Linda Markowiak - And Baby Makes Six

“A formality?”

She hesitated again, and Mitch got impatient. “Just break it to me. What are you trying to say here?”

Alma Winters touched him on the arm again. “All right. Jennifer Litton has raised the issue of whether you’re the proper person to care for Crystal. That’s why we’re having an Ohio social worker check. You see, Miss Litton was under the impression that Kathy’s will named her guardian.”

Mitch stared at her, bewildered. He and Kathy might not have been close, but they’d stayed in touch. She hadn’t trusted him to care for her daughter?

The social worker said, “Miss Litton claims Kathy had mentioned changing her will a couple of times.”

“Well, she never did it, did she?”

“No, she never did. Look, I’m a southerner, and nobody believes in family like a southerner does. You’re blood. You’re kin. But you have a lot of responsibility. It’s not too late to change your mind. If you can’t see your way to providing a home for your niece, Miss Litton would—”

“No. I believe in family, too.” He looked her directly in the eye.

There was a second’s pause. Then she said, “Ready to take your niece home?”

“Sure.” Crystal was just a little kid. A little girl.

A little…girl. He stepped through the door Alma Winters held open.

Crystal was sitting on a chair by the window. She wore her hair long and wavy, and was dressed in shorts that made a yellow bib kind of thing over a T-shirt. Sandals on her feet, those feet swinging up and down as if she were on an imaginary swing. Mitch’s sons’ legs were full of scars, scratches, insect bites in the summer, but his niece’s weren’t. A scrap of a cat, as orange as her hair, lay curled in her lap. A cat so small his dog, Face-off, was likely to have it for lunch and then look for more.

She was just a little kid.

His gaze was caught by the blonde who stood with a hand on his niece’s shoulder. Jennifer—Jenny—Litton. Miss Jenny Litton was real pretty, like some high-class southern belle right out of an old movie. He’d had trouble not looking at her last night at dinner. He glanced away now. After all, he was used to looking—and then not looking—at attractive women.

He addressed himself to his niece. “Hi, Crystal.”

Her legs swung higher. The kitten woke up and stretched.

“We’re going home today. On the airplane, remember? You haven’t ever been on a plane.”

Those bare legs kept swinging. He clenched a fist in his pocket, painfully conscious of the social worker behind him, and the silent woman next to Crystal. The pretty, uppity woman Kathy might have preferred to him to raise her kid.

“You’re going to like it in Ohio. We talked about it last night. We live in an old farmhouse and we do a lot of fun stuff, like sports. In the spring, you can use that mitt and baseball I got you last Christmas.”

The cat turned to stare at him.

Jenny spoke for the first time. “Crystal doesn’t like sports.”

“Oh.”

“Kathy used to say you were a big hockey star. Rich and famous.” There was no admiration in her voice. That voice was low and feminine, and she drew out the syllables until she sounded as southern as fried chicken and biscuits. Mitch frowned. No, not fried chicken. More like a cool glass of iced tea.

He wasn’t a big hockey star anymore, and he wasn’t that famous anywhere outside of North Shore, Ohio, these days, but his sporting-goods store, Serious Gear, was doing well and he didn’t have to answer to this woman.

Belatedly, Mrs. Winters came forward. “Crystal, maybe you’ll learn to enjoy baseball, and here you are with your own mitt and ball.”

Her voice was so falsely cheerful that even Mitch winced.

Crystal shrugged, and her movement must’ve startled the cat. It leaped to the floor. “Jewels,” she called and scrambled down after it.

But Jenny was quicker. She took a couple of steps and bent to keep the cat from scurrying away. “Here, Crystal. Your baby landed on its feet.” Jenny ran her fingers down the kitten’s head and back, her long, polished nails scratching behind its ears. The cat set up a purr so loud even Mitch could hear it.

The floor was dusty, but she got down on her knees despite those expensive-looking silky stockings she wore, and petted the tiny animal. Crystal sat beside her. Jenny stroked along the kitten’s backbone, and its hind end came up as her fingers reached it, its skinny tail in the air like a flagpole. Crystal turned and looked up at Mitch. “My momma named him Jewels because I’m Crystal.”

Huh? Well, at least she was talking to him. “Ah, that’s a good name. For a cat. Jules.” He tried harder. “He’s a cute cat.”

“He’s a she.”

Jules was a weird name for a girl cat, but Mitch decided to let it go. He said, “Okay, a she then.”

But he must have said something wrong, because his niece turned then to Jenny. “Do I have to go with him, Miss Jenny?”

Jenny’s fingers on the cat stilled. In her position on her knees, her jacket was hiked up a notch, showing the fullness of her curves beneath. The fact that he noticed so…intently made him more uncomfortable than ever. Maybe he should have been the one to get down on the floor. But somehow today he had a hockey stick for a spine, and so he stood there like an idiot, looking down at them both.

“Well, then,” he said to Jenny when the silence got so long he couldn’t stand it. “We’ll pick up Crystal’s suitcase and be on our way a little early. The plane leaves in a few hours.”

A really heavy silence fell over the room. Mitch finally added, “I want to thank you for helping out until I could get here.” He really was grateful for that part. He tried a smile on her, though nothing about her manner encouraged one. “You…did a good job. You had things Kathy would have wanted. I knew she liked lilacs. She always did.”

Emotion flickered in Jenny’s eyes for the barest second, so quickly that he almost missed it. But he knew in that moment that his sister had meant a lot to this woman.

Crystal had been scratching the cat. Now she looked up from the floor. “I want to stay with Miss Jenny,” she whispered.

Oh, hell.

Instinctively now, he squatted. At his movement, the cat leaped up in the air and took off. Crystal jerked, wrapping herself around Jenny. Jenny hugged her, whispered something into her ear that Mitch couldn’t catch.

The social worker cleared her throat. “Your uncle is family, sweetie. He lives in a big house in Ohio, which is a very nice place to live, and you’ll have four cousins.” She spread her hands helplessly. “He loves you. He told me so.”

Mitch had told her that, over the phone when he’d got the shocking news of his sister’s death in an auto accident. Had that only been two days ago? Saying he loved his niece wasn’t really a lie. He was sure he would love her…just as soon as he got to know her.

Jenny gently disengaged from Crystal and stood. “Why don’t you find your kitty and see if she’s hungry? You know how hungry she gets, and how much she relies on you to take care of her.” Surprising Mitch again, she pulled a little plastic bag of cat treats from the pocket of that yellow outfit.

“Can we talk?” It was Jenny Litton again, her eyebrow raised in polite inquiry.

He nodded, out of his league. He wanted to do what was best for Crystal.

Jenny stroked Crystal’s hair. “Will you be all right with Mrs. Winters for a while? Just for a minute? I need to talk to your uncle Mitch.”

“Do I have to go with him?” she said, her eyes filling with tears.

Jenny hesitated.

Mrs. Winters said, “Sweetie, we’ve talked about this.”

Mitch seized on a sudden inspiration as the kitten munched on a cat treat. “I have a dog at home.”