Sinners Football 02- Wish for a Sinner Page 13

  “Don’t you want to see the boy, Joe? Margaret named him Dean Joseph with her dying breath. I was able to supply the Mexican authorities with the name of the father for the birth certificate.” She slid a document across the slick surface of her desk.

  Joe was no linguist, but he could read his own name filled in over the word Padre. He frowned, then blanked his features. “I’ll be happy to see the child if he turns out to be mine.” He turned towards the door.

  “Iris, bring in the baby, please,” Nicole ordered over her intercom.

  Joe nearly collided with the receptionist who must have been waiting in the hall. She thrust the baby carrier at him like a woman who had once been a forward on a girl’s basketball team.

  “He’s a little angel, Mr. Billodeaux, so good, so small. Just look at all that dark hair, would you?” Despite her eagerness to hand over the child, Iris paused to touch its soft, red cheek. The infant turned its head and made sucking motions with its tiny lips.

  “Are you hungry, Deanie? Are you hungry, little lamb?” she said, dropping into baby talk.

  “That will be enough, Iris. Leave the diaper bag, too.”

  Iris relinquished the denim bag with the yellow duckie on the side by placing in on Nicole’s desk. She bowed out of the office and shut the door. Joe sank back into his chair, and then taking charge again, sat the baby seat on the oriental rug covering the hardwood floor. The child began to fret, but Joe stared straight at Nicole, refusing to break eye contact.

  “Go ahead, Joe. Pick him up,” she dared. “I see now he has your chin.” Nicole checked her watch, a slim version of her husband’s Rolex as if to say, “How time does fly.”

  Joe leaned over, unstrapped the child and laid the baby on his knees. The lawyer’s mouth opened, amazed no doubt, by his ease with children.

  “Yeah, he has the chin. The hair, too.” Joe ran a hand over the thick cap of curls. Felt like fine velvet. Beneath Joe’s fingers, the pulse of the child throbbed under the soft spot in time with his heart. The baby blinked his eyes open for a moment. Their color was a blue so deep Joe knew it would turn to a dark brown within days. The same thing happened with all the Billodeaux infants. He offered his finger. Dean Joseph clutched it and tried to raise it to his mouth but failed.

  “He’s sort of small though.”

  “Weight at birth was five pounds, nine ounces. He’s already up to six. Those Mexicans love their babies. They probably fed him every time he opened his mouth. If he’s already spoiled, my nanny will be upset.”

  Clearly, Nicole enjoyed this moment. Who wouldn’t when they were about to take a man for all he was worth?

  “That won’t be a problem. He’s mine.” Joe placed the baby in its seat, buckled the security straps and raised the whole contraption by the handle. He sat his bundle of joy on Nicole’s desk for a moment as he scooped up the birth certificate and placed it into the pocket of the diaper bag. He slung the bag over a broad shoulder, picked up the carrier and started for the door.

  “Joe, you forget I’m his legal guardian,” Nicole warned sharply. “Put the baby down.”

  “Seems to me his daddy has the stronger claim, Nicole.”

  “I’ll have child welfare come pick him up. You aren’t a fit parent—single, drinking, womanizing, always on the road.” She listed the things she would bring up in a custody battle.

  Standing in the doorway, Joe surveyed the plush office. “Nice place—a partnership in a law firm, a rich husband who lets you go your own way, two cute little boys.” He nodded at a picture on her desk showing only her children framed in gold.

  “I wonder what the partners, you know, Jeremy and Harry, would say about you being one of Joe Dean Billodeaux’s list ladies. Everyone knows I got past the E’s. Oh right, Harry is your husband, too. Think he’d be upset? Leave it alone, Nicole, and I’ll pay your legal fees and any itemized expenses the boy and Margaret incurred. See she gets a nice burial if that hasn’t been taken care of. Come on Dean, we’re going home.”

  Joe passed a livid Harry Everard standing in the doorway to his office. “I can find my own way out, Harry. Thanks anyhow.”

  As he passed Iris, the receptionist bolted to his side. He took a firmer grip on Dean’s carrier and prepared to block with his diaper bag arm. “Mr. Billodeaux, there are reporters outside,” she whispered. “That bitch made me call them.”

  “Thanks, Iris. We’ll be fine.” He charged out the door and elbowed to the illegally parked Porsche. Getting the car seat settled was awkward even after he remembered to reverse its position. He did the best he could fastening the shoulder strap to hold it in place. All the while, cameras clicked and whirred and reporters shouted questions. Joe answered only one of them.

  “Yes, this is my son, Dean Joseph Billodeaux.” Then, he got in the Porsche and sped away. In his mirror, he saw Nicole standing in the doorway, her cold, calm face ruined by anger. Her husband stood behind listening to her words. Joe Dean could give a damn what she said. He had to report in to Coach Buck.

  “I was supposed to be the one holding the baby. They were supposed to get a shot of Joe Dean Billodeaux walking out on his child, Harry!” Nicole Everard shrieked.

  “Damn if he ain’t cute,” Coach Buck observed. “A lot of trouble in a small package.”

  Jared Forte, the youngest and least favored of the wide receivers, watched Joe lift his son’s tiny buttocks off the training table’s surface, swab his rear with baby wipes and lower the infant on to a fresh newborn-size disposable diaper. “Nothing small about the ’nads on that kid. I think he has an erection already.”

  Joe pressed the diaper over the spouting penis. “Thanks for the heads up. My sisters’ boys used to spray me all the time.”

  “That where you learned this stuff?” Forte asked, still in awe.

  “Yep. Thirteen nieces and nephews as of last week. Dean will be the fourteenth grandchild for my parents.” Joe shook out another diaper and fastened it in place with the tabs. The baby managed to get his thumb to his mouth and sucked vigorously. Not satisfied, the infant wailed.

  “Here it comes. Here’s your bottle.” Joe took a four-ounce container of formula from the duckie bag and reversed the nipple. Tucking Dean into the crook of his arm just like a football, he took a seat and let the baby nurse.

  “Can I hold him when he finishes?” the Rev asked. “I want to get in some practice, you know, in case I can convince Mintay to start on a family.”

  “Take him now. Support the head. Keep that nipple filled. We don’t want him sucking air.”

  “Sure is tiny though. I think my boys were twice his size, the girls, too. He won’t make a lineman,” Calvin Armitage predicted.

  “But look at his legs.” Joe measured the teeny thigh, no bigger than a chicken bone, between his thumb and forefinger. “Once they uncurl, he’s gonna be tall like his daddy.”

  “So, who’s the mommy?” Asa Dobbs asked.

  “Nell is going to be his mama,” Joe answered with certitude.

  “Have you told her yet?” Connor Riley asked as he watched the intent infant, all closed-eyed and red-faced, pull at the nipple.

  “I’ll call her tonight. This is my miracle, Connor. I guess St. Jude wasn’t interested in having the Super Bowl dedicated to him, but I might throw that in anyhow in appreciation for the quick work.”

  “Don’t you think you should wait for the blood test, Joe?” Coach Buck cautioned. “The doc is on his way over to take samples.”

  “Doesn’t matter. If he isn’t mine, I’ll adopt.”

  The wall the team made around the baby opened for the man with the black bag. Joe hardly felt the needle as the doctor took a blood sample from the crook of his arm, but he held on to Dean as the doctor pricked the tiny wrinkled foot of his son. The baby’s toes splayed and his body stiffened with outrage as the doctor squeezed out a sample. The oversized men of the Sinners’ team flinched when the baby began to howl.

  Joe flipped the child to a shoulder covered with a t
raining towel. “There, there, Deanie. We’re gonna walk it off. Yes, we are.”

  He paced up and down gently thumping the infant’s back. Dean Joseph belched, spewed up part of his lunch, then with a shudder, settled a cheek in the mess and closed his eyes. Gently, Joe lowered the child into the carrier and tucked soft flannel receiving blankets around the small body.

  “Can I have the afternoon off, Coach?”

  “Go. We aren’t getting any work done with you and your boy around anyhow, but you make it up tomorrow.”

  “Sure thing, Coach.”

  SEVENTEEN

  Joe gave Deanie a change and a bottle at four and waited impatiently for Nell to get off work. Calling her there would be a big mistake, he sensed. He tried her cell at six, got no answer and left a voice mail. “Nell, please come over. I have a surprise for you. It’s Joe—not your boss or the maintenance man.”

  At seven, he offered the baby another bottle, but the infant fussed and took only two ounces. Around eight, Joe tried Nell again but used her land line at home. He spoke at the sound of the beep. “Please come over. We need to talk. I have something to show you. You know who this is.”

  Ten o’clock came and Deanie fretted. He’d suck, then spit out the nipple. His tiny bump of a nose filled with gunk and his dark hair stuck to his pink scalp with sweat. Joe put his lips to the little forehead the way he’d seen his mother and sisters do. Too warm.

  He tried Nell’s cell. She wasn’t available at this time. Maybe, she had turned it off to go on a date. Maybe, she lay in bed with another man and they were both laughing at his increasingly frantic messages. Not Nell, not his Nell. He tried her apartment again and got the machine. What words would get her here?

  At the sound of the beep, he blurted, “Nell, I think the baby is sick. Please, I need your help.”

  Before he could hang up, she answered, “What baby?” into the receiver.

  “Our baby,” he said simply. “Come see.”

  The trip from Metairie to Joe’s place should have taken twenty minutes depending on traffic. He swore his bell rang in less than ten minutes, sending Dean into frantic cries. The always well-tipped concierge had given him a heads up on Nell’s arrival and he stood right next to the door waiting anxiously. She practically fell into his arms when he turned the knob.

  “Thank God, you’re here!” Joe handed her an enraged red bundle of baby, its face smeared with snot and its mouth open wide enough to see the uvula vibrating in the back of its throat.

  “Joe, I really don’t know much about babies. The children I deal with are older.” She shoved Deanie back at Joe, but not quick enough to avoid a smear of baby saliva on her shirt. “I can call the pediatrician on duty at the hospital.” She did.

  Joe paced with his son while they waited for a return call. “Do-do, Deanie.” He repeated the Cajun words that urged a child to sleep for all the good it did. The ten-minute interval seemed like forever. Over the screaming, Joe tried to tell her about Margaret and Nicole and the prayer to St. Jude, but it came out all garbled. Nell stared at him in astonishment. At least, it wasn’t horror. She pounced on the ringing phone.

  “How old?” she relayed to Joe.

  “Two weeks.”

  “Weight?”

  “About six pounds.”

  “Yes, yes, good. We’re on our way.” Nell looked around the condo. “Do you have a car seat?”

  “Over there. The lady lawyer had everything ready. There’s diapers and little shirts in the bag, two more bottles in the fridge.”

  Nell rooted in the bag and took out a wipe to clean the baby’s face. They swaddled Joe’s son and secured him in the seat. The child’s feet, one with a tiny bandage, kicked out of the covers before they were out the door.

  The concierge took it all in stride. Disregarding the screaming infant, he asked, “The Porsche, sir?” If he thought it no wonder that a baby had been left on Joe’s doorstep after the daily and nightly parade of women making their way to the condo last spring, Gregory kept it to himself.

  “My Toyota would make more sense. Is it handy, Gregory?”

  “Just over there. I wasn’t sure if you were staying the night, Miss Nellwyn.” He handed her the keys taken from his vast pocket. Joe replaced the keys with a twenty and they hustled to Nell’s car. Dean, as loud as a siren on an ambulance, rode in the back seat.

  “Dr. Brown said it was probably just a cold, but an infant so young and small can dehydrate rapidly or go into pneumonia. It’s safer to bring him in.”

  “Safer, sure.” Joe drove like he was racing the Porsche instead of pushing the Toyota to go faster. At the hospital, he dropped Nell off with the baby. “I’ll park and find you later.”

  Dr. Brown waited for them. “Good lungs,” he joked. “No, really. From what I can hear, they sound clear. Whose baby is this, Nell?”

  Joe tore into the examination room. Too impatient to wait for an elevator, he had run the stairs to the pediatrics floor and located his son by the sheer volume of his cries.

  “Oh, I see,” said Dr. Brown, recognizing a face as familiar in New Orleans as that of the Mayor.

  “He was born in Mexico, premature. Maybe it’s some foreign, baby-killing bug,” Joe managed to get out. An instrument shoved into Deanie’s ear beeped.

  “Low grade fever, but no ear infection. Throat’s a little red. I’d like to keep him a day or so since he was a preemie, get some fluids into him, keep an eye out for complications. I think this is simply a case of a very small baby coming into contact with too many people too soon. It’s advisable to keep newborns at home for about six weeks. Keep that in mind.”

  “I let the guys hold him this afternoon. It’s my fault.”

  “No, I think not. More likely he caught it on the plane if he was flown in from Mexico. No diarrhea, eh?”

  “No, none,” Joe said, taking every word seriously. “Just wet diapers.”

  “Wet diapers are good. Really. He’s not too dehydrated then. He’s going to be fine, Dad. Better sit down with Nell and finish filling in those admittance papers so we can get him settled. As it is, we did an end run around the front desk. End run, get it?”

  “Yeah, like football. I appreciate it, Doc. If you’re a Sinners’ fan, call me if you ever want tickets. Here’s my real number.” Joe scribbled it on prescription pad along with his name underlined with the devil’s tail because he was running on automatic.

  Exit the doctor. Enter the nurse who tagged the baby with an identification bracelet and wrapped him up for transport to the nursery. “Finish your paperwork. I’ll get him settled and you can visit for a minute. Then, go home and get some rest. Come back in the morning.”

  Nell, filling in the information from Joe’s insurance card, barely noticed the sudden silence in the room. When she looked up to ask his social security number, she saw the bereft look on his face. “Joe, your son will be fine.”

  “Our son. The one I prayed for. I just didn’t expect him so soon. Marry me, Nell. Dean needs a mother.”

  “Joe, you can hire childcare. You don’t need to marry it. What about his real mother? Run all that by me again.”

  “Dead. You remember Margaret Stutes?”

  “Margaret, the big-toothed PR woman who took the Wish Kidz around at the Super Bowl? Oh, I’m so sorry. That was unkind.”

  “She was setting me up for a paternity suit. Something happened to her down in Mexico, an accident. I didn’t get the details from Nicole. Anyhow, Dean came early and she died. Nicole said she was going to sue for custody. See why I need a wife quick?”

  “Nicole? Were they a lesbian couple?”

  “Hell, no. They were list ladies, both of them. Not like you. Nell, please.”

  “Joe, most women have nine months to get used to the idea of motherhood. As you can see, I wasn’t a big help tonight. Maybe, I wasn’t meant to be a mother and that’s why things are the way they are.”

  “Untrue. You didn’t see Deanie at his best. When he looked up at me with th
ose curly lashes and Billodeaux eyes, I knew he was mine, blood test or no blood test. He wasn’t screaming then.”

  “Joe, you are a wonder.” Nell shook her head. “And a natural father, I can tell, but me…”

  “I’m rich and good lookin’, too.” He held his arms out to his sides as if letting her examine the merchandise.

  “Both, to be sure.” She laughed at him. “But, I don’t think so.”

  Here they were in a small, sterile, brightly lit room. Both of them had baby snot and spit-up on their clothes. He should have proposed when they were making wishes on shooting stars, but no, he hadn’t. Now, he desperately needed a mother for his child, the baby he’d prayed for, the baby he’d wanted for Nell.

  “I promised God, St. Jude and the Virgin Mary that I’d be a good father and a faithful husband if they gave us children.”

  “Bringing out the big guns now, Joe? The really hefty saints? What’s Dean’s middle name? I need it for the forms.” She turned back to the counter to fill in the blank.

  “Joseph. I’m sure his patron saint played a part in this, too.”

  “Certainly.” Nell nodded without looking up.

  Joe spun her chair around, dropped to his knees on the cold floor tiles and buried his face in her lap. He mumbled something into the denim fabric of her jeans. She raised his head with both hands. “What?”

  “I love you, Nell.”

  “Was that so hard to say?”

  Joe rolled the sentence around on his tongue, taste-testing each word. “No. It’s just right. Perfect in fact. Try it for yourself, Nell.”

  She leaned over and kissed his lips. “I love you, Joe. You’re right. Perfect.”

  He raised Nell and set her down on his lap before she realized what was happening he was that quick. “Great. We can fly out to Vegas tomorrow, be married and back before Deanie gets out of the hospital and I have to leave for Dallas.”