Ingrid Weaver - Cinderella's Secret Agent

Maggie had named her baby Delilah out of gratitude. He had understood that. She had meant it as a favor. She couldn’t possibly have known about the sore spot she was probing with her innocent gesture.

It shouldn’t have bothered him. He had come to terms with his limitations almost a decade ago. He had a good life now. He was proud of his work. He enjoyed the loyalty he found among his fellow SPEAR agents and he relished the challenge of each new assignment. He didn’t need a namesake in order to feel fulfilled.

He shouldn’t have told Bill about the baby. It would have been wiser to keep his off-duty life completely separate from his work. Maggie’s world had nothing to do with the world of SPEAR. Yet Del had been so moved by his part in the child’s birth, he would have had to have mentioned it eventually. Too bad he hadn’t left it at that. But when he’d arrived for his shift tonight and Bill had asked about Maggie and the baby, Del had not only told him all about his visit to their hospital room, he’d let slip the name Maggie had chosen.

“Well, well, well,” Bill had said, drawing contemplatively on his pipe. “Delilah, huh? Congratulations, Papa.”

Del had tried to ignore the twinge of pain Bill’s ribbing had caused. “More like an uncle,” he’d said. “An honorary one.”

“That kid doesn’t need an uncle, she needs a daddy.”

“Maggie’s a strong woman. She’ll manage just fine. Anyone can see she loves her daughter to distraction.”

“Oh? How can you tell?”

“It’s all over her face whenever she talks about her.”

“Ah. You mean she gets a syrupy smile and her eyes go soft and unfocused?”

“Something like that.”

Bill let out a puff of aromatic smoke, watching it waft toward the ceiling. “The description fits you, as well.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Next thing you know you’ll be carrying baby pictures around in your wallet and looking for a house with a white picket fence.”

“Bill…”

“Admit it, Del. You’re smitten with both of them.”

“Don’t be stupid.”

“June’s a good time for a wedding, I hear. That’s only two months away.”

“I’m not marrying anyone.”

“Then why all the interest in the young single mother?”

“I’m not interested in her that way. I’m just trying to do the right thing. After the way she was seduced and abandoned by Delilah’s father, she could use a friend.”

“Aha! Methinks you doth protest too much.”

Del rolled his eyes at the mangled Shakespeare.

“Maggie’s going to look pretty good once she gets back into shape,” Bill continued. “Even when she was pregnant she was a cute little thing. You like blondes, don’t you?”

“I never really thought about it.”

“Why not? You’ve already seen what she has to offer when she—”

“That’s enough, Bill,” Del said, cutting him off. He was surprised by the anger he felt at his friend’s tasteless remark. “It wasn’t some voyeuristic fantasy, Bill. It was the birth of a child.”

“Lighten up, Del. No offense meant.”

“Anyone who would be thinking of sex under those circumstances would be sick. Perverted. I have too much respect for Maggie to even consider regarding her—”

“Hey, I said lighten up.” Bill eyed him warily. “I was only joking.”

Del glanced down and saw that he’d curled his hands into fists. It had been an instinctive, protective reaction. He made an effort to relax, taking a deep breath and wiping his palms on his pants legs. “Right.”

“You’re awfully touchy about it.”

“Maggie doesn’t deserve to be mocked that way.”

“Sorry.” Bill continued to scrutinize him. “This whole childbirth thing really did get to you, didn’t it?”

“It would get to anyone.”

“Ever thought about having kids of your own, Del?”

This time he was ready—the comment didn’t cause more than a twinge. Del looked straight at his partner and lied. “No.”

Bill shifted his pipe to the corner of his mouth and smiled enigmatically. “Then you must be pleased that Maggie named her baby after you.”

Yes, he was pleased, Del thought, tipping his head back to drain his glass. That was why he was getting drunk, because Maggie had made him so doggone happy. He squinted at the bottle beside him and reached out to pour more whiskey.

The last time he’d done this, he’d gotten drunk because he’d been angry. More than angry—furious. Eight years had passed, but he still hadn’t forgotten the feeling of helpless rage that he’d tried to drown in the bottom of a bottle. He had just seen the carefully laid plans for his life crumble to nothing.

That’s what love did to a person. He’d been around the same age then that Maggie was now, and he’d been just as wrong about the person he’d fallen in love with.

Only in Del’s case, it hadn’t been a whirlwind romance with someone who was already married. He had loved Elizabeth Johanson since they had made a papier-mâché model of Mount Saint Helens together for a fifth grade geography project. The finished model had looked more like a crumpled soda can than a volcanic crater, but he had fallen head over heels for Elizabeth nevertheless.

They had gone steady all through high school. No one in the county had been surprised when Del and Elizabeth had become engaged after graduation. While she had gone away to teachers’ college, he had stayed behind to help work his parents’ farm, counting the days until they would be married. Their love had seemed stronger than ever each time Elizabeth had come home. By the time he was twenty-one, his parents had deeded him a plot of land, and he had already started to build the house he and Elizabeth had designed together. It would have plenty of bedrooms. They wanted a houseful of children.

Oh, yeah, Elizabeth had wanted children. She was wild about them. She came from a family almost as large as Del’s and she was devoted to her younger siblings. So when her youngest brother came down with the mumps the Christmas before her wedding, she hadn’t hesitated to take care of him. She hadn’t realized she would pass on the illness to Del.

Having the mumps at seven wasn’t usually serious. It was just another one of those childhood diseases that was more of a nuisance than a danger. But the consequences were different for a man of twenty-one.

Del hadn’t wanted to believe the results of the lab test his doctor had ordered. He’d had a second, and then a third, but they only verified the first. The mumps had left Del unable to father children. He was completely sterile.

It had been difficult to grasp. Del hadn’t felt any different physically. He still had the same sexual urges of any normal, red-blooded male his age. As far as he knew, his capabilities when it came to lovemaking hadn’t suffered. He had thought he was the same man.

Elizabeth had cried when he’d told her. In one breath she vowed she would always love him, but in the next she was telling him their engagement was off. She didn’t want to tie herself for life to a man who couldn’t give her children.

Del had felt his anger stir then, but he’d had no target to focus the feeling on. He couldn’t really blame Elizabeth’s brother for coming down with the mumps in the first place. And he tried not to fault Elizabeth for her honesty, either, no matter how hurtful her rejection of him was. If he really loved her, he would want her to be happy, wouldn’t he? He would let her go and wish her well.

That’s what he’d tried to do. He’d been damn noble about the whole thing. But the nobility had been submerged by a wave of fury when barely a month had passed before he learned that the woman who had promised to love him forever had eloped with his best friend. Their first child had been born eight months later.