“Sorry, Phyl,” Lori said, sincerely contrite.
The baby’s screams rose until they seemed to be vibrating the glass bottles on the shelves. A customer in the adjacent aisle headed for the door.
“Let me see if I can quiet him,” Phyllis said as she took Tommy out of Lori’s arms. Phyllis rocked and cuddled the little boy, but Tommy’s unhappy tirade raged on.
“I’ll take him outside,” Anne said, lifting the baby out of Phyllis’s arms.
But the instant Anne settled the baby against her chest, little Tommy’s screaming stopped. All eyes turned toward her.
“You certainly seem to have a way with him,” Lori remarked, her tone ripe with growing interest.
“How lucky for Father Tom that you just happened to be around,” Phyllis said, her eyebrow lifting with possibilities. “I heard you were staying up at the B and B. You here to help Father Tom find this cute little baby’s mother?”
“No, I’m just filling in the blanks on the shopping list,” Anne said.
“Really?” Phyllis flashed Tom a speculative look before turning back to Anne. “I didn’t know you and Tom knew each other that well.”
“We don’t,” Anne said.
“Yet here you are, pitching in to help him,” Lori added. “And on your vacation, too.”
Anne’s eyes dropped to her list. “You’ll need something to carry him around in,
Father Christen,
” she said in her very formal judge’s tone. “I doubt you’ll want to use a towel again.”
It was clear to Tom that Anne had caught the growing speculation coming from both Phyllis and Lori and was trying to cut it off in the bud.
Anne obviously didn’t have a clue as to the kind of women she was up against.
“The baby carriers are on the next shelf,” Phyllis said, pointing. “I’d recommend the over-the-shoulder sling. Keeps the baby close and frees the hands without giving you a backache. Any idea who the mother is, Father Tom?”
“Trudi saw her car,” Lori said before Tom had a chance to respond.
“When was this?” Phyllis asked, swiveling around to face her.
“She was walking down Church Street last night when it whizzed right past her,” Lori said.
Tom knew he didn’t have to ask any questions at this point. Not with Phyllis Cooper around. She was as good as any prosecuting attorney when it came to grilling a witness.
“Did Trudi get the license number?” Phyllis asked.
“No, it was going by too fast,” Lori answered.
“But she got a good look at the driver?”
“Just enough to see it was a woman.”
“What did the woman look like?” Phyllis pushed some more.
“I tell you, Phyl, she didn’t get that good a look.”
“She had to have noticed whether the woman was young or old.”
“Well, of course the woman was young. What mature woman would abandon her baby?”
“How is Trudi doing?” Tom interjected quickly, uncomfortable with the direction the conversation was suddenly going.
“Turning into a real good waitress,” Lori said. “Glad you talked us into hiring her.”
“She seems to take a lot of walks at night,” Phyllis said. “I’ve seen her out in all weather.”
“She works hard,” Lori declared almost defensively. “I don’t see anything wrong with her wanting a little time to herself.”
“Young girls shouldn’t be walking the streets alone at night,” Phyllis said.
“She’s perfectly safe in the village.”
“Don’t kid yourself,” Phyllis warned. “You never know who could be pulling off the highway.”
The general store’s front bell tinkled as a couple came in, and Phyllis went off to wait on them.
“I’ll check around the village to see if I can round up some baby clothes,” Lori said. “Never can have enough.”
“Would it be possible to send Trudi by with the crib?” Tom asked. “I’d like to talk to her.”
“Sure thing,” Lori said. “And remember, Burt and I have raised five babies of our own. You need any help, you come see us.”
After Lori had left, Anne sent Tom an accusing look. “Either one of those women could have helped you prepare this shopping list.”
“But you were the one who was there when I needed it prepared,” Tom said as he pushed the shopping cart toward the baby carriers. “Besides, Tommy obviously prefers you.”
* * *
“O
KAY
, I
ADMIT
MY
curiosity has gotten the better of me,” Anne said as Tom put the last of the supplies in the back of his sleek, midnight blue sports car. “Where did a priest get a Porsche?”
“An addiction from my previous life,” Tom confessed as he closed the back. He walked around and opened the passenger side for Anne.
“What did you do in this previous life?” she asked.
“I was in construction.”
Her eyes glinted up at him. “I don’t believe it.”
“Shall I invite you over to see my power tools?”
A reluctant smile tugged on the corners of her lips. “I would think that a guy who wore a hard hat would be into trucks.”
“Known a lot of guys in hard hats, have you?”
Anne flashed him a warning look before leaning into the back to place the baby in his car seat. “As strange as it is to picture you on the other end of a pile driver, I suppose it’s as likely as your being a priest.”
“Oh? How so?” Tom asked.
“Well, you have to admit you don’t look like a priest.”
“What do I look like, Anne?”
She twisted toward him and the sunlight fused with her hair—copper alloyed with gold. Her eyes turned a misty pearl as she studied him in rapt concentration, as though trying to decide. She had no idea how stunning she was, or how stunned he was by her.
“Actually, you look like a bank robber I once prosecuted while I was working for the D.A.’s office,” Anne said.
She turned away and busied herself with strapping in the baby.
“And you saw that he was acquitted,” Tom said, unable to keep himself from baiting her.
“I saw that he got twenty years,” she called over her shoulder. “Although, if he hadn’t been so good-looking, I might have gone for twenty-five.”
Tom chuckled. She was intelligent, self-assured, beautiful, irreverent and attracted to him. He couldn’t think of a more alluring set of qualities.
The baby began to wail again the moment he was out of Anne’s arms. Tom hated to hear his anguished sounds.
Circling the car, he got into the driver’s side and started the engine, enjoying its pantherlike growl. Apparently, the baby did, too. Tommy stopped crying whenever the car was in motion. Just as he did when he was cradled in Anne’s arms.
No doubt about it, the kid had great taste.
“Give me your professional opinion about something?” Tom asked Anne as he spun the car away from the curb.
“What?”
“How would you go about finding someone? In an unofficial sort of way.”
“You mean the baby’s mother, don’t you?” Anne asked.
“Does it matter?”
“Seems strange you don’t know where she is,” Anne said.
“Does it?” Tom replied.
Anne turned to study his profile. “You answer a lot of questions with questions.”
He snapped her a grin. “Do I?”
She was trying not to grin back. Trying hard. “Tell me something.”
“Anything I can.”
“Did you even know about Tommy before yesterday?”
Tom slowed to round the corner, carefully thinking about her question.
“No,” he said finally.
“I figured as much,” Anne said. “Did she dump the baby on you in order to embarrass you?”
“It’s a confidential matter,” Tom said carefully.
“So we’re back to that again. What can you say?”
“I’d like to find her.”
Tom felt Anne’s eyes studying him again. He waited.
“The logical place to start is her last known address,” Anne said after a moment.
“She’s not there.”
“Family? Friends?”
“Dead ends, as well. I’m looking for more official channels, Anne, ones that can be accessed unofficially.”
“Running her name through the registry of motor vehicles?” Anne suggested.
“I doubt she has a driver’s license.”
“She was driving a vehicle.”
“Is it possible to trace that vehicle even if we don’t have the license number?” Tom asked, sidestepping Anne’s implicit question.
“If we had a good enough description, I could ask the state police to be on the lookout for it and pull her over.”
Tom shook his head. “I don’t want her pulled over. That wouldn’t help either her or the baby.”
Anne was quiet for a moment as she cast a look back at Tommy. “I might be able to call in a favor.”
“Favor?” Tom repeated, trying to sound as uninformed as possible until she made the suggestion he’d been leading her to.
“I could ask the state police to let me know if they see the vehicle, but not stop the driver.”
“Good idea, Anne,” Tom said as he pulled into the church’s parking lot. “As soon as Trudi arrives with the crib, we’ll get the vehicle’s description from her. I’m glad I asked for your advice on this.”
* * *
A
NNE
REALIZED
SHE
’
D
been had. As she stood over the sink in Tom’s kitchen, washing dishes, she could see how adroitly Tom had set her up every step of the way. First the doctor’s, then the store, then tricking her into agreeing to find the baby’s mother.
And now, somehow—she couldn’t even remember the specifics—here she was cleaning up his kitchen!
If she’d had any doubts before, she had none now. Father Tom Christen was a very dangerous man.
Anne told herself that if it weren’t for the baby, she’d leave right this minute. But little Tommy hadn’t liked the new formula any more than he had the old, and had just spit it up all over Tom.
And was screaming at the top of his tiny lungs again. Poor little sweetheart.
She figured Tom was getting everything he deserved. But Anne was very worried about Tommy. How could his mother have left him when he wasn’t well?
She set the last of the dishes in the drying rack and went over to lift the baby out of Tom’s arms. As he had every time before, Tommy stopped crying, snuggled his little cheek against her chest and with a soft sigh went right to sleep.
Ah, the sudden quiet was wonderful!
Anne sat on a kitchen chair, cuddled the baby close and wondered at this odd role that had been so suddenly thrust upon her.
When her co-workers brought their babies to the office, she always said the polite things she knew a parent wanted to hear. But she never asked to hold their babies. And when she had helped her sister with her nieces and nephew, she felt very much an outsider—awkward and unwanted.
But she didn’t feel awkward or unwanted now. Not with this surprising little baby who fit so perfectly into her arms. Since the first moment she’d held his warm little body next to hers, it had felt so natural to cuddle him and keep him close.
Why did Tommy stop crying only when she held him? And why was it she who felt comforted whenever she cradled him in her arms?
“You’re a natural mother,” Tom said from the chair beside her.
Anne kept forgetting how deep and rich Tom’s voice was until it suddenly hummed through her ears and her blood.
“I have a ton of screaming testimonials to the contrary,” she said. “Just ask my sister. And her kids.”
“You were married for four years,” Tom said. “Why no kids of your own?”
The surprise of his question beat like butterfly wings inside Anne’s chest. Her eyes shot to his face.
“How is it you know about my marriage?”
“I asked Maureen about you.”
His eyes were as clear and warm as a summer day and looking directly into hers. The butterfly in Anne’s chest suddenly grew eagle wings.
The doorbell rang through the rectory.
“That will be Trudi with the crib,” Tom said. “Be right back.”
He was out of his chair and gone in a flash.
Anne took a deep breath and let it out very slowly. Her pulse was fluttering and her nerves were skipping. And all he had said was that he’d asked about her. This was definitely not a good sign.
Tommy whimpered in his sleep.
“It’s okay, little guy,” Anne soothed as she rocked the baby. “We’re going to find your mommy. And then everything will be all right.”
Hearing her own words brought a frown to Anne’s face.
Tom would find the mother of his child. And when he brought her back to Cooper’s Corner and reunited her with their baby, what then?
Would he marry her?
It’s none of your concern,
that wise voice inside Anne’s head admonished.
So stop wondering. And stop letting that priest get to you.
* * *
T
RUDI
K
ARR
SEEMED
older than her eighteen years. She was short and thin, her hair the color of the mud that made the unpaved county roads around the village a quagmire. She wore jeans and a faded yellow sweatshirt. Her wary brown eyes never looked straight at Anne.
The three of them sat together in Tom’s study—a cozy space with tall, narrow windows, a polished brass wood stove and walls filled with an eclectic assortment of books neatly stacked on sturdy pine shelves.
Trudi perched on the edge of her chair, her elbows braced on her bony knees.
Anne had seen young women like Trudi in her court. Their old faces had always made her sad.
“I’m sorry I haven’t made it to church, Father,” Trudi said. “I’m grateful you got me the job with the Tubbs and all, it’s just...”
“You don’t have to explain, Trudi,” Tom said. “And you don’t owe me anything. Whether you come to church or not is your choice.”
The tension in Trudi’s thin shoulders didn’t abate, despite Tom’s reassurance.
“I understand you saw the vehicle that drove by the church around eight o’clock last night?” he asked.
“Yeah. It passed me on Church Street, going real fast. Kicked up a mess of mud.”
“Could you determine its make or model?” Tom asked.
“A rusty-red VW Bug—one of those real old ones, not the new models.”
“License plate?”
“Massachusetts, probably. Sure I would’ve noticed were it different.”