The Brennan Baby

His sister’s marriage had affected him more than he cared to admit. He had always taken Kylie’s presence in his life for granted. She was his little sister, who both adored him and fought with him. During their peripatetic childhood as “Navy brats,” they were steadfast pals and allies—and occasional bitter enemies. But whether in positive or negative phases, theirs had been an exceptionally close connection over the years and across the miles. They were first in each other’s lives.

Not anymore. Cade Austin, her new husband, came first with Kylie now. Which was as it should be, of course. Devlin was happy for them, yet as he looked at the pair kidding affectionately with each other, he felt left out

He shook off the feeling. All those calls from his parents, warning him against the pitfalls of dying a lonely old bachelor, must be taking their toll on him.

“I’m perfectly happy with my life the way it is, and I don’t want or need to make any changes, not for a long, long time,” he announced, startling himself. He hadn’t realized that he’d spoken his thoughts aloud.

“Famous last words.” Cade smirked as he headed toward the door. “Come on, Dev, we still have half that van to unload.”

Cade was the chief executive of BrenCo, the family-owned company in Ohio. His voice and his demeanor were conducive to giving orders—and having them promptly obeyed. Devlin automatically started to follow him out the door.

Kylie, in the midst of slipping the CDs into individual slots in the six-foot-high revolving storage case, snickered.

Devlin stopped dead. “What?”

“If you thought you could get out of hauling stuff by having Cade on hand to take over, you thought wrong, brother. Cade is even better at giving orders—and seeing that they’re carried out—than Daddy.”

Which was no small talent, as Devlin knew. Their father, Wayne Brennan, was a retired Navy captain who excelled in orders.

“Does that mean you jump to Cade’s every command, Ky?” Devlin needled her. “Now there’s a sight I’d like to see.”

“Cade doesn’t order me around,” Kylie was quick to assure him.

“Yeah, right. Not much.” Dev chuckled. “Who would’ve ever believed it? When Cade Austin speaks, my little sister—the former formidable feminist—not only listens, she does exactly what she’s told, just like a good little obedient dimwit.”

“Devlin! That van isn’t going to unload itself!” Cade’s voice sounded impatiently from the stairwell at the same moment that Kylie tossed a CD at Dev.

He moved with catlike speed and precision, avoiding the flying missile while racing out into the hallway, laughing.

Where he almost smashed head-on into a young woman holding a baby in her arms. Dev managed to avoid the collision by centimeters, his finely tuned co-ordination serving him well. Taking a deep breath, he leaned against the wall and looked at his near-miss, who was standing in the middle of the hall.

“Hello, Devlin.” Her voice was cool and clear.

Dev’s dark blue eyes widened. He knew her. Oh, yes, he knew her quite well! “Gillian.” He cleared his throat. His voice sounded oddly thick.

“Mama, mama, mama,” the baby chattered, squirming in the young woman’s arms.

“So that’s your baby,” Dev said, recovering somewhat. “A little girl?”

Gillian nodded her head.

“Good guess on my part, huh?” Dev smiled wryly. The baby’s mop of dark brown curls with the pink barrette clipped in one thick lock was a dead giveaway to the child’s sex. The pink ruffled sunsuit and little pink sneakers with lacy socks were other conspicuous clues. No unisex fashions for Gillian’s kid. Nobody could mistake this little girl for a little boy.

Dev’s eyes slid over Gillian as he gave her his routine once-over. Though she was dressed in loose-fitting Jean shorts and a blue T-shirt, she was as unmistakably feminine as her small daughter’s little pink togs. Her red hair, which usually hung nearly to her shoulders in a neat bob, was pulled high in a scarf-tied ponytail. She was petite, just five-one, the top of her head not even reaching the shoulder of his own six-foot frame. Her figure was still curvy and rounded in all the right places; childbirth hadn’t changed that. Dev’s eyes lingered on her chest. Maybe her breasts were bigger....

His eyes happened to stray to her face and he realized that she was watching him stare at her chest. She lifted her brows and nailed him with her pale blue eyes.

Dev felt awkward, a condition he rarely experienced. “What’s the baby’s name?” he heard himself ask, even as he mocked himself for finding the need to make inane small talk. Gillian certainly didn’t.

“Ashley.” She shifted the wiggling baby to her other hip.

“Ashley,” Devlin repeated. “I treated a lot of Ashleys during my pediatric rotation in med school. I’ve often wondered what inspires one out of every three mothers these days to name their daughters Ashley. An interesting phenomenon, yet to be explored.”

“Sorry to be so unoriginal. If I’d known you hated the name, I’d have chosen something else,” she added, her tone caustic.

Dev smiled slightly “I didn’t say I didn’t like the name, just that there are a lot of Ashleys around.”

“Her name is Ashley Joy Morrow. Case closed.”

Devlin recognized the note of finality in her tone. She sounded like an officious bureaucrat, which he decided, she might well be. After all, she was a medical social worker who worked in after-care patient placements at the hospital. Didn’t her position place her firmly within Officious Bureaucrat Realm?

In that case, how could he resist baiting her? It would be positively un-American not to.

“Morrow. Then that would currently make you Gillian Morrow, wouldn’t it?” He gleefully reopened the name game and watched her stiffen in response. “Of course, I knew you as Gillian Bailey back in your wild and crazy single days.”

He felt a perverse pleasure at her frown of annoyance. Gillian had been the polar opposite of wild and crazy while he’d known her. Conservative and stable would be apt, but she would consider that a compliment and right now he was set on riling her.

“I still use Bailey. I was divorced right after the baby was born so I never got around to changing my name,” Gillian imparted the information reluctantly. “And I was never wild and crazy,” she added, stung. She’d spent her whole life trying not to be, though she’d certainly acted that way around Devlin Brennan during the three months they’d been together.

“Divorce?” Dev appeared genuinely surprised by the news. “Well, that didn’t last long, did it?”

“If you mean my marriage, no, it did not.” Gillian looked at the ground, then smoothed the baby’s thick dark curls with her fingers.

He noticed every nervous gesture she made. Clearly, her brief marriage was a sore subject for her. Being Devlin, instead of tactfully letting it go, he pressed her on it. “What happened? And where is Mr. Morrow now? Completely out of the picture—or simply off to one side?”

“I think you’ll understand if I don’t share the details of my divorce with you,” Gillian said frostily.

“Mama!” Ashley roared.

“She’s getting restless, I have to go inside.” Gillian moved toward the door on the right, exactly across the hall from the door of Devlin’s apartment.

“You’re visiting someone who lives there?”

“I live there. We moved in yesterday.”

Devlin felt winded, as if someone had kicked him in the belly. “You’re joking.”

“Why would I joke about that?”

A mirthless smile tilted the corners of his mouth. “Because I’m moving in there.” He pointed to his apartment with his thumb. “Right across the hall from you.”

They exchanged looks of mutual dismay, which each quickly attempted to conceal with a facade of cool unconcern

“Well, if you ever need a baby-sitter, don’t call on me,” Dev said glibly.

“Don’t worry about that. I don’t want you near my baby.”

She sounded a bit too fervent. Dev was insulted. “You don’t think I could baby-sit? I happen to be great with kids.”