Stephanie Dees - Their Secret Baby Bond

“I know the drill. I’ll take him a cup of coffee and visit for a while.”

As Fran entered the kitchen door, Latham headed in the opposite direction for the barn, the dogs at his heels. He’d tucked his work space into a grassy clearing at the back of the property, surrounded by pine trees. It wasn’t unusual to come upon deer nibbling grass around the double-wide doors.

When both doors were wide open and the ceiling fans were on, he ran his hand down the reclaimed wood he was working.

The familiar earthy, pungent smell of the wood soothed his raw edges, the repetitive motions that created something out of nothing giving him a measure of peace for the things he couldn’t control. He couldn’t control Pop’s illness, but he could control this.

He could shape and mold this wood into anything he wanted. This particular piece was turning into a beautiful farm table for some folks in the next county. In the barn, things happened at his whim and will.

He’d gotten Pop appointments with the best specialists in the Southeast, and there was no medical explanation for the elderly man’s confusion, which started when Gran died unexpectedly. Nothing showed up on MRIs or CT scans.

It was as if Pop simply didn’t want to live in a world without Gran. They’d been childhood sweethearts, married at sixteen, and had never been separated. They’d owned the local grocery store and gas station that anchored the town in a gentler, slower time.

Pop and Gran had been the only constant in Latham’s life when he was a kid. His parents weren’t bad people, they just weren’t settlers. They’d moved from place to place in search of, well, Latham wasn’t sure exactly what they were in search of, but whatever it was, they hadn’t found it yet. When he got old enough to understand the gift of a place to call home, he was grateful to them for leaving him in Red Hill Springs with his grandparents.

Because he was a settler. He liked his roots deep.

He leaned in, focusing on the task at hand, not looking up until he heard a car in the drive. He glanced at his watch. It wasn’t unheard of for people to drop by out here, especially since Pop had come to live with him, but it was unusual.

Latham set aside his block of sandpaper and walked to the door of the barn. Wynn Sheehan got out of her car and slammed the door, looking around. For him, he guessed.

He grabbed a rag from the wood worktable beside the door, wiping the dust from his hands as he walked to the center of the clearing. This morning she’d had her hair tied back, but now, the whole long, blond length of it lifted in the wind.

He’d known she was home, of course—the NSA had nothing on the gossip chain in Red Hill Springs, Alabama. He hadn’t seen her, though, until this morning. She was as beautiful as she had been in high school when he’d been so awed by her, he couldn’t put two words together in her presence.

She was opinionated and passionate and had a crazy understanding of the world and where she saw her place in it. He didn’t know anyone else like her, and he’d wanted to be close to her, but she was his best friend’s little sister and, as such, off-limits to the likes of him. They’d come close, once, to being more than friends, but even then he’d quickly come to understand that being rooted in this small town wouldn’t be enough for her.

One hesitant step brought her closer to him, and her eyes locked with his.

Wynn broke the contact first, looking away as a mockingbird shot toward the sky, scolding them for being in the same space.

Latham met her at the edge of her car. “It really is good to see you, Wynn.”

She smiled, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. “It’s good to see you, too. It’s been too long. I won’t stay away that long again.”

He wanted to ask her what kept her away, but they weren’t really friends anymore. “What can I do for you?”

“My mom asked me to come and give you some pictures of what she’s thinking about for the table she wants you to build for her. She could’ve texted them, but she insisted. You know Bertie.”

“I do. There’s no getting around her when she has her mind set on something. Come in. I was about to take a break. Want a Coke?”

“Water?”

He grinned. “I have that, too.”

“I didn’t even know that you were handy with a saw in high school.”

“I could’ve probably made a birdhouse in high school, but it wouldn’t have been pretty.” He looked up from the small fridge in his office—a stall with a desk made from two sawhorses and some old boards. It suited him, though.

He handed her a small bottle of water. “I didn’t start seriously working with wood until about six years ago. I moved back here to be with Pop after Gran died. I do some carpentry work and odd jobs, but there’s just not that much to do in Red Hill Springs. I needed a hobby, desperately.”

“So you just decided to build something?” She was wandering from photo to photo, which he had meticulously hung on the wall. Every item he ever built, starting with the first wooden box, was represented there.

“Yeah, I found some plans for a porch swing online and decided to make it. Back then, I had to get the lumber store to do all my cuts for me.” He waved a hand at the huge saw in the back of his shop. “Now I use mostly reclaimed wood and I do everything here.”

She ran a finger down the table he’d been working on this morning. “Beautiful. You’re really talented. It’s a kind of art.”

Surprised, he searched out her face. “It is, in a way. I remember you being the artist, though.” He glanced at his watch. He needed to leave soon so he could get his jobs done and be at the college before five. “So Bertie sent you out here with some photos?”

She handed them to him and smiled, the first real smile he’d seen from her all day. “I think it was a ploy to get me out from under her feet. I’m not used to being at home, but Bertie isn’t used to me being home either.”

His hands, smoothing the thin magazine sheets, stilled, and he asked the question he’d been wanting to know the answer to since he first heard she was back in town. “Are you planning to stick around for a while?”

The smile vanished. “I’m not sure. I’m still trying to figure all that out. I better go. Tell your pop I said hi.”

He followed her to her car. “You’re welcome to stay and tell him yourself. I teach a class at the college, so I’ve got to get going or I’d go in with you.”

When she opened the door, he reached for her hand. She stared at it. “It really is good to see you again, Wynn.”

She looked down where their two hands joined and didn’t move for a long second. She swallowed hard. “I have to go.”

“Take care.” He watched as she drove away, his eyes following her little blue car until it disappeared around a curve.

He didn’t wonder that he was still as fascinated by her as he had been as a teenager, just accepted it as a fact. That was his nature. But he did wonder what brought her back to Red Hill Springs and what it was that made her eyes look so sad.

Chapter Two

Wynn lay on the floor in her brother Ash’s house, building a block tower with three-year-old Levi, whose adoption would be final in a couple of weeks. He was babbling constantly now, words mixed with sounds that had some resemblance to words.

There’d been a time, not that long ago, when they wondered if he would ever speak, or stand. He’d been broken, physically and emotionally, when Ash’s wife, Jordan, became his foster mom. Together, Jordan and Ash had patiently helped him become a healthy, happy toddler.

When he pulled up to standing using the coffee table, she had to dive to save her glass of ice water from his busy fingers. “Guys, he’s really doing so well.”