“Hi there, baby,” she murmured, taking her daughter’s hand and smiling at her. She could never leave her. She never would. “It’s okay, Tay-bug, we’re on an adventure with Mr. Gallagher.”
Taylor yawned, then pointed to the window. “Go bye-bye?”
“We went bye-bye and now we’re…at a new place. It’s Mr. Gallagher’s home…at least, his home when he was a little boy.”
There was a flash of light and Amy twisted to look back through the windshield, seeing a blur of light through the night to her right. The garage door went slowly up, then Quint was running through the beams of the headlights, and the driver’s door opened.
Quint was back in the car, with the scents of rain and night clinging to him and in the flash of interior light, Amy could see him for a fleeting moment. His hair was flattened to his head, dark and slick, and his shirt was soaking wet, clinging to his shoulders and chest like a second skin. Those eyes narrowed on her, then he shook his head, sending a spray of cool moisture into the air, some of it brushing her face. “Success,” he murmured as he raked his hair back from his face with his fingers, spiking it slightly.
“Wanna go bye-bye,” Taylor said in a small, plaintive voice from the back seat.
Quint turned, glanced back at her and smiled. “You bet, little lady,” he said as he turned and put the car in gear, swinging to the right and through the open garage door. They drove out of the fierceness of the storm.
Amy felt a sigh of relief escape her lips, and Quint turned to her. “Amen. I wasn’t sure we could make it all the way.”
He hadn’t acted as if there was any doubt that they could get here. “You said we could do it.”
He shrugged, the wet shirt tugging at his shoulders. “Should I have told you that once, when I was fourteen, my dad got caught in a flash flood so bad that he ended up ten miles away from where he should have been, with his truck on its side?”
She shivered. “I didn’t need details, but I’d appreciate a fair assessment of what’s happening.”
That brought a smile, a jarring expression that made her heart tense. “A fair assessment? Now, that’s corporate-speak, if I ever heard it. And you’re not even an executive.”
She turned from him, getting to her knees again to look over the seat at Taylor and start undoing the little girl’s safety belt in her car seat. “I just meant, I want the truth. I can deal with it.”
“The hard, cold truth, no matter what?”
She hesitated, then looked at him. “Yes, if you can manage that.”
This time he didn’t smile. His expression tightened perceptibly, and he got out of the car crossing to close the garage door. Then he came around to Taylor’s door and opened it. “I’ll take her,” he said, and Amy wished that Taylor had resisted him just scooping her up out of her chair, but she didn’t come close to resisting. She all but jumped into his arms, hugging her arm around his neck as he straightened. “Can you get the boy?”
“Sure,” she muttered as she got out.
“I’ll come back for the rest of the stuff in a bit,” Quint was saying as he walked across a garage she now realized had two other vehicles in it, a beige sedan and a black pickup truck. “Come on in through this door.”
She hurried around, unhooked the infant seat from the car and flipped up the handle so she could carry the whole thing into the house without waking the baby. By the time she came around the car, Quint and Taylor were out of sight and a door just beyond a long workbench stood open.
She carried the still-sleeping baby across to the door, and stepped into a hallway that seemed overly wide, with terra-cotta tiles on the floor and old-fashioned-looking lanterns on the plastered walls. There was silence and warmth, then the silence was broken when Quint’s voice came to her from a distance. “Turn left. First room.”
She went past two closed doors, came to another hall and glanced right at a huge, adobe-brick-lined archway with nothing but darkness beyond it. She turned left into a short hallway with two closed doors on the right and one on the left that stood open, allowing brighter light to spill out into the hallway. Suddenly Quint was there. He reached for the infant seat, taking it from her, then he stood back and let her go past him into the room.
She found herself in a room that was blue, from the deep-blue carpet underfoot, to the pastel-blue quilt on a white iron bed, the walls an even lighter blue with white shutters on windows over the bed shutting out the night. A tulip-shaded light fixture cast a warm glow over the space. Taylor was on the floor by the foot of the bed, playing with an oversize teddy bear, and barely glanced up when Amy came in.
“My sister’s old room. Mom has a way of keeping things the way they were thirty years ago.”
“You’ve got a sister?” she asked as he went around her and set the baby carrier on the bed.
“You sound shocked that there are more like me,” he said, as he straightened and started undoing the buttons on his soaked shirt. He shook the wet material away from his body.
Shocked? What truly shocked her was her instant reaction when this man did little more than move, when she saw his bare chest under the loose shirt and the dark T of hair. Shocked that she found herself wishing that the man wore an undershirt. “No…no, I didn’t mean that,” she said, thankful when Travis stirred.
“I’ve got a sister, two parents, a son and no pets.” That slight grin twitched at his mustache. “How about you?”
“I’ve got Taylor,” she said. She heard Travis whimper and crossed to the bed, carefully avoiding Quint. She reached for the infant seat, turned it toward her and said, “And Jenn.”
“Not exactly a lot,” he said.
She didn’t look up, but concentrated on the baby, on the tiny hand that peeked out from the sleeves of the sleeper, then on his eyes fluttering for a moment before the pacifier shot out of his mouth onto the bedspread.
“When I got married, the plan was to have a lot of kids, six at least, so there would be a big family for them, and they would always have someone there.” She felt the tightness in her throat and couldn’t figure out why she was telling Quint this. “It didn’t work out,” she muttered, and reached for the baby, loosening the harness, then scooping Travis up into her arms. “But this will work out. His mother will come back and he won’t be alone.”
Quint looked away from Amy holding the baby, rocking him automatically to soothe him. But it was Quint who ached at the pain in her words, for what she must have gone through. For her loss. He’d been left alone, but he hadn’t been in love. He couldn’t even begin to imagine a love such as she’d had—still had—for her dead husband.
He turned from her, murmuring, “I’ll go and get Charlie and the rest of the things out of the car,” walking out as he spoke.
He didn’t stop as he went through the house, back to the garage to get the supplies, and he tried to rationalize the jealousy that was nudging at him. Jealousy for a dead man who had been loved by Amy, and for the child they’d had from that love? He’d seen it in his parents, but he’d never appreciated it until now. Odd.
“Six kids?” he muttered as he grabbed the bags and the rat in the cage, then slammed the door and headed back inside. He was in the house, going back to his sister’s room, and it struck him. Some day Amy would meet a man who wanted six kids, who could love her the way she deserved to be loved, and she’d be okay. He wasn’t so sure about himself. He’d keep going, hang loose, go with the flow and live. But Amy would have a life, a good life.
He got to the door to the bedroom and hesitated before going back inside. Taylor was still playing with the bear he’d given her. Amy was on the bed, sitting lotus-style with Travis in her lap. She was laughing, putting his pacifier in his mouth, letting him spit it out, then putting it back in again.
“He’s got that down to a science,” Quint said as he put the bags on the floor by the bed, then placed the cage on the dresser.
“He’s a smart one,” she murmured, then looked up at Quint. “And he’s
a wet one.”
“He’s not alone in that,” Quint admitted as he picked up the diaper bag and set it on the bed by her. “How do you want to do this tonight? There’s the bed here, and I can find some pillows and linen to make a bed on the floor for Taylor so that she can be near you. But what about him?”
She laid Travis on the bed and started to take the damp sleeper off him. “He can sleep with me.”
Lucky kid, Quint thought before he caught himself. “Good, fine. How about his formula?”
She motioned to the diaper bag. “I got a lot of the pre-made formula that we had at the center, enough for a couple of days and the rest of what his mother left. If you could put them all in the refrigerator and heat one up, that would be great. And after he’s asleep, could you show me where the kitchen is so I can heat them up myself if he wants something during the night?”
“Sure,” he said, reaching into the bag to find packages of formula. “What about Taylor? Milk, juice, something to eat?”
“I have some things for her in her bag, too.”
“There’s more stuffed animals in the closet, if she wants to play with them.”
“Thanks,” Amy said as she reached for a disposable diaper.
He headed through the house to the kitchen, heated the bottle, then went back to the bedroom. Amy was sitting on the floor holding a clean, dry baby in one arm and feeding Taylor some orange concoction out of a jar with her free hand.
She looked up at him. “Great timing. This is done. Could you wipe Taylor’s face and give her a bottle out of her bag?” She dropped the spoon in the empty jar, then held it up to him and motioned with her head to the Raggedy Ann bag by the bed. “It’s in there.”
He took the empty jar and gave her the bottle he had just heated. Travis took to it eagerly. Quint rummaged with one hand in the bag and found a soft cloth and pink bottle. “This one?” he asked Amy.
She glanced at it, nodded and spoke to Taylor. “Mr. Gallagher has your bottle, love.”
The little girl looked at him, scrambled to her feet, literally running over the bear in the process of getting to Quint. “Pink baba!”
“You bet,” he said. He wiped her face then gave her the bottle. She then turned and went to Amy. She dropped down on the floor, put her head on her mother’s leg and sprawled out, totally relaxed as she drank her juice. “I didn’t think to ask, but is Taylor in diapers, too?”
“For now, she is. She’s almost trained, but with all of this going on, I’m not pushing it.”
He went closer to Amy and the babies and hunkered down to her eye level. “Okay, diapers, bottles. Is there anything else that you need for the kids?”
She shook her head. “No. They’ll both be going down soon.”
“And how about you? What do you need?”
She rested her head against the foot of the bed and sighed slightly. “I’ve got warmth. We’re dry and safe. I’d say that about covers it.”
“Lady, you’re far too easy,” he murmured.
Her dark eyes met his. “What more could I want?”
“Food? Wine? You name it.”
She smiled slightly, but there was a real shadow of weariness in the expression. “Maybe, but I’ll take a good night’s sleep instead.” She glanced down at Travis. “Although I’ve got a feeling that sleeping might not be on the agenda tonight.” She hesitated, then sat up straight. “Your phone?”
“You need to make a call?”
“No, your cell phone. Remember I put that number on the note?”
“Oh, sure. I’ll get it and bring it in here…just in case.”
“Thanks.”
He glanced at Taylor; her eyes were starting to flutter shut. Travis seemed content to eat and be cuddled. “Since you’ve got everything under control here, I’ll get the phone and see what there is to eat.” He stood, backing away from a scene of such domestic peace that it literally made him uncomfortable. It was far too endearing to him at that moment. “If you need anything, there’s some clothes of Meg’s in the closet, not much, but maybe something you can use. Although you’ll probably swim in them.” The lights flickered, then steadied. “False alarm,” he murmured. “And if the lights do go out, we’re on propane for heat, so we’ll be okay. We might be in the dark, but we’ll be warm.”
Amy watched Quint leave, the door closing softly behind him, and then it was just her and the children. She was hungry, and she was tired. Thankfully she saw that Taylor was starting to settle and Travis was already sleeping again. She put the bottle down on the floor, then pushed herself to her feet and went to the bed. She tugged the quilt back and laid the sleeping baby on the bed. He sighed, wiggled, then settled with another sigh. She framed the baby with pillows, took a throw off the footboard and spread it for Taylor.
Standing back, she stretched, easing the tightness in her shoulders and arms, then stepped out of her shoes and nudged them halfway under the bed. Turning, she crossed to an archway that opened to a vanity on one side and sliding mirrored doors on the other of a pass-through to the bathroom. She slid back one door and looked into a nearly empty closet. There were clothes, but not many. A robe of white terry cloth, some folded tops on a side shelf, jeans on another shelf, a couple of sweatshirts and a jacket on hangers and one pair of well-used boots that looked sizes too big for her on the floor.
Thank goodness she’d thought to grab the extra set of clothes she kept at the center for emergencies. But she could use the robe. She reached for it, then went into the bathroom, a large room with a deep tub, a shower stall with clear glass and a vanity along one wall under high windows. She left the door open to hear the kids and turned on the water in the shower. She tugged the bands out of her hair, loosening it from the braids, then shook it out. The shower was getting warm now, and she stripped off her clothes, laid them on the vanity, then neatly folded the Super Dude T-shirt she’d worn under her clothes. She twisted a towel around her hair to keep it as dry as she could, then stepped into the stall under the gentle spray of warmth.
She stood there for a very long time, just letting the water flow over her body, taking off the chill that the storm had brought with it. This was a far cry from what she’d thought she’d be doing tonight. And she’d never dreamed that she’d be in a shower at Quint’s family home.
She started singing “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” to distract her thoughts from Quint, but stopped when she stumbled over the reindeer’s names. She could never get them right. “Dasher and Dancer and Prancer and…Donner.” No that wasn’t it, she knew, and realized it was time to get out when she couldn’t even remember if there was a Blitzen in the group.
She turned off the water, stepped out onto the floor mat and tugged the towel off her hair to dry herself. She wiped at her skin with the softness of the terry cloth, and looked up to see herself in the mirrors. Behind her, she caught the reflection of the open door and Travis on the bed.
The baby was sleeping soundly and she could see that Taylor had turned on the floor, pulling the bear with her and hugging it to her in sleep. She tossed the towel on the vanity, then reached for the robe and slipped it on. At the same time she pulled it around her, she saw a flash behind her in the mirrors. She looked up, expecting to see Taylor up or Travis stirring.
Instead, she saw Quint behind her, near the doorway, a changed man in jeans, an unbuttoned chambray shirt and his hair combed straight back from his face, emphasizing the sharp angles of his features. Quint. Watching her. And she had no idea how long he’d been there.
She turned, tugging the belt of the robe around her waist and trying to tie it, but her fingers felt as awkward as her face felt hot from embarrassment. She was so used to having the door open, keeping that contact for Taylor available at all times, that she hadn’t even thought to close the bathroom door. And she hadn’t heard Quint come in. She prayed that he’d just walked in.
“You…you startled me,” she managed to say, going toward him, making herself not cross her arms on her brea
sts.
“Sorry. I brought you the cell phone,” he said, and held it out to her.
She looked at the phone for a long moment before she could move closer to take it from him. “Thank you,” she murmured.
“The food will be ready in five minutes. Nothing fancy. Soup, bread, wine, coffee—decaffeinated, of course. Is that okay?”
“Yes, yes, sure,” she said, relief flooding over her. He hadn’t seen a thing. He hadn’t been there watching her. She pushed the phone into the pocket of her robe. “I’ll be there in a minute,” she said, relaxing just a bit.
“Go through the archway and the kitchen is to your left.”
Quint turned, went to the door, but instead of leaving, he turned back to her for a moment and that smile was there. “Vixen,” he said.
“Pardon me?”
“You know, Dasher and Dancer and Comet and—” he paused, the smile growing just a bit “—Vixen,” he said, then left.
Chapter Ten
Amy checked the kids in passing, making sure that they were still asleep, before she hurried after Quint. As she stepped out into the hallway, rolling up the robe’s sleeves that fell well past her hands, she caught a glimpse of Quint disappearing to the left through the archway.
She was vaguely aware of the fragrance of fresh coffee brewing in the air, and the coolness of smooth tile under her bare feet, then she was in a kitchen, a huge room, probably as big as her entire apartment. There were stone walls, butcher-block counters and a massive table set in the middle of the space, but all she truly focused on was Quint.
He was standing to the left, in front of the stove, lifting the lid of a pot and allowing steam to escape into the air. “Excuse me,” she said, breathless as she stopped a few feet from him.
He cast her a slanting glance as he reached for a large wooden spoon and started stirring the contents of the pot. “Not hungry now?” he asked.
“No…yes…I’m hungry, but that’s not…” She took a deep breath and made herself get the right words. “You were in the bedroom, weren’t you?”
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