Daddy by Surprise by Debra Salonen Page A

she’d buy his excuse that he wasn’t himself. That he’d become an Old West gunslinger named Mad Jack. “Like I said. Maybe the drugs. I could have been sleepwalking.” With a six-gun on my hip.
    A laugh percolated upward, but he tried to cover it with a cough.
    “Do you think this is funny?”
    “Um…no? No. I don’t.”
    She put her head in her hands and groaned. “Oh, God, not again. Please. Not this time. Not this man. No, no, no. It can’t be.”
    “Hey, Katherine, I mean, Kat. Is your real name…? Never mind. Um, look, I know you’re upset, but would you please not act like there’s a dead body on the floor?”
    She looked up sharply, her hands falling to her lap. The sheet dipped slightly, making it hard for him to remember what he was supposed to be saying.
    He cleared his throat and made himself look into her eyes. Her clear, blue, gorgeous eyes that were swimming with tears. He wished he could hold her and comfort her, but he knew she didn’t want that. “Kat, what happened was a mistake. Unplanned. Unpremeditated, I promise. But it’s not a huge deal, right? I mean, we’re both single, and I can fax you my clean health record when I get home. I had a full workup a couple of months ago and haven’t been with anyone since. Until last night.”
    She used the corner of the sheet to wipe her eyes. “Why?”
    “Why what?”
    “Why did you get a full checkup?”
    “I wasn’t sure I could trust my ex-fiancée.”
    “Because you thought she might sleep with a stranger? Like I just did?” Her voice cracked, and he acted on his impulse to comfort her. Mad Jack would have.
    Leaning between the beds, he spotted his navy blue shorts and quickly pulled them on. Advancing one knee at a time, he approached her. “Kat,” he said softly, lightly touching her arm. “I don’t remember exactly what happened. How we got together. How I came to be in your bed. In fact, the last thing I remember clearly is watching you read. Your lips make this kind of fishy look. It’s cute.” He tried to demonstrate.
    Her upper lip quivered in a near snarl and he stopped.
    “But the parts I do remember are really good. Hot and passionate. Like an X-rated movie, only with a plot.”
    She pushed his hand away. “In your dreams maybe.”
    Maybe. Had he imagined everything? “We didn’t have sex?”
    She shook her head. “Of course, we had sex. That part was real. I meant your X-rated movie scenario. I don’t do X-rated. Ask either of my ex-husbands. I’m too uptight.”
    “Like a proverbial schoolmarm?”
    She let out a little cry. “You’re making me crazy. I don’t know what happened or why, but it shouldn’t have and I know there’s going to be hell to pay for it.”
    He sat back on his haunches. “Why?”
    “Because that’s the way things happen in my life. Do you want to know my track record? O-for-two. Men were put on the planet to disappoint me. And vice versa, if you ask them. The swoo giveth and it taketh away.”
    He blinked. “You lost me.”
    “Better now than later,” she said cryptically. Pulling in a deep breath, she gathered her sheet and blanket like a regal cape and scooted off the bed, showing obvious care not to touch him. She paused to pick up her clothes, then hurried to the bathroom. Once inside, she tossed the blankets to the floor and closed the door.
    He heard the lock click emphatically.
    He blew out a sigh of his own and pivoted to rest his back against the headboard. What a hell of a way to ruin a perfectly wonderful dream, he thought grouchily. If he closed his eyes, he could still picture his dream self. Cool and confident. A cross between Adam Cartwright and Clint Eastwood’s character in those spaghetti westerns that made him famous. All charisma and untamed dark energy. A helluva lover. Better than I ever was with—
    “Stop gloating.”
    He opened his eyes. He’d been so caught up in the memory he hadn’t even heard her open the door. His face went hot, but he denied