Tamara was already unbuckling the strap that held the crying infant in her seat. She was so tiny! Couldn’t have been more than a few days old. Her skin was still wrinkled and so, so red. There were no tears on her cheeks.
“There’s nothing poking her. I checked,” Collins said, not interfering as she lifted the baby from the seat, careful to support the little head.
It wasn’t until that warm weight settled against her that Tamara realized what she’d done. She was holding a baby. Something she couldn’t do.
She was going to pay. With a hellacious nightmare at the very least.
The baby’s cries had stopped as soon as Tamara picked her up.
“What did you do?” Collins was there, practically touching her, he was standing so close.
“Nothing. I picked her up.”
“There must’ve been some problem with the seat, after all...” He’d tossed the infant head support on the desk and was removing the washable cover.
“I’m guessing she just wanted to be held,” Tamara said. What the hell was she doing?
Tearless crying generally meant anger, not physical distress.
And why did Flint Collins have a baby in his office?
She had to put the child down. But couldn’t until he put the seat back together. The newborn’s eyes were closed and she hiccuped and then sighed.
Clenching her lips for a second, Tamara looked away. “Babies need to be held almost as much as they need to be fed,” she told him while she tried to understand what was going on. “The skin-to-skin contact, the cuddling, is vitally important not only to their current emotional well-being but to future emotional, developmental and social behavior.”
She was quoting books she’d memorized—long ago—in another life. He was checking the foam beneath the seat cover and the straps, too. Her initial analysis indicated that he was fairly distraught himself.
Not what she would’ve predicted from a hard-core businessman possibly stealing from her father.
“Who is she?” she asked, figuring it was best to start at the bottom and work her way up to exposing him for the thief he probably was.
He straightened. Stared at the baby in her arms, his brown eyes softening and yet giving away a hint of what looked like fear at the same time. In that second she wished like hell that her father was wrong and Collins wouldn’t turn out to be the one who was stealing from Owens Investments.
She didn’t move. Just stood frozen with her arms holding a baby against her.
“Her name’s Diamond Rose.” His tone soft, he continued to watch the baby, as though he couldn’t look away. But he had to get that seat dealt with. Fast. The lump in her throat grew.
“Whose is she?” She was going to have to put the baby down. Sooner rather than later. Her permanently broken heart couldn’t take much more. The tears were already starting to build. Dammit! She’d gone almost two months without them.
“Mine...sort of.”
Her head shot up. “Yours?” She glanced at the cell phone on his desk and then noticed the portable baby monitor. “You don’t have a baby crying ringtone?”
“No.”
“You have a baby?”
There’d been nothing in his file. According to her father, he’d only been dating his current girlfriend—some high-powered attorney—for the past six months. He’d brought her to a dinner Howard had hosted for top producers and their significant others. And had explained where and how they’d met. Which was pertinent because soon after he’d taken the first full vacation he’d had in eight years.
“She’s not mine,” he said then frowned, glancing at Tamara hesitantly before holding her gaze. “Legally, she is. But I’m not her father.”
“Who is?” His personnel records hadn’t listed any next of kin other than an incarcerated mother.
He shrugged. “That’s the six-million-dollar question. No idea. Biologically she’s my sister.”
Tamara flooded with emotion. She couldn’t swallow. Standing completely still, concentrating on distancing herself from the deluge, focusing on him, she waited for her skin to cool. With a warm baby snuggled against her chest.
She had to get rid of that warmth.