The Maverick's Midnight Proposal

by Brenda Harlen

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  Yuletide Baby Bargain

  by Allison Leigh

  Chapter One

  “Are you a social worker or not?”

  Maddie Templeton’s jaw tightened at the impatient words being spat at her through the phone line. She wished she could pretend she didn’t recognize the owner of the voice.

  This was the last thing she needed. She’d already spent the entire day dealing with tying up troublesome details at work before a forced two-week vacation. Then she’d rushed home to change into somewhat date-worthy clothing and driven the thirty miles over winding roads from Braden to Weaver, where she was supposed to meet a man named Morton for dinner.

  Only Morton had stood her up.

  Instead of having a date for the first time in months—which was a generous estimate, if she were truthful—she’d ended up spending the evening with her grandmother. Not that Vivian wasn’t entertaining enough. She just wasn’t the kind of company that Maddie had been hoping for.

  Now, it was after ten o’clock, and after returning to the house she shared with her sisters—knowing they were probably out with guys who’d never dream of standing them up—she just didn’t feel in the mood to deal with Lincoln Swift’s phone call.

  Because she couldn’t stand Lincoln Swift.

  If only she’d let the phone continue ringing as she’d walked in the door. Eventually, it would have gone to voice mail, and she’d be happily trespassing in Greer’s bathroom by now, watching her sister’s claw-foot tub fill with hot water while she decided what task to tackle first on her use-it-or-lose-it vacation time.

  Instead, she leaned against the half-finished kitchen cabinets—the do-it-yourself refinishing job had been stalled for months—and fantasized about hanging up on him. After telling him just how little she thought of him.

  After all these years, turnabout would be sweet.

  But instead of letting every bit of her day’s frustration out on the man, she swallowed it down. “Yes, Linc, I am a social worker,” she said evenly. “What’s the problem?” There would have to be a problem to make Linc ever reach out to the likes of her.

  “I don’t want to get into it on the phone. Just come to the house.”

  “I’m sorry.” Even though her teeth clenched and her hand tightened around the receiver, she managed to channel the dulcet tone that Greer used in the courtroom before skewering someone. “What house?”

  As if Maddie didn’t know perfectly well that he’d moved into the grand old mansion once owned by his grandmother Ernestine Swift after her death. Maddie knew every corner of that mansion, too. But only because as a child, she’d accompanied her mother every week when Meredith cleaned the place for Ernestine.

  That was how she’d met Linc and his brother, Jax, in the first place.

  They’d chased each other all over that place.

  Until Linc had decided he was too old for such nonsense and pretty much seemed to forget Maddie existed.

  Then it had been just Jax and Maddie.

  Until Linc had decided that was nonsense, too.

  “My brother’s gone and done it again.” Linc’s voice was tight. “Are you going to help me or not?”

  When she and Jax had dated, they’d been in high school, but even then Maddie hadn’t been serious about him. He was a lot of fun. But good boyfriend material? Definitely not.

  Aside from her sisters, though, he’d been just about her best friend in the world. Until Linc made sure she knew she wasn’t good enough for Jax in any way, shape or form.

  That had been thirteen years ago, and it still held the record as the single most humiliating moment of her life—far outstripping being stood up by a computer programmer named Morton.

  She dropped the dulcet tones for her usual frankness. “Jax is thirty years old, Linc. He’s a grown man. Whatever he’s gone and done, he can undo.” Jax had had plenty of practice, after all. And it wouldn’t be legal trouble. If it were, Linc definitely wouldn’t have called her. Swift Oil, his family business, had a phalanx of lawyers on the payroll.

  “He’s not here. He’s out of town.” Linc sounded like he was talking through his teeth, too, and it took no effort at all to conjure an image of his face.

  Which annoyed her to no end.

  Even though she ran into Jax fairly often around town, she’d had only a few dealings with Linc since that long-ago mortifying day.

  He ran an oil company.

  She was a social worker.

  Since he’d moved back to Braden when his grandmother died, they’d rarely run into each other. Which was saying something because, on a good day, the population there didn’t break 5,000. The last time she’d seen him in person had been at Ernestine’s funeral. Three years ago.

  She’d offered her condolences and left the very second that she could.

  She squared up the stack of paint chips sitting on the counter that her sisters had been squabbling over for a month, trying to block the memory of the grief that she’d seen in his face that day. “If Jax isn’t there, then what are you even calling me for?”

  “Because his kid is here,” he said even more sharply. “Isn’t that what you deal with? Kids left to fend for themselves because their parents can’t be bothered?”

  She straightened abruptly from her slouch, and felt her red sweater catch on a nail. He could have been describing his and Jax’s parents, but she had the sense not to point that out. She carefully unhooked the threads of her sweater before they unraveled. “Jax has a child?” She knew she sounded shocked, even though it wasn’t such a shocking thought.

  Jax loved women, after all. He’d never been without at least one on his arm from the time he’d entered puberty. But he’d always claimed he’d never get caught by one the way his dad had been.

  Linc made a sound that wasn’t quite an oath. “Just get over here, would you please? I didn’t know who else to call.”

  She grimaced. “You must be desperate, indeed.”

  “I’ll leave the gate open,” he said flatly.

  A moment later, all she heard was the dial tone.

  He’d hung up on her.

  “I’ll leave the gate open,” she muttered, hanging up harder than necessary. Typical Linc. Issuing edicts as if he had a divine right to do so.

  It would serve him right if she ignored him. She was supposed to be on vacation, after all.

  But what about the child?

  Jax’s child?

  She huffed out a breath and left the kitchen, returning to the foyer where she’d left her boots. The artificial Christmas tree that her sister Ali bought was sitting in its enormous box, blocking half the room. None of them were thrilled with having an artificial tree instead of a fresh-cut one, but Ali’s overdeveloped sense of safety had prevailed. She was a police officer and had just dealt with a family home burning down from a tree that went up in flames. Neither Greer nor Maddie had had the heart to argue with her. They’d both promised Ali they’d help put it up this weekend.

  Maddie sat down on the box, pulled on her leather boots and zipped them up to her knees.

  Despite the weatherman’s dire predictions, it still hadn’t snowed yet, but the temperatures were already cold and bitter. She wrapped a scarf around her neck on top of her coat before she let herself back out into the night. Her car was parked in the driveway; both engine and interior were still warm from the drive back from Weaver.

  At least
she wouldn’t have to go so far to get to the old Swift mansion. It used to sit on the eastern edge of Braden, but due to progress, the town limits had been creeping past it for years. Now it was more like a crown jewel in the center of town.

  When she arrived, the ornate iron gate guarding the long drive to the house was open, just as Linc had promised.

  She drove through it, and memories of climbing on the thing pulled at her. The first time, Maddie’s mother had been horrified. But Ernestine—seeming old even then—had merely laughed and waved it off. How could Maddie be expected to not climb on it when her grandsons were doing the same thing?

  Maddie rubbed her forehead, trying and failing to block out the images of her, Jax and Linc running around that first summer. She and Jax had been six, Linc a much older and wiser eleven.

  By the time she and Jax were eleven, Meredith was no longer cleaning the mansion for Ernestine. But Maddie’s friendship with Jax—and her fascination with Linc, who’d totally lost interest in them by that point—had lived on. For a few more years, anyway. Until he’d made so very plain what he thought of her.

  Her headlights swept over the stone wall that ran alongside the narrow driveway as it curved its way to the mansion sitting atop the hill.

  Her mouth felt dry.

  Which was just plain stupid.

  The drive swelled out into a circle in front of the house before narrowing again as it continued off into the darkness. She hadn’t been out there in more than a decade, but she assumed there was still an enormous detached garage next to the gardener’s shack.

  She parked in the circle and took a deep breath before getting out of the car and reluctantly climbing the brick steps. As soon as she reached the door, she could hear the wailing from inside and her gloved hand paused on the lion-shaped door knocker.

  It was the distinct wail of a baby.

  She started when the door opened, the door knocker yanked out of her lax fingers before she could even properly use it.

  “Took you long enough,” Linc greeted her as he shoved the infant car seat he was holding into her arms.

  She rapidly adjusted her hold on it when he let go and backed away. Like he couldn’t get away fast enough.

  From the baby? Or from Maddie?

  She averted her gaze, but not fast enough to keep from noticing that his disheveled blondish-brown hair showed a sprinkle of gray on the sides that hadn’t been there three years ago, and the faint lines arrowing out from the corners of his hazel eyes weren’t quite so faint anymore.

  And he looked better than ever.

  Dammit.

  She channeled Greer’s dulcet tones again. “Good to see you, too, Linc.” She smiled insincerely and looked down at the wailing baby. A girl, if the pink blanket was anything to go by. “Where’s her mom?”

  “Who the hell knows?” He shoved his long fingers through his hair. “I came home and that—” he waved at the infant seat “—was sitting all alone on the doorstep.”

  She stepped inside and set the carrier on the old-fashioned table in the middle of the spacious foyer. After dumping her purse on the table, too, she delved beneath the pink blanket, relieved to feel warmth coming off the crying baby. “How long ago?”

  “You’re not shocked?”

  She deftly released the harness strapping the baby into the seat and picked her up. “By a baby being left somewhere or by you calling me about it?” She didn’t wait for his answer as she tried to soothe the baby. “Unfortunately, I can’t say this is my first experience with an abandoned baby. How long ago did you get home?”

  He was wearing a dark blazer over a white shirt and blue jeans. Date wear.

  She hated the fact that she’d even noticed. Or that she cared.

  The baby was still wailing, so hard that she was hiccupping. “It’s okay, sweetheart.” Maddie jiggled the baby and blindly swept her hand inside the car seat, finally finding a pacifier wedged under a corner of the fabric lining. She touched it to the baby’s lips and she latched on to it greedily.

  “Silence,” Linc muttered. “Thank God.”

  Maddie refrained from telling him that he could have found the pacifier, too, if he’d tried. Through the fleecy polka-dotted sleeper the baby was wearing, she could feel the diaper was heavy. “So? How long ago?”

  “Less than an hour ago.” Linc raked his fingers through his hair again and paced on the other side of the foyer table. “A few minutes before I called you the first time. It took three tries before you bothered to answer.”

  “Don’t make it sound like I’ve done something wrong,” she said. “I was out, too. It is allowed, you know. Even for social workers.”

  And those too lowly to consort with the vaunted Swift family.

  She pressed her lips against the child’s temple, banishing the thought.

  The baby’s forehead felt sweaty, but that could have just been from all her crying. “Is there a diaper bag or something?”

  “Or something.” He set a small plastic garbage bag on the table next to the car seat.

  Maddie quickly reached for it and their hands accidentally brushed. She ignored the heat that immediately ran under her skin and tipped the bag over. A half-dozen diapers and a thin container of baby wipes scattered across the table. A small can of powdered baby formula and an empty, capped baby bottle rolled out.

  She grabbed a diaper and the wipes and marched around the table, heading into the house. “Go make a bottle with the formula,” she told him. “I’ll get her diaper changed, and then I’ll call my uncle.”

  * * *

  Linc stared after Maddie’s departing form. Her hair was as dark as it had always been, but it was longer now than she’d used to wear it, tumbling well past the bright red scarf wrapped around the collar of her short black coat. Below the coat, her hips—trim as ever—were outlined in black denim jeans tucked into her flat-heeled brown boots.

  She always had liked wearing boots. Not the cowboy kind, either.

  He grabbed the container of formula and the bottle. Not that he knew what to do with them. “Why do you want to call your uncle?”

  “He’s a pediatrician,” she answered as if it should be obvious. She’d laid the baby on the antique bench situated against one wall of the living room. Even though the baby’s legs and arms were waving around, Maddie competently peeled back the neck-to-toe outfit, revealing a tiny white T-shirt that didn’t reach past the baby’s rosy belly and a fat-looking disposable diaper. “Poor thing is soaked.” She sent him a chastising look as she slipped a fresh diaper under the existing one.

  “Save that look for the person who dumped off the kid on my front porch.”

  She pulled out a wet wipe from the plastic container. “How long do you think she’d been there before you got home?”

  “God only knows.” His first reaction when he’d realized what was on his porch had been to call the police. He’d had his phone in his hands when he’d spotted the note tucked next to the kid’s head.

  After reading it, he’d learned that the little girl’s name was Layla and that she belonged to Jax. Supposedly. Which meant there was no way he could call the police.

  And there was no way to reach Jax, either, since he’d found his brother’s cell phone sitting dead in the kitchen where Jax had forgotten it.

  He’d found the phone a week ago.

  But his brother had been gone longer than that.

  He focused on the top of Maddie’s head while she undid the wet diaper.

  He knew she still hated him. And why. But even if he’d had to do things over again, he would still choose the same path.

  “I was busy all day at the office. Worked there until about seven, then went straight on to a dinner engagement.” It was as good a way as any to describe the irritating evening spent with his parents. They’d th
rown a party, celebrating their thirty-fifth wedding anniversary.

  Linc might have celebrated it, too, if he didn’t know what a joke their marriage really was. If Blake Swift wasn’t cheating on Jolene, then Jolene was cheating on Blake. Except for the delight they took in making each other miserable, Linc still couldn’t understand why they remained together. He also would have accused Jax of making a getaway before the party, except Linc knew perfectly well that his brother couldn’t care less what their parents did.

  “There was nobody here at the house to notice anything?”

  “No.”

  She’d finished diapering the baby. She kept her palm on the baby’s chest as she glanced up at him. “No?”

  He frowned. Her pretty eyes were as dark as chocolate and yet the doubt in them was as clear as a spotlight. Another thing that hadn’t changed over the years. Everything going on inside Maddie’s head was broadcast through those expressive eyes. Her two sisters had the exact same eyes—the exact same looks, in fact, since they were identical triplets—but he’d never thought their emotions were as transparent as Maddie’s.

  And he’d never looked at Greer or Ali and felt a slow burn inside.

  “Who do you think should have been here?”

  She looked back at the baby. “I figured you’d have a housekeeper or something.” She slipped the baby’s kicking legs back into her stretchy clothes. “At least she seems to have been warm enough. I don’t see any signs of frostbite. She still needs an exam, though.” She folded the used diaper and wipe into a ball, secured it with the sticky diaper tapes and held it out.

  He was glad his hands were full. He lifted them—formula can in one, empty bottle in the other.

  She rolled her eyes and picked up the baby, nestling her in one arm as she stood. “Kitchen still in the same place?” Not waiting for an answer, she walked past him and around the staircase.

  He followed. “Where would it have gone?”

  She ignored the question. When she reached the kitchen, she tossed the diaper into the trash bin located in the walk-in pantry, then returned to stop in front of him. She took the can from his fingers and set it on the wide soapstone-topped island. Then she took the bottle and before he knew it, she was holding out the baby.