Читать книгу Dream Baby - Ann Evans - Страница 9

CHAPTER THREE

JAKE COULD TELL right away that the woman was going to be difficult.

He didn’t know what he had done to put her off him so fast, but he didn’t much care. He gave her a once-over look meant for intimidation.

“Can I help you?” she asked.

Her words were pieces of crystal. He kept his own tone firm, but pleasant. “I hope so. I’m looking for a young woman named Isabel Petrivych.”

“Isabel Petrivych,” the woman repeated slowly, as though trying the name on for size. Then she shook her head. “I’m sorry—”

“Ben at the Whispering River Café told me I could find her here.”

That threw her, he could tell. She wasn’t a very good liar. The base of her neck went pink, and she swallowed, trying to regroup like an actress who realized she’d just muffed a line. “Oh. Well, Isabel was here. But she’s not now.”

“That’s odd. I thought I saw her as I was coming up the walkway.” Jake jerked his head toward the wide picture window. “It’s a pretty good view from the front driveway.”

“You must have been mistaken. It’s just me here today.”

The cool flatness of her tone irritated him. His eyes narrowed, taking in her sleek, toned length. The electric-blue leotard did marvelous things for her body—and a few unexpectedly pleasant things to his. He looked away, annoyed that he was noticing how attractive she was when he was trying so hard to be imposing. “So you’re working out alone.”

“Yes.”

“But Isabel will be back.” He made it a statement, not a question.

“Who knows?”

“I’m betting she will be,” Jake replied with a tight smile. He bent to retrieve a pair of sneakers that lay on the floor nearby. They were small, and even though he’d met Isabel only once, he distinctly remembered her as petite. “She might need these,” he said, taking a chance. When the woman looked momentarily stunned, and then opened her mouth to speak, he shook his head and tossed the sneakers on the desk. “Don’t bother. You’re at least a size eight.”

“Seven, actually.”

He started to smile at the response, then caught himself. “Look, I don’t know you, or why you and Isabel have decided to play this little game—” “I’m Nora Holloway. I own this place.”

“Ah, yes. NLH. The artist.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I saw your paintings at the café. Ben was right.”

“About what?”

“You are pretty.”

It was her turn to look annoyed, which was a shame because the compliment had been a sincere one. The generous mouth, large, brown eyes—the bones in her face were the kind you wanted to linger on. He liked the thick auburn ponytail that swayed back and forth over her shoulder, and that cute little trio of freckles across her collarbone. Too bad she was turning out to be such a royal pain in the butt.

“Mr....”

“Burdette.”

“Mr. Burdette,” Nora Holloway said succinctly. “I’ve told you that Isabel isn’t here. I don’t know when she’ll be back, so there’s really no point in waiting.”

“All right Then I’ll need to rent a cabin for the night.”

“There isn’t one available.”

Jake turned to gaze out the front window again. “Looks pretty quiet out there,” he observed. He pointed toward the wooden Vacancy sign that sat only a few feet away from his rental car, then smiled back at Nora. “And that’s not what your sign says.”

“We don’t rent by the night There’s a three-night minimum.”

“Three nights will be fine, then.”

The pinkening at her throat had gone to red, but she managed to harpoon him with an arctic glare. “Actually, we’re closed. The season hasn’t officially started yet.”

He fished out his wallet and placed two one-hundred-dollar bills on the desk. “Then maybe I can give you a reason to open up early. Unofficially.”

Those dark eyes were smoldering now, and he knew that the offer of money had insulted her. The thin sheet of glass that had sprung up between them when they’d met had turned into solid steel.

“You’re wasting your time,” she said coldly. “And mine.”

He was raw and improvising and suddenly out of patience. “We’re in agreement there, lady, so listen up. I’ve come a long way to see Isabel, and I’m not going home until I do.”

“Well, you can’t stay here.”

“Well, I think I’ll wait, all the same.”

He turned away from her, feigning interest in a wall covered with scattered pictures. The photographs looked as if they dated from the Eisenhower administration. Grainy, black-and-white, but all of them obviously taken nearby.

“How’s the fishing around these parts?” he asked as he peered at a young boy holding up a good-size catfish for the camera.

“It’s good. If you know what you’re doing.”

“Who’s this?” He tapped the picture glass.

“My grandfather.” She gave him a put-upon look. “As an innkeeper, I have the right to refuse anyone—”

He swung back to face her. “Look, I’m tired. I’ve just spent five hours cramming my six-foot, two-inch body in a roller skate of a sports car because my son liked the looks of it better than a roomy sedan. He’s out in the car, by the way, and if you think I’m unbearable, you ought to take him on. The point is, I’m not getting in that toy and heading back to the interstate. Not when there are perfectly good accommodations right here.”

“I don’t want to call the sheriff, but—”

The door beside the registration desk, previously half-closed, suddenly flew back, and Isabel Petrivych appeared in the doorway. “Oh, stop... Enough!” she gasped out.

There was a long moment of silence, then Nora Holloway took a step in her direction. “Izzie...”

The girl’s eyes were fixed on Jake. Her bottom lip disappeared between her teeth for a moment, then she said softly, “You wanted to see me. Here I am.”

She hadn’t changed much since he’d met her last year. Except for the pregnancy, of course. She still had deep blue eyes and long, dark hair that curled attractively down her back. Bobby had always been a sucker for women with hair like that, and Jake had guessed the moment his brother had introduced them that there might be more between them than just two people who’d met at the same political rally.

However, he’d never expected it to amount to anything. Bobby was leaving with Jake for Africa in a matter of days. They were going to build a bridge between two warring townships in the hill country, in a place so hot that the wind smelled like fire. The government had promised protection; the bridge was seen as a symbol of progress in the peace talks, and Jake had kidded Bobby unmercifully about being eager to see how his brother fared living in a place where the nearest comforts of home were miles and miles away.

The bridge was up and in use now. Shining hotly in the naked sun, forged together with a fair amount of tears and sweat...and blood. He’d brought Bobby’s body home, and now he needed to do this one thing for his brother.

“You have seen me,” Isabel said. “Now you can leave.”

“No,” Jake replied. “I can’t.”

“Why have you come here? I want nothing from you.”

“I want to make sure that you’re all right. That you aren’t alone and—”

“I’m not alone. I have Nora to help me.”

He was aware of the Holloway woman moving forward, as though responding to some unspoken cue. He resented it, that little movement to protect Isabel. As though he could ever be a danger to the girl who carried in her womb-all that was left of his brother. He ignored her, keeping his attention focused on Isabel.

“We need to talk,” he said firmly. “Just the two of us.”

“There is nothing left to say.”

“The hell there isn’t.” He crossed the room in long, easy strides, but before he reached Isabel, Nora Holloway moved between them. “There are decisions that need to be made.”

“And I have made them,” Isabel snapped. “Go away!”

Nora’s hand was suddenly on his chest. It was such a small, graceful hand, but it felt like a barrier of steel against his shirt. He frowned down at her, and something crossed her face that Jake hadn’t seen in her eyes before. Genuine anger, iron determination... something.

“Don’t get in the middle of this,” he said finally.

It was clear she intended to ignore that advice. “Isabel’s past the stage where the baby can be aborted, if that’s what you had in mind.”

That statement surprised him a little. So she knew about Bobby’s foolish response to Isabel’s news. What else did she know? “That was a mistake—”

“It certainly was. And you’re not going to come into my home and upset Isabel with any other solutions you think might ease your conscience.” She shook her head, and her eyes were filled with disgust. “You ought to be ashamed—coming here now. Where were you when she needed you the most?”

Jake jerked back. “Wait a minute. You think—”

“No, you wait a minute,” she said, advancing on him a little. “Isabel doesn’t deserve this. Only the worst kind of bastard would turn his back on a woman carrying his child—”

“Nora—” Isabel began.

“Miss Holloway—”

“—and if you think you can make things right now, you’re in for a big surprise.”

Jake took a step back. “So are you. Miss Holloway, I’m not the father of Isabel’s child.”

The woman’s mouth tightened. “So now you want to deny that you’re the father? I suppose we should have expected that.”

He looked over at Isabel again, searching for help. The girl moved forward to touch Nora’s elbow. “Nora,” she said softly. “This isn’t Bobby. This is his older brother. Jake.”

The Holloway woman’s fierce expression melted a little; her eyes lost their fervor. Her hand came off Jake’s chest as though it had been singed.

“Oh.” A tenuous smile tried to form, but it failed miserably and then disappeared. “I’m sorry. I thought—”

“Yes, I know what you thought. That’s part of the reason I’m here. To clear up a few things.” To Isabel he said, “I’d just like to talk to you. That’s all.”

Isabel’s mouth was still a slash of displeasure, but after a long silence she nodded. Nora picked up on this small signal and moved away from Jake. “I think I should leave you two alone,” she said, then added quickly, “Isabel, I’ll be in the rehab shed if you need me.”

“Thank you,” Jake began.

But Nora Holloway was already out the front door, a bright blue blur.

WITH THE LAST LEVEL of Space Scow conquered, Charlie sat in the car and stared down at the video game in his hands. “I hate him.” he muttered to himself.

Well, maybe hate was too strong a word. He really didn’t know the guy well enough to hate him. Dislike, maybe. Yeah, that was it. Intense dislike. You couldn’t burn in hell if you only disliked your father, could you?

He’d have to ask Marisela, his mother’s housekeeper. The old woman was Catholic and knew everything there was to know about God and what he’d let you get away with. She’d know whether Charlie was in big trouble or not.

If he ever saw her again. Which might be never, now that his father had taken him away from his mother.

No. Stolen! That was the word. What was that phrase he’d heard somewhere...? Like a thief in the night. Yeah, that was the way it had been.

Only his father had come to his mother’s Manhattan apartment in broad daylight, and his mother hadn’t been weeping and wailing and carrying on about the loss of her son. Thea was much too dignified for that, and crying only made you look foolish, she’d once told him, so he really hadn’t expected her to try to stop his father. She had other ways to deal with him. Charlie was sure she had an armload of lawyers looking over their new custody agreement right now, finding a way to get him back to New York and...and civilization.

Away from here. This place was creepy. Too quiet. Lots of dark wood and hanging moss. All the little cabins made it look like a ranch, but there wasn’t a single horse or cowboy in sight.

Maybe he’d get out of the car and poke around. Or maybe not. Who knew what was out there? He was comfortable in the city, where the doorman always looked out for him, and security cameras were in every corridor of the apartment building. Here, there could be grizzly bears in the woods that surrounded the main house.

The idea made him shiver, so he forced himself to think about his mother. He pictured her missing him in New York—with no one but her personal assistant, Anthony, and Marisela to talk to in the apartment. No one to ask her how the latest photo shoot went and actually care about her answer.

He looked out the car window, growing more impatient by the minute. He sure hoped they weren’t going to stay in this dump for the night.

NORA SLOWED her pace as she went down the front steps of the lodge, giving herself time to regather her composure. Her breath was captured inside her like a square, solid box pressing against her rib cage. Her cheeks felt fiery, and she turned her face into the exquisite relief of a passing breeze.

She’d never been much of a fighter. Never confrontational. Even as a child she’d been the peacemaker in the family.

So what had she been doing just now? Lying through her teeth to a total stranger. Hearing her voice get higher and higher as she became more and more defensive. Ready to lay a flying tackle on this interloper if he so much as lifted a threatening finger in Isabel’s direction. Even now, the adrenaline was still pumping, pumping in her veins, until she felt almost light-headed with the force of it. And why—for God’s sake?

She felt silly, embarrassed by the assumptions she’d made about Jake Burdette in there. Not the father, but the baby’s uncle. He must think she was an idiot. Oh, it was comical, really...

Only she didn’t feel like laughing. Not at all.

Beneath all the feelings of humiliation and stupidity lay a tiny trickle of fear, slipping through her insides, leaving her cold and frightened.

Why was he here? What did he want? Why now, when she’d just begun to really believe that her life could be different, that her life could be made up of all the wonderful things she’d ever dared to dream about. John Forrester was drawing up the necessary paperwork. A safe delivery. A petition to the court. A few signatures. Then the dream of motherhood would become a reality.

Deliberately she settled on the bottom step and drew in a deep lungful of air. Okay, she told herself, okay. Burdette’s coming here today didn’t have to be a bad sign. It didn’t mean he was here to effect some sort of reconciliation between Isabel and his brother. He was probably just trying to do the right thing by her even if his younger brother wouldn’t. Maybe he planned to give her some money. Pay her doctor bills. Offer her a place to stay until the baby came.

Yes, that was why he was here. He looked like a man who took his responsibilities serioùsly. And in spite of that aggressive attitude, he had kind eyes—the soft hazel of autumn leaves. A man with eyes like that wouldn’t hurt you, not deliberately. She had to remain positive, upbeat.

Closing her eyes, she willed herself to focus on the images nearest her heart—the baby. What he would feel like in her arms. His sweet smell, the softness of his hair, the whisper of his breath as she held him against her neck. Was there anything more heavenly than that—?

“Is my father ever coming out?”

Nora opened her eyes. A boy squinted down at her, his hands fisted on his hips, a look of pure annoyance etched across his childish features. He wasn’t a bad-looking kid, but he was clearly in the pit-bull jaws of adolescence—no patience with adults and little desire to develop any.

Nora stood, brushing off the seat of her leotard. In spite of his preppy, clean-cut appearance, the boy looked tired, and Jake Burdette lost a point in her parenting manual. “Your dad might be a little while. Would you like to come for a walk with me?”

“Why should I? I don’t even know you.”

She stuck out a hand. “Nora Holloway. I own this place.”

He took her fingers in a reluctant handshake. “Why?” he asked in a voice richly steeped in sarcasm.

It looked as though the kid had inherited some of his father’s manner. Nora didn’t rise to the bait. She’d spent too many years winning over unenthusiastic boys and girls who had been dragged to the Hideaway by parents who were determined that they experience “the Great Outdoors.” She smiled at him. “Not your kind of place, huh?”

“Not in a million years.”

“Oh, well. Do you like animals?”

He shrugged. “I guess.”

“I have a shed behind the main lodge where I take care of wild animals that have been injured. Want to see it?”

“Not really.” With overt disinterest, he plucked a handheld video game out of his back pocket and began a slow march back to the car.

She wondered if Jake Burdette knew what a poor job he’d done in raising his son. “Well, you’re on your own, then,” she called after him. “So long.”

She didn’t look back as she walked behind the main lodge, but she could feel the boy surreptitiously watching her. He might not want to acknowledge it, but she suspected he had a kid’s natural curiosity about where she was headed and what she was doing.

Her spirits lifted a little as she trooped down the short, grassy pathway that led to the building at the edge of the woods. The rehabilitation work she did with the animals in the shed usually took all her concentration. Maybe it would help keep her mind off Jake Burdette and what he might be saying to Isabel right this moment.

As kids, Nora and Trip had cobbled together a playhouse from scrap lumber, setting it far enough away from the main lodge to escape their parents’ watchful eyes. Five years ago, enlisting almost no outside help, Nora had expanded the playhouse, turning the modest structure into a rehab station that could house a small number of wounded animals. As a wildlife rehabilitator licensed by the state of Florida, she usually had half a dozen patients, but right now there were only four, with an eagle scheduled to come in from a nearby vet’s office sometime soon.

The door to the shed creaked a little as she opened it, announcing her arrival to her charges. There were screeches and the flutter of wings from the cages holding an orphaned crow named Jeckle and a mockingbird named Begger, a chattering trill from Bandit, a raccoon who’d suffered numerous cuts when he’d been mauled by a dog, and a sniff of interest from the direction of Marjorie’s pen.

“Hello, you guys,” Nora said softly as she moved down the line of cages. “How are you doing today?”

The windows in the shed were small, but the sunlight sifting through them was strong enough for Nora to see that each of the animals was faring well. Within the next two weeks, they would all be able to be returned to the nearby national forest. Even Marjorie.

It was with some reluctance that Nora moved closer to the pen where the deer was penned. She knew she’d made a mistake with the fawn, an unforgivable error for a rehabber to make.

Marjorie’s mother had been killed on the road, and the animal had been brought to her when she’d been hardly old enough to stand, malnourished and soaking wet. Nora had bottle-fed her, had wrapped her in blankets and stroked her for hours until the poor thing had stopped shivering. The fawn’s sweet brown eyes had looked up at her defenselessly, trustingly, as though she knew Nora was trying to save her life but didn’t know what to do to help.

And in that moment, Nora had done something every rehabber was supposed to avoid at all costs—she had fallen in love with one of her charges.

The fawn needed her as no other animal had. Nora brought the creature back from the brink of death at least half a dozen times during those first few days. In the first critical week, she had spent more time out here on a cot in the shed than in her own bed. But gradually the fawn had begun to rally and thrive.

Now, after six months, she was ready to be reintroduced to the wild. Nora knew in her heart it was past time, really. If she kept Marjorie much longer, the deer would lose all her instincts for survival.

Nora moved to the pen’s entrance, but went no farther. Too often the deer had lifted her head over the edge of the door for a scratch, or had taken food from Nora’s hand. Exhibiting such tame and. trusting behavior was sweet and desirable in a deer park, but unacceptable for a wild animal. Knowing she was responsible for this kind of human imprinting, Nora was doing her best to reestablish some boundaries between the two of them.

The deer ran her body against the wire pen, obviously hoping for a friendly rub. Nora backed away. “I’m sorry, little girl,” she said. “No more human contact. You’ve got to stay wild.”

As though disappointed, the fawn snorted noisily, then wandered to the back of the pen to paw through the hay. She looked so healthy now, muscled, sleek, with none of the nicks and scars so many deer in the woods suffered. Nora watched the animal for a long time, wondering where she’d find the strength to send her off to join others of his kind.

While Nora stood there silently asking how she could have allowed herself to make such a mistake with Marjorie, she became aware of another presence. Actually, she heard the boy long before he appeared in the open doorway of the shed. He walked like a city kid—noisily, with total disregard for the beauty of the silence and his surroundings. From the corner of her eye she saw him move tentatively forward, inspecting the place.

Without glancing his way, Nora pulled a bale of hay off the small stack the feed store had delivered last week.

The boy moved into her line of vision, observing her silently for a long time. Then he asked, “Are you...like...one of those weird old ladies that keep eighty-two cats in their house?”

Nora straightened. “Gosh, I hope not. Come back in fifty years, and we’ll see.” She motioned behind him where a rusty box of tools sat on a wooden feed bin. “Hand me those wire cutters, will you?”

It took him longer than it should have to figure out which tool she meant. Finally, he lifted the wire cutters cautiously and held them out to her with a questioning look.

“Those are the ones,” she told him. She slid the cutters under the wire binding the hay together. One snip, and the bale began to fall apart into flakes. “Feel like helping out?”

“I don’t want to get dirty.”

“I can see why,” Nora replied, eyeing the expensive cut of his slacks and shirt. Who dressed a kid—especially a boy—like that? “Maybe you’d better not. I need someone who can really dig in and help me out.”

The boy seemed to consider this statement for a moment or two, then he shrugged. “I’ll be careful, and I guess there’s nothing better to do.”

“Can you tear this hay into pieces?” With one hand she indicated a second small pen she’d recently finished constructing. “Then spread it around the floor there?”

He nodded and began pulling apart the hay, methodically placing it in layers across the dirt floor of the pen while she retrieved medicines from the small refrigerator under one of the counters. She noticed that he was very careful not to allow the straw to touch his clothes.

“Don’t you have anyone to do this for you?” he asked.

“I do now. What’s your name?”

“Charles.”

He said his name precisely, as though he thought it held special meaning. She inclined her head toward him. “Welcome to the rehab shed, Charles. Don’t talk too loud and don’t move too suddenly. It frightens the animals. And if you want to hang on to all your fingers, don’t put them in the cages. All right?”

He nodded again. “So what’s a rehab shed?” he asked when he was about halfway through the chore.

“A place where sick wild animals get better. Every year a few run into trouble—cars, hunters with no sense, predators that beat them up pretty badly. If the problem is fixable, they’re brought here so I can nurse them back to health.”

“So they’re your pets.”

She thought of Marjorie and shook her head firmly. “No. A rehabber isn’t allowed to turn them into pets. They have to remain wild. Otherwise they won’t know how to survive once you’ve released them.” From the sink in one corner, she added a few drops of water to the medicinal base she planned to use on Bandit’s cuts. “Want to meet them?”

He nodded, and she led him to the cages while she gently stirred the yellow concoction into a paste. “This is Jeckle,” she said, inclining her head toward the crow, then the mockingbird. “And that’s Begger. They were both brought to me as orphans.”

Charles wrinkled his nose as he peered into Jeckle’s cage. “Why are you bothering to save him? He’s just a crow. They’re everywhere.”

“You see little boys everywhere, but wouldn’t you want someone to save you if you were in trouble?”

“I’m not a little boy,” Charles said in an aggrieved tone. “I’m nearly a teenager.”

“Well, Jeckle is important to me. All creatures ate.”

The kid looked up at her with sudden speculation. “Do they pay you lots of money to do this?”

“They don’t pay me at all. I do it because I want to.” She moved on to the raccoon’s cage. The animal looked at them with sharp, beady eyes. “This is Bandit.”

“Are you gonna cut his head off!”

“Good grief, no!” Nora stared at the boy, wondering what kind of horrid imagination this kid liked to indulge. “Why would you ask that?”

“You know,” Charles said in a seemingly earnest tone. “Rabies. Isn’t that how they find out if they have them?”

Nora frowned. “Bandit doesn’t have rabies. He had a run-in with a dog. I’m mixing up this paste right now so that I can put it on those cuts you see.”

“Oh. What if he bites you? Is there a chance you’ll get rabies?”

“Are all kids your age so gruesome?”

The boy opened his mouth to reply, then seemed to change his mind. After a few seconds he spoke. “I’ve just never seen many wild animals up close before. I live in the city. At least, I used to.”

“That explains a few things,” Nora muttered.

Charles asked a few more questions about the raccoon and its chances for survival. Unexpectedly, they were thoughtful, intelligent inquiries, and he listened closely to her answers. Nora began to suspect that he was enjoying himself.

“This is Marjorie,” Nora said as they moved on to the deer’s pen. “Her mother was killed on the road.”

“She doesn’t look like a Marjorie.”

“Well, you don’t look like a Charles.”

He jerked his head up to glare at her. “That’s what my mother always calls me.”

“You look like a Charlie to me. Do you mind if I call you that?”

“I guess not,” he said in a soft, sullen voice. He stared at the deer as though memorizing every detail. “Marjorie’s still a dumb name.”

“I named her after Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings.”

“Who?”

“The woman who wrote The Yearling.”

He shook his head. “Never read it.”

“Too bad. It’s wonderful.”

The boy looked up at her again, one eyebrow raised in inquiry. “Any monsters in it?”

“Afraid not. No car chases or killer tornadoes, either. But there’s a young boy in the story. He lives deep in the Florida woods with his family, and he finds a fawn, just like Marjorie here.”

“Sounds exciting,” Charlie commented with a marked lack of enthusiasm. “When are you going to let her go?”

Nora frowned and looked down at the yellow paste in her hands. “Perhaps in a few days.”

“You don’t want to?”

“She has to be released,” she replied, more for her own benefit than his. “She’s probably stayed too long as it is.”

Charlie straightened, and Nora was aware that he was suddenly watching her closely. For a kid, he seemed very intuitive. She had the strangest feeling that he knew exactly how much the mistake she’d made with Marjorie was costing her.

“You could lie,” he said quietly and gave her a sly look, as though they were suddenly coconspirators. “Tell them you let her go, but keep her instead.”

“I couldn’t do that.”

“Why not?” he asked. He seemed genuinely surprised by her answer. “’Cause you’d get caught?”

“No. Because then she’d be miserable instead of me. She’s a wild animal who wouldn’t be happy living in a pen.”

He seemed to give this thought serious consideration for a long moment. Then his shoulders rose in an elaborate shrug. “You should just do what you want, and the heck with what anybody else thinks, including Marjorie.”

“Surely your parents taught you that’s not a very good way to live your life?” Nora said.

The boy actually stiffened. With a quaint and somehow heartrending dignity he said, “My mom taught me everything I need to know, and she did everything right”

His eyes had taken on a militant sparkle, and Nora realized that he was waiting for her to dispute that statement. She didn’t. Instead, she said lightly, “Wow. A mom who doesn’t make mistakes. I hope she’s going to write a book on motherhood.”

“She’s a famous model.” Charlie’s expression turned to one of pride. “So famous that she doesn’t even need her last name anymore. Her name’s Thea. You’ve probably seen her. She was on two magazine covers last month.”

Nora never bothered to follow the news about the “beautiful people,” but even she’d heard of Thea. The woman—in her early thirties—was the latest darling of the photographers. Some perfume company—trying to woo the aging baby boomers—had just given her an ungodly amount of money to be the star of their multimedia ad campaign. There was some other reason Nora was familiar with the woman’s name, but for the life of her, she couldn’t put her finger on it.

She went to the sink and washed the spatula she’d used to stir Bandit’s medicine. With her back to Charlie, she said, “A mother who doesn’t make mistakes and is a supermodel. Your dad must feel pretty lucky.”

“They’re divorced. He hates her.”

She cocked her head in the boy’s direction, not certain she’d heard correctly over the sound of running water from the tap. “How do you know that?”

“He took me away from her. Just to make her mad.”

That statement carried such fury that Nora turned and looked sharply at the boy. She was about to engage Charlie in further discussion, but she became aware of Jake Burdette standing in the open doorway.

Hot blood surged into her cheeks, and she was glad for the late-afternoon light that gave everything in the rehab shed a mellow glow. She wondered if he had heard the last of his son’s remarks. His face gave nothing away.

Charlie—obviously expecting her to react to his words—turned his head and caught sight of his father. His posture went from stiff to ramrod straight.

“Charles,” Jake Burdette said mildly as he ducked his head under the low doorway and moved farther into the shed. “You shouldn’t have run off without telling me where you were going.”

An argument looked ready to drop from Charlie’s lips, and Nora plunged in quickly. “My fault,” she offered in an effort to lighten the sudden tension between father and son. “I’m always looking for someone to fetch and carry, and he was too nice to refuse.”

Jake gave her a vague smile, his attention still focused on Charlie. “Get your things together from the car. We’re checking in.” He held up one of the Hideaway’s large key rings. “Cabin Two.”

“You’re kidding.” There was no mistaking Charlie’s feelings about staying a night in one of the cabins.

When Jake ignored the comment, Charlie sighed heavily, snatched the key from his father’s hand and stomped out of the shed without a look or word in her direction. Silently, the two adults watched him go.

“Thank you for keeping him occupied,” Jake said eventually. “He didn’t want to come on this trip, and he’s been reminding me of that fact ever since we left Norfolk.”

“No problem. He seems like a nice enough kid.”

“Does he?” Jake replied with a surprised look and a light laugh. “I’ve yet to see much of that side of him. I’ve just recently gained custody, and our relationship is a little thorny.”

“I’m sure he’ll come around.”

It was the kind of hope-filled comment all parents like to hear, and he gave her a small smile to indicate he knew that. Then he looked at her in such a calm, deliberate way that her pulse jumped. Before she knew it, he was taking her hand, as though meeting her for the first time. “I’m afraid we got off on the wrong foot. Isabel speaks very highly of you, and I know firsthand that you’re very protective of her.”

She dipped her head. “I’m rather embarrassed...”

“Don’t be. Everyone should have a friend like you.”

The words were low, but sounded so sincere that her pulse jumped again, even danced a little. Silly, she thought, and unexpected. Had it really been so long since a good-looking man had said nice things to her that she should react like a teenager on her first date? Jeckle began to screech unpleasantly, and Nora used the crow as an. excuse to move away from Jake Burdette.

She removed the water bottle from Jeckle’s cage. “So,” she remarked in what she hoped was an offhanded way. “Isabel checked you in.”

“We both felt we needed more time to talk. Do you object?”

She shrugged. “If Isabel doesn’t mind, there’s no reason for me to.”

“How long have you known her?”

“Isabel answered an ad I’d placed for seasonal help three years ago. She’s been coming every break from college since then.” She looked up at him over the edge of Jeckle’s cage. “Well, all except the holidays last year when she met your brother. Over the years we’ve developed quite a friendship. We’re more like sisters now.”

“I’m glad she had a good friend to turn to when she needed one.”

“I’ll do anything I can to help her.”

He was quiet for a long moment, watching her replace the refilled water bottle into the crow’s cage. Then he said in a tone that sounded almost sympathetic, “Does that include adopting her baby?”

She leveled a look at him. “You make it sound like I’m only doing it to help her out of a jam. I assure you it wasn’t a quick decision.”

“Isabel’s very young. Probably confused about what she really wants—”

“She’s not confused at all,” Nora countered. “Perhaps she was at first, and certainly she was frightened, but she’s very clear on what she wants now.”

“So you had nothing to do with her plan to give you her baby?”

The conversation was deteriorating rapidly. “What are you suggesting?” she asked in what she meant to be a chilling voice.

“I’m not suggesting anything,” he said. “I’m pretty much stating it up front. I think this decision to give her baby away is too hasty. Perhaps she saw it as the only way out of a difficult predicament.”

“If she found herself in a difficult predicament, your brother was the one who helped put her there. He washed his hands of the problem and even suggested an abortion. Are you aware of that?”

He nodded. “I am. Isabel’s telephone call threw him for quite a loop. That doesn’t excuse him, but I do know that he came to regret that suggestion almost immediately after he made it.”

“And yet you’re the one who’s come here, when it should be him—”

“My brother is dead, Miss Holloway. He died a few days after he received Isabel’s phone call.”

He said the words in such a matter-of-fact way that at first Nora thought she’d heard incorrectly. She looked at him, trying to gauge his feelings, but his features were expressionless. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

His broad shoulders moved uneasily, and she suspected he wasn’t comfortable with her sympathy. His hands roamed over a line of bottles and cans that sat upon the counter, as though he had real interest in containers of peroxide and liniment.

“He was working with me in Nigeria, building a bridge. A group of bandits attacked one of my field crews. Bobby hung on for a while, but...” He broke off, turning away from the counter suddenly. There was an odd twist to his mouth, as though he’d said too much and wished he could call back the words.

“Have you told Isabel?” Nora asked softly.

“Yes. She took it well, I think.” He grimaced. “I know Bobby’s initial reaction to her telephone call hurt her pretty badly. I don’t believe she’s been entertaining pleasant thoughts about him all these months.”

“Still, I should go to her.” Placing the last of the medicine in the refrigerator, Nora washed and dried her hands. She turned to face him suddenly. “You said Bobby came to regret his decision?”

“I sat by my brother’s hospital bed for almost two days before he died. He wanted to come home, find Isabel and tell her he’d made a huge mistake. There’s no doubt in my mind he would have married her and given his child a name.” Jake expelled a long sigh. “Toward the end he knew he wasn’t going to... He asked me to make sure she was all right. That she’d have enough money to support herself and the baby. That’s why I’m here. Of course, everything’s changed now.”

Nora’s heart cramped suddenly. “What do you mean?”

Jake gave her a hard, level look that didn’t reassure her any. “I’m sorry, but I can’t go along with what Isabel wants. I can’t let you adopt my brother’s child.”