Or rejected.
Like her mother.
Across the room the people he was meeting came through the doors. Marcy saw him first and touched Dave’s shoulder, gesturing in Nick’s direction. He watched as his former partner maneuvered his way between tables and up a short ramp that led to an elevated tier of seating. He didn’t notice that, behind Dave, Marcy was pushing a stroller until they were only a few feet away, and the realization made his welcoming smile fade. When he’d called this morning to suggest that they meet for lunch, Marcy had said she would let the baby go home with her parents after church so the meal could be just the adults. Apparently her plans had fallen through.
This was just what he needed.
The hostess removed the chair on Nick’s left, and Dave expertly wheeled his chair into the space. In the last year, since he’d gotten shot on a case gone south, he’d gotten pretty good at relying on wheels instead of his own unmoving legs. “You’re back early,” he said in greeting. “You didn’t skip out on the wedding, did you?”
“Just part of the reception.”
“Too much family?”
“You could say that.” Reluctantly he turned his attention to the other arrivals. Marcy was freeing the baby from the stroller and transferring her to the high chair the hostess had brought. Marcy fussed over her, talking in a silly, high-pitched voice, kissing her on the forehead, teasing her, but the kid looked unimpressed and more than a little cranky. “Marcy.”
She flashed him a smile. “Hey, Nick. Look, sweetie, it’s Uncle Nick. You remember him. He’s the one who doesn’t like kids, so you’ll have to be on your best behavior, okay?” Finally settling into her own chair, she gave a sigh. “Wouldn’t you know, the one Sunday I needed Mom and Dad to baby-sit, and they’d already made other plans. But she’ll be all right. She’ll eat a little, then probably take a nap.”
The one who doesn’t like kids. He hadn’t realized his feelings on the subject were so well-known—and misunderstood. It wasn’t that he didn’t like kids. He liked them fine. He just liked for them to go home with someone else at the end of the day. He liked for them to be someone else’s responsibitity. He wouldn’t have any problem at all with Amelia Rose if she were someone else’s kid.
But she wasn’t, and neither she nor Faith—through no actions of their own but by merely existing — were ever going to let him forget it.
“So tell us about the wedding.”
Nick shifted his attention back to Dave. “It was a typical wedding.”
His friend hooted at that. “Don’t forget, I’ve met your family. Maybe it was a typical Russo wedding, but that’s a whole world removed from your average ceremony. How many were there?”
“As many as would fit into the church and then some.”
“All the out-of-town relatives?”
“Enough to fill this restaurant if they ate Mexican, which they would never do when there are plenty of good Italian places around.” Beside Nick, the baby—Emily, too close a reminder to Amelia—made a fussy demand, which her mother stifled by sticking a bottle in her mouth. He watched her a moment before slowly forcing his attention to the question Marcy was asking.
“How does it feel to be the last single person in your family?” she teased. “To know that your kid brother and all six of your younger sisters are married while you still rattle around all alone in your empty little condo?”
“I like my empty little condo,” he replied, and it was true. But he had to admit that he could understand the preference so many people felt for houses. Especially big houses, with plenty of room, a nice yard, a great veranda for enjoying good weather and... He frowned.
“Now that you’re the only one left, your parents are going to devote themselves to finding you a mate,” Marcy mussed.
“I’m perfectly capable of finding my own women. I’ve been doing it since I was fifteen.”
“We’ve noticed. We thought by now you would’ve settled on one in particular,” Dave said. “Suitable women aren’t that hard to find, Nick.”
Faith was suitabte—too suitable for a man like him. She needed someone more like his brother. Michael prized the same things she did—family and friends, work, small-town life and small-town values, church on Sunday, quiet evenings, building a future.
And which of those things did he not value? His family and friends were the most important part of his life. He gave a hundred and ten percent to his job. He believed in—and practiced—honor, loyalty, decency and all those other old-fashioned values. He liked quiet evenings, and he certainly intended to have a future of some sort. It had been years since he’d been in church for anything other than a wedding, a christening or a funeral, but he still believed the teachings he’d learned there.
But none of those things made him a good candidate for the husband in Faith’s life—which didn’t matter anyway, since he already was the father in Amelia Rose’s life.
They ordered dinner and talked about nothing in particular through the meal. After all the serious conversations of the past few days, it felt good to speak of nothing important. But the feeling faded when Marcy slung the diaper bag over one shoulder, balanced Emily on her hip and left for a major cleanup in the ladies’ room. That was Dave’s cue to ask quietly, “What’s the problem?”
Nick avoided meeting his gaze. “Who said I have a problem?”
“Like I need to be told? I worked with you for more than ten years. I know you as well as I know Marcy. What’s up?”
Nick looked around the dining room. Ordinarily he could look at a crowded room like this and barely notice anyone under four foot ten. Today every little kid in the place grabbed his attention. They were everywhere, so much a part of everyone’s life except his. That was the way he wanted it...didn’t he?
“Nick?”
Finally he faced Dave. “When Marcy got pregnant, what did you think?”
“That she was an idiot. That I was an idiot. I knew she wanted to get pregnant, but I’d said no. I didn’t want kids, not like this.” He gestured to the wheelchair. “I didn’t want to be responsible for anyone else. I couldn’t even take care of myself. I wasn’t used to the chair yet. I didn’t know how to get by. I wasn’t even sure at the time that I wanted to live, and she was talking about having a baby. I said no. No way. And she got pregnant anyway.”
None of that was really news to Nick, although they had never actually discussed it. He remembered Dave’s anger over the bullet that had robbed him of the use of his legs and his resentment over the fact that Nick had stopped the man who’d shot him even as the bastard prepared to finish the job. He would have been better off dead, Dave had argued. He was of no use to anyone. He was a burden to Marcy—she deserved a whole man. He had been convinced that their three-year marriage couldn’t survive the trauma, and for a time Nick had been convinced that their ten-year friendship wouldn’t survive it, either. That was part of what had made him so determined to bring down the Sanchez brothers. Diego Sanchez had shot Dave, but Emilio had ordered it. Nick had spent nearly a year proving it, much of that time undercover with Phoebe masquerading as his wife. In another month or so, he would put in a little more time as the star witness against the Sanchezes, and then it would all be done with. With a little luck, more of the bad guys would be off the street and Dave would have some little bit of justice.
“When she told me she was pregnant,” Dave went on, “I demanded that she have an abortion, but—you know Marcy.”
He certainly did. Forget that Nick had stopped Diego from delivering the fatal shot or that the finest doctors at Houston’s best trauma center had used their considerable skill to bring Dave back from the brink of death. It was Marcy who had saved him. With her love, determination and refusal to consider any other alternative, she had dragged him kicking and screaming back to life.
“We split up over it,” Dave admitted. At Nick’s startled look, he grinned sheepishly. “I never told anyone about it. She moved in with her folks for a week or so. S
he said that if I was going to be a part of her life, then I was also going to be a part of the baby’s life. I finally gave in and said I wanted the baby, but it was a lie. I didn’t. I kept hoping that it would turn out to be a mistake, that the pregnancy test was a false positive.”
“When did you change your mind?” Nick asked, certain that he had. It was clear that Dave doted on Emily. He was as devoted to her as any father could be.
“Not until after Emily was born. They came home from the hospital on the second day, and Marcy was exhausted. She went to bed and left me to take care of this baby that I’d never wanted and didn’t know what to do with. Well, Emily began to cry, and I didn’t want her disturbing Marcy, so I went into her room and picked her up, and she stopped. Just like that.” He gave a bemused shake of his head. “She snuggled in my arms, wrapped her hand around my finger and went to sleep, just as if she belonged there. Just as if she knew she would be safe there.” He gave an embarrassed laugh. “It sounds corny, I know, but that’s when it happened.”
It did sound corny, Nick agreed—and believable, scary and reassuring. Maybe he wasn’t so different from his father and the rest of his family, after all. Maybe, like Dave, actually holding Amelia Rose would make all the difference. Maybe he had the same paternal instincts as everyone else, but they just hadn’t been awakened yet.
Maybe he could come to see her as more than a problem, much more than a duty. Maybe he could be as good a father to her as his own father had been to him. Maybe he could learn to appreciate the changes she would require in his life.
If he could convince Faith to give him a chance.
“What interest does a confirmed bachelor have in babies?”
Nick considered his answer. He could brush off the question with some remark about his sisters and their kids. He could simply say, “I don’t want to talk about it,” and Dave would accept that. Or he could tell the truth. Some part of him really wanted to, wanted the easing of conscience that came with confession. He wanted his old friend’s opinion and advice—even though he knew what it would be. Don’t think about it, Dave would say. Don’t debate it. Just do what you believe is right, what you feel is right.
It was one circumstance in which what he thought was right and what he believed and felt was right were the same things. Taking responsibility for his actions was right. Being a father to his daughter was right. Giving her his name, protecting her from cruel gossip, being a part of her life—those were all right.
He and Faith might have gone about this all wrong. They might have skipped a few vital steps in the friendship-courtship-marriage-babies process, but it was never too late to make it right. It was never too late to give Amelia Rose the absolute best circumstances to grow up under.
He wasn’t sure exactly what those circumstances would be. Ideally, she would be a part of a family, with a mother and father, three happy people, but that seemed a bit much to ask at this late date. Maybe just having both parents around—not married, not living as a family, but friends for the sake of their child—was the best she could hope for. However he and Faith resolved the issue, it meant one definite change for him: he had to move to New Hope. He couldn’t be much of a father from three hundred miles away.
“So who’s the mother?”
He looked sharply at Dave, who shrugged. “You have this troubled look. You’re asking how I felt about becoming a father when I didn’t want kids. You’ve never tried to hide the fact over the last twelve years that you don’t want kids. It doesn’t take a good cop—though I happen to have been one of the best—to figure it out. Who is she?”
“A woman I met in New Hope when I went home for Michael’s engagement party.”
“Jeez, Nick, you were only there—what, eight hours? She must be something.”
Mentally comparing the women he’d dated here in Houston and Faith, he smiled thinly. She was as different from them as day from night. She was everything he’d always avoided, everything he didn’t want in a woman—and he had no doubt that Dave would like her better than all the others rolled up in one.
“I assume you found out this weekend.”
“The day I got home.”
“Why didn’t she tell you sooner?”
“She’d heard from someone in the family that I’d gotten married. No one ever told her that it was just part of the job.”
“What’s her name?”
“Faith.”
Dave repeated the name softly, then chuckled. “I’m having trouble envisioning this. I can see you with someone named Barbi. Andi. Brandi. But I can’t imagine you with a woman named Faith. What is she like?”
“She’s... nice.”
“Well, that’s something new.” He welcomed Marcy and Emily back to the table with a smile. “Honey, would you ever in your wildest dreams describe any of the women Nick’s dated as ‘nice’?”
She laughed as she settled in her seat, then cradled Emily in her lap. “Yeah, right,” she said dryly. “Flashy, maybe. Fluffy. Brain-dead on occasion. About the best I can say for them is that they’re all gorgeous and they all have long legs and big boobs.”
So he liked a certain kind of woman. Blame it on Mary Kate Thomas. He’d been young and impressionable when he’d fallen for her. But Faith didn’t fit the type. She was pretty, but not gorgeous. She was of average height with average legs, and the only reason her breasts were heavy now was because of her pregnancy. She was far from flashy and fluffy and was probably smarter than he’d ever hoped to be. And she was nice. Sweet. Innocent.
What had attracted him to her that night? He’d met women like her before without feeling the slightest desire. Had it been the booze? Would any woman have served just as well? He didn’t think so. He’d been drunk plenty of times before, but never so drunk that he’d awakened the day after not knowing what he’d done, never so drunk that he’d seduced a total stranger who was the complete opposite of the women he preferred. So what was it? What mystery had compelled them both to do something so out of character?
“Has Nick met a new woman who’s actually nice?” Marcy asked as she stroked her hand lightly over Emily’s blond curls. The soothing touch made the baby yawn, made her eyes flutter shut.
Dave remained silent, leaving it to Nick to answer as he chose. “I meet lots of women,” he said with a casual air.
“It’s those dark eyes,” she informed him. “They get to women every time.”
“And here I thought it was my sparkling personality,” he said drily. He didn’t believe Faith had been seduced by a pair of dark eyes. It must have taken a hell of a lot more than that to persuade her to forget Lydia’s teachings, to discard common sense and years of strict living and fall into bed with him. He would give almost anything to know what it was. What had tempted her? What had convinced her to take such risks with a stranger, especially with a stranger like him?
“Are you serious about this nice woman?” Marcy asked. “When do we get to meet her?”
“She doesn’t live here.” As for a meeting, well, that depended on Faith. On whatever decision they arrived at regarding their roles in Amelia Rose’s life. On whether she was really serious about wanting nothing from him for either of them and, if so, whether he could persuade her otherwise. He was pretty sure he could. Hell, he had seduced her, hadn’t he? He had somehow convinced her to give up her status for just one night as New Hope’s resident saint and indulge in a few hours of passion. He could convince her to do what was right for the baby.
And if that failed, there were always legal remedies. No matter how much she wished it were so, she couldn’t decide what, if any, contact he had with his daughter. The law gave him rights that she couldn’t take away. He would hate to go that route, would hate like hell to force her into court, to air their disagreements publicly, but even the mere mention of it, he suspected, would convince her to be reasonable.
Marcy looked surprised. “You’re going to end up marrying some woman back home in that dreary little town, aren’t you?
”
“New Hope’s not so bad,” Dave said. “It’s the kind of town, Marce, that’s so quiet and peaceful that people die of boredom. You know, somebody gets bored and kills ’em.”
Nick gave his ex-partner a sardonic look. “It’s not a bad place. Rush hour lasts about fifteen minutes. You can breathe the air without worrying what it’s doing to your lungs. The cost of living is manageable. Everyone knows and looks out for everyone else. There isn’t any crime of the sort that would make a cop wonder if someone’s going to —” With another glance at Dave, he broke off, looking guiltily down at the table.
There was a moment of silence, then Dave broke it. “Shoot him,” he finished. His tone was even and normal. “You’re right. It’s sounding better every minute. So answer the woman, partner. You planning to leave here and go back home?”
For a moment Nick didn’t reply. The decision, made sometime over the last few days but recognized only now, was still too new, too strange, too old-fashioned. He didn’t have to live in the same town to be a good father to his daughter. And what about his job? Was he really ready to give it up, to throw away all that he’d worked for the past twelve years and start over again? He might not even be able to get another job in law enforcement. He might wind up washing dishes in the kitchen at Antonio’s. And the condo. He had a lot of money tied up in it. With the real estate market so unpredictable, it might sell the first day it was listed, or it might not sell for a year or more.
And the biggest obstacle of all: Faith. She wouldn’t be pleased to find him back on her doorstep. Even though he had asked her—had damned near begged her—to call him if she needed him, he was willing to bet that hell would freeze over before he’d hear her voice on his phone. What if he gave up everything here and went back only to be shut out by her? Wouldn’t it be easier to be a father in Houston without a daughter close by than to be living in the same town and be kept away from her?
Discovered: Daddy Page 13
