A Baby For Christmas. Marie Ferrarella

looked up, startled. She’d expected to see Connor coming in. Instead, she found herself looking at a small, dark-haired matronly woman who looked as if she was accustomed to being in charge of anything and everything she came across.

      Amy’s hand flew to her chest as if to steady her pounding heart.

      “I’m sorry—who are you?” she asked the woman who made no secret of swiftly dissecting her with her dark eyes.

      “I am Rita Navarro,” Rita informed her. “Who are you?”

      Entering, Connor came between the two women, prepared to act as a human buffer. In his opinion, the housekeeper was a wonderful woman, but she had a tendency to come on too strong at times.

      “Amy, this is my housekeeper, Rita. She tends to think she runs everything.”

      Rita spared him a quick side glance. “That is because I do.” She pressed her thin lips together as she shook her head. “This will teach me to go away,” she murmured under her breath, scrutinizing the young woman sitting on the bed, holding the baby in her arms.

      There was only one way for her to interpret the older woman’s comment. “Then I am intruding,” Amy said, rising to her feet. “I’ll go,” she told Connor.

      “No, you’re not, and no, you won’t,” Connor replied firmly. He gave Rita a warning glance over his shoulder, silently telling the woman to weigh her words.

      Rita tempered her tone as she asked Amy, “How old is your baby?”

      “He’s six months old,” Amy answered. She still looked as if she was somewhat intimidated by the petite but bombastic housekeeper.

      Rita nodded, as if the information jibed with something in her head.

      “Bring him to the kitchen. When I finish preparing your breakfast, I will take care of him while you eat. Come,” she ordered the baby’s mother just before she left the room.

      “And that,” Connor cavalierly said to Amy, “is my housekeeper. I should have warned you—she comes on a little strong.”

      A small smile curved the corners of Amy’s mouth. “Strong. That would be the word for it, all right,” she agreed.

      “Rita means well,” Connor assured her.

      She could only hope that was true, Amy thought, but out loud she said, “I’m sure she does.”

      “Are you coming?” Rita called out from the kitchen.

      “I think we’ve just been given our marching orders,” Connor said, about to take Amy’s elbow to usher her and the baby into the kitchen. “For a small woman, her voice can really carry,” he observed with a laugh. And then, thinking that perhaps the housekeeper’s overbearing manner might be rather difficult for Amy to deal with, he said, “I can talk to Rita and ask her to back off.”

      But Amy shook her head. She did not want to risk possibly getting on the woman’s bad side. “That’s okay. She’s just looking out for you.”

      “Stay here a day and she’ll be looking out for you, as well,” Connor promised. “She might seem gruff, but she’s really good with kids.”

      “Right now, I’ll settle for her just being good with coffee,” Amy said.

      “You’re about to have your wish come true.” He could smell the coffee brewing even before he crossed the threshold to the kitchen.

      “Ah, so you are finally here,” Rita declared. Her back was to them. It was as if she could sense their presence. “Good. The coffee is ready and so is your breakfast.” She nodded at the two place settings on the table, then turned around and crossed to Amy. “Here, give him to me.”

      “That’s all right. I can hold him while I eat,” Amy said.

      “But you can eat better if I hold him,” Rita informed her in a firm voice. Putting out her hands, she waited for the baby to be transferred to her. “Do not worry. I do not drop children.”

      Feeling somewhat uneasy, Amy surrendered Jamie to the housekeeper. The moment that she did, she watched in fascination as a smile blossomed on the woman’s otherwise stern face, instantly transforming her.

      Rita began cooing something to the baby in Spanish, and then she looked up, sparing Amy a glance. “Eat before it gets cold,” she ordered.

      “You heard the lady.” Connor ushered Amy into a chair. “Breakfast is a lot better warm—and so is Rita,” he added with a whisper.

      Amy suppressed a laugh as she sat down, feeling a little more at ease. Maybe, she thought, she’d been right to come here after all.

       Chapter Five

      “Hey, Connor, whose car is that parked out in front of the house?” Cole McCullough asked as he made his way through the living room into the kitchen.

      The second-oldest McCullough brother stopped dead when he saw the answer to his question sitting at the kitchen table, having breakfast across from his brother.

      “Amy?” Cole said uncertainly.

      Not quite sure how he would react to seeing her there with Connor, Amy forced a smile to her lips as she greeted Connor’s brother.

      “Hello, Cole. How are you?” she asked politely.

      Stunned, Cole blinked. Connor didn’t usually have company. Certainly not at this hour in the morning and certainly not someone who had eloped five years ago. He half expected her to disappear.

      But she didn’t.

      “I’m great,” he told her, then repeated, “Just great.”

      Cole had no idea what to say to the woman he knew had left town with Connor’s heart unwittingly packed away in her suitcase. Connor never talked about it, but he didn’t have to. He, Cody and Cassidy all knew how Connor felt about Amy. How he’d felt about her ever since they were kids. Although he had devoted himself to raising them and keeping the ranch going, they all knew that Connor was in love with Amy.

      But because of them and all his obligations, Connor never had a chance to act on it. And then Clay Patton had set his sights on her, scooped her up and left town. Cole, like the rest of his family, just assumed that the story had ended there.

      Apparently not, he thought, looking at Amy.

      Cole finally got back the use of his tongue. “Are you here for a visit?” he asked her. He glanced at Connor for help. He needed to be bailed out before he wound up unintentionally putting his foot in his mouth.

      “Amy’s considering moving back to Forever,” Connor replied quietly, deliberately keeping the situation open-ended for her.

      “You are here just in time, Mr. Cole,” Rita announced as she came into the kitchen, holding Amy’s son in her capable arms.

      Surprised to see that the housekeeper had returned early, Cole was even more surprised to see that Rita was holding a baby in her arms and feeding that same baby with a bottle.

      “Welcome back, Rita,” Cole said, greeting the woman. “I take it that you don’t mean I’m just in time for breakfast, do you?”

      Impatience creased the woman’s already furrowed brow. “You can have some coffee if you wish and then you can help Mr. Connor bring down the crib from the attic.”

      “The one we just put back up there a couple of months ago?” he asked, looking quizzically at Connor.

      It felt as if that crib, used for each of the babies who had been here—not to mention that it had once been Cassidy’s when she was a baby—had more mileage on it than his truck did.

      “That would be the one,” Connor confirmed. “And it was closer to almost four months