Nobody's Baby

by Jane Toombs

  “I constructed a scenario about Erin’s lover being Arabic,” she told Zed. “If he has left the States the search may be hopeless.”

  Zed shrugged. “If he is an Arab, he could just as well live in this country. Anyway, he looks like me and I’ve never been taken for an Arab—though’ I’m occasionally pegged as a Native American.”

  “But Maddamti?”

  “Boat owners choose names for all sorts of reasons and in all kinds of languages. I’ll admit I haven’t run across an Arabic name before, but I don’t really consider it unusual. There’s probably some tie-in, if we can figure out what it might be.”

  “Over dinner,’ she said, retreating to the kitchen with the pizza. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw Zed pick up the soft drink pack he’d brought and follow her.

  While she set out the salad she’d prepared, he sat on a chair, Danny on his knee, and jiggled him up and down while the boy shrieked with glee.

  When she sat down to eat, she tried to take Danny and put him in his high chair, but he scowled at her and clung to Zed. “He’s okay with me,” Zed told her.

  “You don’t have any idea what you’re letting yourself in for,” she said. “I hope you can keep him out of your pizza. Better give him one of his cookies.” She gestured toward a small plate in the middle of the table. “I warn you—what’s within his reach, he tends to grab.”

  Zed managed with surprising dexterity for someone who wasn’t accustomed to handling babies, she thought. He fended off Danny’s attempts to intercept what went into his mouth and kept baby fingers out of his plate. Not until they were almost finished did he make the fatal error of leaving his soft drink within the boy’s range. Danny lunged toward the glass, hands extended, and over it went. Toward Zed, naturally, so that the fizzy liquid drained into his lap.

  “Whoa, Tiger!” Zed exclaimed, too late. He handed the boy to her and began mopping up.

  Karen placed Danny in the high chair, dropping several of his favorite toys on the tray before coming to Zed’s assistance.

  Danny promptly threw the toys on the floor, into the sticky mess Zed was trying to wipe up. “Da!” he said imperiously.

  “If you think I’m going to pick up your toys after you dumped soda all over me and the floor you’re badly mistaken,” Zed told him. He shoved them under the high chair.

  In an effort to see where the toys had gone Danny leaned so far over the side of the chair that Karen, fearing he’d topple over, took him out and plopped him into the playpen. That didn’t suit him at all and he complained loudly.

  “Tiger sounds a tad annoyed,” Zed remarked.

  “And a touch spoiled, too, I’m afraid,” she said ruefully.

  It wasn’t until later, after she’d put Danny to bed, that she and Zed had a chance to talk. “Thank heaven he’s always been a sound sleeper,” she said, easing down onto the chair next to the couch, where Zed was. “I’ve heard horror stories from some of the teachers I work with about babies his age still waking every two hours during the night and demanding attention.”

  “I’m no expert on babies, but I wouldn’t put up with that situation very long,” Zed said. “I don’t think you would, either—and Tiger probably senses it. He’s one smart kid. Which reminds me—tomorrow’s Friday. What do you have planned for you and the boy this weekend?”

  Words leapt to her lips unbidden. “I thought we’d help you.”

  “Good. A couple with a baby is less intimidating to people than a man alone. We’ll cruise the marina with the photo and talk to anyone who doesn’t growl at us. I’ll be meeting with your P.I. tomorrow—maybe he’ll come up with a new angle.”

  “You don’t think the man—Danny’s father—could be Arabic?” she asked.

  “If he was, wouldn’t Erin have told you?”

  Karen thought about it “Maybe. But not necessarily. In many ways she was secretive about her affairs. Unless she got into a jam and needed help, I really didn’t know much about the men she dated.”

  “Did your help include previous pregnancies?”

  “No, not that.” She didn’t want to get into details—some were rather sordid—so she tried to change the slant of the conversation before he went any further.

  “So you think the Arabic name on the boat doesn’t mean anything significant?”, she asked.

  “It might or might not. We’re handicapped by not really knowing anything about this man.”

  The roughness in his voice alerted her. “You’re angry with him, aren’t you?”

  “Who wouldn’t be? I know you are.”

  “Yes,” she agreed, “but Erin was my cousin and my friend. I realize it takes two to get pregnant, but I can’t help but believe if it hadn’t been for him, she’d still be alive. Maybe he couldn’t have saved her, but at the very least he could have stood by her through it all. That’s not your reason for being angry.”

  He leaned forward, looking at her. “I didn’t know Erin but I know you. He’s blighted your life. Now he’s interfering in mine. I can’t explain the blood match between Danny and me—I can only try to prove to you that I couldn’t have been Erin’s lover. Is that possible where you’re concerned? Or will there always remain the shadow of doubt? You know as well as I do that he’s come between us, and there he’ll stay until we find him. I hate the bastard!”

  The ferocity in his voice took her aback.

  “Then there’s Danny,” he continued. “What’s going to happen to him?”

  “I’ll take good care of him,” she said defensively. “I love Danny!”

  “Boys need fathers, too.”

  Yes, she thought, and you’d make a good one for him. If only you’d been the man in the picture and hadn’t known about Erin’s pregnancy I think I could forgive you, because I can see you’re beginning to love Danny. She started to chew on her thumbnail as what he’d called the shadow of doubt loomed darkly.

  Should she believe him? Had he and Jade conspired to lie to her? The Reno lab would be sending the DNA report to her San Diego address as soon as they received it. What if that, as well as the blood, was a match?

  “Karen,” he said. “Look at me.”

  She didn’t want to; she couldn’t bring herself to.

  He rose and pulled her to her feet. Hands on her shoulders, he repeated his command. “Look at me!”

  Bracing herself so she wouldn’t make the mistake of falling into his dark gaze again, she took a deep breath and did as he asked. The pain she saw in his eyes twisted her heart.

  “I swear I’ve never lied to you.” His voice throbbed with emotion. “I am not Danny’s father.”

  She wanted to believe him; she needed to believe him. She longed to put her arms around him and offer him comfort, more than comfort. But he was right—the man in the photo, whoever he was, stood between them.

  “We’ll keep searching,” she said finally. It was all she could offer him.

  When Zed, bitter and frustrated, reached his hotel room, the red light on his phone was blinking. The message the desk gave him turned out to be from George Stone, a request to meet him at the marina at seven in the morning. Which probably meant, Zed realized, that good old George had decided to trust him with the Painted Lady for the duration of his stay.

  He wished he could sail her out of the bay into the ocean and keep going until the sea and the sun and the wind blew away what his grandma had referred to as the bogies.

  “Everybody has them,” she’d told Zed when he was young. “Your grandpa and I do, just like you. Sometimes they seemed about to devour us but here we still are, so you can be sure you’re safe.”

  He sat on the bed, untying his running shoes and kicking them off. His socks went, then the rest of his clothes. He lay on the bed naked, feeling slightly better with San Diego’s moist sea air cool on his skin. His grandparents had always seemed so together that he wondered what bogies had haunted them.

  He recalled how upset his grandmother used to get when he or Jade failed to come directly
home from school, forgetting to call to say they’d stopped at a friend’s house or some such on the way. That seemed pretty normal, though, considering she was old to be raising kids and had already lost her only child, Jade’s and his mother.

  His grandparents had many pictures of Ellen Marie Adams as a baby, a toddler, growing into a teen. Jade looked quite a bit like her, even to the green eyes. There hadn’t been any pictures of his mother’s wedding, though, and not a single photo of his father. His early questions had been silenced by his grandmother saying, “He’s dead and we don’t talk about him. It was your mother’s wish, as it was her wish that you and Jade take her maiden name when we adopted you. Our name.”

  He knew his dark hair and eyes came from his father, because Grandpa had let that slip once. He’d always wanted to know more about the man who’d fathered him, and when he was in his twenties he’d confronted his grandfather. “Is my father really dead?” he’d asked.

  Grandpa had looked him in the eye. “Have I ever lied to you?”

  Zed had to admit Bill Adams was as honest as they came. His grandfather might hold back information, but he wouldn’t deliberately lie.

  “What my mother asked you and Grandma to do,” he’d persisted, “was to obliterate my father. Even his name. Why?”

  “Ellen Marie had her reasons. We did as she asked. That’s all I can tell you.”

  “But they were married?”

  “They were married. Now I think we’ve discussed the matter enough.” At that point Grandpa had risen from the kitchen stool and left the house, effectively ending the conversation. Zed had never brought it up again.

  After his grandparents passed away, he’d searched for a marriage certificate or other papers, hoping to at least learn what his father’s name had been. He found nothing relevant.

  His birth certificate and Jade’s were no help, since they listed his grandparents rather than his mother and father as the parents, something he’d always wondered about. That, too, had been explained as his mother’s request, just as she had insisted her parents legally adopt her children.

  He’d been curious and had never had his curiosity satisfied, but he’d been forced by his grandparents’ persistent silence to let things ride. Not until this moment, though, had it occurred to him to wonder if his father had ever had a child in or out of wedlock before he met Ellen Marie Adams. A son who’d be a man now. A son who looked a lot like the one he’d fathered with Ellen Adams. Like Zed.

  He shook his head. Enough speculation. He needed solid facts if he was ever going to find Danny’s father.

  Chapter Five

  Morning mist obscured the bay and the marina when Zed met George Stone at seven in the morning.

  “Texans are prone to trades,” George told him, getting right to the point. “Here’s what I’m proposing. I can’t take Painted Lady out by myself these days. She’s always been a handful for one man, and my wife isn’t able to crew for me like she used to. Damn arthritis slows a man down. I can’t move quick anymore. So, you take me out for a sail a couple times a week and you can use the boat for your stay here.”

  “That’s a hell of an offer,” Zed said. “You do realize you’re rewarding me for using the Painted Lady.”

  George shrugged. “You get what you want, I get what I want. Deal?”

  “Deal.” Zed shook George’s hand.

  “One more thing,” George said. “After we met yesterday, I watched you for a while and for the life of me I couldn’t figure out what you were up to. Looked like casual conversations here and there, but I saw they weren’t. Asking questions, that’s what you were doing. None of my business, but I’m a nosy old goat. Checked you out later, too. You’re what you said you were and well thought of up there in the boondocks, to boot. To me it didn’t add up—a Nevada rancher roaming the marina asking questions. Just what the hell are you doing here in San Diego?”

  No reason not to tell George. “I’m hunting for a man who looks like me,” Zed said. “Chances are he owns a thirty-two-foot clipper named Maddamti, because I have a photo of him on board that particular boat. The Star of India’s in the background, so San Diego is where this picture was taken a year ago last summer.” Zed pulled out his copy of the photo and showed it to George. “I need to get in touch with him and this is all I have to go on.

  After a careful examination, George shook his head. “Nothing familiar here. Sorry. But I’ll keep it in mind. Got a lot of old sailor buddies. I’ll ask around.”

  “Thanks.” Zed handed him the photo, saying, “Keep this to show your friends. I have another.” He added, “When do we go for our first sail?”

  George glanced around at the persistent mist still obscuring the bay. “Not today, obviously. Supposed to rain tomorrow, but we can try for Sunday. You call me.” He handed his card to Zed along with the boat keys and a cellular phone. “This belongs on the boat. Use it while you’re there. We’d have coffee somewhere but Doc has made me swear off caffeine and I can’t stand that other muck. Talk to you on Sunday.”

  Elated at temporarily acquiring a shipshape boat like George’s, Zed returned to the motel to move his things to the Painted Lady. Remembering he ought to let Karen know, he punched in her number.

  “Hello?” Her voice sounded harried.

  Zed started to tell her about his change of address, but she interrupted him.

  “I can’t talk right now ‘cause I need to use the phone. Danny’s regular sitter called in sick and I’m desperately trying to find another sitter for him. I hate to miss any more time, especially today, because I’m supposed to chair the monthly meeting.”

  “You found one,” Zed said.

  “What?”

  “A sitter. Me.”

  “You? But you can’t—”

  “Why not?” he demanded. “Tiger knows me and I know him. We’ll get along just fine without you for a few hours. I’ll be over in fifteen minutes or so, depending on traffic.” He hung up without waiting for her to agree or disagree.

  He checked out of the motel, piled his belongings into the car and took off for La Mesa.

  When he reached her apartment, a harried Karen thrust the boy at him, at the same time showering him with multiple instructions—changing diapers, when to feed Danny, when he napped, where the emergency numbers were. At that point he stopped her.

  “Relax. I’ll cope. Trust me.”

  She chewed on her thumbnail. “I’d like to, but taking care of a baby isn’t as easy as you think. Maybe I shouldn’t go to work.”

  “Go, already,” he said. “Tiger isn’t crying—he’s glad to see me. He’ll let me know when he needs to eat or sleep or be changed. What’s the problem?”

  “You don’t have the slightest idea what you’re doing,” she told him. “But you’re right—Danny will survive.” She smiled slightly. “I’m not so sure about you.”

  After issuing more instructions, she finally left, returning almost immediately to give him Danny’s car seat in case he needed to use it.

  After that, still toting Danny, he waved her off. “Women,” he told the boy, who was eyeing him uncertainly. “You’re still too young to realize what worry warts they can be.”

  Danny’s lower lip began to quiver and Zed cast a hasty look around for the blue horse with the bedraggled ears. Where the hell was it? By the time he located the blasted horse in the crib in the bedroom the boy shared with Karen, Danny was whimpering.

  Spotting a rocker in the living room, he dropped into it, shifted the boy in his arms, handed him the horse and began rocking. Danny hugged the horse but continued to whimper. “I’d sing to you, Tiger,” he muttered, “but I can’t carry a tune for—” He stopped abruptly, realizing he was on the verge of corrupting the baby’s innocent ears with a four-letter word.

  “How about if I whistle?” he asked. “Think you’d like that?” He pursed his lips and started off with the first tune that popped into his head, a country-western song he couldn’t remember the name of, something t
o do with a guy who was crying in his beer. He was well launched into the tune when the boy stopped fussing and twisted around to watch him. A moment later he began poking a finger between Zed’s pursed lips, interfering with the whistle.

  Reminded of games he’d watched his grandparents play with Jade—maybe they had with him, too, but he didn’t recall it—he leaned over, grabbed a pillow off the couch and started playing peek a boo. This simple maneuver amused Danny far longer than it did Zed. Finally unable to peek another boo, he hefted the boy around the waist and stood him on his feet.

  “Da!” Danny exclaimed, bending his knees and then straightening them. “Da, da.”

  “Like that, do you? Told you you’d be walking in no time.” Rising from the rocker, he sat on the floor, still holding the boy erect. Danny bounced happily up and down until Zed’s arms got tired.

  He pulled an afghan off the couch, spread it on the carpeted floor, sat Danny on the afghan and rolled a large red ball he’d found in the playpen toward him. Danny squealed with glee when the ball bumped against his leg. He didn’t have a clue how to roll it back, so Zed retrieved the ball and rolled it at Danny again. When that palled—at least, as far as he was concerned—he tried out other toys that clicked or rang or clacked, temporarily as fascinated by their ingenuity as the boy was.

  When nature called, he decided for safety’s sake to sit the boy in the playpen while he went to the bathroom. He hadn’t taken more than two steps away before Danny let out a horrendous howl.

  “Okay, Tiger,” Zed said, scooping him up. “I suppose you might as well come with me and see how it’s done for future reference.”

  Careful maneuvering enabled him to relieve himself without dropping Danny into the toilet. On the way back he discovered that whether or not the kid’s diaper had been wet before the trip to the bathroom, it certainly was sopping now.

  He remembered Karen explaining that she kept the changing table in the bedroom because the bathroom was too small. “Here goes nothing,” he said as he laid the boy on his back on the table. Seeing the stack of clean disposable diapers at hand, he added, “Easy as falling off a fence, right?”