Your Baby Or Mine?

by Marie Ferrarella

  He realized what that had to sound like as soon as he said it. Alec didn’t want there to be any misunderstandings between them. “I mean, when Andrea needs you.”

  Alec held the passenger door open for her until she was seated. He seemed to be tripping over his own tongue a good deal tonight. But there was something about Marissa’s sympathetic nature that drew the sentiments, more than the words, out of his mouth.

  He was going to have to watch that.

  Alec rounded the hood and got in behind the wheel. It had been a long time since he’d had anyone really listen to him. But then, he supposed it had been a long time since he’d attempted to share anything so personal. He firmly believed that some sentiments were best left on the shelf, under lock and key. It did no one any good to allow them into the light of day.

  It wouldn’t change anything.

  She turned to look at him as he started the car. “Then you’ve raised Andrea all by yourself this past year?”

  He hadn’t meant to make it sound as if it had been a hardship. Andrea was the best part of his life. It was fatherhood that was still mystifying him. It probably always would.

  “Not alone. Like I said, there’ve been nannies and I’ve persuaded Roberta to lend a hand on occasion.” He smiled, thinking of his mother. “Although it’s her housekeeper who does the actual changing and feeding. Roberta just chucks her under the chin and says a few baby talk syllables at her.” His smile widened into a grin. “Andrea, not the housekeeper.” He spared Marissa a glance as he eased into traffic. Dusk was settling in, bringing along a cool mist. He turned on the car’s headlights and with them, the windshield wipers. They moved lazily across the glass, resting after every pass. “Don’t misunderstand, my mother isn’t a bad woman, she just has trouble giving of herself to anyone under the age of thirty.”

  He was probably close to that now himself, she guessed, although when he smiled, his face looked more boyish and rugged. “Then you’re due soon?”

  He laughed. She had a good eye. “In a few months.”

  How old was she? he wondered. “Is turnabout fair play?”

  She arched a brow. “Excuse me?”

  A trace of whimsy flittered through him. It passed so quickly that it didn’t occur to Alec that it had been a year since he’d felt anything remotely similar. “Do I get to ask you your age?”

  She lifted a shoulder indifferently. “No law against asking.”

  From her tone, he knew he could ask, but she wasn’t going to answer. She’d said she was going for a masters, that had to put her at about—what?—twenty-five at the earliest. But she sounded a great deal more mature than that. He couldn’t tell by looking at her. It aroused his curiosity. Most women didn’t become secretive about their age until well into their thirties.

  Alec stepped on the accelerator again. “I think I’ll pass.”

  Marissa took pity on him. “I’m twenty-eight, but I would think it would be my experience rather than my age that would be more useful to you in ascertaining what sort of a woman you’re hiring.”

  He switched the wipers on to a higher speed as a light sprinkling of rain was dotting the windshield. Twenty-eight. That would explain the maturity, though she didn’t look her age. “I already know the kind of woman I’m hiring.” He ticked off the attributes he’d observed and gleaned from their conversation. “A very energetic, capable one who evidently knows how to roll with the punches and has turned survival into an art form.”

  She laughed. “Wow, with a recommendation like that, I’d hire me, too.” Turning in her seat, she leaned back to check on Andrea and Christopher. Both were still dozing. Luck was holding, but probably not for much longer. She raised her eyes to Alec’s face. “Just how did you arrive at that glowing conclusion?”

  He’d caught a whiff of something sweet and tangy when she inclined her head. It was vaguely familiar, but he couldn’t place it. It took him a minute to focus on her question.

  “Easy. You’re good with kids, hence capable. You know how to roll with the punches because you’re a single mother who’s made a home for herself and her son, planning on a future rather than retreating into bitterness. And you’re a survivor because here you are, taking advantage of an opportunity that you heretofore only thought was annoying.”

  Had she given him that impression? She hadn’t meant to. “Not annoying, just not doable.”

  Alec looked at her. The light from the passing cars refracted through the wet windshield, dusting her skin with a sheen of diamonds. He found himself wondering about the man who left her. He must have been blind as well as insensitive.

  “And now?” Alec pressed.

  “Now I’m going to have to find a way to do it.” She’d already begun to outline schedules in her head. “It’s a matter of getting everything down on paper and seeing what can either be pushed aside, postponed or scaled down.”

  He was- curious to hear just what she had decided to rearrange in her life. “Go on.”

  “All right. Priorities.” She took a deep breath, visualizing a page in her mind. “In order to have a place to stay, I need to take care of your daughter. In order to continue receiving my scholarship money, I have to maintain twelve credits a quarter and a B average. Besides that, I do have a commitment to the Y to teach those Baby and Me classes. They already advanced me money against my wages so that I could buy a few things for Christopher.” She saw the unspoken question in his eyes. “It was a rough winter.”

  “No child support?” He would have known he was stepping into territory that was best left unexplored had he thought about it. But it seemed a natural enough question when he asked.

  “Some, but not much.” She knew through mutual friends that Antonio was doing very well, but she refused to ask for more than they had originally agreed upon. It wasn’t in her nature to beg. In that respect, at least, she was too much the Sergeant’s daughter to sacrifice her pride. She’d just have to find a different way—and by accepting Beckett’s offer, she had. “It never seems to be enough.” She glanced over her shoulder at her son. “Every time I turn around, Christopher’s outgrowing something.”

  He was acquainted with that. But for him, it was never a hardship. He wondered how he would have managed if he’d not only needed a nanny, but the funds for one, as well.

  “They do that,” he agreed. Andrea had already grown so much in the last year that he couldn’t think of her as a baby anymore. In a way, he rather missed that, the feel of something so tiny, so sweet curling up in the crook of his arm. He’d never thought of himself as a sentimental man until she had entered his life.

  A thought occurred to Marissa. “Tell me something. Why haven’t you thought of placing Andrea into a preschool or a day-care center?” She knew that she would have been lost without the one that existed on campus. It allowed her to attend her Wednesday classes, which were only given in the daytime.

  Was she changing her mind again? “I want someone who can give Andrea the attention she needs. I don’t want her to be lost in a crowd, just one of the kids who’s being cared for.” His reasons were grounded in his own past and the myriad strangers who had taken care of him. “There’ll be plenty of time for her to be melded into a crowd when she’s older. Right now, I want someone who can focus on her, who’s there for her when I can’t be.”

  He paused at another traffic light. He seemed to be catching each one tonight, but for once he wasn’t in a particular hurry. Talking to Marissa was pleasant, soothing. Alec placated his conscience, which directed his attention to all the office work he was leaving undone, by telling himself that he was actually conducting an interview. One interview instead of twenty.

  “And you know, I can’t think of anyone better than you,” It was true. There was just something about her that told him she was the genuine article and that he was lucky that she had changed her mind. That Andrea was lucky, he amended silently.

  Marissa wasn’t accustomed to things being taken on faith. “Without checking out m
y references?”

  He supposed it wouldn’t hurt, but there would have to be something pretty damaging before he went against his instincts. “Do you have any?”

  She flushed. The question had just come out. It had never occurred to her to garner any letters from the various places she had worked. “Just the school where I teach.”

  The answer was refreshingly honest. Other people might have tried to snow him, the way one applicant had. She’d had glowing letters to show him, none of which had checked out when he’d looked into them. It was obvious that the woman had thought he’d be so impressed with her references that he wouldn’t think to question the people who supposedly wrote them.

  “Then I guess I’ve checked out everything I need to.” Andrea was beginning to make noises in her sleep. That meant she was going to be waking up soon. “Andrea likes you, and to me, that’s the most important reference of all.” He guided his car into the now-empty lot and parked next to hers. Pulling up the emergency brake, Alec turned to look at her. “So, do we have a deal?”

  She’d learned to be cautious in her actions, no matter how blithely she appeared to be going through life. “Do I get to ask you any questions?”

  Her response amused Alec. “You want to see my references?”

  She’d seen and heard enough to form her own opinion about him. References were just nice pieces of paper that served as reinforcements of an opinion. If there was something damning about him, probably even his best friends wouldn’t know.

  “No, I just need to work out a few logistics with you and I thought we should do it up front. That means I need to know your schedule. I have evening classes on Monday, Tuesday and one on Thursday. On Wednesdays I have two during the day. Also, there are the classes I teach at the Y. You already know about the time. I can bring Andrea to those. You don’t have to come along anymore if you don’t want to. I’ll keep an eye on her the way I do with Christopher.”

  He had no plans of dropping out. “Hey, I was just getting good at it.” Or was there some sort of hidden message in her suggestion? He eyed her. “Wasn’t I?”

  She nodded. “You’re one of the more attentive fathers. Actually,” she admitted, “until I started teaching classes, I wasn’t aware that fathers could be attentive.”

  Alec thought of his own father and drew the only logical conclusion he could. “Your father walk out when you were young?”

  The assumption surprised her. Marissa shook her head. “A person doesn’t have to leave not to be there,” she said quietly. It was as much as she was willing to say on the subject. “So, what do you think? Can we work things out to our mutual satisfaction?”

  There was no way he was going to let her out of it. Not when the alternative meant either going back to his mother or sifting through endless candidates who would probably leave him cold. Besides, she was going to be good for Andrea. He had a feeling.

  “I’m home two days a week. One of those can be on Wednesdays. I can watch Christopher for you while you’re attending class.”

  “You don’t have to. There’s a great day-care center on the campus.” The center had its limits, one of which was that it closed at five. She bit her lip. “But the evenings—”

  It took effort to draw his eyes away from her mouth. “All right, the evenings then.”

  “That would certainly make things easier,” she admitted. Relying on Jane was an evening-to-evening thing. A few times Jane’s mother had come to take her place because Jane had too much homework to watch Christopher. And there were times when she had to skip class because Jane and her mother were both unavailable and she couldn’t find anyone to stay with Christopher. If she were living on Beckett’s property, that problem would be solved. Provided Christopher didn’t send the man running for the hills.

  “So, we have a deal?” he prodded again, putting out his hand.

  Marissa slipped hers into it. “We have a deal.”

  He felt relieved. He also felt something else, something nameless that was pushing its way forward, into the sun. Suddenly aware that he was holding her hand much too long, he released it. “How soon can you move in?”

  She didn’t even have to think. “As soon as I can get my things together. I don’t have a class tonight, so I can pack and be over in the morning.”

  Now that the deal was sealed, he was anxious to remove any obstacles. He wouldn’t feel secure until she was actually on the premises. “Why don’t I come over and help you pack? Can you be over tonight?”

  She looked uncertain. “Your car is too small. We’d have to make several trips.”

  “I have a van.”

  He certainly was determined, she thought, laughing. “Are you usually this pushy?”

  “No, but I’m usually not this desperate, either,” he confessed. “There’s a meeting in the morning I have to attend and if I leave Andrea with Roberta for a third day in a row, she’ll probably make me endure the death scene from Hamlet before letting me out the door.”

  He was exaggerating, but she found it rather cute. “Which one?”

  Alec didn’t have to think. He knew his mother. “All of them. She tends to be a little overly dramatic.” He saw a skeptical look enter Marissa’s eyes. “Roberta was in the theater when she was young. Younger,” he amended, knowing that if his mother had heard him just then, there would have been hell to pay. “She claims it never leaves the blood.”

  His mother sounded eccentric. “You must have had an interesting childhood.”

  He lifted a shoulder. “That’s one way to put it.” But, if Marissa worked for him, she’d find out about Roberta soon enough. “It was unique. Roberta’s family was, and is, well off. She is the family black sheep. But, since she was their only sheep, they doted on her and let her do whatever she wanted. Trouble was, she never quite knew what she wanted, other than to remain perpetually young.” He recited the story from memory, having heard it from his grandmother a number of times. “She married my father against everyone’s wishes, which was why I think she actually married him in the first place. As an act of rebellion, nothing more. By the time I was born, Roberta had declared herself out of love and had gone on to enroll in an ‘acting school for talented beginners.’ Her words, not mine. My father left. I was entrusted to a nanny while she went off to wow the world.”

  Marissa nodded, beginning to understand. “So, a tradition began.”

  He hadn’t realized that was what it sounded like. “God, I hope not. I never want Andrea to feel the way I did.”

  She waited, but he wasn’t going to tell her on his own. “How did you feel?”

  “Like a pair of shoes someone wanted to keep polished in case they had to be brought out of the closet for some formal occasion but for the most part were kept pretty much out of sight.”

  Her heart went out to the boy he had been. Feeling as if you didn’t count was hell. “Did you get along with your mother?”

  Did he get along with her? Alec considered the question. He’d never had enough time alone with Roberta to really find out.

  “I saw her infrequently. She was always going somewhere where she couldn’t take me.” After a while he’d stopped asking to be taken. “And then she sent me off to boarding school so she wouldn’t have to keep hiring nannies. They came and went with fair regularity.”

  She could just see him, a lonely little boy, unloved, unnoticed. Invisible to the adults around him. In a way, they had a lot in common. “That sounds absolutely terrible.”

  He hadn’t meant to bare this much of his past. There was absolutely no need for it. And yet a small part of him did feel better, sharing this. “It sounds worse than it was. I managed to grow up and make something of myself and she likes to say she had a hand in it, when it suits her.”

  And he lets her, even though he knows it isn’t true, Marissa thought. That said a lot about him. “But she won’t let you call her mother.”

  He shook his head. Roberta wouldn’t answer if he did. “Not since I became taller than s
he was. I was almost fifteen and home for Christmas when she told me she wanted me to start calling her Roberta.”

  Merry Christmas. “What about Andrea? Is she going to be able to call her Grandmother?”

  Alec began to laugh, just picturing that. “Not unless Andy wants that to be the last word she ever says. No, I expect Roberta will continue be ‘Roberta’ to all concerned.” He’d said so much more than he had intended. Alec looked at the woman beside him, bewildered. “How did we get started on this, anyway?”

  She was the soul of innocence. “I asked you a question and it just came out.”

  He shrugged self-consciously. “I’m not accustomed to talking this much. It has to be something in the fries.” He put the blame on the likeliest target. It was better than admitting that talking to her was a comfortable thing and words just seemed to slip out of their own accord.

  Marissa nodded, her expression solemn. “I hear that the FBI has been known to use French fries when interrogating spies and trying to get international secrets out of them.”

  For a second he said nothing and she was afraid that she had gone too far and annoyed him. And then he laughed. “You have a smart mouth, you know that?”

  She grinned. “Yes, I’ve been told that.”

  It was also a very tempting mouth, but he saw no reason to say that out loud. It was bad enough that he had thought it. It had absolutely no place in the relationship he saw for them.

  “As long as you know. All right, here’s the plan. You give me your address and I’ll be back with the van within the hour.” Within the half hour if everything went well, he added silently.

  Marissa tore off a piece of the classified section and wrote her address in the margin. She wasn’t going to be needing that paper anymore, she thought with satisfaction.