Rock-A-Bye Rancher. Judy Duarte

a cold and bitter heart. Then he let out a pent-up sigh and studied the fair-skinned baby girl with a head of dark, downy hair. Her cheeks lacked that rosy, healthy hue one expected to see. And her eyes, a golden brown, showed no spark of life. No hint of love.

      He surmised she’d been provided with an occasional bottle of goat’s milk, but nothing else. No warm embrace. No whispered words of love. Perhaps her father’s relatives would be more welcoming than her mother’s.

      He picked up the telephone.

      Twenty minutes and several calls later, he located Clay Callaghan at a ranch outside of Houston. A woman answered. Her clipped, professional tone suggested she was a servant of some kind. Luis introduced himself as a priest from a small village near Guadalajara, then asked to speak to Mr. Callaghan.

      While he waited for the woman to summon the rancher, Luis again glanced at the basket and was glad to see the baby girl had fallen asleep. The sadness in her eyes haunted him in a way no other child’s had.

      “Por favor, Dios,” the padre prayed. “Touch Señor Callaghan’s heart. This baby needs someone to love her, to bond with her. She needs a home.”

      A deep, baritone voice sounded over a crackling telephone line. “This is Clay Callaghan.”

      “Señor…sir, I am Father Luis Fernando, a priest from Rio Seco, a small village outside of Guadalajara. One of my parishioners gave me an orphaned baby girl. I have reason to believe her father was Trevor Callaghan.”

      The line seemed to have gone dead.

      “Sir? Señor Callaghan? Did you hear me?”

      “Trevor died in a car accident nearly a year ago,” the man responded.

      “Sí. I am aware of that. In Mexico, while attending the university in Guadalajara, no? But before his death, he and a young woman named Catalina Villa Montez conceived a baby. From what I understand, they planned to marry. But your son died before they could say the vows.”

      “What about the child’s mother?” the American asked, his curiosity validating his interest.

      The padre quietly released the breath he’d been holding. “Catalina was a bright young woman from a poor village. The townspeople and her parents pooled their money to send her to the university, in hope that she would return with an education and help the community. But when her family learned she was pregnant, they were angry and embarrassed. They sent her secretly to Rio Seco, where she bore her baby in the home of a distant relative. With your son dead, señor, I believe she feared there were no other options.”

      “You said the baby was orphaned.”

      “Sí. Catalina died after childbirth and left the newborn in the care of an elderly aunt who cannot keep the baby any longer. If you will not take the baby girl to live with you in Texas, I will be forced to deliver her to an orphanage.”

      Silence filled the line, then the deep, graveled voice asked, “How do you know my son is the father?”

      “There are blood tests that can prove it, but I was given the mother’s personal effects, including a photograph of the baby’s father, a handsome, blond-haired young man standing next to an airplane. I also have an engraved, black onyx ring.”

      Again silence. Then a graveled clearing of the throat. “Where can I find the baby?”

      The padre gave him directions from the airport in Guadalajara to the church.

      Surely, the American grandfather would be more loving than the old Mexican caretaker had been.

      The padre prayed that he would.

      Chapter One

      Daniela de la Cruz sat in her seventh-floor office in Houston, Texas, gripping the telephone until her knuckles ached.

      “It’s not fair,” her fourteen-year-old sister complained to her over the phone. “I hate being cooped up in the house, babysitting, when all my friends have the whole summer to do whatever they want and have fun.”

      Life isn’t fair, Dani wanted to snap back. Deal with it, Sara. I’ve had to.

      At twenty-five, Dani was the youngest and newest associate of Phillips, Crowley and Norman, and she was working her tail off to build a career and make a name for herself. On the outside, it appeared as though the sky was the limit in terms of her upward mobility. But that wasn’t the case. Most attorneys in her position didn’t have to balance home and career the way she did.

      “Marcos!” Sara shrieked at her brother, obviously not covering the mouthpiece. “Put that down. You’re going to break the lamp.”

      Dani pinched the bridge of her nose, hoping to ward off the headache that began the moment Sara called. “What’s your brother doing?”

      “He’s swinging a baseball bat in the house,” Sara said. “And he better take it outside right now, or I’m going to scream.”

      “Sara’s mean,” the ten-year-old boy shouted in the background. “I hate being stuck with a couple of dumb girls.”

      “I’m not dumb,” little Delia said loud enough to be heard through the receiver.

      If Dani wasn’t at work and trying desperately to keep her turbulent home situation a secret, she’d pitch a fit that would rival any of Sara’s.

      Couldn’t the teenager understand that Dani was trying her best to keep the kids fed, clothed and safe? Didn’t she understand that they all had to pull together?

      Dani’s frustration level was at an all-time high, and she was beginning to feel inept when it came to solving the domestic disputes that were popping up regularly, now that it was summer and the kids were out of school.

      Before she could respond to her squabbling brood, the intercom buzzed.

      “Hang on,” she told her sister.

      As the teenager continued to object to the unfairness of life, Dani silenced her with the punch of the hold button. Then she tried to morph into the career-minded attorney she’d professed to be during the job-interview process and connected with the senior partner who wanted to talk to her.

      “Yes, Martin.”

      “Daniela, can you please come into my office?”

      “Certainly. I’ll just be a moment.” She switched lines, reconnecting with her teenage sister, who was still in mid-rant and hadn’t realized she’d been on hold.

      “…and all my friends are going to the mall. But oh, no. Not me. I’m stuck here at the house babysitting a bunch of juvenile ingrates.”

      Dani slowly shook her head and blew out an exasperated sigh. If anyone could relate to Sara’s complaints, it was Dani, who’d begun looking after her younger brother and sisters after her stepmother died. When her father passed away nearly two years ago, she’d really had to step up to the plate, accepting the role of single parent. There’d never been a question about what to do with the children. She’d taken custody and tried her best to make a home for them. Her only problem had come in learning how to balance it all.

      Dani had been in her third year of law school and had almost dropped out to put the family back together again, but a professor had talked her out of it.

      Somehow she’d pulled it off and had passed the bar.

      She loved the kids, but now that she was on a partnership track, parenting them was proving to be more difficult each day.

      “Listen,” she told her sister. “I’ll see what I can do about lining up someone to help with child care this summer. But right now, I need you to hang in there with me. I can’t come home and settle things in person, but I’ll try and leave work early today. Maybe I can take Marcos and Delia to dinner and a movie. Then you can have some time with your friends, okay? It’s the best that I can do.”

      “Well, what am I