Free The Daddy Decision by Donna Sterling

don’t believe Laura will go to your house, and I’m not sure that she should. We’d better come up with a backup plan to slow her down until we can make her see how ridiculous her idea about parenthood really is. They’re skipping the love and marriage and going straight for the broken home!”
    He stared at the women, perversely amused. They’d both ignored the fact that he’d wished Laura and Fletcher luck with their parenting plan and assumed he disapproved. They were right, of course. He would foil that plan in any way he could. But he hadn’t realized that the effort would be part of a widespread conspiracy.
    â€œWhy don’t you think she’ll go, Tam?” Steffie asked.
    Tamika plied her with an incredulous stare. “You know as well as I do that she avoids men who show too much interest in her. She’s got some internal fire alarm. As soon as she detects serious heat...” she clicked her fingers and pointed at the door “...off she goes. In the opposite direction. ” Tamika slanted Cort a glance. “Take that as a warning, brother.”
    He frowned. He’d thought he’d been pretty damn subtle regarding his interest in Laura. “Did it occur to either one of you,” he said irritably, “that when I asked her to decorate my house, I had absolutely nothing in mind other than getting my house decorated?”
    They glanced at him with barely disguised smirks.
    So much for subtlety.

    â€œThe way you’ve been looking at her is enough to send the house up in flames,” Tamika retorted.
    â€œI was hoping Laura hadn’t noticed,” put in Steffie.
    â€œEven if she hasn’t and she goes to your house,” Tamika went on, “the plan could backfire. Time alone with you could send her rushing to that clinic and her date with a petri dish.”
    â€œThanks.” He dropped onto the bed and leaned his back against the headboard. How had he ever come to this? Competing with a damn petri dish!
    â€œAm I correct in assuming that you don’t want to see her pregnant by Fletcher any more than we do?” Tamika asked.
    The very possibility was making him sick. “I think it would be a mistake,” he cautiously admitted.
    â€œIt would be a disaster!” Steffie pronounced. “This is her way of slamming the door on romantic relationships. She’s made up her mind she doesn’t need a lover or a husband, but I believe she does.”
    â€œOf course she does,” Tamika agreed. “She hides it well, but deep down inside, she’s lonely. She needs a man, whether she realizes it or not.”
    â€œBut once she has that baby, she won’t date,” Steffie predicted. “She’ll use the baby as an excuse. Besides, I’m sure it’s harder for a woman with a child to find a man.”
    â€œAnd it won’t be beneficial for her child to be the center of her world,” Tamika added. “The situation won’t do Fletcher any good, either. He never had a mother of his own, and I believe he sees Laura as a mother figure. That can’t be healthy.”
    Cort almost scoffed at that. They might know something about Laura’s motivations, but they sure as hell weren’t reading Fletcher right. Fletcher wanted Laura tied to him
so he could lure her into his bed during a vulnerable moment.
    And Cort wasn’t about to let that happen. Although her parents’ chronic animosity toward each other had probably generated her mistrust of marriage, he may have caused, or at least contributed to, her gun-shy view of intimate relationships.
    He’d been cruel when he’d left her. Deliberately so. For her own good. She would have sustained much more damage if he hadn’t cut their ties. His crime had not been in ending his relationship with her, but in starting it.
    He now had to do whatever he could to repair the damage. He had to make her see that physical intimacy