LITMIR.BIZ

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I grew up in it. I watched them pour their hearts into it. I can’t just sell it and move on.”

      He didn’t know why she seemed to need his agreement, but she did.

      “I understand,” he said.

      Apparently she didn’t think he could. “I’ve never heard of you,” she said, rocking the baby as he began to fuss. The words suggested that was his problem rather than hers. “Do you live here, or are you just helping out?”

      “I went to medical school with Nathan,” he replied, opening the examining-room door for her. “I visited last summer, and he told me if I wanted to come back, he’d give me a job. I liked it here, so I took him up on it. This is my third day as a resident of Jester.”

      “Well…learn to soft-pedal that aggression,” she said, stepping out into the hallway. “Most of the people here are kind and neighborly and good to their children.”

      She offered the advice seriously. He took it humbly, eager to send her on her way so that he could put in his last hour here, get something to eat and go to his bed—such as it was. He’d been sleeping on a cot in the storage room upstairs until he found a place to live.

      “Hey, Doc. How’re you liking Jester?” Luke McNeil stood in the waiting room, hat in hand, chatting with Carlie Goodwin, the receptionist. She went back to work when Connor claimed Luke’s attention.

      Connor had been on call the night before, and the sheriff had brought him a teenager he’d picked up for drunk driving. The kid had cut himself on broken glass in a fall while trying to escape. Connor had liked McNeil and his caring but no-nonsense approach to law enforcement.

      Connor went forward to shake hands with him. “I’m doing fine, Sheriff. Too bad about this little guy.”

      McNeil looked alarmed. “Is he sick?”

      “No,” Connor assured him. “I meant, it’s too bad somebody abandoned him and left him to the mercies of the system.”

      “Yeah, well, the system’s not working too well at the moment.” He frowned in concern. “Every time the wind picks up around here, the phone lines go down. We have virtually no cell phone reception. I can’t get through to Pine Run to get a caseworker here.” He turned a subtly pleading look on Shelly.

      She began to fidget. “I can’t, Luke. I’ve never taken care of a baby. I wouldn’t know what to do. A couple of hours would be one thing, but through the night? I…I…”

      As though on cue, the baby grabbed a fistful of her hair, yawned mightily, blinked deeply several times, then fell asleep on her shoulder.

      Connor had never seen a woman look so terrified at the prospect of caring for a baby. What he’d taken for lack of enthusiasm about her baby when he’d thought she was his mother was apparently just inexperience. Or possibly simple unwillingness to deal with babies.

      He couldn’t help the animosity that stirred inside him. He knew it was indicative of his own personal dichotomy where babies were concerned. While he truly felt that people who didn’t want children shouldn’t have them, he wanted them. Yet the only women who seemed to cross his path were those who didn’t. One of the many irreconcilable differences that had ended his marriage to Lisa a year ago was their divergent opinions on whether or not to have children.

      This woman was certainly entitled to do what she wanted with her own life, but he wanted her to come to the rescue of this baby—at least for tonight. He couldn’t keep it. He was sleeping on a cot in an upstairs room that had nothing else in it but supplies. And as long as Nathan was gone, he could be called out at any time of the night.

      McNeil sighed. “Then, I guess we’ll have to leave the baby with Connor, Shelly.”

      “With who?” she asked.

      McNeil looked from her to him. “You mean you haven’t even introduced yourselves?”

      “No,” she said. “He was too busy accusing me of child neglect.”

      Connor kept quiet. It didn’t look as though there was any way he was going to be able to defend himself in this.

      McNeil pointed to Connor. “Shelly, this is Connor O’Rourke, Jester’s new pediatrician. Doc, this is Shelly Dupree, owner of The Brimming Cup and usually a very nice lady.” He fixed Shelly with a serious expression. “Now, come on. You got to help me find a solution here.”

      Shelly rocked the baby from side to side, her mouth set in a pugnacious line. “We can’t leave Max with him. He has a bad disposition.”

      McNeil studied her in puzzlement. “Now, I know that isn’t true, Shelly, because I woke him up in the middle of the night last night with an injured kid and he was very kind to the boy. And he didn’t yell at me, either.”

      “You wear a gun, Luke,” she pointed out. “Nobody yells at you.”

      McNeil took each of them by an arm and led them to the old brown vinyl sofa and chairs. “I have a thought,” he said. “Let’s talk this through.” He sat them side by side on the sofa, then pulled up a chair facing them.

      He pointed to Shelly. “You’re unsure of how to take care of the baby.”

      “Yes,” she agreed.

      “And you—” he indicated Connor “—are sleeping on a cot in the supply room.”

      “Yeah.”

      “So what if—” he smiled winningly at Shelly “—the doc stays the night at your place so that if you have a problem with the baby, he’ll be there to help.”

      Her eyes widened. She looked at Connor as though he carried the Ebola virus.

      “I’ll try to get through to Pine Run tomorrow. I’ll even drive down there, if I have to. But I can’t do that tonight because I still have a crowd of picketers in front of the office and a bunch of reporters who’ve taken offense at their attitude. Come on, Shell. Give me a break. The other day when I was having lunch at your place, you told me you’d thought about taking in a boarder.”

      She didn’t want to do this. It had trouble written all over it. In bold caps.

      But the weight of the warm baby on her shoulder was scrambling her determination to have nothing more to do with him. She finally had life the way she wanted it. She was solvent. She could do things. She didn’t know what yet, but when the opportunity arose, she wanted to be ready.

      She couldn’t afford to be sidetracked.

      But this was just for one night. And it involved the grumpy doctor, but she could live with that if it would help Max.

      “What do you think, Doc?” Luke asked.

      Connor O’Rourke turned to Shelly, a look of clear reluctance on his face. “You promise not to make my life miserable while I’m there?” he asked.

      There was amusement in his eyes, but not a hint of a smile on his face. She wasn’t sure if he was teasing her or not.

      “If you promise not to make assumptions about me,” she retorted stiffly.

      “All right!” Luke said with relief. “Now we’re talking.” He stood, apparently anxious to get away before one of them had a change of heart. “I’ll try to contact Pine Run first thing in the morning, and I’ll see what I can do about tracking down his mother. Thanks, Shelly. Thank you, Doc.”

      “Yeah.”

      “Sure.”

      The door closed with a bang behind Luke, and the baby raised his head with a whimper.

      “It’s okay, it’s okay,” Shelly crooned, patting his back and rocking him. He put his head down immediately and went back to sleep.

      “I live on Orchard Street,” Shelly said, putting her purse on her shoulder and moving carefully to her feet with the baby. O’Rourke

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