She quickly passed Bella to Matt Patterson—so quickly he didn’t have time to protest and their fingers didn’t even accidentally brush. “I’ll slide inside, then you hand Bella to me. I will strap her in the car seat, and you can be on your way.”
She climbed in. He passed Bella to her. She put the baby into the car seat and secured the straps. As she pulled away, she looked at the baby’s pretty face. Blue eyes. Pug nose. Cupid’s bow mouth.
Her heart twisted. She’d had this baby with her twenty-four hours a day for four days. Caring for her. Teasing her and playing with her to help her accept her new circumstances. Walking the floor with her as she sobbed all night because she missed her mom and dad. Bella had cried so hard the first night that Claire had cried with her. A baby couldn’t understand or deal with death. All she knew was she missed her mom and desperately wanted the comfort of her arms.
Claire swallowed. This poor sweet baby would never see her mom again. Just as Claire hadn’t seen her mom after she died.
She pressed her fingers to her mouth. How could she leave this sweet baby with a man who didn’t know how to care for her?
She couldn’t.
She scooted across the seat and out of the limo. Though fear trembled through her, she faced Matt Patterson and held out her hand. “Do you have a business card?”
He frowned. “Yes.”
“Does it have your home address?”
His eyes narrowed. “Are you planning to do some kind of surprise inspection?”
“I’m going to lock the office, then meet you at your house.”
He smiled. Those beautiful green eyes of his lit with so much pleasure, a corresponding pleasure tugged at her stomach. “You’re going to help me?”
God help her. “This evening, yes, to get you settled in. Then you’re on your own.”
THE rhythm of the car lulled Bella to sleep and she napped through the entire drive home. But when Jimmy, Matt’s driver, stopped the limo to punch in the code to open the big black wrought-iron gate for his estate, the baby awoke. She glanced around sleepily. Her little mouth turned down. Her nose wrinkled and she let out with a yowl that went through Matt like an icy wind blows through barren trees.
Pretending not to notice, Jimmy drove up the brown brick driveway. Little Bella’s wails filled the back of the limo. She didn’t see that the grounds were manicured to perfection. Or that the leaves on the trees had begun to change colors and swatches of red, yellow and orange guided them along the circular driveway to the front of the stately stone mansion.
She didn’t care when Matt said, “Shh. Shh. Please stop crying.”
She simply continued to wail.
Jimmy appeared at the back door, opened it with a wince. “Quite a set of lungs.”
“Indeed.” Matt smiled ruefully. “You wouldn’t know how to…” He paused, searching for a proper phrase and finally settled on, “Make her stop.”
Jimmy backed off. “No, sir. Confirmed bachelor.” He tugged both ends of his bow tie jauntily. “Happily single. Not daddy material.”
Remembering what Claire had asked him, he said, “No nieces or nephews?”
“Several but I don’t take to them until they’re old enough to go the bathroom on their own and get into the casinos in Atlantic City.”
He sighed. “An excellent plan.” His plan. Until circumstance changed things.
Bella’s screams grew louder. He raised his voice to be heard above the sobbing. “So how do we get her into the house?”
Jimmy stepped back again. “Sorry. Not in my job description. In fact, I think I’ll go make sure the limo’s place in the garage is cleared.”
He raced away and Matt scowled. See if the place in the garage is cleared? What a line.
He turned back to the baby. “So…what? You want food? A bottle? Some Scotch?” He knew she didn’t want the third, but the terror riding his blood right now had him giddy. He’d like a Scotch. But he knew he wasn’t getting one. Might not ever get one again until this child turned eighteen.
With Bella wailing beside him, he knew he had a choice. Sit in this limo for God knew how long until the adoption agency woman arrived. Or get Bella out of her car seat and into the house.
A cold wind blew alongside the car. The open door caught it and sent frigid air swirling into the limo. A few drops of rain pelted the limo roof, then the rain started full force.
“Crap.”
He reached for the door and slammed it closed. Bella’s wails echoed around him.
Jimmy suddenly appeared at the driver door. “Let’s get this in the garage!”
“Good idea.”
The sound of Bella screaming competed with the drumming of rain on the roof, making a horrendous racket. Matt squeezed his eyes shut, popped them open and turned to Bella. “Come on, kid. You knew me at the adoption agency office.” He pointed at his chest. “I’m Mommy’s friend.”
Her crying only increased when they pulled into the garage. Being indoors seemed to cause the sound to ricochet off the walls and reverberate through him.
He peeked at her face. Little blue eyes watery and sad. Her nose red. Her lips trembling.
He scrubbed his hand across his mouth. He couldn’t stand to see her like this. He had to do something!
Noting that Jimmy had disappeared as soon as the limo lurched to a stop, he reached for the buckles of her car seat. Once he had her out of the car seat, he’d carry her into the house and maybe the movement of walking would calm her down?
He found a clasp at her belly that, when opened, allowed him to raise two straps over her head. A buckle by her hip released the bottom strap. When he jiggled the padded half circle around her, he discovered it rose, too.
But with all of her trappings gone, Bella fell forward. He just barely caught her. And when she plopped against him, she wiped her wet face in the lapel of his silk suit.
He groaned.
She clung to him. Using his lapels like a rope ladder, she climbed up and burrowed into his neck.
His heart knotted with confusing emotions. Fear and misery wanted to dominate. He had no idea what to do with this kid. Barely any idea how to get her into the house.
But sympathy snaked through the fear. She was alone. Lost. He knew what it was like to be alone and lost. Except he could also add unwanted. The morning after their legendary fight, Cedric might have retracted his demand that Matt leave the Patterson home, but too many harsh words had been spoken. Up until then, Matt had called Cedric Dad, believed they were blood. But in that awful fight, Cedric had let loose of the big family secret.
Matt and his twin were not Cedric’s children. His mother had been married before. She’d left her first husband not knowing she was pregnant, and Cedric had taken her in, raised her children as his own.
It explained why Matt had always felt a distance between himself and Cedric, always felt a nagging sense of not being wanted, not really having a place, not having a home—
He looked at Bella. Orphaned. Alone. With a guy who didn’t even know how to get her to stop crying, let alone how to feed her. She could have heard the conversation he’d had with Jimmy about not wanting kids. Not being daddy material. And though he knew that on a logical level she didn’t understand a word they’d said, on an emotional level, she’d recorded it all.
Did