Bryson (Members From Money Season 2, #165)

Chapter 1

She was pregnant.

The words sounded inside her brain like a death knell, clanging and haunting and refusing to be quiet. Those three words had been on the brink of her mind for the past two weeks. They could no longer be ignored.

She stared at her reflection in the mirror, horrified at how haggard she looked.

She had been in the middle of typing up a contract when she felt the queasiness that had her running to the bathroom.

She made it just in time. The salad wrap she had hastily consumed for lunch had come right back out, not to mention the coffee and donut she had for breakfast that morning.

She felt empty, hollowed out and sick to her stomach.

She should have noticed that her body was changing.

She had felt the tenderness of her nipples at the slightest touch and of course the dizziness, the awful fatigue that had her going to bed at the abnormal hour of eight at night.

But she had chalked it up to stress and emotional despair.

It had been two months since she had decided to call it quits with the relationship and she was still reeling from the parting.

Lifting a hand, she pressed it against her throat and then her lips. She couldn't think about it now, she decided firmly. She had a meeting to attend and things to do.

She had just splashed cold water on her face when the knock sounded on the door.

"Yes?"

"Ms. Merrywood, they're waiting for you in the conference room." Her secretary's voice sounded harried, reminding Julianne that she had spent more than ten minutes in the facility.

"I'll be right out." Hauling the makeup case from her oversized purse, she did what she could to repair the damage.

It will have to do, she mused. Her eyes still looked overbright, but at least, she did not look as if she was on her last. Her stomach was still queasy and her knees felt weak, but she would manage. She had to. Lifting her chin, she tucked the makeup kit back into the purse and made her way out.

"What are you planning to do?"

"Kill myself!"

"What's your second choice?" Brian asked her mildly, light green eyes twinkling.

"Face facts and go and get an official ruling from a qualified doctor."

"Christ, you always sound like a bloody lawyer," he grumbled.

"That's because I am." She reached for her Virgin Mary and took a sip, eyeing his cocktail with a resentful expression on her face.

They were having drinks and then dinner at the popular rooftop bar and grill.

The dinner crowd consisted of mostly working-class people, lawyers, doctors, and a few executives in the mix.

They had been given the corner booth because they were both regulars, and Brian happened to have an interest in the place.

Brian Lewis had his hands in almost every pie in town, including the law firm where she worked as a commercial lawyer.

He was her best friend from high school and was always there for her.

Julianne never knew her dad, who had run off when she was just three years old, leaving her mother to bring her up on her own.

"You'll have to tell him, honey," Brian added in his deep, reasonable tone of voice.

"I was hoping you would not say that."

"I hate the bastard for what he did to you and not standing up to that shrewish mother of his, but the fact is you're carrying the heir of a man of substance," he pointed out reasonably. "He has to know."

"Please don't say heir," she muttered, taking another sip of her drink. "And you can say, 'I told you so.'"

"I already did," he reminded her, lips parting to reveal his white teeth.

Brian could have been a model and had dabbled in the art when he was in his early twenties.

With his burnished blonde hair and light green eyes, he turned heads wherever he went.

People often had the impression that he and Julianne were a couple until they realized that he was decidedly gay.

"When do you leave for McNab Crossing?" he asked with raised brows.

"I haven't decided yet."

"You're going to have to take a leave of absence."

"And ruin my chances of becoming partner.

" That was what was killing her most of all.

She had left the law firm before because she had foolishly fallen in love with a handsome cowboy.

Bryson McNab had swept her off her feet the very first time they met at the cocktail party Brian had thrown for some charity event.

From the first time their eyes met in the crowd, something had clicked between them.

For the first time in her life, Julianne had thrown caution to the wind and gone to bed with him at the penthouse suite he was staying in.

She had spent the entire weekend with him.

When the two days were over, he had asked her to quit her job and go home with him.

She had balked at the idea at first, refusing to do anything so reckless, but he had continued coming for visits and eventually broken down her resistance that had been shaky in the first place.

She had spent a year at McNab Crossing, the quaint town owned by his family where he had inherited the ranch and everything else when his father died of a heart attack five years ago.

She had been overwhelmed by the magnificence, the sheer elegance and the power that had not been evident when she was with him at first. But it had become painfully obvious to her that Brian was right.

She had no idea what she had been up against.

She probably could have managed to adjust, but his mother had made it extremely difficult for her.

Barbara McNab had not been outrightly disapproving of the match and the African-American girl her son had foisted on her without notice.

Oh no, the woman had been pleasant and welcoming before her son's eyes.

As long as Bryson was in the room, the woman had been the perfect hostess.

Julianne had tried to be friendly with the woman she had hoped was going to be her mother-in-law, to no avail.

Barbara had different plans for her son and that certainly did not include some black woman from out of town.

Julianne had tried to tell Bryson, but his mother had always been there for him and he loved her.

Besides, he had never seen any indication that Julianne was treated badly.

Julianne had stuck it out for as long as she could, until she couldn't. The parting had been painful with them both saying things to hurt each other.

From the very beginning, their relationship had been volatile, with them arguing and making love in a feverish frenzy that often left them gasping for breath and frightened at the intensity and power of their coupling.

She had left the ranch one early morning, with the painful image of Bryson riding off to attend to his duties after instructing one of his men to take her to the airport.

Her hopes that when he had calmed down enough, he would come and find her had been dashed.

It had not been quite a month before she noticed that he was seeing someone else.

The proof had been in the tabloids. There had been photos of a party at his club, with a blonde clinging to him and smiling.

The blonde was someone she had seen at the ranch and was a friend of the family.

"Honey?"

Shaking off the painful memories, she forced herself to concentrate on her best friend and attempted to smile.

"Yes?"

"When will you leave?"

"I haven't said I would."

He quirked a brow at her as he fished for his olive and popped it into his mouth. "I could make my plane available for the trip and accompany you to make sure you're all right."

And he would too, Julianne mused with an inward smile. Brian had always been there for her, and she had never taken his friendship for granted.

"Thanks," she told him warmly, reaching over to cover his hand with hers. "But this is something I have to do on my own. And I won't be taking a leave of absence."

He frowned at her. "Whatever do you mean?"

"I love my job." She lifted her chin determinedly.

"I will do Bryson the courtesy of not telling him the news over the phone, but I will be flying back and resuming my life.

We will come to some arrangements concerning the baby and go our separate ways.

He's involved with someone." She managed to say it without choking but Brian was not fooled.

As a best friend, he had been witness to the intense passion between them and had been the one to try and console her when she returned heartbroken.

Besides which, the McNabs were a powerful family and there was no way in hell the man was going to allow her to part ways again, not while she was carrying his baby.

"What?"

"You're fooling yourself," he told her mildly. Waiting until their salads had been placed in front of them, he continued. "Bryson McNab is not going to allow you to leave."

"He has no choice." Briskly attacking her meal, she ignored the tremors going through her body. "And it's my life and I intend to live it as I damn well please."

Bryson Ian McNab sat straight in the saddle of his magnificent thoroughbred mare, shoulder-length dark hair blowing in the wind, a brooding expression on his harsh, handsome face.

His skin was darkened to a golden brown color by the sun, the elements creating creasing lines at the corners of his emerald green eyes.

His nose had a slight uneven hook to the bridge, having been broken when he was merely a child of ten, thrown off a particularly mean-spirited horse he was trying to break in.

He was the owner of several thousand acres of land and master of all he surveyed.

The Circle M ranch had been in his family for generations and had been passed down to him on the death of his father five years ago.

He had taken over seamlessly, because he had been training for the role for as long as he could remember.