Dad By Choice

And she loved them for it. And for countless other reasons. If this baby did turn out to be a Maitland, her feelings wouldn’t change. There would just be one more child to love.

With affection, she terminated the banter. “We’ll discuss the abilities of the copy machine and your sister’s lack of shadow later. Abby, go.” Shooing her off, Megan turned to the remaining duo in the spacious office. She wanted to adjourn to her own office, where she had faced her toughest decisions, had had her finest triumphs. She felt secure there. “R.J., Ellie, come.”

Abby raised a brow and glanced toward her sister. “Ever notice how she treats the kids like dogs?”

“Go,” Megan repeated.

Abby hurried off.

“WHAT’S GOING ON?” Dana’s question met Abby the moment she walked out of R.J.’s office.

“I’m not really sure,” Abby confessed. Dana Dillinger was one of her closest friends and she didn’t feel right about brushing her off, but she was really running behind now. “Get R.J. to tell you.”

Dana shook her head and sighed. “As if R.J. could ever share anything but reports and schedules with me.”

Abby raced out the door and hurried to the elevator banks, nodding at several people she knew. Mercifully, the elevator was empty. She got in and quickly pressed the button. Only once the doors had slid closed again did she glance at the baby in her arms.

The eyes were blue, as were those of most infants, and opened wide, as if he were drinking in the entire world around him and storing it up for future reference. Abby felt a tug in her heart, the way she did with each child she held in her arms.

“So, am I really your aunt Abby, or is this just some kind of a hoax?” In response, the baby squirmed. “No offense, little guy, but I really hope it’s a hoax. Not that I wouldn’t mind having you in the family, you understand, but…”

The squirming was followed by a gurgling sound a moment before the infant turned an extreme shade of beet red. A second later, a distinct odor began to rise from the vicinity of his tiny bottom.

How could anything so small smell so bad? she wondered.

“Okay, be that way,” Abby murmured, shifting the baby. This was going to mean a little extra work for Katie, she thought. As if the pediatric nurse didn’t already have enough to do…

DROPPING THE CHART Ford had just given her into the To Be Filed pile, already four deep at nine-thirty in the morning, pediatric nurse Katie Topper turned when she heard the private entrance door opening. She flashed a quick smile when she saw who it was. Then a small furrow formed between her brows when she noticed the baby.

“Abby, what’s up?”

Like Dana, Katie was one of Abby’s closest friends. But if she’d had no time to fill Dana in, she had even less time now. Her mother’s unintentional ambush had cost her more than half an hour. The way her luck was running, she’d probably be called away for a multiple birth on her way back down.

“Got a new patient for Ford to check out.” Abby glanced toward the reception area. There were only three patients waiting their turn with the pediatric surgeon. “Mother’s orders.”

Katie glanced behind Abby, expecting to see another woman entering. “Where is the baby’s mother?”

An involuntary sigh escaped her lips. Abby looked at the infant. “That’s the 64,000-dollar question.”

“But you just said—” Katie began.

“My mother,” Abby clarified. “She wants Ford to check him out as soon as possible.”

The request was unusual. “What’s wrong with him?” Katie sniffed the air. “Other than the obvious. Did you have to bring me a ripe one?”

“Sorry.” Abby laughed. “And to answer your other question—nothing, I hope.”

“Curiouser and curiouser,” Katie said. She reached for an empty folder. “So, what name do I put on the chart?”

“This—” Abby held the infant up “—is Baby X.”

Katie put down her pen and looked at Abby. “Is this some kind of a joke?”

R.J.’s words, Abby thought. “I wish. Someone just dropped him off on our doorstep. Classic note pinned to the blanket and everything. All that was missing was snow and a heart-wrenching musical score.” She shook her head. It wasn’t the baby’s fault, but that didn’t change anything. “The press is going to have a field day.”

Katie took the baby from her. “The press?”

Abby nodded. “They were there for Mother’s announcement about the clinic’s twenty-fifth anniversary celebration. They liked this story better.” She glanced toward the door leading to the first examining room. It was closed. “Tell Ford I’ll be by as soon as I can manage.”

Katie shifted the baby to her other arm. The outer door buzzed softly, announcing another patient. “What do we do with Baby X until then?”

Abby paused in the doorway, one hand on the knob. “See if you can get him to talk.” With that, she hurried away.

THE DARKNESS ABOUT HER lifted slowly, like a heavy curtain being drawn away. A dull, persistent ache came to fill its place, and it felt as if there was something inching down her forehead just above her brow.

With fingers that didn’t quite feel as if they belonged to her, she touched the spot on her head. A stickiness registered. She looked at her fingers.

Blood.

Her blood.

Why?

She gazed around slowly. The ache wouldn’t allow her to move quickly. She was on the ground, in an alley of some sort, and it was daylight.

Relying on shaky limbs, she managed to rise to her feet. As she did so, she became aware of another sensation.

Her arms felt empty. As if she had been holding something that was gone now.

But what?

Dazed, confused, she looked down at them, trying to remember what it was she’d lost.

Trying to remember anything at all.

But there was nothing but a huge void.

She couldn’t remember.

Anything.

A noise caught her attention. Like a magnet of hope, it drew her around.

There was a man standing at the end of the alley. A man dressed in blue. A policeman.

He looked at her uncertainly, stepping forward. “Can I help you, ma’am?”

A sob caught in her throat as she made her way toward him. “Yes.”

Suddenly the world began to shimmer. Spinning, it retreated from her until there was nothing left but a tiny opening for the light to squeeze through. And then, even that was gone.

Boneless, she fell to the ground.

CHAPTER TWO

KYLE MCDERMOTT SHIFTED in his chair. He’d lost count of how many times now. Had he been wearing the jeans he so rarely put on these days, he would have rested his ankle across his thigh. But that wouldn’t fit, given the three-piece suit he was wearing. Besides, it would somehow seem disrespectful to the other occupants of the room, most of whom looked as if they hadn’t been truly comfortable in months.

He glanced at his sister. He knew that Marcie had been uncomfortable for a while now. She was the reason he was here, suffering and growing progressively more agitated.

Kyle didn’t like waiting, had never been able to tolerate it. And even if he could have, he wouldn’t have liked waiting here, in a room full of women whose bodies were in various stages of pending motherhood. He felt out of place, the lone male in the midst of some secret female sorority he had no right to be invading.

As far back as he could remember, Kyle McDermott had never thought of himself as an actual people person. His talents lay in other directions. It was only because he loved his baby sister, Marcie, that he was here. And paying dearly for it.

Trying vainly to stifle an exasperated sigh that begged to be exhaled, he glanced at his watch. Forty-seven minutes. Forty-seven minutes past the scheduled time for Marcie’s appointment.

Where the hell is that doctor?

Never raising her eyes from the magazine she was flipping through, Marcie leaned over in his direction. “It’s not going to go any faster if you keep looking at it.”

“I don’t want it to go faster. I just want your doctor to get here.”

He was trying to keep his voice down, but it seemed as if every set of eyes had turned in his direction. He should never have let Marcie talk him into coming along. It was bad enough having to be her coach, without enduring this.

“When I told you to get your doctor’s first morning appointment, I didn’t think he started at noon.”

“She.” The word left her lips tersely. Marcie gave up the pretense of reading and closed the magazine. “Can’t you even remember that? I must have told you a hundred times.”

“A dozen,” he corrected out of habit, remembering now. Of course, he knew Maitland was a woman. It had just slipped his mind, that’s all. He saw Marcie’s brows draw together the way they always did when she stubbornly dug in. He didn’t want another argument. This was neither the time nor the place. For the sake of peace, he tried for a truce. “Sorry, Marce, I’m preoccupied.”

“You’re always preoccupied.”

It wasn’t the first time Marcie had flung the accusation at him. And to a certain extent, it was true. His mind was always going off in a dozen different directions, taken up by a myriad of details. Maybe that was why she’d turned to Billy Madison in the first place.

This bickering wasn’t going to get them anywhere, Kyle thought. And the only thing worse than sitting here in the middle of a room full of pregnant women was arguing with his sister in a room full of pregnant women. He shouldn’t have come today. If it really meant that much to Marcie to have him along on an office visit, next week would be better for him.

Fed up and tired, Kyle began to rise. Marcie’s hurt look came as no surprise. He fielded it. “Listen, I’d better go. I’ll leave the car for you and I’ll call a cab.”

Marcie reached out to catch his arm, then stopped herself. “Afraid you’ll miss your precious meeting?”

If they hadn’t already been at the center of everyone’s attention, they were now. He’d raised her better than this, Kyle thought. But then, he reminded himself, if he’d truly raised her well, she wouldn’t be in this condition.

Kyle gave up trying to be discreet, though for the moment, he sank back down in his chair. “At this rate, I’m afraid I’ll miss the rest of my life. Your doctor doesn’t seem to respect the fact that other people have schedules, too.”

Having said nothing out of the ordinary and certainly nothing that wasn’t true, he saw no reason for Marcie’s suddenly wide eyes.

Until he heard the voice behind him.

“Oh, but I do, Mr. McDermott. It is Mr. McDermott, isn’t it? I’m assuming that since you’re lecturing Marcie and you definitely look older than eighteen, you have to be the big brother she’s been telling me about, and not Billy.”

It wasn’t often that Kyle could be accused of being caught off guard. Since his father’s death more than ten years ago, when he’d suddenly found himself sole guardian of his younger sister, he’d tried to be prepared for all contingencies way ahead of time. But the woman’s voice, amused, low and reminiscent of aged bourbon taken slow on a long winter’s evening, did just that.

And the sight of her did even more.

Having expected to see a dour, matronly looking woman in sensible black shoes, an austere hairdo and utilitarian clothing, he was momentarily rendered speechless by the slender brunette in three-inch heels and a fashionable, light blue suit that looked as if it had been made for her.

The blue brought out her eyes.

He had no idea why he thought that, or even noticed. He wasn’t given to details like that. Not about people, only about microchips and semiconductors, like the one he’d perfected—the one that was responsible for his fortune.

Well, Abby thought, it seemed as if good looks ran in the family. Marcie McDermott had struck her as a beauty the first moment she’d met the poised teenager. On her brother, Kyle, those dark good looks were even more arresting, although on him they seemed to come with a certain edginess.

That could have been due to the frown on his lips.

Gamely, Abby put out her hand, feeling just a tad like someone bearding a lion in its den.

“Hi, I’m Abby Maitland, Marcie’s doctor, and I’m sorry about the delay.” She looked around the waiting room. It was more packed than she’d expected. Some of her patients had turned up early for their appointments. Murphy’s Law. “Ladies, I’ll see you all in due time. I’m afraid I was unavoidably detained, but I’ll try to make up for it.” Crossing to the inner area, she nodded a greeting at her nurse. “Lisa, please show Marcie into room 1. I’ll be there in three minutes. Faster, if the buttons on the lab coat don’t give me a hard time.”

The nurse she’d addressed as Lisa, a willowy blonde, came to the doorway, a chart in her hands. “Looks like you’re up, Marcie.” But when Kyle rose to accompany his sister, Lisa stopped him with a slight shake of her head. “Not yet, Mr. McDermott. I’ll come get you when we’re ready.”

Great, Kyle thought. More waiting. Now he really couldn’t leave. He didn’t want Marcie to come out and find him gone. God knows what she’d think or do then. For the most part, she’d always been a levelheaded kid, he thought, but this pregnancy had thrown her off.

As it had him. With effort, he banked down the resentment that rose within him.

Kyle sank back onto the seat, resigned. How had he gotten to this place in his life? he wondered. Wasn’t this where the good part was supposed to come in? He’d struggled hard these last fifteen years to get through college and make a go of his business, at times financing things on a shoestring that seemed as if it would snap at any second. He’d made sacrifices to keep the company going, a great many sacrifices. He knew his romance with Sheryl had been a casualty. She hadn’t been willing to share him—not with his dream and not with his sister. So he’d made his choice, stuck with the plan. All so that he and Marcie could finally be in a position to have everything they ever wanted or needed.

So that Marcie would never want for anything.

Now here they were, fifteen long years later. His company was bordering on going public and his sister was bordering on unwed motherhood.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

He looked at his watch again.

Lisa returned to call another patient in, this time to room 2. Before Kyle could ask her how much longer this was going to take, she turned toward him and smiled.

“Mr. McDermott?”

He was on his feet instantly.

Lisa opened the door wider and stepped back. “Dr. Maitland says you can come in now.”

“How very gracious of her.”

Passing the nurse, Kyle struggled to curb his temper. It wasn’t the doctor’s fault that Marcie had gotten herself pregnant. And it wasn’t her fault that Marcie adamantly refused to marry the boy who had gotten her into this condition, despite all Kyle’s assurances that he would set them up and help pay for her education and Billy Madison’s, as well. But it was the doctor’s fault that he was now drastically behind schedule. He didn’t tolerate lateness well, not in himself and not in others. That wasn’t how things got done.

His father had always been late. Late to work, late to pay the bills. Late with everything. That’s why he had never amounted to anything, and why, when he died, there had been a mountain of debts for Kyle to pay off.

He walked into room 1 to see his sister lying on the examining table. A wave of discomfort washed over him. His eyes darted toward the doctor. “Is this going to take long?”

Busy preparing the monitor, Abby glanced in his direction. “Not too.”

Maybe it was the tension of thinking that one of her brothers might be responsible for the baby she’d just left with Ford. Or maybe it was knowing that, at the very least, because of this baby her family had suddenly become the target of every journalist, photographer and news media wanna-be.

Or maybe she just didn’t like Kyle McDermott’s distant attitude. Marcie had confided a few things to Abby in moments of dire unhappiness. Things that hadn’t put the too-too-busy Mr. McDermott in the most flattering light, despite his chiseled, killer looks, his high cheekbones and that dark, flowing mane of hair that seemed just a bit out of place when paired with the expensive suit he had on.

Whatever it was, Abby found herself hanging on to the tattered ends of a far shorter temper than she normally possessed.

The monitor was ready. She walked over to Marcie, but she was still looking at Kyle.

“Most people view this as a miracle, Mr. McDermott, one not to be hurried through like a car wash. This is a very precious time. You get to make the baby go where you want it to and do what you want it to—except for kicking,” she added with a smile as she looked at Marcie. “They really don’t listen when it comes to that, no matter what diplomacy you use.”

Marcie’s swollen abdomen was partially exposed, and Kyle watched as the doctor with the sharp tongue rubbed some sort of jelly on it. He loved Marcie more than anything in this world and had thought, until this thing with Billy had come up, that he was pretty much privy to all her feelings. But right now he felt intrusive, as if he were somehow invading her privacy. It was the same at the birthing classes. He was out of his depth, had no business being there.

Kyle turned away, not sure where he should look.

As she watched him, Abby’s lips twitched in amusement. He certainly didn’t look like the delicate type.

Can’t tell a book by its dust jacket.

Kyle shoved his hands into his pockets and addressed the wall beyond Abby’s head. “I don’t mean to sound as if this isn’t important to me, it’s just that—”

“You’re running behind schedule, yes, I know.” This man was flirting with an ulcer, if he didn’t already have one. But that was his problem, not hers. “You made that very clear. I’m afraid most of us are running behind schedule practically from the day we’re born. I suspect your niece or nephew might be a few days behind schedule, too.” Amplifier in hand, she looked at him. “Ready?”

Kyle really didn’t know if he was or not. He knew it was absurd, but he felt nervous about this. That was why he’d turned down Marcie’s previous requests to come with her to the doctor’s office. But after the argument they’d had last night, he knew this was the only way she would even speak to him.

Masking his emotions, he nodded. “Yes.”

Abby placed the amplifier against Marcie’s abdomen and began to slowly move it around.

Straining to catch the faintest sound, he heard nothing. Was there something wrong with the baby? Concern edged out discomfort.

“I don’t hear anything,” Kyle said.

Brows drawn together in concentration, Abby held up her hand for silence. “Wait.” And then a smile like late-summer sunshine curved her mouth. Triumph filled her eyes as she looked up at him. “There. Now listen.”

He drew his eyes away from her, because she was none of his concern. He was only here because of Marcie. A strange bittersweet emotion filtered through him as he listened. He’d watched Marcie’s small body become progressively wider and thicker with child, and yet, somehow, it had all seemed like a fantasy.

Until now. Now there was a heartbeat, and he heard it.

Perhaps that was why he’d resisted this meeting so much, even though he had reluctantly begun accompanying Marcie to her birthing classes, going there in place of Billy, whom he would have thought the more likely choice. Because hearing made it real.

He realized that Marcie’s doctor was waiting for him to acknowledge what he heard. He lifted a shoulder and let it drop, not really sure what she wanted from him. “Sounds like hoofbeats.”

Abby paused, rolling his words over in her mind. She listened closely herself. She’d been doing this for a while now, but had never thought of the sound she was monitoring quite that way. The description made her smile.

“I suppose, in a way, it does.” Satisfied that everything was fine, Abby put the probe back into place and moved the monitor aside. “And the beats are getting closer.” Positioning herself beside Marcie, she gently helped the girl into a sitting position. “Not much longer now, Marcie-girl.”

The familiar nickname gave testimony to the bond between Marcie and her doctor, and cinched the silent debate Kyle had been having with himself ever since the drive over here. It was very clear to him that he wasn’t getting anywhere with Marcie in his campaign. He wanted to convince her to give her child a last name and marry the boy she professed to love so much. Billy was more than willing to marry her, but that didn’t seem to be enough to sway Marcie. She was perversely adamant in her refusal, and Kyle could only conclude that she was doing it strictly to annoy him.

But he only wanted what was good for Marcie and he wasn’t about to allow her to cut off her nose to spite her face—and him. Not for the first time, he wondered what had become of the little girl who had been his faithful shadow, who had tried so hard to please him. Who’d been so afraid that he would die, too, and leave her alone in the world.

Now she didn’t seem to care what he thought.

Maybe this doctor of hers could accomplish what he couldn’t. He didn’t care how it came about, as long as it did.

“Okay, Marcie, you’re doing great,” Abby said, making a final notation in her chart. “All systems are go.” She flipped the chart closed. “Continue taking your vitamins, get plenty of rest, and I’ll see you next week.”

But as Abby began to leave, Kyle took her arm, stopping her. She raised her eyes to his quizzically. Was there something she hadn’t covered to his satisfaction?

He dropped his hand when she looked at him. Without meaning to, Kyle lowered his voice. It seemed to rumble as it met her ear. “Doctor, could I see you alone for a minute?”

To his surprise and no small annoyance, since she had been the one to keep them waiting, the doctor glanced at her watch. There was just the slightest hint of an apology in her voice.

“I’m afraid it’ll have to be just for that one minute. As you pointed out, we’re both running behind, and I’m sure you noticed all those women in the waiting room.”

This wasn’t going to get said in a minute, and he had enough pressure on him without being timed by a woman who barely came up to his shoulder. Kyle bit back the urge to point out that if she hadn’t come in forty-five minutes late, she wouldn’t be so far behind and might have a few minutes to spare for reasonable requests.

He thought a moment. “All right, after hours, then.” For a change, he had some time to himself this evening. “What time do you get through?”

He made it sound as if she were a worker on an assembly line, Abby thought, able to tell him when she knocked off for the night. She supposed that to a man who, according to the business section in the Herald, was on his way to becoming Austin’s next billionaire, she probably was.

She sank her hands into the lab coat’s deep pockets. “The posted hours on the door say five o’clock.” She’d never shut her doors at that time, even on the first day. “With luck, six.”

Kyle nodded. That worked out perfectly. His last meeting was at four. Barring something unforeseen occurring, he should be finished around five-thirty. Even given the traffic at that hour, he could probably make it back here before she had a chance to escape. He had a feeling that consultations with her patients’ older brothers were not a high priority with the woman.

“Fine, I can be here by six-thirty. That should give you a little time to catch your breath.”

His phrasing seemed to amuse her. Despite her hurry, she paused at the door. “Will I be needing to catch my breath?”

He ignored the strange sensation that ran through him as he watched a quirky smile lift the corners of her generous mouth. At a loss as to how to answer her, he plowed ahead as if she hadn’t asked. “There’s something I need to discuss with you.”