A Bachelor, a Boss and a Baby

by Rachel Lee

  Then, for the first time, she really saw his face. Looked at it and took it in, and felt her stomach flutter. Dark, nearly black hair with blue eyes so bright the color was arresting. The rest of that face was great, too, squarish, a good chin, with fair, unblemished skin. His last name suggested he was Irish, as did a few hints in his pronunciation. He couldn’t have left the isle very long ago, she thought. Western sun and wind hadn’t kissed him for long.

  Fortunately, Daphne made a small sound, drawing Diane’s attention before she stared at Blaine too long. Somebody should have warned her that a man holding an infant was more irresistible than one standing solo. She never would have dreamed. She watched as he pulled a visitor’s chair back from her desk and slowly lowered himself into it. The chair was springy, and he rocked gently.

  Then she felt embarrassed. “Would you like me to take her back?”

  He smiled over the baby’s head. “It’s been a while since I held a baby. I’m liking it.”

  She felt her mouth frame a smile in return. She had to admit that this early into her new role as a mother, she was glad of a brief break. She’d had no idea that her patience wasn’t infinite, that she’d be losing a lot of sleep and that she could get frazzled by a baby’s persistent crying.

  The new character insights didn’t exactly make her feel proud. Now she not only needed to deal with a job and the baby, but she needed to deal with herself, as well.

  “So what brought you here, Blaine? I’m assuming you didn’t grow up here.” An assumption based on those faint traces of an accent.

  “No, I grew up in Ireland, I did. Galway. I’m liking it quite a bit here, but missing my family.”

  “You said a big family?”

  “I’m one of six. The eldest.”

  “That’s a big family,” she agreed.

  He leaned back a little farther and crossed his legs loosely. Tight denim left no doubt that his lower half was built as well as his top half. Diane swallowed and dragged her gaze away.

  After a bit, he spoke again. “You look tired. Not sleeping well?”

  Finally she felt a bubble of real amusement, for the first time in days. She’d begun to wonder if she still had a sense of humor. “What do you think?” An attempted joke that might have sounded like a challenge, but his demeanor didn’t change. God, was she going to have to watch her tongue now, as well? Somehow she needed to get more sleep.

  He nodded. “Babies are hard at first. It does get better, though. Just snatch your sleep whenever you can. So has anyone primed you for how things run around here?”

  She sat up a little, fatigue forgotten. “What do I need to know?”

  “Only that members of the city council and the county commission make up the county planning board. Two hats, you might say.”

  She wanted to drop her head into her hands. In an instant she began to envision a skein of tangled relationships all knotted up with ego and personal aims. No real control on them at all, except for when they might get angry at one another. Why had they even wanted a planning manager?

  Oh, yeah. They needed an updated comprehensive plan in order to apply for government grants. She was the path to get there. To be fair, however, her job always became political at some point. Money carried a lot of weight, and developers had enough of it to be persuasive.

  She had hoped, however, that she might be little less boxed in here. Small population, for one thing, and no rapid growth for a while. Most of what was needed was bringing the plan up-to-date on new regulations from the state and federal government. Environmental regulations had increased dramatically...and there was seldom a way around them. She had that on her side, at least. Also, she needed to create a plan that would display a good future for the county and city, a good environment for the people as well as one that encouraged careful growth.

  Still, it was bound to be tough, and even tougher when the cabal running matters was very small.

  She kept her face smooth, however. She didn’t know Blaine Harrigan and didn’t dare express anything untoward. Now that she was here with her cousin’s baby in her care, she couldn’t afford to lose her job. To protect herself, she had to stay here at least a year, so she wouldn’t put a problem smack at the top of her résumé. Wonderful. She couldn’t afford a catastrophe.

  “You get used to it,” he rumbled, gently patting Daphne’s back. “When are you supposed to meet with the gentlemen and lady?”

  “Tomorrow evening. I hope by then I can find childcare. Do you know of anyone good?” she asked hopefully. If she had to choose someone, she’d rather they came with a recommendation.

  A quiet laugh escaped him. The baby stirred a little and settled quickly. “I’m not in the way of having a family. But I have friends I can ask. I’ll call around today.” He rose slowly, taking care not to jar the baby. “I need to be off. I’ve got a meeting at ten a few miles out of town about a road repair. Might require some work on the culvert. I’d invite you but for the wee bit, here.”

  “Oh.” A truncated pointless response, but she was holding her breath anyway as he slowly bent and placed Daphne in her car seat. To her relief, the child didn’t wake.

  “I’ll see you later,” Blaine said as he straightened. He winked at her. “We’ll be together a lot. In fact, you and me might need to become a damn army of two.” A nod, then he let himself out.

  An army of two? Diane bit her lip wondering what he meant. Had it been some kind of warning? Then she wondered at the ease with which he’d taken over with Daphne. Too bad he wasn’t looking for childcare work.

  Resting her chin on her hand, she looked down at the baby and wondered how all this had happened. Well, the job, at least, was her fault. It might turn out to be a very good job, too, despite what she’d heard from Blaine.

  But Daphne? While she was having trouble facing it herself, it remained that Daphne’s presence in her life was probably going to be long term. As in permanent.

  MaryJo had been growing sicker for years, but it had been a slow process. A lot of it had been brushed away as quirks. Then, last year, MaryJo’s parents had died in a flash flood in Texas, and that seemed to have pushed MaryJo past her tipping point.

  First had come the social workers, then had come a pregnancy during which she couldn’t take any meds, and the next thing Diane had known, her cousin had a full-blown psychotic break. After the baby was born, the meds didn’t help much.

  MaryJo heard voices that told her to do terrible things. She even hallucinated. In short, MaryJo had vanished into an alternate universe, and nobody believed it was safe to leave Daphne in her care, or even nearby. To this day, Diane was ashamed of how little time she’d spared for thinking of her cousin on the far side of the state. She’d gotten the wrap-up from a social worker after MaryJo was hospitalized.

  Then, a little less than three months after Daphne’s birth, the baby had come to live with Diane.

  Inevitably, though, Diane looked down at the sleeping child and smiled. Except when Daphne was fussing and inconsolable, Diane always felt happy looking at her. Something about a baby.

  Then she turned back to her desk and opened the folder containing all the notes for her new job that someone had left.

  * * *

  Around noon, a quiet knock sounded on her office door. She glanced at the still sleeping Daphne and decided she’d better answer it rather than call out. Rising, she rounded her desk and opened the door to find two women of about her own age, early thirties, standing there with big smiles. One had silky chestnut hair to her shoulders and wore a Western shirt with a denim skirt and cowboy boots. The other was a redhead who wore a flaming red slacks suit that she carried off with panache.

  “I’m Aubrey,” said chestnut hair. “And this is my friend Candy. We’re in the clerk’s office. We heard you brought your baby, and everybody is dying to see her, so we thought we’d skip down here first and p
repare you. And maybe you’d like to go to lunch with us?”

  At once startled and charmed, Diane returned the smile. “You can peek, ladies, but she’s sleeping for the first time since 1:00 a.m. I’d rather nothing wake her.”

  “Of course not,” said Aubrey, keeping her voice low. “I’ve been through it. Sleep before everything.”

  Deciding it was okay, Diane stepped back and opened the door wider. Both women crept in quietly and looked down on the angelic baby who only a few hours ago had been wearing horns and carrying a pitchfork. The mental image suddenly made Diane want to laugh.

  “Ooh, how sweet,” breathed Candy. “She’s so pretty. And that’s saying something about such a young one.”

  Aubrey elbowed her gently. “Wait till you have your own. But yeah, she’s gorgeous, all right. We’ll tell everyone to give you space, but now we can report back so they won’t be so curious. I didn’t know you were bringing a family. I thought you were single. Well, we all did.”

  Diane flushed, realizing that the questioning had begun. She wondered how long before it turned into a cross examination.

  “I am single. This is my cousin’s baby. I’m taking care of her because my cousin is seriously ill.”

  “That’s a shame,” said Aubrey. “About your cousin, I mean. Well, I guess you don’t want to carry the baby across the way to the diner, but would you like us to bring you back lunch? And if you like coffee, don’t get it out of the machine in the hallway. It’s terrible. But walk half a block and you’ll get it world-class.”

  “That’s good to know, because I do love coffee and tea. Especially a latte, but...”

  “Oh, we’re part of the modern world,” said Candy. “The diner makes lattes. I do wish we’d get a decent Chinese or Mexican restaurant, though. Maude’s great, but basic.” She hesitated, then asked, “Do you want a salad or a sandwich? I can recommend the Cobb salad.”

  “Or the steak sandwich,” Aubrey chimed in quietly. “That usually makes two meals for me. You wouldn’t have to cook tonight.”

  “I love Cobb salads,” Diane said, but she couldn’t help thinking about a steak sandwich. Full of calories, but over two meals... “Let me get my purse. I think I’ll have the sandwich, after all.”

  Candy quickly waved her hand. “Consider this a welcome-to-town present. It’s just a little thing. While we’re out, does the baby need anything?”

  Yesterday’s trip to the market had pretty much taken care of that. “I’m stocked,” she said with confidence.

  The women both smiled and began to make their quiet way to the door. Then Aubrey looked back. “Do you need day care?”

  Diane’s heart leaped. “Yes. But...”

  “You don’t know who to trust,” Aubrey finished. “How could you, being new in town? My brother’s wife works at the early-learning center. I’ll see if she can find you a space. Be back in a short while?”

  With waves, the women left. Diane checked on the baby once again then settled at her desk, wishing for coffee and an answer to cosmic questions. She’d been so career focused until this, but now she had another life to worry about.

  Forgetting the folder she needed to read, she sat and stared at the nearby baby. Daphne had already changed everything, and Diane suspected the changes had only just begun.

  She just wished she had some experience to guide her.

  * * *

  Blaine stood on the road in question, surveying the situation. The road was elevated a few feet above the surrounding ranch land, which helped keep it dry and, in the case of blowing snow, relatively snow-free much of the winter.

  But there was no question that the recent heavy rain and runoff had caused the road to dip dangerously, right over a culvert meant to equalize water buildup between the grazing land on either side and to prevent ponding as much as possible. But the recent rains had been anything but usual for this area, and problems had begun to turn up.

  Climbing down to a lower position, Blaine scanned the figures the surveyor had gathered, then eyed the situation for himself. The question was whether they could save the culvert and road simply by clearing the asphalt, building up a layer of solid earth and gravel, then repaving over it.

  Neither option would be cheap for the penny-pinching county commission, but the right option had to be chosen regardless of cost. A road cave-in could cause worse problems. And no matter what his decision, a lot of people were going to be bothered by a necessary detour.

  His colleague Doug Ashbur, from the roads department, was inspecting the other end of the culvert. He called along it to Blaine the instant he saw him.

  “Abandon hope,” Doug called, his voice echoing. “I don’t know about your end, but the metal’s rusting out down here, and the concrete casement is cracking.”

  “Grand.” The view from his end wasn’t any better. He saw more than rusting steel and cracking concrete. He also saw a definite dip in culvert beneath the sinking road. The entire thing was trying to collapse.

  He stepped back a few yards, being wiser than to enter that culvert in its current condition. Past engineers and road builders had tried their best, but the simple fact was that with the typical hypercold winter temperatures and the eventual thaws, that concrete was bound to crack. Even a minuscule crack would worsen with temperature changes, the ice expanding when water filled the small cracks, enlarging them, until this. The galvanized steel pipe under the concrete had been someone’s attempt years ago to prevent a catastrophic failure.

  It had worked so far, but now it was a question of how long they had.

  He eyed the ground above the culvert, beneath the road, and saw evidence that the ground was extruding from the smooth slope that must have once been there. So the concrete was no longer adequately bearing the weight of the road, the steel pipe was collapsing and the ground between the culvert and road had evidently washed away from the weeks of rain that must have penetrated through cracks in the old asphalt. An accident waiting to happen.

  He called to Doug. “We’d better redirect traffic and close this road. See you up top.” He climbed the bank, using his hands when necessary, then went to his truck, where he pulled off his thick leather work gloves and stood staring at the dip.

  It didn’t look like much now. There was also no way to be sure when it would become a big deal. It was far too weakened to be driving trucks and cars over, but it might last months. Even through the winter. And that was counting on luck a bit too much for his taste.

  Up here he could feel the ceaseless breeze that never stopped in open places. While it was early autumn, the air was still warm and smelled a bit like summer. A very different summer than in Galway: warmer, drier, dustier. Sometimes he missed the cooler, wetter clime of home, but mostly he liked it here. Different, but with its own beauty, like when he turned to look at the mountains that loomed so close to the west. Any morning now he’d wake up to see the sugary coating of a first snowfall.

  Doug joined him. “I’ll order up equipment, Blaine. It might be a few days before I can get it all together. You know how it goes.”

  He most certainly did. This county didn’t have any resources to waste, and his too many bosses all had their eyes on things beyond the event horizon, like finally getting that oft-promised ski resort built and finding other ways to make this county more attractive and create jobs. Oh, and wealth. He was sure that had to fit in somewhere.

  The ranchers around here weren’t much interested in the big schemes. They just wanted to survive another year. But that meant they needed decent enough roads to carry cattle to the stockyard at the train station, roads over which to get to town and see their kids get to school...oh, a million reasons why folks these days couldn’t just be cut off from the rest of the world for months at a time.

  Like it or not, expensive or not, the county was going to have to fix this culvert.

  “I believe we’ve g
ot enough in the budget,” he said to Doug. “This clearly can’t wait.”

  “I agree. But we’ve got a dozen others that aren’t much better.”

  “At least they’re not already collapsing. Let’s get the signs up. You have some barricades?”

  Doug laughed. “Never travel without them. Okay, I’ll work on pulling together the equipment and crew.” He paused, looking back at the dip in the road. “How you want to do this? Another culvert?”

  “We talked about other solutions, you remember. The problem is that if we don’t use culverts, the erosion just expands to eat the road.” As dry as this place was in general, he was often surprised how much of a headache water gave him. Usually in the spring, however. The last rains had been record-breaking for September.

  While he put out some orange cones and staked some detour signs at the crossroad, his thoughts wandered back to Diane. He wondered how she was going to like dealing with the good ol’ boys of Conard County. He wondered if they’d give her a hard time about the baby.

  Mostly he wondered why she was haunting his thoughts and why he kept thinking she was a tidy armful. And why his body stirred in response.

  Well, he assured himself, that would wear off. It had to. Anyway, he’d hardly talked to her. Chances were he wouldn’t continue to feel the sexual draw when he learned what she was really like.

  Wasn’t that always the way?

  Chapter Two

  Diane went to her little rented house that night with a briefcase full of files that had been left on her desk and a baby who’d eaten enough today to satisfy a horse...well, relatively speaking. It seemed as if she needed to be fed about every two or three hours, even though the social worker had said that should begin to slow down. Not yet, obviously, and it might continue through the night.

  Oh, yeah, get the girl a pediatrician. Maybe she ought to start keeping a list so she didn’t forget something. The move and taking charge of an infant had left her a bit scatterbrained.