Found: One Secret Baby (4 page)

What she did remember was how happy it made her just to be with Morgan, to have him smile at her as if they shared some wonderful secret. Not that they agreed on everything they talked about, but even arguing playfully with him was a joy.

The mood shifted as they lingered over a last cup of espresso.

“Tell me about your mother,” Morgan said.

Rosalie closed her eyes and smiled. “She was a free spirit. She loved flowers.”

“No surprise there.” He chuckled.

“And she loved me.” That love had been Rosalie’s rock through everything that happened, but the simple words brought a dark shadow to Morgan’s face.

“Did she look like you?”

“She was tall, slender, fair. I look more like the women on my father’s side of the family.”

Morgan’s voice was gentle as he asked, “When did he die?”

She stared at the dark liquid in her cup. “He didn’t. The day the wheelchair arrived, he left.”

Morgan tensed, then let out a long breath. “How long was your mother ill?”

“About fifteen years. That’s pretty average for the progressive form of MS she had.”

“It must have been hard.”

Rosalie shrugged. “We got by. I had to live at home while I was in college and law school, but she made sure my studies came first. We managed pretty well, until …” She cleared the tears from her throat. “Until we didn’t. I hated it when she had to move to a care facility. She loved her flower garden so much. But she made the best of it. She made the best of everything.”

Her tone must have told him she didn’t want to go any further down that road, because he let a long silence fall.

As they’d talked, their bodies had shifted until they sat so close together their shoulders touched. Rosalie didn’t quite know when during their conversation Morgan had put his hand on her knee, perhaps to emphasize a point he was making, but the weight and warmth of it felt right, as if it belonged there. Being with him, sharing her memories with him, felt right, as if she belonged there.

Then he turned more toward her and the hand moved a few inches up her leg. Closeness became intimacy, warmth became heat, heat became need. Her face almost touching his, she became aware that they were alone in their corner of the dining room.

Something inside her melted. It had been so long since she’d allowed a man to hold her, kiss her … Her hands flowed of their own accord to his shoulders and her mind emptied of everything except the hope that he wanted to kiss her as much as she wanted to kiss him.

Morgan was mesmerized by the woman beside him and the sad story she’d told. This woman might understand the sadness that haunted him. More, she had the heart to care about that sadness. He looked into her eyes, surprised to discover the little specks of brown were gone, leaving a pure sea-green a man could drown in.

Her lips were wet and full, as if he’d already kissed them, nipped them, plundered them, as his body had been screaming at him to do since he first saw her in the gallery.

He thought about suggesting they go to the condo, or at least move to the relative privacy of his car, but the moment was too fragile, too precious.

He put both arms around her and drew her closer. His body hardened when his wrist brushed the side of her lush breast. The brief contact made her frown. He charmed the frown away by brushing his lips across her forehead.

When he lowered his head, she lifted her face so he could see her unspoken longing.

The first few bars of “
Für Elise
” broke through the haze of desire. He closed his eyes against the interruption, but managed a smile as he pulled away.

“Your purse is playing music.”

Rosalie had been so lost in Morgan’s midnight-blue eyes she hadn’t heard her cell.

She shook her head to clear it, then gasped and grabbed the phone out of her evening bag, her heart pounding. Joey!

“Yes?” Her voice was a squeak of alarm.

“Rosie, it’s the kid.” Vanessa sounded half-panicked, too. “He’s got a fever of 104 and it’s still climbing. At first, he wouldn’t stop crying, but now all he does is lie in his crib and whimper. Aaron says it’s not serious enough for the emergency room, but he thinks it might be a good idea to take him to the urgent care clinic. What do you think?”

Rosalie forced herself to breathe. She should never have left Joey when he was sick. But guilt—or panic—wasn’t what he needed now.

“I don’t know! Just let me get home. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“Okay. But hurry.” Vanessa’s voice shook with alarm.

“I will. I promise.”

Rosalie clicked off and closed her eyes against the nightmare. She dug around in her purse for the keys. To a car that was parked half-way across Beverly Hills.

“What’s wrong?” Morgan asked, his face a polite mask.

“Can you take me back to my car? I need to get home right away because …”

She couldn’t tell him why. Despite how much she’d enjoyed her time with him, he was still the enemy. She should never have let herself forget that.

“Because something’s happened,” she told him. “I have to get home.”

“Okay.”

His tone sounded wrong, but she didn’t have time now to figure out why. She had to get home to Joey.

Morgan threw some bills on the table to cover their tab and followed her as she rushed out of the deli. “Where are you parked?”

When she told him, he said, “You can leave your car there overnight. I’ll take you home.”

“No. Please, just take me to my car.”

He opened the car door for her and she slid in.

“You’ll get home much faster if you let me drive you straight home.”

Her mind was too numb with fear to be able to choose between the time letting Morgan drive would save and the risk of having him anywhere near Joey. When Morgan turned his car toward the freeway, she didn’t protest.

With the light late night traffic and a heavier-than-legal foot on the gas, he had her home in fifteen minutes, but by the time he drove up in front of the house her chest was so tight she could barely breathe, much less think. She bolted out of the car as soon as it stopped and dashed up the walk.

Aaron had seen her coming and held the front door open, the front-hall light a beacon, and shut it behind her as she ran in.

Morgan sat in the dark car, unsure what had happened. Or rather, unsure of what it meant.

One minute he’d been half intoxicated with touching Rosalie, fascinated with the promise, even eagerness in her eyes. The next minute it was as if he’d stepped into a different reality.

With her so close, he’d forgotten about everything that might stand between them, about Lillian and Charlie, about Aaron. Maybe Aaron was where he’d gone wrong.

Rosalie had been in a state of panic the moment her cell rang. By the time they got to her house, she’d seemed scared to death. Morgan had thought maybe her Aaron was sick or injured, but, no, he’d been waiting for her at the door when they got there, a dark shadow twice her size.

Could there be a more sinister reason for her intense feelings about Charlie and the woman he’d murdered? Was that why the usually cool Ms. Walker had been so nervous the day he was at the house? Why she’d jumped so much when the neighborhood busybody mentioned Joey/Aaron’s name that she’d nearly given herself a concussion?

Morgan drove away, a sick dread in his stomach.

He slept in fits and spurts, and got up the next morning feeling as if something dark and dangerous was closing in on him.

When coffee and breakfast did nothing to ease his mood, he had his assistant in Boston reschedule his flight home before he called Rosalie’s office.

“I’m sorry,” the male receptionist intoned in his out-of-work actor’s baritone, “Ms. Walker isn’t in. She won’t be again until Monday.”

Anger shot through Morgan’s system. Had that big jerk beaten Rosalie up last night?

He thanked the receptionist and headed for the car. He needed to get to her house and make sure she was okay.

Joey’s wail broke through the black haze of exhaustion and pulled Rosalie out of her bed.

When she reach his room, tears flowed down her cheeks at the sight of him standing there rocking side to side while clutching the side of his crib, the way he did every morning.

A quick touch to his cheek told her the fever was still down. The medicine they’d given him at the urgent care center had done the trick. She lifted him from the crib and gave him a ferocious hug.

“Okay, food or diaper first?”

“Best.”

“Breakfast it is. I bet you’re hungry. Vanessa said you didn’t want your bedtime bottle,” she murmured as she put him down and took his tiny hand in hers so he could toddle beside her to the kitchen. “You gave her and Aaron a real scare last night, you know.”

“Vessa,” Joey echoed. “Run.”

She lifted him into his highchair, mixed his cereal and set it in the microwave.

“Yes, Vanessa and Aaron watched you last night.”

The sudden memory of what she’d been doing while they’d dealt with Joey’s fever froze her in place until the microwave’s penetrating ding brought her back to the moment.

She’d almost been kissed by Morgan Danby. Had almost kissed him back.

The man who claimed Charlie Thompson for his brother. The man who could take Joey away from her.

Shame washed over her.

Joey made an impatient sound. She finished fixing his cereal and set it on the highchair. With luck he wouldn’t demand that she feed him. She needed time to pull herself together.

Automatically she fed the cats, who were twining around her legs. When the coffee-maker sputtered to a stop she poured herself a cup and stood by the sink to drink the bitter liquid.

Instead of pulling herself together, she fell apart more. Márya’s will gave her custody of Joey, but that wasn’t the final word. Not in the face of blood relatives, wealthy blood relatives who wanted him. And the fact that she’d deceived those relatives would count against her in court. But what else could she have done?

The questions and the guilt, spun deeper and deeper. But one thing was clear. She must never get within kissing distance of Morgan Danby again.

A clatter and plop on the floor told her Joey had had enough breakfast. She took a deep breath before she bent down to right the bowl and wipe the cereal off the floor.

By the time they were both dressed, Joey was restless. Maybe she could drive him out to a playground at the beach.

That’s when she remembered her car was still in Beverly Hills.

If she’d been thinking more clearly last night she wouldn’t have this problem. But letting Morgan Danby take the weight of making even one decision off her shoulders had been too tempting. Everything about him had been too tempting.

She didn’t let herself think about what it would be like to have someone around to help her make decisions all the time, someone to share the burdens and joys of raising Joey.

“Pak.” Joey bounced in his playpen. “Pak!”

“Okay, tiger. We’ll go to our usual park. Let me get a jacket from your closet.”

In his room she noticed a bag of his outgrown clothes that she’d set aside to pass along to a neighbor down the street who had a boy two months younger than Joey. Maybe she could borrow their car seat and take an expensive taxi ride to Beverly Hills to pick up her car.

She bundled Joey up, put on her own jacket, and picked him up for the short walk down to the neighbor’s.

“So, Joey …” she started as she opened the front door.

Morgan Danby stood on the other side, one hand raised to knock.

Rosalie’s heart stuttered, stopped, raced. It took every ounce of energy she had to breathe. Tense, painful seconds ticked by while the three of them silently stared at each other.

“No!” Joey cried suddenly, pointing down.

Smudge was trying to slip past her legs out the open door. Sylvester, as usual, was right on his heels.

Morgan crouched down to block the cats’ path, then raised his head, eyes boring through her. “Why don’t we all go inside?”

She nodded numbly as she stepped away and let him herd the cats back into the house. He shut the door with a noise that was only fractions short of a slam.

“The living room?” he suggested, when she still couldn’t find any words or the breath to say them.

He looked around the room at the playpen and scattering of toys she’d hidden away so carefully when he’d been there before. Joey squirmed and kicked to get down, but she held him tighter, stroking his head to calm him. Fear, anger, regret burned her throat to silence.

Morgan turned his attention to the child in her arms.

“Joey?”

The boy giggled at his own name, then buried his head in her shoulder.

“Josef, perhaps? For Ms. Mendelev’s father?”

She made the mistake of looking Morgan in the eye. The rage that glowed there stifled any possible defense she might have thought she could offer.

He laughed, a mixture of anger and triumph that sent an arctic chill down her spine and made her hold the precious bundle in her arms so close Joey gave a squeak of protest.

“It’s all in my favor, isn’t it,” Morgan went on. “Or Lillian’s favor. Trying to keep the child secret from her won’t serve you well in court. Of course, you know that.”

The words shattered the icy fear that held her silent and immobile. Finally able to draw a full breath, she set Joey in his playpen and blindly handed him his favorite stuffed bear.

“I also know the woman who raised Charlie Thompson should never be allowed to raise another child.”

“She raised me, too.”

That stopped her for a half a beat. “I rest my case.”

The last remnants of polite charm vanished from his face.

“You’ll hear from my stepmother’s lawyer soon, Ms. Walker. Very soon.”

Before she caught her breath, he was gone.

“Bye-bye,” Joey said solemnly.

Morgan drove the rented Ferrari to the nearest commercial street and pulled into the parking lot of one of L.A.’s ubiquitous strip malls.

He needed to let the rage boil off so he could think. He never acted out of anger. He wasn’t that kind of man. He wasn’t like Charlie.

The image of a small face framed by red-blonde curls floated into his mind. Damn if Joey didn’t look like the pictures Lillian had of Charlie as a baby, or a toddler, or whatever you called a kid that age.

Morgan took another deep breath and wished it was late enough in the day to have a drink. No, he didn’t. He wasn’t that kind of man, either.

So, what to do now? How could be get some payback at the sneaky Ms. Walker for what she’d put him through?

She hadn’t lied to him in her capacity as an attorney, so disbarment wasn’t an issue. His friend’s gallery had already sold most of her mother’s paintings, so he couldn’t stop that from happening. Not that Ms. Walker cared about the money.

Then, the obvious answer. Nothing would hurt her more than taking away the kid she’d clung to for dear life during most of their brief conversation. She clearly loved the little bastard. Love always made it easy for people to hurt you.

Despite the threats he’d made, he’d never really intended to help Lillian get custody if the kid already had a decent home. He’d hoped she’d settle for visitation rights. Rights she’d probably never use, since it would mean disrupting her life in Boston to travel to Los Angeles. His main goal had been to keep Charlie’s father from getting at the kid.

Ms. Walker’s lies changed everything.

Not only did they give him a good reason to carry out the charge Lillian had given him to bring Charlie’s child home, they also made it easier for him to do that. He could make Lillian happy and have his revenge on the lady lawyer, too.

As his anger faded, cold reason raised its ugly head. If given the choice, wouldn’t Rosalie rather have him hurt her physically than take kid away from her?

He shook off the uncomfortable implications of that thought and looked out at the string of fast-food restaurants in front of him.

Two boys walked along the sidewalk. Suddenly the larger one lunged sideways and pushed the smaller off the curb and into the parking lot. The harried-looking woman a few feet ahead of them turned at something the larger one said, then yelled a curse at the smaller one and grabbed his arm to yank him back up on the curb, oblivious to the larger one’s smirk.

Something twisted inside of Morgan. The hopeless expression on the younger boy’s face reminded him too starkly of his own past.

And of the look in Rosalie’s eyes when he’d stormed out of her house.

Sure, the lovely Ms. Walker had tricked him. But maybe revenge wasn’t the best reason for whatever he did next. Maybe he should be thinking about what was best for Charlie’s kid.

Rosalie was lucky enough to get an appointment with Joey’s social worker on Monday morning. Ms. Cameron was so overloaded with cases she often took as long as a week to return a phone call, but someone had cancelled and Rosalie managed to get the free spot.

“I’m so glad you’ve finally decided to go through with the adoption,” Ms. Cameron told her. “You and Joey both need the closure.”

The social worker’s cheerful smile grated against nerves worn raw by worry and guilt.

Rosalie cleared her throat and managed to say, “Yes,” in an almost-normal voice.

Ms. Cameron glanced over the forms Rosalie had spent some of the sleepless hours of the last three nights completing. When the social worker got to the last page, she frowned.

“There’s a name listed here under next-of-kin, but no contact information. I thought you didn’t know whether Joey had any living relatives besides his father or not.”

“I didn’t.” Rosalie swallowed. “His father’s mother contacted me recently.”

Ms. Cameron set the sheaf of papers down. “What’s she like?”

Rosalie closed her eyes against the image of Morgan Danby’s face that danced through her mind. “She didn’t contact me in person. I met with her stepson.”

Ms. Cameron leaned back. “What’s he like?”

A litany of inappropriate responses roared through Rosalie’s mind. Handsome. Charming. Intelligent. Sexy. Hot. Cold. Angry. And out for revenge.

“Not much like Joey’s father, thank goodness. They’re very wealthy, apparently.”

“Does this grandmother want visitation rights?”

Rosalie swallowed a wave of panic. “I think she may be interested in custody of Joey.”

Ms. Cameron raised her eyebrows. “Since you’re an attorney, I assume you know what your rights are here.”

Rosalie nodded. She’d spent the rest of her sleepless weekend nights making herself an expert on California adoption law.

“Then we’ll want to move forward as quickly as possible on the adoption.” Ms. Cameron’s tone conveyed the optimism Rosalie needed. “First, we’ll need to do a DNA test.”

“A what?”

“A DNA test to establish that this,” she looked down at the papers in front of her, “Lillian Danby is, in fact, Joey’s grandmother.”

The idea that Márya could have ever cheated on Charlie had never crossed Rosalie’s mind. Her friend wouldn’t have dared do that, of course, even if she’d been the kind of woman who might have, but for the first time since she’d opened the door to Morgan Danby on Friday morning, Rosalie felt a glimmer of hope.

“How is that done?” she asked. “Would Mrs. Danby have to come to L.A. for the test?”

“No.”

Rosalie’s hope faded again as Ms. Cameron explained the procedure for DNA tests of this sort. Nothing there to keep Charlie’s mother from proving she had a claim to Joey.

“How are my chances?” Rosalie couldn’t stop from asking before she left.

“I’d say they’re excellent. You’re a great mom and Joey loves you. I’ll be sure to put that in my report. And you’re the guardian his mother chose for him. As long as there’s nothing negative in your file, there shouldn’t be any problem with the adoption going through.”

Nothing negative in the file, such as lying about Joey’s existence to his presumably loving and grieving grandmother. Throat too thick with tears for words, Rosalie nodded.

“Give your boy a big kiss for me.”

She nodded again and went out to her car, the California sunshine dimmed by her own personal bank of dark clouds.

She’d been a fool. Morgan Danby had taken her by surprise and she’d acted like an idiot.

Not just on Friday, when she’d added insult to injury, but the first time he showed up in her office. She should never have lied to him. She’d known it all along. But the thought of losing Joey had made her stupid. And stupidity never paid.

She drove to her office and grimly dove into the pile of work that waited on her desk.

Lillian was overjoyed, of course. Morgan had decided against telling her on the phone. Instead he waited until he was back in Boston and told her the news over drinks in the conservatory of the Back Bay mansion his family had owed for over a hundred years. The air was thick with the smell of growing things, marred by Lillian’s expensive perfume.

“A boy!” His stepmother set down her martini. “Does he look at all like Charlie?”

“Pretty much. He’s blonder, I guess.”

Lillian smiled coyly and touched her own blonde curls, as if they both didn’t know how much she paid every month to keep it that color. “I can hardly wait to see him. How soon can you bring the little angel to me?”

Little imp would be more like it, Morgan suspected.

“You know it’s more complicated than that, Lillian. Ms. Walker is the child’s legal guardian. You’d have to go to court and get custody of him first.”

“Ms. Walker? Isn’t she the one who lied to you about whether the child existed? I knew you were letting the woman put one over on you. Men!” She shook her head.

Morgan took a sip of his single malt and forced the image of Rosalie’s face out of his mind.

“She misled me, but the boy’s mother chose Ms. Walker to be his guardian, and the court is going to give a lot of weight to that, especially given the circumstances of his mother’s death.”

At least Lillian had the good grace to look uncomfortable. She picked up the martini glass and twisted it in her hand without taking a drink, then set it down again.

“What do I have to do to get my grandson?”

Morgan sighed. “The first step is a DNA test to prove Charlie was his father.”

“Do you mean that foreign woman Charlie lived with was sleeping with other men?”

“Of course not. But the court isn’t going to take your word for it that you’re the child’s next-of-kin. They’ll want proof.”

“Then what?”

Morgan launched into the details of the procedures that he’d studied online before he left California.

“It seems like a great deal of trouble to get my grandson back. After all, he’s my own flesh and blood,” she protested when he was finished.

“The courts will want what’s best for the child.”

Lillian gestured broadly to the subtle opulence around them. “I can buy him anything he wants, send him to exclusive schools. How could that not be what’s best for him?”

Morgan acted as if it was a rhetorical question and took another sip of his drink.

“You’re sure my grandson is okay?” Lillian frowned. “Mentally, I mean?”

“Yes. He seems bright and healthy.”

“He wasn’t damaged by how that woman lived? Homeless shelters.” She shuddered.

“Shelters for battered women,” he corrected.

“Whatever.” She thought for a minute. “Do you think the court will let me change his name once I have custody? Josef Mendelev sounds so … so foreign.”

“What would you change it to?”

“I was thinking Charleston Danby would be appropriate.”

“You want to name him after Charlie?” Morgan carefully set his glass down to hide the tremor of anger in his hands.

She sat straighter. “Charleston is an old family name. My grandfather was a Charleston.”

“Lillian, the boy is almost a year and a half old. Maybe you could change his last name, but he knows his name is Joey. If you don’t like Josef, you could change it to Joseph.”

Since she pronounced the two names the same way, she gave him a puzzled look in reply.

“Or,” he said as casually as he could, “you could leave him with the only mother he remembers. You could visit him every few months, maybe have him come here to visit you during the summer when he’s older.”

“But she tried to keep my grandson a secret from me. Why would I allow a woman like that to raise him?”

“Because she loves him, and he loves her.”

“He’ll love me, too, once he knows I’m his grandmother. I don’t understand why you’d suggest giving away Charlie’s child.”

“If you let Ms. Walker have custody, you’re likely to get visitation rights. But if you take her to court and she convinces the judge that you’re too, um, senior to chase after an active toddler, you might end up with nothing.”

She sniffed. “I can hire people to chase after him. That’s how I raised you and Charlie.”

Which was the whole point, but this wasn’t the time for hard truths. “I’m not sure that’s what a judge will want to hear.”

Harkins, the butler, appeared to announce, in the fake English accent that always grated on Morgan’s nerves, that dinner was ready.

“Felicity Mason called this morning and wanted to join us for dinner,” Lillian announced as Morgan helped her into her chair at one end of the table that could have seated twelve. “I told her I wanted you to myself this evening.”

He gave a low sigh. He wouldn’t have minded the distraction of his friend’s wry wit.

“I didn’t know she was back from France.”

He took his usual seat to Lillian’s right.

“She came back yesterday. Her mother is delighted to have her home again.”

The thoughtful expression on Lillian’s face as she took a sip of the soup the maid set in front of her should have been a warning.