she was kidnapped,” he suggested.
Sharon Lynn swallowed hard. It was one explanation she had never even considered. Kidnapped babies were held for ransom. They weren’t abandoned. Were they?
“You don’t seriously think…”
He raked a hand through his hair and snapped impatiently, “I don’t know what to think. I would have known a hell of a lot more by now if you’d told me about her last night, if I’d been able to check out the alley behind the store for any evidence, and if I’d had time to check all the faxes about missing kids.”
“Do that now,” she said reasonably. “Whatever evidence was in that alley hasn’t gone anywhere. As for the faxes, I’ve seen your desk. They haven’t gone anywhere, either.”
“I’ll do all that right after I take her to the hospital to be thoroughly checked out and call social services,” he said. “They’re going to love being hauled out on a Saturday after a blizzard.”
Sharon Lynn instinctively moved between her cousin and the baby. “My point exactly. If it’s going to be such a bother, then don’t call them.”
His expression turned sympathetic. “Sweetie, there are procedures in cases like this. You know this is what has to be done.”
“She’ll just end up in foster care, unless you locate the mom, right?”
“I suppose.”
“Then let her stay with me. I’ll call Grandpa Harlan. He can pull a few strings and get me temporary approval as a foster parent. It’s not as if I’m an unfit candidate for it. We can call Lizzy to come check her out medically, if that will make you happy. She’s practically a full-fledged doctor. She’s doing her residency in Garden City, while granddaddy builds that clinic he promised her here in town. It’ll be by the book.” She beamed at him, then shrugged at his intractable scowl. “More or less.”
“Sharon Lynn—”
“Justin, this is the way it’s going to be,” she said fiercely, ready to fight him on this if she had to.
“That baby would have died last night if Cord and I hadn’t found her. I’m not letting her out of my sight until I know she’s going to be safe. Whoever left her there doesn’t deserve to live, much less have the baby given back to them.”
“Well, of course not, but—”
“No buts. You know I’m right. You know she’s better off with me, at least for the time being. I feel like I owe her that much.”
She watched his face intently, saw the worry, the indecision and prayed he’d go along with her on this. Justin had a powerful sense of right and wrong, a fierce dedication to playing by the rules. She knew she was probably asking him to break a million of them.
“Please,” she begged. “Just think of what’s best for the baby. Think of all the trauma she’s already been through. She’s here now, she’s warm and safe. Don’t start dragging her around again now, just so you can cross all the t’s and dot all the i’s on your paperwork.”
He sighed heavily. “Okay,” he relented finally. “But this is temporary. You understand that, right?”
“Of course.”
He regarded her skeptically. “You’re sure?”
“Justin, I understand.”
“All right, then. Hopefully Lizzy’s not on duty over at Garden City. Call her and get her over here. If she gives the baby a clean bill of health, that’ll do for now. Meantime, I’ll go check out all the reports on missing kids to see if there’s a match.”
“Thank you,” she said softly.
“Don’t thank me,” he said curtly. “Something tells me I’m setting you up for heartbreak.”
Chapter 3
“Tell me again how you wound up with a baby,” Lizzy said when she arrived an hour later.
She looked every bit the doctor with her little black bag and white lab coat over a silk blouse. She’d even coiled her long, black hair into a tidy topknot. Sharon Lynn still hadn’t gotten used to her professional demeanor. To her way of thinking, Lizzy was still first and foremost a rambunctious, anything-for-a-lark cowgirl. Her medical degree from the University of Texas said otherwise.
As Sharon Lynn repeated the same story she’d told Justin, Lizzy’s eyes widened. Her mouth narrowed into a thin, disapproving line before she muttered a stream of expletives that would have blistered the ears of the person who’d abandoned the baby. Sharon Lynn said only, “My sentiments exactly.”
“How long was she outside, then?”
“Probably not more than a minute or two. We heard a thump, went to investigate and there she was.”
“So her body temperature was warm enough when you brought her inside?”
Sharon Lynn nodded. “She was pretty well bundled up. She felt fine to me. Cord thought so, too. I took her temperature and it was normal.”
Just as Justin had, Lizzy seized on the mention of the unfamiliar name. “Cord?”
“The customer who was there when it happened. He was actually the one who found her.”
“Interesting,” Lizzy said, studying her face. “Is this Cord person handsome, sexy and single?”
“I have no idea,” she claimed. At Lizzy’s skeptical look, she conceded, “Not about the single part anyway.”
Lizzy grinned. “Then he is handsome and sexy?”
“I suppose. I hardly noticed.”
“If he’d turned up after you found the baby, I might believe that, but he’d been there how long? A couple of hours? That’s a long time to hang around a drugstore during a blizzard, unless the man had something besides food on his mind.”
“Are you here to check out the baby or to cross-examine me?” Sharon Lynn grumbled.
Lizzy patted her cheek. “Not to worry. I have time to do both. Come on, let’s see the baby. We’ll get back to this Cord person later.”
Without waiting for Sharon Lynn, she headed to the bedroom and bent over the baby, who was wide-awake and waving her tiny fists in the air. Lizzy sighed. “She’s a cute one, all right. And obviously someone has been taking good care of her. Looks to me as if her weight’s normal and her color is good. Just look at those rosy little cheeks.”
She began examining her with practiced fingers, pausing to tickle a laughing response from her every now and again. When she was finished, she plucked her up off the bed and cradled her in her arms. “You are a little doll.”
Sharon Lynn watched her aunt, who was actually younger than she was, and had an almost overwhelming desire to yank the baby out of her arms. Even she recognized that as a bad sign. If she was this possessive after less than twenty-four hours, what was going to happen when the time came to give the baby up? Maybe Justin had been right to worry. Maybe this wasn’t going to be as easy as she’d thought.
“Don’t go getting any ideas,” she told Lizzy.
“You’ve got one of your own and I don’t see Hank letting you bring another one home for him to take care of while you finish your residency.”
“Are you kidding? Hank’s in seventh heaven playing full-time daddy. If he could figure out some way to convince me to stay pregnant and have another kid every nine or ten months, he’d be a happy man. He loves ranching, but parenthood is his true calling. I’m not sure which one of us was more surprised by that. For a long time making a go of his ranch was all that mattered to him. Now he just leaves most of that to Pete and the hands. I come home and he has a zillion and one stories