from her to the baby and then all around the room as if searching for the spaceship that must have dropped off this strange creature. “What is it doing in our office?”
“She’s here because I brought her here.” Which maybe hadn’t been the smartest move, but she and Peyton had only gotten in the previous evening, after driving from Boulder, Colorado. With less than seventy-two hours of parenting experience under her belt, Wendy hadn’t known what else to do with Peyton. “I didn’t have anyone to watch her. And I don’t think she’s ready to be left with a stranger yet anyway. I mean, I’m strange enough, right? And—”
Jonathon cut her off. “Wendy, why do you have a baby?” His gaze dropped to her belly, suspicion lighting his gaze. “She’s not… yours, is she?”
She was glad he’d cut her off, because she’d been babbling, but at the same time dreading the conversation to come, because he was not going to like what she had to say. Still, when she glanced down at the sixteen-pound baby, she had to laugh.
“No, I didn’t go away for seven days and miraculously get pregnant, gestate and deliver a four-month-old. She’s—” Her throat closed over the words, but she forced herself to say them. “She was my cousin’s. Bitsy named me guardian. So she is mine now.”
There was a long moment of silence during which Jonathon’s expression was so blank, so unchanging she thought he might have suffered a stroke.
“I—” he began. Then he looked down at Peyton, his frown deepening. “Well—” He looked back at her and cocked his head to the side. “It turns out Jeanell was right. On-site childcare was a good idea. I’m sure she’ll be just fine there.”
Dread settled in Wendy’s belly. As well as something else. Sorrow. Nostalgia maybe. She didn’t want to leave FMJ. Even though she was just an assistant here, she’d never felt more at home anywhere else. Professionally or personally. Working at FMJ had given her purpose and direction. Something her family had never understood.
“I’m not going to bring Peyton to work,” she began. And then decided there was no point in pussyfooting around this. “I’m not coming to work anymore. I came in today to resign.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Jonathon barked, too shocked to temper the edge of his words. “Nobody quits a job because they have a baby, much less because they inherited one.”
Wendy rolled her eyes in exasperation. “That’s not—” she started, but he held up a hand to cut her off.
“I know how stupid that sounded.” This was why he needed Wendy. Why she was irreplaceable. Most of the time, he was too outspoken. Too blunt. Too brash. He had a long history of pissing off people who were easily offended. But not Wendy. Somehow, she managed to see past his mistakes and overlook his blunders.
The thought of trying to function without her here as his buffer made him panic. He wasn’t about to lose her over a baby.
“FMJ has one of the highest-rated on-site child-care facilities in the area. There’s no reason why you can’t continue to work here.”
“I can’t work here because I have to move back to Texas.”
As she spoke, she crossed to the supply closet in the corner. She moved a few things around inside and pulled out an empty cardboard box.
“Why on earth would you want to move to Texas?”
She shot him another one of those looks. “You know I’m from Texas, right?”
“Which is why I don’t know why you’d want to move back there. I’ve never once heard you say anything nice about living there.”
She bobbed her head as if in concession of the point. Then she shrugged. Rounding to the far side of the desk, she sank into the chair and opened her drawer. “It’s complicated.”
“I think I can keep up.”
“There’s a chance members of my family won’t want me to raise Peyton. Unless I can convince them I’m the best mother for her, there’ll be a custody battle.”
“So? You don’t think you can win the battle from here?”
“I don’t think I can afford to fight it.” Sifting through things in the drawer, she answered without looking up. She pulled out a handful of personal belongings and dropped them into the open box.
He watched her for a moment, barely comprehending her words and not understanding her actions at all. “What are you doing?”
She paused, glancing up. “Packing,” she said as if stating the obvious. Then she looked back into the drawer and riffled through a few more things. “Ford called yesterday to offer his condolences. When I explained, he said not to worry about giving two-weeks’ notice. That if I needed to just pack up and go, I should.”
Forget twenty-two years of friendship. He was going to kill Ford.
The baby squirmed. Wendy jostled her knee to calm the little girl, all the while still digging in the drawer. “I swear I had another tube of lip gloss in here.”
“Lip gloss?” She’d just pulled the rug out from under him.
If he’d had two weeks, maybe he could talk some sense into her. But no. His idiot of a partner had ripped that away too. And she was worried about lip gloss?
She must have heard the outrage in his voice, because her head snapped up. “It was my favorite color and they don’t even make it anymore. And—” She slammed the drawer shut and yanked open another. “Oh, forget it.”
“You can’t quit.”
She stood up, abandoning her task. “You think I want this? You think I want to move? Back to Texas? You think I want to leave a job I love? So that I can move home? I don’t! But it’s my only option.”
“How will being unemployed in Texas solve anything?” he demanded.
“I…” Peyton squirmed again in her arms and let out a howl of protest. Wendy sighed, sank back into the chair and set it rocking with a pump of her leg. “I may not have mentioned it before, but my family has money.”
She hadn’t mentioned it. She’d never needed to.
People who grew up with money had an air about them. It wasn’t snobbery. Not precisely. It was more a sense of confidence that came from always having the best of everything. It was the kind of thing you only noticed if you’d never had money and had spent your life trying to replicate that air of entitlement.
Besides, there was an innate elegance to Wendy that was in direct contrast to her elfin appearance and plucky verve. Yet somehow she pulled it off.
“From money?” he said dryly. “I never would have guessed.”
Wendy seemed too distracted to notice his sarcasm. “My grandfather set up a trust for me. For all the grandkids, actually. I never claimed mine. The requirements seemed too ridiculous.”
“And
