by Kaitlyn Rice
Jack paused on the steps to blow out a puff of pure frustration, before charging on down to the group. When he reached them, Abby handed the child over without a word. Her lips were pinched so tightly that a scattering of dimples embellished her chin.
He smiled at her, appealing silently for understanding, but she didn’t seem to notice. Her stormy eyes never abandoned the baby.
Turning his own attention to the boy in his arms, he looked down into the face of his brother’s child—and his responsibility for about the next eighteen years. Wyatt’s eyes were a muddy blue today—somewhere between the gray-blue of a newborn and whatever shade he’d wind up with eventually. They were wide and trusting. Innocent.
A fit of panic nearly overwhelmed Jack, but he squelched it, and put on a mask of bravado for the benefit of Abby and her parents. “Hi, Wyatt,” he crooned. “I’m Daddy Jack. I’m going to take good care of you.”
The baby stared back. He had grown considerably in five and a half months, but he was still so very…puny. His balled fist lurched wildly through the air, and his face scrunched into an odd contortion.
Nervously, Jack studied the way Faye was holding Rosie with the baby’s back against her chest, wrapped in her arms, and gently bouncing. Rosie seemed content with the situation, so Jack copied their stance. The change in position meant he couldn’t see Wyatt’s face, but since the boy hadn’t started screaming, he figured it was working.
Abby and her parents stood watching, placing the burden of goodbyes on him. Since he couldn’t offer a handshake, he offered a nod instead. “Faye and Mike, it’s been good to see you again,” he said. “Next time, let’s hope we meet under easier circumstances.”
“Of course, dear,” Faye said. “This has been terrible for all of us. I’m just glad your brother and Paige were so happy in the past year.”
Jack wasn’t sure whether he was pleased that his brother had grown into his marriage, or sad that the happiness had been so short-lived, so he didn’t respond.
Instead, he noted the way Abby had her arms wrapped against her stomach, and he smiled at her again, hoping to soothe her pain. “Abby, we need to talk about the farm,” he said. “May I call you?”
“I guess you’ll have to,” she answered.
Jack started toward his car, carting Wyatt in front of him like a sack of potatoes. He knew four pairs of eyes were probably boring into his back, but he’d gone a few yards before Abby spoke.
“Jack? Don’t you want his things?”
He stopped in his tracks and turned around. Of course. The baby’s things. He’d been so intent on looking capable that he’d forgotten Wyatt would need special food, and diapers. He’d need clothes and toys and…baby things.
“I have some of it in my truck,” Abby said, beginning to walk toward the other end of the parking lot.
As Jack followed her, he added idiocy to his growing pile of bad feelings. At least this one wasn’t new—she had a knack for making him feel foolish.
Maybe it was her no-nonsense manner. Maybe it was her sober expression. Whatever it was, it always seemed abundantly clear that she wouldn’t surrender to his most valiant efforts to charm.
But at least she was in the minority—most women surrendered plenty.
At fourteen, Jack had taken a wide-angled look at his future. As far as school was concerned, he’d been on a path to success. He was sure to graduate in the upper five percent, along with many of his pals in the computer club.
The only problem was that none of them had been surrounded by girls. He’d recognized the narrow perception most of his peer group had of intelligent males, and refused to accept it.
He could do better. He’d used his brains to figure out the most surefire method to win a lady’s attention, if not her heart, and a would-be nerd had turned into a masterful lothario.
Since then, most women had been only too happy to catch his interest. Abby was one of very few who’d been resistant. But she hadn’t always been. She’d consented to more than one dance at Brian and Paige’s wedding reception. She’d even laughed at a few jokes, until they’d talked their way into a squabble.
Now she didn’t seem to mind hurtling across the parking lot in front of him, and she didn’t try to make polite conversation. Once she reached a big blue pickup, she opened the passenger door and reached inside for a second diaper bag and a box of supplies. “If you’ll meet me at the farmhouse tomorrow morning, say around nine, we can get the rest of his things,” she said. “This is just a start.”
“Sure thing. Phenomenal. Thanks.”
Abby set the box on the pavement and looked pointedly at Wyatt. “Why don’t I hold him while you put these in your car? Then I’ll get his car seat and you can take it, too.”
Handing the baby back to her, he looped the diaper bag over a shoulder, picked up the box and strode to his car to stash both in the trunk.
Returning to Abby, he took Wyatt again, and thought about all the juggling involved in transporting a single infant. How had Abby thought she could handle two of them alone?
He was careful to hold Wyatt in the same face-out position, rocking him gently, and was surprised when the boy started to whimper. When Jack bounced harder, the bawling got louder. He cleared his throat. “Abby? Why is he crying?”
“You have a lot to learn, don’t you?” she said. “He may be hungry or wet. Try putting your fingertip in his mouth.”
Jack scowled. This was no time to make jokes.
Abby opened her eyes wide, set her hands on her hips and waited. She looked serious.
Frowning still, he stretched one hand across Wyatt’s chest so he could press a pinkie finger against the quivering lips. Wyatt immediately stopped sniveling and started sucking.
“Good,” Abby said. “Your finger should calm him until you can dig a binky out of the bag.”
“A binky?”
She chuckled. “A pacifier.”
Abby turned back to her truck, leaning across the back seat to disengage one of the car seats. She had the most delicious little tush, and the skirt she was wearing showcased it perfectly. It wasn’t too much of a stretch to imagine what she’d look like without it.
Jack smothered a groan and looked away. The last thing he needed was to foster an attraction for Abby.
Keeping his finger in place, he lifted Wyatt onto his forearm and occupied himself with chuckling at the boy’s tiny vest and long brown curls. Abby had dressed him like a little man today, but from the looks of things, a trip to the barber would be in order before Wyatt’s first birthday.
Abby clunked the car seat down on the pavement and lifted Wyatt from his arms. “I’ll carry him to your car,” she said. “Installing a car seat takes both hands.”
Make that three to four hands, Jack thought a few minutes later as he fumbled with straps and buckles that seemed to make no sense.
It took one extra baby rotation before the seat was secure, but after Abby’s more practiced hands took over the chore, Wyatt was in the seat with a pacifier and she was heading back across the parking lot toward her parents.
Jack frowned as he sat in his car and watched her go. Her purposeful walk belied the reluctance she must have felt, and he knew she had to be upset.
He wished he could think of a better way. He glanced down at Wyatt, whose eyelids were droopy by now, and back out the window at Abby.
Her stride hadn’t faltered, but somehow, in a morning of mixed-up feelings, her walk made him smile. It wasn’t her speed or the lack of artificial sway, so much as the perfection of well-used legs and a sweet round bottom that couldn’t help but wiggle. That no-nonsense walk was as entrancing as any he’d seen.
That walk, and his reaction to seeing it, were the only right things about the morning. He kept grinning as he started his car. Quite unintentionally, Abby had graced him with a moment of pure delight.
“ABBY? IT’S ME,” Jack said, pleased that she had answered her phone. During the last call she had definitely sounded riled. He
’d been afraid she would take the phone off the hook, and he needed her advice.
“Yes, Jack. What do you need?”
“I finally got this formula mixed and heated, and then the phone rang and I didn’t get Wyatt fed for thirty minutes. Do I have to start over completely?”
“Hang on,” she said with a long sigh. She spoke to someone in the background. The string of babbling that followed must be Rosie, playing. In his five hours with Wyatt, Jack had heard nothing but wailing.
“He’s been waiting for his bottle for thirty minutes?” Abby asked abruptly. She sounded as if she was right there beside him. He could picture her with her hands on her hips and that preachy look on her face. “What’s he doing?”
“Lying on the floor, sucking on a pacifier.”
“For thirty minutes? What did you do with the bottle?”
She made a tsk-ing sound, which was totally unnecessary.
There was no possible way for Jack to feel any more inept than he already did.
“It’s on the counter, in the kitchenette.”
“For Pete’s sake, feed the kid. Why didn’t you do it while you were talking on the phone?”
“Sometimes I need to get on my laptop to figure out how to solve a client’s problem. I needed my hands free.”
“Jack, wake up. You’re a parent now,” she said, her tone implying exactly how dim she thought he was.
“You may have to call a client back now and then.”
After hanging up, Jack retrieved the bottle from the kitchen and settled down with Wyatt on the hotel sofa. He popped the pacifier out of the baby’s mouth and watched in horror as the tiny back stiffened and the tinier mouth opened wide to shriek.
Frantically, he stuck the bottle in. And relaxed. Once that first taste of formula hit Wyatt’s tongue, he quieted quickly. “That’s my boy,” Jack said, feeling as if he’d conquered a major obstacle.
He was going to get this baby business down and get back to Kansas City. Back to his life. Things would go much better there—he’d have his speakerphone, his main computer and his girlfriends to ask for advice. They might not know as much as Abby, but they’d never make him feel unfit, either.
Under the circumstances, Abby’s snappy attitude made sense, but he was certainly not dim. He loved a challenge. He could make this work.
Wasn’t he the same guy who’d managed to finish high school a full year early? In spite of having little help from a mother who was busy running through boyfriends.
Jack had to keep Brian occupied and fed on many nights, and he’d still been able to attend college, keep a string of girlfriends happy and start his own business. He could learn to care for a person too young to walk or talk.
Besides, for all practical purposes he’d already raised a boy. Although Brian had been older by the time he had taken over the chore, Jack knew that if he could just persevere until Wyatt was about school age, the job would be old hat.
The most important thing, he thought, was a desire to do the job well. Motivation was half the battle with anything.
He could always deal with the guilt later.
But a few minutes after Wyatt finished the bottle, he started fussing again. Jack changed a diaper that was only slightly wet, but the baby kept screaming. Jack couldn’t figure out why. He’d have to call Abby again.
“Hullo?”
“Abby, he’s been crying for fifteen minutes straight,” he hollered above the noise.
“Did you feed him?”
“Yes,” he said in horror, thinking there must have been something terribly wrong with the formula. “He drank the whole bottle.”
“Did you burp him?”
“Oh…uh, no. I didn’t. Hang on, I’m picking him up. Talk me through it,” he implored. “Talk loud.”
He held Wyatt out in front of him, hoping against hope the child simply needed burping. The baby howled as if a pin was sticking in his belly, but these diapers had Velcro. That formula must have been spoiled.
Next time, his client would wait.
Abby described the burping position she found most effective, and several others to try if that one didn’t work. Within a few minutes, the tiny boy had produced three burps that could vie for a record with Jack’s beer guzzling buddies. All of the sudden, Wyatt was gurgling and waving his fists in the air contentedly.
Once again Jack thanked Abby for her help and hung up.
After that, the Kimball men had a fairly decent evening. Jack found a soft blue blanket in the diaper bag and spread it on the floor. He let the baby kick around on that while he ate a room service dinner.
Later, they took in the end of a baseball game together. Wyatt hadn’t actually developed a fondness for sports yet, but if Jack sat on the floor beside him and spoke animatedly about the wisdom or folly of each play, the baby seemed happy to respond to the conversation.
When Wyatt started sobbing again after the game, Jack fed him—brilliantly, this time. He had the baby fed and burped within a half hour, without a single snag. Then he changed a dirty diaper, congratulating himself on that, too. It had been his first poopy diaper, and he managed it without needing a bit of advice.
He called Abby only one more time that night.
“Hullo, Jack. What is it?” she asked tiredly, after just one ring.
“How’d you know it was me?”
“Are you kidding? You’ve called at least once every hour for the past six. I was wondering where you’d gone.”
“Oh.”
“Well, what is it?”
Abby had worked her magic again: he felt foolish. He considered hanging up, but he still needed to know the answer to his question. “How do I take a shower?”
She giggled. “Now you’re kidding, right?”
“No, I’m not,” he said. “What do I do with Wyatt?”
“It’s eleven o’clock. He’s not asleep yet?”
“No.”
After another exaggerated sigh, she said, “Is there a separate place in your hotel room for him to sleep?”
“Yes, we’re in a suite.”
“Go pull a mattress off the bed and put Wyatt in the middle of it on his back. Stack pillows on every side. Then—and this is the most important part—leave the room.”
It sounded too easy. “Won’t he cry?”
“For a while, but if he’s quiet within a few minutes, you’ve made it,” she said in a whisper-soft voice that sounded sweet for the first time today. “Then you can go take a shower.”
“Good,” he said, grateful for her kindness. He’d been through enough already.
“And Jack?”
“Yes?”
“I’m going to bed. Babies wake up at night. You check their diaper, see if they’re hungry. You can do that. Don’t call me again unless it’s an emergency.”
SEVEN HOURS LATER, Jack stirred from a light snooze when Wyatt starting moving around. The arm of the hotel room sofa was rock hard, making deep sleep out of the question. But Wyatt had been quiet and comfortable, belly down against his uncle’s chest, with a blanket tucked snugly around him.
Jack had tried Abby’s suggestion. He had tried hard. But it had been impossible to listen to Wyatt shriek for longer than a minute or two. For all he knew, the child had fallen off the mattress and rolled across the floor. Or maybe the little guy missed his family. Jack couldn’t discount that possibility.
Besides, he had the other hotel guests to consider.
So he’d slept on the sofa with Wyatt nestled on his chest. The arrangement had worked wonders for the baby.
Jack himself hadn’t slept more than an hour or two.
All those wakeful hours had afforded him plenty of thinking time, and he’d started to come to some conclusions. For one thing, taking care of an infant was a laborious chore— Wyatt seemed to need constant attention.
Where had Jack gotten the impression that babies slept most of the time? So far, Wyatt had cried more than he’d slept. Or so it seemed.
If he took
the baby back to Kansas City, he could try working from home so he could tend to Wyatt. He imagined a day broken into scattered segments of trying to feed, change and pacify a baby, while his clients cooled their heels on the other end of the phone line. And Jack had no idea what he’d do when he had to go on a business trip.
In any case, his company would probably fail.
If he hired round-the-clock care, he could spend time with his nephew whenever he wasn’t working. Then he’d have a definite hand in the boy’s upbringing.
Of course, Jack would have to slow down his social life to a snail’s pace. The ladies would have to visit him at home, or see him a lot less often.
But when it came right down to it, he didn’t have many options. His working hours were unpredictable, and he didn’t have a kindly old aunt nearby to help when he needed it.
Although there were three women he dated regularly, none seemed as if they would want to take on the chore.
He knew for certain that Paula, the woman he’d known the longest, would revolt at being asked to help with an infant.
She might close her eyes to his playboy ways, but she wouldn’t tolerate a child. She often said that having children was what other women did when they didn’t have the imagination to create an exciting life for themselves.
There was something else that was bothering him, too, and it was the most important aspect of his dilemma. The twins were all that was left of the family Brian had loved. Jack shouldn’t tear them apart, especially not after they’d just lost their parents. They deserved to grow up knowing one another. At the very least, they deserved to spend time together as siblings. He shouldn’t take that away from them.
But he couldn’t just give the boy up, either. That would be letting himself down, as well as Brian.
Jack needed to talk to Abby.
ONE OF THE BABIES was crying.