The Sheriff's Christmas Surprise

Lupe seemed to know better than to resist. Besides, it was obvious she thought the little guy was cute.

“I can take care of him for you, Sheriff,” she volunteered. She turned the infant seat around toward her and began to unfasten the straps securing the baby. Freeing the infant, she picked him up. “But make sure you come back.”

“Don’t worry, I will,” he promised. With that, he made his way to the door.

Rick was back faster than he intended.

Strictly speaking, he was back before he left. Opening the door, he was about to walk out of the diner when a statuesque blonde all but knocked him over. Contact was hard, jarring, and oddly electric as their bodies slammed together, then sprang apart.

Stunned, with some of the wind knocked out of her, the woman staggered, somehow managing to keep from falling, but just barely.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to run into you like that,” she apologized in a deeply melodic voice that reminded him of aged whiskey sliding down the side of a thick glass on a chilled winter morning.

His badge and uniform seemed to register belatedly in her brain and she added, “But you’re the man I need to see—” The baby made another noise, pulling her attention over to where Lupe stood holding the baby. Her eyes widened.

“Bobby!” she cried, appearing stunned and thrilled all at the same time.

Chapter Two

Trial attorney Olivia Blayne was seven steps beyond bone tired.

The twenty-nine-year-old had been on the road for more hours than she cared to think about, taking off the second she finally managed to get a lead on her younger sister’s location. That was thanks to an ex-boyfriend who knew someone who could track down the coordinates of her last cell-phone call, a service which, ironically, she paid for.

In reality, she’d been paying for her sister since the day their parents had been killed, victims of a senseless robbery at the small jewelry store they owned and operated.

From the moment she’d left Dallas behind in her rearview mirror two days before Thanksgiving, Olivia had haunted every roadside diner from there to here—a small town two steps away from the border—in hopes of finding her sister and her three-month-old nephew, Bobby.

Ordinarily extremely law-abiding, she had driven like a woman possessed, determined to bring both of them back to Dallas—preferably over Don Norman’s dead body, she thought bitterly.

But as the hours peeled away—and her stomach protested more frequently that she’d put off eating—Olivia started to despair that she was on a fool’s errand and was never going to find either her sister or the baby.

Robert Blayne, her father and ever the pragmatic one, had taught her to rely on logic; Diana, her mother, to believe in miracles. In Olivia’s estimation, she needed the latter, not the former. The former was far too daunting to think about now.

When she all but collided with the six-foot-something rugged officer in a khaki uniform, she found her miracle. Or at least half of it.

It took Olivia less than a second to recover and rush over to the young, fresh-faced Hispanic woman holding her nephew.

Her heart, all but bursting with joy, leaped into her throat.

“Bobby,” she cried again, tears smarting her eyes. She blinked twice, refusing to let them escape. She’d always hated women who broke down and cried. Crying was a sign of weakness and she couldn’t allow herself to be weak, not even for a moment. Far too much depended on her being strong.

Olivia stretched out her arms to the infant, eager to take him from the petite, dark-eyed waitress.

Hesitating, Lupe looked toward Rick for guidance and he nodded. Only then did she let the baby be taken from her by the woman in the deep blue—and somewhat dusty—power suit.

Bobby felt like heaven in her arms. For a second, Olivia pressed her cheek against his, just savoring the moment, the contact.

“Oh, Bobby, I was beginning to think I’d never see you again,” she whispered to him.

Bobby wriggled, making a noise and seeking freedom. Reluctantly, Olivia loosened her hold on him, resting him against her shoulder. She’d discovered that, at least for now, it was his favorite position.

“So ‘Bobby’ is yours?” In Rick’s estimation, the question was a needless one, but he still had to ask it. There were rules to follow, even in a town as small and laid-back as Forever.

The question indicated that the sheriff thought Bobby was her son, so she said, “No.” The second the word was out, she negated her response, afraid that the man might think she was just some crazy woman, jumping at the chance to grab a baby.

God knew she probably looked the part, she thought, catching a glimpse of her reflection in the aluminum-covered bread box.

“Yes.”

The woman in the expensive suit looked just a bit flustered, her pinned-up hair coming loose in different sections. Rick allowed his amusement to show. “Is this like some kind of a Solomon thing?”

For a moment, Olivia didn’t answer. She hadn’t realized how good it would feel to have this little bundle of humanity in her arms again until she’d begun to believe that she never would.

“No.” Swaying just a little to lull the baby, Olivia continued to hold him against her shoulder as she looked at the man with the rock-solid chest and the annoying questions. “Bobby’s my nephew.” One hand cupping the back of Bobby’s downy head, she turned and scanned the all-but-empty diner. A sinking feeling was setting in again. Tina wasn’t here. “Where’s my sister?” she asked.

Rick had a question of his own for her. “I take it that’s the baby’s mother?”

At twenty-four, Tina had turned out to be much too young to be a mother. Or at least, much too immature. But, for better or for worse, Tina was still Bobby’s mother.

“Yes.”

Rick nodded, leaning back against the counter. “I was hoping you could tell me where she was.”

Damn.

Olivia focused on the small-town sheriff for the first time, her eyebrows drawing together as she did a quick assessment of the man, a skill she found useful in the context of her present vocation. She could tell if a man was being sincere, or if he was lying. The only time her ability seemed to fail her was when it came to Tina. But maybe that was because the thought of her sister lying to her, after all that they’d been through, was particularly hurtful.

She wanted to believe that Tina was better than that. Wanted to, but really couldn’t. Not any longer. Not after the disappearing act she’d pulled.

“Sheriff, I’ve been trying to find Tina and the lowlife who forced her to run off with him for the last forty-eight hours. All I know is that she should be somewhere around here.”

As she spoke, Olivia became aware that the matronly looking woman behind the counter, who was quite blatantly listening intently to every word, had placed a cup of coffee and a powdered bun on a small plate practically directly in front of her.

Olivia raised her eyes to the woman’s, an unspoken question in them.

The woman was quick to smile. “Thought you might need that right about now, honey,” the older woman said. “You look like you’re running on empty.”

Admitting a weakness, or even that she was human, was not something Olivia did readily, even to someone she’d never see again. But she had been turned so inside out these past few days, what with one thing and another, that the protest that quickly rose to her lips turned into a simple “Thank you.”

The next moment, giving in to her tightening stomach, she look a long sip of the inky coffee. And felt human again. Almost.

Watching, Miss Joan slanted a quick look toward Rick and then chuckled, pleased that, once again, her intuition had been right.

“I was gonna ask if you wanted cream and sugar with that, but I guess not.”

“Better?” Rick asked the baby’s aunt when she came up for air and set down the cup.

Olivia nodded. “Better.” Her eyes shifted toward the woman behind the counter. “How much do I owe you?” she asked, setting her purse on the counter and attempting to angle into it with one hand while still holding Bobby.