Be My Baby. Holly Jacobs

of prospective families who would love to make her their daughter.”

      Another red light, and the car filled with the baby’s screams.

      “Do you think she’s hungry?”

      “I don’t know. Basically, the old lady watching her just handed her and that diaper bag to me.”

      “Why don’t you pull over somewhere and let’s try feeding her. Maybe she’d be happier then?”

      “Okay.” He’d do anything to calm the baby down. Her pitiful wails were breaking his heart.

      He pulled into a gas station. “I need to fill the tank anyway. I think the weather reports were right, and I want the tank topped off if it’s going to storm.”

      Mac got out and started pumping the gas. He watched Amelia get out and climb into the back seat with the baby. He couldn’t help glancing in the back window as she opened up the diaper bag and found the bottle. She leaned over and started feeding Katie.

      He watched her lean closer to the baby, saying something, though he couldn’t make out just what. She was smiling at the baby. He knew, even though she was looking at Katie and not at him, that her eyes were sparkling. Alight with that special something she had—that certain quality Amelia Gallagher had, that drew people to her.

      Even babies.

      Donovan once said she was gregarious and friendly, the perfect receptionist. Maybe. Though describing Amelia as gregarious might be accurate to his colleague, she’d never been overly friendly with Mac.

      As a matter of fact, she’d been almost hostile.

      She always picked at him.

      Of course, he picked right back. Their banterish quarrels were well-known in the office.

      Why did she always rub him the wrong way?

      Mac realized the gas had stopped pumping. He replaced the nozzle, put the cap back on the tank and walked into the store to pay, still puzzling over Amelia and how she affected him.

      Mia watched Mac disappear into the store. He’d been staring at her.

      “What’s up with him, Katie?” she whispered.

      There had been something in his voice as he spoke about Katie. Something that told her there was more to this situation than his wanting to find the baby a home. There had been an undercurrent of pain, of vulnerability, in his tone. She’d never heard anything like that before.

      She knew that Larry did a lot of volunteer work. She’d always thought it was just a way for him to fulfill the firm’s requirement that each lawyer give back to the community by doing pro bono work. But now she wondered if there was something more to it.

      Katie slurped enthusiastically at her bottle.

      She’d been hungry. Very hungry if her speed at emptying it was any indication.

      “Didn’t they feed you?” she asked.

      Katie smiled without letting go of the bottle’s nipple. Milk bubbles formed at the gap.

      “You are sweet,” Mia told her.

      Katie gurgled her agreement just as Mac opened the door and got in. “Are you ready?”

      “Sure. I’ll sit back here and let Katie finish her bottle before we get to the store.”

      “Fine.”

      It was almost a relief to be in the back with Katie. This way she didn’t have to deal with Mac looking at her.

      It wasn’t as if she was shy, but he always made her feel as if he saw…

      Well, she wasn’t sure what he saw, but whatever it was, it made her uncomfortable.

      Almost as uncomfortable as her new questions about Mac’s motivations.

      She looked at the baby and couldn’t help remember when her brothers were little. Her mother had let her feed them, just like she was feeding Katie now.

      “You’re responsible for him, Mia,” her mother had told her. She’d been hardly more than a baby herself, but she’d taken care of first Marty, then Ryan.

      After her father finally left, she tried to help her mother take care of the boys. Even though she was only a few years older than they were, she assumed more of a parental role than a sister’s.

      But now that Ryan had graduated her job was done.

      She could do all the things she’d dreamed about.

      It wasn’t just a new car. She could travel.

      Maybe even date.

      Nothing serious. Mia didn’t want anything serious or committed. She wanted fun. She wanted adventure. She wanted to live out her dreams…if she could ever figure out what they were.

      She sighed.

      “You’re awfully quiet back there?”

      She forced herself to put away thoughts of the past. It was better to concentrate on here and now.

      “After all Katie’s screaming are you really complaining that it’s too quiet?”

      “No,” he said with a laugh. “Listen, after we shop, would you come back to my house and help, just for a while? I have to get a crib and whatever else she’ll need for however long I have her. Everything will need to be set up and I’ll need help with her. I mean, I’ll take you back to the office once it’s all settled so you can get your car.”

      “Sure,” Mia said, without thinking. “In for a penny, in for a pound.”

      A couple hours later, the car was stuffed with multiple pounds of baby paraphernalia. Mac had bought out the baby store. Watching him mull over the merits of different baby monitors, trying to decide what size Onesies to buy…well, it had been cute.

      And thinking the word cute as a description for Larry Mackenzie was just too strange for Mia. She just wanted to go home and forget this odd afternoon.

      She was back in the front seat as they pulled into Mac’s driveway. Almost done, she thought with a sigh as he put the car in Park and turned off the ignition.

      She studied his house. It wasn’t at all what she’d expected, though she couldn’t really have said what it was she did expect.

      It was a neat, two-story brick home in Glenwood Hills, a lovely, older section of town. A huge tree stood dead-center in the front yard. In the summer it probably shaded the whole house. Right now, it stood like a snowy sentinel.

      “Come on,” he said. “If you get Katie out, I’ll start unpacking the stuff.”

      Doing so would probably take him a while. For a man who claimed he was giving the baby up, he’d bought more than what the baby would need for the next year.

      A crib, a changing table, clothes, bottles, pacifiers, toys, stuffed animals, diapers—three different sizes because they weren’t sure what size she’d need—and formula.

      “Come on, Katie,” Mia said as she unstrapped the seat.

      “Here,” Mac said, tossing her the keys.

      Mia carried the baby onto the porch, set the car seat down on the ground and unlocked the door.

      “Switches are to your left,” Mac hollered.

      Mia flipped the two switches there. One turned on the porch light, and one turned on a table lamp next to a dark leather couch. She kicked off her shoes and walked to the couch and set the car seat on it.

      She studied the living room. The focal points were a huge fireplace and a piano. Did that mean Mac played the piano, or was it just for show?

      He had a huge leather couch and a matching overstuffed chair with a knobby-looking afghan thrown carelessly over the back. And there was a picture on the wall. No,