Page 11 of A Christmas Baby for the Cowboy
Normally when she arrived on his doorstep, he met her at the door—but not like this. It was usually a fight or a surrender, or both, and they usually ended up naked. Sometimes right there on the floor in what was essentially his foyer in all this open space he liked.
She couldn’t say she was proud of that, but it was in the past.
And everything was different tonight, obviously.
You need to get your head in the game, she told herself, the way her grandpa would have.
Ramona put down her supplies and then set about stripping off her outer layers. It was always a production. She pulled off her boots and her cold weather gear, then placed it neatly on the bench next to the door that existed for exactly that purpose. She hung her coat on one of the pegs on the wall, and tugged off her hat and scarf and shoved them into one sleeve.
When she turned back around to face him, he was watching her much too closely.
She pretended she didn’t notice.
“Let’s see what we’re dealing with here with this little sweetheart,” Ramona said, in her best clinical voice.
She motioned for him to follow her as she marched herself into his kitchen, where she knew his counters would be clean and gleaming. They were. She set her medical bag on one end, and then held out her hands.
Something inside of her seemed to shift precipitously when Knox looked alarmed. And reluctant. Like he didn’t want to let go of the child.
“I’m not going to hurt her,” Ramona assured him, though her throat was suddenly tight. “I need to examine her.”
“Right, of course,” he muttered.
But it still seemed to take him a minute to pull the baby off his chest and let Ramona take her from him.
She cuddled the baby close and cooed at her, tracking the baby’s responses. Ramona held her close as she moved over to the drawer where she knew Knox kept kitchen towels that were happily oversized and always clean, and she spread a couple of them out over the cold counter. Then she set the baby down on them, murmuring to the little girl as she did it.
Then she conducted a full exam, culminating in a diaper change. When she was done, she put the baby on her hip and prepared a bottle, noting how greedy the little girl seemed when she started to suck it down.
Only then did she allow herself to pay closer attention to Knox, who had shrugged into a T-shirt at some point and was watching her intently.
“She seems perfectly healthy, even happy,” Ramona told him, smiling because babies always made her smile. She remembered who she was talking to and dialed it back. “It’s a miracle. Do you know how long she was left outside?”
“I don’t think it could have been long,” Knox said, frowning. “I could still see footsteps in the snow, but you saw how hard it was coming down. Tracks can’t have lasted long out there.”
“Well, she came through her ordeal like a champ,” Ramona said. She looked up at him, and it was a fight to keep her voice cool, but she managed it. Somehow, she managed it. “Have you given any thought to who might have left her here?”
“A maniac?” he retorted.
“You haven’t really thought this through, have you?” Ramona asked, and again, it was painful to keep her voice calm. But a suspicion had taken her over while she was examining the child and she couldn’t let it go. “There’s only one reason that someone would leave a baby here, don’t you think? One very obvious reason.”
Knox looked at her like she was speaking in tongues. “I can’t think of any reason that someone would leave a baby here.”
“That’s actually my point.” Ramona said this quietly, because her heart was doing wild things in her chest and she wasn’t sure she was breathing, either. “There are all kinds of reasons that women abandon their babies, and they’re usually very sad. Still, normally, they do it in places where they know the baby will be found and cared for. Hospitals. Police stations. Firehouses. Why would anyone drive up here in this kind of weather? I’ll tell you, it was pretty horrific out there.”
He stared back at her, something like a scowl on his face, as he braced himself against the counter across from her. “I don’t know where you’re going with this.”
“Why would a woman drive up and leave her baby on the doorstep of a man who has exhibited no sign whatsoever, ever as far as I know, of being capable of or interested in taking care of a child?” She didn’t keep that as calm as she should have. “Take a wild guess, Knox.”
“Just because I’ve never taken care of a child doesn’t mean that I’d be incapable of it,” he shot back.
Like that was the point of this.
“You’re not exactly known as the Mr. Rogers of Cowboy Point, are you?” She shook her head at him, aware that there was something trembling deep inside of her. Maybe a scream. Maybe, worse, a sob. “So why would someone do this?”
“It seems pretty clear to me you have an answer to that, Ramona.” His gaze was gold and hot and clearly furious. “So why don’t you just tell me.”
She made herself smile, professionally.
