The Baby Switch!

“I’m gonna need this, right?” Norah asked. “Both bottles, from the expression on your face.”

“Yes,” Shelby said, and this time her sister’s eyes went even wider. She attempted something of a smile, took the whiskey bottles back into the kitchen and poured two glasses of white wine instead. Norah followed her in, standing in the doorway. “Okay. Here goes,” she said, handing her sister a glass.

Norah gulped half the glass of wine. “I’m ready. Whatever it is, whatever you need, I’m here for you.”

Tears streamed down Shelby’s face. She stood there in her kitchen and bawled.

Norah burst into tears, too. “Oh, God. Oh, God. You’re sick.”

Shelby froze. She wasn’t sick. No one was dying. Get ahold of yourself, Shelby. Perspective. With that, she launched into the whole story, starting with the meeting at the clinic, explaining about having her blood retested at the hospital and ending with being invited to Liam Mercer’s family ranch for dinner tonight.

Norah’s open mouth and chin kept dropping lower. She stared at Shelby with what the? shock on her face, then raced over and enveloped Shelby in a long hug, both of them sobbing. Her sister wiped under her eyes and gave Shelby’s hand a squeeze before dropping down on a chair at the round table in front of the window. “I seriously think my legs are going to give out. I just can’t believe this.” She opened her mouth as if to ask a question, then clamped it shut. Then again. Then again. “It’s not sinking in, Shelby.”

Shelby sat down across from Norah. “I know. I don’t even think I’ve processed it. It’s just buzzing around at the forefront of my mind like a bee that won’t go away.”

“What’s Liam Mercer like? I’ve seen him around. He’s hard to miss.”

Shelby took a sip of wine. “I know. Gorgeous. Amazing body. And surprisingly nice.”

A strawberry-blond eyebrow shot up. “Really? He didn’t threaten you?”

“About taking Shane? No. I don’t think it’s sunk in for him at all that Shane is his child. Or he’s not ready to believe it. I think he’ll need the results of the DNA test for that. His blood type is compatible with Alexander’s, as is the baby’s mother’s. As is mine. So I guess he’s still holding out hope that his life can go back to exactly what it was seven hours ago.”

Norah shook her head. “If he does threaten you, we’ll sic David on him.”

Shelby reached across the table and squeezed her sister’s hand, glad she’d rung the bell like a lunatic, after all. “It’s good to be dating a lawyer. I’ll tell everyone else tomorrow morning. I need to just lie down and breathe before getting ready for dinner at the Mercers’.”

“God, have you seen that place?” Norah asked. “I didn’t know ranches could have mansions on them.”

She thought back to what Liam had said, that all the money and power in Wyoming couldn’t make the truth any less true.

She wasn’t sure if that helped or not.

* * *

As Liam watched his brother hoist Alexander high in the air in the family room, as close to baby talk with an “up you go!” as Drake Mercer got, he found himself studying Drake’s face and hair and the dimple that deepened when he laughed every time Alexander giggled. Liam had been studying his family since he’d arrived ten minutes ago for the weekly Mercer family dinner. Last Friday night his mother had remarked over the Italian wedding soup course how Alexander was looking more and more like his handsome grandfather every day, especially around the eyes and “something in the expression.” He wondered now if coloring was enough to make people see similarities where otherwise there was none—when people knew they were related.

He’d always figured Alexander must look more like Liza’s side of the family, though he’d never really seen Liza in Alexander’s face. And since Liza had been raised by a few different foster families, she’d never known her family.

“I knew you were going to be a rancher like me,” Drake said, tapping the tiny Stetson Harrington Mercer had bought for Alexander.

“A weekend cowboy, like me,” Harrington corrected. “That’s how it’s done. You devote your weekdays to the family business and the weekends to appreciating the land. Every Mercer has done it that way for generations.”

“A real cowboy, weekend or otherwise, walks his own way, blazes his own path,” Drake said, hoisting up Alexander again and earning a giggle.

“A real man puts family first, Drake,” Harrington said, his tone its usual imperious don’t-bother-arguing.

Drake didn’t bother. He’d long stopped. He’d say his piece to a point, but he knew he was talking to a brick wall.

Liam admired his brother. He’d been blazing that own path since he was knee-high, doing things his way, taking the punishment and lecture rather than follow rules that didn’t make sense to him or came from someone else’s rigid vision for how he should act and think. Now, at twenty-seven, Drake was the foreman’s right-hand man on a very prosperous cattle ranch and would likely take over the retiring-age man’s job in the next year or two.

Liam had never thought he and his brother looked that much alike, but as he studied Drake, he could see how similar their features were. They had their mom’s blue eyes and thick, dark hair, though Drake wore his a bit longer and messier than Liam did. Liam had his mother’s strong, straight nose, while Drake more resembled Harrington Mercer.

How could someone who looks so much like me be so different from me in every way? their father would mutter at many a family dinner.

He glanced at his son, whom Uncle Drake was now setting down in the giant playpen by the sliding glass doors to the deck. Now that he knew that Alexander was very likely Shelby’s son, he saw Shelby in his sweet little face.

“Must we have the same conversation every Friday?” Larissa Mercer asked, dusting her hands on her apron as she emerged from the kitchen, the smell of something delicious wafting out. His mother loved to cook and was working her way through one of the Barefoot Contessa’s Italian cookbooks. “We’re here together. That’s what matters. Let’s just enjoy ourselves.”

Harrington Mercer gave Drake a half frown and poured himself a drink. Before he could respond, the doorbell rang.

Shelby. And Shane.

“I should have mentioned this earlier—I invited a friend to dinner,” Liam announced. “She also has a six-month-old.” He’d had a few hours to let his mother know. He also could have mentioned it when he’d arrived. But he’d found himself unable to get the words out.

Plus, he’d be hit with a barrage of questions about who Shelby was to him—with the assumption that they were a couple. Liam hadn’t brought a woman to a family dinner in a couple of years, since he’d gotten his heart stomped on as a love-struck twenty-three-year-old bursting with a marriage proposal. Then two years ago he’d finally gotten serious again with another woman, a VP at Mercer Industries whom he’d discovered had been more interested in him as a stepping stone and left MI high and dry in the middle of a merger when she’d gotten a better offer from a rival company. Then a year ago there was Liza, whom he might have fallen for if he hadn’t been so guarded against betrayal. But Liza had always said she had no interest in meeting his snooty, highfalutin family, which had made him laugh. All she’d wanted from Liam was his time and attention, and he hadn’t even been willing to give that. She’d been right to dump him when he told her he wasn’t interested in marriage or children—probably ever.

His mother’s eyes lit up. “Ah, a new love interest!” She turned toward the family room, where her husband and younger son were ignoring each other in opposite corners. “Ooh, Harrington, did you hear? Liam’s bringing home a girlfriend to meet us!” She turned back to Liam. “I had a feeling you’d fall for a single mother of a baby. Gives you quite a bit in common from the start.”

Liam headed toward the door. “Actually, Shelby is just a friend.”

His mother smiled slyly. “Sure she is. You’ve never invited a friend to Friday dinner before.”

Liam pulled open the door, and the sight of Shelby stopped him cold. It wasn’t just that she was beautiful; she was. But she suddenly seemed so...necessary, as if he couldn’t get through the day without being with her and had just realized it when he saw her face.

That was nuts.

They were in the middle of one hell of a thing. That was it. She was like a lifeline. She was the other half in this. Not his other half, of course, but the other half in this insanity. It made sense that he needed her to feel some sense of grounding.