Her eyes fly open, and he freezes, as if he’s been caught doing something he shouldn’t. She looks up at him, and it is indeed a picture-perfect scene, as she stares up at Dalton, and his expression goes from frozen shock to wonder.
I want to capture it … and I want to forget it. I want to pretend I don’t see that look in his eyes, don’t see his smile.
“Hey, there,” he says, and the baby doesn’t cry, doesn’t even look concerned. She just stares at him.
“Water,” I say, and I feel like a selfish bitch for spoiling the moment, but I can’t help it. I need to shatter it, and I hate myself a little for that.
“Right.” He wriggles his finger into the baby’s mouth. She starts to suck on it, and he laughs again, no nerves now, just a rumbling laugh that comes from deep in his chest.
“Reminds me of a marten I found, when I was a kid,” he says.
“A baby marten?”
He shrugs. “I had a bad habit of bringing home orphaned animals. My mom…” He trails off, and I realize it’s the first time I’ve heard him use that word. When he speaks of Katherine Dalton, he says “my mother.” That isn’t who he means here. He means Amy O’Keefe, his birth mother. The parents he never talks about. The ones he can’t talk about without a hitch in his words, a trailing-off, a sudden switch of subject. He lived with his parents and his brother out here until he was nine and the Daltons “rescued” him, from a situation he did not need rescuing from.
“Your mom…” I prod, because I must. Every time this door creaks open, I grab for it before it slams shut again.
“Water,” he says, and I try not to deflate.
I lift the pot, and then realize there’s no way in hell I can “drip” it from this suddenly huge pot into her tiny mouth.
“Take out one of our shirts,” he says. “Dip a corner in and squeeze it into her mouth.”
I’m not sure that’s sanitary, but I settle for taking a clean shirt of mine, one fresh from the laundry. As I dip it in, I say, “Is this how you fed the marten?”
“Nah, it’s how I fed birds. For the marten, I’d put food on my finger and hope she didn’t chew it off.” He looks at the baby. “You gonna chew it off, kid?”
“No teeth, remember?”
“These gums feel hard enough to do the job.”
I’ve relaxed now. He’s talking about rescuing orphaned animals, comparing them to the baby, and that eases tension from my shoulders. That’s what he sees this as—the rescue of an orphaned creature. Not picking up a baby and being overwhelmed with some deeper instinct that says “I want this.”
That would be silly, I guess. But we all have our sensitive spots, and this is one of mine: the fact that I cannot provide a child should he decide that’s what he wants. It’s an issue I never had to worry about because I did not foresee myself in a relationship where the question might arise. Now I do.
I wet the shirt and trickle water in the baby’s mouth. I’m being careful to have it close enough, so we can see how much she gets, and suddenly she clamps down on the fabric itself. She sucks hard and then makes such a face that we both laugh.
“Not what you expected, huh?” I say.
Her gaze turns my way. I seem to recall that, at this age, babies can’t see more than shapes, but she’s definitely looking. Processing. I swear I can see that in her dark blue eyes. Every move, every noise, every passing blurry shape is a cause for deep consideration, her brain analyzing and trying to interpret.
I dip the fabric into the pot and press it to her lips. She opens them and sucks. Makes that same face, distaste and displeasure, like a rich old lady expecting champagne and being served ginger ale. She fusses. Bleats. But when nothing better comes, she takes the shirt again and sucks on it.
When she’s finished, she fixes us with a look of bitter accusation.
“Sorry,” I say. “We’ll do better next time.”
We aren’t what she wants, though. Not what she needs.
I think of the woman in the clearing, the woman under the snow.
“We should get her back to Rockton,” I say. “Can you do that by yourself?”
“What?”
“Her mother. I have to…” I look at the baby. “I need to get what I can from the scene.”
“Scene?” He adjusts his position, making the baby comfortable in the crook of his arm. “You think she was murdered.”
“Possibly. I know that isn’t my crime to solve, but this baby didn’t come from nowhere. She has family. She needs to go back to them.”
I know that, better than anyone, because of the man sitting beside me. The Daltons found a boy in the forest, and they ignored the fact that he was well fed and properly clothed and healthy. Ignored the fact that he already knew how to read and write. They decided he was a savage in need of rescue. There is no gentle way to put it. They stole Dalton from his parents, from his brother, from the forest.
“She needs to get back to them,” I repeat, and Dalton’s hand finds mine, his fingers squeezing as he says, “She does.”
“So to do that—” I begin.
“We have to check out the body.”
“I have to check it. You need to take her.”
He passes me the baby and starts rolling the sleeping blankets.
“I’m not leaving you out here alone,” he says, and before I can protest, he continues. “Yes, you can find the way back. Yes, you have a gun. Yes, I could leave you with both dogs. But an hour or two will make no difference if she’s wrapped well. She survived for longer under the snow.”
“Yes but—”
“Maybe I should stay and check the body,” he says, tying the blankets under his backpack. “I know what to look for, and I’m better than you at tracking, especially with the snowfall. I might also be able to tell if she’s from a settlement or she’s a lone settler or even where she comes from.” He settles onto his haunches. “Yeah, that makes sense. I’ll check the body. You take the baby.”
I only glower at him. He grins, leans forward, and smacks a kiss on my cheek. “Yep, I’m not sure which is the scarier prospect. We’ll both go check the scene first. Wrap her up properly, and I’ll break camp.”
FOUR
We’re heading back to the clearing. Dalton has the baby snuggled under his parka, left undone just enough to be sure she’s breathing. I’m in the lead, the dogs trotting along beside me, confused but calm, sensing we have this under control.
When we reach the deeper snow, it’s slow going with the heavy pack on my back. It’s not as bad as it sounds, though. On a trip into Whitehorse, I made an amazing discovery: backpacks are not unisex.
I had always worn a regular backpack, and if someone had offered me a “girl” one, I’d have been offended and amused, like when I saw an ad for a women’s pen. Except, as I discovered, a women’s backpack is a perfectly logical invention. The normal ones distribute the load across the shoulders, but women carry weight better at their hips. My new backpack utilized that, and I no longer felt like the ninety-pound weakling struggling to carry a backpack half the size of Dalton’s.