Every hour that passed made her more and more sad as she realized he wasn’t the least bit interested in even pretending to want the baby. He was going to walk away. He would probably pay child support, maybe offer to take the kid for a day here or there, but that would be it.
The death of her dreams, dreams she hadn’t been willing to admit, was painful. Even worse was looking up at him, and knowing that she could never be in the same room as him and not want him, not love him. It made the concept of getting over him and moving on impossible to imagine.
“Charity?”
“Come in,” she said.
He stepped inside and closed her door, then moved to her desk. He took a seat and gave her a crooked smile. “How are you feeling?”
“Fine.”
“No morning sickness or anything?”
“Not yet.”
He gazed into her eyes. “Tell me what you want.”
“Excuse me?”
“You’re pregnant. We’re having a child together. Tell me what you want. How do you see this playing out? Do you want me to stay away? Be involved? Do you think we should get married? What do you think would work best for you?”
What worked best for her was a man who genuinely loved her. One who couldn’t picture life without her. A man who longed to have a family with her and grow old with her. She wanted passionate declarations, not rational lists of possibilities.
The semi-proposal hurt the worst, she admitted. Getting married for the sake of the baby crushed nearly every romantic dream she had.
As she looked at him, she saw caring in his eyes. A little worry—maybe for her, maybe for himself. Affection. But he was still Josh Golden, perfect, worship-worthy, not for lesser mortals such as herself.
Even as she thought she could tell him the truth, that she was completely in love with him, she dismissed the idea. Why make him feel bad? It wasn’t as if he was going to love her back.
“I’m sure we can come to some kind of an agreement,” she said.
“What does that mean?”
“Just what I said. Do you want to be part of the baby’s life? I’m open to that. I’m staying here in Fool’s Gold. While you’ll probably be racing all over the world, this is your home base. So when you’re in town, we’ll have a schedule or something.”
He frowned. “And that’s what you want?”
“It seems the most rational approach.”
“Nothing more?”
She tried not to flinch. What did he expect her to tell him?
“What more did you have in mind?” she asked.
“I don’t know. Something.”
“When you get it figured out, let me know. We’ll talk about it.”
He studied her. “What aren’t you telling me?”
“I have no idea.”
“There’s something.”
She gazed at him, willing her expression to stay neutral. If he guessed how she felt, he would feel sorry for her. Worse, he might try to make things better by offering a crumb or two of attention. Not exactly the road to happiness.
Finally he stood. “I guess we have time to figure it out.”
She nodded.
He hesitated for a second, then left.
When she was alone, she breathed out a sigh of relief. One conversation down, who knows how many left to endure. She told herself it would get easier and hoped she was telling the truth.
But before she could turn back to her computer, Bernie hurried in. Her normally calm expression was tense.
“You won’t believe it,” she began. “I don’t believe it.”
“What are we talking about?” Charity asked.
“The money. The missing money.” Bernie put her hands on her hips. “I found it.”
Charity blinked at her. “You’re kidding.”
“No. Well, I found most of it. Some has already been spent, but most of it is sitting in an offshore account. It wasn’t easy to trace, but I’m good at what I do. I’m just so pissed.”
Charity almost didn’t want to ask. “Who took it?”
“It’s always the person you least expect. I should know that by now. But once again I was sucked in by a friendly smile and an offer to help.”
“Who?” Charity repeated.
“Robert.”
She stood and stared at Bernie. “No. I don’t believe it.” Robert? Quiet Robert who lived alone and cared way too much about the Civil War? “He’s the one who figured out the money was missing and reported it.”
“I know. He was angry about the money, too. Always talking about how whoever took it was stealing from the good people of Fool’s Gold. I bought it. Hell, I even went to dinner with him.”
“Me, too,” Charity murmured, unable to take it in. Robert? Not possible. “You’re sure?”
“There’s a paper trail leading right back to him. I found it through dumb luck, which annoys me. There are money transfers, withdrawals. He’s good, I’ll give him that. Just not good enough.”
“What happens now?”
Bernie rolled her eyes. “I’ve already called your police chief to take him into custody while I notify state authorities. She’ll be here any second. I’m just so mad. He had me completely fooled.”
“He had all of us fooled,” Charity said, still not able to believe it. “Is he going to jail?”
“For a really long time. I have to go make those calls.”
“Do you need me to do anything?” Charity asked.
“Just don’t tell anyone I thought he was a nice guy.”
“You and me, both.”
After Bernie left, Charity tried to go back to work, but she couldn’t think. Robert the thief? The information proved that once again she was a horrible judge of character. She’d been convinced his only flaws were that he was a little boring and kind of a mama’s boy. Instead he’d stolen millions of dollars, spearheaded the investigation, most likely to keep attention off himself, and had fooled an entire town.
She was furious. Beyond furious. She’d actually felt bad about not wanting to go out with him. Talk about a new level of stupid!
She stood and crossed to her window, where she saw the police cars pull up. In a matter of a minute or two, Robert would be in custody.
Still pissed, she went down the hall and entered Robert’s office. He glanced up and smiled.
“Hello, Charity. How’s it going?”“Not well for you. Did you really steal that money?”
His expression twisted a little. There was a second of confusion, followed by surprise, then an annoyingly smug look.
“What a question. I’m insulted.”
“Are you? I don’t think so.” She studied him, looking for the truth. “How? No, wait. That doesn’t matter. Why? That’s the more important question. Why would you take money from the town? Did you really think we were all so stupid that you wouldn’t get caught?”
“I didn’t do anything,” he told her. “But if I did, no one would find out.”
“Is that what you think? That you’re smarter than all of us?” She leaned against the doorframe. “Sorry, Robert. It turns out Bernie’s even smarter than you.”
The smugness faded. “What are you talking about?”
“She’s already called the chief. Apparently she found your secret accounts and has everything she needs to put you away for a long time.”
He sprang to his feet and started for the door. She stepped out of the way and watched him fly toward the stairs. Seconds later he tripped on Bernie’s outstretched foot and went tumbling onto the marble floor. He lay sprawled there on his belly. Sheriff Burns climbed the stairs and calmly put her foot on the small of his back.
“I was halfway home when I got this call,” the sheriff told him, not sounding happy. “I don’t like it when anyone messes with my plans.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
“I FEEL SO USED,” Marsha said the next morning as she and Charity sat in the mayor’s office. “I liked Robert. I believed in him.”
“I dated him,” Charity said, shaking her head. “I felt bad that I didn’t like him more. How did this happen?”
“We were too trusting,” Marsha told her. “He had such excellent recommendations.”
“Is this where we talk about what a nice, quiet man he was?”
News had spread quickly. Not only had Robert stolen the town’s money, he’d been using a false name. Apparently the circumstances under which his elderly mother had died were suspicious and he was sitting in the city jail, waiting to be extradited back to Oregon for a possible murder charge.
“I have inherited my mother’s bad taste in men,” Charity said glumly. “Here’s one more example.”
“Robert doesn’t count. You barely went out with him.”
“I had no sense there was anything wrong with him. That should be a few points against me.”
“Half a point,” Marsha told her. “How are you feeing?”
“Fine. No obvious symptoms yet. No weird cravings or morning sickness.”
“Have you talked to Josh recently?”
“Since the original announcement? He came by and asked me what I want from him. When I didn’t have an answer, he said we would work it out. It was a thrilling moment for me.”
“You’re hurt.”
“Some. And angry.”
“Because he couldn’t read your mind?”
Partly, but Charity wasn’t going to admit that. “Why do I have to do the asking? Shouldn’t he be offering? This is as much his child as mine.”
“So you want him to do the right thing. Are you waiting for him to propose?”
“No.” She tried to put a little force behind the word. “I want him to…” She wanted so much—it was difficult to pick just one direction. “I want him to want to be with me and the baby. I’m not interested in doing anything because he thinks he has to.”
“Does he know you want to be with him?”
Charity didn’t want to answer that either.
“You have a hard time asking for what you want,” Marsha said. “Is it because your mother was never there for you?”
“Probably. I don’t trust easily.”
“What has Josh done to make you not trust him?”
“Nothing,” she admitted reluctantly. “But look at his past. He wants to get back into racing. He wants everything that goes with it.”
“Or maybe he just wants to know he hasn’t failed.”
An interesting point, Charity admitted grudgingly. But before she could figure out what to say, Sheryl stuck her head in the door.
“Charity, I’m sorry to bother you, but it’s Dr. Daniels from the hospital committee. He says it’s important.”
“Thanks.” Charity rose.
“You can take it here,” Marsha told her. “I’ll go get some coffee.”
“Thanks.” Charity waited until she was alone in the mayor’s office, then picked up the phone. “Hello, Dr. Daniels.”
“Ms. Jones. How are you?”
There was something about his voice. A hesitation. Her heart sank. “I’m good. What’s going on?”
“You know we really enjoyed your presentation and everyone on the committee thinks the town is great.”
Here came the but.
“But we have some concerns. While Fool’s Gold is a great town, it’s small and you already have one hospital. We’re concerned we won’t have enough of a workforce to support the new hospital and we didn’t see much in the way of community support.”
The need to scream grew, but she forced herself to breathe deeply and calmly. “Dr. Daniels, we have a very well-educated workforce and a community that is beyond eager to embrace the new hospital.”
“I’m sure you think that’s the case, Charity—”
“I don’t think it, I know it,” she said, interrupting him. “And I can prove it. Please give me one more chance with the committee.”
There was a long pause. “I’ll give you that because you’ve impressed me from the beginning. However, I’ll warn you, we’ve already voted on the other site.”
“Then I have my work cut out for me, don’t I?” she said, determined to sound positive when she felt crushed inside.
“Friday,” Dr. Daniels said. “Nine o’clock.”
“I’ll be ready.”
They hung up. Charity staggered to the sofa and collapsed, then covered her face with her hands.
Three days. She had three days to find a miracle. Three days to come up with a way to convince the hospital committee that yes, there was plenty of local support, not to mention a trained workforce. She’d already provided plenty of statistics, shown them Fool’s Gold, offered tax and housing incentives. What was left?
“Not good news?” Marsha asked when she returned to her office.
Charity briefly outlined what had happened. “I don’t know what to do,” she admitted. “We were so close. I know they liked our town better, so why are they balking?”
“Is the other city larger?”
“Yes. It’s about twice the size, but it doesn’t have any of our charm. The location isn’t close to this nice, they don’t have a better trained workforce and I know we’re more enthusiastic than they are. Why won’t they believe me?”
“I guess you’re going to have to show them.”