He’d tried to hide his dislike for his sister-in-law from Tamara. Evidently he’d failed.

“I request that Dena act as surrogate mother and carry to term one of my embryos, fertilized by Alexander Chandler.”

“What?” Shock cracked Alex’s leaden wall of grief.

Dena jerked upright, as though zapped with a live cattle prod. “As if I don’t have enough problems already,” she murmured.

Alex reluctantly sympathized. With four-year-old twins and their disappearing father, Dena’s plate was full.

Her green eyes widened with bewilderment. “Did you know this was coming, Alex?”

He shook his head. “Tamara changed her will shortly after she was diagnosed. At the time, I didn’t know what she did, and I didn’t care. I was focused on her chemo, hoping she’d recover.” Alex frowned. He’d worshiped his wife, but knew that sweet, well-meaning Tamara had also been manipulative and very, very smart. What on earth had she planned? Why?

“Well, I…I can’t.” Dena placed a hand on her stomach, as if caressing an imaginary pregnancy. “I know Tamara wanted a baby, but…I just can’t bear a child and then walk away. Not even for Tami. Maybe you can find someone else, Alex.”

He breathed deeply, striving for calmness in the face of sudden chaos. He’d do anything to make his wife’s dreams a reality, however distasteful Dena Randolph might be. Why didn’t she feel the same commitment to Tamara’s memory?

“Further,” the attorney continued, “I bequeath my one-half ownership of said embryos to Dena Randolph with the specific instruction that only Dena be implanted with them.”

Dena went white, pale cheeks contrasting with her Titian-red hair. Alex couldn’t blame her. He felt faint himself. What had Tamara done? She’d snared them both. Now he and Dena owned the precious embryos.

“For medical costs, Dena’s support during the pregnancy, and for the support of the baby, I hereby provide the sum of three hundred thousand dollars, to be managed by Alexander Chandler.”

Dena blinked. Then blinked again, trying to reconnect with reality. Interiors by Tamara, her sister’s business, must have been lucrative. But Dena’s world revolved around her kids, not money.

She’d opened her mouth to turn it down flat when the attorney said, “In addition, I hereby bequeath the sum of two hundred thousand dollars to be held by Dena for the benefit of Miriam and Jackson Randolph, my beloved niece and nephew.”

Dena sagged in her chair. Tamara had known Dena would dig ditches with her teeth for her children, if necessary. But she wouldn’t have to, not with this generous bequest. The funds would pay for cars and college, maybe even help buy them homes, luxuries her small landscaping business could never support.

Tamara had adored the kids, so no strings were attached to the trust. But Dena’s conscience wouldn’t let her rest if she didn’t ponder her sister’s last request. How could she repay such generosity with a refusal to grant Tami’s dying wish?

Could she resist the money, which would provide so much for her sweet darlings?

Dena sucked in a deep breath, then peeked at Alex Chandler. With every blond hair in place, he sat rigidly, as if a poker had been shoved up his…

Yes, she could resist. Dena didn’t want Alex, the android accountant, in her life. Eyeing him, she hesitated. “I won’t have to sleep with you, will I?” She’d rather snuggle with a cyborg.

A glimmer of a smile twitched Alex’s set lips. “I don’t think so. Our fertilized embryos are stored at her gynecologist’s office. He defrosts them, implants a couple, and away we go.” He gestured, exposing a perfectly starched French cuff secured by onyx links.

Dena dropped her head into her hands, digging her fingers through her hair. “I can’t believe it. What if one of us says no?”

“No baby, and Tamara loses her lifelong dream.”

“Oh, no,” Dena moaned. Tears burned behind lids already swollen from crying. She fumbled for a tissue. “Oh, Tami. Why me?”

Alex flicked imaginary lint from his immaculate, pinstriped sleeve. Not a shred of emotion showed on his too-handsome face. “You’re her half sister and, in her opinion, a great mother. She remarked often that she admired how easily you carried the twins.”

“That’s true. It was pretty easy, considering everything.” Considering that Dena had been dumped by her cheating ex-husband, for whom Lamaze was something a mouse ran through to get cheese. She winced. “But another child? I have my hands full already.”

“It wouldn’t be your child, Dena, but mine. Tamara trusted you to carry our baby to term and then give him up for me to raise.” Alex’s blue eyes gleamed, vivid and intense.

“I’m not a—a brood mare. I don’t know if I can have a child and give it up.” Dena couldn’t keep a tremble out of her voice.

“You have to,” Alex said. “This was your sister’s last wish. How can you say no?”

Six months later

On a chilly, bright March day, Alex sat in his attorney’s office, waiting for Dena Randolph. She was late—as usual. If Tamara hadn’t selected her half sister as their surrogate mother, Alex would have found someone more punctual.

Alex sipped stale coffee and tried to squelch his irritation. Had Dena shown up on time, the meeting would have concluded during his lunch hour. More than anything else, Alex wanted to go back to his office, bury himself in his work and forget how much he still missed Tamara.

Attorney Gary Kagan passed a sheaf of papers across his desk to Alex. “You can review the contract while we wait for Ms. Randolph.”

Alex skimmed the closely typed pages. He’d wanted a contract so Dena would understand her place in the scheme of things. Dena, interfering and bossy, had off-beat ideas about child-rearing.

And her kids…Alex grimaced. He loved his niece and nephew, but the four-year-olds always seemed to be sticky, dirty, lost or in trouble. They were hardly poster children for Dena’s parenting style.

Alex flipped through the pages. He saw everything he’d requested: the clauses stating what Dena had to do during the pregnancy, and what she couldn’t do after the baby was born—namely, have unsupervised contact with his child or control over it. Gary had taken several months to draft what looked like a complex document.

“What happens if she doesn’t sign it?” Alex asked.

Gary shrugged. “Both of you own the embryos, see? If she doesn’t sign it, you don’t cooperate. If you don’t cooperate, no baby, and Tamara’s dream dies right here.”

Alex frowned. “That’s rather blunt.”

“That’s life. Let me tell you—”

A loud pop interrupted Gary.

Alex’s body involuntarily jerked. “Hey, are there gangbangers around here?” he asked his attorney.

“Only at night.”

The chug of an overtaxed engine vibrated through the window. Alex cautiously scrambled over to the glass, then peeked through the pane.

Peering past a clipped hedge, he could see a battered yellow pickup, with fanciful vines and flowers painted on it in vivid rainbow colors. Dena’s Gardens was stenciled in purple on the door. Dena’s pickup backfired again as she reversed into a nearby parking space. Black smoke billowed from the muffler. Alex wondered if the pickup complied with California’s strict antismog laws. Probably not, knowing Dena.

He raised his brows. “Guess who.”

Gary joined Alex at the window. “She really ought to replace that old clunker pretty soon.”

“She’d better. I won’t have the mother of my child riding around in that piece of junk. It looks dangerous.”

The door of the truck squealed as Dena opened it. Hinges need oil or something, Alex thought. He kept some in the trunk of his car. He’d take care of that squeak before she left.

Alex watched Dena climb down from the cab of the truck. Her faded jeans had dirt ground into the knees. She wore heavy work boots. He winced.