Her Lost and Found Baby

by Tara Taylor Quinn

  Could be she’d be traveling to San Diego by herself in the morning. Staying in a much more affordable and modest hotel.

  Could be...

  Her phone rang. She’d failed to remove it from the front shirt pocket of her scrubs when she’d dropped her bag on the counter.

  She grabbed the phone. Saw Johnny’s caller ID and felt the sweetness of relief.

  He was fine.

  And she was fine again, too.

  Chapter Eleven

  Day too nice to waste. Decided to take plane up. Heading to Phoenix. Not sure when I’ll be back. Don’t count on dinner.

  Johnny mentally replayed the text he’d sent earlier that day as he listened to the ring on the line, waiting for Tabitha to pick up. Hoping she picked up.

  And hoping to God he hadn’t screwed up past the point of them being able to continue on with their plans. Tabitha was such a loner, so independent... Would she shut him out once she knew he’d been so messed up he’d had to get away from their life and back into his own?

  “Hello?” The sound of her voice sent spirals of relief through him. At least she was still talking to him.

  “Hey, listen... I’m sorry. I had a bit of a brain fart earlier and... I’ve got takeout barbecue with all your favorite sides. If you haven’t already picked something up...” Johnny wanted to just keep talking, to prevent her from mentioning the damning text message he’d sent, but ran out of words to string together.

  He’d screwed up, gotten weird on himself, which he still didn’t understand so how could he explain it to Tabitha? He needed to reassure her it was no big deal.

  But he’d sent the damned message...

  “Why would I have picked something up?” She sounded perplexed. Okay, maybe his text message hadn’t been as bad as he thought.

  “I just—good, then... So, you haven’t eaten.”

  “Of course not, Johnny, I don’t get off until seven. It’s only seven thirty. And it’s not like we have some set-in-stone time limit to eat. I’ll jump in the shower and be ready when you get here.”

  Wow. The woman was incredible. Going on as though he hadn’t had a bizarre out-of-body experience that afternoon and nearly screwed everything up...

  “Unless you want me to meet you at your place?” she added. There was a lilt to her voice. He liked it. A lot.

  “Johnny?”

  “I’ll see you at your place,” he told her, wiping the sweat off his brow as they ended the call. The afternoon away had done him good. Until he’d heard her voice, heard how happy she was to hear from him, and he’d realized how relieved he was that she wasn’t holding the text he’d sent against him.

  He had to talk to her. Let her know...what? That he had the hots for her so badly he’d run away from her that afternoon? That he’d purposely put himself in a position where he couldn’t do what he’d told her he would?

  Of course, she already knew that part, about the way he’d run off. It had been in his text message.

  She hadn’t asked why. She’d just been glad that he’d returned with dinner as planned. Because that was how their partnership rolled.

  Too bad Johnny wasn’t rolling right along with it.

  * * *

  Showered, in sweatpants and a big, thick gray sweatshirt—chosen because she could go braless in it and hadn’t been able to bear strapping herself up again that night—Tabitha picked up her phone. She was ready to leave her small master suite and head to the dining room. She could smell barbecue and mac and cheese. Johnny had arrived...

  And her phone’s new-text icon showed on the screen. She’d just left work, so no need for FYI messages from the hospital. If there’d been an emergency pertaining to something she’d done that day, they would’ve called. So who’d be texting her? Except... Mallory?

  Clicking to open her text app, she stood in the middle of her room, willing her hands to stop trembling. She’d given the other woman her cell number...just in case.

  Johnny’s caller ID icon appeared on the new text. She could breathe again.

  Smiling, she took a couple of steps toward the door, opening the message. He was probably sending some unnecessary apology for having been late.

  As if she had any right—or desire—to...

  Day too nice to waste. Decided to take plane up. Heading to Phoenix. Not sure when I’ll be back. Don’t count on dinner.

  Slippered feet frozen in place, one in front of the other, Tabitha continued to stand there, reading the message a second time. Johnny hadn’t called because he was running late; he’d called because he thought she wasn’t expecting him at all.

  Heart pounding, she took a deep breath. He didn’t owe her dinner. Or anything. He’d had a free Sunday and...

  Had he been planning to get back in time to drive to San Diego in the morning, as planned? They weren’t opening the food truck until dinner. But there was nothing that said he had to open it at all the next day. Or ever.

  They’d been planning to meet Mallory and Braden to go over her lists...

  But Johnny’s real life had called out to him and he’d answered the call. He owed her nothing; he could end everything at any time. There was no law that said he had to live next door to her for the entire year he’d set aside for himself.

  “Tabitha?” Johnny’s voice sounded in the hall, as if he was heading toward her bedroom door. Looking up, she saw him standing there, his gaze locked on the phone in her hand.

  She might have gasped when she first read the text. Might have made a sound. She didn’t know what had brought him to her.

  “You’ve been out of the shower a long time,” he was saying, still looking at her hand. “I was just checking to make sure you were okay.” He raised his eyes to meet hers.

  “You own a plane?” It was the only thing she could get out. The only thing she wanted to focus on.

  He wasn’t just rich. He was...completely out of her league.

  The relationship between her and Johnny had been different lately. Changing. She’d worried about it. And then she hadn’t. The past three days had been great...

  For her.

  “Technically my family owns it,” he said, his hands in his jeans pockets now as he stood in the doorway facing her.

  Another time she might have felt awkward having a man in the doorway of her bedroom. As much as she’d come to care for Johnny, she probably would’ve been a little uncomfortable having him there. At the moment, the bed behind her mattered not at all.

  “Your family owns a plane.”

  Forget about the plane, already! Who cares about a plane?

  “Yes.” He nodded. His shirt, cream-colored and with a denim-like texture, fit his shoulders to perfection, making him look...manly. She’d been thinking about those shoulders a lot. Thinking about those arms. About him holding her. About laying her head on his shoulder and letting him take care of her for the second or two she’d need to regain her usual strength.

  Had he sensed her out-of-character neediness? Been repulsed by it?

  “A four-seater? Like a Cessna?” Some only moderately rich people had them. But was he a pilot? As well as a corporate attorney and an only child with a dead wife to grieve for? Didn’t he know how dangerous those small planes could be?

  “A twelve-passenger corporate jet.”

  Tabitha’s knees felt like they were going to give out on her. She had no intention of letting them. “So, you hire a pilot to fly it?”

  What kind of family business allowed for such expenses? He’d said his father was rich enough to have people work for him. That he made his money by investing in various projects. She’d never imagined enough magnitude to support a corporate jet. Johnny’s other life was out of bounds for her. She’d understood that from the beginning. Was fine with it.

  But...he and his family owned a corporate jet? One he could just ta
ke out on a Sunday-afternoon lark? To Phoenix?

  Was he getting a kick out of driving her around the state in the little SUV he’d purchased for his sabbatical?

  “We have a full-time pilot on staff,” he told her, shoulders a bit hunched as he remained standing in her door. “But I took it up myself today.”

  “A twelve-passenger jet.”

  “Yes.”

  “By yourself.”

  He shrugged in lieu of yet another affirmative response to her sudden aeronautical fascination.

  “What did you do in Phoenix?”

  Who jotted off to Phoenix for the afternoon?

  She’d been at work for twelve hours. He could have...done anything he wanted to. His time away was no business of hers. Even if he had some woman from his previous life that he’d flown to Phoenix to have lunch with. Maybe a friend to him and Angel?

  The immediate stab of jealousy she felt dissipated when she remembered that Johnny wasn’t dating at all this year as part of honoring Angel. And prior to that, he’d been a married man.

  There’d be no other woman to make her jealous. Not yet.

  “I sent that text late this morning,” he said, side-stepping his time in Phoenix, sending another stab of...insecurity where her relationship with him was concerned. And envy, too. Any woman Johnny would fly to see would be one of the luckiest women on earth. Whether that happened now or in three months.

  The man had a corporate jet that he could “take up” on a whim. No one she knew lived like that. Johnny Brubaker was so far out of her realm, she couldn’t imagine what it must be like to live in his real life.

  Or to spend a day in Phoenix with him.

  “I didn’t land in Phoenix,” he said into the silence that had fallen.

  “Where did you land, then?” They had to talk, to get out of that moment so they could get out of her bedroom. And back to—or on to—whatever came next.

  Did she dare hope he’d still be going to San Diego with her the next day? And that he’d be with her for dinner with the Harrises?

  Did he find her too ordinary? Maybe he felt sorry for her behind her back, living the way she did. It probably seemed to him that she was on the verge of poverty. She owed money on her house. On her little car.

  He had a corporate jet.

  Was she wrong to cling to him if he’d determined it was time for him to move on?

  She still had three months with him.

  Unless he’d decided to end his sabbatical early.

  Fear struck her again.

  “I’m sorry, Tabitha.”

  For leaving their partnership ahead of time? “You don’t owe me any apologies, Johnny.” She had to assure him of that much. “You’ve been...a godsend and...”

  She was not going to cry. She’d found Jackson. She just had to believe that. The rest, getting her son home—that work would be small in comparison. And the result immense. Beyond important. She could...

  “Where did you land?” she asked him.

  If he’d resumed his old life early, if he was even thinking about it, she had to support him. So she would. As soon as he told her what she was supporting.

  “I didn’t land. I circled the airport in Mesa where we usually land and I turned around and came back. There’s a golf course there I like. I’d thought about playing a round, but decided against it.”

  She didn’t react for a second. He had a jet. Could fly it. Had flown to Arizona and back. But before he’d left, he’d texted to tell her he wouldn’t be home.

  She glanced at her phone again. Had he been coming back at all? The message said he wasn’t sure when...

  “I’m said I’m sorry. I... Dammit, Tabitha, I sent that text this morning. Why are you only looking at it now?”

  She bristled at his tone of voice. As though it was her fault, somehow, that she was feeling like crap. It was, of course. She’d had no business starting to...want him as a permanent part of her life. To picture him playing with Jackson sometime. Maybe coming to one of his games in the future. To think about calling him now and then just to say hello.

  As friends only. She wasn’t so far gone as to think there’d be more. She’d never be happy in his world.

  No one in her circle randomly called guys who owned jets just to say hello. If ever she’d needed the reminder that her life and Johnny’s real life didn’t coincide, that moment was it. Burning up with humiliation, she said, “The text only showed up a couple of minutes ago.”

  Pulling his hand from his pocket, he threw it in the air. “How could that be? I sent it hours ago!”

  So now it was the text’s fault?

  “I...don’t always get my texts right away in the hospital. And I put my phone on data-saver mode last night because I got a notice from the phone company that I’ve almost used up my plan’s allotted amount for the month. It connects to my wi-fi when I’m at home. With all the stuff I did while we were in San Diego last week, the things I looked up and the research and—” When she heard herself sounding like she was whining, she stopped. Just shut right up.

  He flew off on a whim, and she had to use data-saver.

  He ran his hand through his hair and then slid it back into his pocket. Was the barbecue getting cold? They should probably go eat. She stared at him.

  He stared back. There were clearly things he wasn’t telling her. If she forced the issue, would she lose him sooner?

  “Were you planning to be back in time to head out in the morning?”

  “I didn’t know.”

  Biting her lower lip, she nodded. So she was right...he was already starting to pull away. To return to his real life.

  She couldn’t blame him. As his friend, as someone who truly cared about him, she had to encourage him. The best part of her was glad that he was healed to the point of hearing his life calling to him.

  “And now? Are you still planning to go to San Diego in the morning?”

  “Absolutely.” His gaze didn’t waver as he added, “I’m not going to leave you in the lurch.”

  Something he’d decided that day? At the moment, she wasn’t going to question him about it. But she would later. Sometime that week they’d have the conversation. And she’d find a way to let him go.

  She nodded, took a step toward him, toward the door, to move down the hall and back out to the room they’d shared the previous two nights—her kitchen. “Is dinner ready?”

  He didn’t step aside. Not even when she was standing directly in front of him. “I mean it, Tabitha. I’m going to see this through with you.” His look was so intense, she had to swallow. Wet her lips.

  And then she smiled. “I know,” she said. And she did. Ultimately, Johnny would always do what he said he was going to do. Including taking up his old life as soon as his year was out.

  Which meant it would be up to her to set him free.

  And she would.

  As soon as she figured out how...

  Chapter Twelve

  Johnny had to hand it to Tabitha. Driving to San Diego, shopping for perishables, working side by side in the rented kitchen on Monday, preparing to open for dinner that evening—during all of it, she was congenial, helpful as always, efficient. She even reminded him to eat something as they cleaned up the day’s leftovers to carry him over until they met Mallory and Braden for a late supper.

  Everything the partnership required.

  And nothing else.

  There were no long glances between them. No touching, not even brushing by each other as they worked in the truck. And not a single word of non-life-quest conversation.

  The lady had class.

  And enough inner strength to see her through any hurricane that might hit her shores.

  She’d also clearly changed toward him since reading his text the night before. The partnership was intact; he couldn’t
say as much for whatever friendship had developed between them. When he’d first seen her standing there, staring at her phone, when she’d looked up at him, he’d been slammed like he’d never been slammed before. It was a look he’d never forget. One he didn’t want to remember. One he wished he’d never seen.

  What the hell was going on with him? He didn’t know. But he was going to do something about it. As soon as he figured out what that something was.

  Or...he could leave things as they were. Finish out the partnership—nice and clean, based on the day they’d had—and then sever it as planned.

  He could if he didn’t constantly have to fight the urge to take her in his arms.

  If he didn’t feel the tension in her as they pulled up to the pub to meet Braden and Mallory. The same place they’d been the night they’d met the other couple for the first time.

  If he didn’t care so much that she was struggling all alone.

  Alistair Montgomery had called that evening as they were parking the truck. Tabitha had heard the PI say that so far, he’d found nothing. He’d even questioned whether Johnny still wanted him on the payroll. According to him, Jason and Matt were a “melt your heart” father and son. Johnny had translated that to melt a judge’s heart. There wasn’t a hint of any cause for a warrant based on the child’s safety or well-being.

  He and Johnny both found it odd that, other than one previous address, and his current one, they couldn’t find anything on Matt—no birth certificate and no family that came up when he searched his name, but not all counties had everything available on the internet, and Matt could’ve been born anywhere. Alistair couldn’t find a social security number, which would have allowed him to deepen his search. Maybe he’d only rented places to live and never bought a home or owned a business. The gym he was running wasn’t an LLC, which could be a red flag, but not enough of one to do anything with. It wasn’t illegal not to incorporate. Stupid, maybe. Foolish in terms of federal taxes. But not illegal. If they could find out where he said he was born, they could do more. Or if they knew where he’d gone to school...