Husband By Inheritance

The mirror played that trick on him, too. He looked in it and saw a man who looked so much younger than he felt.

“Thirty,” he said.

“Surely you’re a little too young to be retired, Mr. McCall?”

“Shane. Uh. Well. Semi, I guess. I’m a consultant on police training, now. Look, do you want to come in and sit down?”

Her eyes found his ring finger, and he saw her register the band of soft, solid gold that winked there. “Are we going to wake your wife?”

“No. I’m a widower.”

“I’m sorry.” After a moment, “You seem young for that, too.”

“Tell God.” He heard the bitter note in his voice, and would have done anything to erase it. “Look, are you coming in or not?”

She hesitated, looked like she was going to cry again, wiped at her face with her sleeve. “I don’t know what I want to do. I’m so tired.” She brightened. “I know, I’ll call one of my sisters.”

He liked the way she said sister, somehow putting so much love into the word that he knew her sister wouldn’t mind her calling at this time of the night. But why hadn’t she thought of that before?

She thrust the baby at him and bent to undo her shoes. It seemed to him he’d been in a better position when she didn’t trust him. He wasn’t good with babies.

He held the chubby body awkwardly, at arm’s length. “Uh, just leave your shoes on.”

“On these floors. Are you crazy?”

He looked at the floors, not sure he’d ever noticed them before. Wood. In need of something. Tender loving care.

The baby was regarding him with a suspicious scowl. Like mother, like daughter. “Me, Belle,” she finally announced warily.

“Great. Hi.” He still held her out, way far away from him.

She wiggled and he could feel the lively energy, the strength in her.

Abby straightened, and he went to hand the baby back. “Could you just hold her for a minute? Just until I use the phone?”

It would seem churlish to refuse. “The phone’s through here,” he said, leading the way, past the closed door that went into the empty main floor suite, and down the hall to the kitchen. The baby waggled away on the end of his held-out-straight-in-front-of-him arms.

“She won’t bite you.”

“Oh.” He made no move to change his position. Belle wiggled uncomfortably.

“Does she smell?” Abby asked.

“Belle no smell,” the baby yelled indignantly.

“Uh,” he managed to unbend his arms a little, draw the baby into him. Sniffed. She did smell. Of heaven. Something closed around his heart, a fist of pain.

And whatever emotion it was, it telegraphed itself straight to the baby, because she stared at him round-eyed, then touched his cheek with soft fingers, took the collar of his jacket in a surprisingly strong grip, and pulled herself into him.

“That’s otay,” she told him, nestling her blond curls under his chin and her cheek against his collarbone, and beginning to slurp untidily on her thumb. Drool fell down the vee of the jacket he hadn’t taken off for fear of reoffending Ms. Blakely’s sensibilities with the view of his naked chest.

“The phone’s right there.”

His intruder gave his kitchen, which was as Spartan as his bedroom, a cursory glance, went to the phone and picked it up. He could hear her calling information. How come she didn’t have her sisters’ phone numbers?

When she hung up she looked discouraged again.

“They’re not here yet. My sisters.”

“Here yet?”

“We’re all moving here. It’s a long story.” She looked exhausted and broken.

“All? Like how many dozen are you talking?”

She laughed a little. “Just three. I’m one of triplets.”

Three of her. That was kind of a scary thought for a reason he didn’t want to contemplate. The baby was sleeping against his chest, snoring gently. He registered the warmth of her tiny body, the light shining in her curls, and braced himself, waiting for some new and unspeakable pain to hit him.

“I’ll call a road service for you,” he said, tight control in his voice, “But I wouldn’t count on anything happening right away. This isn’t Chicago.”

She looked at him, startled.

“License plates,” he said. “Parking sticker on the left-hand side of your windshield.”

“You really are a cop.”

“Not now,” he corrected her.

Still leaving him with the baby she began to fish through a bag nearly as big as she was. She came out finally, triumphant, with a piece of wrinkled paper.

She handed it to him.

He awkwardly shifted “Me-Belle” to the crook of his arm and took the piece of paper. He stared at it. Blinked rapidly. Looked again. His own address was written there in a firm, feminine hand.

“There’s some mistake,” he finally said.

“Why?”

“This house is number twenty-two, Harbor Way.”

She looked deflated. “I must have written it down wrong.”

“You must have.”

She slumped down on a chair, took off her ball cap, ran a hand through her straight hair. It was sticking up in the cutest way. “Now what? I have to go. Obviously.”

That was obvious all right. Her hair was tangled and damp, and her face was pale with weariness. And still, all he could think, was that she was damnably sexy. She was wearing jeans that were way too big for her, accentuating the fact she was as slender as a young willow. She couldn’t stay here. Obviously.