No Strings Attached

“I should be back before she wakes up, but in case I’m not, there are bottles of formula right next to the crib. No need to heat them up—she takes her bottle at room temperature. Just pop the nipple and you’re good to go.”

“Sounds easy enough,” Samantha said with a lot more confidence than she felt. She hadn’t spent a lot of time around babies. Most of the kids she’d previously babysat had been a lot older and didn’t poop their pants.

“I’m using Pampers on Melissa,” Mary said, as if reading Samantha’s mind.

“We’ll be fine. Now go and enjoy the fresh air, window shop, have an ice-cream sundae. Relax.”

Mary exited the room with a huge smile on her face, and Samantha tiptoed out of the nursery and headed for the living room, where she’d left her work in progress. Settling onto the sofa, she had just picked up her pen when she heard the first wail through the baby monitor.

Fear and uncertainty filled her momentarily, but she figured she was a lot bigger and smarter than a one-month-old baby. How hard could it be to comfort a screaming infant, anyway?

Turns out, very.

Upon entering the nursery, she made a face at the unpleasant odor that assailed her and knew immediately that Melissa had made a doodle in her diaper. Samantha could have called it shit, but doodle sounded much nicer for an infant.

Picking the baby up, she set out to change the offending diaper while trying to hold her nose closed. But that was easier said than done. Melissa’s tiny legs were flailing as she removed the Pamper. Shit flew everywhere, including in Samantha’s hair.

“Quit being gross, Melissa. I’m new at this so give me a break, okay?” The baby stared back at her intently for a moment, giving the illusion that she had actually listened, but then began squirming again. So much for reason.

Grabbing a handful of baby wipes, Samantha cleaned the mess out of her hair, and then went to work on Melissa. After changing her diaper, she put the baby into an adorable pink stretchy thing called a onesie, and then carried her to the rocking chair situated beneath the window.

Nestling her nose in the baby’s downy hair, Samantha inhaled. Melissa smelled wonderful, like spring blossoms and sweet chocolate cake, all rolled into one. For some reason, babies always smelled good…well, when they were doodle-free, that is. Like new cars, the smell only lasted for a brief time, but it was so distinctive that you never really forgot it.

The baby stared wide-eyed at Samantha, taking her measure, she supposed. Samantha smiled and cooed, and as she held the baby in her arms the strangest thing happened—her heart actually felt so full she thought it might burst.

Samantha had always been so dead-set against marriage that she hadn’t given a great deal of thought to what not getting married would mean. She’d never have a child. She’d never change a poopy diaper or hug a sweet-smelling baby to her breast, and she would never know the joy and pain of childbirth, of experiencing one of God’s greatest gifts.

Then again, she didn’t have to be married to have a baby. She wasn’t saying she would, but if she really wanted a baby, she could have one on her own.

It was an intriguing possibility.

AN HOUR LATER, the baby was finally asleep. But no sooner had Samantha sat down with her work again than a soft knock sounded on the door.

It couldn’t be Mary; the woman had a key. She peered through the peephole to find Jack staring back at her.

“Hi!” he said when she opened the door. “I found your note.” He held it up.

“Ssh! I just got Melissa to sleep.”

He arched a brow. “I’m impressed. I didn’t think you knew much about babies.”

“It’s instinctive for a woman,” she told him loftily, though she had no idea if that were really true. It sounded good though. “Would you like to see her? She’s quite adorable.”

He shrugged, not looking at all comfortable with the idea. “I really just came by to see if you’d picked up the cleaning. I can’t find my new blue shirt.”

“It’s hanging in my closet. I didn’t have time to sort everything out before Mary called. Come on,” she urged. “Come see Melissa.”

“Oh. Well, I guess I can take a quick peek at her.”

They stood side by side in the darkened room, gazing into the crib. Jack had an expression of awe on his face.

“Melissa’s perfect, isn’t she?” Samantha asked.

“She’s so small,” he whispered.

“I know.”

Their hands met on the crib rail, and Jack looked over at her with an expression she’d never seen before. Her palms started to sweat and she pulled her hands to her sides. “Makes you wonder, doesn’t it?” he asked.

“Wonder?”

“What we might be missing by—”

“Oh there you are!” Mary said, entering the nursery and cutting off whatever else Jack was about to say, much to Samantha’s dismay.

But she’d heard enough to start her wondering.

SAMANTHA COULDN’T STOP thinking about babies. Everywhere she went, it seemed parents were hauling their young children around or nannies were pushing baby carriages in the park.

And the more she saw, the more she thought, and the more she thought, the more she yearned.

She wanted a baby. She wanted to have a child of her own. She supposed deep down she always had.

From childhood, girls were raised to be mothers. It was the expected course to take. But that course typically included marriage, and so she’d decided to detour and take a different route.

But suddenly her biological clock was ticking like a time bomb. Samantha wanted to have a baby before she got too old to conceive, with or without the benefit of marriage.

In this advanced day and age a woman didn’t need to rely on a man to conceive—only his sperm. It would have been nice to get pregnant the old-fashioned way, to experience the event with someone she cared about, not some stranger who’d made a donation to a sperm bank, but beggars couldn’t be choosers and she had no daddy candidates on the horizon.

Women of today enhanced their breasts through implants, held back the clock with plastic surgery and achieved orgasms through battery-operated devices, so it wasn’t unnatural or unacceptable to conceive a baby by artificial means. Millions of women had done so successfully, and so could she. Besides, lots of good things came frozen: ice cream, waffles, diet dinners. So why not sperm?

“I’M GOING TO HAVE A BABY!”

Patty Bradshaw’s jaw dropped so low it almost landed in her Cobb salad. “You’re not serious! Who’s the father? I didn’t know you were seeing anyone. And why the hell weren’t you using protection? Do you have a death wish? Did you skip Sex 101 in high school?” She stared at Samantha as if she’d lost her mind.

As Patty fired questions at her with the rapidity of a Gatling gun, Samantha just smiled. Patty was a lawyer, a borderline feminist and a damn good friend.

The two had met shortly after Samantha’s arrival in New York City. She’d been coming out of Bloomingdale’s after an interview that had gone nowhere, while Patty had been on her way in, to buy fabulous clothing, no doubt.

Colliding in one of those purses-flying incidents that had them howling in laughter, they had hit it off immediately and been best girlfriends ever since—probably because Patty had as many opinions as Samantha did, and never hesitated to voice them. But she was a whole lot tougher than Samantha, owing to the fact that she had to compete in the legal profession with ego-driven males, who viewed the attractive woman as little more than a sex object. But then, men often thought with their dicks, not their brains.

With deep auburn hair, pretty green eyes and a killer body, Counselor Patricia Bradshaw was hot and knew it. In fact, Patty played on that image. She hadn’t met too many men in her thirty-four years that she didn’t want to try on for size, and fortunately for her, most of them fit. But Patty was also a damn good attorney who’d won the majority of her cases and was considered an ace in her field of employment law.

“Okay, I didn’t say that right. What I meant to say is, I want to have a baby. It’s all I’ve been thinking about lately.” Obsessing would probably have been a more accurate term.

Patty gulped her wine, poured herself another glass and then looked Samantha straight in the eye. “Are you crazy? Have you lost whatever sense you were born with? A child will tie you down, destroy your life as you know it, not to mention that you’re not married. Not that that’s a requirement these days, but it sure as hell makes things easier.”

“Well, I can’t help that. I want to have a baby, and I’m not going to change my mind. I’m thirty-one. My time is running out. If I don’t do this now, it’ll be too late.”