Read The Rancher's Christmas Princess for Free Online Page B

she...if we...”
    “ I know.” Belle’s voice had gained
strength again. She spoke firmly now. “Anne would never claim you were Ben’s
father if she didn’t know beyond a doubt that you were. She named me his legal
guardian. She knew I would always take care of him and that I would give him all
the love in my heart and an excellent start in life. She also knew she should
have contacted you. She realized that both you and Ben deserve to know each
other, that Ben needs his father and you have a right and a duty to be with your
son. So she set me the task of making that happen.”
    Pres was not keeping up with this flood of information. He was
still stuck back there with the fact that, apparently, he actually did have sex
with Anne Benton on the night that Lucy married Monty Polk. “Damn it to hell. If
it happened, it was only one night.”
    Beautiful Belle gave him a sad little smile. “Sometimes one
night is all it takes.”
    “Dear God.” He realized he was on his feet. And his knees
didn’t want to hold him up. He sank to the chair again. “A boy. A little
boy...Ben, you said? His name is Ben?”
    “Yes. Ben.” Belle produced an envelope from the pocket of her
skirt. Her hands were shaking. “She gave this to me two days before she died. It
was tucked inside a note she wrote to me. She told me to...” The tears welled
again. She pressed her lips together, forced herself to go on. “...to read the
note addressed to me after she was gone. That note told me who you were and
where to find you. Also in that note, she asked that I give you this.” She
extended the envelope across the coffee table toward him.
    He took it from her trembling fingers. Struck with a sense of
complete unreality, he tapped the end on the table, tore off the other end and
removed the single sheet of folded paper within. He unfolded the thing, stared
down at the words on it, words written in a hand that didn’t appear to have been
all that steady. Those words ran together at first, kind of wiggling, like a
caravan of ants trudging without direction across the paper, refusing to take
any recognizable form. With effort, he read it through once.
    And then again.
    And finally, on the third time through, the ragged writing made
sense to him.
    He dropped the letter onto the coffee table and tossed the
envelope on top of it. And then he made himself speak, although his voice
sounded rough, ill-used, raggedy as Anne Benton’s handwriting. “She says the boy
is mine. She says she woke up in that motel by the roadhouse with me and...she
didn’t know what she would say to me. So she just...left. She says when she
found out she was having my baby, she didn’t know how to tell me. She kept
meaning to do it, but she never managed to work up the courage.”
    Belle was nodding again. “She told me she always intended to
get in touch with you, to tell you...”
    “But she didn’t.” How could she not? How could she keep the
reality of his own child from him? It wasn’t right. For the first time since
he’d met the princess across from him, he felt the heat of anger in his veins,
the blood pumping in furious spurts. Wrong. All wrong, what Anne Benton had
done. “By God, she didn’t come to me, didn’t tell me....”
    Belle stood up. He stiffened in the chair and watched her
warily as she came around the coffee table to his side. Gingerly, she touched
his shoulder. “Preston, please... Try to understand...”
    He jerked free of her hand and glared up at her dead on. “I
want you to go.”
    * * *
    Belle longed to stay, to soothe him, to ease his
confusion and frustration—and perhaps even to come to an agreement about how
they would proceed from there. She had plans, detailed plans. She knew what to
do and was prepared to move forward.
    But she understood that she couldn’t force him. He would need
time to process such momentous news.
    Plus, there was the way she’d handled telling him the
situation: badly. She should have told him