“For crying out loud,” Dana said, “how could anyone be so selfish? Ooooh!” Her palm slammed the counter, dislodging a teddy bear from its perch by the register. She caught it, only to squeeze the life out of the thing. “If Trish showed her face right now—” the bear’s floppy limbs flailed as she shook it “—I swear I’d slap her silly. What an air-brained, self-centered, addlepated little twit.”
“Familial love is such a wonderful thing,” Cass wryly observed.
Ignoring Cass, Dana stuffed the bear back into its chair. “What am I supposed to do now?” She shook her head, watching six-month-old Ethan play with Mercy’s hair. Her own, as usual, was coming undone. “How am I supposed to take care of a baby on my own? I live in this itty-bitty apartment, and hello? I work full time? What on earth was Trish thinking?”
“Maybe your parents could take over during the day,” Mercy suggested, but Dana wagged her head emphatically.
“Neither one of them is up to full-time babysitting at this point in their lives.”
Then both of her partners went ominously silent, instantly putting Dana on the alert. “What?”
“What about C.J.?” Mercy asked, wincing a little as she dislodged curious little fingers from the three-inch-wide gold loops dangling from her ears.
“Oh, right. Mr. Family Man himself.” When they both blinked at her, she sighed and ‘fessed up about the day before. Okay, she might have done a little judicious editing of the conversation—they didn’t need to know about the dinner invite—but she definitely left in the “He doesn’t want kids” part.
“Be that as it may,” Cass said, assuming the role of Voice of Reason. She folded thin, bare arms over a button-front blouse already adorned with a telltale wet spot on one shoulder. “C.J. doesn’t strike me as the kind of man who’d blow off having a kid. So my guess is Trish left town without telling him.”
Dana hadn’t thought about that. Still, she wasn’t exactly in a charitable mood. “And if she did?”
Mercy leaned against the counter, setting the baby on the edge, protectively bumpered by her arms. He yanked off her turquoise satin headband and began gnawing on it; she didn’t seem to notice. “Hey, if he knew about the baby and refused to take responsibility, you better believe I’d be first in line to string him up by his gonads. But if he didn’t—and remember, you’re not absolutely sure Ethan is C.J.’s—then I think you’re gonna have to wait and see. Give him a chance.”
“You weren’t there, you didn’t see the look on his face …” Dana began, then shook her head, her mouth pulled tight. She reached for Ethan, her eyes burning for reasons she had no intention of thinking about too hard. “I think it’s pretty safe to assume I got me a baby to raise.”
The bell jangled over the door; with a grunt of annoyance, Mercy left to help the pregnant woman slowly picking her way through the store. Cass, however, stroked Dana’s arm for a second, then grasped Ethan’s chunky little hand.
“Honey, I understand what you’re saying. But you really have no idea how C.J.’s going to feel once he sees his son. Look at him—he’s adorable. How could he not fall in love with him?”
At that, the baby turned all-too-familiar blue eyes to Dana and grinned as if to say, “Hey! Where ya been, lady?” Amazement and terror streaked through her, so powerful, and so sudden, she could hardly breathe. Dana nestled the infant to her chest, rubbing his back and sucking in a sharp breath. I’ve been given a baby, she thought, only to then wonder … was this a dream come true?
Or the beginning of a nightmare?
She gave Cass a wan smile. “Hand me the phone, wouldja?”
Hours later, Dana watched Mercy scan the tiny one-bedroom apartment, her features a study in skepticism. Between her Firebird and Dana’s Jetta, they’d managed to haul a portacrib, playpen, baby swing, a case of powdered formula, two jumbo packs of disposable diapers, clothes, rattles, wipes, bedding and at least a million other “essentials” Mercy insisted Dana would probably need before sunrise. In the middle of all this, Ethan lay on his back in the playpen, grunting at the birds. Mercy’s eyebrows knotted a little tighter.
“You sure you’re gonna be okay?”
“Uh-huh,” Dana squeaked out. “Besides, I don’t want any witnesses when C.J. shows up.”
“Damn. I always miss all the fun.”
Dana managed a weak, but nonetheless hysterical, laugh. All afternoon she’d ping-ponged between hope and profound skepticism. Maybe prejudging the man wasn’t in anybody’s interest, especially Ethan’s, but she wasn’t so naive as to expect him to take one look at his kid and suddenly switch tracks.
“Sweetie,” Mercy said gently, “why don’t you call your mom? Let her come help you out.”
“I will, I will. Soon. But one does not spring potentially life-altering news on my mother without a plan. The woman has turned worrying into an art form.”
“I hear ya there. At least let me set up the portacrib—”
Dana took her friend by the arm and steered her toward her door. Not that it wouldn’t make sense to let her stay. Most of Mercy’s sisters were spittin’ out babies like popcorn. No matter when one visited the Zamora household, it was awash in little people. But while Mercy’s presence would have been a great help in many ways, Dana wouldn’t have been able to think. And thinking was the one thing she most needed to do.
And she really didn’t want any witnesses when C.J. arrived. Not because she was going to kill him—she didn’t think—but because Ethan’s sudden appearance had turned a nonrelationship into … well, she didn’t know what, actually. But so much for never having to see the guy again.
Thirty seconds and a heartfelt hug later, Dana was finally alone.
With a baby.
She zipped to her bedroom, rummaging through her bottom drawer for a pair of old shorts, and a faded UNM T-shirt, changing into both at warp speed. The gurgling, drooling six-month-old pushed himself up on his elbows when she walked back to the living room; Dana squatted down in front of the playpen as if inspecting a new life form. Yesterday, she had no idea this child even existed. Now she was responsible for him, maybe for a few days, maybe for the rest of her life.
The thought slammed into her so hard she nearly toppled over. One day, she figured she’d adopt a child or two, when she was ready, both financially and emotionally. At the moment, she was neither. She’d always assumed she’d have some prep time for accepting a child into her life. As, you know, part of a couple?
So much for that idea.
A particularly ripe odor wafted to her nostrils. A byproduct of the earlier grunting, no doubt.
“Let me guess. You messed your pants.”
Ethan grinned and cooed at her, lifting his head at exactly the right angle for Dana to get a good gander at his eyes. Lake-blue, flecked with gold around the pupils, exactly like you-know-whose. On a sigh, she stood and hefted the smelly little dear out of his cage and over to the sofa, where she changed his diaper with surprising aplomb and less than a dozen wipies.
“Now I bet you’re hungry, right?”
In answer, Ethan stuck his fist in his mouth and started gnawing on it with the enthusiasm of a lion ripping into fresh wildebeest. Dana picked up the much sweeter smelling child and plopped him back into his car seat, which she figured was as safe a place as any to try to shovel food down his gullet. But what food, she wondered, might that be?
“Next time you dump a kid on me, Trish,” she muttered, ransacking the paper bag full of little clanking jars Mercy had helped her pick out at Albertson’s on their way home, “don’t forget the dag-nabbed feeding instructions!”
She yanked