Chapter 18---Updated this story again. Hope you enjoy reading it and thanks for the comments!

Matt read the inscription again to make sure he had gotten it right. Prenatal vitamins take twice a day as needed. No, what he had read was what had been printed on the bottle.

Different emotions inundated his mind at once. If a woman took prenatal vitamins then that meant…and if he had slept with that woman say about two months or so ago… then he had hit a bull's eye. And he had done that with the woman he had loved all of his life even if he had been too foolish to admit it.

He walked out of the Brick still holding onto the bottle with that realization in his mind. That C.J. had gotten pregnant on that last night they had spent together, with his child. The plethora of emotions only grew further and nearly knocked him off his feet. No mean feat for a tall, strongly built Texan who usually kept his boot clad feet clearly on the ground. But while joy intermixed with fear which intermixed with a trace of sadness that his father weren't alive to meet his first grandchild, his heart sank when he realized that C.J had kept the news a secret from him. That he had to find out about his own child thorough the bottle that C.J. had accidently left behind.

"Are you okay Matt," a woman asked.

He looked up to see Ruth Ann about to enter into the restaurant. Matt recovered quickly, his heart slowing down its rhythm.

"I'm fine," he said, "I was just on my way down to your store…"

She smiled at him.

"Just walk right in and help yourself to whatever you need," she said, "I've got some hot tea ready."

Matt knew he needed something a hell of a lot stronger than tea but he nodded and thanked her for her generosity.

She left him then and he continued on towards the general store, to fax some more invoices which was the last thing he wanted to do right now. That's definitely not what his instincts directed him to do, but as much as he wanted to go find C.J. and confront her with her prenatal vitamins, he knew he had to wait until she returned. He had a ton of questions he wanted to ask her about her pregnancy and how she felt about it. And why she hadn't told him the most important news of his life.

C.J. sat with an elderly woman inside her living room, filled with relics of her travels throughout the world. Even at 90, she still traveled when the weather was nice but had given up wintering in some warmer spot of the Lower 48. Nothing felt better to her than her own home.

Ed had been filming the house including the decorative parlor which adjoined the living room of the old house that had witnessed the creation of so many memories in this woman's life. Her children had grown and moved away to create families of their own but still kept an eye on her and her on them. She had carefully removed a stack of photo albums and had thumbed through each worn page to show off her family tree.

C.J. fingered a photo worn around the edges of a baby, taken at the turn of the century.

"That's my older sister," the woman said, "but she died in 1918 of that Spanish Flu. It took so many young lives. That was in New England before my father moved us here."

"It sounds fascinating," C.J. said, "Coming here as a young girl and starting a new life."

The woman's smile widened.

"Like an adventure," she said, "Of course we had our tough times too."

C.J. nodded, looking at the album.

"When are you due," the woman asked.

The question startled her almost out of her chair.

"Oh…about five and a half months."

"You'll start to fill out soon," the woman said, "I hope you have clothes."

C.J. smiled.

"I'm fine," she said, "The people of Cicely have really been looking out for me."

The older woman furrowed her brow, creating more wrinkles which lined her face.

"I hope the feller who is responsible is taking good care of you."

C.J. looked away for a moment.

"Well he is, isn't he?"

C.J. sighed.

"He doesn't know yet."

The woman put her hands on her hips.

"Doesn't know," she said, "Why not? Of course if he waits long enough, he'll figure it out on his own."

C.J. shook her head.

"It's a long story," she said, "and you might think, a rather strange one."

The woman harrumphed.

"I'm 90 years old and there's next to nothing I haven't heard in my life."

C.J. hedged, thinking that maybe the woman had in her long life heard of a man who got a woman pregnant, then died and then came back to life. She decided not to push her luck and just smiled instead.

"Maybe next time," she said, sipping the herbal tea.

The woman didn't press for more information and C.J. sat back in the chair and closed her eyes for a bit allowing her mind to wander. Most of the fatigue that had marked the earlier weeks of her pregnancy had faded but she still felt tired sometimes. The woman didn't say anything more perhaps content to let her rest a bit in her chair until Ed finished filming.

But C.J.'s mind kept working, trying to decide when she would tell Matt the truth about her pregnancy. He had the right to know and to decide whether or not he would play a role in his child's life. C.J. knew she had no problems there as Matt wouldn't want to be apart from his flesh and blood. While growing up, he had always wished for a brother or sister, having been raised an only child. She smiled to herself, imagining the joy on his face when he learned the news but would he understand why she hadn't told him sooner? She guessed she would find out when she told him, which would be tonight when he picked her up to take her home after the girl's night out at the spa. She would make sure that he sat down first before she shared it with him.

Matt listened to the voice on the other end of the phone.

"Murray, just calm down," he said, "I'll fax the other invoices to you later this afternoon."

"The board meeting is first thing after lunch," Murray said.

"Give them what I just sent you and tell them you'll fax the rest later," Matt said, "I've got some things to take care of before I can send the rest."

Murray hedged.

"Well maybe I can postpone it a day," he said, "and keep the new clients happy."

"You do that Murray," Matt said, "and I'll get the rest of the invoices out first thing tomorrow morning."

Murray seemed to be satisfied with that response and hung up. Matt clicked off his phone and went back to work, trying to keep his focus on his business rather than his personal life.

C.J. and Ed headed back towards the Brick to get some lunch and she wasn't surprised to see Matt waiting for her sitting in a booth in the back. She headed back to sit with him, after taking off her coat.

"Did you order yet," she asked.

He looked at her carefully, as she took a seat and picked up a menu. She looked as she always had, beautiful and curvy in the right places but no wait, something had been different about her, he just hadn't known what but now that mystery had been solved.

"No," he said, "I just got here after getting off the phone with Murray."

"How is he anyway?"

"Running the business smooth as silk."

She nodded, trusting the company president to do just that.

"I know it's hard for you to be away from all that," she said, "But he's great at his job and he'll take great care of your company."

"What about you," he asked, "You miss any of that?"

She shrugged and he watched her become more reflective.

"Sometimes," she said, "But I don't think I was ever really a city girl."

"You didn't want to move out to L.A.?"

She looked over at him, with a smile.

"No, no," she said, "I wanted to go with you and make the corporation a success and we did that."

"I couldn't have done it without you."

She smiled at that and clasped her hands together on the table.

"I know," she said, "But things are different now."

Matt reached into his pocket and pulled out the prescription bottle, setting it on the table between them.

"I know."

C.J. didn't need to look at the bottle to know that it contained her vitamins that Joel had prescribed for her. He raised her brows at her for an answer to the question he hadn't asked out loud.

"Houston," she said simply.

Emotion threatened to overwhelm him but he kept himself in check, barely.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

She looked at him, at a loss for words. Not that she hadn't anticipated this moment or imagined how it would play out many times but when faced with it, her mind had gone blank. The pain of having believed she had lost him returned as if it had never left. She blinked her eyes, not wanting to cry in front of him.

"When I found out," she said, "You were gone. I thought you were dead and that our child would never know his father."

He heard the sadness creep in her voice but he pressed forward. Not wanting to push her too hard but needing to know the truth.

"What about when I came back," he said, "Why didn't you tell me then?"

She just looked down at her plate, knowing that she had upset him.

"I had a right to know C.J.," he said, "about my own child."

"I was going to tell you…"

He set his jaw hearing her out.

"When was that going to be exactly," he asked, "when the child was born?"

Her eyes flashed and he knew he had made her angry.

"That's not fair…"

"What's not fair is keeping such a secret from me," he said, "We've been friends most of our lives and you never did this before."

He played dirty pool but she knew she had hurt him and she hadn't meant to do that. But she knew she had her reasons if she could remember what they were.

"I thought you were dead after that car exploded right in front of me," she said, "then I found out I was pregnant and I had someone else to think about and I still do."

"You think…"

She shook her head, knowing suddenly she had to get out of there.

"No I'm not going to get into this with you," she said, "You don't know what it's been like being alone and pregnant with a child who would never know his father."

"C.J…"

She got up from the table and picked up her things. He reached for her arm but she turned around to face him.

"Don't…"

She left then leaving him scratching his head in her wake, wondering what to do or say next.

C.J. rubbed some of the lotion on her arms after looking at it dubiously. Shelli nodded approvingly as she went from table to table checking on everyone's progress.

"It's really good for your skin," she said, "It's got aloe and a few other things."

"It feels nice," C.J. said, reaching for the bottle, "I might pick up some more of this stuff if being bundled up all day keeps drying out my skin."

Shelli smiled.

"You've got to try the foot spa bath too," she said, "I'll give you a kit to take home."

"I can't wait," C.J. said, "I've been on my feet all day."

She had gone home and changed her clothes before heading out to the spa night. She had considered not going but decided she needed to get away from her problems for a while and concentrate on something else. It had been her turn to bring refreshments and she had settled in not long after she arrived and quickly got caught up in trying out Shelli's different spa products. And she had gone nearly two hours without thinking about him.

"How's Matt doing," Shelli asked, "I saw him earlier in the day before you left with Ed to meet with Maurice."

So much for not thinking about him.

"He knows about the pregnancy," C.J. said, "He's not happy I kept it from him."

Shelli shrugged.

"Bummer," she said, "But he'll get over it. There's something about babies that make men go soft and forget everything else."

C.J. sighed.

"It might take more than that," she said, "Not that I blame him. I should have told him when he first got here."

"But you were shocked to see that he was alive and you had to deal with that."

C.J. nodded as she reached for some of Maggie's cookies. The pilot had gone all domestic when she had returned from her charter flight and baked up a batch from an old family recipe. She closed her eyes thinking they tasted really good. The conversation had focused on how excited they were to hear that Chris and his brother, Bernard had submitted their latest collection of poetry to a publisher and it had been accepted.

"Friggin' awesome," Shelli said, "We should hold a book signing party at the Brick."

They had talked about that for a while until Shelli had brought up Matt and the others looked to see C.J.'s response to that, given that the other women had learned through the rumor mill that Matt had found out about her pregnancy at the Brick.

"Men," Maggie said, shaking her head, "You think he'd be overjoyed that he planted his flag and all that. It's a macho thing with them."

"It was probably a shock to him," Ruth Ann offered up, "He might need some time to grow into it."

C.J. nodded.

"I know I should have told him," she said, "but part of me thought he'd get involved in some dangerous case again. I know that's part of who he is but if I'm going to be alone, I'd rather just know it."

Shelli rolled her eyes.

"I don't think he's planning on ditching you," she said, "He seems totally into you."

"I've got to look out for the both of us now," C.J. said, "I guess I just got so used to it just being the two of us that when he came back…"

"It changed your idea of how things would be," Maggie nodded, "after you had it all planned out. It' s just like a man to be so unpredictable."

"So can women," Ruth Ann commented.

"Are you going to talk to him," Shelli asked, "or have him come to you?"

"I'm going to have to let him calm down and see what happens," C.J. said, "I don't blame him for being mad at me but I've been mad at him too for leaving me and getting inside that car."

"But he had to," Shelli said, "to solve that mystery you two were working on."

C.J. sighed.

"I know that I really do," she said, "It's just hard to really feel that inside, I just know how it felt to see him die in front of me."

The other women nodded, assuming it must be a difficult thing.

"I'm just not sure what to do next," C.J. said, "I never meant to shut him out of our baby's life."

"Then you need to tell him that," Ruth Ann said, plainly, "Men are a little slow in the uptake with these things."

Shelli nodded.

"Yeah, they're from Mars, we're from Venus," she said, "That kind of thing."

Maggie grumbled from her seat.

"Men have the romantic sensibility of an amoeba," she observed, "He might never get it until you set it straight for him."

C.J. looked back from one woman to the other at all the instructions she was getting. Marilyn just smiled while stirring her facial mask ingredients.

"Just listen…"

C.J. nodded, knowing that in order to get him to hear her out, she would have to offer him the same courtesy. After all, they had known each other all of their lives, how hard could that be?

Matt sat and listened to his uncle talk his ear off the phone.

"Matlock for being a Houston, you can be dense about some things," Roy told him.

His nephew gritted his teeth on his end.

"She should have told me Uncle Roy," he said, "I've been here nearly a week and not one word about her being pregnant."

Matt listened to his uncle sigh on the other end.

"When she got the news, she thought you were dead," Roy said, "And you waited a couple of months to tell her that you were alive."

"That was different…"

"I know that it was. I've been involved in a covert operation or two myself," Roy said, "But she did what she had to do to survive and look out for my great nephew or niece all by herself in a strange place."

Matt ran his hand through his hair.

"So you think I'm being too hard on her?"

Roy tried to be patient.

"I think you need to give her a little space and show her that trusting you is not going to get her hurt," he said, "or more importantly as far as she's concerned, her baby."

Matt paused to consider that.

"But…"

Roy interrupted him.

"No Matlock," he said, "I think if you push at her, she'll push you out of her life and if she does that, it will be your fault."

Matt considered that too.

"I don't want to push her," he said, "I just want her to understand how important my family is to me."

Roy sighed.

"Well if that's what you want to do," he said, "Why not just show her instead? Don't throw a bunch of self-righteous words at her, give her some actions to show how important she and the next Houston are to you."

"Well…"

"You attract more bees with honey Matlock," Roy said.

Matt hung up not long after that, trying to think about what to say…do next.