The Detective's 8 lb, 10 oz Surprise (12 page)

“Let's go visit the Pattersons and see if they recognize Timmy,” he said, moving on, which was what Nick liked to do. Move on.

Nick made another left and drove about ten miles to a more run-down part of town. He slowed the car and came to a stop in front of a peeling, two-story small gray house with a chain-link fenced yard.

“You know what I hate about my job?” Nick asked. “The part where you don't know what you're going to find when you knock. I've never gotten used to that.”

“You knocked on my door and found me,” she whispered.

He looked at her and took a deep breath but didn't respond.

* * *

Nick felt something of a shiver as he rang the Pattersons' doorbell. He'd thought Eleanor would have moved from this house after her husband's death, but she never had. For the first few months, she'd said she just needed to adjust to all the changes in her life now that she was a widow and she'd wanted Dylan to stay in the same school. But two years later, she hadn't moved.

Georgia stood beside him, holding Timmy's carrier. Nick wondered what reaction he'd get when Eleanor Patterson opened the door. He had no idea if he was on the right track here, if Timmy were connected to the Pattersons. His gut wasn't telling him anything.

But there was no response from inside. Nick rang the doorbell again. Then knocked. Still nothing.

“Are you looking for Dylan?” a voice asked.

Nick glanced to his left. An elderly woman was leaning out the window of her home next door.

“Well, I'm looking for his mom, Eleanor,” Nick explained.

The woman's face fell. “Eleanor passed away about six months ago. A car accident.”

Dammit. His shoulders sank, his chest tight. How much did Dylan have to deal with? The boy was only seventeen now if Nick remembered right. “And Dylan?”

“I don't see much of him these days,” the woman said. “He graduated from high school a couple of months ago and works in a diner. Short-order cook, I think.”

“Do you know which one?” he asked.

“It's right up the street,” she said, pointing in the opposite direction. “Neon sign. Can't miss it.”

He thanked the woman, and he and Georgia got back in the car, Nick's heart heavy. He shook his head, barely able to believe the hand that poor kid had been dealt. And Eleanor. After everything she'd been through. A damned car accident. He slammed his hand on the steering wheel, his frustration getting the better of him. “I can't believe she's gone. Survived all that and gone.”

Georgia finished settling Timmy in the backseat, then slid into the passenger seat and put her hand on his arm. “From what you told me of the case, Eleanor Patterson spent the past two years not being scared anymore—for herself and her boy. At least she had that. You helped her get settled into a new life, a life she was able to enjoy.”

He nodded, taking a deep breath and letting it out. “James wasn't quite sixteen when his father died. Now he's lost his mother, who he was very close to, before his eighteenth birthday.” He closed his eyes for a moment, sorrow hitting him in the stomach.

“Let's go see if we can find him at the diner,” Georgia said.

Nick lifted his head and nodded. He could see the neon sign for the twenty-four-hour restaurant from here. Nick got out and unlatched Timmy's carrier, and he and Georgia walked up the block and across the avenue to the corner diner.

Inside the small restaurant, which smelled like bacon and burgers, a middle-aged waitress carrying a coffeepot nodded. “Sit anywhere.” She glanced at Timmy in the carrier Nick held. “Aw, cute baby.”

He gave something of a smile, all he could muster. “Actually, we're just looking for Dylan Patterson.” He glanced around. “I was told he might work here.”

“He's right back there,” she said, pointing to the pass-through between the kitchen and behind the counter.

Nick could see an elbow, a hand flipping pancakes on the griddle. Then he saw a burger get flipped.

“Dylan,” the woman called out. “Some folks to see you.”

Dylan slid over and poked his head into view. He was a lot taller than he was two years ago, more muscular, but still looked like a kid. He stared at Nick in complete shock, then turned as if running away. Nick heard a screen door slamming shut.

What the...?
Did he just run? Nick handed Georgia the carrier and rushed through the swinging door of the kitchen, then through the screen door to the back alley. He could just make out Dylan hopping a fence.

“Dylan, wait! I just want to talk to you!”

But he was out of sight before Nick could even think about chasing him.

Nick hurried back inside. “Has Dylan been in any kind of trouble lately?” he asked the waitress. “Trouble with the law?”

The waitress shook her head. “Opposite. I'm the manager here, and Dylan is a model kid. Hard worker too. Comes in early every shift, stays late, wants as much overtime as possible.”

“Dylan lives alone?” Nick asked.

“He lives with his elderly great-aunt,” the woman said. “Ever since his mom passed. Dylan cares for her best he can since his mom died. She's hard of hearing and on the frail side.”

Poor Dylan. He'd been practically on his own for the past six months. Nick thanked the manager for her help and let her know that if Dylan came back, she should assure him he wasn't in any trouble, that Nick just wanted to see how he was. After getting Dylan's cell phone number, he and Georgia left.

“Why would he run?” Nick asked as they headed back to the car. “Why would he be afraid of me if he's a model citizen?”

Georgia shrugged. “Maybe we should stay a day or two. You could ask around about him. Speak to his aunt.”

Nick nodded and resettled Timmy in the backseat, then opened Georgia's door for her until she slid in and buckled herself in. “Wow, you weren't kidding about being all right with being back here.”

“I'm with you,” she said, her green eyes on his. “I feel safe.”

He held her gaze, unable to look away. A surge of emotion hit him in the chest and it was so overpowering that he closed his eyes for a second. God, what was happening to him?

He certainly couldn't do this without her. On the teamwork front alone, he needed her to watch Timmy, hold Timmy, take care of Timmy. He couldn't poke around on unofficial business with a baby in his arms.

He was aware again of how much it comforted him to have her near, to know she was safe because she was by his side—but this time, there couldn't be secrets. If something was wrong, he wanted to know. She hadn't said a word about the other night, how he'd walked away from her after they made love. That had to have stung, unless he was flattering himself that sex with him meant anything to her. Regardless, he'd acted like a selfish, self-absorbed toad and she hadn't called him out on it. He'd made some brief apology for his behavior and she'd accepted it and they'd moved on. But it had to bother her on some level, right?

Again, maybe he was flattering himself. But he wanted her to speak her mind. If he did something wrong, he wanted to know it, even if it pissed him off. Which it probably would. Nick Slater liked to keep things swept under that ol' rug where all the bits and pieces of his past lay either dormant or festering. Nick mentally shook his head at himself.

He got in the driver's seat and turned to face Georgia. “You'll tell me if anything is wrong. If anything's bothering you, right? No secrets this time. No matter what.”

“Even if it bothers you to hear it?” she asked with a smile.

Again it pricked at him that she seemed to know him so well. “Even if. I'm kind of the king of that lately, wouldn't you say?”

She smiled again and placed her hand on his for just a second. “You sure are. I will admit that I wish Timmy could speak and tell me what he needs,” she said as the baby fussed a bit, then settled. “I feel so helpless sometimes. I keep thinking I should have this down by now, but I don't always know what to do.”

He stared at her, surprised she felt that way. She seemed like a natural to him. Yes, she was learning as she went, since she had no experience with babies or children at all, but she was doing a hell of a job.

“I guess I shouldn't admit that to my boss,” she said.

He raised an eyebrow. “I'm not your boss.”

“Well, you kind of are. I'm your nanny. I work for you. You're my boss.”

He turned the key in the ignition and pulled out of their spot in front of the Pattersons' house. “I'm no one's boss. Which is how I like it. I don't have any interest in telling anyone what to do or how to do it.” Which was why he wouldn't be much of a father.

“But you uphold the law,” she said. “It's your job to tell people what to do and how to do it.”

“
Almost
a good point,” he conceded. “But I'm a detective. I solve crimes. I hunt for clues. I look over evidence. No one reports to me. I like it that way. I'm responsible to my cases. That's as responsible as I want to be.”

He thought about adding something so that he didn't sound so...robotic or as though he didn't care. He cared plenty.

She raised an eyebrow. “You sure did tell your sister what to do and how to do it.”

“That's different. Avery is my kid sister. I
am
responsible for her. Legal adult now or not,” he added as he turned left toward the historic district.

“You do know that love you feel for her, the responsibility you feel, all the stress over her decisions—that's how parenthood feels,” she said. “You're already doing it, Nick. A little bossily for someone who doesn't want to be a boss, but quite well. You love Avery. You want the best for her. You
care
.”

His chest tightened. Somehow the conversation had morphed from boss to fatherhood. “Taking care of a sixteen-year-old girl for two years isn't the same as parenting a baby into adulthood. And if I did such a good job, then why is Avery marrying at eighteen? Running off to Nashville after some pie-in-the-sky dream?”

“She's engaged because she's in love. Because she believes in love and marriage. Because she found the one—young, but she found him. And she's chasing her dream because she believes in
herself
. I have no doubt you had a lot to do with that.”

He leaned his head back against the seat, eyes straight ahead on the road. She just didn't understand. Or he didn't want to hear it. He wasn't sure. But he was almost certain it was the first. “We'll just have to agree to disagree, as they say.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “Except I'm right.”

He laughed. “I admit I like your confidence.”

“I actually surprised myself with it. What do you know? I'm getting my groove back. In Houston, no less.” She sat up straight and lifted her chin. “I know I'll be fine on my own,” she said, placing a hand on the swell of her belly. “I've got this,” she added—to her belly and not to him.

He looked at her, full of admiration for her strength, full of...disappointment in himself for making her feel that she'd be alone in raising their son. He pulled over into a spot and put the car in park, turning to face her. “Georgia, I'll take full responsibility for our baby. You know that, right? I will not let you or the baby down.”

“Meaning you'll sign your name to the birth certificate. You'll fulfill financial obligations. You'll come by a few times a month to see him, since you'll probably be living in Houston.”

“I don't know,” he said honestly. “I've been thinking about how this will work, but I don't know yet.”

She stared at him and let out a frustrated breath. Timmy fussed from the backseat. “I think he's ready for a nap.”

Using Timmy's need for a nap or a bottle or a diaper change had always been his old standby for getting out of a conversation. But this time it was Georgia who was weary and done. Not that he knew what else to say on the subject. He really didn't know how it would work, how their “family” would operate.

Family. Would they
be
a family? His son would be his family, of course. And Georgia was his baby's mother, so that made her family.

A twitch started forming in his right temple. He needed some time to himself to
not
think.

“I know a nice hotel in the theater district,” he said, starting up the car again. “I can do some research into Dylan's background and Timmy can get some rest. And you can put your feet up.”

She offered a smile. “That does sound good.”

I wish I could be what you need
,
he thought out of nowhere as he continued on down the street.

But he didn't see that happening, even if he willed it to be.

Chapter Twelve

“E
njoy your stay, Mr. and Mrs. Slater,” the hotel desk clerk said as she handed Nick two key cards.

Georgia stiffened. Mrs. Slater. She glanced at Nick, who shifted Timmy's carrier in his other hand, then smiled tightly at the clerk.
Mrs. Slater
, she thought again.
Mrs. Slater.

It had a familiar ring to it, a nice ring, a comfortable ring.

As if there were any ring at all, she reminded herself, glancing at her bare left hand. Nick Slater wasn't proposing. There would be no big happy family. Well, there would be a happy family. And a big one, given her clan. But she wouldn't be Mrs. Slater. She felt bereft all of a sudden as if she'd ever been Mrs. Slater.

Nick slung their just-in-case overnight bags, which had come in handy, on his shoulder and took the carrier, then led the way to the elevator across the marble lobby.

“You're sure you're okay with the one room?” he asked as they stepped inside and he pressed the button for the fourteenth floor. “I can try to find a room for me in a nearby hotel.” Because of two conventions being held in Houston, hotel rooms were scarce for the next couple of days.

“You've seen me naked already,” Georgia said, again surprised by how bold she was getting. She liked that the old Georgia was coming back. The Georgia who spoke her mind. The cheeky Georgia. “Twice,” she added dryly. “So it's okay.”

Well, it wasn't really okay. She wanted to share a room with him, but she wanted him to keep his hands off her and on her at the same time.
Not
touch her so that she wouldn't yearn for him, for his love, for a future with him.
Touch
her because she loved him and wanted him desperately.

Was that win-win or lose-lose? Georgia wasn't sure.

His eyes widened at her brassiness, which always seemed to surprise him too, and he laughed. “I'm sure there's a club chair. I'll sleep in that.”

She said nothing, but took one of the key cards from between his fingers and slipped it in the door of room 1412. The room was large, the king-size bed dominating. There was the usual desk and chair, a long bureau with a big mirror, an armoire holding a television and a minibar. Nick put Timmy's carrier down on the desk, then opened the heavy drapes, revealing an expansive view of the city. There was indeed a club chair too, which didn't look comfortable.

“You'll be okay on your own?” he asked. “I figure I'll be gone a couple of hours to pay Dylan's aunt a visit. I recall mention of an aunt on his father's side, but she didn't live with the Pattersons two years ago.”

She sat down on the edge of the big bed. “I'll be fine. I'm zonked so will nap when Timmy does.” She
would
be fine. Just as she'd told him in the car. She'd be fine on her own because she had to be. Wasn't necessity the mother of invention? Reinvention too.

She'd just prefer him by her side, in general.

I don't know how this will work...
She could imagine Nick coming to the house every second or third Friday with a stuffed giraffe or a soccer ball, building a sandbox in the yard, then a play set, then a tree house. A visitor in their lives.

Yeah, yeah, she'd be fine on her own, but the wave of sadness that rushed through at the thought of Nick ringing the doorbell of the home she shared with their child made her very tired.

“If you need me, for anything, just call,” he said. He glanced at Timmy, who was looking at his little mobile, then he looked back at Georgia, nodded and left.

She missed him immediately.

* * *

Nick drove back to Dylan's house. There was no car in the short driveway, and the curtains at the front windows were closed. Was Dylan inside? Hiding from him? Only one way to find out.

Nick walked up the three steps, expecting the elderly neighbor to poke her head out the window again. It only took a few seconds.

Her gray head appeared. “Did you find Dylan at the diner?”

“I did, thank you. But now I'm here to see his aunt.”

Curiosity brightened her expression. “If Dylan's not home you'll have to knock hard a few times. Helen's hard of hearing.”

“Ah, thank you,” Nick said, recalling that the diner manager had mentioned that.

He felt bad about pounding on the door, but after two police-level knocks, he heard shuffling feet. The door opened and a frail-looking woman in her eighties wearing a pink sweat suit appeared.

“My name is Detective Nick Slater,” he practically shouted. “I'm—”

The woman's face lit up. “Detective Slater! I know who you are. You were very kind to Eleanor when she was having all that trouble with her husband, who was my nephew, God rest his soul. You were kind to Dylan too. I'm Helen Patterson, Dylan's great-aunt.”

“Nice to meet you,” he said loudly, extending his hand, which she took in both of hers with a warm smile. “May I come in? I'd like to hear how Dylan is doing.”

She pulled the door open wide. “Of course. You'll have to sit on my left. I can barely hear a thing out of my right ear.” She led the way into the small living room.

As she moved slightly, Nick's gaze landed on a photograph atop the mantel. He froze.

The photograph was of a baby, a newborn, wrapped in the standard hospital-issue striped blanket, a light blue cotton cap on his head.

The baby looked an awful lot like Timmy.

“May I?” he asked Helen, gesturing at the photograph.

“Sure. Such a darling baby,” she said, her expression faltering as she sat down on an easy chair.

He glanced back at Helen Patterson as he walked over to the mantel. The woman looked upset. She was shaking her head; then she reached to a basket beside her chair and pulled out a small stuffed teddy bear, her eyes downcast as she clutched it to her chest. Had this frail eighty-year-old managed to get herself to Blue Gulch to leave Timmy on his desk? Highly doubtful. Whose child was he?

Nick's heart lurched as he stopped in front of the mantel and lifted the photograph, studying the baby. Timmy's eyes had turned a bit more blue, less the gray-blue in the picture. The newborn redness in the face was gone. As were the crinkles and wrinkles. But it was Timmy. He had no doubt.

“Ma'am, whose baby is this?” Nick asked.

“Little louder, Detective?” she asked, pointing at her right ear.

“This baby,” he shouted. “Who does he belong to?”

“He belongs to me,” a male voice said. “I'm his father.”

Nick whirled around. Dylan Patterson stood in the doorway to another room, his hands stuffed in his pockets. The teenager glanced around the room, his blue eyes filling with fear. “Where's Timmy? He's okay, isn't he? Why isn't he with you?”

Nick's mouth almost dropped open. Dylan was Timmy's father? What?

He was just a kid himself. So much a kid—in Nick's mind and memory, anyway—that it hadn't even crossed Nick's mind that Dylan Patterson could be Timmy's parent. Though now that he thought about it, he'd been thinking
mother
the entire time. It had never occurred to him that Timmy's
father
had left the baby on Nick's desk. Not once.

Because you're so damned blocked about fatherhood you couldn't even imagine that a father, a father in some kind of trouble, would have written that desperate note to you, left the baby on your desk for you to safe keep for the week. A father.

“Where is Timmy!” Dylan shouted, tears welling in his eyes.

“Timmy is fine, Dylan,” he assured the young man. “He's with Georgia—the woman who was with me at the diner earlier. We're staying at a hotel in the theater district. Timmy is likely napping right now or else Georgia is giving him a bottle or singing one of her many lullabies to him.”

Nick watched Dylan's entire body relax. The boy shut his eyes for a second, letting out a very deep breath. But he said nothing. No explanation.

Helen glanced uneasily from Dylan to Nick. “Dylan's a wonderful father. But because Dylan is only seventeen and the sole parent of Timothy, a social worker came by and said she'd have to determine Dylan's fitness to care for the baby, since I'm not in the best of health or able to help much. She said she was backlogged with cases but would be back in a few days. That was over a week ago. Every time someone knocks, I think it's her coming to take Timmy away.”

Ah. So Dylan left Timmy on Nick's desk because he was afraid Social Services would be coming to take the baby away.

“Okay,” Nick said. “Let's back up.” He looked from Helen to Dylan. “Start from the beginning. You're the sole parent? Who and where is Timmy's mother.”

Dylan ran a hand through his mop of sandy blond hair and stepped into the room, his gaze on the photograph Nick held. “Madeline Connors is Timmy's mother. She was my girlfriend. We had all these plans to get married and raise Timmy. But the closer she got to her delivery date, the more she changed her mind. When he was born, she said she was too young for marriage or motherhood, that she was only eighteen and had her whole life ahead of her.”

Nick sucked in a breath, his heart heavy for Dylan. So young and he'd been through the wringer, one major blow after another.

Dylan walked closer to Nick, clearly not wanting his aunt to overhear what else he had to say. “Madeline thought my mom would be around to help, since she's not close to her parents. But then my mom—” He squeezed his eyes closed, as if willing himself not to cry, not to break down.

Nick's heart clenched. He wanted to pull the boy into a hug and let him cry it out, but he knew he should let Dylan finish his story. “I'm so sorry about your mother, Dylan.”

Dylan wiped away tears, taking a deep breath. “My great-aunt is a widow and was living on her own, but that wasn't working out. When Madeline found out Aunt Helen would live with us, it was the last straw for her and she wanted out of the whole thing. She signed away her parental rights.” Tears slipped down his cheeks. “How could she do that? How could she not want Timmy?”

“If that social worker comes back,” Helen said, “she might take Timmy away.”

Dylan nodded, looking from his aunt back to Nick. “That's why I drove to Blue Gulch to leave him with you. I was afraid if you knew the details, your hands would be tied. So I put Timmy's carrier on your desk with the anonymous note, and then I started freaking out that maybe you wouldn't be back for a long time. But I saw the note you left about just going out for ten minutes to pick up lunch. I hid outside until you came back and watched through a window. Once I saw you pick up the note, I ran to my car and drove home.”

“Dylan, that was a huge risk leaving him on my desk,” Nick said. “I did have to call Social Services. What if they'd come to take him into foster care until his parents could be tracked down?”

“I knew you wouldn't let anyone take him. I knew that if I wrote the note asking you to care for him, I could trust you, that you'd take care of him until Saturday.”

“What happens Saturday?” Nick asked. Tomorrow.

His shoulders lifted. “I turn eighteen. I'm no longer a minor. No one can take Timmy away from me after tomorrow. Right?” he asked, his eyes worried again.

“No one is taking Timmy away from you, Dylan. You've got my word on that.” He opened his arms and the boy rushed into them, sobbing.

“I miss Timmy so much,” Dylan said, his voice breaking. “Leaving him was the hardest, worst thing I've ever had to do. And I've had to do some of the worst things imaginable.”

Such as worry about his mother. Such as bury his father. Such as bury his mother. Then he'd been dumped by his baby's mother, was responsible for his elderly great-aunt, and had to take care of a baby on his own—a baby he'd been terrified he'd also lose.

“Everything's going to be all right, Dylan. I'm here for you, okay? You were one hundred percent right—you
can
trust me. We'll get this settled with the social worker—but no one is taking Timmy from you. He's your son.”

Dylan calmed down, wiping under his eyes with the bottom of his T-shirt.

There was no way Nick was leaving Dylan here in Houston with all this on his shoulders, eighteen or not. “I have an idea for a fresh start for you and your family. What do you think about moving to Blue Gulch, the three of you?”

He'd have to talk it over with Georgia, about offering Dylan a job in the kitchen at Hurley's, and he'd have to find a home for the Pattersons, but all that seemed the easy part.

“I'd like that,” Dylan said, relief flooding his expression. “And I'm sure Aunt Helen would too.” They both turned to look at Helen Patterson, who was leaning toward them with her left ear and nodding with a smile. Dylan smiled back at his aunt, then turned to Nick. “Can I come see Timmy? I won't take him till tomorrow—I won't feel safe until I'm legally an adult. But I have to see his face. I have to see my son.”

Nick felt a punch to his gut at the longing coating Dylan's voice, but ignored it and pressed a hand on Dylan's shoulder. Would he ever feel that? What Dylan felt for the baby he'd been compelled to leave for a week. What Logan Grainger felt for his missing nephew. “Let's go.”

If he was missing that...synapse or whatever the right word was, he'd do his child a terrible disservice, make his own boy feel unloved, unwanted. Something cold slithered up Nick's spine and settled along his neck. Maybe staying away was the right thing to do. Maybe moving to Houston and visiting twice a month would be better than living in Blue Gulch a half mile away when he might as well be hundred of miles away.

He glanced at Dylan as he told his great-aunt they were going to see Timmy and that Dylan would be back in a little while. The boy seemed at once such a kid and such a grown-up that Nick wasn't sure what to think about Dylan Patterson—teenager or adult. He only knew he believed in the young man 100 percent. Why Nick couldn't believe in himself was another question, one with a lot of answers that added up to a big nothing.