Read Online The Cottage on the Corner by Shirlee McCoy - Free Book Online Page A

needs someone to watch her for a few days.”
    â€œAnd she left her with you?” She raised a light brown brow and tapped her fingers on the desk.
    â€œWhy not?”
    â€œBecause, as far as everyone around here is aware of, you haven’t spoken to the woman in years. Not to mention the fact that you wouldn’t be most women’s first choice as a babysitter. You wouldn’t be mine, anyway. I don’t even think I’d leave you with Pops.”
    â€œThanks,” he said dryly.
    â€œJust a statement of fact, Max. You’re not a kid kind of person. You like adult companionship. Preferably the female kind, and you don’t have a lot of patience for fools. Pops is nothing else if not a fool.” She frowned, her gaze jumping to some point behind him.
    He glanced back. A small group of ladies was decorating the lobby Christmas tree. Very slowly decorating it. When they realized he was looking at them, they bent over the tree’s heavy boughs, pretending that they weren’t straining their hearing aids trying to listen in on the conversation.
    â€œThis probably isn’t the best time to discuss any of this,” he murmured, and Emma nodded.
    â€œProbably not.”
    â€œI’m going to do some paperwork,” he said loudly enough for the women to hear.
    â€œYou’re going to have to clear off your desk first. And your chair, and maybe some room on the floor. The historical society wasn’t the only group that brought donations for your daughter.”
    â€œShe is not my . . . !” He glanced at the elderly women. Their eyes were big as saucers as they waited for him to shout the denial. He wasn’t going to do it. He’d take a paternity test before he made another public statement. That way he’d have undeniable proof that Zuzu wasn’t his.
    Or that she was .
    The thought gave him a momentary pause, that one-percent chance that she could be his eating away at him. He wasn’t father material. Would never be father material. God help the kid if he turned out to be her dad.
    â€œYou were saying?” Emma prodded.
    â€œNever mind,” he muttered. “I’ll be in my office if you need me.”
    â€œMight want to take some coffee with you. You look like you need it.”
    He wanted to ignore her, but she was right.
    He needed coffee. Badly.
    He poured a cup from the carafe near her desk and retreated to his office. He planned to sit at the desk, drink his coffee, try to get his head together. One look at the room, and he knew that wasn’t going to happen.
    The desk was overflowing with stuff, his computer draped with a pink blanket that had little white flowers all over it. The chair was covered with more stuff. Pink stuff. Purple stuff. Little girl stuff. Even the floor had piles of clothes and toys and dolls.
    â€œShit!” he muttered, lifting the pile from his chair and tossing it onto the desk. He’d need a wheelbarrow to get it all out of there and another apartment to store it all.
    He only had himself to blame for his troubles. He could have just let Morgan leave with the kid. He could rectify the situation. It would be easy enough to track Morgan down. He knew her name, her destination. He could put out an APB on her Mazda, find her, and ship Zuzu back where she belonged.
    He couldn’t make himself do it, and he wasn’t sure why not. Old memories, maybe. Thoughts about what it had been like to be a fatherless kid pawned off on whatever adult was willing to take him. Maybe a generic sense of responsibility. Zuzu was a little kid. Someone needed to protect her from her mother’s selfishness.
    Damn his civic-mindedness. He blamed his grandparents for it. If they’d left him with his drug-addict mom for a few more years, he probably wouldn’t have cared all that much about one little kid.
    He did care, so he and Zuzu were stuck with each other until Morgan returned. Or until he got fed up and