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They usually
    ended up with them in bed. “Give me a hint.” His mouth nibbled along her jaw, inhaling the perfume of her skin.
    “No,” Sydney pulled back to give him a sly smile.
    “None of that until later.”
    “Okay, if you’re going to play dirty.” Alex gave Sydney a little push to get her out of his lap. “I have no alternative but to wait.” He stood for a second to allow the blood to come back to his legs instead of his dick. “Let’s go then.” He picked his coat out of a small closet in his office and held his hand toward the door. “After you.”
    33
    Dyann Love Barr

    ****
Sydney went out to the garage to see the new
    kittens, Beulah, Mom’s four-legged mousetrap, had birthed a few weeks earlier. They had their eyes open. Alex knew anything warm and cuddly would
    keep Sydney occupied for a while. Anything except human children. She’d declared early in their
    relationship that she had no desire to start a family, now or in the future.
    Mom wanted grandchildren.
    He couldn’t say he blamed her. The idea of
    children grew on him over the last few years as well.
    Once he’d ironed out this particular wrinkle in his and Sydney’s relationship, there would more
    grandkids than his mother could handle.
    But first, he had to tell Mom about Keeley
    Jacobs’s claim.
    “Do you want coffee while we wait for Sydney?”
    He shook his head. “No. Actually, I sent her
    away so we could talk in private.”
    “Well, it will have to be quick. The caterer is coming by in a half hour to meet with Sydney and me. You’re invited to join us.”
    He shook his head. “Like that’s going to happen.
    Mom, sit down.”
    Her blue eyes dimmed with worry, but she took
    a seat on the cushy floral sofa. “What is it? It’s that letter I had you look at isn’t it?”
    Alex sat down beside her and took her hand in
    his. “Yes.”
    His mother closed her eyes. “I’m not stupid, you know. Do you think I ran my family’s business on my own, without a few smarts? I realized it had to do with the estate, but I’m not an expert in legal affairs. The minute I saw the name Keeley on the letter, I knew it meant trouble.”
    He didn’t know where to begin, but he had to do this, so it might as well be hard and quick. Mom 34
    A Perfect Bride for Christmas

    could take a punch, but she’d had more than her share this year.
    “Keeley Jacobs says she is Dad’s daughter. Her
    mother is someone called—”
    “Cathryn Jacobs.” His mother’s eyes welled up.
    Her hand trembled against her lips as she nodded.
    It threw him for a loop that she already knew
    Keeley Jacob’s mother.
    “Vietnam. The nurse there.” She let out a heavy sigh and got to her feet. “He told me about her. The first night he came home—our anniversary,
    Christmas Eve.”
    Her hands covered her eyes, and she stood still as a statue. “I wanted him so badly.” The slap of her hands against her thigh made him jump. She turned to look at him with anger, pain, and understanding in her bright blue eyes. “But he wouldn’t touch me.
    Not until he told me about this nurse. They’d become friends, and one night after an ambush…” She took a shaky breath. “He and his men were under
    gunfire, two of them were killed, another injured.
    Your father got the injured man into a helicopter and rode with him to the M.A.S.H. unit. That’s
    where he met her. Frank told me he how tired,
    scared, and so alone he felt. He wanted me, but she was the one there.”
    “Mom, I don’t want to hear this.”
    “You’re my lawyer, so you sit there.” She
    stabbed a finger at him. “You are going to listen to me, and that’s that. You seem to forget your parents were flesh and blood people.”
    He might be her attorney but right now, he
    squirmed in his chair like as if he were still six instead of thirty-two. “Okay.”
    “He never said anything about getting the
    woman pregnant. She was a nurse, for God’s sake.
    Frank swore he used protection.”
    Alex