The 7 Lb., 2 Oz. Valentine Read online

  Table of Contents

  Cover Page

  Excerpt

  Dear Reader

  Title Page

  Dedication

  About the Author

  Praise

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  Copyright

  Erin Collinss Surefire Plan To

  Get Her Man To Remember Her:

  Whip out the old albums. He can’t dispute photographic evidence.

  Ask him to move in…again. Maybe familiar surroundings will help jog his memory.

  On Valentine’s Day, deliver him a 7 lb., 2 oz. beautiful baby girl.

  WARNING: Amnesiac dads-to-be are

  especially hard to convince. Proceed with

  caution—and lots of love.

  Dear Reader,

  “What should I give my sweetheart for Valentine’s Day?” women ask as February 14 draws near. Bestselling author Marie Ferrarella offers a one-of-a-kind gift idea: The 7lb., 2 oz. Valentine—which is also book three of her wonderful cross-line series, THE BABY OF THE MONTH CLUB.

  In The 7 lb., 2 oz. Valentine, Erin Collins is a mom-to-be, but the unknowing dad-to-be hasn’t been seen in months. And when he does turn up, he doesn’t remember anything—let alone her! Next month, look for book four of THE BABY OF THE MONTH CLUB series in Silhouette Desire.

  Lori Herter, one of Yours Truly’s launch authors, presents her own valentine to you—How Much Is that Couple in the Window?—book one of her irresistible new miniseries, MILLION-DOLLAR MARRIAGES. Jennifer Westgate has to live in a department store’s display window with a make-believe husband—for an entire week of newly wedded bliss! Look for book two of this fun series in August.

  Next month, you’ll find two Yours Truly titles by JoAnn Ross and Martha Schroeder—two new novels about unexpectedly meeting, dating…and marrying Mr. Right!

  Happy Valentine’s Day!

  Editor

  Please address questions and book requests to:

  Silhouette Reader Service

  U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269

  Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

  The 7lb., 2oz. Valentine

  Marie

  Ferrarella

  To Jeannette Stacey,

  who was a

  7 lb., 2 oz. almost Valentine herself.

  Welcome to the world, Jeannette.

  about the author

  Hi!

  I’d say that we have to stop meeting like this, except that I love meeting like this. It means you’ve picked up another one of my books to read. This one comes in the middle of THE BABY OF THE MONTH CLUB series and centers around a simply worded personal ad: “Brady, come home. Love, Erin.” Simply worded things are usually the best. They go straight to the heart of a matter, and this did for me, when I thought of it.

  I’ve been writing (simply and otherwise), since I was eleven. But mentally, I’ve been spinning stories since I was old enough to string two sentences together. Television was a huge influence. For instance, did you know that the Cartwright boys of “Bonanza” had a sister? (That’s okay, they didn’t know it, either.) Her name was Kit. Marty of “Spin and Marty” had a sister (I can’t remember her name, so I guess she wasn’t very impressive.) Zorro had one, too, (Zora—I was very young at the time and not overly creative.) In each case, the heroine was feisty, brave and wonderful, and yes, she was me. Writing myself into the stories always made them that much more exciting for me.

  I never lost that time-worn tradition. A piece of me, of my heart, is in each heroine, each story, I write. That s why they’re always so special to me. So here I go again, offering you my heart wrapped up in a story of love lost and then found. I hope it succeeds in giving you a little pleasure.

  Love,

  Marie

  BRADY AND ERIN LOCKWOOD

  ARE

  PROUD TO

  ANNOUNCE THE

  BIRTH OF THEIR

  PERPETUAL

  VALENTINE,

  JAMIE

  1

  Brady, come home. I love you, Erin.

  Nerves that would have put a well-rehearsed chorus line to shame danced all through her, doing triple time. Erin fingered the ad she had placed in the personals column of the Times.

  Maybe touching it would bring her luck.

  The scrap of newspaper lay deep within her purse. It was the first of a series that had appeared faithfully in the newspaper four Fridays in succession. When she’d phoned the ad in, Erin had known that the odds against Brady’s even seeing it were incredibly small. The Brady Lockwood she knew never looked at such things.

  But desperation drives you down unorthodox avenues, and Erin Collins had been desperate. Desperate to find Brady, to see him just one more time. Not because he was the father of her unborn child, but because he was Brady and she loved him.

  She had to know that he was all right before she could go on with the rest of her life.

  So when the tall, dark policeman with the tonguetangling name had first called her, then walked into her flower shop holding the ad in his hand, Erin had looked upon it as nothing short of a miracle. But then, she was carrying a miracle inside of her, so she figured that in itself gave her the inside track on receiving another.

  Sergeant Augustus Tripopulous had politely asked her if she’d placed the ad. When she had replied, mystified, that she had, the sergeant told her about the mugging victim he’d brought into the station house some five months earlier. And then he’d brought her here, to his sister’s restaurant.

  But not before Erin had gotten his uniform shirt wet with tears of utter relief.

  Gus didn’t even have to tell her about the St. Christopher’s medallion around the victim’s neck. He barely had to get into his story before Erin was certain that he had found Brady. In her heart, she just knew it. Or maybe if she believed enough, it would happen.

  He’d cautioned her not to get her hopes up too high, but after all these bleak months of not knowing, Erin clung to that dizzying hope like a shipwreck survivor to a branch of driftwood that had passed within reach. She refused to even entertain the possibility that it wasn’t her Brady.

  Stopping only to collect the album of photographs Gus suggested she bring, she had left with him immediately. Somehow, even immediately seemed slow after waiting all this time.

  It was only as she entered the restaurant that her nerves suddenly took over, threatening to undo the last threads of her composure. The aroma of Greek cuisine in Aphrodite’s swirled all around her. Normally, that would have been enough to nudge her healthy appetite into second gear. But this afternoon, she moved like someone in a trance as Gus led her to a booth.

  What if it wasn’t him, after all?

  Erin didn’t think she could stand it if she was disappointed again.

  He knew his name, but only his first name and that only because the policeman who had found him that hollow August evening he’d marked as the first day of the rest of his life had noticed the St. Christopher’s medal around his neck.

  “To Brady. Love, Erin.”

  That was all it said. The inscription was faded, rubbed smooth against his skin by the passing of days. That meant he’d had it for a while. The medallion was the only clue to the man he had been and the life he had had. The life he no longer remembered, thanks to a blow to his head. The scar had formed just below his hairline.

  Brady didn’t even know how he had gotten the injury, but given the condition Gus had found him in, a safe guess was that he had been mugged. The slight tan line on his left wris
t and right ring finger showed that the mugger had not only made off with Brady’s wallet, but his watch and ring, as well.

  He’d made off with a great deal more than that, Brady thought in frustration as he piled the dishes from the rear table onto a tray. The man had made off with his identity.

  For five months, Brady had lived in a vacuum, stepping out into each day enshrouded in a fog.

  Tray in hand, Brady turned and saw Gus entering the restaurant. He was ushering in a very pregnantlooking redhead. Moving with the ease of someone in his second home, Gus walked toward table five. He had his hand on the redhead’s arm. Brady noted that she wasn’t looking where she was going. Instead, the woman was looking intently in his direction.

  She was probably hungry, he mused, especially given her condition. He hoped she wasn’t in the mood for the specialty of the house. They were all out of that. The lunch crowd had been particularly heavy this afternoon, but Brady didn’t mind the hectic pace. He liked keeping busy. And with each person who entered Aphrodite’s, Brady figured that his chances increased of seeing someone he might have once known. He hoped that when that happened, it would jar his dormant memory.

  So far, nothing.

  Table five was his station. Dropping off the tray of dishes on the water-slick conveyor belt that fed into the steam room, Brady took his pad and pencil out of his apron and made his way over to table five to see what Gus and his companion would have.

  He was coming toward them. Erin’s heart lurched and lodged in her mouth.

  This was ridiculous. Her stomach was tied in a huge knot, barely allowing her to catch her breath. Why did she feel so nervous? It wasn’t as if Brady was a stranger who she was meeting for the first time. He’d just acted like a stranger, dropping out of her life.

  Out of everyone’s life, she amended. But that was something she hadn’t discovered until three weeks after the fact. She had only her own stubborn pride to blame for that. It was that same stubborn pride that had prevented her from going to Brady’s apartment or his place of work, looking for him, until the trail was completely cold. No one knew where he was, or what had happened to him. All anyone knew was that he had gone to St. Louis on business—and disappeared.

  Just as he’d threatened, Erin thought. His last words echoed again in her mind the way they did almost every day. Maybe it would be better all around if I just stayed in St. Louis. And then the door had slammed, cutting him out of her life. She’d had no way of knowing then for how long.

  There was no family to turn to when he had disappeared. Brady didn’t have any. And there were no clues to go on except that Brady Lockwood wasn’t the kind of person who would just disappear without a word, even in the heat of anger.

  Certainly there were no clues in his apartment to his sudden vanishing act. The only things missing were his suitcase and the few items he had packed for his trip. Everything within the modest one-bedroom home looked as if it were waiting for him to return.

  Just the way she was.

  The policeman in St. Louis who had taken down her statement when she’d finally flown there and reported Brady missing had looked at her with a kindly, knowing expression. She knew what he thought. That Brady had decided a pregnant girlfriend was more than he wanted to commit to and had very conveniently vanished. Though his words had been couched in gentle euphemisms, the policeman had suggested as much. After all, it wasn’t that unusual an occurrence.

  Indignantly, Erin had informed the officer that Brady hadn’t known anything about her condition when he’d disappeared. She was sorry she had even mentioned that fact in her statement. At three months, she still hadn’t looked pregnant.

  The simple fact of the matter was that they’d had an argument, a heated one, and Brady had gone out, leaving her Bedford condo to cool off. Angry, stung and in a dilemma because the argument had been about having children, she hadn’t bothered to ask Brady if he was coming back that evening. Instead, she had turned her back on him and for once had maintained her silence.

  Over and over again in the next five months she’d upbraided herself for that.

  Why hadn’t she asked? Why hadn’t she gone after him? Because she had been too damn stubborn, that was why. And now she was paying for it. Dearly.

  Initially, when Brady hadn’t returned, she’d assumed he had just gone on with his trip the next day. When he didn’t call her, the way he normally did when he was away, she thought he was still angry. It was unlike him, and it worried her.

  Brady didn’t call while he was away, nor did he call her when he supposedly returned two weeks later. She had alternated between being upset and angry. Erin had thought the same thing that the questioning policeman had. That Brady had decided their relationship and her mercurial temper were not worth the trouble.

  He had no way of knowing that her temper was on a roller-coaster ride because her hormones had gone out of whack, adjusting to her new condition.

  She hadn’t wanted to believe he’d just dumped her without a word, but everything had pointed to that. It was only after she finally broke down and called him at work that she’d learned they hadn’t heard from him since he left for his trip. She had become really alarmed and had contacted the police in St. Louis.

  So now, here she sat in a restaurant opposite a policeman who claimed he had found Brady wandering the streets, her nerves playing havoc with her as she watched the man she loved coming toward her without an iota of recognition in his eyes.

  Erin sipped water from an amber glass to soothe the dryness in her throat. She could have drank a river, and it wouldn’t have helped.

  Though she prayed it was Brady, until this very moment, Erin couldn’t quite get herself to believe the policeman’s story about finding a mugging victim not far from where she lived. For one thing, muggings in her neighborhood were basically unheard of. Bedford was a peaceful city where people could walk the streets at night in safety. For another, the whole story about an amnesiac seemed like something that would happen in the pages of a book or in the movie of the week, not in her life.

  Of course, if Brady had had amnesia, it would explain a great deal. He hadn’t just left her of his own free will. She took solace in that.

  And she needed solace right now because the look in Brady’s blue eyes told her that this kind of thing didn’t just happen on TV. It was happening to her.

  “Hi, Gus, how’s it going?”

  The smile on Brady’s face was one of warmth for the man he considered his partial savior. Gus had reached out to him at a time when he’d desperately needed to make contact with someone. When he had come to in that alley, everything about his life had been a complete blank.

  For the most part, it still was. Brady knew, without knowing how, that he liked the color blue. But very little else had returned to him. At an age when men were getting to know people around them with more insight, fostering relationships with women who were in tune with their own likes and dislikes, Brady was stumbling around in the dark, trying to get to know himself.

  “I’m fine, Brady,” Gus answered carefully. “And I’ll have the usual. How about you, Erin?”

  The woman named Erin looked at Brady with a strange expression on her face. It was so pained and confused, it prompted him to ask, “Is something wrong, miss? I mean ma’am,” he quickly amended in deference to her condition.

  Yes, everything. Oh God, it’s true. It was all true. Everything the policeman had told her was true.

  Still, she hoped the sound of her voice would shatter that polite, distant look in Brady’s eyes. “Brady?”

  The woman’s voice was light, reminding him of chimes swaying in the summer breeze. Where had that come from, he wondered suddenly, clinging to the snippet of a memory. He remembered chimes. Whose chimes? His? His family’s? Damn. It was so frustrating, reaching out and trying to grasp something, only to have it turn into air in his hand.

  Brady turned his attention back to the woman at the table. She knew his name. Did she know him? Or ha
d Gus told her about finding him?

  “Yes?”

  There was no familiar note in his voice. He might as well have been talking to a stranger. Erin bit her lip. Brady’s memory was really gone. It wasn’t an act. The Brady she knew couldn’t have put on a performance to save his life. What you saw was what you got.

  She tried again, silently praying for yet another miracle. Just one more, please. “Brady, don’t you know me?”

  He wanted to. Oh, God, he wanted to know someone, something, a link to take him out of this vapid world he found himself so lost in.

  But she didn’t look familiar, although the scent she wore tickled something very, very far away, something he couldn’t quite catch hold of.

  Brady shook his head slowly. “No, I’m sorry, but I don’t.”

  Erin covered her mouth and took a deep breath. Gus had warned her when he’d told her about Brady’s condition that it wasn’t going to be easy. That was why he had suggested she bring the photo album with her.

  She placed her hand on top of it now, as if it could somehow act as a talisman. She’d found Brady. Now she needed to have him find her.

  Confused, struggling with frustration, Brady looked at Gus for some sort of clarification.

  Gus nodded his head. He gestured to the space beside him in the booth. “Why don’t you sit down and join us?” After a moment’s pause, Brady did. “I think we finally might have a last name for you, Brady.”

  Brady looked from the man who was his friend to the woman whose green eyes shimmered with a coating of tears. Eagerness nipped at him. “What is it?”

  “Lockwood,” Erin whispered, afraid that her voice would break if she spoke any louder. “Your name is Brady Lockwood.”