Now, however, he could feel things beginning to change. Esme was the kind of woman that made a man reconsider his values – everything he thought he knew about his feelings. And she did it completely effortlessly. She didn’t try to curry his favor, to suck up to him or ingratiate herself. She didn’t try to hold anything above his head, to suggest that she was integral to his life or hold him hostage by his gonads.
She simply was.
She puttered around the house jotting down ideas for her most recent recipe. She fooled around in the kitchen mixing, stirring and tasting – lost in her own little word. As summer segued into fall, she enjoyed hours by the pool, her face buried in various volumes - and all the while, she provided for him without even realizing it. When she made her meals, she always made sure to cook enough for even his gargantuan appetite. She asked what kinds of things he liked so that she could incorporate them into her creations. Whenever he ventured out onto the ranch to work with his cattle, she packed a lunch for him – delicious fare that made his staff jealous every time they caught a whiff. When he asked her to join him on a picnic, an outing, or even just to sit with him as he unwound for the day, she never denied him.
She was there when he needed her to be – with a soft smile, a reassuring word, and some of the most delicious food he had ever tasted. For he, who had never since his mother experienced a relationship with a woman who truly cared for him, it was like she had opened his eyes to things he’d never known existed.
And she did it all just by being herself.
When Daniel was honest with himself, he wasn’t quite sure what to think of her. He desired her -that much was certain. And he was more grateful for her carrying his child than she could ever possibly know. Everything else, however, was mired in confusion. He cared for her.Even if it weren’t for the baby in her belly, he’d still feel remiss if anything were to happen to her.
Then again, if it weren’t for the baby, they would never have met.
The child – the sex of which they’d decided to keep a secret until its birth – was, of course, the inexorable connection between them, and after its birth…he had no idea where they would stand. Esme would most probably want to get on with her life - and the kitchen career she’d always dreamed of.
He only hoped that he could somehow dissuade her from walking away completely. He knew she wasn’t ready for children, and he wouldn’t be so selfish as to expect her to take on his…but to be finished with him? To walk away abruptly as soon as their biological partnership was over? He didn’t know if he could fathom it.
And somehow, he doubted Esme could be so callous.
“He looks funny.” He was drawn back to the present by her soft statement as she turned the ultrasound image she held back and forth in an effort to clarify it. She continued to refer to the baby as a he – convinced that it was, indeed, a boy. He himself would play no favorites, and from the time he’d begun, hesitantly, to call in a decorator to work on the nursery upstairs, he had insisted that everything be gender neutral.
While he’d never take for granted the money that his business made him, when it came to organizing the baby’s room, he was glad he could afford the best money could buy. It would make things a lot easier for him in the long run – and ensure the child’s room had the right feminine touch.
A touch that would, no doubt, be absent for the rest of its life.
“What do you mean ‘he looks funny’?” Daniel hid his heart’s heaviness with a smirk, shaking his head in amusement. “He’ll be handsome and charming. Just like his father.”
“He or she.” Esme shot back with a clever smile, her almond eyes gleaming with mischief. “As you have still yet to be convinced.”
They sat on the front porch of the house, watching the sun sink below the horizon as herds of cattle grazed their way across the land. It was a picturesque sight – one Daniel had always loved – and as he took in Esme rocking back and forth, one hand curled protectively over her abdomen, he knew she appreciated it too.
“Little bean is going to love it here.” She mused, using her bare toes to rock her chair back and forth slowly. “There’s so much space. And you can teach him to ride horses and wrangle cattle,” she cut her eyes at him quickly, “Though maybe wait until he’s about eighteen for the latter.”
Daniel had once come back from a full day out among the animals with a cut lip and a blacked eye from where a cow had gotten the jump on him. Esme had been somewhat shocked at his injury, asking how often such things happened, and he’d been forced to tell her he faced injuries a few times a year. One of the perils of the profession.