Free Baby Experts 02 by The Midwife’s Glass Slipper Page B

hold on to me,” he assured her.
    “And Emily.”
    He hadn’t thought about Emily visiting his mother.
    “Oh, I don’t think I’ll be going,” Emily said, glancing at him, making sure she didn’t overstep their working relationship or their friendship.
    Friendship. Had he ever been friends with a woman?
    Courtney ran to him, wrapped her little arms around him and looked up at him with big green eyes. “Daddy? Can Emily come, too?”
    How could anyone say no to this beautiful child who had formed a bond with this woman who was caring enough to be a mother? Courtney liked Chloie, but she never responded to his cousin the way she responded to Emily. Neither did Amy.
    Emily’s cheeks were flushed as if she were embarrassed and didn’t know what to say or do.
    Stooping down, he lifted Courtney into his arms. “Can you tell me why you want Emily to come along? I’m sure she has a very busy schedule, so it has to be an important reason.”
    Courtney bit her lower lip as she thought about what he’d asked. “I won’t be scared.”
    Jared had the feeling that sometimes when his daughters were with him, they thought he’d be called away and they’d be left alone. He didn’t know how to counteract that. Apparently they felt more solid with Emily. That was a shocker.
    “Why don’t you two have your milk and play and I’ll talk to Emily about it? Okay?”
    Courtney nodded again, leaned toward him to give him a kiss on his cheek. Every one of those kisses was precious.
    He carried her over to the table and settled her in one of the chairs, lifting the lid from her pudding. Amy ran over and he did the same for her. He left them jabbering about the hospital and patients.
    Emily had risen from the floor. Tendrils of curls hadcome loose from her ponytail and wisped around her face. Her color was still a little high. He couldn’t seem to get enough of looking at her face, her sweetly curved lips, her long eyelashes that fringed her dark brown eyes and emphasized them.
    “I don’t have to go along. I certainly don’t want to intrude on your time with your mother.”
    His time with his mother was always strained. With the girls around, less so. Truth be told, he wondered what his mother would think of Emily, and vice versa.
    “The girls seem to find a certain level of comfort and safety when you’re with them. I wouldn’t want to take that away from them in a strange setting. Are you busy tomorrow evening?”
    “No, I’m not busy,” she admitted, realizing she didn’t have a social life outside of her friendships with Francesca and Tessa. “But are you sure you want me involved? Would your mom want a stranger around?”
    “I don’t know what my mother will or won’t want. I do know I’ll keep the visit short. I don’t want to overtire her, and the girls can be a handful when they get excited and start asking questions. That’s where I think you’d be a big help. You have a calming effect on them.”
    “If I can help, I’d be glad to come along. But if for some reason your mother doesn’t want any other visitors, I can wait out in the hall, or visit the nursery again.”
    He remembered too well the day he’d transferred Leanne Martin’s baby to Emily’s arms. She would make a wonderful mother. He could imagine her pregnant, getting larger with child each month.
    Oh, no, he wasn’t going there. He might be considering a night of hot sex, but a minister and wedding bells weren’t on his agenda. He’d done that once. He’d been alousy husband and back then, not a very good father. He’d been building his practice, and he’d left the needs of his infants to Valerie.
    If he had it all to do over again, what would he change?
    He didn’t know. Valerie’s distaste of his being called away had always caused problems between them. But those problems had turned into resentment on both their sides, and that colored everything they had done and said.
    He could have done it differently. He should have been