing her close, framing her face with his hands.
Ah, she thought. He wanted Nathan forever. He wanted her now. That was the difference. She chided herself silently for even considering that he might have meant something different. A twist of regret grabbed at her but she relentlessly pushed it aside.
She’d been in his home for nearly a week. She knew Simon Bradley was a cool, calm man who didn’t make decisions lightly. He liked to think he responded to his gut instincts, but the truth was, he looked at a situation from every angle before making a decision.
He wasn’t the kind of man who would take some sexual heat and a shared love for a child and build it into some crazy happily-ever-after scenario. That was all in her mind.
And her heart.
She should have known better. How silly, she told herself, staring up into his eyes. How foolish she’d been to allow herself to care for him. To idly spin daydreams that had never had a chance to come true.
The three of them weren’t a family. They were a temporary unit. Until Simon and Nathan had found their way together. Then good old “Aunt Tula” would go home and maybe come to the city once in a while for a visit.
As Nathan got older, he would no doubt resent time spent with her as simply time lost with his friends. He would be awkward with her, she thought, her heart breaking at the realization. Kind to a distant relative when his father forced him to be polite.
The little boy she loved so much wouldn’t remember her love or the comfort he had derived from it. How she had sung to him at night and played peekaboo in the mornings. He wouldn’t know that she would have done any thing for him. Wouldn’t recall that they had once been as close as mother and son.
He would have no memories of these days and nights, but they would haunt her forever.
She would be alone again. But this time, it would be so much worse. Because this time, she would know exactly what she was missing.
“Tula,” Simon whispered, drawing her back from thoughts that were threatening to drown her in misery. He tipped her face up until their gazes were locked, his searching, hers glittering with a sheen of tears she refused to shed for the death of a dream that should never have been born.
So very foolish, she thought now, looking up at Simon Bradley. Until this very moment, Tula hadn’t had any idea that she was more than halfway in love with a man she would never have.
“What is it?” he demanded. “Are you crying?”
“No,” she said quickly because she couldn’t let him know that she had just said goodbye to a fantasy of her own making. “Of course not.”
He accepted her word for that as his thumbs traced over her cheekbones.
“Come to my room with me, Tula,” he said softly, his voice an erotic invitation she knew she couldn’t resist. More, she knew she didn’t want to resist it. She’d let the fantasy go but she would be a fool to turn her back on the reality, however brief it might be.