She’d probably hear James knock if he came over. He could pound on her door like a madman if he needed to. As he’d done earlier tonight.
But in the end, she sighed, pulled her pillow off the bed, and went to the couch. She settled down, pulled her favorite throw blanket over her and patted the cushion next to her. “Come on, Ami.”
The dog looked over at her, then seemingly turned up his nose, before putting his chin on his paws and facing the door again.
She didn’t think Ami actually liked James more, but he didn’t have as many chances to sleep over there, so he usually spent James’s night off on the foot of James’s bed.
But she wanted the dog with her tonight. She couldn’t say why exactly, but she thought it might be bitterness over the tiny person who was with him tonight because of the female person who had been with him in order to make that tiny person.
James didn’t need to have the dog, too.
Harper stared at the ceiling. He’d made a baby with another woman, and he wasn’t even sure who she was. Or rather, which one she was. That woman hadn’t felt close enough to him to come to him during the pregnancy or even actually with the child herself. She’d just left the baby on the landing.
Who did that?
And did Harper really want to be counted in a number so large that James had to really think hard about who this woman could even be? Would he be able to come up with more than a first name? Had he known her for more than one night? Was she from here or had she been a tourist? Was he going to have to deal with someone local who could, potentially, be around all the time? Or would he have to figure out something with someone long distance? Or would he even have a prayer of tracking her down at all? Even if she was local, if he only had a first name and a few hours of… impressions of her, it might be difficult finding her at all. Especially if she didn’t want to be found.
A woman who left her baby on the doorstep of its father with nothing more than an unsigned note didn’t seem like someone who was interested in Mother’s Day brunches and parent-teacher conferences.
Harper pressed her hand over her heart. The whole thing was so crazy. She’d been right inside this very apartment while that woman had climbed the steps and put that baby—her baby—in a basket outside James’s door for him to discover when he got home. Harper believed him when James said the baby probably hadn’t been there long. It was even possible the woman had hung around in the shadows downstairs to be sure that James kept him rather than calling the cops or taking him straight to a safe haven location.
Harper swallowed hard. The woman could have taken the baby to James at the fire station. But she’d brought him here. She’d brought him to James specifically. With a note. So yes, she’d known who James was and had wanted the baby to be with him. Not just safe. Not just out of her hands. But with James.
Harper forced herself to relax, breathe deep, and shut her eyes.
This was all now, officially, not her problem. The baby wasn’t hers, and the guy who she’d thought could maybe, possibly, eventually, be hers a little bit, was now really off limits. So she might as well get some sleep so she could figure out how to share a dog with a guy she had an enormous, stupid crush on who now had an infant son and a whole lot of mess to figure out.
On. His. Own.
3
Harper blinked and looked around.
Why was she on the couch? And what was that noise?
It was Ami. Scratching at the door.
But why was the door right there?
Oh, right, she was on the couch.
Why was she on the couch?
She reached for her phone on the coffee table and squinted at the time.
Three a.m.
Why was Ami asking to go out at three a.m.?
Then it all came flooding back. Why she was on the couch, why Ami was out here in the living room, why she’d been dreaming about showing up for a parent-teacher conference dressed in her flannel pajama bottoms and a tank top that said I run on cuss words and caffeine.
Neither of which was true. She tried to curtail her cursing, and when she did it, she did it in French. It sounded better that way. Everything sounded better in French. She also drank tea. On the rare occasion she had coffee, she doctored it with enough cream that she wasn’t sure it counted as coffee anymore. Yes, her morning tea had caffeine, but she switched to decaf after that first cup.
So the shirt made no sense. Of course, that was only one thing in the dream that didn’t. The parent-teacher conference, for instance.
What was…
Ami gave a short bark and Harper frowned.
The dog wanted James.
Yeah, well, join the club.
But now that she was awake it was impossible to ignore the fact that James was across the hall with a baby boy and that she was worried about them both and wondering how they were and feeling horribly guilty for leaving them alone and feeling jealous but also slightly possessive and more than slightly irritable about the whole thing.
Yes, possessive. She’d been here. Helping him. Liking him. Taking care of his olives.
Where had this other woman been?
Sure, growing his baby. But not here.
Harper was trying very hard not to judge the woman for leaving the baby. She didn’t know this woman’s situation or motives or emotional state. For all she knew, this was the most selfless thing she could have done for her child and possibly the hardest thing she’d ever do in her life.
But the fact remained that Harper had more of a relationship with James than that woman did. In spite of the little life they’d accidentally made together, which meant that Harper did have a sort of right to be over there. If not for the baby, then for James.
It all sounded perfectly reasonable in her head as she pushed up from the couch and went to slip her feet into her flip-flops.
She couldn’t blame wine for her sudden one-eighty on this. But it was three a.m. No one was totally rational at three a.m. She could blame that if needed.
Ami was about to burst into happy bubbles of joy, she was certain, as she unchained the door and opened it. She peeked out. She wasn’t sure what she was expecting to see. Or afraid of seeing. But one never really knew what might be waiting on that landing.
It was clear and quiet. She cocked her head but could hear nothing from James’s apartment, and there were no lights shining from his windows.
She grabbed her key to his apartment from the porcelain bowl on the table by the door and crept across the landing and put her ear to his door. Ami gave a short bark.
“Quiet,” she hissed, pointing her finger at the dog.
He minded, but his tongue was hanging out, his tail going a mile a minute, and she knew that if she loitered for too long outside the door, the dog would lose his patience.
“Okay, but you have to be quiet,” she told him. She inserted the key and let them in, opening the door slowly.
The apartment was dark and quiet.
That was probably a good sign. No crying babies. No harried men.
Harper rolled her eyes. Of course James would be good even with babies. He might not have known a ficus from an olive tree, but once he’d learned, he’d been great with the tree. And Henry. And Courtney. And Ami. And her.
Harper had to admit that he’d been really good with her, too. He’d teased and flirted. He’d flaunted his firefighting. He’d shown off his musical talents. But it had always been with a touch of humor and good-natured confidence. He’d never pushed. Never been inappropriate. Never overstayed his welcome at her apartment. Not that there had ever been a time when she’d been fully ready for him to leave.