Authors: Theresa Ragan
“It’s the truth.” He picked her up by the waist, his eyes never leaving hers as he twirled her about, making her blush, something she seemed to be doing a lot of lately.
“Time for all you kind folk to make a basket,” Zoey called out.
And before Jill could bow out, she found herself doing what all the other ladies were doing, raising her arms up and around her partner’s neck. Derrick took hold of her waist and lifted her from the ground.
Pressed up against him, she felt every nerve ending in her body sizzle and crackle. For a fleeting moment in time, Jill thought he might kiss her, but then the music stopped and the dance was done.
~~~
“Look what the cat dragged home,” Jake said, gesturing with his chin toward the house.
Sandy looked over her shoulder and tried not to look too obviously pleased by Connor’s presence when she saw him approaching.
“Wook at me!” Lexi shouted, making Jake wince.
“It’s
L
a
L
a
L
ook not
W
ook.”
“Wa Wa Wook!” she shouted with glee.
Sandy had already explained to Jake that she’d taken Lexi to a speech therapist, who told her that once more teeth came in Lexi would be able to pronounce her Ls, but he and his brothers didn’t appear to believe her.
“Hey,” Connor said as he caught up to them. “How’s it going?”
Jake had hold of the reins and he didn’t slow down to wait for his brother.
Sandy held onto Lexi’s leg and walked backwards so she could keep up with Jake and yet talk to Connor. “As you can see, we’re all having fun.” Connor had looked nice in a suit last week, but in jeans and a T-shirt, he took her breath away. His arms weren’t as built as his brother Derrick’s, but he definitely worked out on a regular basis. As he caught up to her, she noted that he smelled good too, like fresh hay mixed with a hint of spicy cologne.
Connor walked at her side and reached out to stroke the pony’s wiry mane. “This is Peanuts. Peanuts used to be my pony,” he told Lexi. “My brothers and I all used to play cowboys and Indians and Peanuts was the fastest of the bunch. Nobody could catch us.”
“He’s wrong,” Jake told Lexi. “After Connor left for college, Mom said he was mine and Peanuts here has been my pony ever since.”
“Okay children,” Sandy teased, “enough.”
Connor chuckled, but Jake didn’t look happy about having Connor around.
About six inches taller than Jake, Connor towered over his brother, making it easy for him to reach over and rub his knuckles over the top of Jake’s head. “You can have Peanuts, okay?”
“He’s all yours,” Jake said, handing him the reins. “I promised Sandy I would teach her to square dance. No time like the present.”
Sandy didn’t know what to say. She preferred to stay and talk to Connor, but she had expressed interest when Jake had mentioned square dancing earlier.
“I would love to,” she told Jake, thinking fast, “but I better stay with Lexi.”
“Don’t worry, Connor will keep an eye on her, right Connor?”
Connor glanced from his brother to Sandy. “It would be my pleasure.”
Sandy inwardly scolded herself for telling Jake she would dance with him. She’d been waiting for Connor to arrive all afternoon and now that he was finally here, she had to leave him. Sometimes life just wasn’t fair. “Are you sure you don’t mind?”
“Go have fun. Lexi and I will be fine.”
“Lexi, you be a good girl for Connor, okay?”
Her curls bobbed when she nodded. “I wike him.”
Connor laughed.
“I’ll hurry back,” Sandy said, but Jake grabbed her hand and pulled her along before she could add anything else, or gaze into his eyes for a few minutes longer, or think of an excuse to reach out and touch him. When she and Jake got as far as the barn, she looked over her shoulder and watched Connor lead Peanuts in another circle and at the same time laugh at something Lexi said.
Then he turned her way, as if he knew she’d be looking.
~~~
After her third dance, Sandy took a seat on a bale of hay next to Jill and wiped her brow. “Thank you, Jake. That was fun.”
“I’ll grab you both some punch and I’ll be right back.”
“I think Jake has a crush on you,” Jill said. “What happened to Connor?”
“He’s leading the pony around with Lexi. To tell you the truth, I wanted to dance with Connor, but by the time Jake had asked me to dance, I didn’t think Connor was going to show up anyhow. I feel like I’m back in high school.”
Jill laughed as she brushed hay from her pants.
Sandy gestured a hand toward Derrick and the woman he was talking to. “Is that his attorney?”
“Yes, it is. She’s also his adopted brother’s fiancée. Her name is Maggie.”
They both watched Derrick as he chatted with the woman.
Sandy’s eyes narrowed. “What’s going on with the whole court thing, anyhow? Is he still going to try to get partial custody of Ryan?”
“I guess we’ll be discussing all of that before a court assigned mediator in a few weeks.”
“Maybe if you just agree to let him see Ryan four times a year that will satisfy him and you won’t have to bother with mediation.”
Jill chewed on her bottom lip. “I really don’t know what to do at this point. I really should talk to Thomas about it.”
“There are thousands of attorneys out there. You don’t need to get Thomas involved.”
Jill sighed as she continued to watch Derrick and Maggie. “What do you think about those two? I met Aaron, Derrick’s adopted brother and Maggie’s fiancé, the day Derrick and I took Ryan to his doctor appointment. There was some obvious animosity between the two brothers.”
“Interesting.”
“And then yesterday,” Jill went on, “before my date with Ryan’s pediatrician, Nate Lerner, I saw Maggie at Derrick’s apartment. When I asked him about her visit, he played it off as if it was nothing, said she was just helping him decorate Ryan’s room.”
“I didn’t know you went out with Ryan’s pediatrician.”
Jill nodded. “It was supposed to be dinner and a movie, but he was called away to be in the delivery room for an emergency c-section. Instead, I ended up watching a movie with Derrick—after he walked into my apartment unannounced and caught me half-dressed.”
“This just keeps getting better and better.” Sandy angled her head as she looked closely at Jill. “He’s growing on you, isn’t he?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. Yes. Sometimes Derrick looks at me as if I’m the only woman in the world and other times he just looks confused.”
“Men.”
“Yeah.”
“If God was a woman, she wouldn’t have been so cruel.”
Jake returned with a glass of punch for each of them, putting an end to any further talk of Derrick Baylor.
~~~
“Thanks so much for having me and Ryan at your house today,” Jill told Phil Baylor. “I had a wonderful time.”
“I should be thanking you for bringing Ryan. It meant a lot to all of us.” He gave her a hug. “While you retrieve your son,” he told her, “I’ll grab the rest of your things.” He pointed to her left. “Ryan is asleep in Derrick’s old bedroom down the hall to the left. I’ll be right there.”
“Thank you.” As Jill headed down the hallway, she took her time looking at all the family pictures hanging on the walls. Apparently it wasn’t easy squeezing ten kids into one picture because in most of the pictures someone’s head or body was cut off by the frame. There were photos of Derrick playing football and of all the Baylor boys riding horses and ponies and swinging from ropes in the barn. A large section of the wall was devoted to ribbons and awards they had won at horse and pony shows.
Voices caught her attention as she neared the first bedroom. She recognized Derrick’s voice and when she peeked through the partially open door, she saw Derrick and Maggie standing near the portable crib. Derrick’s mother stood on the opposite side and was about to pick up Ryan when Maggie held up two pieces of paper and said, “I have some very good news.” She jiggled the paper in her hand. “Guess what this is?”
“I have no idea,” Derrick said.
Mrs. Baylor paid no attention as she scooped Ryan into her arms.
“Not only is it the letter you sent to CryoCorp,” Maggie said excitedly, “but a copy of the check CryoCorp cashed, proving they received the letter and the check within days of the date you said you mailed it. Not only will CryoCorp be forced to admit to their part in this mess, the judge will have no choice but to give you half custody of Ryan.”
Derrick’s father had returned with Jill’s things. He coughed to let everyone know he and Jill were standing at the door.
Everyone turned their way.
Jill’s stomach churned and her eyes stung. She didn’t know what to say; she only knew she needed to leave right this minute. She never should have come today. She had wanted to play fair, but now something stirred inside of her, something deep and dark and scary, something telling her she needed to be wary of Derrick and his family. Not because they might not be good people—her instincts told her they wanted only the best for her and Ryan—but because she needed to be the one who decided what was best for her and her son. Although she’d truly started to believe she might be able to handle Derrick being a part of Ryan’s life, she wasn’t ready to give Derrick half custody or any say at all when it came to Ryan.
Unsure of what to say, she stepped forward. Derrick’s mom handed Ryan over. As Jill held her baby close to her chest, her gaze connected with Derrick’s. “I should go. I need to get Ryan home.”
“I’m sorry,” Maggie said, and Jill wasn’t sure if the apology was meant for her alone or for Derrick’s family, too, but it didn’t matter. If anything, Jill felt as if she should be thanking Maggie for making her see how quickly she’d reverted back to doing exactly what she’d been doing her entire life—trying to please everyone else. She had a son now and she needed to put his welfare above all else. Ryan was her son, and nobody, including Derrick Baylor and his family, was going to take him away from her.
The ride home was almost more than Jill could handle. Lexi and Ryan fell fast asleep when she needed the distraction most. Sandy had on her earphones and was listening to her iPod. Her eyes were closed.
“I’m sorry about the situation with the letter,” Derrick said. “I know what you’re thinking and I want you to know that nobody was trying to hide anything from you.”
Jill’s gaze was directed out the window. She watched the sunset behind row after row of houses and trees as it all swept by in a hazy blur. She didn’t want to talk about this now. She needed to think, to plan, to decide what her next step was going to be.
“You’re not going to talk to me?”
“I spent months enduring injections and medications,” Jill blurted out, unrehearsed. “For eight and a half months I carried my baby inside of me. I ate right and exercised every day. Ryan belongs to me and nobody is going to take him away from me.”
“I would never take him away from you.”
“Then why are you proceeding with this mediation thing?”
“We haven’t known each other very long. Doesn’t it make sense that I would want some sort of formalized document stating your agreement that Ryan is also my son and I can spend time with him?”
She reached for her purse, rifled through it and pulled out a pen and paper. She scribbled the words:
Derrick Baylor is the father of my son, Ryan Michael Garrison
. Then she stared at the paper for a moment longer before she crumpled the paper and tossed it to the floor. “I think you should have blood tests taken.”
He kept his eyes on the road. “Why?”
“What if you’re not his father? How do we really know?”
“That’s not necessary. CryoCorp sent me a letter with your designated number on it. That’s how I found you in the first place.”
“Companies are run by people. People make mistakes. I’m going to call the court and tell them I do not want to proceed until blood tests confirm paternity.”
Chapter Fifteen
Jill looked from the beautiful plaque to her two friends and co-workers, Sandy and Chelsey. “Up and Coming Food Magazine of the Year. We did it, girls.”
The three of them gathered in her apartment where they usually met twice a month, but tonight was extra special. Jill stood and held up her champagne glass. “I want to make a toast.”
Sandy and Chelsey held up their glasses too.
“I wanted to invite you here today to not only celebrate winning ‘
Up and Coming
,’ but also for working endless hours to produce the best issue of
Food for All
yet. You both did an amazing job and I’m proud to have the honor to work with such dedicated and talented people.”
The doorbell rang.
Jill went to the door and looked out the peephole before opening it.
“Flowers for Jill Garrison,” he said.
“That would be me.” She signed the paper on his clipboard and then took the flowers. They smelled heavenly. She knew who they were from and she knew he was probably watching, so she didn’t dare look pleased by them. “Thank you,” she said before shutting the door.
The flowers came in a vase with water, saving her from having to cut and arrange. The other bouquets Derrick had sent over the past three days had each been delivered at different times of the day and in different vases. She put the lilies on the kitchen counter next to the roses and tulips and avoided going near the kitchen sink since she figured Derrick would be watching from his apartment. The man would stop at nothing.
Chelsey joined her in the kitchen and took a long whiff. “They smell wonderful. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such beautiful flowers.”
“You can have them.”
“Really? Thanks.”
“So, let me get this straight,” Chelsey said. “You’re mad at Derrick Baylor because he wants half custody of his son?”
“I’m not mad at him. I just don’t trust him or his family and I don’t want him around. Not until everything is figured out legally.”
Chelsey looked at Sandy. “I thought you said his family was amazing and that you both had a great time?”