His Forever Family(22)

What she wanted more than anything else in the world was a family-with  Marcus, with William, with babies of their own. A family where no one  had to hide from drug dealers or pimps or even overbearing parents. A  family where they had lots of good food and a nice place to live and  they never had to worry about tomorrow. A family where everyone was  happy and laughing and smiling.

She'd always wanted that, ever since she'd realized that other people had it.

But now? Watching Marcus coo at William?

She wanted that with them. The wanting was so strong that she couldn't even seem to breathe.

"Those men-they even washed the bottles!" Hazel was saying. "I never!  They put everything together, took all the old things away and even  organized the drawers!"

Marcus turned to her. "Was everything acceptable? Is there anything I  missed? I don't really know what a baby needs, so I had to take the  salesman at his word."

"My heavens!" Hazel wiped a tear of joy from her eye. "It's so much  more than I could give the little angels." She turned to Liberty. "Did  you help pick out the clothing? So thoughtful, to send clothing for  little boys and little girls."

Liberty realized that her mouth was hanging open to her chin. She shook her head, trying to make sense of all of this.

Marcus, who had just spent maybe ten thousand dollars on a weekend  wardrobe for her, had at some point spent another God-only-knew how much  on a complete nursery, including bottles and clothes. And all for an  abandoned baby boy he had no earthly reason to care for.

"No," Liberty finally said, her voice weak. "He did this all."

"Why," Hazel said, turning her attention mercifully back to Marcus,  "you're just a guardian angel, aren't you?" William made a high whining  noise in the back of his throat. "Oh," Hazel said, "he's hungry. I'll go  get his bottle and you can feed him."

"Okay," Liberty said. Somehow, despite the fairy-tale qualities of the  past six days, this took the cake. When Hazel was out of earshot, she  turned to Marcus. "When did you do this? How did you do this?"

The man had the nerve to look pleased with himself as he sat in the  chair and began to rock William. "I wanted it to be a surprise. Before I  came to find you at the office last Saturday, I made some calls."

"Why did you do this, Marcus?"

He gave her a long look. "You have to ask?"

"Here we are," Hazel said, bustling back in. "Oh, just look at the two  of you," she added, beaming down at William and Marcus. "Don't they make  a handsome pair?"

"They do," Liberty agreed automatically.

The panic hit her like a Mack truck barreling down the highway at  seventy miles an hour, and suddenly she couldn't breath. This was all  well and good, this little delusion she and Marcus were enjoying. All of  her private fantasies were not only seeing the light of day, but Marcus  was proving to be better than she ever could have dreamed. She knew sex  was fun-why else did people do it so much? But being in bed with  Marcus, where she could pretend their world was just big enough for the  two of them-that was one thing.

But this? Him sending professional baby people over to revamp Hazel's  house? Him taking her for a wardrobe makeover so she could fit into his  world-no, not even that. So she could fit into a very specific social  setting, complete with cheating ex-girlfriend and overbearing,  borderline abusive parents?

No. Not only was this not going to work, was this going to fail-it was  going to fail epically. Marcus may think that a few vicious people might  whisper behind their hands at this wedding and then people would move  on, but Liberty knew the truth. People didn't move on from something  like this.

She'd come so far. She'd literally, figuratively and metaphysically  pulled herself up by her own bootstraps through the sheer force of her  will and a promise she'd made to Grandma Devlin all those years ago-she  would save herself. Because no one else would do it for her. Not her  mother, not her nonexistent father-not even Grandma Devlin could save  Liberty from her own mother or from foster care.

But Liberty had gone too far. She'd fallen in love with a  billionaire-someone so far above her station that she shouldn't have  even been able to see him, much less talk with him, work with him-run  with him. She'd gotten too close to the sun and when the truth burned  bright, she would fall back to earth and her carefully constructed life  would fall with her.

For so long, that had always been the worst thing that could happen to  her-someone would learn the truth and she'd be out of a job, back on the  streets, struggling to start over once again. But now she knew the real  truth.                       
       
           



       

Marcus looked up at her as if he could sense her racing thoughts. "Liberty?"

"I'm sorry," she said, her voice shaky. Because she was. When she fell,  she wouldn't just lose her job. She'd lose Marcus. She'd hurt him  because he was naive enough to think that he could trust her.

"I asked if you two had discussed applying for adoption." If a little  old lady could do puppy-dog eyes, Hazel was doing them right now.  "William would be lucky to have two loving parents like you." She sighed  happily. "Such a handsome family you'd be."

Marcus looked at Liberty as if he were expecting her to come up with  some sort of reasonable response to this statement, but she had nothing.  So he finally said, "We're still thinking about it."

Oh, God-he was thinking about it. She could tell from the way he gazed  down on William's little face as he happily drank his milk.

And just as she'd stood in front of that mirror and seen a different  version of her mother-a path not taken-she knew that right now, Marcus  was looking at a different version of himself, one where he found a way  to make her fit into his life and a way to make this baby fit into his  life and just like that-poof!-they were this instant family that was  supposed to live happily ever after.

He thought he could make it happen, just as he'd made this nursery  happen. He was rich and powerful and he could bend reality to his will  because his illusion was that he was in control of his own life.

He would hate her when she took that away from him.

He looked up at her and there was no missing it-the way his face  relaxed into that peaceful smile. The way his eyes lit up when he caught  her gaze. Even-oh, God-even the way he leaned down and pressed a tender  kiss to the top of William's fuzzy little head.

She was shaking with want, with need, with the wish to make this  fantasy reality. I don't want to wake up, she decided. If this is a  dream...

She was in love with her boss, one of the richest, most powerful men in Chicago.

No, that wasn't true. It had been, once, but not anymore.

She was in love with Marcus, with a man who cared for a baby boy he  didn't have to, who'd once almost run away to Germany just to be free.  She was hopelessly in love with a man who used his power, his influence,  to pull her up next to him, instead of lording it over her.

If only there wasn't a wedding or a reality television show. If only they could go on ignoring the rest of the world.

But they couldn't. She had to end this charade before it destroyed both  of them. She couldn't go to the wedding with him and that was that.

"I think Liberty needs to cuddle a baby," Marcus said, half to her and half to William.

So she took the infant in her arms and sat in the finest rocker money  could buy and tried to stop looking as if she'd been flattened by a  semi.

She gazed down at the baby boy in her arms. William. Her William, her  second chance to redeem her mother's greatest mistake. She hadn't been  able to save her little brother, hadn't had the power or the money or  the skills to keep that baby alive. He'd never been anything but a ghost  of regret that haunted her. But here this baby was, just as alone and  lost as William had been.

Except for Marcus, his guardian angel.

What would happen to William when she and Marcus ended? Would Marcus  still invest this kind of money and time in the baby? She didn't want to  think that he'd punish her by punishing William. The child was  innocent.

But she couldn't risk that. She couldn't risk losing another William, not when she had the power to save him this time.

She looked up at Marcus, who was making good-natured small talk with Hazel about cribs and diapers and babies.

She hadn't wanted anything to change. She hadn't wanted to risk the  comfortable life she'd made for herself. And if they hadn't found this  tiny baby in a shoe box by the trash, maybe they would have gone on as  they had, Marcus gently teasing her during their morning runs and  Liberty working every Saturday and their worlds crossing only in safely  defined ways.

But everything had changed.

And there was no going back.





Thirteen

Liberty paused at the top of the stairs, her hand on the railing that  led down to the beach. She just stood there for a moment, her eyes fixed  on some point way out in the ocean.