The Non-Commissioned Baby
And why did he care?
He didn’t, Jeff told himself. He couldn’t afford to feel the sense of awareness already creeping through him. Laura Morgan was going to be living in his house, taking care of that baby. He wasn’t about to mess that up by allowing his hormones to do his thinking for him.
Still, he told himself, he must be lonelier than he had thought, to be intrigued by a tiny woman dressed in clothes two sizes too big for her.
The look in her eyes as he continued to stare at her only grew frostier. So much for her sweatshirt, he smirked inwardly. He’d be willing to bet that she hadn’t found anything “grand” about life in years.
But, since the baby was cooing contentedly, he was willing to put up with the poor man’s Mary Poppins. As for his hormones—apparently, he needed to spend some time with one or two lady friends. That should take care of any bizarre interest in Laura Morgan.
“Okay,” he said at last, folding his arms across his chest and completely ignoring the sticky substances on his T-shirt. “What are these rules?”
She nodded. “I’ll stay here and take care of the baby for the summer, but...”
“Yeah?”
She inhaled sharply and tried to draw herself up to a formidable height. He could have told her it was a futile attempt. She couldn’t be more than five foot one. And that was no one’s idea of intimidating.
“You’re not hiring me to be your housekeeper.” She paused for a look around at the mess his apartment had become. “Or,” she added, “your cook and laundress.”
Insulted, Jeff tried to defend himself. “Look, until this morning, everything was under control—”
“Also,” she said, cutting him off neatly, “there will be no walking around naked, no women strolling in and out of the apartment—”
“What are you—?”
“One of your neighbors thought it prudent to warn me about the fact that you’re what she calls a ‘ladies’ man.’”
He shook his head and gave a resigned sigh. “Let me guess. White hair, big blue eyes?”
She nodded, but he thought he saw the ghost of a smile twitching at her lips.
“Agnes Butler,” he said, the elderly woman’s features forming in his mind. “For lack of anything better to do, she spies on me.”
Twin brown eyebrows arched high on her forehead. “Spying? Sounds a little paranoid.”
Briefly, he recalled all the times he had strolled down that short hallway and spotted his neighbor, her eye glued to a partially opened door. Yeah, spying was the right word.
“You’re not paranoid,” he told her, “if they really are after you.”
A moment or two of silence passed. At last, she nodded and said, “Yes, well, the rest of the rules are pretty simple.”
“There’s more?” he asked.
She smiled. “No foul language—”
“Now, just a minute—” he said, trying to interrupt, but she was on a roll.
“No talking before coffee in the morning, and no loud TV or radio after eleven at night.”
Jeff stared at her. Was she finished? Or just pausing for breath? A few seconds ticked by, and he told himself that apparently, she’d reached the end of her demands. Well, fine. Now it was his turn.
He would tell her just what she could do with her rules. This was his house after all. Where did she get off telling him when he could or couldn’t watch his TV? And what about women? So he didn’t exactly have a parade of females trooping in and out of his apartment every day and night. If he wanted to, he wasn’t going to be stopped by her.
“Listen up, lady,” he started, “I don’t know who the hell you think you are...”
She froze, stiffening for a fight.
Miranda sniffled, shifting against a suddenly tense body.
Recognizing the signs of baby distress already, Jeff lowered his voice and spoke in a quiet, reasonable tone. “You can’t order me around. I’m the employer here, you know.”
“I can tell you what I expect,” Laura countered, her voice matching his. “And if you don’t like it, you can find someone else.”
He didn’t believe the threat. Even as she said it, her arms were tightening around the baby as if afraid that he would try to take Miranda from her forcibly.
No worries there.
But with the position he was in, he couldn’t afford to take the risk. If she left, he’d be right back where he started that morning. In deep trouble, begging Peggy for help.
All right, he could swallow a little bit of pride for the sake of his sanity. And he could even learn to deal with her ridiculous rules. Anything to keep her here and the baby quiet. After all, it wasn’t forever. Just for the summer. By the end of three months, he would either have found a suitable replacement guardian for the baby or, God help him, a permanent nanny to help him raise Hank Powell’s kid.
Abruptly, he said, “Fine. Agreed.”
“Thank you.” She accepted his defeat gracefully. “But as long as we’re discussing this situation, I should like to add one more rule to my list.”
He snorted disbelievingly. “What’s left?”
“I’d like to state clearly right from the first,” she said, “that I am not interested in you romantically, so I would appreciate it very much if you would keep your distance.”
Jeff laughed, the first good laugh he’d had all morning. Pointedly running his gaze over her slowly, he shook his head and said, “No problem.”
Once Jeff was out of the shower—and Laura had even resorted to turning on the TV so she wouldn’t have to listen to the spray of water and imagine it pummeling his naked, no doubt gorgeous body—they set things to rights.
The living room was a disaster.
With a fed and changed Miranda watching happily from her wicker basket, Laura and Jeff worked together to rebuild the place. So much for her rule about not being a housekeeper. As most of the clutter was cleared away, she noticed that the apartment wasn’t exactly homey. In fact, it was surprisingly impersonal.
A sprinkling of framed photos and commendations hung on the beige walls, but there were no paintings. Tweed fabric covered the couch and two chairs that sat on the tan wall-to-wall carpeting. There was an impressive stereo system and a large-screen TV on one wall, and a fireplace that looked as though it had never been used stood on the opposite wall. A two-person table sat at the end of the kitchen, and there were two bedrooms, one on either side of the single bathroom.
She tried not to think about having to share that bathroom with Jeff Ryan for the next three months. Luckily for her, she no longer noticed things like just how good-looking Jeff Ryan was. If she had been the slightest bit interested in finding a man, these next few months could have been torture.
Of course, she had thought she was past noticing the fresh, clean scent of a man’s aftershave, too.
“So,” he said, and snapped her attention to him. He folded up yet another brown paper grocery bag as he asked, “How come a kindergarten teacher didn’t already have a summer job nailed down?”
She stacked the last can of formula in what had been an empty cabinet, then closed the door and straightened up. “I did,” she admitted. “This one sounded like more fun.”
He snorted a laugh. “More fun than what?”
“Transferring card catalogs to computer in the local library.”
He whistled low and long. “You’re right, not fun.” He glanced at the baby a few feet away. “But this is?”
“Sure.”
“Lady, you’ve got a strange sense of fun.”
Peggy had told Laura that Jeff not only had no experience taking care of children, but also that he didn’t even like them.
She frowned at him. “Your sister has three kids. Don’t you remember how cute they were when they were little?”
He shrugged and bent down to neatly place the folded bags in the appropriate rack just inside the pantry door. “I remember they cried. A lot,” he said as he stood up again and closed the door. “They smelled bad and they couldn’t even talk to tell you why they cried all the time.”
“No wonder you never visit Peggy and her family.”
He looked at her. “Is that what she said?”
Was he offended? How could he be? “It’s true, isn’t it? You see them about once a year?”
“Yeah, it’s true.” He folded his arms across his chest and leaned one hip against the blond wood countertop. “She tell you why?”
“She said you’re uncomfortable around kids.” Laura didn’t tell him the rest. Did he really need to know that his own sister, though she loved him, thought he was too self-involved to be concerned about family?
“That’s part of it,” he admitted, letting his gaze slide from Laura to the baby, now chewing contentedly on her own fist. “But mostly it’s because I can’t even talk to Peggy and her husband anymore.”
“Why not?” Laura asked. Peggy and Jim Cummings were two of the nicest people she’d ever known. Was the woman’s own brother too dense to see that?
He shook his head and smiled without humor. “Before they had those kids, Peggy and Jim and I had some good times. Skiing, sailing, took a few trips together.”
“And?” she prodded, interested now.
“And, the minute the first kid was born, it was all over.” He pushed away from the counter, walked across the utilitarian kitchen and stood, staring down at the baby in the basket. “They became parents in the worst possible sense. All they talked about was Thomas. His teeth. His upset stomach. His first steps. The first time he used a spoon by himself, you would have thought he was Einstein reincarnated.”
Laura smiled to herself as she stared at Jeff’s broad back. His sister was still like that Just a few weeks ago, Peggy had called to crow over Tina winning the second-grade spelling bee.
Like any other good parent would.
“But that’s perfectly natural,” Laura said, and walked to stand beside him. Looking down at Miranda, she smiled. “They’re proud of their children.”
“They’re boring,” he countered, swiveling his head to stare at her. “They used to have plans. Ambitions. Now those ambitions are all for the kids.”
An emotion she couldn’t quite identify flickered in his pale blue eyes briefly, then disappeared. “All parents want good things for their kids,” she said quietly.
“Sure,” he countered. “But do they have to stop being people themselves to be good parents?”
“Peggy and Jim are terrific people,” she argued, defending her friends.
He shook his head as he looked at her. Once again, Laura felt a flutter of awareness dance through her bloodstream. Deliberately, she squashed it.
“Is it so wrong to have ambitions and dreams for your kids?” she asked, determined to keep this conversation going, if only to keep her mind too busy to daydream.
He thought about her question for a long minute, then shrugged. “Not for Peggy and Jim,” he said, shifting his gaze back to the baby, now intently staring up at the two adults. “But that’s not me,” he continued. “I have plans for my career. Plans I’ve worked toward long and hard.”
“Everybody makes plans,” she said.
It was as if he hadn’t heard her.
“I’m going to be the youngest general in the corps,” he stated. Then he glanced at the wicker basket. “And I’m not going to let anything stop me.”
Three
A nightmare.
In less than twelve hours, his life had become a waking nightmare.
Jeff stumbled across the living room, stepped on a fallen pacifier and grunted as the dull yet stabbing pain lanced from his arch straight up his leg.
“Are you all right?” Laura asked, her voice high enough to carry over the baby’s wailing.
“Dandy,” he muttered, then flopped down beside her on the couch. Instantly, he lifted one hip and pulled a leaking baby bottle from under his butt. “How can one kid need so much stuff?” he grumbled to no one in particular as he slammed the plastic bottle down onto the coffee table.
Laura had only one lamp on, and in the dim light, he surveyed what had, only that morning, been his sanctuary.
Blankets, clean diapers, bottles, pacifiers, lotion, powder—there was enough junk in the already small room to satisfy a battalion of babies. So why wasn’t the only baby present happy?
“Why is she screaming like that?” he demanded.
“I think she’s teething,” Laura said, and hitched Miranda higher on her shoulder.
“Perfect,” he said. “How long does that last?”
In the soft light, Laura smirked at him. “According to my watch, she should be finished in another three and a half minutes.”
His eyebrows lifted. He knew sarcasm when he heard it, and if he wasn’t so damn tired, he might have taken a shot himself. As it was, his heart just wasn’t in it.
Laura whispered to the baby while stroking the infant’s back in long, gentle motions. Jeff watched her, at first for lack of anything else to do, but after a moment, because he couldn’t seem to look away.
And he also couldn’t figure out why. That nightgown of hers certainly wasn’t alluring. An oversized T-shirt emblazoned Life Is A Trip, Don’t Miss It hung to midthigh. Although, he thought, the surprisingly shapely legs revealed by that shirt were not bad at all. As he watched, she shifted slightly, tugging the hem down fruitlessly.
Her thick brown hair lay loose on her shoulders, and he had to admit that the casual style complemented her features far better than the scraped-back ponytail she’d worn earlier. Her high cheekbones were more sharply defined in the soft light. Light brown eyebrows arched high over eyes that looked as deep and mysterious as a moonless night. Her generous mouth was curved in a half smile even as the baby in her arms flailed tiny fists against her face. Laura merely caught one of those fists, opened it and kissed the small, chubby palm.
His jaw tightened, and something inside him twisted. A curl of desire trickled through him, and he deliberately squashed it. Shifting position on the sofa, he wished he had taken the time to grab his robe before leaving his room. Wearing only a pair of boxer shorts, Jeff felt suddenly, decidedly uncomfortable.
He was staring.
In the shadowy light, Laura saw his pale blue eyes darken as he watched her. Her gaze slid away, unfortunately dropping to his bare, muscular chest. Her heart beat faster, and her palms were damp. Breath after breath straggled into her lungs even as she told herself that she was probably just too warm in the overheated apartment.
All she needed was to turn the heater down.
This had nothing to do with how attractive he was. After all, she didn’t even notice things like that anymore.
Laura’s gaze flicked to his again, then quickly away. Her stomach fluttered and twitched. Why was he looking at her so strangely? She wasn’t exactly a supermodel, so what did he find so fascinating that he couldn’t stop watching her?
Miranda sucked in a gulp of air, coughed, choked, then cried again, pumping her little legs against Laura’s chest. Immediately Laura dismissed Jeff Ryan and the strange things he did to her stomach and concentrated on the baby.
“It’s all right, sweetheart,” she soothed in a low, humming tone.
“No, it’s not,” Jeff said, his voice grumpy. “Is she ever going to shut up so I can get some sleep tonight?”
Laura frowned at him, furious at his impatience. Carefully, she shifted the baby to her lap and began to rock slowly. “Well, now that you’ve told her that she’s disturbing you, I’m sure she’ll settle right down,” Laura snapped. “After all, how can the throbbing pain of new, sharp teeth slicing through her gums compare with your being tired?”
He scowled at her and sat forward, leaning his forearms on his thighs. “You know—” he started to say.
“Yes, I do,” she cut him off neatly. “I know that you don’t give a—” she broke off, searched for a word, then continued “—hoot about this baby. All you care about is yourself.”
“Up until eleven this morning,” he reminded her, “that’s all I had to worry about.”
“Well, things’ve changed.”
“Tell me about it.” He waved one hand at her and the baby. “In less than twenty-four hours, I’ve inherited a baby and a snotty nanny.”
“Snotty?”
“Snotty,” he repeated.
Bouncing the baby a little faster on her knee, Laura’s rocking motion became a bit jerky. “You are the one who needed my help,” she told him stiffly, still smarting from the “snotty” remark.
“Help,” he clarified. “Not harassment.”
“Now I’m harassing you?”
“What do you call it?” he asked hotly.
“I call it looking out for this baby when no one else seems willing.”
Miranda sniffled and rubbed her eyes with both fists. Then, reaching down, she snatched at the hem of Laura’s nightgown and lifted it. Jamming the fabric into her mouth, she chewed furiously.
“I didn’t say I wasn’t willing,” he said.
“Of course you did,” Laura countered, paying no attention to the suddenly quiet baby in her arms. “Not five minutes after I got here, you were talking about finding a way out of this situation.”
A long silent moment passed, neither of them aware that Miranda had stopped screaming. Finally, Jeff stood up, and ran one hand across the top of his head. Something Laura had already noticed he did quite often when he was upset.
“Look,” he said, gazing down at her in the half-light, “maybe we got off on the wrong foot.”
“How’s that?” She looked up at him, determined to keep her gaze locked on his face. Thankfully, she was immune to the distraction of a well-muscled chest, but there was no point in taking chances.
“I’m not some kind of monster,” he told her, and his voice sounded distant, quiet. “I don’t even hate kids.”
Wow. A testimonial. Her hold on Miranda tightened protectively.
“It’s just that I’m not...” He shook his head and looked off into the shadowy corner of the room. “Hell, I’m nobody’s idea of father material.”
Was that a wistful tone in his voice? “You could be,” she said hesitantly. “If you tried.”
He snorted a choked laugh. “You’re a lot more sure than I am, Mary Poppins,” he commented.
Laura stood up, hitching the baby higher in her arms. Forcing herself to look into Jeff’s eyes, she said, “I thought Marines weren’t afraid of a challenge.”
One corner of his mouth lifted in a sardonic half smile. She told herself that it was lucky for her she was beyond noticing things like the dimple he had in his right cheek.
“Challenges, no,” he told her. “Slaughters, yes. And I have a feeling that kid’s already got me outnumbered.” Pausing, he listened for a minute, then said, “Hey, she’s not crying anymore.”
True, Laura thought. Miranda had finally settled down, and neither one of them had realized it.
Jeff looked at the baby in her arms, then pulled in a deep breath as his gaze slipped lower.
Laura saw his jaw tighten. Glancing down, she looked for whatever it was that had caused such a reaction in him. Her eyes widened immediately. The hem of her nightshirt was drawn up to just beneath her left breast. Exposed to Jeff’s view was not only a wide expanse of flesh, but the electric blue lace bikini underwear she wore. Laura’s one concession to femininity in her wardrobe had always been her secret weakness for beautiful lingerie.
Well, it wasn’t a secret anymore.
“Oh, my goodness,” she blurted as she tugged at the fabric even while turning her back on Jeff.
“Wow,” he murmured.
Laura silently thanked heaven that it was so dark in the living room. She felt the heated flush of embarrassment rush to her cheeks and was relieved he wouldn’t see it.
“Who would have thought you’d be hiding lace under all that camouflage you were wearing earlier?”
It would have been too much to hope for that he would ignore what he’d just seen. But did he really have to talk about it, too?
“I think it would be better if we just pretend this never happened,” Laura said as she tugged at the fabric, hoping to restore her dignity. But the baby, happily chewing on the soft cotton, was blissfully unaware of Laura’s predicament. Little fingers curled into the material and hung on with a surprisingly strong grip.
“Nothing did happen,” Jeff stated.
Laura shot him a quick, furtive look over her shoulder. An odd gleam shone in his eyes, but she dismissed it as a trick of the low lighting. For whatever reason, he wasn’t going to talk about her underwear anymore. That was enough.
“Good,” she said quickly. “Now, if you’ll excuse me,” she grunted as she stepped around him, keeping her back to him at all times. “I think I’ll put Miranda down. She seems contented enough now.”
He chuckled.
She heard him, but since she still wasn’t decently covered, she didn’t turn around. “What’s so funny?” she demanded, stopping just outside her open bedroom door.
“Nothing,” he said, his voice low and intimate. “It’s just that I was thinking how alike Miranda and I are after all.”
“What does that mean?” she asked, knowing even as she did so that it was a mistake.
“It means that pulling a woman’s nightgown up always makes me pretty content, too.”
She inhaled sharply. Straightening her shoulders, she ignored the deep chuckles coming from behind her and walked into her room. When the door was safely closed, Laura leaned back against it.
Miranda laughed, let go of the nightgown and patted Laura’s cheeks.
“Oh, sure,” she said to the smiling baby. “Now you cooperate.”
Jeff cupped his head in his hands and inhaled the scent of the strong black coffee in front of him. His eyes felt like two marbles in a bucket of sand.
Between the baby’s restless first night in his apartment and the heart-stopping peep show Laura had unwittingly given him, he had lain awake most of the night. Visions of blue lace and smooth, lightly tanned flesh had haunted him.
Even now, he could see her, flustered and embarrassed as she turned away from him. If the light in the room had been better, Jeff was willing to bet that he could have seen a blush steal across her cheeks.
How long had it been since he’d known a woman to blush?
He inhaled sharply, blew the air out of his lungs in a frustrated sigh and told himself that he would be in real bad shape if he was attracted to women like Laura Morgan.
Thankfully, he wasn’t.
Give him a well-dressed, sophisticated career woman every time. The motherly type had never done a thing for him. Although, you really couldn’t classify those blue lace bikini panties as motherly.
He groaned quietly.
Should have taken another sick day, he thought A man just couldn’t function on two hours’ sleep. Unless of course, he thought as he leaned back in his chair, he was on a battlefield. Live ammunition whizzing past your head had a way of waking you right up.
“Captain?”
Jeff blinked groggily, almost surprised to find himself in his office. He looked at the younger man poking his head in the doorway. “What is it, Corporal Warren?”
“A Private Higgins is here, sir. Says he has those files you wanted.”
“Send him in,” Jeff ordered sharply. He’d been waiting all morning for these records to arrive.
A young, eager-looking redheaded kid in the standard camouflage utility uniform strode into his office. File folders tucked neatly beneath his left arm, the kid came to an abrupt stop in front of Jeffs desk and flashed a picture-perfect salute.
Nodding absentmindedly, Jeff reached for the files.
“This is all I could find, sir,” the private said as he handed the manila folders over. “If you’d like, I could make a few calls, see if there’s anything else available.”
Jeff opened the files and glanced quickly over the pages inside. Then he looked up again. “That won’t be necessary, Private. Thank you.”
“Aye, sir.” Another salute, an abrupt about-face and the kid was gone.
“Corporal Warren,” Jeff called. His clerk appeared instantly.
“Sir?”
“Close my door, Corporal. No interruptions.”
“Aye, sir.”
In seconds, the door was closed and Jeff was alone. Picking up his coffee, he started reading all about the man who had given him Miranda. Not that he didn’t remember him. But it had been more than five years since he’d seen the sergeant. And in the military, an officer served with so many men—sometimes names and faces blurred without a good prodding of the memory.