Dream Baby

Jake shrugged. “It can be unmade. I understand no adoption papers have been signed yet.”

“They will be. Isabel is not going to change her mind.”

“We’ll see. I’ve asked her to give me a week to convince her otherwise.”

“Mr. Burdette, did Isabel tell you about her plans for the future?”

“No. I suppose that’s one of the things we’ll need to discuss. We barely covered the basics. She told me the child was a boy, but little more than that.”

Nora snorted in derision. “I’m afraid you’re in for quite a disappointment. Isabel may seem rather... scattered right now, but she has very specific goals for herself, and they don’t include raising a child.”

Her hands were shaking, and to find something for them to do she began reorganizing the items on the counter, tilting bottles this way and that as though they were intended for some sort of display.

Jake observed her silently for several long moments, then he reached over to place one hand on top of hers.

“Miss Holloway,” he said in a surprisingly gentle tone. “Nora. I’m sorry. I’m sure you’re a very nice person—”

She snatched her hands out from under his and jerked her head up to glare at him. “You don’t even know me.”

“By the end of the week I intend to know everything I need to know about you.”

The sudden steely tone in his voice made her heart buck in rebellion. Her eyes narrowed. “Are you trying to intimidate me?”

“There’s no need to be defensive.”

She clamped her jaw around a few harsh words that came to mind. Giving him the same hard, level look he had given her only minutes ago, she said with biting courtesy, “Mr. Burdette, I’ve waited a long time to have a child. Now that it’s about to become a reality, I’m not willing to just politely step aside. I want this baby. It’s Isabel’s intention that I have this baby. The wishes of the mother hold a considerable amount of sway in the eyes of the law.”

He appeared completely unperturbed. If anything, something in his stillness became more ominous. “Yes, they do,” he agreed in a quiet tone. He pushed away from the counter and headed toward the door. Before he left the room, he turned to look at her one last time. “But I doubt very much that the courts would completely ignore the concerns of a blood relative.”

ISABEL PLEADED a headache when Nora returned to the lodge, and she allowed the girl to escape into her bedroom for the evening. Tomorrow was soon enough to find out if all her hopes and dreams for this baby had been for nothing.

But in the morning, Isabel was already gone when Nora woke. A note on the kitchen counter indicated she’d gone into town with Jake Burdette and would return by mid-morning. Instead of trying to drum up an appetite for breakfast, Nora began working on the baby’s quilt the two of them had been piecing together. She wanted desperately to believe that one day her child would lie under it.

By ten o’clock, when she head the front lobby door of the lodge open and shut, her nerves were as tight as each stitch she had pulled through the pastel material.