Millionaire's Instant Baby
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Emma’s arms felt empty when Penny took Chandler into her own. But the other woman was oohing and ahhing over him, obviously delighted to hold him. Emma collected the plastic bag and her case and drew in a breath as she faced the wooden steps leading up the side of the garage to her apartment.
“I just got home myself, and I’m so sorry I wasn’t able to meet you at the hospital,” Penny chattered on, taking Emma’s overnighter from her. “You shouldn’t be carrying that,” she chastised, heading up the stairs. “If I could have canceled my meeting, I would have. I feel terrible that you drove yourself home like this.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Emma followed her landlady more slowly. Once she got Chandler fed and settled, she was definitely going to take a few of those extra-strength pain relievers her doctor had advised. “Megan agreed to, but I said no. We were fine.” She made it to the landing and pushed open the door, stopping short. “Oh, my!”
Penny laughed and rested her cheek on Chandler’s head. “Isn’t it fabulous? Why didn’t you tell me you’d met a man? Because I know for certain that good-for-nothing Jeremy St. James would never have been so extravagant.”
Emma cautiously stepped into her apartment. Glorious displays of summer flowers decorated every single surface. An enormous bouquet of yellow and white balloons hovered above her small round dining table. “I haven’t met a man,” she murmured faintly. Cheerful daisies graced the small table just inside the door and she touched one of the blooms. “Well, nobody except…No. He wouldn’t have. He couldn’t—”
“Who? Kyle Montgomery perhaps? He is a handsome one. And quite determined, too.”
Emma felt light-headed. She dumped the plastic bag on the floor and cautiously lowered herself to the couch. “Kyle…was here?”
“Earlier today.” Penny nodded. She flipped open a changing pad on top of the table and gently settled Chandler on top of it. In seconds she’d changed his diaper and carried him back to Emma. “There you go, sweetie. You feed him and I’ll get some lunch started for you.”
Emma had a lot of questions, but her son’s hunger was the primary need. She opened her blouse and situated her son in her arms. He latched on greedily and she chuckled and winced both at once. “Good thing you know what you’re doing there, pumpkin, ’cause if it was up to me, I’d still be fumbling around.”
Penny must have heard her, because she laughed lightly. “When Elliot was born, bottle feeding was the preferred choice. Herman was horrified when I insisted on nursing our baby.” She came back into the room, carrying a tray with a sandwich, a cup of soup and a tall glass of lemonade, which she set on the metal footlocker Emma used as a coffee table. She nudged it within reach of Emma, then pushed the footrest she’d given Emma for Christmas the year before next to the couch.
Emma lifted her feet onto it and let out a long relieved breath. But Penny wasn’t finished. Not until she’d taken Emma’s two bed pillows from the top shelf in the closet where they were kept during the day and propped them behind Emma’s neck and under her knees.
“There. That’s better, isn’t it?” Penny patted her hand and continued moving around the small apartment, unpacking the few items from Emma’s overnighter and adding the baby items from the plastic bag to the secondhand chest of drawers Emma had found. “Too bad your mother can’t be here to help you,” Penny said.
Emma shook her head. That was the last thing she needed. “Mama’s helping my sisters back home with the grandkids she already has.” She shifted against the pillows and sighed sleepily. “She doesn’t understand why I’m a single mother, anyway, so her helping would have been accompanied by a lot of lectures I don’t want to hear. Once a week is plenty for me.”
“The only one needing a good lecture is that pimple on the face of society who left you to fend for yourself.”
Emma managed to smile at the caustic description of Jeremy St. James.
“Fortunately I’m able to wholeheartedly say that I approve of your new choice,” Penny went on.
“If you’re referring to Kyle Montgomery, he is not my new choice. He’s just…”
Penny waited expectantly, her eyes sparkling with expectation. “Just handsome enough to make even my old bones sit up and take notice?”
“You’re not old.”
Penny chuckled. “Old enough to know a perfect match when I see one. A grown man doesn’t track down a landlady at a church committee meeting to gain access to his young lady’s apartment where he proceeds to fill it with every flower known to humankind if he’s not totally smitten.”
Totally determined, totally insane and totally off-limits. “I don’t even know the man,” Emma insisted. “I met him just this morning.”
A fact that seemed to delight Penny even more. “Well, you certainly made an impression on him,” she said. “I’ll leave you to rest now, but I’ll come back this evening with some supper for you.”
“You don’t have to do that, Penny. I can manage.”
Penny stopped at the door and shook her head. “I know you can manage, sweetie. But sometimes you don’t have to do it all on your own, so let me help in the ways that I can.” She plucked a small white envelope out of the daisy arrangement and handed it to Emma. “Your admirer left this for you.” She winked and went out the door, shutting only the outer screen. Emma heard her footsteps on the stairway, then all was quiet again, except for the thumping of her pulse in her ears.
She nibbled the inside of her lip, turning the small envelope over in her fingers. He had nothing to say that she wanted to hear. Or, in this case, read.
“Oh, Emma, honestly. It’s just a card.” She tore open the envelope and pulled out the flat card.
Chandler is blessed to have such a lovely mother.
Emma’s eyes blurred. She looked down at her son to find him looking up at her. “We’re both blessed, aren’t we, pumpkin? I just figured that a man like Kyle Montgomery wouldn’t be able to see that.”