Best Laid Plans (23 page)

After several minutes, she finally took her eyes off her precious baby. Ignoring all the happy faces in the living room, her gaze locked on the one face that wasn’t. Jake stood on the far side of the room, watching Violet and Daisy. His lips turned up in a sad smile and tears glinted in the corners of his eyes when their eyes met.

“Let’s go see your daddy,” she whispered to Daisy.

When he saw his family headed toward him, Jake’s smile morphed into the real thing. He held his arms out to Daisy and her body strained toward him while they were still several feet away. Violet remembered when the baby reaching out to Jake would have made her jealous and protective. No more. Daisy didn’t need protection from her father.

She transferred the baby to his arms. “I’m so sorry,” she said in a voice so low only he could hear it.

Daisy squealed as her father planted kisses on her chubby neck. “She doesn’t smell right,” he said to Violet. “We need to give her a bath.”

She nodded. She’d noticed the same thing. Daisy smelled foreign, and it was an unpleasant reminder she’d been out of their care for far too long.

“Wait. Did you say you were
sorry
? What do
you
have to be sorry for?”

“I didn’t listen when you said the exposure of the ad campaign could be bad for Daisy. Her kidnapping was all my fault.” Violet knew now her mistake hadn’t been letting Jake into their lives, it had been not trusting him enough. Not that she wanted to turn the decision-making over to him — he shouldn’t have let Carrie into her townhouse without talking to her first — but maybe they could learn to communicate better. They were Daisy’s parents. They’d have to work together from now on, whether they were in the same room or on different continents.

Jake shook his head. He shifted Daisy to his left arm and embraced Violet with his right, pulling the three of them into a tight circle. “I could have said no. I decided I was overreacting, seeing danger where there wasn’t any. There’s always risk, but you have to live your life. It will be hard for us not to be overprotective of Daisy now. Hard for
you
.”

“No, you were right the first time. It will be hard for
us
.”

He pulled back and gave her a questioning look, but Daisy was squirming and rubbing her eyes. She took her from Jake. “This baby needs a bath and a bottle. Do I have a volunteer to run to the store for diapers and formula?”

• • •

When Violet woke the next morning, the terror of the previous day came rushing back in her first moments of consciousness, and she bolted upright to find herself in an unfamiliar room.

“Relax, everything’s fine.” It was Jake’s voice, and Jake’s comforting hand on her arm. She remembered then that she was in the guest room in Jamie’s luxurious penthouse.

She sat up and turned to face Jake. He was stretched across Daisy, who was nestled between them with a pillow on either side of her, still asleep despite the disturbance Violet had created. Since a king-sized bed in the center of the guest room was their only sleeping option in Jamie’s apartment, and it was too heavy to move against a wall, they’d been forced to share the bed. Jake had assured her co-sleeping was a common practice in many parts of the world and neither of them would roll over and crush the baby. She’d pretended to believe him, but had added the pillows and planned to stay awake all night, just in case.

“I can’t believe I slept. Did Daisy wake up at all?”

He shook his head. “I think she’s officially sleeping through the night.”

“That’s not the only ‘first.’ This is the third time I’ve gone to sleep in the same bed with you, but the first time you were still in it when I woke up in the morning.”

His laugh made Daisy startle, and she looked around in confusion for a moment, then settled her gaze on Violet. She smiled and wriggled her whole body in excitement.

“I couldn’t desert my post. Daisy might have climbed over the pillows, rolled over four or five times, and fallen off the bed.”

The baby turned her head toward Jake and laughed.

“See, even Daisy thinks it’s funny.”

Violet was relieved the baby was in such good spirits. “Do you think she’ll remember what happened on some level?” Was her child going to be traumatized, prone for the rest of her life to fears and phobias? If only she’d listened to Jake when he urged her not to do the ad campaign.

He sat up and lifted Daisy to his bare shoulder, where she was content, for the moment, to rest her head. Violet would have liked to do the same. “I think she’ll be fine. We just have to make her feel as loved and secure as possible.”

Violet sighed. “
We
, Jake? I know you’re Daisy’s father and I want you to be as involved in her life as you can or want to be, but won’t it be hard for you to make her feel ‘loved and secure’ from Zimbabwe?”

“Zimbabwe? I thought I was going to Peru.”

His flip response brought tears to her eyes, and she had to turn her head away so he wouldn’t see. As she’d fought sleep the night before, she’d thought about everything that had happened, and decided she needed to keep Jake in Daisy’s life. In
hers
, too. Together they’d have a better chance of making good parenting decisions. If it meant he was only physically present for brief periods, then she’d do her best to remind Daisy of him the rest of the time. In a world where you could spy on your nanny, that should be easy, right? He could take a laptop with a camera everywhere he went.

This morning, however, with Jake so close she could feel the heat from his body, it didn’t seem like a very good plan.

Violet felt the bedsprings move as he slid over beside her. Daisy flung herself at her mother, and after shifting the baby into her lap, Jake slid his arm around her and pulled them both close to him. She shivered at the contact with his bare chest. When they went to bed last night, the joke had been that Jamie had no pajamas to lend his brother, and after asking her permission, he’d climbed into bed wearing only a fresh pair of white boxers.

Jake touched her face, turned it toward him and kissed her lips while Daisy pummeled them both, trying to get some attention. “Violet, I’m not going to Peru.”

Did he mean he was staying in Boston, or going somewhere else? She held her breath until he completed the thought.

“How can I leave Daisy? How can I leave
you
? I love you both. No more running away for me.”

“But Jake, will loving us be enough?” Monty had loved her mother. He’d most likely loved her and Seth, too. But it hadn’t been enough to make him stay. She didn’t want to have Jake in her life now, only to lose him later.

“Violet, do you love me?”

The last time she’d told him she did, he’d moved out the next day. What was the right answer? She took a deep breath. In her profession, and her life, the only right answer was the honest one. “Yes, Jake, I love you.”

“Ga!” cried Daisy, and pounded Jake on the nose. He broke eye contact with Violet and grabbed Daisy’s fist.

“Is this the kind of treatment I can expect from my new family?” he asked the baby.

The word brought a mist of tears to Violet’s eyes, but she was still not certain they were doing the right thing. Or even what it
was
they were doing. “Jake, you love to travel. You
need
to travel for your work …”

“And I will, but only for shorter periods. Or you and Daisy will come with me. You’re a journalist. Haven’t you ever wanted to get the stories outside your own backyard?”

She smiled. Suddenly the world was full of possibilities. All she’d had to do was stop making plans and let life happen. Let
Jake
happen. “I’d consider it.”

“There’s plenty of time to discuss the details. But first, I have an important question to ask you.”

Violet’s heart thumped in her chest. “Go ahead.”

His amber eyes gazed directly into hers. “Violet Gallagher, will you …” Daisy, who had been whining softly, chose that moment to erupt into an angry, shrieking cry. “Will you … get our daughter a bottle? And a dry diaper?”

She rubbed the slight growth of reddish beard on his chin, shivering at the thought of all that was to come. “Yes, my love. I will.”

Violet’s heart thudded as she watched Richard Rayburn open the envelope with the name of the winner of the Thompson Award for News Excellence inside. The word in the industry was that she had no serious competition, but you never knew how these things would go. Jake gripped her hand under the tablecloth and she smiled at him. She’d told him she had to be prepared to clap her hands raw and appear genuinely happy if one of her rivals won, which would be harder than producing her story had been.

Richard grinned and his gaze zeroed in on her from the stage. “Violet Gallagher, for her story ‘Abuse, America’s Dirty Little Secret.’”

Jake helped her up from her chair, and kissed her full on the lips. “Was there ever any doubt?” he whispered in her ear. “Be careful in those shoes,” he added.

Violet laughed and shook her head. “Stop worrying so much.” Even so, she stepped gingerly around the tables and chairs as the crowd applauded, and when she reached the steps to the stage she realized Jake was right about the stylish high heels she’d insisted on wearing. There was no handrail, and she couldn’t see her feet. Would she
ever
learn to listen to his advice? Noticing her hesitation, Richard rushed down and gave her his arm.

“Congratulations, Mrs. Macintyre,” he said as he escorted her up to the dais. “It looks like you’ve hit the jackpot.”

As she waited for the applause to end, her eyes scanned the room. The first person she saw, as always, was Jake. If the glow of his tan and his golden curls didn’t draw her attention, the fact that he was clapping hard and whistling would have. Had it been three years since she’d first picked him out of a crowd, at a time when she was feeling sorry for herself because she had no special someone to celebrate her success with her? Could so much have changed in such a short time?

She smiled at each of the special people standing at the table with Jake. Matt, Jamie, and Seth — it was like having three brothers to tease and torment her now instead of just one. David Gallagher, who was so pleased that she still used his name professionally after her marriage, with her mother at his side, tears on her face but her make-up, of course, intact.

The only loved one missing was Daisy, who wasn’t invited to this grown-up event and had to spend the evening with a babysitter. But Daisy’s little sister was here, she thought, feeling a foot wiggle inside of her. Placing her hand on the mound of her belly, she noticed with surprise that a space had opened up above it — her baby had dropped into the birth canal sometime this evening. It was time for her to speak, but her only thought was a fervent wish that her water not break in front of all these people.

Locking eyes with Jake got her back on track. “Two years ago, I met a woman who was being abused.” She wished Carrie could be here tonight, and knew Matt did too. “I didn’t understand why it took her so long to do something about it. After getting to know her, I wanted to understand. So I did this story.”

She’d done it not just for Carrie, but for Amanda, the mother-in-law she would never know. Donations to the local battered women’s shelter had increased dramatically after the story ran, as had discussions in the newspapers and on the Internet. That was far more satisfying to her than any award; the recognition by her peers was just a sweet bonus.

Although she’d planned to say more, a wave of pressure low in her groin made her catch her breath. She forced a smile and simply said, “Thank you for this wonderful award, it means the world to me.”

Jake ran onto the stage as applause filled the ballroom. “Violet? Is something happening?” He guided her back down to the table, where their family waited.

“Yes, I think it is. But don’t worry, there’s plenty of time to go back for my overnight bag, and to say goodbye to Daisy.”

“Say goodbye to Daisy?” Her mother had overheard her and her face lit up with excitement. “You’re in labor! I’m finally going to find out the sex of this grandchild. You know, if it’s another girl, Rose would be a lovely name. Or have I already suggested that?”

Violet and Jake looked at each other and laughed. They had wanted the sex of the baby to be a surprise, but an unwitting nurse had spilled the ultrasound results at her last checkup. Although they hadn’t told anyone else yet, they
had
picked out a name. Amanda Rose, after Jake’s mother. Sandra would have to be content with that.

Another contraction squeezed Violet’s insides, mild but still strong enough to show on her face. Jake collected her evening bag and took her elbow.

“We need to hurry. Your bag, my camera, and the birthing plan are all at home.”

She laughed. “Which means things are already not going the way we planned. Jake, when are you going to learn to lighten up and be more spontaneous? You know what they say about the best laid plans …”

Although she was admonished to “stop making things up” when she was a child, Elizabeth Palmer never did. She took early retirement from her job in IT, and now spends her days with the ever-changing cast of characters in her head, her handsome husband, and the requisite author’s cat.