Found: One Secret Baby by Nancy Holland Page A

the floor told her Joey had had enough breakfast. She took a deep breath before she bent down to right the bowl and wipe the cereal off the floor.
    By the time they were both dressed, Joey was restless. Maybe she could drive him out to a playground at the beach.
    That’s when she remembered her car was still in Beverly Hills.
    If she’d been thinking more clearly last night she wouldn’t have this problem. But letting Morgan Danby take the weight of making even one decision off her shoulders had been too tempting. Everything about him had been too tempting.
    She didn’t let herself think about what it would be like to have someone around to help her make decisions all the time, someone to share the burdens and joys of raising Joey.
    “Pak.” Joey bounced in his playpen. “Pak!”
    “Okay, tiger. We’ll go to our usual park. Let me get a jacket from your closet.”
    In his room she noticed a bag of his outgrown clothes that she’d set aside to pass along to a neighbor down the street who had a boy two months younger than Joey. Maybe she could borrow their car seat and take an expensive taxi ride to Beverly Hills to pick up her car.
    She bundled Joey up, put on her own jacket, and picked him up for the short walk down to the neighbor’s.
    “So, Joey …” she started as she opened the front door.
    Morgan Danby stood on the other side, one hand raised to knock.

Chapter Four
    Rosalie’s heart stuttered, stopped, raced. It took every ounce of energy she had to breathe. Tense, painful seconds ticked by while the three of them silently stared at each other.
    “No!” Joey cried suddenly, pointing down.
    Smudge was trying to slip past her legs out the open door. Sylvester, as usual, was right on his heels.
    Morgan crouched down to block the cats’ path, then raised his head, eyes boring through her. “Why don’t we all go inside?”
    She nodded numbly as she stepped away and let him herd the cats back into the house. He shut the door with a noise that was only fractions short of a slam.
    “The living room?” he suggested, when she still couldn’t find any words or the breath to say them.
    He looked around the room at the playpen and scattering of toys she’d hidden away so carefully when he’d been there before. Joey squirmed and kicked to get down, but she held him tighter, stroking his head to calm him. Fear, anger, regret burned her throat to silence.
    Morgan turned his attention to the child in her arms.
    “Joey?”
    The boy giggled at his own name, then buried his head in her shoulder.
    “Josef, perhaps? For Ms. Mendelev’s father?”
    She made the mistake of looking Morgan in the eye. The rage that glowed there stifled any possible defense she might have thought she could offer.
    He laughed, a mixture of anger and triumph that sent an arctic chill down her spine and made her hold the precious bundle in her arms so close Joey gave a squeak of protest.
    “It’s all in my favor, isn’t it,” Morgan went on. “Or Lillian’s favor. Trying to keep the child secret from her won’t serve you well in court. Of course, you know that.”
    The words shattered the icy fear that held her silent and immobile. Finally able to draw a full breath, she set Joey in his playpen and blindly handed him his favorite stuffed bear.
    “I also know the woman who raised Charlie Thompson should never be allowed to raise another child.”
    “She raised me, too.”
    That stopped her for a half a beat. “I rest my case.”
    The last remnants of polite charm vanished from his face.
    “You’ll hear from my stepmother’s lawyer soon, Ms. Walker. Very soon.”
    Before she caught her breath, he was gone.
    “Bye-bye,” Joey said solemnly.
    Morgan drove the rented Ferrari to the nearest commercial street and pulled into the parking lot of one of L.A.’s ubiquitous strip malls.
    He needed to let the rage boil off so he could think. He never acted out of anger. He wasn’t that kind of man. He wasn’t like Charlie.
    The image