A Bride by Summer. Sandra Steffen

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СКАЧАТЬ her throat.

      It was a relief when she walked out into the bright sunshine, the white paper bag that contained her lunch in her hand, her oversize purse hanging from her shoulder. Dazedly donning a pair of sunglasses, she hurried down the sidewalk. She’d reached the corner before the haze began to clear in her mind. Up ahead, two young girls were having their picture taken in front of the fountain on the courthouse square and several veterans were gathered around the flagpole.

      Ruby skidded to a stop and looked around. Where was she?

      She glanced to the right and to the left, behind her at the distance she’d come, then ahead where the sun glinted off the bronze sculpture on the courthouse lawn. With rising dismay, she shook her head.

      She was going the wrong way.

      * * *

      “Care to tell me what you’re doing?” Marsh asked Reed after the waitress cleared their places.

      Decorated in classic Americana diner style, the Hill had its original black-and-white tile floors, booths with chrome legs and benches covered in red vinyl. Other than the menu, which had been adapted to modern tastes and trends, very little had changed. The Sullivans had been coming here for years. This was the first time they’d brought a baby with them, however.

      Reed double-checked the buckles on Joey’s car seat. The baby’s head was up, his feet were down and the straps weren’t twisted. Ten days ago he hadn’t known the correct way to fasten an infant safely into a car seat. That first week had been one helluva crash course for all three of them, but now Reed could buckle Joey into this contraption with his eyes closed. He could prepare a bottle when he was half asleep, too. Even diaper changing was getting easier.

      Sliding to the end of his side of the booth, he said, “I’m buckling Joey into this car seat. What does it look like I’m doing?”

      “You noticed nothing unusual here today?” Marsh countered in a quiet voice strong enough to penetrate steel.

      “If you have a point, make it. I don’t have time to play Twenty Questions,” Reed declared.

      “You don’t seem concerned that the judge joined us for lunch,” Marsh said, digging into his pocket for the tip.

      Ivan Sullivan was one of those men few people liked but most couldn’t help respecting.

      After discovering Joey on their doorstep ten days ago, Marsh, Reed and Noah had paid their great-uncle a visit at the courthouse. An abandoned minor child was no laughing matter, and no one had been laughing as the brothers fell into rank in the judge’s chambers. The note clearly stated that Joey was a Sullivan, and they’d had every intention of caring for him themselves while they unraveled this puzzle. In order for Joey to remain under their care, they were to keep the judge apprised of Joey’s progress in detailed, weekly in-person reports.

      Reed glanced over the heads of other diners and watched his great-uncle cut a path to the door. The way the aging judge tapped his cane on the floor with his every step only added to his haughtiness. Today’s interrogation had been impromptu, but it was completely in keeping with his character. Surely, Marsh agreed.

      His older brother left the tip on the table and Reed picked up the car seat with Joey strapped securely inside. Showing up in public with the baby had been the private investigator’s suggestion. Arguably the most successful P.I. in the state, Sam Lafferty was banking on the possibility that seeing Marsh and Reed with Joey would stir up a little gossip and perhaps jar someone’s memory of having seen an unknown woman with a small baby in the area.

      “We’re doing our best to care for Joey,” Reed insisted. “The judge knows that. We leveled with him today.”

      “We?” Marsh countered. “He asked what steps we’re taking to locate Joey’s mother and why we haven’t hired a permanent nanny and how much Joey weighs and where he sleeps. You, who can outtalk most politicians, barely said boo.”

      “I wouldn’t go that far,” Reed argued.

      “That a fact?”

      Reed narrowed his eyes at his brother’s tone. And waited.

      “You ordered the salmon,” Marsh said offhandedly.

      “That was salmon?” Reed asked.

      Marsh slanted him a look not unlike the judge’s. “You had meat loaf. It arrived with a loaded baked potato just the way I ordered it. Shelly mixed up our plates. You dug into my lunch the moment she set it in front of you.”

      With his sinking feeling growing stronger, Reed raked his fingers through his hair, for surely the shrewdest judge in the county had noticed Reed’s faux pas. If he and Marsh were going to keep Joey out of the system, neither of them had better display so much as a hint of poor behavior.

      They walked outside together and stood shoulder to shoulder beneath the red-and-white awning shading the restaurant’s facade.

      Grasping the handle of the car seat firmly in his right hand, Reed let the seat dangle close to the ground, simulating a rocking motion that was lulling Joey to sleep. “I owe you,” he said. “You don’t even like salmon.”

      “It’s nothing you wouldn’t have done for me, but that was some reaction you had to the redhead who bought Lacey’s place.”

      A city crew was working on a burst water main at the bottom of the hill on Division Street, and traffic was being rerouted. Unbidden, Reed’s thoughts took a little detour, too, over long legs and creamy skin and amazing hair and green eyes that had locked with his.

      “Holy hell,” he muttered under his breath.

      He didn’t get any argument from Marsh.

      A horn honked at a delivery truck parked in the left-turn lane and three boys with shaggy hair and black T-shirts raced by on skateboards. A meter reader was marking tires and three old men were talking in front of the post office. It was just another ordinary summer day in Orchard Hill, and yet nothing had felt ordinary to Reed and Marsh in the past ten days. Joey’s arrival had changed their lives, and neither of them could shake the feeling that something monumental was coming.

      Their phones rang moments apart, startling them both.

      Reed fished his phone out of his pocket, and over the booming bass of a passing car’s radio, he said, “Yes, Sam, I’m here. Slow down.”

      When it came to investigative work, Sam Lafferty didn’t mince words. Reed listened carefully to the latest report while keeping his end of the conversation to simple yes-and-no answers.

      Marsh’s call ended first. After a few minutes, Reed slipped his phone back into his pocket, too. Waiting until two dog walkers were out of hearing range, he said, “Sam located another woman named Julia Monroe.”

      He had Marsh’s undivided attention.

      “According to Sam, she’s five feet tall, has curly blond hair, a doting husband and a six-month-old baby daughter who looks just like her.”

      Joey’s eyelashes fluttered as he slept. Reed wondered if he was dreaming of his mother. He didn’t know if that was possible, but lately a great deal had happened that he’d never imagined was possible.

      “The СКАЧАТЬ