A Baby For Lord Roderick. Emily Dalton
as much bacon and several slices of fried tomato. Liam preferred a bowl of oatmeal or fruit for breakfast, but Mrs. Preedy still believed in a hearty English breakfast and he didn’t mind indulging on those rare mornings he spent with his grandmother. He smiled up at Mrs. Preedy, who was still hovering anxiously, and gamely picked up his fork.
“You really should be asking about Allie Lockwood, you know,” Mary presently informed him. “I hear she’s a looker.”
Sure, Allie Lockwood was a “looker,” Liam had to admit that, now that he actually thought about it. Last night he’d been too shocked and busy to think about it, but he had somehow managed to notice that she appeared to be very curvy under that shapeless flannel shirt she was wearing, and had lips like Catherine Zeta-Jones…that slight, natural upturn at the corners of her mouth even when she wasn’t smiling. Kissable lips.
Fortunately Sheriff Renshaw had dibs on those kissable lips, and they were, therefore, off-limits. Not that Liam had given the idea of kissing them a second thought.
“Ribchester and Mrs. Preedy aren’t keeping you up on the latest, Gran,” Liam informed her. This announcement, of course, caught the couple’s attention and they turned and listened from their posts in the kitchen. “Sheriff Renshaw knows his way around that little house of hers like the back of his hand. They obviously have something going.”
Ribchester’s chest swelled and he smirked with the superior delight of someone who knows something someone else doesn’t.
“I beg to differ, my lord,” he said, striving to keep a humble tone. “Sheriff Renshaw knows his way around Dr. Lockwood’s house because they had something going.”
“They were married,” Mrs. Preedy finished with a decided nod, “but got divorced nearly a year ago.”
Ribchester and Mrs. Preedy stood motionless in the kitchen and Mary smiled over her teacup at him, all three watching for his reaction, but Liam hardly knew how to react. All night he had thought of Allie Lockwood as being with Doug Renshaw. He’d thought of it in the context of the town’s doctor and sheriff marrying, and how that would prejudice the courts in their favor if Allie wanted to adopt the baby. But now he realized that thinking Allie was involved with someone else had, in a way, mercifully prevented him from acknowledging an attraction to her.
Liam said nothing and began to industriously cut up his fried tomatoes. Ribchester and Mrs. Preedy were forced to resume their tasks in the kitchen, and Gran held her tongue while he dealt with this new revelation of his attraction to a woman for the first time since Victoria’s death.
So what? he finally concluded to himself. No matter how physically attractive he found Allie Lockwood—and it was only a physical attraction, since he hardly knew her and what he knew he wasn’t sure he liked—he was not about to have a fling with a woman he might possibly be facing in court in a battle over an abandoned baby they’d both fallen in love with.
His initial impulse was to squelch any idea his grandmother had about him linking up with Allie Lockwood romantically. Mary meant well. She thought he’d shied away from dating long enough. But his grandmother was a hopeless romantic and didn’t realize how ridiculous the idea was even without knowing his intentions regarding the baby. In more than the literal sense, there was an ocean between Allie’s world and his.
Then it occurred to Liam that details about Allie’s private life might come in handy if there was a court battle.
He wasn’t going to let Mary in on his plans just yet—he wasn’t going to confide in anyone at all—so he’d have to be a bit dishonest about his interest in Allie Lockwood.
“All right, Gran. What else do you know about Allie Lockwood?”
Mary’s face lit up, making Liam feel guilty as hell.
“I’m so glad you’re curious! That’s a very good sign. Trouble is, as I told you already, I don’t really know very much.” She turned to face the kitchen. “Have I told them all we know, Ribchester?”
Ribchester leaned on the counter with his hands. “Well, mum, there is a bit more.”
“Oh good! What do you know?”
“A sad thing, really. Sheriff Renshaw cheated on her, is what I’ve heard, mum. That’s what broke up the marriage.”
“Yes,” piped up Mrs. Preedy, standing over a sink full of soapy pans. “But he was a bit rowdy and irresponsible all along, I heard. I think his fling with the waitress was the straw that broke the camel’s back, so t’speak.”
“How dreadful!” Mary clucked.
“But he’s not given up on her,” Ribchester added. “People say the sheriff’s still in love with her.”
“Oh, well, I hope she’s smart enough not to let that rascal back into her life,” Mary declared.
“He’s a handsome devil,” Mrs. Preedy said with a dire look and waving a sudsy knife. “Many a woman’s head’s been turned by a pair of bonny blue eyes.”
Mary’s glance slid to Liam…as he knew it would. “But what good luck for Allie that the bonniest pair of green eyes I’ve ever seen just arrived in Annabella.”
Liam was about to gently end a conversation he’d let, perhaps, go to far. He was spared the trouble by the ringing of the doorbell.
When Ribchester returned from answering the door, Sheriff Renshaw of the “bonny blue eyes” followed him into the room. And the sheriff looked none too happy.
AS SOON AS THE SUN ROSE, Allie was up and warming a bottle for the baby. She fed him, burped him, changed him into some baby clothes she’d tucked away in a dresser in the spare room (which had been destined for a nursery at one time), then rocked him till he fell contentedly to sleep again. She took a lightning-fast shower, with the baby’s box just outside the door, and dressed quickly. By seven o’clock she was standing outside her sister, Kayla’s, neat brick bungalow, ringing the doorbell.
She had to ring three times before Kayla finally answered the door. She was dressed in her usual outfit of a baggy sweatshirt and pants, and her mass of curly, strawberry-blond hair was disheveled and hanging in her eyes. She was pale and bleary-eyed.
“Kayla, you look like something the cat dragged in!” she blurted out, then added more sympathetically, “Up all night with Travis again? Or are you sick?”
Kayla pushed her hair aside and gave a weak smile. “Not sick. Your first guess was right. Travis was up till three this morning. He just wouldn’t go to sleep. And for your information, sis, most people don’t look so hot when they’ve been dragged out of bed after only four hours of sleep. What are you doing here? And what have you got in that box?”
Allie slipped past her into the house. “I still think you should bring him into the office again so we can discuss the possibility of medication for Travis.”
“You know I don’t believe in that stuff. Besides, he’s only like this in spells. He’s not always hyper.”
Allie sat down on the sofa, placing the box beside her. “Maybe it’s his diet. Like I said, bring him in again and we’ll talk.”
Kayla rubbed her eyes. “I will…when I get a chance.”
“Kayla, you know you don’t have to pay.”
“But I want to.”
“Don’t be ridiculous—”
The baby moved in the box, engaging Kayla’s attention again. “I hope you haven’t got a kitten or a dog in that box, Allie. If you do, don’t you dare show it to Travis. I don’t need a pet right now. Can’t afford one. I’m barely making ends meet as it is. Brad’s support check bounced again.”
Allie scowled. “That creep! Men who don’t pay child support should be hung by their thumbs, or some other part of their—”
“I know what you