Mac squelched an almost overpowering urge to pummel Allen to the ground. His heart spoke before his mind had a chance. "Yes, I want him."

For a split second, Allen looked speechless. And then he laughed. It was a harsh sound. "Then take him. Take him and get the h.e.l.l out of here." He turned and yelled into the room. "Hey kid, get out here! You've got yourself a new old man." When Tommy failed to appear, Allen raised his voice. "I said get out here!"

Tommy came out hesitantly, his eyes wide, his gait halting as he looked from one man to the other. Fear was stamped across his small face.

There was no doubt in Mac's mind that if he left the boy here now, Allen would take out his foul mood on him, doing even more damage to Tommy's soul than to his small body. Mac couldn't leave him.

That he wasn't prepared to take on the responsibility of a child never entered into his decision. He simply reacted to what he saw, what he felt. Tommy needed someone and Mac wanted to be that someone for him. He'd grown to care a great deal for the boy in a very short time.

Planting the flat of his hand against the other man's chest, Mac pushed his way into the house. "Get your things, Tommy, you're coming with me."

The little boy sitting in the pa.s.senger seat beside him had been very still, very quiet the entire way. It was as if Tommy understood that once again in his all too young life, he was going through a life-altering change.

Mac had tried to draw him out, asking Tommy questions, but all he got in response was either a nod or a shake of the head.

He looked afraid, Mac thought. No child should be afraid.

It wasn't a long trip.

Pulling up in the driveway, Mac quickly got out and rounded the hood, then opened the door for Tommy. Taking his hand as the boy got out of the vehicle, Mac brought him to the front door of the Tudor-styled house.

He had nowhere else to turn to for help.

The headaches were coming more and more frequently. Haunting her until she fell asleep, springing out at her first thing in the morning, before her eyes were even opened. Plaguing her all through the day. There seemed to be little or no respite from the pain.

She bought herself a little respite each time she popped aspirins, but she found she had to up the dosage and the strength.

It couldn't go on like this, she thought, taking an almost empty economy-size bottle of extra-strength aspirins out of the downstairs medicine cabinet. She'd bought the bottle less than a week ago, she thought.

The doorbell rang. Now what?

Jolene tossed three tablets into her mouth and washed them down quickly. One of the tablets felt as if it had gotten caught in her throat on the way down.

Terrific.

Muttering under her breath, she hurried to the front door.

She wasn't expecting MacKenzie tonight. Hoping, maybe, because he'd taken to coming over unannounced, bringing excitement with him like Christmas in July. But even as she hoped, she told herself she was playing a dangerous game. A game that she would only lose if she expected to win.

Peering through the peephole, her heart did a little leap as she saw Mac.

Not a good sign, she thought, if her heart could still leap at the sight of a man she'd been sleeping with. This was casual, just casual.

Opening the door, her smile turned to a look of surprise.

"Hi, I wasn't expecting you tonight." Her eyes swept over Tommy who looked up at her shyly. "Either of you. This is new," she murmured to Mac, nodding at the little boy attached to him.

For possibly the first time in his life, words eluded Mac. "There's been a new development."

"I see." She extended her hand to the little boy. "Would you like to come inside?" She could hear Amanda coming down the stairs. Or rather hopping down them. Jolene glanced to make sure the little girl was holding onto the banister the way she'd been instructed. She was. "I've got some hot chocolate and a bouncy playmate you might like."

"So what's going on?" Jolene asked Mac once she'd situated Tommy, with his mug of hot chocolate, in her family room and introduced him to her daughter. The two hit it off instantly, with Amanda taking charge.

Amanda, Jolene firmly believed, was a born dictator looking for her own country to boss around.

Standing off to the side, watching her daughter slowly drawing Tommy out, Jolene turned toward Mac, waiting for an answer.

"I'm not sure." Looking back, it was all almost a blur to him. Mac shrugged. "Tommy's stepfather just gave him to me."

"Gave him to you? What do you mean, like a gift?" Although, from what she'd seen of Allen, she wouldn't have put something like that past the man. She'd never seen anyone so devoid of any feelings for the child he'd been entrusted with.

Mac blew out a breath and nodded. "Something like that." He knew he should begin at the beginning so she could make some sense of this. G.o.d knows he couldn't. "I went over there because Allen missed the appointment I'd set up to discuss Tommy's second reconstructive surgery. When I got to his house, Allen told me he had no time for that, that the boy wasn't really his responsibility and that if I cared so much, I could have him." Just repeating the scenario rankled Mac all over again.

Jolene laid a gentling hand on his arm. She could read the anger in his eyes. "So what are you planning to do?"

He dragged his hand through his hair. He wasn't prepared to be a father, had never even remotely thought about having children, but what choice did he have? Tommy was alone. Sometimes things just arranged themselves. Tommy was alone and he didn't want him to be. He wanted to be part of Tommy's life. Forever.

"I don't know. I asked Wanda about Tommy, she knew his mother best. She said that the woman told her she had no family, that was why she stayed with Allen even after he became abusive. If he washes his hands of Tommy, then Tommy goes into the system."

They both knew what that meant. Being pa.s.sed from foster home to foster home until he was eighteen. "Unless someone adopts him."

"Unless someone adopts him," Mac echoed. He looked into the room again, watching the boy. Tommy looked so small, so defenseless. "I guess that someone would be me."

Jolene studied his face in silent. "You're really serious?"

"I said it. I guess I must be." Tommy laughed, drawing his attention. It was the first time he'd ever heard the boy do that. It was a nice sound. "I can't stand seeing a kid in pain."

Raising up on her toes, she kissed his cheek. He looked at her, surprised. "You know, you really never cease to amaze me."

Mac grinned at her c.o.c.kily. "You mean outside the bedroom?"

She shook her head. He wasn't fooling her. There was a good man beneath that facade, even if he didn't want to broadcast it.

"That didn't amaze me. I expected that. Your legend preceded you." She looked at Tommy again. This was such a huge undertaking. "But taking in a child..."

He read between the lines, knowing what his own parents would have said about the situation had either of them still been alive. "I must be crazy, right?"

"No, you must be very, very nice." Taking his face between her hands, she kissed him softly.

A sweetness filled him. Mac rested his hands on her waist, drawing her to him. But now was neither the time nor the place to give in to the attraction he instantly felt each time their bodies were close.

Instead he held her to him, absorbing her warmth, telling himself he was doing the right thing. "Jolene, I hate to ask, but-"

She looked up at him, finishing his sentence for him. "Could he stay here tonight?"

Mac looked at her, clearly stunned. "How could you know I was going to ask you that?"

She laughed. "Clairvoyance comes nine months after the gestation period. Take a look, it's in the motherhood bylaws."

She was being incredibly understanding. He felt a little guilty, imposing on her this way. After all, this was his problem, not hers.

The fact that he was sharing it with her, or even considered sharing it with her, was not lost on him. "You don't mind? I need to get a few things, get a room ready for him, a bed-"

He didn't get it, did he? In a way, that made him almost modest. "He adores you. He'd sleep on floor at the foot of your bed like a puppy if you let him, but no, I don't mind," she added in case Mac thought she was changing her mind. "Amanda and Tommy probably won't sleep a wink until dawn, but that's okay. And tomorrow, I'll have my mother come over here to watch them."

He'd forgotten about that. He was going to need a baby-sitter, or a good day-care center until Tommy started school. "She won't feel put-upon, watching two?"

"My mother loves kids, the more the better." Jolene caught her lower lip between her teeth and worked it for a moment, thinking. "You realize this is a very serious step you're talking about taking and that there's going to be a great deal of red tape to wade through." She had no personal dealings with social services, but knew that the path was littered with overworked, underpaid people and paperwork.

"Probably less red tape than we think." He knew any action he took would be unopposed. He lowered his voice, not wanting Tommy to overhear. "Allen can't wait to be free of him."

She wasn't thinking about Allen being a problem, but there were other factors to deal with. "They're still going to have to check you out."

One of the doctors he knew had a cousin who worked for social services. The man owed him a favor. "I can pull a few strings."

She laughed, shaking her head. It was going to take more than that, but if anyone could do it, Mac could. "From where I stand, you're going to have to be a fully accomplished puppeteer, but somehow, I think you can pull it off."

For a moment, everything else took a back seat to the woman beside him. Mac pulled her into his arms, thinking how right she felt there.

When had all this happened?

He obviously hadn't been paying enough attention. "Now I know why I came here."

She c.o.c.ked her head, a smile playing along her lips as she looked at him. He almost made her forget the headache that was threatening to return, full force. "To be flattered?"

"No, just to be near you." G.o.d, but he wanted to make love with her tonight. "You make me feel good, Jolene."

The admission surprised her, but she warned herself not to make too much of it. He was just talking, nothing more. And maybe he was being grateful for her help. "So now I'm your drug of choice?"

There was something in her tone that told him not to let everything out, not to share with her these feelings that were milling about, holding a meeting within him. Entirely new feelings that were somehow involved in this whole new set of circ.u.mstances he found himself in.

So he said evasively, "Something like that."

And how soon before he tired of his drug of choice and went to sample another? Distance, she schooled herself. Distance was the key. As long as she remembered that he was at heart a man who couldn't commit, couldn't settle down, she'd survive.

But if he couldn't commit, what was he doing with Tommy?

Apples and oranges, Jo. Tommy is a good deed, Tommy doesn't cut into his ability to move from woman to woman. It had nothing to do with her.

Her head began to hurt again.

Jolene hadn't realized what a terribly claustrophobic experience having an MRI could be.

It had taken her a week to work up the courage to finally go see the chief neurosurgeon on staff at Blair. She knew the man by sight and by reputation, but hadn't had any dealings with him before this.

Howard Monroe had surprised her by being warm and kind, reminding her a little of her grandfather who had pa.s.sed away when she was nine.

Right now, though, the expression on his face didn't inspire optimism.

Clad in a hospital gown that made her feel incredibly vulnerable, Jolene sat on the edge of the table, trying to brace herself. "I'm not used to being on this side of the examining table."

His smile was kind when he looked at her. Was that pity? "They say doctors and nurses make the worst patients."

She bit her lip, nodding at the X-ray sheet he held. It was comprised of multiple views of her brain. "It's not just my imagination, is it?"

He put the large sheet on the rack and flipped on the illuminating light beneath it. "No, it's not. You have an aneurysm." He pointed out the area on several views. It looked no more than a pinp.r.i.c.k. "Whether it was brought on by the fall, or the fall just activated it, I'm not sure, but it most definitely is what's causing your headaches." He switched off the light and placed the sheet on the desk. "You were right to come in when you did."

Jolene folded her hands before her. "I came in because I was hoping you'd tell me it was all in my head-so to speak."

He wished he could give her a clean bill of health, but they both knew better. "I'm not going to sugar-coat this, Jolene."

She raised her chin. "I don't want you to."

"You could continue for a long time like this, or it could get worse." He looked at her, seeing denial in her eyes. A common recourse, but she had too much going for her to take that route. "Want my advice?"

"That's why I'm here." She did her best to sound cheerful.

"Have the operation. The sooner you have that pressure relieved, the better."

That wasn't what she wanted to hear. She wanted him to a.s.sure her that if she did nothing, that would be all right. That somehow, the aneurysm would disappear on its own as mysteriously as it had come. "But I could go on like this, right?"

"Right." But it was a path best not followed. He'd taken the time to acquaint himself with her background before he'd come out to speak to her. "You're a single mother, correct?"

Her throat suddenly felt dry. "Yes."

"Your daughter's how old?" He knew the answer, but he wanted to have her hear herself say it.

"Two."

"Want to see her graduate elementary school?"

She blew out a shaky breath. She didn't want to deal with this, didn't want to have to face it. She was twenty-eight. That was too young to face her own mortality. "Now you're scaring me."

"Good, then I've done my job." He placed his hand over hers. "If you were my daughter or wife, I'd force you to do it."

She didn't want to go under the knife. What if she didn't wake up? What would Amanda and her mother do then? "But there's a downside."

He would have been lying if he said there wasn't. Every surgery came with risks. "There's always a possible downside. But chances are you'll come through it with flying colors. And not having surgery guarantees you a downside."

She felt tears clawing their way up her throat. "I don't have time for this."

The irony of her words coaxed a sad smile from him. "No one has time for an aneurysm, Jolene. They just happen. But if you want more time in your life-" She knew what he was going to say. Afraid she was going to break down in front of him, she looked away. "All right, I'll think about it."

He nodded. That was all he could ask. "Anyone you want me to speak to?"

"No." She shook her head adamantly. She would be the one to tell her mother. Eventually. "Absolutely not. This is just between you and me."

"Not even Mac-?" He paid attention to hospital gossip with half an ear whenever he needed amus.e.m.e.nt. He'd heard her name coupled with the plastic surgeon's more than once recently. He had a deep respect for the young man and his work ethic.