Van Zandt stepped up next to his wife and slipped an arm around her shoulders. Lori sighed inwardly. She wanted that kind of love, but she accepted that it might not be God’s will for her. Lucia, however, clearly was, and that, she told herself sternly, was enough. If she could just keep Lucia with her, she wouldn’t ask for romance or anything else.
Olivia Cavanaugh skipped over to peek at the baby. “Awww, she’s so cute.” Lucia sighed and squirmed, rubbing her nose with one tiny fist, and Olivia giggled. “Joseph does that sometimes. Mama says a baby’s dreams are delivered on the flutter of angel wings, and that’s why they jerk and stuff, because the angel’s wings brush them.”
Lori smiled. Joseph, Ben and Leah Cavanaugh’s son, was only a couple months older than Lucia. “What a lovely thought.”
Ben stepped up and laid his big, capable hands atop his daughter’s narrow shoulders. “Now, don’t wake her, Livy.”
“Oh, Lucia is a champion sleeper,” Lori told him. “I sometimes think maybe she naps a little too much.”
Ben smiled. “I wish I could say that about Joseph. He kept us up all hours for months, and even now sometimes that boy just seems to vibrate with energy. I think he’s going to walk before he’s six months old.”
“Speaking of Joseph, where are he and Leah?” Lori asked.
Grinning, Ben jerked a thumb over one shoulder. “Leah’s putting out our lunch, with Joseph on her hip, no doubt, grabbing everything that comes within reach.” He shifted his gaze to the Van Zandts. “I just came by to let Kelly and Zach know that I’m making arrangements to meet my birth mother’s family.”
As a child Ben had been placed for adoption by Barnaby Harcourt, but until recently no one had known who his biological parents were. Records had recently been discovered during renovations hidden in a wall at the Harcourt Mansion, and Ben’s had been among them.
“Ben, that’s wonderful!” Lori blurted, thinking how blessed he was to have discovered family.
Of course he already had Olivia, his adopted parents and his adopted brother, Eli, who happened to be Lucia’s pediatrician, and now Leah and baby Joseph, not to mention his sister-in-law, Rachel, and brand-new niece, Madeleine. But Ben had suffered much loss in his life, too. Not only was Ben’s birth mother deceased, his first wife had died long ago—cancer, if Lori wasn’t mistaken. He must be thrilled to have found his biological siblings.
Lori would have fallen on her knees and cried out thanks to God if she had been so blessed. She was shocked to see the tall, muscular carpenter duck his dark head and look uncertain. He probably wished he hadn’t spoken up in front of her.
The trouble with being a reporter was that everyone always feared that they would see themselves in print if they weren’t careful. But surely they all knew this wasn’t news to her. Kelly and Ross had given her coworker Jared Kierney the story themselves, and Jared had passed the info on to her when she’d taken over the Tiny Blessings series from him. Both she and Jared had been very careful about what they’d used.
“Well, we better get back,” Ben said, nudging Olivia and backing away.
Tony made the observation, “Good man, that Ben Cavanaugh. Done a heap of work for me around the shop. Excellent carpenter.”
Murmurs of assent went around the small space as the Cavanaughs moved away.
Ross glanced at his wife, putting on a friendly face. “Can we have a private word, Lori?”
“Sure.” She looked down at the still sleeping baby, her hair sliding forward. Even held back from her face by a narrow elastic band, her hair constantly fell over one eye.
Sandra insisted that she and Tony be allowed to watch over Lucia while Lori and the Van Zandts spoke a few feet away.
“You don’t have to worry,” she told them. “I won’t be printing Ben’s plans on the front page of the Richmond Gazette.”
“Well, of course you won’t,” Kelly said dismissively. “We never thought you would.”
“That’s not your style,” Ross confirmed.
“Then what’s this about?” Lori asked, puzzled.
Ross lowered his voice to say, “We have a favor to ask, but first we want you to know that we’ll both understand if you don’t want to do it.”
“We would never ask you to compromise your integrity,” Kelly added.
“If only your competition had some,” Ross muttered darkly.
“You must be talking about yesterday’s Alton Kessler piece,” Lori surmised.
She’d read the story and knew for a fact that it wasn’t just unfair, it was at least partly false, and it attacked Kelly personally. Unfortunately it was just the latest in a steady stream of criticism and implied wrongdoing at the agency. No wonder the Van Zandts were upset. She would have been, too.
“We have to get at the root of these leaks and lies,” Kelly whispered.
“Do you think you could ask around, find out who Kessler’s source is?” Ross asked, coming to the point.
Lori parked her hands at her hips, striking a determined pose. “You leave it to me. I’ll go to Alton himself. I can’t promise that he’ll cooperate, but I do have a little leverage.”
Ross smiled wolfishly. “I knew we could count on you. I’m so pleased I won’t even ask what you’ve got on Kessler.”
Lori grinned. “Let’s just say that Alton would make a better novelist than journalist and I can prove it.”
Ross chuckled. “I don’t know why you haven’t already busted him, but I’m glad that it works in our favor.”
She shrugged. “I’m not the news police, and it’s a minor issue so far as the public goes. Besides, my paper isn’t in the business of outing their competition, although I doubt Alton even understands why the Gazette would hesitate to publish dirt on a fellow reporter. He certainly doesn’t care whether or not what he does reflects unfavorably on the rest of our profession, and I doubt his publisher does, either.”
Ross nodded. “I understand, and I thank you for using whatever leverage you have. Can you give me a call as soon as you talk to him?”
“No problem.”
They returned to the gazebo. Lucia was waking and making the sorts of noises guaranteed to embarrass any parent, much to the amusement of Sandra and Tony. Lori excused herself to go and change the baby. Afterward she gave Lucia a bottle and a good burping, then tucked her back into the stroller, content and smelling sweet, before setting off in search of Alton Kessler.
She pushed the stroller toward the parking area, intending to see if she could spot Alton’s luxury sedan. She was halfway there when she spied the Estes family arrayed around a picnic table draped with a cheery, vibrantly striped cloth.
Pilar, her pregnant stomach swollen, rested on a folding chaise longue, her bare feet peeking out from beneath the skirt of her bright, heavily embroidered dress, while her husband, Zach, helped their little almost-adopted-daughter,
