Twelve
“That little boy would be a good brother, wouldn’t he, Mommy?”
Wyatt Wright stifled his groan. Not another one. He’d been in this grocery story almost twenty minutes, and he’d put only three things from his list into his basket, thanks to his son’s many female admirers. At least, that’s how he preferred to think of the women who used Cade to open a conversation with him.
Only this time Cade’s fan sounded like a little kid.
“He’s a cutie all ri—” A woman’s light, cheery voice paused. “Uh-oh.”
Intrigued by the way warning overtook her amusement, Wyatt did something he’d vowed not to. He looked directly at the stranger and spoke to her.
“Is something wrong?”
She peered at Cade. “Your son is about to be sick.”
Clear gray eyes set in a heart-shaped face met his, empty of the coy look he often saw in the ladies who were—how did he say it without sounding conceited?—looking to make his acquaintance. And yet Wyatt didn’t get the impression that he was the attraction here, given the coolly polite smile that lifted this woman’s pink lips. Still, he couldn’t help but admire her flaxen hair as it tumbled to her shoulders in an attractive disarray of curls. She wore a pale blue sundress, probably in deference to the heat of a late-October evening in Tucson, that flirted around her tanned legs.
Cade was sick? That was an opening gambit he hadn’t heard before. Of course she was wrong. Wyatt had been eighteen-month-old Cade’s sole parent for over a year. He knew all about—
“Look out!” the pretty stranger warned.
Wyatt turned in time to see his usually grinning boy grimace before spewing a sour mouthful all over his daddy’s favorite T-shirt.
“Sorry. I tried to warn you.” The slender stranger was quite tall, only a few inches shorter than Wyatt’s own six-foot height. She dug into her large shoulder bag, pulled out a packet of wipes and extracted several. “Poor baby. But your tummy feels better now, doesn’t it?”
Wyatt blinked twice before realizing her tender tone was for Cade. Gently she wiped the disgusting mess from his son’s face and shirtfront, then tucked the used wipes into a plastic bag which she grabbed from a roll at the nearby produce stand. After removing more clean wipes, she reached toward Wyatt. He stepped back just in time to stop her from cleaning him up, too.
“Oh. Sorry.” She blushed very prettily, then stuffed the wipes into his hand. “I guess you can do that yourself. Moms get used to cleaning up spills. But I suppose dads do, too, right?”
Entranced by the melodic sound of her light laugh, Wyatt couldn’t find his voice. After a minute her smile faded. She shrugged, then bent to look at Cade.
“Hope you feel better, sweet boy.” Cade grinned at her, his feet churning. She glanced at Wyatt. “You’ve got a real charmer here.” Then she turned and reached for her daughter’s hand. “Come on, Gracie.”
Wyatt hid his smile when the little girl planted her feet and stubbornly refused to move.
“This man would make a good daddy for us, Mommy,” the blue-eyed sprite mused, her silvery-gold head tilted as she assessed Wyatt.
That was so not funny. Wyatt suppressed his overwhelming desire to bolt.
“Then he—” Gracie continued jerking a thumb at Cade “—could be my brother. I’d really like to have a brother,” she added, her head tilted to one side thoughtfully. Then she frowned. “’Cept I don’t want him to spit on me.”
Wyatt cleared his throat, intending to voice a firm yet delicate refusal that would end the child’s ludicrous notion real fast, before her mother latched on to it. Instead he got sidetracked by the lady’s burst of laughter.
“You used to spit up exactly the same way, Gracie.” The mom chuckled when her daughter wrinkled her nose in disgust. “But we don’t need a daddy,” she said in a firm voice. “We’re fine just the way we are, you and me. Don’t you like our family?”
Instead of rushing her child away from a touchy subject, as Wyatt had seen other parents do, the mother waited for a response. He admired her serenity and total focus on her child and made a mental note to practice the same kind of patience with Cade when he got older so he’d be the best father a kid could have. He’d do whatever it took to be a better father to his son than his own father had ever been.
“Our family’s nice,” Gracie agreed. “But I want a daddy. And a brother. Melissa and Courtney have brothers and daddies,” she said, her chin thrust up.
“So you’ve told me, many times.” A resigned sigh colored the mother’s response. “But I’m sure there are other kids in your kindergarten class who don’t. Each family is different, Gracie. One isn’t better or worse than another, just different.” She smoothed the child’s rumpled curls. “We need to get our ice cream now so we can go to Wranglers Ranch.”
Wranglers Ranch? That was the place that sponsored camps for troubled kids. Months earlier the owner, Tanner Johns, had left a message on Wyatt’s answering machine asking him if he was interested in taking on a full-time vet position there. Wyatt, his hands full caring for Cade, hadn’t responded. Though he kept running into Tanner at church, the rancher had never pressed him for a reply, simply offered friendship. Wyatt figured Wranglers’ ministry must be growing because of a mention at last week’s church service about a youth group outing to the ranch.
“And—” Gracie dragged out the word, giving him and Cade another once-over before blowing out a heartfelt sigh. “Now that Beth and Davy live at Wranglers Ranch, they have a daddy, too. I’m the only one who doesn’t.”
The pathos in her mournful words reached in and squeezed Wyatt’s heart, until he caught the mother’s grimace as she rolled her eyes at him.
“Oh, that’s not the worst of my shortcomings,” she explained with a teasing chuckle. “Last week Gracie was the only one in her kindergarten class not allowed to stay up late to watch a TV show.” She raised her eyebrows in a pseudo-severe look. “As you must know, single parenthood isn’t for the faint of heart.” She fluttered her fingers. “We have to go. Bye.”
Wyatt nodded bemusedly until her gaze dropped to his shirt.
“You, uh, might want to get that off before it dries,” she advised quietly. Then she took Gracie’s hand and firmly drew her toward the freezer section.
Wyatt grimaced and used the wad of wipes she’d handed him to clean up the mess as best he could.
“Thanks a lot,” he said to his son who was now happily blowing bubbles.
Wyatt quickly gathered the rest of the items on his list and hurried through the checkout determined to avoid another encounter with more of Cade’s admirers. But in the parking lot he noticed the same woman buckling her little girl into a car seat. Pure impulse and an innate curiosity he should have suppressed sent Wyatt walking briskly toward them.
“How did you