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I shrugged. I wanted her involved. Sure, part of that was because I didn’t know what the hell I was doing. But the rest was because we were a team. It felt as if we’d always been one. She was the first person I thought to tell when good stuff happened, like when my brother moved back to town last year and opened his restaurant.
I also relayed the bad, but that depended on severity. She could be a worrier, and I didn’t want to cause her undue stress.
But if she was conflicted about getting in too deep with this, I didn’t want to make it harder for her. What I wanted wasn’t the only consideration. I could tell her own needs weren’t all she was thinking about either.
She studied my face and let out a sigh. “You don’t make it easy, Brooks.”
I didn’t know what exactly she meant, but I couldn’t deny a sense of relief as she withdrew a piece of paper from the envelope. She was still in this situation with me.
Even if she didn’t entirely want to be.
Her forehead wrinkled as she read. “Your daughter’s name is Samantha Mae. At birth, she was 19 inches long and weighed six pounds, four ounces,” her voice cracking, she met my gaze, “and her birthday is September eighteenth. So, she’s just about two months old on the nose.”
I sagged into my recliner, somehow managing to absently pat Sadie’s head when she ambled over. I slid a look toward the baby and found her watching us while she chewed on her fist.
“Samantha,” I murmured, and she blinked at me, owlish as ever.
“A beautiful name for a beautiful girl.” Gina cleared her throat. “She needs a lot of stuff, Jared. Diapers especially, but all the other things babies need too. I made a list. If you want, you can go to Walmart and get the essentials.”
“Walmart? You know I prefer to shop local.”
“Fine. You want to shop local, you’ll be waiting for daylight.” Gina put the baby’s birth certificate back in the envelope and handed it to me.
I immediately tucked it in my pocket. I’d put it with the other important papers in my fireproof box in the hall closet later. “Is that such a bad idea?”
“God forbid she needs her diaper changed beforehand. It’s probably long overdue already.”
“You don’t know?” At her narrowed-eyed look, I held up a hand apologetically. “Okay. You can go to Walmart then if you don’t mind. But it’s late.” I moved to the windows with Sadie dogging my every step. Outside, a winter wonderland filled my vision. “No. I’ll go. You stay here with the baby.”
“She has a name.”
“I know that,” I snapped.
“Also, newsflash, I’ve lived here all my life, and I know how to drive in the snow. My car has snow tires too.”
Ignoring her, I went to the hook beside the door and grabbed my keyring. “Take my vehicle.”
“The sheriff’s car? I’ll pass. Unless you’ll let me turn on the lights and siren. That might be cool.”
“Not the sheriff’s car.” I couldn’t hide my derision. “That’s an official vehicle.”
“Oooh, excuse me.” Gina slapped a hand to her chest, and Sadie took that as a signal to play and leaped on her, nearly knocking her over.
“Sadie, knock it off. Not in the house,” I said in the stern, authoritative voice her trainer had advised me to use.
Not that the training had helped much.
As usual, Sadie ignored me and kept jumping on Gina, her swishing tail knocking off the stack of newspapers I hadn’t dealt with yet on the end table.
The baby started to cry. I tilted back my head, praying for strength.
“The Jeep,” I said through clenched teeth, gripping the keys in my fist. “You can take the Jeep.”
“Fine. Easier not to argue with your chauvinistic ass.”
“It’s being chauvinistic to be concerned you’ll be driving in the snow late at night?”
“It is when you assume by way of prick you can do it better.” She sidestepped Sadie and gave me a healthy nudge in the belly before she snagged my keys and sashayed past me. “Trust me, pussy wins in all things.”
