She wasn’t someone he’d met and forgotten as Amelia had suggested. Leave it to Amelia to always suspect the worst of him. Just this once, he wished she’d been right. It would be so much easier if Kim Lindsay was just another person he’d met and could forget. But no, Ms. Lindsay was a social worker assigned to his case.
Not his case, but Katie O’Keefe’s case. It had been Kim Lindsay’s job to find out if the infant had any relatives to care for her and to make arrangements if she didn’t.
Katie O’Keefe didn’t have any relatives, but she had Mac.
Her guardian.
He was responsible for the baby. That was something Ms. Lindsay was having problems remembering.
“I already have a foster home lined up for her,” Ms. Lindsay said. “The super let me into Marion’s apartment and I found your name as her emergency contact.”
“Not an emergency contact, a guardian. I’ve shown you copies of all the papers.” He was glad that he’d thought to bring them.
“And you told me that you never imagined it would come to this, that you don’t know the first thing about babies, and don’t plan on keeping her. If that’s the case—”
“I’d be willing to keep her, for a fee. Just enough to cover the costs,” Esther Thomas wheedled.
Mac looked at Marion O’Keefe’s neighbor. She looked frail with age, hardly able to take care of herself, much less a baby.
“No,” he said, his response was quickly echoed by the social worker. They exchanged conspiratorial smiles. They might not agree on where Katie O’Keefe should stay, but they obviously had no trouble agreeing it wasn’t here.
“I mean,” Mac said when the old woman scowled, “while I appreciate all you’ve done for Katie, her mother wanted me to care for her, and that’s just what I’m going to do.”
“Ms. Thomas, would you excuse us a moment?” Ms. Lindsay asked.
“Yeah, whatever. Her mother never wanted me to baby-sit either, as if I can’t take care of a baby…” The older woman wandered down the hall, muttering to herself.
Ms. Lindsay studied a file.
Mac recognized the move. He often employed it himself. Looking at the file gave her a feeling of authority, reminding both of them that she was in charge.
Mac waited to see what her next argument was.
He didn’t have to wait long.
She looked up from the chart and met his gaze. Before she could say anything he said, “I’m taking her with me. After all, it’s just short-term. Her mother trusted me with her care.”
“Tell me again how that came about?”
“Ms. O’Keefe didn’t have any family. The baby’s father died before she was born. Marion wanted to see to it her daughter never ended up in a foster home. She knew she needed a guardian, someone to see to the baby’s future in case anything happened. She’d read about some of my cases, and knew that I’d been instrumental in arranging a few adoptions.”
Mac did pro-bono work for Our Home, a nonprofit agency that tried to place special needs children into adoptive families. But he didn’t work with the children personally and he’d never served as anyone’s guardian.
He should have told the woman no. It was legal in Pennsylvania for a lawyer to serve as guardian, but rare. He should have simply said no.
Mac had been ready to do just that. But when Marion O’Keefe had come to his office she’d seemed so alone as she told him her story. And despite his best intentions, he empathized. He knew what that felt like to have no one to turn to.
She’d looked at him, her need apparent in her eyes. “There’s no one else to ask, Mr. Mackenzie. I wouldn’t expect you to raise her, but you’ve done adoption cases, worked with a lot of kids. You’d find her a good home.”
“Her?” he’d asked.
“Her. I had a sonogram. It’s a girl.” Marion had smiled then and run her hand lightly across her stomach, a small caress filled with love.
That’s when he realized he couldn’t say no.
The memory still hit Mac hard. At that moment he’d envied the unborn baby. Her mother had wanted her so much. Marion O’Keefe had loved her child before she was even born. She’d worried about the baby’s future and had trusted him to see to that future if she couldn’t.
In the end, he didn’t have the heart to refuse her request. He’d agreed to act as her unborn child’s guardian if anything should happen to her, and then dismissed the entire incident. After all, Marion O’Keefe had been young and seemed healthy. No one could have predicted the aneurism that had taken her life.
Mac felt a stab of sorrow for the woman’s passing, for the baby who would never know how loved she’d been before she was even born.
He might not have thought it would come to this, but the baby was his responsibility. He wasn’t going to fail Marion or her child. Marion’s baby would never know her mother’s love, but Mac would see to it she was placed in a home where she would know love. He wouldn’t trust her care to strangers. Until he found her a new home, he’d watch over the baby.
“I promised her mother and I have an ethical obligation to personally see to the baby.”
“But—”
“Ms. Lindsay, unless you can come up with a legal reason why I can’t take the child, then this conversation is over.”
The woman sighed. “Would you at least take my card and phone if you need anything?”
“Listen, I might be stubborn,” he flashed her a smile, hoping to charm her out of her annoyance, “but I’m not stupid.”
He took the card. “I’ll call regardless and let you know how we’re doing and what I decide.”
“Fine. There wasn’t much at the apartment. Not even a crib for the baby. I don’t think her mother had much.”
“I don’t either,” Mac said. “I offered to write her will pro bono, but she refused.”
Marion O’Keefe had been a proud, loving woman. She’d made payments. Five dollars every week, like clockwork.
Mac would make sure Katie knew that about her mother.
“The super said he’d pack all her personal items and ship them to you for Katie.”
“That’s fine.”
The social worker started toward the door. “Mr. Mackenzie, do you know what you’re getting yourself into?”
“She’s how old?” he asked, knowing it was less than a year since Marion O’Keefe had sat in his office.
Ms. Lindsay glanced at her chart again. “Seven months.”
“Seven months.” He laughed. “How hard could it be?”
This time it was Kim Lindsay who laughed. “I’ll talk to you in a couple days and you can let me know your answer then.”
Ms. Thomas came back down the hall, carrying a bag. “I put her clothes and stuff in here. There’s only two more diapers, so you’d better stop and get some.”
“Thank you, Ms. Thomas.” He took the bag.
“Let me go get her.”
It would have been so much easier if Mac had allowed Ms. Lindsay to place the baby with someone who had experience with