He’d given up wondering if she was here to harm him. The complete innocence she displayed wasn’t very likely to be a put-on. And anyway, what sort of an incompetent murder master would send a young woman with a baby to do the dirty deed? It just didn’t make sense.
“My parents were Ambrian,” she began. “I was actually born there but that was just before the rebellion. My birth parents died in the fighting. I don’t remember them at all. I was taken out with a lot of other refugee children and rushed to the States. I was adopted right away. I was only about eighteen months old, so as far as I’m concerned, my adoptive parents are my parents.” She shrugged. “End of story.”
“Are you kidding? We’ve barely begun.” He stopped and looked down at her, arms folded over his chest. “Who told you about your Ambrian background?”
“Oh, the Sommerses had Ambrian roots, too. Second generation American, though. So they told me things, and there were some books around the house.” She shook her head. “But it wasn’t like I was immersed in the culture or anything like that.”
“But you do know about the rebellion? You know about the Granvilli family and how they led an illegal coup that killed a lot of people and left them in charge of an ancient monarchy that should have been left alone?”
She blinked. “Uh…I guess.”
“But you don’t know much about it?”
She shook her head.
He gazed at her, speculation glowing in his silver-blue eyes. “So you don’t have family still in Ambria?”
“Family?” She stared at him blankly. “Not that I know of.”
“I guess they were all killed by the rebels?”
She blinked and shook her head. “I don’t know if the rebels killed them.”
He raised a cynical eyebrow. “Who do you think killed them?”
She ran her tongue nervously over her lower lip. “Well, to tell you the truth, I really don’t know what side they were on.”
That stunned him. The idea that someone decent might support the rebels who had killed his parents and taken over his country didn’t really work for him. He dismissed it out of hand. But if she were around long enough, and he had a chance, he would find out who her parents were and what role they played. It seemed like something she ought to know.
“Now that we’ve established who you are, let’s get to the real topic. Why are you really here?”
She sighed. “I told you.”
But he was already shaking his head. “You told me a lot of nonsense. Do you really expect me to believe you had a baby and don’t know the father? It doesn’t add up, Ayme. How about giving me the real story?”
She felt like a bird caught in a trap. She hated lying. That was probably why she did it so badly. She had to tell him something. Something convincing. Had to be. She was beginning to see that she would really be in trouble if he refused to help her.
But before she could conjure up something good, a wail came from across the apartment. Ayme looked toward where the sound was coming from, uncertainty on her face. Why didn’t this baby seem to want to sleep for more than an hour at a time, day or night?
“I just fed her an hour ago,” she said, shaking her head and thinking of her dwindling stash of formula bottles. “Do you think she really wants to eat again?”
“Of course,” he told her. “They want to eat all the time. Surely you’ve noticed.”
She bit her lip and looked at him. “But the book says four hours…”
He groaned. She was still using a book?
“Babies don’t wear watches,” he noted, feeling some sympathy for this new mother, but a lot of impatience, as well.
“True.” She gave him a wry look as she turned to go. “But you’d think they could look at a clock now and then.”
He grinned. He couldn’t help it. If he really let himself go, he would start liking her and he knew it. And so he followed her into the room and watched as she stroked the little round head rather inefficiently. The baby was definitely crying, and the stroking was doing no good at all. From what he could tell, Ayme didn’t seem to have a clue as to what to do to quiet her.
“Why don’t you try changing her?” he suggested. “She’s probably wet.”
“You think so?” That seemed to be a new idea to her. “Okay, I’ll try it.”
She had a huge baby bag crammed full of things, but she didn’t seem to know what she was looking for. He watched her rummage around in it for a few minutes, then stepped forward and pulled out a blanket which he spread out on the couch.
“I can do this,” she said a bit defensively.
“I’m sure you can,” he said. “I’m just trying to help.”
She winced, feeling genuine regret for her tone. “I know. I’m sorry.”
She pulled out a paper diaper and laid it on the blanket, then pulled Cici up out of the drawer.
“There you go little girl,” she cooed to her. “We’re going to get you nice and clean.”
David stood back and watched, arms folded across his chest, mouth twisted cynically. She didn’t seem very confident to him. Cici wasn’t crying hard, only whimpering at this point, but he had the impression that she was looking up at the woman working over her with something close to apprehension.
“Don’t you have someplace else you could be?” she muttered to him as she worked, and he could see that she was nervous to be doing this in front of him. Like someone who didn’t really know what she was doing.
One thing he knew for sure—this woman didn’t know the first thing about taking care of a baby. How crazy was that? And then it came to him. She wasn’t the mother of the baby. Couldn’t be. In six weeks time anyone would have learned more than she seemed to know.
“Alright Ayme Negri Sommers,” he said firmly at last, “come clean. Whose baby is this?”
She looked up, a deer in the headlights.
“Mine.”
“Liar.”
She stared at him for a moment, degrees of uncertainty flashing across her pretty face. Finally, she threw her hands into the air. “Okay, you got me.” She shrugged, looking defeated. “She’s not really mine.” She sighed. “What was your first clue?”
He grunted, stepping forward to take over. “The fact that you don’t know beans about taking care of a baby,” he said, taking the diaper from her and beginning to do an expert job of it in her place. “The fact that you’re still reading a book to figure out which end is up.”
She heaved a heart-felt sigh. “I guess that was inevitable. It’s really such a relief. I hated living a lie.” She looked at him with more gratitude than resentment. “How come you know so much about babies, anyway?”
“I grew up in a big family. We all had to pitch in.”
She sighed. “We didn’t have any babies around while I was growing up. It was just me and Sam.”
The baby was clean and in dry diapers. David put her up against his shoulder and she cuddled in, obviously comfortable as could be and happy to be with someone who knew what he was doing. He managed a reluctant smile. It was just like riding a bicycle. Once you knew how to hold a baby, you didn’t forget.
He turned back to Ayme. “Who’s this Sam you keep talking about?”
She swallowed, realizing the answer to that question was going to be tied to very different emotions from now on.
“My…my