Baby Business: Baby Steps

Ignoring the air-conditioning, he cranked open the kitchen window over the sink, breathing in the scent of fresh cut grass from his neighbor’s yard that instantly suffused the still, stuffy room. Steve jumped up onto the sill, mashing his ears against the screen and chattering to the delectable whatever-they-weres incessantly chirping in the juniper bushes under the window. Still standing, C.J. attacked the sandwich, somehow swallowing past the grapefruit-sized lump in his throat as an image of Dana sprang to mind, barefoot in that matchbox of an apartment, her burnished, baby-food-streaked hair floating around her face.

The hard, unforgiving look in her eyes when she’d greeted him at the door, Ethan firmly parked on her hip. Now there, he thought as he took another bite of the sandwich, was someone with all her nurturing instincts firmly in place.

Unlike him. Who wouldn’t know a nurturing instinct if it bit him in the butt.

A plan, he thought. He needed a plan. Plans solved problems, or at least reduced them to manageable chunks. When in doubt, just bully your life into order, was his motto. So, still chewing, C.J. marched into his office. Steve followed, complaining; C. J. tromped back to the kitchen, filled the cat’s bowl, returned to the office. Sat down. Rammed both hands through his hair.

Thirst strangled him. Seconds later, ice cold beer in hand, he sat down again, yanking open desk drawers until he found a legal pad and a pen. He slapped the pad on his desk, to which Steve promptly laid claim. C.J. threw the beast off; he hopped right back up and settled on top of the phone, glaring. C.J. glared back, then picked up the pen, stared at the paper.

Nothing. Not a single, solitary, blessed thought came to him. But then, how the hell was he supposed to make a plan without all the particulars? Instead, all he saw were two sets of eyes, one blue, one glinty gray green. A child for whom he might very well be responsible, and a woman he had no business getting anywhere near. And, if he got the test results he expected, the two were inextricably linked.

As he would then be to them.

Because while he really wouldn’t turn his back on his own child—no matter how unlikely the situation in which he now found himself—neither would he, could he, take the baby away from Dana if her cousin didn’t come back. Not that she’d let him, he thought on a wry smile. Poleaxed as she undoubtedly was, she was also clearly already superglued to the kid.

Envy sliced through him, along with a sense of longing so sharp, so unexpected, it took his breath away.

The pen streaked across the room, dinging off the wall. What if he couldn’t do this, couldn’t be what both woman and child needed him to be? Not that he wouldn’t give it his best shot: Even going through the motions would be better than letting a child grow up believing he was a mistake. A burden. But what if that wasn’t enough? Would they both end up hating him? The boy, when he realized his father had been faking a connection he’d never really felt? And Dana. Oh, God, Dana. Could he deal with the inevitable disappointment in her eyes?

So what are you going to do about it, lamebrain?

Seconds later, C. J. found himself standing in one of the two guest bedrooms. The one he’d left empty, since guests had never been an issue.

As Steve writhed around his ankles, his questioning meow seeming to ask what the hell they were doing in here, C.J. stood frozen in the center of the room, visualizing a crib in one corner. And in that crib, a chubby little boy with blue eyes leaning over the side, smiling, arms outstretched …

… trusting in his father’s unconditional love.

C.J. shut his eyes and waited until the dizziness passed.

Chapter Five

At 8:00 a.m., the phone rang. Wedged in the corner of the sofa with twenty pounds of guzzling baby in her lap, Dana could only glower from across the room as some chick with this godawful Southern accent told whoever to leave a message.

“Hey, it’s C.J. I’m on my way over.”

Click.

She muttered something unseemly, realizing she wouldn’t be able to use the no-no words for long with a baby around. Not only did the apartment look worse than it had yesterday, but she was still unwashed and in her Mickey Mouse sleepshirt. And despite the Glade PlugIns rammed into every available outlet, she strongly suspected the place reeked of beet-infused baby doo.

Mercy said six-month-olds generally slept through the night. Unfortunately, no one had informed His Highness of that fact. The kid not only peed like a herd of goats, but was apparently one of those “sensitive” types who didn’t tolerate wet diapers very well, stay-dry linings be damned. Dana calculated she’d had roughly three hours sleep over an eight-hour period. Again. The last thing she needed was company. Especially sexy male company who would probably waltz in here looking ready for brunch at the country club. Whereas she, on the other hand, looked like week-old roadkill. Probably smelled like it, too.

She jiggled the bottle, determining Ethan had maybe five minutes yet to go. It occurred to her she had no idea where C.J. lived. With any luck, Taylor Ranch, clear on the other side of the—

Bzzzzzzzt went her doorbell.

—city.

Cell phones, she decided, were the instrument of the devil.

“Who is it?” she yelled, as if she didn’t know.

“Dana? Honey?”

Apparently, she didn’t.

“Dana?” Her mother’s voice came through the door, thin and anxious. “It’s just me, honey, I thought I’d drop by before I went on to church. You okay in there? Why aren’t you opening the door?”

There was only one person she’d rather see less than C. J. Turner at that moment, and that person was standing on the other side of her door.

“Just a sec, Mama!” Dana heaved and grunted her way out of the deep-cushioned sofa. Ethan never broke his rhythm. “I’m not, um, dressed.”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, honey, I’ve seen you undressed before … oh …”

The last oh was the kind of oh people say when they think they’ve caught you at an awkward moment. Which was true, God knew, but, alas, not that kind of awkward moment.

“Hang on, almost there …” Swinging Ethan to one hip, she looked down into his fathomless blue eyes. “Okay, you’re about to meet your great-aunt Faye.” Formula dribbled out of the corner of the baby’s mouth, making tracks down his chin. Dana bunched up the hem of the already baptized sleepshirt and wiped away the trickle. “Now, she really loves babies, but don’t be surprised if she acts a little peculiar there for a bit. Just hang loose, and we’ll all get through this. Okay?”

And exactly who was she trying to reassure here?

“Dana? It’s gettin’ hot out here in the sun, honey….”

She plastered a smile to her face and swung open the door.

“Hey, Mama! What brings you here?”

Her mother’s eyes zinged straight to the baby, then drifted over Dana’s shoulder to inside the apartment. “I, uh, made coffee cake,” she said, sounding a little distracted, “and figured I’d better not leave it around or your father’d eat the whole … dang thing.” There was a small, anxious pause, then, “Honey?”

“Mmm?”

“Why are you holding a baby?”

“Because he can’t walk yet?”

In a flash of pale rose polyester, Mama pushed her way past Dana into the apartment. “Looks to me,” she said, her voice gaining altitude with each syllable, “you’ve got any number of places you could put him—it is a him, isn’t it?—”

Dana nodded.

“—down … oh, my word!” Her hand flew to her mouth. Dana somehow caught the foil-wrapped paper plate before it landed on the carpet and set it on the dining table. She cringed as realization bloomed in her mother’s eyes.

The hand fell, and words gushed forth. “Oh, sweet heaven, tell me that isn’t Trish’s baby! But it has to be, doesn’t it? He’s the spittin’ image of her when she was a baby! That’s why she suddenly left town, isn’t it? Because she was pregnant? Why she called, wanting to know all about what you were doing and all? Because she had a baby? Well, say something, Dana, for goodness sake!”

“As a matter of fa—”

“Oh, my stars, he looks exactly like her! That chick-fuzz hair, and those fat little cheeks … Except for those blue eyes. Where did those blue eyes come from?”

“Anybody home?”

Both women snapped their heads around to the man of the hour, standing in the doorway. He held up a McDonald’s bag, as if in explanation for his presence.

“Breakfast?”

Ethan let out a series of gleeful grunts, as if he recognized C.J., who wasn’t, Dana realized, dressed for brunch in any country club she’d ever heard tell of. A gray sleeveless sweatshirt, ratty jeans, well-worn running shoes. Far cry from dress shirts and business suits. And yet, he had the nerve to still look good. Probably smelled good, too, fresh from the shower, she guessed, judging from the way his damp hair curled around his ears.

Yeah, heckuva time for the hormones to kick in.

“And who might you be?” Dana’s mother shrieked, effectively smashing to paste all hormones foolish enough to venture forth this fine Sunday morning.

C.J. thrust out his free hand, laying on the charm thick enough to suffocate the entire Northeast Heights. “C. J. Turner, ma’am.” Dana saw her mother’s eyes pinch in concentration as she tried to place the name. “And you must be Dana’s mother,” he said, grinning. “There’s no mistaking the resemblance.”

Faye’s eyes popped wide open, arrowing first at C.J.—”The Realtor Trish worked for”—then to Dana—”the one who’s showing you places for the shop?”

Wouldn’t be long now. “The very same.”

“Well, what’s he doing here this early on a Sunday morning? And why is he bringing you breakfast?” Her eyes zipped up and down his body, settling on his eyes. His very blue eyes. With gold flecks around the pupil. Just like Ethan’s. “Dressed like tha—” The word ended in a gasp as Faye slumped against the edge of the table, clutching her chest.

The woman had truly missed her calling.

“You … and Trish … and … and …” Faye jiggled her index finger at C.J.’s face, her jaw bouncing up and down for several seconds before she got out, “Blue eyes … your blue eyes. The baby … you … and Trish … and … oh.”

And still, he managed to give her mother the perfect smile, a little abashed, a little nervous, appropriately contrite. “Yes, Mrs. Malone,” he said calmly, “there’s a strong chance I’m Ethan’s father.”

Shock gave way to blazing indignation, of the kind peculiar to Southern women whose kin have been wronged. “Lord have mercy, boy—you must be at least ten, twelve years older than Trish! What were you thinking? She was barely more than a child!”

“Oh, come on, Mama.” Bouncing Ethan on her hip, Dana grimaced at her mother. “You know as well as I do Trish hasn’t been a child since she hit puberty. Or it hit her. And C. J. already told me how it happened, so you can’t put all the blame on him—”

Sparking eyes shot to hers. “What do you mean, he already told you?” Dana’s face flamed. She was eight years old again, caught sneaking off to her girlfriend’s house before she’d cleaned her room. “Yesterday,” she said in a somewhat steady voice. “Which is when, uh, Trish left Ethan with me.”

“So you spoke with her?”

“Well, no, not exactly. You know all those old movies where somebody finds the baby in the basket on the doorstep? It was kind of like that.”

“Oh, for the love of …” Her mother shut her eyes, shaking her head, but only for a second. Presumably recovered, she said, “Wait a minute—she left him with you? Instead of with—” her eyes shot to C. J., then back to Dana “—him? And why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because I couldn’t deal with having a baby dumped in my lap and your overreacting, too!”

“Don’t be ridiculous, I’ve never overreacted in my life!” Faye quit clutching herself long enough to press her fingers into shut eyelids. “But I’m so confused. Was this a secret or something? Did you know about this?” she lobbed at C.J., then to Dana, “Did you? I mean, what did Trish say when she dropped the baby off? And where is Trish, anyway?”

Not before a shower and breakfast, Dana decided, could she deal with this. And since C.J. looked as though he’d had the luxury of at least one of those things already—and probably more than three hours sleep, to boot—he was more than welcome to have first crack at her mother.

It was a rotten thing to do, but hey. In all likelihood, he was family now. The sooner he weathered his first Faye Malone interrogation, the better it would be for all concerned.

“Tell you what—” With a sweet smile, Dana handed the baby to a very startled C.J. “Why don’t you play with Ethan while I go jump in the shower before the city slaps me with a condemned notice? And you can get acquainted with my mother, while you’re at it.” She grabbed the McDonald’s bag out of C.J.’s hand, extracted coffee and an Egg McMuffin. “Good choice,” she noted, then got her fanny, as well as her unconfined 38 D’s, the hell out of there.

Holding an active six-month-old, C.J. immediately discovered, was like trying to hang on to a stack of greased phone books. Every part of the child—and there seemed to be an amazing number of those—was hell-bent on veering off in a different direction from all the other parts. After nearly dropping the kid three times in as many seconds, he settled for securing him to his hip under his left arm, his hand braced across the baby’s chest. That finally settled, he dared to look up at Dana’s mother, who was glowering at him with all the sympathy of a highway patrolman who’s clocked you at eighty in a fifty-five-mile-per-hour zone.

Talk about curveballs. Here he’d been all revved up to discuss possible options with Dana, only to be confronted with this fire-breathing she-dragon ready to chew him up and spit him back out in itty-bitty pieces. Her daughter’s quick vanishing act didn’t seem to faze her. Nor did the fact that two minutes ago, they’d never laid eyes on each other.

“One question,” Mrs. Malone said, crossing her arms. “Why are you doubting my niece’s assertion that you’re the father?”

After he explained, as obliquely and quickly as he could, she regarded him shrewdly for several seconds, then blew out a breath.

“I think I need to sit down,” she said, doing just that. “And you do, too, before you drop that baby. Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she said, leaning over, “this isn’t nuclear physics….”

After several seconds of fussing and adjusting, the child was finally seated on his lap to her satisfaction. Then she leaned back, squinting. “So if there’s a good chance the baby isn’t yours,” she said, more calmly, “why are you here?”

“Because I don’t feel right about leaving Dana to shoulder the burden alone.”

“I see. And if it turns out he isn’t?”

At that moment, the baby grabbed one of C.J.’s hands, doubling over to gnaw on his knuckle. Without thinking, C.J. shifted to keep the little guy from falling on his noggin, then lifted his eyes to Mrs. Malone’s. “Guess I’ll deal with that moment when it comes.”

Faye gave him a strange, inscrutable look, then shook her head. “I cannot believe that girl just left the baby. Then again,” she said on a sigh, “knowing Trish, I can. Well …” She slapped her hands on her thighs. “I guess, for once, they’ll have to do without me at church.”

With that, she sprang from the couch, then began picking up and straightening out as if being timed, only to stop suddenly in front of the balcony door, hugging her elbows. “I owe you an apology, Mr. Turner,” she said, her voice tight with humiliation and frustration. “It’s not you I’m mad at. My niece has always been headstrong. Always determined to do whatever she wanted and damn the consequences. Even her own mama finally gave up on her, when she was fourteen, sent her to Dana’s daddy and me to see what we could do with her.”

She turned to him, her mouth set, her eyes hidden behind the window’s reflection in her glasses. “Obviously, it wasn’t enough. But it’s true. By this age, Trish is nobody’s responsibility but her own. Whatever the outcome, it’s a little late to be accusing anybody of leading my niece down the primrose path. Heaven knows, if she walked in here right now?” Her hair, darker than Dana’s, tangled in her collar as she shook her head. “I’d be tempted to throttle the living daylights out of her. Dumping her baby on Dana like that, not having the decency to even tell you about the child … nobody in this family has ever done anything like this.”

She snatched an empty baby bottle and a rolled-up diaper off the coffee table. “But this family sticks together, Mr. Turner,” she said, wagging the bottle for emphasis. “That child’s gonna know he belongs, that he has kin that care about him, no matter what his scatterbrained mama might have done.”

“I couldn’t agree more,” C.J. said. “Which is why, if Ethan really is mine, I want him to come live with me.”

Three feet from the living room, Dana froze in her tracks.

Her wet hair hanging in trickly little snakes down her back, soaking the fabric of her camp shirt, she cautiously peered out into the living room. Her mother’s back was to her, partially blocking her view of C.J. Not that she needed to see his face to picture his expression.

“You don’t exactly sound overjoyed about this,” Mama said.

“It’s hard to sound much of anything when you’re still in shock. But it’s a no-brainer, wouldn’t you say?”

Dana ducked back into the shadows to lean against the wall, too stunned to think clearly, let alone join the fray. Which would probably not be a wise thing until she figured out which side she was on. Shoot, at this point, she didn’t even know what the sides were. Her mother, however, didn’t miss a beat.

“Then why d’you suppose Trish left the baby with Dana and not you?”

It got so quiet, Dana peeked around the corner to make sure everyone was still there. She could see C.J. clearly now, cradling Ethan to his chest, one strong hand cupping the fuzzy little blond head in a protective, masculine pose that set her insides to bubbling.

No instinct for fathering, her foot. Only then his quiet, “Probably because I didn’t exactly give her the impression I wanted children,” made Dana wince.

“And now you do?”

“Now … I’ll do whatever I have to. If he’s mine.”

“Well, he is ours,” her mother said in that tone of voice that always raised the hair on the back of Dana’s neck. “So why not leave him where you know he’ll be loved? Without reservation?”

Showtime, Dana thought, lurching into the living room as if pushed. “Okay, Mama, this is really none of your business—”

“Nonsense,” her mother replied, completely unperturbed. “This is about family.”

“I realize that, but this is a bizarre enough situation without having to deal with outside interference.”

“Interference?”

“Yes, interference. As in butting in, an activity at which you excel.”

“Well, I never—”

“Yes, you do. Every opportunity you can get. C.J. and I haven’t had two minutes to discuss our options—”

“Do you want him to take the child?”

She knew what her mother was really asking. And it had nothing to do with C.J. “You mean, because here’s a shot at getting the grandbaby I can’t give you?”

Her mother flushed. “No, of course not—”

“For goodness’ sake, I didn’t even know about Ethan forty-eight hours ago! How dumb would it be to start thinking about him as my own this early in the game? Besides which, we already talked about this, how I can always adopt. You’ll have your grandchild, Mama,” she said, tears prickling behind her eyelids. “Someday. When the time’s right. But at the moment, I only want what’s best for Ethan.”

“And how is it best for the child to send him to live with a man who doesn’t even want children?”

“Mrs. Malone,” C.J. said quietly, getting to his feet, “I appreciate your concern, which is more than valid. But until I know for sure I’m Ethan’s father, there’s really nothing to discuss.”

“And anyway,” Dana said, “Trish is a completely unknown factor in all this. For all we know she might well come to her senses and want her baby back. Until then,” she said with a daggered, determined look in C.J.’s direction, the equally determined expression in his eyes making her own sting even harder, “this kid’s going nowhere.” She looked back at her mother. “But I wouldn’t dream of keeping Ethan from his daddy, whoever that turns out to be.”

A war raged in her mother’s eyes: anger at being dismissed—for that was what Dana was doing—tangling with an unwavering love, that primal maternal desire to see everything work out. To keep her own child from getting hurt. And that, when all was said and done, tamped down Dana’s own annoyance and frustration.

She walked over to the dining table, picked Faye’s handbag off the table and handed it to her. The older woman hesitated, looking like the last guest at a party who can’t decide how to make a graceful exit, then took the bag.

“If you hurry, you won’t even miss the first hymn,” Dana said quietly.

Defeated—though for how long, was anybody’s guess—Faye simply nodded and headed to the door. Then she turned, worry brimming in her eyes. Dana touched her arm. “It’s gonna be okay.”

“You’re sure?”

“Oddly enough, yeah. I am.”

Her mother smoothed away a strand of hair from her daughter’s face, squeezed her hand and left. Dana shut the door, leaning her head against it, staring at her bare feet for a moment. “Well,” she said to the doorknob, “that went well, don’t you think?”

“You can’t have children?” C.J. said softly behind her.

Her head jerked around, her insides constricting at the kindness in his eyes. “Nope. Stork took me off his delivery route more than a year ago.”

“God, Dana … I’m so sorry. Of all people for that to happen to.” He released a sigh. “Talk about not being fair.”

She nodded toward the now dozing infant slumped against C.J.’s chest. “You should know.”

He gave her the oddest smile, and something kicked in her stomach, a premonition that she wasn’t going to like what she was about to hear. She walked over to C. J. to remove the slumbering infant from his arms and lower him into the playpen. The man followed, close enough to feel his heat, for that soap-and-male scent to reach right in and yank her idiot libido to attention.

“I have no intention of taking Ethan away from you, Dana. Especially now.”

Hanging on to the side of the playpen, she pressed the heel of her hand to one temple, deciding the heat was making her fuzzy-brained. “Then why did you tell my mother you were?”

“No, what I said was, I wanted him to live with me.”

She twisted around. Moved over a bit. Frowned. “Is this where I point out that you’re not making any sense?”

His laugh sounded … strained. “No. This is where I ask you to move in, too.”

“Get out,” Mercy and Cass both said simultaneously when Dana got to that point in the story.

After reaching a deal with the owner of the new place, the partners returned to Cass’s (since the store was always closed on Mondays) to discuss the hows and whens of the relocation.

Only Dana’s insane weekend was proving a much more interesting topic than floor plans and moving company selection. Go figure.

“Yeah, kinda stopped me dead in my tracks, too,” Dana said, then frowned at the box of gooey, glistening, probably-still-warm glazed donuts Mercy had just plopped in the middle of the tempered glass table out on Cass’s patio. “And you’re blatantly setting temptation in my path why?”

Curls glistening, the tube-topped elf settled her tiny fanny on the cushioned faux wicker chair. “Not to worry, these have half the sugar of the regular ones.”