Detective Daddy

As for the baby, holding that tiny body had made him understand for the first time his ex-wife’s inner need to have a child. There was something about the warmth and helplessness of a baby that triggered something deep within. Yes, even in him, the man who’d vowed never to bring a child of his own into this dangerous and imperfect world.

Chapter Two

Once the drowsy baby finished nursing, Dan carried her back to the improvised crib. When he turned to Fay, he saw her eyes were closed. Good, she needed to sleep. Since neither of them required his help for the moment, he used this chance to duck out to the garage and start the generator. They needed electricity not only for the lights, but for the well pump, so they could have running water. He’d warm the water in the wood kitchen range for bathing the baby and for Fay.

He got into his winter gear, tied a scarf across his face and headed for the back shed. As he opened the shed door, Fay cried out, “Don’t leave me!”

He turned and saw her sitting up, staring at him.

“I wouldn’t do that.” He realized there was more indignation in his tone than reassurance. Didn’t she know he’d never desert her?

“You’re going out into that storm,” she wailed. “What if you can’t find your way back?”

“Just to the garage to turn on the generator. We need electricity. The garage is close to the back shed. Believe me, I won’t get lost.”

Fay watched him step into the shed and close the door, cutting off her view of him. She sank back down onto the couch, clutching her hands over her now deflated abdomen, feeling more tired than she could ever remember. Daniel Sorenson was her lifeline. Hers and the baby’s.

She took deep breaths, trying to control what she knew was illogical panic. The emotion was strange to her. Cool, competent Fay Merriweather had always been the one others turned to when things went wrong. She’d never realized giving birth would make her feel so vulnerable. But then she’d never expected to have the baby in a wilderness log cabin during the worst storm she’d ever seen.

In a hospital there were doctors and nurses to take care of everything. Here all she had was Dan. If anything happened to him… She blocked that line of thought.

I have to be strong for my daughter, she told herself firmly. I will be strong.—which was easier said than done. But Dan would be back, he’d said so. She glanced toward the wood-box that was being used as her baby’s bed, and she smiled slightly as she made a decision.

She’d planned on the name Marie if she had a girl, but circumstances had changed her mind. Marie would be her daughter’s middle name, not her first. Fay’s eyes drooped shut. Half-asleep, she heard Dan reenter the cabin. She sighed and plunged into oblivion.

The sound of a baby’s wail roused her. For a moment or two, seeing unfamiliar surroundings, she couldn’t place where she was. Whose baby—? Then she heard a man’s voice. She turned her head and saw Dan lifting a baby—her baby—into his arms. She could tell it was daylight through the window, but the roar of the wind let her know the storm was still raging.

“You are one wet little peanut,” he said in a soft, teasing tone she knew was meant for the baby. “Good thing I got the generator going so I can use the washer, ’cause we definitely have a limited supply of dry diapers. Not to mention baby blankets. And only two safety pins.”

She watched as he laid the baby on the table and somewhat awkwardly removed the wet diaper and replaced it with a dry one, then wrapped her in a blanket. He picked her up again and turned toward Fay.

“Good morning,” she said.

“In some ways,” he agreed. “We’re okay, but the storm’s still stuck fast in the Upper Peninsula.” He crossed to her and handed down the baby who’d begun to cry again. “I think she’s saying she’s hungry.”

“You can call her Marie,” Fay told him as she arranged the child at her breast. For a moment, fully occupied with making sure Marie was sucking, then wincing just a little at the cramp nursing brought to her lower abdomen, she wasn’t looking at him. When she did, she saw he’d turned so he wasn’t facing her.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

Thinking he’d noticed her wince, she said, “Yes. Nursing is supposed to help interior healing.”

“That’s good.”

“You don’t have to keep looking away from me while I’m nursing,” she told him.

“I know it’s a normal process,” he said, “but it’s new to me.”

A tiny giggle escaped her. “New to me, too. It’s lucky Marie didn’t need to be taught what to do.”

He faced her again and nodded. “I—it’s sort of a personal thing between mother and child.”

Since he was looking at her almost with awe, Fay couldn’t help but understand how moved he was by watching her nurse little Marie. She found this incredibly touching.

After the baby finished nursing, Fay felt exhaustion creeping over her again. “Marie needs to be burped,” she said. “I don’t think I’m quite up to it at the moment. Maybe tomorrow. Could you—?”

Dan blinked. “Burped? How do I do that?”

“You hold her up on your shoulder so any air bubbles in her stomach can rise and come out. Otherwise they might make her stomach hurt.”

Fay watched him take the baby from her and position her carefully. It seemed to her each time he held Marie he did so with more confidence. They smiled at each other when they heard a soft but unmistakable burp. As he shifted the baby down to hold her in the crook of his arm, Fay noticed what had accompanied the burp.

“Uh-oh, she spit up a little on your shirt.”

“No problem. She couldn’t help it.” He looked down at Marie, his expression positively doting, which both amused and touched Fay.

As he crossed to lay the baby back in her makeshift bed, Fay threw back the quilt, sat up and plucked one of the old towel pieces from the couch back. She swung her feet to the floor, but when she started to get up, everything whirled alarmingly and she sank back down. Rats. No way could she make it on her own. She was going to need Dan’s aid to get to the bathroom and back. As if the poor guy hadn’t been already burdened enough.

“Need some help?” he asked, crossing to the couch.

“I’m afraid so. Sorry.”

“No need to be. You’ve been through a lot in the past eight hours.”

Once she reached the bathroom, Fay assured him she’d be okay until the trip back. Even if she had to do it by pure willpower alone, she thought. She had a vague memory of him undressing her and putting her in the shower before the baby was born, then dressing her in this way-too-big pajama top. Woozy as she’d been, she distinctly recalled the feel of his warm fingers against her breasts as he’d buttoned the top. The least she could do now was tend to her private needs alone, rather than embarrass them both.

But she was glad of his strength when she leaned against him as he led her back to the couch. He covered her with the quilt and it was all she could do to thank him before she fell into another deep sleep.

By the time Dan gathered up all the wet and soiled flannel sheets and diapers and baby blankets, he had a full load. Thank heaven his dad had installed the small washer with the dryer above it when he’d redone the bathroom.

If anyone had told me I’d be spending my administrative leave washing baby diapers, he thought, I’d have asked what he was on.

He wiped at the wet spot on his shoulder and stared at the few tiny milk curds on his fingers. Fay’s breast milk. He took a deep breath. Watching her breast-feed had triggered a strange new emotion, one he’d never felt before. It had nothing to do with lust or sex, but he was damned if he could figure out what it meant. Just like holding the baby and caring for her made him feel as though he’d been awarded some kind of privilege.

Whatever emotion it was unsettled him and he tried to reason it away. So they both needed him. So what. As a cop, plenty of people had needed his skills at one time or another. No reason to get all cranked up about it.

He started the washer, returned to the main room and put another log on the fire. He’d meant to make a meal for Fay, but she was sleeping so soundly he decided to wait. Rest was probably more important than food at the moment anyway. He’d sure hate to go through what she had, especially alone with a stranger in a cabin isolated by a storm.

He thought of his ex-wife and frowned. He couldn’t imagine Jean being as brave as Fay under the same circumstances. He stared down at Fay, dark lashes contrasting with too-pale cheeks, her brown hair tangled. Her eyes, he knew, were hazel, a sort of gold-green. She looked so vulnerable asleep, looked as helpless as her baby actually was.

He had no notion of how long it took a woman to recuperate from childbirth. Maybe she’d feel stronger tomorrow, as she’d said.

Little Marie whimpered, and he quickly moved to her side. She wriggled a little, but didn’t open her eyes. Blue eyes, he knew. Like his.

Come on, man, he scolded. Probably she had her father’s eyes. Besides, hadn’t he heard somewhere that babies’ eyes changed color when they got a little older?

The fine fuzz on top of her head was blond, also like his. He frowned impatiently. Marie was certainly not his daughter.

That had been one of the reasons he and Jean had gone their separate ways. He didn’t want children and she did. Something clutched at his heart as he looked down at the sleeping baby. What a world Marie would face as she grew up, danger lurking around every corner. He wasn’t a cop for nothing; he knew what kids had to cope with. None of his would ever have to, that was for sure. But it troubled him to think this little one would.

The next morning, when Fay tried to get up, she found she could make it all the way to the bathroom herself if she held on to furniture or the wall. But she still felt incredibly weak.

“I’ll have to ask you to go on taking care of Marie for another day,” she told him after she made it back to the couch. “I’m still sort of noodle-kneed.”

At his worried look, she added, “But I’m sure it’s only temporary.” What she meant was she hoped it was only temporary. Still, it had to be, didn’t it? “Any sign the storm’s letting up?”

He shook his head. “Usually these spring storms are three-dayers. Can last four, but no longer. We’re stuck here for a while yet.” As he spoke he brought her a tray of food, pulled the coffee table closer to her and set down the tray.

She eyed the toast and eggs with real hunger. “That gives me at least one more day to recuperate enough to ride into town, then.”

“More than one or two. The road’s private, so the county plows don’t come in here. The plow’s still on my truck, though, so I’ll get us out to the main road when the time comes. No use starting out from here unless the highway is cleared, and they won’t begin ’til the storm’s pretty well over. What I can do when the wind dies down is to go look for your car and bring back your stuff. Any idea how far you were from the cabin when you had the crash?”

Fay put down her fork. “I’m not sure. It seemed to take forever to see a light. To get here.” Chilled by the realization neither she nor the baby would be alive if she hadn’t, she hugged herself.

He reached down and touched her shoulder. “Hey, you made it. Eat up, you need to.”

She nodded and picked up the fork, aware he was right. She did need food. Without her breast milk, Marie would have no nourishment. “Thanks. I could use a change of clothes. And I did pack a box of disposable diapers and some baby clothes in the car, too.”

She swallowed a forkful of scrambled eggs, then paused. “It just occurred to me to wonder why you left that outside light on in the midst of a storm. Were you expecting someone?”

He shook his head, looking uncomfortable. “A habit left over from childhood, I guess.”

“You mean from when your mother left a light on for you?”

“You might say that.”

Puzzled, but also curious about his obvious uneasiness, she asked, “Have I said something wrong?”

He released his breath in a sigh before muttering, “At least I had the sense to leave the damn light on.”

She’d hit a nerve, though she hadn’t a clue why. Somehow she knew, though, it had nothing to do with her.

“Your eggs are getting cold,” he told her.

So they were. She picked up her fork again.

Between naps and nursing the baby, the time passed so quickly Fay was surprised to note darkness when she looked at the windows. Dan had run the washer and dryer, so temporarily, at least, Marie had clean diapers and blankets. That evening, after he’d prepared dinner and cleaned the dishes, he pulled a chair up beside the couch where Fay had propped herself up on pillows.

“I’m still curious about how you got here,” he said. “Want to talk about it?”

“Just the facts ma’am?” she asked, smiling at him.

“My dad used to watch Dragnet,” he said. “Police work in those days seemed pretty cut-and-dried.”

“My dad watched it, too.”

“Was he a cop?”

She shook her head. “He worked as a foreman in an automobile foundry until he retired.” When he could have been so much more, she couldn’t help thinking. At least she hadn’t inherited her dad’s lack of ambition. Fay sighed. “I guess you could say my dad is part of the reason I’m here in this cabin. He didn’t want me to have the baby.”

Dan frowned. “Because your—the baby’s father was dead?”

How careful he was not to say husband, Fay told herself, wondering if all cops were so tactful. “You’re right in thinking I wasn’t married to Marie’s father,” she said. And that was all she intended to tell him about what had happened there.

“Anyway,” she continued, “my mother died five years ago. Since my father and I were at odds, I decided I’d rather have my baby in a more nurturing atmosphere. I still had a couple more weeks to go before my due date, and I made up my mind to drive to Duluth to see my mother’s sister and have the baby there. Aunt Marie and I have always been close.”

“So she’ll be worrying about why you haven’t shown up.”

Fay shook her head. “Aunt Marie invited me to come stay with her any time I wanted to. She said she wasn’t planning on making any trips for a few months and she’d love to have me there. I knew she meant it, which was why I decided to go. I called her to let her know, but when the answering machine started to kick in, I hung up.”

“You didn’t leave a message?”

“No, I thought I’d call her on the way. You probably think that sounds so impulsive, but that’s the way I am.”

“You’ll get no polite denial from me.”

She tamped down her spurt of annoyance. Okay, she had been a tad impulsive. But she’d badly needed someone who cared about her, someone who would welcome the baby. “I did try to call, but my cell phone battery went dead.

“I planned to use a pay phone and I tried that, too, from a gas station near the Straits. But there was only one phone at the place and the guy using it apparently intended to talk forever. The next place I stopped, just before I crossed the Straits, had an out-of-order phone.”

“What you’re telling me is your aunt didn’t know you were on your way to Duluth.”

She sighed. “That’s one of those Sergeant Friday facts. So Aunt Marie won’t be worrying about me.” Fay eyed him. “I did plan to call once I crossed the Mighty Mac, but by then it had started to rain and I figured I’d just drive straight through. No need to tell me, I realize it was a bad choice.”

When he raised one eyebrow slightly and seemed about to speak, she tried to change the subject. “You must have some kind of police rank.”

“Sergeant, just like Friday.”

Though no expert about the police force, she knew sergeants didn’t walk beats. “That makes you a detective?”

He nodded. “Once over the bridge, the rain got progressively worse, I gather.”

“Yes, but I had no idea it was going to get so bad I got lost.” She glanced toward the makeshift crib. “And I certainly had no warning I was going to start labor.”

“The cabin phone’s still out,” he said. “Can’t expect any repairs ’til the storm blows out. And a cell phone won’t work in this remote area, so it’s just as well your aunt didn’t know you were on your way to her. How about your father?”

“I did leave a message on his answering machine saying I was leaving town and didn’t know when I’d be back. Not that he cares.”

She fielded Dan’s skeptical look and gazed calmly back at him. He had no idea what her father was like. Time to try to turn the tables again. It didn’t seem likely he had a wife if he was out here all alone in the wilderness, but he must have relatives. “Isn’t there anyone who might be worrying about you?”

“Bruce, Will and Megan, my brothers and my sister, know I can take care of myself. They live in Evergreen Bluff, the closest town to this cabin. We’ll be going there as soon as we can get out to the main road. Bruce is a doctor and I’m taking you and Marie to him to be checked out.”

“Oh. Well, thanks.” She waited a minute, then said, “Do you actually live in this cabin year round?”

“I live downstate, in Archer.”

“Archer!” she cried. “So do I. What a coincidence.”

As they stared at each other in mutual surprise, she noticed again how bright a blue his eyes were, really an unusual and attractive color. She also saw, for the first time, a thin scar running from his hairline across his left temple. When she realized she was raising her hand as though to touch the scar, she hastily clasped her hands together. What was the matter with her? Had the baby’s birth addled her wits?

Marie cried, as if on cue, and Dan hurried to change her and bring her to Fay to nurse.

The next morning, though intermittent snow mixed with rain still sputtered from the clouds, the wind no longer howled around the cabin. After making sure Fay and Marie were all right, Dan set out to try to find the wrecked car. He wished Fay would get some color back in her face. The slow and careful way she walked around the cabin and her frequent naps told him she still wasn’t up to par.

He was almost to the creek before he saw the snow-mounded car up against a good-sized pine. He was about to trudge through the snow to it when he noticed the bridge over the creek looked wrong. Wading closer, he let loose with a few choice expletives when he realized what had happened. The no-longer-frozen creek, roiling over its banks with snow melt, had washed out the footings on the far end of the bridge, closest to the main road. Great. Just great. No way to cross the damn thing until it got fixed.

As he slogged his way back to the wreck, he tried to console himself with the fact that at least her car was on this side of the bridge so he had access to supplies for the baby and for Fay. After brushing away some of the snow, it was obvious to him the car would have to be towed when that was possible. It seemed a miracle Fay hadn’t been seriously injured.

He wound up making two trips to transport everything he found inside the car to the cabin. On the second trip he thought about Fay wandering lost and half-frozen through the storm. He gritted his teeth, knowing she and the baby might well have died out here, if he hadn’t thought of his mother’s strange belief about storms and left the porch light on. Though he tried not to think about his mother much, the memory he’d dredged up about the light had saved lives.

But his mother was someone he never talked about, even to his siblings.

“Good thing you brought so much for the baby,” he told Fay, once he was inside again. “Looks like we may be stuck here longer than I figured.” Then he gave her the bad news about the bridge.

“If it can’t be helped, there’s nothing we can do,” she said, much less upset than he’d thought she would be. “You said there was enough food for us, I have breast milk for Marie, and now we have the stuff from the car. We’ll make it all right, the three of us.”

We. The three of us. Her words warmed him even as he tried to push them from his mind. Fay and her baby were his responsibility until he could get the two of them to safety. Still, he was Dan Sorenson, a man who wanted no ties to anyone.

Since Fay was still too weak to trust herself carrying the baby back and forth from the wood-box, Dan continued to fetch Marie for Fay to nurse and, much of the time, to change her diaper as well. He was getting more adept at the latter, especially with the disposable ones. Fay had also included a dozen cloth diapers, which some book she’d read had told her would be welcome in case of an emergency. Dan was sure the author had never figured on this kind of emergency.

He’d thought about and discarded the idea of giving her the only bedroom, in the loft, because he doubted her ability to climb up and down the steep stairs in her condition. Besides, where she was on the couch, near the fireplace, was the warmest spot in the house. Dan had been sleeping in the Morris chair since her arrival since he couldn’t take the chance she or the baby would need him in the night and he might not hear from the loft. He’d never felt such a tremendous urge to protect anyone as he did Fay and her baby.

Watching her sleep, he noticed how attractive she looked with her brown hair now softly curling around her face, in the topaz robe that changed her eyes to the same warm shade. He wondered about the baby’s father, who’d died, and about Fay’s father, who didn’t want his own grandchild. He glanced over at the wood-box, where Marie was sleeping. Though he’d recovered the baby bed from the car and set it up, they’d decided together the baby was better off where she was.

“You’re frowning.” Fay’s voice told him she was awake. “Having bad thoughts?”

“Not as bad as some,” he told her.

“Yeah, I get those in-between ones. I found the best thing to rid myself of them is to work.”

“What kind of work do you do?”

She hitched herself up higher on the couch. “I’m a consultant.”

“That covers a lot of ground.”

“So do I. After I got my MBA, I worked for a high-powered management company that sent me all over the place doing this and that for different firms. Once I had enough experience, I decided I could do better on my own, so I took the leap and it’s worked out great.”

“A high-powered consultant.”

She smiled and said, “Good description.”

“What did Marie’s father do?”

“Something similar, only for a firm, not for himself.”

“Now you’re frowning,” he told her.

“I like a man to be ambitious. Ken…” Her words trailed off.

“Sorry to pry. A cop gets used to asking questions.”

“I don’t mind your questions. After what we’ve been through together we’re hardly strangers. It’s just that I discovered somewhat late that Ken and I didn’t mesh too well. There was no way I could marry him and I told him so.”

Dan hid his surprise. “Then he died?”

Fay bit her lip. “I’d already broken off with him by that time. I had no idea then I might be pregnant, but that wouldn’t have changed my mind. It was all so sudden, the leukemia he never knew he had and killed him almost overnight.” She took a deep breath. “Logically, his death wasn’t my fault, but sometimes I feel so guilty.” Tears glimmered in her eyes. “Why is it logic has no effect on emotion?”

Dan moved from the chair to sit beside her on the couch and took her hand between both of his. “You can’t blame yourself for his disease.”

She sighed. “I know. But then, even though I’ve always used protection, I discovered I was carrying Ken’s child and told my father. He insisted I not have this baby. He hated Ken. Dad never reconciled himself to the fact I meant to have my baby.” The tears ran down her cheeks.

Dan wrapped his arms around her and held her while she wept, patting her soothingly, trying to ignore how good her softness felt against him.

When her tears eased, she drew away, wiping her eyes with a tissue from the pocket of her robe. “Sorry. It should have been Aunt Marie listening to all this, but I didn’t make it that far.”