SUSAN MEIER - Baby Before Business

“It’s not the swing. It’s the sense of community…”

“Elitist liberal crap,” Ty said, walking to the wall of window behind his desk and looking out at the rural Arkansas town that housed his company. Tall and broad-shouldered, he stood ramrod straight. His dark hair gleamed in the late-afternoon sun. Madelyn couldn’t help noticing again that the man was hot, but it was too bad all those good looks were wasted on a grouch.

“The last thing kids need is to be mollycoddled. What they really should learn is to earn what they get and to pull their own weight. If you think otherwise, you’re certainly not the person to be doing Bryant Development’s public relations. You’re fired.”

Madelyn blinked, stunned. “What?”

He faced her. His dark eyes were cold and serious. “You…are…fired,” he said, enunciating each word as if he were speaking to a slow-witted child. “Pack your things and go.”

Madelyn’s mouth fell open in complete shock. Suddenly grouch, ogre, scrooge and troll seemed too kind to describe Ty Bryant. Even tyrannical dictator didn’t hit the mark. He was the coldest man she had ever met. He was, quite simply, a public relations nightmare and she realized nobody was going to clean up this guy’s image—not even somebody who desperately needed to.

She was at the end of the money she’d saved while working for a high-powered PR firm in Atlanta. Her father had recovered from the heart attack that had brought her home the year before, but she still didn’t feel right about leaving. She and her sister and their two brothers had all moved to other parts of the country to find work, and her parents were alone. Arlene sold medical supplies in the northwest and couldn’t live in Arkansas. Jeff and Marty both worked for big corporations that didn’t have offices anywhere near Porter. Madelyn was the logical choice to return to their hometown.

She’d tried drumming up consulting jobs, but in little Porter she didn’t get much work. She wrote a few press releases for local politicians and helped some people enhance their résumés, but that had been about it.

Seth Bryant had dangled two enticing possibilities when he offered her this assignment. First, working for Bryant Development would give her exposure enough to get new clients—maybe not in Porter but close enough that she could still live in Porter. And second, Seth planned to talk Ty into creating a permanent PR department. If she succeeded in cleaning up Ty’s image, she would be the logical choice to head it.

But after meeting Ty Bryant she had to be realistic. He wasn’t the kind of guy positive PR could change overnight—or even in the three weeks she had before the reporter arrived—and there was a bigger chance she would fail than succeed. Then there would be no job at Bryant Development. Plus, if word leaked that she’d failed, she wouldn’t attract new individual assignments. She might even lose the résumé business she had. Either way, she would be returning to Atlanta.

“Excuse me?” Joni O’Brien, Ty’s secretary, poked her head into Ty’s office doorway, and Madelyn and Ty’s attention turned to the petite brunette.

Clearly annoyed, Ty said, “Joni, I’m meeting with someone. You know better than to disturb me.”

“Well, okay. Then I won’t tell you that I’m leaving to take my kids to the dentist or that the attorney for your cousin Scotty’s estate is here to see you.”

“Why is Scotty’s attorney here?” Ty asked, obviously surprised by the visit.

“I think I’d better let him answer that.” Joni turned toward the reception area and said, “Mr. Hauser, why don’t you go ahead in?”

“Joni! I can’t see him…” Ty began, going from annoyed to furious in under five seconds, but when Pete Hauser, one of only two attorneys who had offices in Porter, stepped into the doorway, Ty stopped talking.

Madelyn’s face scrunched in confusion. Pete held two diaper bags and a car seat. His secretary, Renee Brown, stood beside him, holding a little girl Madelyn guessed was about six months old. Wearing a pretty pink dress, white ruffle tights and black buckle shoes, the baby was adorable.

“Sorry about this,” Pete said as he and Renee entered Ty’s office. “But as you can see, we’re really not in a position to wait.”

Ty Bryant cast a quick glance at Madelyn Gentry. Medium height and thin, with no-nonsense straight red hair that fell to her shoulders, she didn’t look like the perky Pollyanna his brother had described. Though she was only twenty-five, in her green skirt and simple beige top she looked professional and businesslike. But that didn’t change the fact that her job was fluff. Unnecessary fluff. More akin to Gossip Grid and Night Life magazines than actual work. Though Ty really didn’t know why Pete and his assistant Renee had brought Scotty’s daughter to his office, he didn’t want anything personal witnessed by a recently fired woman with contacts at all the newspapers on the eastern half of the United States.

After nodding an acknowledgment to Pete, Ty faced Madelyn. “Ms. Gentry, I think our discussion is over, but you look like you want to argue. You’re not going to change my mind, but if you still wish to duke it out, you can wait in my secretary’s office until I’m finished with Mr. Hauser.”

Ty watched Madelyn glance from the baby to Pete and then back to him again. Her bright green eyes displayed confusion. She licked her full, perfect lips as she assessed the situation, but she didn’t say a word. She simply rose and left the room.

Ty walked to his office door and closed it. “What’s up?” he asked, striding back to his desk.

Pete dropped the two heavy-looking diaper bags onto a convenient chair. “We found Scotty’s will today, Ty, and he names you as Sabrina’s guardian.”

Ty shook his head. “Sorry. Can’t do it.”

“I don’t think you heard me,” Pete said. “Scotty’s will names you as guardian. It’s my responsibility to give you the baby, that’s it.”

“Oh, come on, Pete, you can’t just barge into my office and drop off a child!”

“Yes, I can. As administrator of an estate I do what the will says and the will says you get the baby.”

Ty gaped at him. “You’re kidding!”

“No.” Pete paused, then added, “I assumed Scotty and Misty had spoken with you about this.”

“They hadn’t.” Ty glanced at the little girl in Renee’s arms. With her curly blond hair, pink dress and tiny black shoes, Sabrina looked like an angel, but Ty knew better. Kids were work, but Sabrina was a baby. There were years of trouble in this kid’s future. He wouldn’t start with high school as he had with Seth or even college as he had with Cooper. He would start with bottles and diapers and sandboxes and preschool, and build up to cars and proms.

No way he was doing this.

“Here, take her,” Renee suggested with a smile, offering the baby to Ty.

Eyes wide with horror, Ty stepped back.

“Oh, come on,” Renee cajoled. “She’s a sweetie. You’ll be fine,” she insisted, forcing Sabrina into Ty’s arms.

He had no choice but to catch the baby as Renee let go. He awkwardly juggled Sabrina into the crook of his elbow, then peered down at her as she raised her gaze to meet his. For ten seconds, she looked at him as he studied her. Then, without a sniff of warning, her lips puckered, her eyes filled with tears and she issued a blistering wail that would have singed off his hair if she had been closer.

“What about Misty’s parents?” Ty asked, shifting her over his shoulder and patting her back in a clumsy attempt to quiet her while he stalled Pete long enough to find a way out of this.

“Scotty and Misty’s wills both give you custody, but even if they didn’t Misty’s dad is in remission from cancer,” Pete shouted because Ty’s back-patting wasn’t calming Sabrina down. If anything, her crying seemed to get louder. “Given the state of his health, Misty’s parents didn’t think they were capable of dealing with a baby. They were relieved this afternoon when we read the wills and saw you got custody.”