She absolutely couldn’t believe that she’d finally obtained the position she’d worked so hard for. Meeting Daniel had changed her outlook on life in a bevy of ways – and provided her with opportunities she’d never imagined she might have. While, of course, it had crossed her mind, that the man could be throwing his weight around to provide for her the way he had, Daniel just didn’t seem the type.
He didn’t flaunt his money or status, and seemed genuinely embarrassed by the wealth he’d amassed.
For that one afternoon, Esme got a taste of what it was truly like to live the high life. Despite her hesitation, she allowed Daniel to steer her into a high class maternity clothing store and stood by awkwardly while he and the saleswoman picked out a bevy of clothes for her to try on. While Esme had never been a huge shopper, she found that she liked getting pampered in such a manner. She got figuratively wrist slapped for the one instance in which she looked at the price tags on the clothing and could only gape. She tried to insist that she couldn’t accept anything so expensive from Daniel – he was already giving her a stipend for God’s sake – but the man would hear nothing of it – even threatening to buy everything once she left the store anyway.
So Esme relented, allowing herself to revel in the experience as she tried on floaty silk tops and the most flattering maternity pants she’d ever encountered. They left the shop laden down with bags, only to enter another. It was, to Esme’s shock and slight embarrassment, a lingerie store – if anything, more expensive than the last shop they had entered. She thought the clerks would take one look at her rounded belly and turn her from the store, but of course, they kowtowed to Daniel as if he was royalty and he only winked at her, before telling her she could pick out anything she liked.
At first, Esme had only turned bright red, more than a bit taken aback that Daniel wanted her to buy sexy underwear in front of him – and in her state, no less. But after her initial hesitation, she quickly grew engrossed with the high quality silks and laces. She’d never had such divine undergarments in her life, and it took her less than half an hour to find a few pieces she liked. Shyly, she presented them to Daniel for his approval, only to have the rancher give her a wicked smile, tipping back his Stetson before proceeding to add about three times more than she’d chosen to her pile.
It was all paid for with the swipe of a card, leaving Esme’s head spinning at the amount of money they must have spent.
She didn’t think she’d ever seen a bill so large in her life and merely tried to wrap her mind around Daniel’s insistence that the money would simply sit around if it wasn’t spent. She declined his offer of more shopping, citing the ache that now seemed ever present in her back from the extra weight she was carrying and, content, started back towards the car with him, contemplating the opportunity of her new position at Pierre’s.
She was only distracted right before they left through the entrance of the mall – by a store selling different collections of infant clothing.
Pausing, Esme found herself staring into the window.
Though she knew that Daniel was arranging the nursery for the baby, she hadn’t been able to bring herself to visit the upstairs room. She often passed the closed door on her way to and from his room, and had even once or twice almost ventured in to take a look, but she always hurried back downstairs unfulfilled, her heart pounding.
The nursery was none of her business.
Daniel’s baby was none of her business – but whether from the hormones assaulting her body or from her own inexplicably volatile mind, she found her mind lingering on the child more and more as her pregnancy progressed. She, who had vowed that she might never have children of her own – for whom her career took all precedence and who had finally achieved what she’d worked towards her entire life.
The past few weeks, she’d woken from dreams in which she held Daniel’s baby to her chest, her own heart brimming with love for the child as she felt its heart beat next to her own. She’d imagined what Daniel’s face might look like for his son’s first steps – his first words…his first horse ride. Things that she would never see. Things she had no business wanting.
She tried to tell herself that it was just out of concern for the baby’s health – that she only wanted him to be strong in order to fulfill her commitment to Daniel…but deep within, Esme knew it was something more.
Like the reason she never spent the night with the man.
Certainly, they were intimate. At almost every opportunity, Daniel caught her alone and ravished her breathless, captivated by her changing body beneath his agile hands. The sex was incredible – but anything else…it was more than Esme could afford. When she’d signed up to be Daniel’s surrogate, she hadn’t even considered what might happen if she developed feelings for the man. Then again, she’d assumed Alyssa would be there to prevent those kind of entanglements from occurring.