She's Having a Baby

He read between the lines. “By ‘healthy interest’ you mean everything short of strapping someone to a lie-detector machine and assaulting him or her with a barrage of questions?”

She grinned at that image and he thought to himself that the expression added extra wattage to the room. “Something like that.”

He supposed it wouldn’t harm anything if he told her where he’d lived before everything inside of him had died. “I’m from Chicago.”

She nodded, pleased by the step he’d taken. “I’m from Boston originally.”

But he wasn’t here to exchange information. He had no desire to get to know anything about any one of his neighbors, or the people he was going to be working with, for that matter. All he wanted to do was his work and wait for eventual oblivion, because that was what Ellen had left in her wake. A deep, vast hole that he found himself walking around in in slow motion.

The look in his eyes was meant to put the woman in her place. “I don’t remember asking.”

“No, I’m just volunteering.” Her smiling eyes met his. “Anything else you want to know?”

Quade frowned. He was wasting time here. “I didn’t even want to know that.”

Her smile didn’t wane. The man was clearly in need of someone to talk to before he became some kind of weird hermit. “Is that what’s called being brutally frank?”

“That’s what’s called minding my own business.” About to leave, he paused just for a moment. He had to ask. “I thought New Yorkers kept to themselves.”

“That’s just bad publicity by someone who never took the trouble to really get to know his neighbors.” Delivering the salvo, she looked up at him and smiled brightly.

Ellen used to smile like that, Quade realized suddenly. Realized, too, that it had warmed him just to see it.

Abruptly, he straightened, as if being rigid could somehow keep the memories at bay. “I’ve got to get back to unpacking.” He nodded toward the rear of the apartment. “Thanks for the use of the bathroom.”

“Any time.” She moved a little closer, matching him step for step. “Sure I can’t interest you in an egg roll or something? They’re small.”

“No, thanks. I already ate,” he told her. “I grabbed a burger and fries earlier.”

“Then you didn’t have dessert,” she said suddenly. She switched positions quickly, swinging around to look at the contents she’d just removed from the bag. She scooped up the first fortune cookie she came to and offered it to him. “Here.”

He was about to refuse, decided that it would just be wasting his breath, that he’d wind up with the cookie in some form or other no matter what he said. So he nodded instead and was immediately rewarded by having a fortune cookie thrust into his hand.

“Thanks.”

He looked as if he were going to shove the cookie straight into his pocket without looking at it. Where it was probably going to stay until he sent the pants to the cleaners. If he bothered taking it out then, MacKenzie thought.

She caught his wrist before he could get his hand into his pocket. He looked at her in surprise. “Aren’t you going to open it? I know you’ve got this ‘no curiosity’ thing going, but me, I’ve always love reading fortune cookies.”

He was all set to give it back to her. “Then you keep it.”

But she held up her hands, warding off the exchange. “No, bad luck to take a used fortune cookie. It’s yours now.”

He sighed, debating just leaving but he had a feeling she would pop up like toast in his place the next morning, asking what the fortune cookie had to “say.” Since she wouldn’t take it back, he was stuck.

Quade cracked open the cookie and pulled out the small white paper. “Destiny has entered your life,” he read, then crumpled the paper.

No, it hadn’t, he thought. Destiny had left his life. With the last breath that Ellen had taken. “Happy?” he asked.

“For now,” she answered truthfully.

Well, at least she didn’t try to lie. Quade nodded curtly at her as he walked out her door.

MacKenzie hurried after him, crossing the threshold. The sky looked as if it was going to rain at any moment. The air smelled pregnant with moisture. MacKenzie shook her head. She had pregnancy on the brain.

“Let me know if you need anything else,” she called after him.

The only acknowledgment she received was another quick, dismissive nod before he closed the door behind himself. She heard the lock click into place.

“Good-looking fella.”

Startled, MacKenzie bit back a squeal of surprise. She turned and saw that there was a short, slightly rounded older woman standing in the doorway of the apartment that was two doors away.

The woman had frosted hair cut short and looked to be somewhere in her late fifties, possibly early sixties. Her blue eyes were sparkling as they took in Quade. It seemed to MacKenzie that the woman was stroking the dog she was holding a tad too hard. The dog, a Jack Russell terrier, softly growled his displeasure until she finally stopped petting him.

Careful what you wish for, Dog, MacKenzie cautioned silently.

“New neighbor,” MacKenzie volunteered out loud, nodding toward Quade’s apartment.

Finding herself no longer hungry for food and in no mood for the solitude she’d told herself she’d been craving all afternoon, MacKenzie crossed to the older woman. The woman didn’t look the slightest bit familiar. MacKenzie would have remembered someone who could have easily been cast in the role of Mrs. Claus.

“I’m sorry, did you just move in, too?”

“Me?” One hand went to her ample bosom as the woman laughed at the idea. The sound was rich, bawdy and not entirely in keeping with the angelic-looking rest of her. “No, Cyrus and I have been here for ages.”

“Cyrus?”

“My dog.”

“Oh.” MacKenzie looked at the woman more closely. Nope, not familiar at all. “I’m sorry, I’ve got a very hectic, erratic schedule. I guess I just never bumped into you.”

The woman’s smile was almost cherubic. “No, you haven’t. Can’t say I wouldn’t mind ‘bumping’ into that young man, though.” The woman peered around MacKenzie, as if hoping to get another glimpse of Quade. But the door at his apartment remained closed. If he was going to be bringing up any more furniture or boxes, it wasn’t now. “He’s been moving in all day.”

MacKenzie nodded. “Yes, I know.”

Interest etched itself into the older woman’s soft features. “Do you also know his name?”

“Quade Preston.” MacKenzie liked the way that sounded. Strong.

The other woman seemed to be trying it out in her head, as well. She nodded at MacKenzie. “Very masculine sounding. Doesn’t look very friendly, but maybe that’s because he’s new,” she theorized. “Shy so often can come off as standoffish, don’t you think?”

“Yes, I suppose so.”

MacKenzie considered herself shy, but she took just the opposite tack, trying to force herself to be as friendly as possible. Obviously it wasn’t working with her new neighbor.

As if someone had just snapped their fingers, the other woman seemed to come out of a self-imposed trance. She stopped looking toward the other apartment with a bemused expression on her face and faced MacKenzie instead.

“Oh, where are my manners?” The woman shifted the dog she was still holding to her other arm, putting out her hand toward MacKenzie. A thin layer of downy dog fur clung to her sleeve. “I’m Agnes Bankhead. Aggie to my friends.” Her eyes brightened as MacKenzie took her hand. “And I think we’re going to be friends—as long as you tell me your name.”