Here with Me

As he drank in the sight, he felt as if he were coming home, which was ridiculous. Home was New York.

This?

The cottage just outside Erie in Northeast Pennsylvania was just a place where he used to live near this girl he used to know.

And that girl, Mary Eileen Singer, had never really liked him much.

He smiled and acknowledged she had every right not to like him. He’d tormented her with all the gusto a young boy could.

A loud squawk from the back of the SUV announced that Jessie was ready to be set free.

“Hey, there, kiddo,” he said as he worked the myriad of hooks and buckles that locked the baby into the car seat.

Actually, now that Jessie was mobile, he should probably start thinking of her as a toddler.

“Here we go,” he said as he lifted her out of the car.

Jessie immediately arched her back, her nonverbal cue that she didn’t want to be held. He set her down and she squealed with delight.

“Don’t eat the grass,” he warned as her chubby fingers grabbed a large hunk and started pulling.

She giggled, not the least bit intimidated. “What on earth am I going to do with you?”

That’s what this break was all about—figuring out what to do about Jessie.

He remembered all those years ago. His parents had died, and he’d gone to live with a foster family. Then one day, his social worker had announced she’d found his uncle, and that this unknown relative had agreed to let Adam come live with him.

He hadn’t been thrilled about going to New York. But over time, he and Paul had sort of meshed. Adam had continued living with his uncle while he’d gone to college and things had been great. Two single guys in the city.

A year after Adam started, Paul met Cathie.

Adam remembered those first few months Paul had dated her. Adam had been obnoxious.

That seemed to be a theme in his past—obnoxious.

He hoped he’d grown out of it.

He watched as Paul and Cathie’s daughter picked the grass and let it run through her fingers.

She didn’t seem to be too affected from her loss. Adam, on the other hand, was reeling from losing Paul and Cathie two months ago.

They were the only family he had—except for Jessie, their daughter. His cousin and goddaughter.

Adam Benton might know how to handle himself in the business world, but he wasn’t equipped for this, for dealing with an eighteen-month-old.

Jessica Aubrey Benton was his responsibility.

Paul and Cathie had trusted him to raise her.

When the lawyer had told him, it had shocked him. He’d assumed they’d named Cathie’s folks Jessie’s guardians.

Cathie’s parents had assumed the same and had been equally shocked.

But Paul and Cathie had named him guardian in their will. Their choice still didn’t make sense to Adam. But he’d picked the toddler up from her grandparents just two weeks ago, determined to take some time with her and decide what to do.

He shook his head as he watched Jessie gleefully wiggle her fingers in the long grass.

Give him a room full of corporate execs. Give him a computer system that needed to be created from scratch…that he could deal with.

Even give him the new computer chip that he hoped would put Delmark, Inc. on the road to success and he was in his element.

Yes, Adam Benton could cope and plan on par with just about anyone when it came to business matters.

But Jessie?

He just wasn’t sure what to do with her.

He loved her, but he wasn’t prepared for taking over her care on his own.

After the will had been read, Cathie’s parents had immediately started pressuring him to let them have her and raise her. Part of him agreed it was the best idea. The other part felt obligated to honor Paul’s request.

He was torn and needed time to sort out what was going to be best for Jessie.

But he wasn’t going to figure anything out standing in the driveway. He got busy unpacking the car. Once he got Jessie’s box of toys, she was content to play with them on the porch. As soon as she’d dumped the box, she’d drop them all back in, then start again.

He hadn’t brought much. A few suitcases for each of them, his laptop, printer and fax machine, and Jessie’s toys and her portable crib.

When everything was in the living room, he scooped up Jess and her toys, and she played while he set up the crib in the bedroom. As soon as it was up, he laid her down. She must have been tired because she was almost agreeable as she settled down for her nap with just a token of a complaint.

Adam cracked her bedroom window so he could hear her, and went out to the front porch. It had two rockers on it, just as it always had. They looked weathered enough to be the same two that had sat here years before.

Nothing about the twin cottages on the lake seemed to have changed, unlike Mary Eileen.

Lee.

She’d changed her name.

Well, not really changed it, but altered it.

Not that he could find fault with that. He’d altered his as well.

He’d almost forgotten Mary Eileen Singer until he’d read an article a month ago. It talked about how a small shop on Perry Square was making big waves with its unique jewelry. He hadn’t connected the girl he knew with the jewelry artist Lee Singer until he’d seen her picture. At the time, it had spurred a passing memory of his time in Erie.

But after he lost Paul and Cathie in the accident, he’d known Erie was the perfect place to get away and figure things out. He’d known that Lee would—

He broke off his thoughts of the past as a Jeep came down the long dirt driveway.

She was here.