She didn’t mean to scare you.’
Harry did his best to twist away from her. She swallowed down a lump. It bruised her throat and lodged as a dead weight in her chest. He didn’t want her touching him. He knew what she was. What further proof did she need that as a mother substitute she was the worst?
She tried to fight the blackness that threatened to descend around her, the tears that clogged her throat. And then, amazingly, Liam moved forward and lifted Harry from her arms. And suddenly she could breathe again.
Harry didn’t stop crying, but his sobs no longer tore at her chest or rang so loudly in her ears. She fell into the nearest chair—Liam’s armchair—and just stared at man and child.
Liam didn’t know what to do with the squirming, screaming bundle he held. It was just he hadn’t been able to bear the look on Sapphie’s face any longer. She’d looked as if she’d been about to break. And if she’d had to deal with this for six hours last night…
He couldn’t regret trying to ease her burden, but now that he’d taken the child he didn’t know what to do with it. He glanced at her. Maybe she’d give him a hint?
She smiled. He marvelled that, given her exhaustion and her concern for the child—not to mention how upset she’d been earlier to learn of Lucas’s death—she’d found the strength for even the smallest of smiles.
‘Your arms are going to get dreadfully tired, holding Harry like that,’ she observed.
His arms were held out at a straight ninetydegrees from the rest of his body. Harry dangled at their ends, securely clamped beneath his armpits. Gingerly, Liam pulled the child in close against his chest. Harry didn’t stop crying. As he had with Sapphie, he tried to twist away. For something so small, he sure had some strength in that little body of his.
Don’t drop him!
Liam promptly sat. In the very middle of the sofa. Shored up by the plump softness of cushions on all sides.
He tried jiggling Harry on his knee. Harry would have none of it. The volume of his cries had tension coiling tight in Liam’s stomach and knotted his shoulders. Sapphie had done this for six hours last night? He’d held his nephew for less than two minutes and—
Don’t panic. You’re a grown man. Harry is just a baby and—
Just a baby? He had to clamp down on the harsh laugh that threatened to burst from him. Five years ago he’d have done anything for a baby, and now here he was holding one in his arms—admittedly it was his nephew, not his son—and he didn’t have a clue what to do.
As if she sensed his growing sense of inadequacy, Sapphie slid off her seat, collected a soft toy from the floor and knelt down in front of him and Harry.
‘Hey, Harry,’ she crooned, prancing the toy from one end of the sofa to the other, dancing it across Harry’s feet and Liam’s legs along the way. It seemed strangely intimate, though he knew she hadn’t meant it to be. ‘Horsie hates to see you so sad.’
Harry didn’t stop crying, but he did stop squirming. And then he leant forward and seized the stuffed horse and buried his face in it. Liam’s gut twisted and turned. Poor little kid. He was tired and out of sorts, and Liam didn’t know how, but he wanted to make things better for him.
‘It gets under your skin, doesn’t it?’ Sapphie whispered.
As his nephew’s warm weight filtered into his consciousness, Liam found he couldn’t speak. All he could do was nod.
Sapphie gulped, her eyes suspiciously bright. ‘Okay, so far we’ve tried his toys, his bottle, and walking up and down. We’ve changed his nappy, changed his clothes. We’ve tried cuddles, silly faces, silly voices…chocolate custard. If there’s anything else you can think of…?’
Liam went to drag a hand down his face and then thought better of it, kept it anchored around Harry instead. ‘Have you tried singing to him?’
‘I tried nursery rhymes.’
She pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes, and for a moment Liam was tempted to haul her up onto the sofa beside him and order her to rest.
‘Oh, Harry…’ She pulled her hands away. ‘You know what your Grandma Dana used to do when I was sad?’
Harry barely paused for breath between wails. Liam hadn’t known a baby could cry for so long without pause.
‘Your Grandma Dana, she’d sing ABBA songs to me and your mum.’
At the word ABBA, Harry stopped mid-wail. Sapphie’s jaw dropped. Liam straightened. He stared down at Harry. Harry’s face screwed up again. ‘Sing an ABBA song,’ Liam ordered.
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