Читать книгу The Cowboy's Christmas Proposition - Silver James - Страница 12

Four

Deacon fell into bed just before 7:00 a.m. While he appreciated all the help from the Barron wives—or the Bee Dubyas as his brothers called them—they’d exhausted him and Noelle. The baby had been passed around so much she was wailing before he could convince them to go home. It helped that he’d sent out a group text to their husbands to come get them.

But they’d worked some serious magic on short notice. He’d come home to a functional nursery, courtesy of the chain store that was open 24/7. His home was now filled with bottles, diapers, formulas and more clothes than a kid needed in the short term. The crib and playpen thingy were up and ready—not that any of the women put Noelle down long enough for the baby to use them. They’d also set up a baby monitor. As tired as he was, that was a good thing.

Noelle took thirty minutes to calm down. He’d put her in the crib then sat next to it, stroking her gently and singing to her until she fell asleep. Deke had fond memories of singing Dillon to sleep and he sometimes wondered if that was why they both ended up in the music business. In the end, Noelle had been clutching his finger as her eyes drifted shut and her breathing turned into little puffs. He was in desperate need of at least a couple of hours of sleep. Then he’d deal with the curveball life had thrown him—and the intriguing Highway Patrol trooper he’d left in the Thunder River Casino parking lot as she attempted to placate the DHS caseworker.

* * *

Bacon. Deacon inhaled deeply. That was bacon he was smelling. And biscuits. What the...? He jumped out of bed and stumbled toward the kitchen. He was halfway down the hallway when his brain caught up with his body. The baby-monitor receiver on his bedside table had been turned off. He backtracked to the baby’s room and looked in. Noelle was sleeping soundly.

By the time he reached the kitchen, he’d corralled the panic and was mostly coherent. Until he recognized the woman standing at his stove. He should have known she’d come as soon as word leaked out.

“Mom, why are you in my kitchen?”

She leveled him with a look insinuating he was both not too bright and maybe not her son as a result of that fact.

“Beyond the obvious, Mom.”

She poured him a cup of coffee and placed it on the island. He hitched his butt onto one of the bar stools and gratefully accepted her peace offering.

“Your brothers and cousins are in quite the tizzy, son.”

Okay. Son was better than his full name, but not by much. “It was a crazy night, Mom.”

“Uh-huh.” She flipped the strips of bacon in the cast-iron frying pan.

“It was late, Mom. Or early, depending on which side of dawn you went to bed.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Cut me some slack here.”

“Don’t get snippy, Deacon. Is she yours?”

He studied the steam rising from his mug. “You’ve seen her.”

“Yes.”

“What do you think?”

“I think she’s a darlin’ little girl that somebody—preferably her parents—should love beyond all things.”

“We’re doing the swabs for the test this afternoon. Chance says it’ll take about three weeks. While it’s possible, I’m not sure she’s mine.”

“I figured, sugar. She could be, but I don’t think she is, either. As disappointing as that is.”

“Mo-o-o-o-m,” he warned by stretching out the word.

“None of you are married, Deke, so I am not advocating any of you rush out and find...what’s the term you young people use? Baby momma? No baby mommas. Your daddy and I raised you boys to be honorable men, to do the right thing. You’ll find the right girl, marry her and then have babies. Until we get the paternity-test results, the baby needs looking after. We’ll hope her momma decides to come back. ’Course, if she’s yours, she’s ours. But that’s a whole different situation. On the chance she is yours, we’ll look after her.”

Deke slid off the stool, walked around the island to his mom and kissed her on the cheek. “Yeah, we will. So...is that why you decided to come over and fix breakfast for me?” He noted the pile of bacon and sausage patties, the cartons of eggs and the huge pan of homemade biscuits baking in the oven.

“I suspect the locusts will descend soon enough. You know how crazy the family went over Cord’s little CJ. Noelle is a baby. That just trips switches like you wouldn’t believe.”

Except he would, because seeing the baby, hearing her cry and holding her? Yup, every last one of his switches had been tripped. “She might not be mine, Mom.”

“If she isn’t, what happens if her momma doesn’t come back?”

And that was the elephant in the room, wasn’t it? “I truly don’t know.”

“What’s your gut say?”

“I brought her home, Mom. No way was I letting her go into the system. But to make a commitment lasting the rest of my life?” He stared out the window over the sink. The note claimed he was Noelle’s father. Why didn’t the mother confront him? Ask for support? Why hadn’t she contacted him before the baby was born? So many questions and no answers. At least not until the DNA test. If the baby wasn’t his and they didn’t locate her mother, he had no clue what he’d do. “I just don’t know, Mom.”

“You were always my homebody, Deke. At least until you picked up a guitar. If you weren’t out there singin’ for your supper every night, you’d be right here with a sweet woman making babies for me to spoil.”

He splorted coffee through his nose. She clapped him on the back, pounding a little harder than necessary, and passed him a dish towel to wipe up the mess he’d made.

“Mom, you do remember that I’m the one who took three different girls to prom. The same prom.”

She scowled at him. “I’m not likely to forget. You were a sophomore and they were seniors.”

Deacon coughed behind the towel. He’d also escorted two seniors his junior year, and another three his senior year. Going steady was a foreign concept to him. Heck, the likelihood of his dating a woman more than a couple of times in a row ranked right up there with the Cubs winning the World Series. He’d had one relationship with another country singer that was sort of exclusive and it had ended amicably with both parties going their separate ways. One gossip columnist had labeled him a serial dater. He enjoyed all sorts of women and sex was just gravy.

His mom pointed her finger at him. If there was one deadly thing about Katherine Barron Tate, it was when she brought her “mother finger” to bear on her unruly sons.

Luckily, her lecture was interrupted by a perfunctory knock on the front door followed by the entrance of his older brother, Cooper.

“I smell food!” His brother paused at the door to kick off his muddy boots. “Sorry I missed the concert, little bro. We had a situation on one of the wells last night.” Cooper worked with Cord Barron at BarEx, the oil-and-gas exploration-and-energy corporation controlled by the Barrons.

Coop padded into the kitchen and kissed their mother on the cheek. “Mornin’, Momma. Sure could use a cup of coffee.”

“Is your arm broken? You know where the mugs are kept and the pot is right there staring you in the face.”

Laughing, Cooper made himself at home. This was the way of the Tates. There were times Deke wished for boundaries but his big, boisterous family refused to acknowledge them. Before his mother finished the bacon and started a batch of scrambled eggs with onions and peppers, along with home fries, his younger brothers, Bridger and Dillon, had tromped in. The rest of his brothers were likely out of town—Hunter and Boone working with Senator Clay Barron in Washington, DC, and Tucker out in Las Vegas with Chase Barron.

Dillon set the big farm-style table without being asked while Bridger stirred the gravy. Cooper had ducked out to grab a shower, seeing as he was covered in dirt and grease. When he returned, he was wearing a pair of Deacon’s jeans and a Sons of Nashville concert sweatshirt.

Noelle’s whimper echoed from the baby monitor on the counter, and Deke led the charge. Halfway down the hallway, he turned to glower, noting how his mother and Dillon hadn’t followed. He grinned evilly. “Coop, you and Bridge go grab her. I’ll get her bottle ready.” At their eager nods of agreement, he began to head back to the kitchen, then added, “Oh, she’ll need a fresh diaper.”

Then he ran, laughing. But between the two of them, they got Noelle sorted out and appeared with her several minutes later in the kitchen. His mother took over the care and feeding of the baby while her “boys” ate their breakfast.

* * *

Quin was supposed to be starting her days off. She’d hit Troop A’s headquarters building an hour after her shift change. She’d spent another hour filling out her report and filing it so the information would go up the chain. Whatever was to be done about baby Noelle “Doe” and Deacon Tate was above her pay grade.

Sneaking out the back door after stuffing the report in her supervisor’s in-box, she wanted only home, a hot shower, a protein shake and bed. In that order. And when she woke up, she’d have shopping to do. Housecleaning. Laundry. All the mundane things that normal people did on their days off.

Two hours after she’d arrived home, her supervisor called, jerking her from a sound sleep. She was to report for duty as soon as she could get to Troop A headquarters.

So...

Here she was, rapping her knuckles on the lieutenant’s office door and peeking in through the glass window. He was on the phone but he crooked two fingers and gestured for her to enter. Quin slipped inside and sank onto a chair.

Lieutenant Charles had one of the best poker faces in the Department of Public Safety. As hard as she tried, Quin couldn’t get a read on the conversation or who he was talking to, until he ended the call. “Of course, Governor. Whatever we can do to assist.”

Her brain went down all sorts of rabbit holes. The governor had lots of reasons to be calling the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, but direct contact with her supervisor at Troop A? It wasn’t like he was in the chain of command at the state level. Not that she was paranoid or anything, but after last night, the idea of a political target located between her shoulder blades didn’t seem all that far-fetched.

The lieutenant’s opening salvo just confirmed her suspicions. “So, you had quite the Friday night.”

“You have my report, sir.”

“Ease down, Kincaid. Yes. I have your report. And multiple calls from the governor on down.” His dry chuckle did little to settle her nerves. “The decision has been made to take you off regular patrol—” He held up his hand, palm facing her to stay the retort she’d opened her mouth to make. “Priorities, Kincaid. And this case is now yours. You’ll be the DPS liaison with all the other law-enforcement entities involved. Basically, you’re heading up a task force to locate the baby’s biological mother, to expedite the investigation and to act as the bridge between law enforcement and Deacon Tate.”

“Bridge? What does that mean?”

“That means you are to stay on top of him—”

Quin all but sputtered as her mind went places it had no business going, and all her feminine parts perked right up at the thought.

“And this investigation. You’ll work in conjunction with Child Protective Services from the Department of Human Services. The assigned CPS social worker will contact you. There is to be no direct contact with Mr. Tate unless you are present.”

The cop side of her brain finally overrode the rest. “Wait. What does that mean, exactly?”

“What it means—exactly—is that you need to work closely with Mr. Tate. He is not to be disturbed by CPS or any law-enforcement agency involved in this investigation. You’re point, Kincaid. You take any questions directly to him.”

Quin stared, working hard to keep her mouth from gaping. She finally uttered, “Are you kidding me?”

“This is not something to kid about.”

“But—”

“No buts.”

“Yes, there is a but, sir. I’m scheduled for vacation time next month.”

“Then you better get busy and find the mother, determine if Mr. Tate is the biological father and round up any other pertinent information.”

She sat there, staring, her brain emitting nothing but white noise as it tried to wrap itself around the situation.

“Dismissed, Kincaid.”

Quin rose, pivoted and headed for the door. The lieutenant’s voice stopped her just as her hand touched the knob.

“FYI, Kincaid. No leaks. If any information beyond what DPS releases about this investigation gets out, it’s all on your head.”

Her mouth felt numb, just like her semicoherent brain, but she muttered, “Yes, sir,” then exited. But the lieutenant still wasn’t done.

“You need to get out to Mr. Tate’s ranch and talk to him, Kincaid. Welfare check on the baby and all that. ASAP.”

Oh, whoop-de-do. She had plans for today and none of them included driving to Timbuktu to deal with a spoiled star. Except there was a baby involved and seriously, what single guy was truly capable of 24/7 child care?

First, she had to locate directions. Then she’d just drop in on the man himself. And give him a piece of her mind.