Page 37 of A Baby for the Billionaire Cowboy

She yawned. “Also, it’s possible I should wait until I have my brain back before I try to figure out all this stuff. From what I hear, that could take a couple of years though.”

He chuckled. “I think your brain is fine. But yeah, maybe you don’t want to make enormous life decisions right now, unless you can change your mind later.”

“Yeah.” She glanced at him and then looked down at Avery and fussed with the swaddling. “Another thing came up. The best kind of work, you do by choice, not because you’re afraid of poverty. I feel safe here, and you’ve all been so generous.” She gestured around the room.

He waited, breath held. That sounded like a sentence that would be followed bybut.

She met his gaze, and her expression firmed. “But I don’t want to be dependent on anyone else. So I’ll do my job, to the best of my ability, and I don’t want any favors just because I’m a single mother or anything. I want y’all to tell me if I’m doing anything wrong or could do anything better.”

“Okay.” He almost wished he could think of some little thing to tell her, to prove he respected her wishes. Some of the organizing and accounting, she did differently than he would, but once he got used to her methods, they were fine. Sometimes she distracted him from his own work, especially when she came in smelling of orange blossoms, wearing a skirt that stopped above her knees. But he couldn’t tell her that.

“I guess you could make the coffee a little stronger,” he finally said.

She laughed out loud. Avery twitched and made smacking noises. Daisy leaned closer, so Xander could see the flecks in her eyes and the sweet curve of her lips.

“You, sir, need higher standards.” She reached for Avery. “Now hand over my baby and go find something interesting to do with yourself.”

He passed her the baby, nudged Calico off his lap, and stood up. “I’ll tell Mama you’re going to rest for an hour. That will give you a break before the aunties descend.”

It wasn’t what he really wanted to say, but it was all he could allow himself.

Chapter Sixteen

Afew dayslater, Xander was distributing fresh hay to the horses when he got a call from Herman at the guard shack. “Fellow here named William. Says he’s Miss Daisy’s husband.”

Xander felt like he’d grabbed an electric fence. Her husband? But Daisy wasn’t married. Unless she’d lied about that. No, she wouldn’t do that. Anyway, she’d said quite clearly that she ran away from her wedding before it started. And she was embarrassed about being an unmarried mother. She wasn’t married.

But she had mentioned William, so this must be the guy. The father of her baby.

“He wants to see Daisy?” Xander asked.

“Actually, he says he wants to see one of you Tomlinsons.”

Xander was tempted to tell Herman to run the man off the property, by waving a gun if necessary. But he ought to find out what William wanted.

“Send him along,” Xander said. “I’ll meet him in front of the house.” Xander stormed over to the house from the barn. He was halfway there when he remembered he hadn’t finished giving the horses their hay. Well, they could wait a few more minutes.

William pulled up and got out of his car, something fancy and not suited for rural roads. He was tall and lanky, with receding fair hair and blue eyes. Probably decent looking, as far as Xander could judge, but he sure hoped Avery grew up to look like his mother.

Xander found it easy to ignore years of training and not even offer a welcome. He crossed his arms and glared. “What do you want?”

“Why, I want to see my wife, of course.”

“Then you’re in the wrong place. If you’ve got a wife, she’s not here.”

“Ah. She told you we weren’t married.” William grinned and shrugged. “I didn’t want to embarrass her in case she was pretending to be something other than what she is.”

“She’s not pretending anything. She’s an independent woman who made a choice, and it wasn’t to marry you.”

William spread his hands. “So she got cold feet at the wedding. It happens. But I’m willing to forgive her and take her back.”

“She doesn’t want to go back to you.” Or did she? Had she called him? Was she planning to leave and hadn’t told them? Did she love this man, after all, or think marriage to him was the best thing for Avery? Xander could barely breathe at the thought of Daisy leaving them forever.

William stepped closer, smiling in a way that made Xander want to punch him, and he’d never punched anyone in his life.

“Look, I’ll be frank with you,” William said. “You look like a man of the world, and I guess if you weren’t before, you are now that you’ve won all that money. Truth is, Daisy panicked. I left her alone, figuring she’d come to her senses. I guess it hasn’t happened yet. That’s fine. She wasn’t the woman I thought she was. But that’s my baby. I have rights.”

Xander went cold. “You want to share custody?” The courts might agree to that. Maybe it was even reasonable. Fathers should have rights.

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