"Can you find out if Grace has left the compound recently?"

"Hold on a sec." There was some clicking of keys; then Nate said, "She didn't check out a car and her security card hasn't been used at the gate. She could have gone with someone else, I suppose."

"Do you keep track of when she uses her key card?"

"Yeah, all that stuff is logged."

"Can you see when the last time she used hers was?"

"Around noon yesterday."

"Who has left since then?"

Nate read off a list of names. It was short.

"Can you check to see if the cameras showed her in any of their cars?"

"What's going on here, Torr? Is she in some kind of trouble?"

"I don't know. She told me she left town. She told her brother she was staying with me. I have no idea where she is."

"Okay. Give me a few minutes and I'll go through the security footage. Our face-recognition software will find her and tell me the last place she was seen. Call you in a few. Will you have someone there who can pick up the phone?"

"Yeah," he said, feeling cold and more afraid than he had in a long, long time.

Now that he thought about it, she had been acting a little odd the last time he saw her. He'd chalked it up to stress, but maybe she'd been trying to tell him she was in some kind of trouble. Maybe the toll of taking care of him had worn her out and she'd had some kind of breakdown.

Ten million things went through his head, each one worse than the last.

His phone rang, and he scooped it up, his weak fingers clumsy on the plastic. "Did you find her?"

"It's kinda weird, but she went into a vacant suite and hasn't come out again. I can't leave, but I'm sending someone to check it out."

"What room number?"

Nate told him, then said, "I'll call you back as soon as I know what's going on."

Torr didn't tell him not to bother. He was going to go there himself and find her and then give her h.e.l.l for sneaking off like that and scaring him. She didn't have to lie and tell him she was leaving town to get a break from him. All she had to do was tell him she needed some time off. He would have understood.

He grabbed his sheathed sword, knowing he was going to need some kind of cane to keep from falling on his face. The suite was only one hall away, but as wobbly as he was, it was going to feel a h.e.l.l of a lot farther.

John refused to give up on Meghan. He couldn't imagine that any man capable of raising a daughter like her would also be capable of keeping her from living her own life.

There was only one way to find out.

Like some kind of creepy stalker, John followed her back to her home. As soon as she pulled into the garage, he hurried to the front door, hoping her father would be the one to answer so she wouldn't have the chance to slam it in John's face.

The man who answered the door came up only to John's nose. He was thin, but not sickly, and peered up at John with a clear, questioning gaze. "Yes?"

"My name's John Hawthorne. I'm a friend of Meghan's from Minnesota. Mind if I come in?"

The man's eyes lit up with interest and he smiled. "Of course. She doesn't have many people stop by these days. Not like she used to when she was a kid. That girl had people parading through this house back then."

"Dad, I'm home," she called from somewhere off to the left.

"Just in time. Your friend's here."

Meghan stepped through a doorway and stopped cold. "You followed me home?" she asked in shock.

"I figured you wouldn't invite me over, so I had to be rude and show up on my own."

Her father took a protective step toward his daughter. "Is this man causing you trouble?"

"No, Dad. He just doesn't know when to give up."

"Can we talk?" asked John.

Sadness tinged her voice. "I've already said all there is to say."

"Please. We can't let it end like this."

"Just go, John. This is already hard enough."

Her father was listening to every word, watching each of them carefully. John hated that there was an audience for this, but that was her choice. Not his. He would have rather discussed this with her in private.

He knew before he said the words that she wasn't going to like him discussing this in front of her father. "I can't go until I know whether you might be carrying my baby. We didn't use a d.a.m.n thing, and you never said whether you were on birth control."

Meghan's eyes went wide with shock, as if she'd just realized what he had realized on the way over here: She might be pregnant. Why he hadn't even thought about it before, he had no idea. He'd always been responsible. h.e.l.l, he had a condom in his wallet. He simply hadn't thought about using it.

Her hand moved to her stomach in an unconscious gesture.

That was all the answer John needed. He found himself praying to G.o.d she was pregnant, because at this point, he was willing to resort to whatever slimy tactics he could find to keep her in his life. A baby would tie her to him and give him the time he needed to convince her she could love him for reala"the way he knew he loved her.

The realization was a bit stunning, but it warmed him from the inside out and made his path forward as clear as day.

Meghan's father crossed his arms over his chest and said, "Obviously, the two of you have things to discuss. I'll be in the kitchen making dinner. For three." He directed that last part at Meghan. "You go kicking out the father of my possible future grandkid before dinner and we'll have words."

He walked away, leaving the two of them alone in the foyer.

Meghan had gone pale and had pressed her hand to the wall as if to steady herself. "I hadn't even considered . . . I'm sure I'm not ..."

"Pregnant," he offered, bothered that she couldn't even say the word. "You look like you're going to fall over. Can we sit down?"

She nodded numbly and led him into the next room. She sank onto the couch, but rather than sitting across the room, as she'd probably intended, he sat down next to her.

John wasn't a man to mince words, so he just blurted out, "I want to try to make things work with you. Come live with me."

"I can't. My dad."

"Bring him, too. I have plenty of room. That cabin is just a spot I go to get away. I have a real house, tooa"big enough for all of us."

"It's too cold for Dad. His arthritisa""

"Will be greatly improved with all the exercise a grandchild will give me," shouted her father from the kitchen. The man peeked around the corner, grinning like he was already planning what to do with a child they didn't know existed yet.

In that moment, John decided he liked the man. He wouldn't mind having him as a father-in-law at all.

"My work is here," she said.

"I know lots of people up there. I can help you find a good job. Or I can give you one at my company."

"That's a horrible idea and you know it."

"As bad an idea as never seeing each other?" he asked.

Her face crumpled in pain, and he knew then and there that he wasn't alone in his feelings for her. She felt something, too. Their time together had been more than just great s.e.x, though it had definitely also been that.

"We hardly know each other," she said.

John cupped her face in his hands. The bruise from her accident was still there, reminding him just how precious she wasa"how easily she could be taken away from him. Every second counted, and he wanted to spend as many of them as he could with her.

"I know enough to want to know more."

She covered her hands with his and pulled them away. "I can't uproot myself and my dad just to see if we can make a go of it."

John nodded slowly. "Okay. Fair enough. It'll take me a few weeks to get things settled on my end. I was just getting set to break ground on a new development, so I'll have to take care of finding someone to take over for mea"transfer the contracts to them, or maybe sell the business. I'll talk with my lawyer and see what makes the most sense. I'll need to put my house on the market, but I think we should keep the cabin, don't you? It'll be nice for family vacations."

Meghan blinked at him. "You're going to give up your lifea"your business, your home, your career?"

"I can have those anywhere. I can only have you here. I'll have to learn the ropes againa"new building codes and whatnota"but I'm good at what I do. I'm sure I can find someone willing to take me on for a while. I can work my way up to the top again."

"Why? Why would you do that?"

He frowned at her, confused. "Why wouldn't I? Jobs come and go. There's only one of you in the whole world. And if we're lucky, one special little boy or girl who will be coming into our lives in a few months. I'd give up just about anything for the two of you."

"What if there's not a baby?"

"Then there's not. At least, not yet. We'll have more time alone to get to know each other. But either way, I've made up my mind. I want to be with you."

"Why?"

"Because I love you." As he said the words aloud, everything fell into place with a happy little click. The thought of giving up what he'd spent years creating didn't even bother him.

"You do?" she asked. Her chin started to wobble.

"Don't sound so surprised. I'm sure I'm not the first man to have fallen for you. I hope to G.o.d I'm the last, though."

Tears shimmered in her eyes. "It's not possible to love someone so fast."

"Why not?"

"That's just not how it's done."

She was cute when she got all teary. Her nose was red and her bottom lip stuck out, quivering until John had to fight the urge to kiss it. "How do you propose we do it, then?"

"We need to slow down. This is all too sudden."

John looked at his watch. "How much time do you need?"

"Dinner will be ready in ten minutes," said her father. "That enough?"

"Dad," she said, raising her voice. "You need to b.u.t.t out of this."

There was a joyful lilt in her father's voice. "I hear the fishing up there's really good."

"Yes, sir," said John. "We've got some whoppers in our lake. My cabin sits right on it, too. Best fishing this side of the Canadian border."

"Put the man out of his misery, girl."

"What about you?" she asked her father. "Who will take care of you?"

"I'm fine and you know it. The cancer's gone. I feel like my old self. If you want to take care of someone, have your own kids. I quit." He grabbed his keys off a hook and said, "I'm going out to meet my girlfriend. Don't wait up for me."

The door to the garage closed. A car started and drove away. Meghan still hadn't said a word.

"So, what about it?" asked John.

"I have two weeks of vacation coming," she said. "I guess I could spend it with you. See where things go."

A smile of victory pulled at his mouth. "We could spend one week here and one at my place. You could even bring your dad if you want. I don't mind."

She touched her stomach again and the wistful look on her face told him more than words ever could. "By then we should know if I'm pregnant."

"It won't change my mind. Either way, I want you in my life."

"You say that now," she said, as if it were a warning.

"And I'll be saying it twenty years from now, too. Just you watch."

"One step at a time, John. We have to slow this down."

He didn't need that, but if she did, that was what he'd give her. "Anything you want."

Chapter 22.