Drive-By Daddy: Drive-By Daddy / Calamity Jo

“No. I don’t care how.”

“You do, too.”

Silence followed. Darcy stared at her mother. Her mother stared at her. Darcy caved. “All right. How?”

Margie smiled triumphantly. “By some of the things he left behind.”

Darcy flopped the clipboard onto her bed and folded her hands together in her lap. “Like what?”

“Like that Indian blanket. And a matchbook with the name of a fancy Phoenix hotel on it. I forget which one just now. And a pocketknife with engraved initials. T.H.E. His initials, don’t you think? Anyway, those things were all tangled up in the blanket’s folds. And I have them.”

Darcy remembered the knife and the matchbook. But his initials were THE? The what? Tom? Terry? Ty? Her interest quickened…before she remembered she wasn’t interested. But it was too late. Her mother had noticed. Great. “What about them?” she was forced to ask, even as she tried hard, and failed, to sound as if she couldn’t care less.

“Johnny Smith. That’s what about them.”

A sick feeling came over Darcy. She gripped her covering sheet in her hands. “Not Johnny. Mother, what are you thinking of doing? Don’t do it. I swear—”

“Not in front of me you won’t.” With that, Margie Alcott stood up and collected her lunch leavings. “Now you rest easy, honey. They’ll be bringing Montana in to you in a minute, I believe. And I’ve got to get back to work. That sweet little old lady, Mrs. Hintzel, is back in the hospital. I think she’s just lonely. But I swear, that tiny stick of a woman—you know she’s 87?—well, she just plain worries if I don’t come around. So I’ll go check on her first and then—”

“Don’t practice medicine, Mother. You know how the doctors get. You’re supposed to be volunteering in the admissions office. Not making patient rounds.”

Her 70-year-old mother pursed her lips. “I know what my job is, Darcy. But it doesn’t hurt a thing if I visit those poor old people. I can’t imagine why that young Dr. Graves can’t figure out Mrs. Hintzel has something wrong with her uterus. Must be inexperience.”

Darcy sighed out her breath. “Or the fact that Mrs. Hintzel had a hysterectomy thirty years ago. You told me that the last time she was admitted.”

Margie Alcott frowned. “I see your hormones are making you testy again. I’m going to go check on Mrs. Hintzel. And then I’m going to call Johnny Smith.”

Darcy’s mouth dried. Johnny Smith, bachelor son of bridge-playing Freda Smith, was also one of the small town’s few policeman. The man looked like a bloodhound. But if anyone could track down a Montana cowboy…with no more information than what her mother had to give him…it would be Johnny Smith.

This was not good. For her. Or for T.H.E. Lone Ranger.

MEANWHILE, BACK AT The Ranch, an upscale hotel in Phoenix, Tom Harrison Elliott was back in his room after the morning’s meeting with the land brokers who were interested in his grandfather’s plot of land here. Quickly changing clothes, Tom picked up his white Stetson, settled it low on his brow, headed for the door…and called himself a fool in love.

He stopped…as if he’d smacked into an invisible brick wall…and just stood there, staring into space as the realization washed over him. He was in love. Instantly. This was the way it happened in his family. Every one of them. One day you’re just walking down the street, minding your own business, when you see that special someone and…bam, right between the eyes. In love. First-sight love. And here he’d thought the rest of his family was crazy. He’d teased his sister and cousins mercilessly about succumbing to—and believing in—the old family tradition. And now, here he was…succumbing. To two women. Well, a woman and her baby girl. Head-over-heels in love with both of them…since the moment he’d taken Darcy in his arms to lift her out of her car, and when he’d first held the baby girl in his arms.

Tom made a face. Lordy, he’d never hear the end of this once he got home. Well, he’d never hear the end of it, if there was something to report. He supposed he ought to check on the beautiful woman he knew only as Darcy to see if she’d felt anything, too. But maybe not today. After all, she’d had a baby yesterday. Might not be in a mood to think about love right now, given the wriggling consequences that she could now hold in her arms.

Take it slow, Tom, he warned himself. One bright and shiny in-love day at a time. Give the lady some time. Speaking of which, it was time to go. Snapping out of his reverie, Tom turned around, checking his room, then himself. He had everything he needed. Tom still couldn’t believe he was doing this. He never did this. But then again, he’d never been in love before.

He’d bought flowers. A huge bunch of flowers. Pink roses, to be exact, along with something else the kindly white-haired lady in the lobby’s flower shop had dubbed a beautiful baby spray. Looked like a bunch of different colored flowers in a tub-sized ceramic baby cradle, if you asked him. Pink and blue and silver balloons with streamers sprouting from all angles out of the danged thing.

But the nice lady had said it was appropriate and, since what he knew about flowers wouldn’t fill a boot heel, Tom had trusted her. Signing the cards was another matter. After much thought, he signed, Congratulations on your new daughter. Tom Harrison Elliott. On the other one, in a moment of whimsy he now regretted—since he didn’t have another card and the flower shop was closed—he’d written Glad to have been at your coming out party, baby girl. He’d signed it The Lone Ranger and Silver.

Now, that was about the dumbest thing he’d ever done. Next to buying the flowers, and getting ready to make the trip back to Buckeye to see mother and daughter. And, yes, most likely…father. Because even though one hadn’t been in evidence yesterday, there had to be a father somewhere. And with Tom’s luck, the man was also Darcy’s husband.

Tom wasn’t reassured by her lack of an engagement or wedding ring. Hell, a lot of pregnant women didn’t wear them. Their fingers swelled, was his understanding. At least that’s what Sam said. And his older sister ought to know. She and Luke had given him two nieces and three nephews—so far. At 37, Samantha was pregnant again.

Tom shook his head as he plucked up the flowers and put the two cards in his shirt pocket. Then he crossed the room in long-legged strides more suited to raising Montana dust and tried to convince himself that a return visit to the maternity ward in Buckeye, despite his true feelings—feelings he had no intention of acting on…today—was nothing more than a polite call. After all, with Sam and Luke doing their best to populate the entire state of Montana, there was no call for him to marry and father a child.

Fighting the fact that he’d fallen in love…fighting because reason told him there was most likely a husband.…Tom reminded himself that he was a man who liked his space. The kind of space you find out riding the range. The kind of space where you don’t see another soul for days. Just you and your horse. And the mountains. And the big sky. He had no time for a family. Not when he had the ranch to run. It’d been that way for over a hundred years of Elliotts. With its thousands of acres and as many head of cattle every year to tend, it kept a man busy. It didn’t give him time to think about much of anything else. Like love.

Juggling the flowers in one hand, Tom wrestled the door open and waited while it swung closed behind him. Making sure it locked, he then transferred the roses to his other hand and set off toward the bank of elevators. As much as he tried not to, he couldn’t help thinking about the young woman he’d helped. He felt he knew her intimately. And he didn’t mean anything disrespectful by that. No, she’d done everything she could until he got there. He could respect that…and did.

She’d seemed an intelligent sort, too, from the little bit of talking with her he’d done. Probably a woman over his head, in terms of education. Not someone to look twice at him. But, hell, no matter how he felt about her, the odds were…given that suspected husband…he wouldn’t be here long enough to worry about that. Right now, he just wanted to see her—and her daughter—once more. To make sure they were really okay. And that was it.

No, it wasn’t. He stopped in front of the elevators and pushed the down button. And fought the fire of need that burned at his insides like a hot branding iron. He needed to leave the woman alone. He needed to take his silly Elliott love-at-first-sight heritage and get on back to Montana. If he had a lick of sense he’d do that. But he couldn’t. There was more here at stake than love. There was honor. He’d been raised to believe in the cowboy code…a life saved was a life owned. Darcy and her baby were now his responsibility in ways her husband probably wouldn’t understand.

But whether or not the man understood didn’t change anything for Tom. Because together, they…he and Darcy…had brought a new life safely into the world. And that new life was now his duty, too. Not just duty, either. The silly thing, the most surprising thing to Tom, was how proud he was of his part. How close he felt to that baby girl.

Son of a gun. If this wasn’t instant heartache, then Tom didn’t know what was. A new mother and her baby. He shook his head. He hadn’t been able to think about anything else since yesterday. How afraid and yet brave Darcy’d been. How tiny and fragile the baby’d been. Tom grinned now, thinking of this morning’s business meeting. More than once the bankers and developers had asked him if he was okay. He’d said yeah, that he was just tired. Then he’d asked them to repeat everything. And all because a dark-haired beauty had filled his thoughts and distracted him. He’d seen that she was a pretty woman, even despite her ordeal. Good bone structure. Nice, even teeth. Long legs. Clear eyes. Lots of curly, glossy hair that spoke of health.

The elevator bell finally dinged. The doors slid open. The car was empty. Tom stepped inside, managing…despite being flower-challenged…to press L for the lobby. When the doors closed and the elevator car began its quick trip down three floors, Tom suddenly realized he’d described Darcy in terms of a healthy horse. A booming laugh spilled out of him…just as the elevator reached the busy lobby and the doors opened.

All heads turned Tom’s way. He instantly sobered, clearing his throat and managing to glare as he crossed the lobby and went out into the Arizona heat…trailing pink, blue and silver balloons and streamers.

Fortunately, the ride out to Buckeye wasn’t an overly long one, once he cleared noontime Phoenix traffic. If it had been, the pink, blue and silver balloons and streamers…which kept floating over into his line of vision in the truck’s air-conditioned cab…would have found themselves ornaments for the prickly saguaro cacti that dotted the sandy landscape. And the accompanying roses would have made a ready dinner for the Gila monsters. But as it turned out, Tom, the roses, and the beautiful baby spray made it safely to the parking lot of the Buckeye Community Hospital.

So far, so good. Tom opened the white truck’s door and squinted against the heat that poured in waves over him as he scooped up the flowers from the seat.

Hitting his remote lock button and then backing out of his truck, given his floral overload, he nudged the door closed with his foot and stepped up onto the sidewalk. Glancing toward the hospital’s exterior, he thought he saw a dark-haired woman, up on the second floor, quickly duck behind a curtain. Tom grinned…and wondered if the curtains would be closed in Darcy’s room.

He walked through the hospital’s automatic front doors, took the elevator up to the second floor without asking—he just knew that’s where her room would be—and strode right up to the nurses’ station. Parting the flowers, he startled the red-headed nurse, who’d had her head bent over an open chart. “Oh, I’m sorry,” she said, laughing. “It’s not every day I see a walking flower shop wearing a cowboy hat.”

Tom grinned. “I expect not. Uhm, I’m looking for Darcy—” All he knew was her first name. “Well, I’m looking for Darcy. She had a baby girl yesterday. In the back of my truck. I brought her in.”

The nurse surged to her feet. “Ohmigod, you’re the Lone Ranger.” She looked him up and down. “I get it. The white hat. And you drive a white truck, right?”

Tom started to answer, but was distracted by the number of hospital staff pouring out of rooms and crowding around him. Murmurs of the Lone Ranger and white hat and saved Darcy Alcott and her baby and it’s him swelled around him. Tom’s eyes widened. He leaned over the counter, toward the nurse. “Yes, ma’am, I drive a white truck. Isn’t that what you asked me?”

“It sure is,” she said. “I can’t believe it, sugar. We’ve all been trying to figure out who you are.”

Tom suddenly thought he knew how a young bull felt when it was sent alone into the auction ring for everyone to gape at and paw over. “You have?” he asked, his mouth suddenly dry.

“We certainly have. Honey, you’re a hero around these parts. Just who the heck are you?”

“Tom Elliott, ma’am. From Montana. Pleased to make your acquaintance. Now, would it be all right for me to see—” What had one of them said Darcy’s last name was? Then, and blessedly, it came to him. “—Mrs. Alcott, please?”

“She went home already, mister.”

The voice came from behind him. Tom pivoted to see a pretty Hispanic girl with a thick ponytail standing there. She smiled and repeated, “Mrs. Alcott already went home. She worked until 2:00 p.m. and then left for her bridge club meeting.”

None of what this girl said made sense—even despite the corroborating nods and murmurs of the others with her. “Bridge club? She left for a bridge club meeting?” Then he focused on what else she’d said. “She worked today? But she just had a baby.”

Tom suddenly wondered if he’d stepped into the psychiatric ward. Then one of the nurses cleared things up. “Mrs. Alcott is Darcy’s mother. She’s a volunteer here. You want Darcy…Miss Alcott. Well, Professor Alcott, actually.”

Professor? Tom could only stare at her. What she’d said left more questions than answers. “I see. Well…Professor Alcott, then. May I see her, please?”

“Oh sure, honey. Will you look at me—standing here jawing when I should be working.” She picked up a form of some sort and scanned it. “Let me check the schedule. Yep. Marty—that’s the neo-natal nurse—just picked the baby up and took her back to the nursery.” She put the form down and leaned toward Tom…conspiratorially. “We’ve got to keep a close eye on that baby—she’s already got a mind of her own, as I’m sure you know.” Then she straightened up and reached for the phone. “Just let me buzz Darcy’s room and see if she wants a visitor.”