Their Baby Bond

by Karen Rose Smith

  “I’d appreciate that. I’m going to meet Jake at the toy store after the gallery closes. We have to buy birthday presents for his nephews.”

  “Need a sitter for Andy?”

  Tori laughed. “Nope. I’m taking him along this evening. I have bottles in the fridge in back. He’ll probably sleep while we shop.”

  Loretta came around the counter and gave the rattle attached to the seat a little shake. When the baby responded to the movement, she smiled. “I hope your mother and Sean have a smooth flight home. With all the commotion this morning, we hardly had a minute to breathe, let alone talk.”

  Shortly after Tori and Loretta had opened the gallery today, Detective Trujillo had come in with his composite sketch. Tori had been sure she’d never seen the thick-necked man in the sketch before. Loretta was less sure. She thought he resembled a customer who’d come in the previous week asking about upcoming art shows. She’d given him brochures on Peter’s show, as well as Renée Ludwig’s, which would be held the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. Detective Trujillo had asked several more questions, reminded them both that the person sketched might simply be a frequent customer of the shops in the small plaza, and then left.

  Soon after, Peter had arrived and so had the journalist for Around Santa Fe, a quarterly magazine that would give the artist terrific exposure. The interview had lasted until lunch. Tori had mostly listened, fed Andy in a chair close by and made sure he was settled for his morning nap in Nina’s portable crib. Bringing him to the gallery when she needed to oversee matters herself didn’t seem to be a problem. Once he started crawling and walking, maybe she could hire more help and arrange coming into the gallery one day a week.

  She’d definitely have to hire additional staff within the next few weeks before Christmas, especially if she and Andy were going to visit her mother and Sean in Kansas. She hadn’t yet asked Jake if he’d come along.

  Running tape around the edges of the box that held the painting safely ensconced in bubble wrap, she mused aloud, “I want to find something really unique for a wedding present for my mom and Sean. They both have everything they need.”

  “Something simple might please your mom more than something elaborate. Did you take pictures while they were here?”

  “Loads of them.”

  “You could do a collage, then mat and frame it.”

  Jake would appear in lots of those pictures. Tori ached to have him in her life permanently. “That’s a wonderful idea. I’m sure Mom would appreciate that more than anything I could buy.”

  When the bell on the door rang, Tori looked up and then went perfectly still. Barbara Simmons had just walked in, her expression serious. She’d lost much of the weight she’d gained during her pregnancy. Her gaze landed directly on Andy.

  Tori didn’t move from Andy’s side, but she smiled warmly. “Hi, Barbara. It’s good to see you.”

  “My mom said you called. Andrew was sick?”

  “He was. But he’s not sick anymore. He had to have surgery.” Tori explained what condition had developed and how the doctor had remedied it.

  Barbara couldn’t seem to take her eyes off Andy. “He’s grown so much.”

  “Yes, he has. Inches and pounds. How was your trip?”

  As Loretta moved away, Barbara shrugged. “It was okay. It was fun to be with Vanessa and Melanie again.”

  “They’re not going to college?”

  “Melanie’s starting in January, like I am. Her grades weren’t good enough to get her into the fall session. Vanessa’s not sure what she wants to do. Her parents just got divorced and she’s pretty messed up over that. She’s trying to get her head together. She plays in an all-girl band and has these dreams of becoming a star. She has an aunt in California, and she’s thinking about going out there and looking around.”

  Watching Barbara and listening to her, Tori thought the teenager seemed more subdued than she’d ever seen her.

  Barbara reached out and gently stroked Andy’s hair. The little boy looked up at her. “It wasn’t the same as before,” she said in a low voice.

  “What wasn’t the same?”

  “Being with them. I thought everything would go back to being the way it was. You know—before I got pregnant and all. But they’re so into guys and clothes…”

  “And you’re not?”

  “A guy is the last thing I want to think about. They just laughed when I said I wanted to be a neurosurgeon. Vanessa said it’ll never work because I might chip a nail. But I don’t care about things like that anymore.”

  “What do you care about?” Tori asked softly.

  “Different stuff. I just kept thinking that I only held Andy once. I didn’t know if you’d be here. I didn’t think he’d be here. Would it be all right…would it be all right if I picked him up?”

  Tori’s insides were gyrating, and the fears that had become tempered over the past couple of weeks came fully awake. Still, she knew she had to let this teenager say goodbye to her baby, since she obviously hadn’t done that. “Of course you can pick him up. Just make sure you keep his head supported.”

  Gathering up Andy, Barbara was careful as she put him to her shoulder. Her face was close to his and she swayed back and forth a little. “He smells good.”

  “Not all the time,” Tori joked, trying not to let panic run away with her.

  Barbara turned away then, looking around the gallery. She slowly began walking around with Andy, becoming more sure of herself.

  Tori made herself wait by the counter.

  It was only a few minutes, but it seemed like an eternity before Barbara brought Andy back, placed him in his car seat again and picked up her purse. “I have to go. Thanks for letting me hold him.”

  Not sure what to say or do, Tori kept silent.

  Barbara smiled weakly. “See you the week after next. My lawyer will call you with the time and place.” Then she hurried out the gallery door.

  Lifting Andy, Tori held him close, praying her fears were figments of her imagination and Barbara would sign the final papers, hoping the teenager would get on with her life and forget about her son.

  When Jake picked up Tori at the gallery, she still felt unsettled by Barbara’s visit. But she pushed it from her mind, eager to enjoy this time with Jake. Andy’s car seat was positioned in the back seat of Jake’s cab. Since the seat faced backward, she couldn’t see Andy when she looked over her shoulder. Jake could, though.

  “He’s fine,” he assured her. “Will this be the first time he’s ridden in his stroller?”

  “No. I’ve taken him for a few walks. He seems to like it.”

  “Babies always like movement,” Jake said with a chuckle.

  As they parked at the entrance to the toy store, Tori asked, “What do you want to buy the boys?”

  “Not videos. I want to get them some good, old-fashioned toys that will make them use their imaginations. Maybe some books, too.”

  “Just what are old-fashioned toys?” Tori asked with a smile.

  “Maybe one of those big fire engines. I don’t want to get them both the same thing, so maybe I can get that for Ricky and find a construction truck for Ryan.”

  “They won’t fight over each other’s?”

  Jake grinned. “Probably. But they’ll learn how to share, too.”

  They took a few moments to unfold the stroller and settle Andy in it. Then Jake wheeled it across the parking lot and lifted it over the curb. When they went inside, he pushed it like a proud dad.

  Tonight she’d ask him to go with her to her mother’s at Christmas.

  This time of year the toy store was busy. Clerks were adding stock to the shelves, unpacking boxes, directing parents already looking for bargains for Christmas. Tori took over steering the stroller while Jake commandeered a cart. It didn’t take him long to find exactly what he wanted.

  He loaded the trucks into the cart. Tori picked up two small remote-controlled cars, knowing the boys would get a kick out of them, and dropped them in
to the basket.

  Tossing her a smile, Jake headed for the sportinggoods section. “Charlie said something about buying them a football. I’ll get them a basketball. They’ll probably want a hoop set up before they’re too much older.”

  “They’ll want a hoop or you want a hoop?”

  He grinned and plucked a basketball from the shelf, examining it closely. “There’s not much difference right now. While I’m here—”

  “Jake Galeno!”

  Jake’s name was a startled cry, coming from a woman who had just turned into the aisle and spotted him. She was petite, with short brown hair streaked with gray. She wore a long broomstick skirt in brown and green. Her overblouse was also green and she carried a jacket over one arm.

  Dropping the basketball into the cart, Jake straightened. “Hello, Mrs. Montgomery.”

  “That’s all you have to say to me? Hello?”

  “There’s so much I’d like to say, but I don’t think this is the place. I’m so sorry about Marion. You’ve got to know that.”

  “I don’t know anything anymore. My lawyer said I couldn’t sue you or the police department, that there was no wrongdoing. But I don’t care what your Internal Affairs said. Someone was to blame. You trained Marion. You put her in that situation. You should have been in there instead of her.”

  Tori could see the pain in Jake’s eyes and on his face. She didn’t know what this was all about, but whatever it was, it was the reason he was in Santa Fe. It was the reason he had left the police force in Albuquerque. It was obvious Mrs. Montgomery was more than grief-stricken. She was angry down to her soul.

  “She was just a novice in negotiation,” the woman went on. “She didn’t know how to handle herself. You got her killed!”

  Jake’s face was drawn, and when he spoke, Tori could hear the anguish he’d obviously experienced since the incident had happened. “You can’t blame me any more than I blame myself.”

  His comment seemed to take the woman by surprise. If she was expecting a righteous justification, Jake obviously didn’t intend to give it.

  “I’d like to talk to you sometime, someplace other than here.”

  “I don’t want an explanation for what happened. My baby is dead. I just want her back.” With that, Mrs. Montgomery spun around and fled down the aisle.

  Tori and Jake stood in silence as the loudspeaker crackled and shoppers continued their searches, as if nothing earth-shattering had occurred.

  “Are you okay?” Tori asked.

  A guardedness came over him, the guardedness that she’d seen slowly drop away over the past few weeks. “I’m fine.”

  “Maybe we should go. If you want to talk about it—”

  “I don’t want to talk about it, Tori. Talking about it only makes it worse. Let’s just finish shopping and get out of here.”

  Jake headed for the book aisle so fast Tori could hardly keep up. Why couldn’t he let his walls down? Why couldn’t he tell her what had happened?

  One look at Jake’s stony face said he didn’t need help picking out books for Ricky and Ryan. She’d no sooner chosen one for Andy when Jake asked, “Ready to go?”

  She was ready to leave the store, go back to her house and get some explanations. She simply nodded and followed him to the checkout line.

  In the cab of the truck once more, with Andy safely tucked into his car seat, Tori offered, “I can make something at the house. Maybe an omelette.”

  He switched on the ignition. “I won’t be coming in tonight.”

  “Jake—”

  “I’m not in the mood for questions. And I know you’re going to ask them.”

  “What if I promise not to?”

  “It won’t last. We’ll eat supper, feed Andy, go to bed, and eventually you’ll ask.”

  “Maybe then you’ll be ready to—”

  “No.” He shifted gears, let off the brake and headed for the street.

  Ten minutes later, he’d carried Andy inside for her, retrieved the stroller and her shopping bag from the truck and said good-night.

  She clasped his arm. “Don’t go like this, Jake.”

  “I just need to be alone, Tori. Try to understand that.”

  But she didn’t understand. She didn’t understand why he was becoming her world and she didn’t fit in to his.

  Tori was straightening up her living room while Andy watched from his stroller. She’d put on a CD of children’s songs. As she sang along, she dusted, smiled at her son and tickled him now and then. He seemed to enjoy all of it. She just wished…

  She wished Jake was sharing every moment of this. She hadn’t heard from him since their trip to the toy store the night before last. She thought about calling him. But if he needed space, she had to give it to him.

  Didn’t she?

  Tori had gone back to dusting when her phone rang. Taking the stroller with her, she rushed to it, hoping it was Jake. “Hello.”

  “Tori, it’s Tom Davidson.”

  It was her lawyer. He was probably calling to tell her the place and time when Barbara would sign the final papers. Maybe Barbara’s lawyer had contacted him. “Hi, Tom. Do you have the arrangements made for signing the final papers?”

  The silence that met her words warned her there was trouble. “Barbara Simmons’s lawyer called me.”

  Tori’s heart stopped. She couldn’t even ask the obvious questions.

  “Barbara wants to take Andy for the weekend.”

  “What do you mean, take him?”

  “She’s having doubts about the adoption. Her mother is going to be away, and she wants to take Andy and care for him herself.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  “I’m afraid not, Tori. You’re his legal guardian, but eighteen or not, she’s his mother.”

  “Can’t we stop this?”

  “You could. But what good would that do? If we don’t let her take him for the weekend, she certainly won’t sign the papers.”

  “Oh, Tom.”

  “I know. This is tough. But you knew it might happen. It could just be part of a necessary process. Don’t give up hope.”

  “When…when does she want Andy?”

  “She said if it’s all right with you, she’ll pick him up this afternoon around four. Do you want her to come to my office?”

  “No. That doesn’t make any sense. She can pick him up here.”

  “If you don’t want any contact with her, I can handle it.”

  “Contact doesn’t make any difference at this point. I’m not going to turn hysterical. If you want to be here, that’s fine.”

  “It would probably be a good idea. I’d like to document everything that happens for the judge.”

  Tori listened to the rest of her conversation with Tom in a heart-hurting haze. After her lawyer clicked off, she stared at the keypad on the phone, and then she dialed Jake’s number.

  Chapter Twelve

  Jake had kept himself busy, trying to put the encounter with Marion’s mother out of his mind, trying to forget the questions he’d seen in Tori’s eyes. Questions he hadn’t wanted to answer. He didn’t have answers.

  And he certainly didn’t want to rehash everything that had happened. Yet when Tori had called him to tell him Barbara was taking Andy for the weekend, he’d felt as if he’d been poleaxed, too, and could only imagine what was going through Tori’s head.

  Working through his lunch hour to leave the job early, he pulled up in front of Tori’s in time to see Barbara standing on the porch with Andy in her arms. Tori stood in the doorway with the man who must be her lawyer. Her face was drawn and her arms were wrapped around herself.

  As Jake approached, he could see her knuckles were white. He could only imagine her anguish as she thought about never seeing the baby she wanted as her son again. This visit could mean the adoption was off. Her voice had trembled as she’d told Jake that earlier. Then she’d taken a breath, composed herself and said she just thought he might want to know.

  D
amn, yes, he wanted to know! He wasn’t about to let her go through this alone.

  Although Barbara’s face was pale, too, and her eyes bright, there was resolution in her stance as she held her baby. “I’ll bring him back Sunday night, no matter what I decide. I promise.”

  Jake understood exactly what Barbara meant. If she was going to keep her baby, Tori would have another week with him.

  “Do you have a car seat?” Tori asked, her voice surprisingly normal.

  “Yes, I do. I borrowed it from a friend of my mom’s. I have formula and diapers and everything else I’ll need, too.”

  Jake wondered about that. There was more resolution on Barbara’s face than the motherly concern he always saw on Tori’s. That wasn’t fair, he guessed, because Barbara hadn’t had time to bond with her child. Still, when Tori had first seen Andy, there’d been no doubt what she felt.

  Barbara’s gaze met Jake’s, then she looked away and hurried to her car.

  The scene seemed frozen in time. The three of them didn’t move, but rather watched as Barbara strapped Andy into the car seat and drove away.

  Tori gave Jake a weak smile, then turned and went inside the house. When Jake and the lawyer joined her, she introduced them.

  “It’s going to be a long weekend,” she said, letting out a huge breath.

  Her lawyer, a gray-haired man in his fifties, looked at her kindly. “I could still have the judge make Barbara return that baby to you.”

  “But only temporarily. If she doesn’t sign the final papers, he’s hers again. As you told me, I’m cornered, Tom. There’s nothing I can do but wait and see what she decides.”

  “I suggest you not sit around here all weekend. You’ll make yourself crazy.”

  “I could go into the gallery—”

  Jake interrupted. “I have a better idea. Let me make a call.”

  Tori’s gaze was curious as he went into the kitchen for a little privacy.