Heiress for Hire (Cuttersville #2)(13)
Author: Erin McCarthy

She took a fortifying sip of margarita, bracing herself for the fact that her child might be dying. God, she couldn’t lose her son. He hadn’t even given her grandbabies yet, for crying out loud. Didn’t that rate special consideration?

That was the problem with only having one son—you decreased your odds of grandchildren. Since Shelby and Danny had split, Willie had lived in constant fear that he would never find another woman to settle down with and fill up the yard with kids.

Not that she wanted him to marry the wrong woman. Like what’s-her-name with the high heels. Willie wanted him to be happy. While procreating.

But she reassured herself that if Danny were dying, Daniel would be more upset than he sounded.

"First, do you know where we put the phone number for that lawyer we used to make our wills? Danny came around tonight saying he’d gotten a bit of a surprise."

"Lawyer? What the hell does he need a lawyer for?" Willie met the shocked gazes of her three friends and felt panic swelling up in her.

"I’m getting to that part."

"Well, speed it up." Daniel took things easy, calmly, thought them through. Willie wished for once he could just spit it out. If her son had committed murder and was facing the electric chair, she needed to know.

"Turns out when he was in high school Danny met a girl at the county fair and uhhh, well, was intimate with her."

It wasn’t murder, but did she need to hear these things? Willie was going to need another margarita at this rate. "And?"

"She got pregnant. But she never told Danny. Tonight the gal’s husband dropped by with Danny’s daughter. She’s eight years old, and the stepfather doesn’t want her any more."

"A daughter?" She was drunk. That had to be the only explanation for this. Maybe the booze had gone to her head and she was really in bed sleeping it off, dreaming this. "Are you serious?"

"Dead serious. And I want to talk to that lawyer. As far as I’m concerned, we need to establish who has custody of this child. Danny says she’s underweight and dirty, Wil. They haven’t been taking care of her."

Everything tilted and shifted, and the only thing that mattered now was that she had a granddaughter. Who needed her. Willie scrambled for her purse. "I’m leaving. I’ll be home in an hour and a half."

"Wilhemina…"

She hung up on Daniel and looked at Trudy, Karen, and Dawn. "I have a grandbaby."

Dawn looked at her in astonishment. "Didn’t you know that? Erica Kirkwood called me twenty minutes ago and left a voicemail. Turns out Janice ran into Danny shopping with the little girl at Wal-Mart. Everybody knows by now."

Danny’s truck was crammed full with plastic bags, and his credit card had suffered the largest hit since he’d gotten the account six years ago. He wouldn’t be surprised if Visa called him inquiring about unusual activity on his card. But it wasn’t enough. It didn’t feel like enough to make up for eight years of not knowing about Piper.

She was tucked into the truck beside him, her knobby knees crammed against the gearshift. He knew he shouldn’t expect otherwise, but she was so quiet all the time. It was hard to know what to say to her.

Despite nearly getting tossed out of Wal-Mart on their ears, he could admit he was glad after all that Amanda had gone shopping with them. At least she filled the silence and gave him someone to bounce his thoughts off of. He wasn’t used to having to make decisions about someone else, and it was reassuring to have Amanda back him up. Or more like disagree with him, which allowed him to argue why his choice made more sense.

They were pulling in Amanda’s drive to drop her off, the new bike he’d gotten Piper scraping across the truck bed. Piper hadn’t wanted a bike—said she couldn’t ride two-wheel—but he hadn’t been able to resist. A bike on a farm was a good way to tool around and explore. He’d spent hours racing his BMX around when he was her age.

Maybe it was overcompensation. He was trying to make up for lost time. Fix everything that he had missed. Everything that Piper hadn’t had.

But he didn’t know what else to do.

SpongeBob SquarePants Band-Aids couldn’t take away the past, but it was a start for the future.

"This your house?" Piper asked Amanda, peering through the dark at Amanda’s little gray rental.

"Well, I don’t own it. I’m just renting it for the summer."

Until she went back to Chicago. Danny couldn’t forget that. Didn’t matter that she had been amusing in the store, that he enjoyed her quirky company, and that sometimes he thought he saw beneath the chemical-processed cover and glimpsed the lonely woman beneath.

"It’s pretty."

"They say it’s haunted, but I haven’t encountered one ghost. It’s been an incredible letdown."

Danny had never seen any ghosts either, but enough folks around town had claimed to, so he was inclined to believe the stories. But he was glad that no disembodied entities had any interest in his house. He’d prefer to stay disembody-less.

Amanda opened the door. "Thanks for letting me hang with you, Piper. I’ll see you soon."

"I’ll walk you to the door." Danny opened his own door. "Stay in the truck, Piper. I’ll be right back."

The panic that flitted across his daughter’s face made him curse silently. "Or why don’t you walk up with me? We can make sure Amanda gets in safe and sound."

He didn’t want Piper to think for one second that he would abandon her. It was going to take time before she learned to trust that this was permanent. Before she learned to trust him.

Piper was so relieved she scrambled right out, even letting him take her hand, which up to now she had shied away from. Danny walked over the gravel driveway, his throat tight at the feeling of his daughter’s small, cool hand in his. She seemed so tiny, so fragile next to him. Damn, he didn’t want to screw this up and break her. Piper already had chips and cracks all over; he didn’t want to be the one to shatter her.

It was a hell of a responsibility.

Amanda was fishing her keys out of her big purse, the plastic Wal-Mart bag with the Barbie in it hung over the opposite wrist. She had set Baby down on the porch, and the dog raced past the wicker chair, squatted, and did her business.

"Why is the dog wearing a shirt?" Every time he looked at that poodle, something seemed off to him. Now he realized it was because the dog was wearing a tiny peach-colored T-shirt. "It’s summer."

"It’s not for warmth. It’s a logo T-shirt." She smiled. "It says NO ONE PUTS BABY IN A CORNER."

All those letters had fit across that itty bitty chest? "What’s that supposed to mean?"

"Ah! You don’t remember that from Dirty Dancing?" She looked astonished. "That’s like a classic line."