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his forearm.
    “It’ll be okay, Raoul, I promise. They won’t bite. They’re your friends, and they understand how hard this is for you.”
    Understand? He doubted it but he forced his thoughts away from Bree and to the here and now. To the vista before him, peppered with people he knew. People who knew him. And then, to the woman who sat beside him in the passenger’s seat. The woman whose hand still rested warmly on his arm. A woman who’d put her own life and, he knew, her career on hold so she could look after Bree’s daughter.
    His gaze flicked to the rearview mirror. His daughter.
    The sensation in his gut wound up another notch and he hissed out a breath.
    “C’mon, let’s get this over with.”
    He pushed open his door and turned away from Alexis, letting her hand drop. He stalked around to the back of his SUV and lifted the hatch, purposefully grabbing the diaper bag and the picnic bag out before lifting out the stroller. He tugged at the handles to try to unfold the thing but it remained solidly shut.
    “I’ll do that if you like,” Alexis said, coming around the car with Ruby.
    She pushed the baby at him, much like she’d done the other day. Stiffly, he accepted the child’s weight into his arms. Ruby looked at him with solemn blue eyes and then reached up to pat him gently on the cheek. Alexis had the stroller up in two seconds flat and she put the diaper bag in the basket on the underside before placing the picnic bag in the seat.
    “Shouldn’t she go there?” Raoul asked.
    “Nope, she’s fine right where she is. Aren’t you, precious?”
    She reached out to tickle Ruby under her chin and was rewarded with a little chuckle. The delightful sound made Raoul’s heart do a flip-flop in his chest and ignited an ember of warmth deep inside. He rapidly quashed the sensation. He couldn’t afford to soften, it just laid you open to so much pain. He wasn’t going there again. Not ever.
    “No,” he said emphatically, reaching for the picnic bag and putting it on the ground before buckling Ruby firmly into her stroller. “She’s safer here,” he said, once he was satisfied she was secure.
    “She was fine with you, you know, Raoul.”
    “I know what you’re trying to do, Alexis. It’s not going to happen. You can’t make me fit into the mold you want to squeeze me into.”
    Heat flashed in her eyes and her lips drew into a straight line. Something he’d noticed she did whenever she was annoyed with him—which was pretty darn often come to think of it.
    “Is that what you think I’m trying to do? Squeeze you into a mold? For what it’s worth, I’m not attempting to do any such thing. You’re Ruby’s father and it’s about time you stepped up to your responsibilities.” She softened her tone slightly as she continued. “Look, I know you miss Bree, I know how much you loved her. But rejecting your child isn’t going to bring Bree back. If anything it’s only pushing her memory further away.”
    The permanent ache that resided deep within him grew stronger and he dragged in a breath.
    “I’m dealing with this the only way I know how. The only way I can,” he said quietly. “Just leave me be, okay?”
    With that he picked up the picnic bag and walked toward the gathering group. This was hard enough as it was without fighting with Alexis every step of the way at the same time. Deep down he knew she had a point. Bree wouldn’t have wanted this, wouldn’t have been happy that he’d left Ruby with Catherine. After the amount of time the baby had spent in hospital, he was terrified to even hold her and it had seemed that Catherine needed her daughter’s baby about as much as Ruby had needed a confident and loving touch. It had appeared to be the best choice for everyone for him to withdraw, to confine his contact with his daughter to financially providing for her care. After all, what did he know about babies? What if he did something wrong or missed some vital clue that could lead