Cathy McDavid - Baby's First Homecoming

Wayne said something to Sierra about her and Jamie staying in Ethan’s old room, that her room had been given over to the girls.

Clay listened and watched.

Jamie fascinated him. He picked at the laces of Isa’s sneakers with amazing determination and quickly had them untied. Clay admired that quality, having plenty of it himself. He’d inherited it from his father and grandfather Jamie.

Suddenly, the air was too thick to breathe and the room stifling hot.

Clay mentally calculated how long since he and Caitlin had last seen each other. Last slept together. Not quite two years. She had mentioned Jamie was about a year. But if he was older, say thirteen or fourteen months…

She’d lied, and not just about Jamie’s age.

“Sierra.” The volume of Clay’s voice surprised not only himself but everyone else in the room. He didn’t care. “We need to talk.”

The fear he’d seen in her face earlier returned tenfold, only now he knew the cause.

When she didn’t move, he started toward her. “Right this minute.”

“I—I—” She bent and picked up Jamie, who was not happy about being separated from Isa and started to wail. “I really should unload the car.”

“I’ll help you.”

“What’s going on?” Wayne moved to stand in front of Clay.

“This is between me and Sierra.”

Wayne might be pushing sixty but he presented a formidable obstacle when protecting his daughter. “Whatever you have to say to her, you can say to me.”

“Is that what you want?” Clay’s gaze locked with Sierra’s.

“No.” Her answer was hardly more than a whisper.

He went to the kitchen door, opened it and waited for her to join him.

“Sierra, you don’t have to go with him.” Wayne laid a protective hand on her arm.

She squared her shoulders. “It’s okay, Dad.”

She was brave, he’d give her that much.

“No, it’s not,” Wayne said. “I don’t like him ordering you around.” The glare Wayne shot Clay reminded him it hadn’t been that long since he’d reconciled with the Powells.

He didn’t care. He’d lost one child already, he wasn’t about to lose a second.

“You harm one hair on her head—”

Clay cut off Wayne before he could finish. “I won’t. I swear.”

Wayne reluctantly backed off, his narrowed gaze informing Clay they weren’t done by a long shot.

When Sierra reached the door, he held out his arms to Jamie. “Let me take him.”

“No!” She curled her body away from Clay. “He doesn’t like strangers.”

Jamie made a liar of his mother by extending his arms to Clay. She held fast but lost her grip when Jamie squirmed and wriggled sideways.

Clay caught the boy easily and balanced him on his hip as he’d seen Sierra do.

“Give him back,” she demanded.

“I will, after you and I talk.”

Sierra went outside with Clay. Whatever she felt, she did a good job of keeping it to herself.

Clay was ready to explode.

They’d no sooner stepped off the back patio when he stopped and reeled on her.

“How dare you keep my son from me!”

Chapter Two

“Let me explain,” Sierra insisted, jogging to match Clay’s long strides.

“You lied to me.”

He was right. She’d done everything in her power to hide Jamie’s existence from him. Worse, if there was any way she could go back in time to an hour ago, she’d drive past her family’s ranch and keep driving until she found someplace safe.

“Give Jamie to me, I can—”

“He’s fine.”

And he was fine, if his silly grin and happy babbling was any indication. Damn Clay.

She wanted to cry out, tackle Clay and wrestle Jamie away from him. It would be fruitless, of course. Clay was easily six-two and strong as a linebacker. What if he took off with Jamie? Made a mad dash to his truck? She might never get her son back.

“Please, Clay.” She strived to maintain a reasonable tone. “If we could just talk.”

“We’ll talk, all right. But not here. I don’t want your family interfering.”

Her family! Oh, God, what must they be thinking? They’d barely begun to accept she had a child and now this. Surely her father was putting two and two together. They might have made their peace with Clay, but he’d still been their hated enemy when he and Sierra had their affair.

Clay crossed the open area and headed toward the stables, her son still clutched in his arms.

Her son.

Yes, his son, too. That, however, was a technicality. Clay hadn’t wanted her when given the chance, had chosen to marry his off-again, on-again fiancée instead. As far as Sierra was concerned, he’d forfeited any and all say regarding Jamie.

It was an opinion Clay didn’t seem to share.

“Wait!” Sierra hurried to catch up. “I’ll carry Jamie. He doesn’t like strangers.”

“I’m no stranger.” Clay didn’t take his eyes off the ground in front of him. “I’m his father.”

Anger bloomed inside her. “Clay, I said wait!”

He slowed, then, to her relief, came to a halt. She drew up beside him, weak-kneed from exertion as much as emotional overload.

Jamie hung on to Clay’s neck and giggled.

Maybe he really did like other people, and she was the one with the phobia.

It was possible.

No one other than the pediatrician during their visit to his office last Monday had been allowed to hold Jamie besides Sierra. She didn’t count the months between his birth and three weeks ago when he’d been returned to her. The Stevensons, the ones who’d cared for him, didn’t matter. Didn’t exist. Not after rejecting her child.

“Where are you taking us?” She captured Jamie’s flailing foot in her hand and cupped the ankle, desperately needing the contact. He had been no more than an arm’s length away from her since the minute she’d got him back.

“Ethan’s apartment.”

Sierra remembered now. Her brother had converted the old bunkhouse into an apartment after Sage and Isa moved into the main house.

“We can be alone there and lock the door.”

“Lock the door?” She shook her head. “Aren’t you being a little extreme?”

“No, considering the cavalry’s almost here.”

Sierra looked behind her. Her dad and brothers were indeed coming after them. The three sweetest, most important and ridiculously overprotective men in the world were going to rescue her. She had half a mind to let them. Then, she remembered Clay’s hardheadedness. He wouldn’t give up Jamie without a fight.

“Let me talk to them.”

“I’ll meet you in the apartment.”

Inside? Out of her sight?

“No!” The mere thought of being away from her baby paralyzed her.

The muscles in Clay’s jaw were clenching with anger or impatience or frustration, she didn’t know which. “I won’t take off with him.”

She exhaled slowly. How to explain her crippling separation anxiety? She barely understood it herself.

“I’ll go with you to Ethan’s apartment. Anywhere you want. Just stay where I can see Jamie until I’m done talking to the family. Please.”

“Fine, I’ll wait for you on the porch.”

Sierra mentally measured the distance. Thirty yards, give or take. It felt more like ten miles.

“You have about three seconds to decide.”

Or what? He would go back on his word and run off with Jamie? Her temples throbbed. This day, her entire life, was unraveling at lightning speed.

“Okay.”

As soon as Clay walked away, Sierra regretted her decision. He would be alone with her son. Never once had she imagined Clay would walk into her family’s house and steal Jamie from her like an eagle snatching prey.

With one eye trained on Clay and Jamie, she braced herself for the confrontation with her father and brothers.