Dad By Choice

The policeman answered for her. “She doesn’t know her name.”

Daisy’s eyebrows puckered closer together over a remarkably thin nose. She lowered her voice. “Something wrong with her?”

Rick shrugged, the helpless feeling growing. The young woman he’d found turned to look at him without saying a word. She’d been quiet all the way over here. Quiet on the way to the police station, as well. He supposed losing her memory didn’t leave her with a whole lot to say.

“There’s a bump on her forehead, just where her hair falls over it.” He nodded vaguely in her general direction. “Maybe that did it.” He sucked air in through his teeth. “She says she can’t remember anything.”

“I can’t,” she said softly.

Daisy believed her. The young woman looked as if the sound of her own voice surprised her. Daisy had never had any children of her own. Everyone who passed through the doors of Serenity Shelter was her child. Compassion filled her as she slipped a wide arm around the young woman’s small shoulders.

“Don’t you worry none—it’ll come back to you. But for now, you need a name.” Cocking her head, Daisy looked at her, trying to see beyond the bruises. Trying not to judge whoever had given them to her. That wasn’t her job. “You look a little like my niece, Sara. How about I call you Sara? Would that be all right with you?”

Newly christened Sara nodded her consent.

That settled, there was more. “Has she been seen by a doctor?”

Rick shook his head. “When I checked her for priors and came up empty, I was going to send her to the clinic.” He hesitated. This went beyond duty, but sometimes you had to. “But I thought, in view of the circumstances, maybe you’d want to take her there yourself.”

Daisy snorted. “Checked her for priors, indeed. A sweet-faced little thing like this? Anyone with eyes can see how innocent she is.” And then she nodded. “Yeah, I guess I’ve got time to take her to the clinic. In between my pedicure and my massage.” The sound emitting from her lips was more of a crackle than a chuckle. “Let’s get you checked out, honey, and then we’ll see where we can fit you in.”

Nowhere, Sara thought. I fit in nowhere. She looked at them. They meant well, these people, but they had no idea how it felt to have nothing to think about, nothing to remember.

Daisy reached for her purse in the bottom drawer of her desk, then paused. She saw the look in Sara’s eyes. “It’ll come back to you. Whatever brought you here, it’ll come back.” She nodded at Rick, who then took his leave. “You don’t know how lucky you are, not remembering. Some of the stories I could tell you…”

Sara didn’t feel very lucky. The only feeling she had was a vague sense that something was missing. Something vital. Because there was nothing else, she clung to that as she allowed herself to be ushered out into a world she didn’t recognize.

DRAINED, ABBY DROPPED into her chair. The last patient had finally left several minutes ago. She heard the front door close, telling her that Lisa was hurrying home to her twin boys. They’d packed a lot of work into one day. It was 6:19, and they had seen their full load, plus two unexpected patients who’d pleaded emergencies in order to see her. And Mrs. Calvert had had her triplets two weeks early, to add to the excitement of the day.

Abby wondered if it was poor form just to curl up on one of her examination tables and go to sleep.

“You’re not getting enough vitamins, Abby-girl,” she murmured to herself, trying to summon enough strength to get back on her feet again.

She needn’t have bothered. At 6:20, the telephone rang. The flashing red light told her it was coming in on her personal line. Abby pulled the last remaining pin from her hair, and it came tumbling down her back as she reached for the receiver. At least it wouldn’t be a prospective father calling her to frantically proclaim, “It’s time.” Given her druthers, she really didn’t want to have to face another woman in the throes of labor tonight.

Taking a deep breath, she brought the receiver to her ear. “Abby.”

“Abby, it’s Mother. Put on that little television set you have in your office and turn to channel eight.”

Her mother rarely called her at work, and when she did, it wasn’t to tell her to watch something on television. This wasn’t going to be good.

Opening her side drawer to retrieve the remote control, Abby braced herself. “I take it by your tone, I’m not about to be entertained.” She aimed the remote at the set and pressed the power button.

“Only if your sense of humor has suddenly turned bizarre.”

From the sound of it, her mother was struggling to keep a tight rein on her emotions. Concern took a firmer hold on Abby.

The color on the set came into focus. Flipping quickly, she found Channel 8 and the program that had prompted her mother to call her.

“Son of a gun.”

There, smiling up into the camera, was Chelsea Markum—the reporter Abby had taken the baby from this morning. Along the bottom of the screen scrolled the teaser: “Which of the Maitland Men Sired This Baby?” Beside the reporter was a fuzzy photograph of the baby, obviously lifted and freeze-framed from the video taken earlier.

Stifling an exasperated sigh, Abby leaned forward and turned up the sound.

“…Just as the Maitlands’ PR department released word of a silver anniversary party in the works to celebrate the clinic’s twenty-five years of service, we finally learn that there are skeletons in the very proper Maitland closet, after all. No matter how well respected the family, they obviously have something to hide. Something they’re not proud of. So the question still remains—”

Annoyed, Abby turned off the television set. “Ignore it, Mother.”

Her mother’s voice was calmly logical. “How do I ignore the baby?”

The tension headache that had been building all day now threatened to take Abby’s head off. She pressed her fingers to both temples and massaged, knowing it wouldn’t help. “Good point.”

“I’m calling a family conference tonight.” Megan had always been in tune with her children, so her next words came as no surprise to Abby. “If you’re too tired…”

She was, but she also knew that she had to be there. This was serious and it affected them all. Abby pushed away from the desk. “No, I’ll be there.” With effort, she tried to sound brighter. “I just saw my last patient a few minutes ago and I’m free for the evening. I can be at the house in about twenty minutes.”

“I appreciate it.”

Abby could hear the relief in her mother’s voice. “See you.”

She hung up, then suddenly remembered that despite what she’d said to her mother, she wasn’t free. Marcie McDermott’s brother was coming to try to browbeat her into doing heaven only knew what.

“Not tonight, McDermott,” she murmured.

But as she reached for the telephone, Abby realized that she had no idea what his number was. He’d failed to give her his card. Probably to avoid having the appointment called off, she thought, getting to her feet.

Maybe the number was in Marcie’s file. Lisa had been too busy today to take care of the filing. That meant the files were still stacked on the side of her desk in the order the patients had been seen. Marcie’s would be on the bottom.

As she went into the outer office, now dim and eerily still after all the life that had crossed its floors today, a knock on the door startled Abby.

Crossing to it, she saw the outline of someone tall and broad-shouldered through the frosted glass.

McDermott.

“Speak of the devil,” she murmured to herself.

CHAPTER THREE

SHE LOOKED HARRIED, Kyle thought, when Abby opened the door to admit him. And her eyes looked tired. The kind of tired that came from juggling too many balls at the same time.

He’d seen the same look staring back at him from the mirror.

Would that work to his benefit or not? Would she give in quickly because she was tired, or would it make her irritable and resistant? He was hoping for the former. The argument he’d had with Marcie on the way home nearly nine hours ago was still fresh in his mind. That about filled his quota for the day. Lately, all Marcie did was argue with him, if she spoke to him at all.

He noticed that Abby wasn’t moving aside to let him enter. Behind her, the office was in semidarkness.

“I’m early,” he told her.