The Ties That Bind by Emilie Rose

Author:Emilie Rose [Rose, Emilie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Romance, Fiction, Contemporary, General
ISBN: 9780373731701
Google: kl21azrJQqkC
Amazon: 0373731701
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2012-05-01T04:00:00+00:00

Seven

“I’m going to take a shower,” Pierce said, and stormed from his bedroom—or more appropriately, away from the redhead in his bed.

One lover? And then him. Seriously?

He closed and locked the bathroom door fully conscious that his behavior was several notches below common courtesy. But damn it, a woman whose only previous lover had been a man she’d married was not for him. And why would she have come to his bed if she weren’t looking for more—like a wedding ring and a meal ticket for her son?

No matter what she said to the contrary.

It wasn’t as if he hadn’t previously had women tell him one thing and do another. The first being the foster mother who’d promised she was his family now and that he had a home with her. There’d been several others over the years, culminating with Kat. She’d claimed all she wanted was his baby. Not him. Not his wedding ring. Not his money. He hadn’t believed one word of her story—especially since she’d been happily cashing his very large child support checks each month.

And he didn’t believe Anna.

He turned on the shower and stepped into the marble cubicle without waiting for the water to warm. The icy spray hit him like sleet pellets, making him suck wind between his gritted teeth. But he forced himself to stay under the stinging spray. Bracing his arms against the wall, he let the cold water wash away every last vestige of Anna’s honeysuckle scent.

Having sex with her had been a mistake. His only excuse was that she’d caught him at a weak moment. The phone call earlier in the evening from the head of the team he had contracted to search for Kat had rattled him. The man had claimed he’d heard of a mutilated female body dumped outside the ravaged city, and he was on his way to investigate. The ninety-seven minutes between that initial call and the callback informing Pierce the corpse wasn’t Kat had been the longest hours of Pierce’s life—longer even than that hellacious flight from Atlanta with Kat’s son’s deafening howls.

He’d panicked and ended up in the nursery. If Kat died what would happen to her son? As the past few weeks had proven, he wasn’t equipped to be a father and didn’t want to be one. He couldn’t be responsible for such a fragile life.

Kat’s father was in no condition to take care of a baby, and since her brother’s death two years ago she didn’t have any other family. That left Pierce and only Pierce. Father by default.

Pierce adjusted the water temperature to something above frigid and his skin began to thaw. Maybe, as he’d told Sarah, he’d have something to offer the kid when Graham was old enough to work for Hollister Ltd. and they could talk man-to-man. But not before then. He didn’t want anyone depending on him if something happened to him. Not Graham. Not Anna.

No matter how good sex with Anna had been, it had been a mistake.

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