Baby In The Making

Until she looked at Yeager and found him eyeing her with a scrutiny unlike any she’d ever had from him before. Normally he showed her no more interest than he would...well, a seamstress who was sewing some clothes for him. Sure, the two of them bantered back and forth whenever he was in the shop, but it was the kind of exchange everybody shared with people they saw in passing on any given day—baristas, cashiers, doormen, that kind of thing. In the shop, his attention passed with the moments. But now...

Now, Yeager Novak’s undivided attention was an awesome thing. His sapphire eyes glinted like the gems they resembled, and if she’d fancied he could see straight into her soul before, now she was certain of it. Her heart began to hammer hard in her chest, her blood began to zip through her veins and her breathing became more shallow than it had been all day. This time, though, the reactions had little to do with the news of her massive potential inheritance and a lot to do with Yeager.

He must have sensed her reaction—hyperventilation was generally a dead giveaway—because he nudged her glass closer to her hand and said, “Take a couple sips of your drink. Then tell me again about how you ended up in Staten Island.”

She wanted to start talking now, but she did as he instructed and enjoyed a few slow sips of her whiskey. She wasn’t much of a drinker, usually sticking to wine or some sissy, fruit-sprouting drink. The liquor was smooth going down, warming her mouth and throat and chest. She closed her eyes to let it do its thing, then opened them again to find Yeager still studying her. She was grateful for the dim lighting of the bar. Not just because it helped soothe her rattled nerves but because it might mask the effect he was having on her.

“According to Mr. Fiver,” she said, “my mother got help from a group of women who aided other women in escaping their abusers. They paid counterfeiters to forge new identities for both of us—fake social security numbers, fake birth certificates, the works. I don’t know how my mother found them, but she needed them because my father’s family was super powerful and probably could have kept her from leaving him or, at least, made sure she couldn’t take me with her.”

“And just who was your father’s family?”

Hannah hesitated. During her internet search of her birth name, she had come across a number of items about her and her mother’s disappearance from Scarsdale a quarter century ago. Some of them had been articles that appeared in newspapers and magazines shortly after the fact, but many of them were fairly current on “unsolved mystery” type blogs and websites. It had been singularly creepy to read posts about herself from strangers speculating on her fate. Some people were convinced Stephen Linden had beaten his wife and daughter to death and disposed of their bodies, getting away with murder, thanks to his social standing. Some thought baby Amanda had been kidnapped by strangers for ransom and that her mother had interrupted the crime and been killed by the perpetrators, her body dumped in Long Island Sound. Other guesses were closer to the truth: that Alicia escaped her abusive marriage with Amanda in tow and both were living now in the safety of a foreign country.

What would Yeager make of all this?

Since Hannah had already told him so much—and still had a lot more to reveal—she said, “My father’s name was Stephen Linden. He died about twenty years ago. It was my recently deceased grandfather, Chandler Linden, who was looking for me and wanted to leave me the family fortune.”

Yeager studied her in silence for a moment. Then he said, “You’re Amanda Linden.”

She had thought he would remark on her grandfather’s identity, not hers. But she guessed she shouldn’t be surprised by his knowing about Amanda’s disappearance, too, since so many others did.

“You know about that,” she said.

He chuckled. “Hannah, everyone knows about that. Any kid who was ever curious about unsolved crimes has read about the disappearance of Amanda Linden and her mother.” He lifted a shoulder and let it drop. “When I was in middle school, I wanted to be a private investigator. I was totally into that stuff.”

“Yeah, well, I wasn’t,” she said. “I had no idea any of this happened. Let alone that it happened to me.”

She took another sip of her drink and was surprised by how much she liked the taste. Since Yeager had ordered it, it was doubtless the best this place had. Maybe her Linden genes just had a natural affinity for the finer things in life. She sipped her drink again.

“So you were destined for a life of wealth and privilege,” Yeager said, “and instead, you grew up in the New York foster care system.”

“Yep.”

“And how was that experience?”

Hannah dropped her gaze to her drink, dragging her finger up and down the side of the glass. “It wasn’t as terrible as what some kids go through,” she said. “But it wasn’t terrific, either. I mean a couple of times I landed in a really good place, with really good people. But just when I started to think maybe I’d found a spot where I fit in and could be reasonably happy for a while, I always got yanked out and put somewhere else where I didn’t fit in and wasn’t particularly happy.”

She glanced up to find that he was looking at her as if she were some interesting specimen under a microscope. A specimen he couldn’t quite figure out. So she returned her attention to her glass.

“That was the worst part, you know?” she continued. “Never feeling like I belonged anywhere. Never feeling like I had a real home or a real family. Now I know that I could have and should have—that I actually did have—both. The irony is that if I’d grown up as Amanda Linden, with all her wealth and privilege, I would have had a terrifying father who beat up my mother and very well could have come after me. Foster care was no picnic, but I was never physically abused. Dismissed and belittled, yeah. Neglected, sure. But never harmed. As Amanda, though...”

She didn’t finish the statement. She didn’t dare. She didn’t even want to think about what kind of life she might have lived if her mother hadn’t rescued her from it. What kind of life her mother had endured for years before her daughter’s safety had compelled her to run.

“Some people would argue that neglect and belittlement are harm,” Yeager said softly.

“Maybe,” she conceded. “But I’d rather be neglected and belittled and shuffled around and have nothing to my name than live in the lap of luxury and go through what my mother must have gone through to make her escape the way she did. I just wish she’d had more time to enjoy her life once she got it back.”

And Hannah wished she’d had more time herself to get to know her mother. Mary Robinson, formerly Alicia Linden, might very well have saved her daughter’s life—both figuratively and literally. Yet Hannah had no way to thank her.

“Your grandfather, Chandler Linden, was a billionaire,” Yeager said in the same matter-of-fact tone he’d been using all night.

Hannah’s stomach pitched to have the knowledge she’d been carrying around in her head all evening spoken aloud. Somehow, having it out in the open like that made it so much more real. Her heart began to thunder again and her vision began to swim. Hyperventilation would come next, so she enjoyed another, larger, taste of her drink in an effort to stave it off.

“Yeah,” she said quietly when she set her glass on the table. “He was.”

“Which means that now you’re a billionaire,” Yeager said in the same casual tone.

Oh, boy. There went her stomach again. “Well, I could be a billionaire,” she told him.

“Could be?” he echoed. “You said your grandfather bequeathed his entire estate to you. What are they waiting on? A DNA test?”

“Mr. Fiver took a sample of my saliva while we were talking,” she said. “But that’s just a formality for the courts. There’s no question I’m Amanda. I didn’t just inherit my father’s unique eye color. I also have a crescent-shaped birthmark on my right shoulder blade that shows up with some regularity in the Linden line. And, yes, my grandfather wants his entire estate to go to me. But there are certain...terms...of his will that need to be met before I can inherit.”

“What kind of terms?”

Hannah threw back the rest of her drink in one long gulp. Before her glass even hit the table, Yeager was lifting a hand to alert the bartender that they wanted another round. He even pointed at Hannah and added, “Make hers a double.”

Hannah started to tell him that wouldn’t be necessary. Then she remembered her grandfather’s demands again and grabbed Yeager’s drink, downing what was left of it, too. She would need all the false courage she could get if she was going to actually talk about this. Especially with someone like Yeager.

Once the whiskey settled in her stomach—woo, that warmth was starting to feel really good—she did her best to gather her thoughts, even though they all suddenly wanted to go wandering off in different directions. And she did her best to explain.

“Okay, so, as rich as the Lindens have always been,” she said, “they weren’t particularly, um, fruitful. I’m the last of the line. My father was an only child, and he didn’t remarry before his death. My grandfather’s sister never married or had children. Their father had twin brothers, but they both died from influenza before they were even teenagers. The Linden family tree prior to that had been growing sparser and sparser with each ensuing generation, so I’m all that’s left of them.”

Her thoughts were starting to get a little fuzzy, so Hannah drew in another long breath and let it go. There. That was better. Kind of. Where was she? Besides about to have a panic attack? Oh, right. The dried-up Linden family tree.

“Anyway...” She started again. “I guess my grandfather was sort of horrified by the idea that the world would no longer be graced with the Linden family presence—we were, I have learned, some of the best fat cats and exploiters of the proletariat out there—so he tied some strings to my inheritance.”

“What kind of strings?” Yeager asked.

“Well, actually it’s only one string,” she told him. “A string that’s more like a rope. A rope that’s tied into a noose.”

He was starting to look confused. She felt his pain.

“Hannah, I think I can safely say that I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

She tried again. “My grandfather included a condition I’ll have to meet before I can inherit the family fortune. He wanted to make sure that I, um, further the Linden line.”

“Further the line?”

She nodded. Then nodded some more. And then some more. Why couldn’t she stop nodding? And why did her head feel like it was beginning to disconnect from her body? With great effort, she stilled and tried to think of the most tactful way to tell Yeager how her grandfather had stipulated that, before she could inherit the piles and piles and piles of Linden moolah, she’d have to become a Linden baby factory.

Finally she decided on, “My grandfather has stipulated that, before I can inherit the piles and piles and piles of Linden moolah, I have to become a Linden baby factory.”

Yeager’s eyebrows shot up to nearly his hairline. “He wants you to procreate in order to inherit?”

Yeah, that would have been a much more tactful way to say it. Oh, well. “That’s exactly what he wants,” she said. “It’s what he demands. In order to inherit the family fortune, I have to either already be a mother or on my way to becoming one.”

“Can he do that?”

“Apparently so. The wording of his will was something along the lines of, if, when I was located after his death, I had a child or children, then no problem, here’s more money than you could have ever imagined having, don’t spend it all in one place.”

“But you don’t have a child or children,” Yeager pointed out.

“Nope.”

“So what happens in that case?”

“In that case, I have six months to get pregnant.”

Yeager’s eyebrows shot back up. “And what happens if you don’t get pregnant in six months?”

“Then aaaallllll the Linden money will go to charity and I’ll get a small severance package of fifty grand for my troubles, thanks so much for playing. Which, don’t get me wrong, would be great, and I’d be most appreciative, but...”

“It’s not billions.”

“Right.”

He opened his mouth to say something then closed it again. For another moment he studied her in silence. Then he said, “Well, that sucks.”

“Yeah.”

The bartender arrived with their drinks and Hannah immediately enjoyed a healthy swallow of hers.

“See, though,” she said afterward, “the problem isn’t with me having children. I’ve always planned on having kids someday. I want to have kids. I love kids. I wouldn’t even mind being a single mother, as long as I had the time and money to make sure I could do it right. Which, of course, I would, with billions of dollars. But to only have six months to make the decision and put it into action?”

“Actually, you don’t even have six months, if that’s the deadline,” Yeager said oh, so helpfully. “I mean, I’m no expert in baby-making—and thank God for that—but even I know it doesn’t always happen the first time. Or the second. Or the third. You’re going to need all the time you can get.”

Hannah closed her eyes at the reminder of what she already knew. “Thanks a lot, Grandpa. There’s nothing like the pressure of a ticking clock to bring a girl’s egg delivery to a crawl.”

She snapped her eyes open again. Oh, God, did she actually just say that out loud? When she heard Yeager chuckle, she realized she had. Then again, this whole situation was kind of comical. In an over-the-top, stranger-than-fiction, absolutely surreal kind of way.

She leaned forward and banged her head lightly against the table. In some part of her brain, she’d already realized that, if she wanted to inherit this money—and she very much wanted to inherit this money, since it would enable her to realize every dream she’d ever dreamed—she was going to have to make a decision fast and get herself in the family way as soon as possible.

But now that the rest of her brain was getting in on the action, she knew the prospects weren’t looking great. She had nothing remotely resembling a boyfriend. She didn’t even have a boy who was her friend. And only one attempt at in vitro was way beyond her financial means. She’d already checked that out, too.

Which left visits to a sperm bank, something she’d also been researching online tonight. If necessary, she could afford a few of those—barely—but if none of the efforts took, and she didn’t conceive by the six-month deadline, she would have drained what little savings she had. And fifty grand, although an impressive sum, wasn’t going to go far in New York City. These things came with no guarantees, especially if her anxiety about everything really did turn her eggs into the same kind of shrinking violets she was.

What Hannah needed was something that could counter her potentially diminished fertility. A super-tricked-out, ultra-souped-up, hypermasculine testosterone machine that could fairly guarantee to knock her up. And where the hell was she supposed to find a guy like—

She sat back up and looked at Yeager—and the super-tricked-out, ultra-souped-up, hypermasculine body that housed him. Talk about testosterone overload. The guy flew MiG 29s over the Russian tundra for kicks. He’d climbed Mt. Everest. Twice. He served himself up as shark bait on purpose, for God’s sake. The man probably produced enough testosterone for ten men. If he couldn’t put a woman in the family way, nobody could.

Maybe it was the wine. Maybe it was the whiskey. Maybe it was the wine followed by the whiskey. Or maybe it was just the unmitigated terror of having finally discovered who she was and where she belonged and everything she could attain. It wasn’t just the reclaiming of a life that had been denied her, but the promise of a happiness she never thought she would have—and realizing she could lose it all in the blink of an eye or the shrink of an egg.

And she heard herself saying, “So, Mr. Novak. Have you ever thought about donating your sperm to a good cause?”

* * *

Before he could stop himself, Yeager spat back into his glass a mouthful of whiskey, something that had never happened to him before. Then again, no one had ever asked him about his intentions for his sperm before, either, so he guessed he was entitled to this one social lapse.

As he wiped his chin with his napkin, he tried to tell himself he’d misheard Hannah’s question. “Excuse me?” he asked.

“Your sperm,” she said, enunciating the word more clearly this time. “Have you ever thought about donating it?”

So much for having misheard her. “Uh...no,” he said decisively.

She eyed him intently, her gaze never wavering from his. For a minute he thought she was going to drop it. Then she asked, “Well, would you think about it now?”

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