The Cowboy's Baby(10)

A child would be happy here, he knew. Lots of space to run and play, horses to learn how to ride, animals to interact with, and the great outdoors. Perhaps once they were settled down with one, he could convince Alyssa to go for another – perhaps they could even use the same surrogate, if she was willing.

At the thought of Esme Carter, Daniel’s thoughts paused – and hovered.

Alyssa didn’t care for her. Exactly why was painfully easy to see: the girl was gorgeous. While Alyssa used veritable pounds of makeup to supposedly enhance her already comely features, Esme’s face was totally natural – full lipped, and dark-skinned with entrancingly almond shaped eyes that caught and held one’s attention with devastating effect. Her body was lean and toned – that much he had been able to tell beneath the black sheath she wore. He could appreciate a woman with some muscle on her – a woman who worried about breaking nails made him cringe.

Alyssa hadn’t been that woman at first. When they’d first met, she’d liked nothing more than to come out riding with him – she’d been interested in watching him break cattle and train calves. Now, she rarely ever came outside. She was content to remain sequestered in her room in the house, snapping at him when he passed by.

She could be sweet…so sweet when she was relaxed. When she wasn’t tense about one thing or the other, clamoring for some vacation, bag or bauble. He was holding out hope that the child they would have would speed the return of that sweet disposition.

But they would have to deal directly with Esme.

Alyssa had made it clear that she thought Esme was after him – citing the way she’d behaved upon their first meeting as evidence. In Daniel’s opinion, the girl hadn’t reacted very strangely considering she had just found out that a high profile businessman and his partner wanted her to have their baby. She’d been a little flustered…a little nervous…her lovely face had flushed the most alluring shade of pink when she’d spoken to them and…

Goddamn it.

If anything, Alyssa must be wary of the girl because she had some sort of sixth sense that told her when he was the slightest bit attracted to another woman. He wouldn’t even look – or speak; and the vast majority of the time his appreciation wasn’t even sexual, but aesthetic. As he was from the south, he’d been taught to pay a compliment to a woman if she looked fine, as it would make her day brighter.

Alyssa immediately took offense if he told an elderly woman that she looked fetching.

Here, without her harping over his shoulder, Daniel could admit to himself that he found Esme Carter very alluring – and not simply in an aesthetic way. Seeing her sitting there, long legs primly crossed in her simple, modestly cut black dress had done things to him – made his throat dry and his pants uncomfortably tight

Somehow, not seeing what her dress covered was a thousand times more alluring than any flash of cleavage or high slit. What was she hiding beneath the garment, he wondered. Pert, firm breasts and a smooth, tight behind? It wasn’t as though he didn’t appreciate the alluring garb Alyssa wore for him when she deemed herself in the mood for seduction, but for some reason, Esme had triggered something in him he’d thought long dead.

And now the young woman would be carrying his seed and his child. Of course, the genes would be completely his and Alyssa’s, but there was certain intimacy to be had when a woman’s belly grew round with your progeny. He sensed that Alyssa had jumped on the idea of a surrogate more to preserve her figure than for any biological difficulties she might have. After all, she let him touch her so rarely these days that they’d barely had the opportunity to see if they could do things the old fashioned way.

The buxom Latina beauty often cited his bed-play as being too rough and too crude to satisfy her; though Daniel had also tried sweet words and seduction to similar results. Though he did like to show his strength behind closed doors, he knew how to take things soft and slow when the occasion called for it – not that that had happened for a long while.

Sighing, he took a swig of his beer.

He supposed he shouldn’t be complaining. The ultimate goal of sex was to make children, wasn’t it? And now he would be getting a son or daughter within the next nine months. That should be enough to calm his libido down, shouldn’t it?

Unless Esme Carter was involved.

If there was one thing Alyssa had done right, it was to whet his appetite for ethnic women. With the South’s history of racial strife, he didn’t think any of his Texan buddies knew what they were missing. When they’d first come together, Alyssa had been all fire and want; the fire had eventually dimmed to be ultimately extinguished, and the want? Well, there were times when he pondered whether or not she wanted him or his money.