The Baby Bargain. Wendy Warren

      Hold the phone.

      LJ’s brain, which was starting to hurt, scrambled to take in the information that she was a Children’s Connection client. By God, he loathed surprises.

      How was she a client? Of which services had she availed herself? Adoption or the fertility clinic?

      And what did she do here, anyway?

      Racking his brain some more, he sought a polite way to remind everyone present that he was the professional here and that Little Bo Peep didn’t know advertising from a flock of sheep.

      He opened his mouth, but applause came out. Huh? Frowning, he glanced around.

      Every soul around the table had his or her hands in prayer position, clapping enthusiastically. Heads nodded. Broad, unmistakably proud smiles wreathed every face.

      He looked to his left.

      Eden Carter ducked her head humbly, adding an “Oh, pshaw” shrug before she picked up her plate of cookies and passed it around.

      And he was worried about finding a polite way to discredit her?

      His irritation rose and his head pounded harder with each “Ahhh” a bite of her apparently excellent baked goods inspired.

      The hell with polite.

      The meeting was out of his control, the first time he recalled that happening ever, and he had five feet, six inches of curving Betty Crocker to thank for it.

      When the plate of cookies made it back to their end of the table, she reached in front of him and held it aloft. Unshakably pleasant, she offered, “Cookie? Only—”

      “Three Weight Watchers points?” he recited along with her. “I heard.” Smiling with no humor at all, he reached for a perfectly round disk studded with chocolate chips. Examined it. “It looks good. And sweet.”

      Returning the cookie to the plate, he curled his lips into something feral. “But I’m an Atkins man.” He leaned toward her, his words for her ears only. “See, I have a goal. Don’t think for one second that I’m going to let a little sugar get in my way.”

      Chapter Two

      “Then he looked at me with his beady eyes all scrunched up and nasty and said, ‘Don’t think for one second I’m going to be nice about this!’ Or something like that. That was the idea, anyway.”

      Eden sat on an Elmo beach towel spread atop the grass in Woodstock Park and recounted the afternoon’s weirdness for her best friend and housemate, Liberty Sanchez. Eden’s accent, modulated and subtle on a typical day, sounded particularly twangy when anger became her overriding emotion. “Oh, mah Gaawwwwd, what a weasel.”

      Snatching a red grape from the bag she’d brought for their dinner picnic and popping it into her mouth, Liberty shrugged with the fatalism she’d developed over her thirty years. “Sounds like a typical businessman. You get in his way, you’re dust.” Her near-black eyes narrowed. “Was it so important to make your point, Eden? I mean, I know you care about your business, but as long as what’s-his-face—”

      “Lawrence Logan, Jr., rich boy.”

      “As long as Junior saves the day, does it matter so much how he does it?”

      Eden cast her friend a look of disbelief. “Since when did you decide the end justifies the means? I do like that you called him Junior, though.”

      Remaining worked up, she slapped her hand on the towel, close to her playing son, who dropped his Elmo phone. Swiftly, Eden retrieved the toy and handed it back. “Sorry, honey. Mommy is in a snit, all right. You gotta bear with me. Some people get under my skin, and I just can’t scratch hard enough.”

      “Maybe,” Liberty said with her usual dry brand of calm, “the problem is you scratch yourself and think the other person is going to bleed.”

      Eden scowled at her best friend since middle school. “You have got to stop going to those twelve-step groups. You’re absolutely ruining my resentments.”

      Liberty said nothing more. Wrapping up the grapes and stashing them in a plastic container along with a tofu quiche she’d made for their dinner, she stowed the container in a nylon backpack and slipped the straps over her shoulders. While Eden got Liam ready for the short walk home, Liberty shook out their blanket.

      Watching her friend, Eden knew, as she’d always known, that although she and Liberty had reacted differently to their life circumstances, they’d both grown a protective armor that functioned as a second skin. Most of the time they understood each other quite well. They were excellent roommates and good friends. Moreover, Liberty was studying at night to be an ob-gyn nurse. Eden had wondered whether introducing a baby to the mélange would encourage Liberty to look elsewhere for housing, but her roommate’s enjoyment of babies had smoothed the path so far.

      Fitting Liam into his front carrier became easier with an extra set of hands as Liberty wordlessly adjusted the straps Eden had trouble reaching.

      “Thanks.” She passed Liberty the Elmo phone and took the cold purple teething ring Liberty handed her. Liam accepted it eagerly from his mother and began gumming. “You always know just what he needs. You sure you don’t want one of these? I know a great fertility clinic.”

      Liberty’s laugh sounded like a squawk. “No, thank you.” She smoothed Liam’s dark baby curls. “I’ll stick to helping them come into the world and babysitting this one.”

      It was the answer Eden expected. Liberty’s childhood had been as tough as Eden’s, one reason they’d bonded as girls and remained tight as they sprinted toward thirty. Whereas Liberty had decided she didn’t know enough about happy families to help create one, Eden for years had longed to start a family of her own and to give her kids what she had not had—a magical childhood.

      Like Liberty, she enjoyed the work of bringing children into the world. That, coupled with her keen interest in natural medicine, had led to her work as a doula and eventually to her job at the Children’s Connection. She’d worked hard, made a nice home, but had never met the guy. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t tried. Just the opposite: she’d tried too hard.

      The fallout from her failed relationships polluted the memory of her late teens and early twenties. Truth be told, she’d had a few too many relationships.

      Her head had been so doggone stuffed with dreams about forever and about that big strong somebody she could cling to in times of trouble…geez Louise, her poor brain hadn’t had any room to work.

      She’d turned a new leaf, thank God. Hadn’t had a relationship in an age, and never let herself even think anymore about strong arms and a man who’d die for her and blah, blah, blah.

      Her Southern ancestors may have thought it was impossible to raise a family without a man, but Eden knew better. It would have been pure foolishness to wait until she’d met someone marriageable before she’d had a baby. Her ovaries might have been the size of pinheads by then.

      Besides, she’d learned the hard way that waiting for someone to fix things generally meant you stayed broken. A smart woman solved her own problems.

      And a scared woman made deals with her Maker. Eden had made one.

      Since the age of fourteen, she’d been keeping a journal in which she wrote down her thoughts about life, her hopes and prayers and gripes. A few years ago, when she’d decided to have a child on her own, she’d written it in her diary like this: “God, give me a baby, and you’ll never have a single cause to call me an unmindful mother.”

      From the time she’d conceived, she’d known her first priority would always be Liam. Nothing would get in the way of providing a lighthearted and stable growing-up time for her little boy. And that meant—

      NO MORE MEN.

      She’d written that in her journal, too, with a red permanent marker. Her life had fallen apart when she