“You could never make me unhappy, Gabrielle. I knew that the first time I saw you in the dining room, being so deliberate about picking out the right table so you could see what you wanted to see. I’ll admit I never expected to fall in love with someone quite so…”
“Pregnant?”
He chuckled. “That, too. But the word I’m looking for is perfect. Because you are.” He took hold of her hand and pulled it to his lips, then kissed it tenderly. “I don’t think I’ve mentioned this before, but you look beautiful when you’re not pregnant. Of course, you’re absolutely stunning when you’re pregnant. Any chance that could happen again?”
“And that would mean?” It was definitely time to get
her hopes up. In fact, they were so far up they were floating.
“About fifty or sixty years, if we’re lucky.”
“And you’re good with Bryce being Gavin’s son? Because that’s something he’ll have to know when it’s time.”
“I’m already crazy in love with him, so I’m good,” he said. “As long as you let him call me Daddy.”
“Daddy suits you. But I can’t promise you other children, Neil. One was a miracle.” Gavin’s miracle to both Neil and her.
“One’s perfect. So are ten.”
“Ten?” she sputtered, slipping from the bed, going straight onto his lap and into his waiting arms. “You would want ten?”
“Or twelve. Or, like I said, one.”
As their lips met, Gabby thought about that day she’d first come to White Elk, amazed by what a perfect town it was. The place, from Ben Gault’s photos, that had stolen her heart. Her home, meant to be even before she’d recognized it. Yes, it was perfect. But not for the reasons she’d thought when she’d made the decision to spend a night there. White Elk was where her son had been born, where she’d met the man she’d love forever, where she’d found the dream of her heart. Those were the things that made it perfect. And made it home. “I love you, Dr Ranard,” she said, resting her head on his shoulder, happier than she’d ever thought was possible.
“And I love you, Dr Evans. Want to snuggle up?” He pointed to the bed.
“Right here? I mean, I just had a baby, and…”
He laughed. “Snuggle, Dr Evans.
Only
snuggle.”
“In that case, I’d love to snuggle with you, Dr Ranard. Every day, for the rest of my life.”
Six months later
“H
E
’S gained another pound.” Neil picked up his son and held him high above his head, laughing. The adoption was final. Bryce Thierry Evans Ranard was his in every way and it was hard for either him or Gabby to imagine a time when this bouncing bundle of energy hadn’t been the center of their lives.
“Eric said he’s perfect. Everything checks out fine. Heart’s good, lungs sound. Normal in every way. Oh, and I ran into Angela. She was there at the clinic with her baby…”
“Sarah,” Gabby reminded him.
“With Sarah. Anyway, seeing Angela reminded me that we haven’t had our honeymoon yet. So I was thinking that if we could find a babysitter…”
Gabby arched skeptical eyebrows. “I’m sensing a definite plot here, Bryce. Your father is up to something.”
“I’m up to a short honeymoon,” Neil said. After Bryce’s second surgery, the three of them had settled in like a happy family, and the honeymoon had been forgotten. Tonight was the four-month anniversary of their marriage, though, and it was time for the two of them to get away. “And I’ve
had a whole battalion of women volunteer to watch Bryce for a couple of days while we go up to Pine Ridge…couldn’t get the honeymoon suite, though. It was already reserved by someone else. But we’ll have a nice room anyway. Room service when we want it, lots of time alone…” Neil lowered Bryce, and looked him straight in the eye. “You may have to help me convince her,” he said, grinning.
She took Bryce away from Neil. “You tell your father that your mother would love to have a honeymoon with him.”
“Two whole nights,” Neil reminded her.
“Two wonderful nights,” she said, handing Bryce back to Neil, then picking up the bag she’d been hiding. “Shield his eyes,” she said.
“Why?”
“Because he’s too young to see this.”
“Don’t look, son,” he said, laughing, as Gabrielle pulled a black, filmy nightdress out and waved it.
“Oh, and I’m the one who reserved the honeymoon suite, by the way. Already had several people ready to take care of Bryce, too.” By all estimates, she had about another two months before her belly would start bulging again, and she wanted to take full advantage of that. Or, at least, two nights of it.
“Any chance we can stay away for a week?” he asked.
“With the way our medical practices are growing?” She waved the nightdress again, deliberately brushing it against his cheek. “Let’s be glad we can have two nights, then promise to do it again in another month. Maybe try out a honeymoon suite at a lodge on one of the other Sisters.”
“The practices are expanding, Bryce, because your mommy’s a good doctor and women from everywhere are coming to see her.”
“That’s because your daddy turned his house on the hill into a women’s clinic and birthing center.” Her very own hospital, named The Three Sisters Women’s Hospital. The Three Sisters who did, indeed, look after the people in their valley.
She and Neil had bought a modest little cottage on the edge of town, a perfect spot from which they could see all Three Sisters. Somehow she felt connected to them, like they’d watched over Bryce and protected him the way the legend had it. Like they’d brought her here in the first place so they could do just that.
Bryce’s response was to gurgle out a baby bubble. Then laugh.
“But Mommy doesn’t want to talk medicine right now,” she said, tickling Neil’s other cheek with the nighty. He was the perfect father. Devoted. Caring. Best of all, he didn’t mind diaper duty. “But we will have to come home for a little while because Ben Gault is coming to town tomorrow afternoon. He’s going to do a family photo of us.” A family photo—her very own family. For her entire life, her family photo had been of two. But now, with three, then in a few more months with four…she still had to pinch herself sometimes to make sure it wasn’t a dream.
“Ben Gault is going to interrupt my honeymoon? Couldn’t we wait until he’s here again in a couple of months?”
“We could, but I’ll be showing.”
“Showing what?” he asked.
She smiled warmly, and patted her belly.
“No!” he gasped.
“Yes,” she whispered. “We might be on our way to the ten or twelve you wanted.”
He snatched the black nightdress away from Gabrielle and let it float to the floor. When it cascaded into a puddle
at his feet, he smiled. “Well, then, I don’t think you’ll be needing this.”
She bent and picked it up, then dropped it back into the bag, gave Bryce a kiss on the forehead and Neil a deep, lingering kiss on the lips. Afterwards, breathlessly…“I think you’re right.”
By
Extract from
NEWBORN NEEDS A DAD:
Maybe he’d gone a little too far when he’d kissed her.
But another time, another situation? He could almost picture himself involved with Gabrielle. Maybe even more than involved. She was everything he’d never expected in a woman. Funny, direct, honest, smart. Little Bryce Evans was going to have himself one hell of a mother, and Neil was a little envious he didn’t fit into the equation somewhere, because it was a nice equation. One he’d never expected he’d want.
“I’
LL
be there in thirty or forty minutes, and don’t even think about going out on your own. It’s too dangerous.” Dinah Corday had been studying the
Welcome to White Elk
sign for the past ten minutes, creeping inch by inch down the main road into the little village, along with the rest of the jammed-up traffic. Right this very moment, her heavily pregnant sister, Angela, was on the verge of braving the spring storm to go and stay with a pregnant friend, and Dinah wanted to get to her before she did that. But the rising waters weren’t being accommodating. Nothing was. “Just don’t do it, OK? I know you want to be with her, and I’m doing the best I can to get to you, but it’s crazy out here. So just be patient.” Easy to say, not so easy to do under the circumstances.
Glancing up at the three mountain peaks, Dinah sighed impatiently. The mountains looming over the valley, affectionately called the older, middle, and younger Sisters, were said to have magical powers. According to Ute Indian legend, they protected those in their shadow, and while she’d never given much credence to mystical things, she hoped that this one was true. Because Angela would
absolutely
go out in this flood to help a friend as surely as Dinah was stuck in the slow lane, getting more frustrated with each passing second.
Ahead, she saw people on the street running about in a congested knot like ants scattering after the demise of their anthill. Traffic was lined up bumper to bumper. Detour signs were being erected on the streets. Streetlights weren’t working. And the wind was blowing so hard the water pooling in the gutters was flowing in small waves. “Promise me you’re not going anywhere until I get there to take you. You’re too far along…” A smile found its way to Dinah’s lips. She was going to be an aunt in a little while. That was nice. Their family needed something good to happen to them for a change. It was overdue. “Just, please, stay there and take care of yourself. I’m on my way.”
Angela assured her she wouldn’t budge, but that didn’t relieve Dinah’s anxiety. Of course, that anxiety was pelting her from so many different directions these days, she feared turning around lest something else came hurtling at her. Today, though, her mind was on Angela. Nothing else mattered.
Except the traffic. That mattered, and she wanted to honk her horn, pound on her horn actually, but what good would it do? She wasn’t the only one stuck in this mess and, most likely, everyone else had somewhere important they needed to be, too. So as the radio weather forecaster was predicting more rain, she crept forward like the rest of the people were doing, one car length at a time, while the waters outside were getting deeper.
After listening to another ten mind-numbing minutes of dire weather warnings, Dinah finally turned off the news station and dialed into a soft jazz station then leaned her head against the headrest, hoping to relax. She needed to be calm, not agitated, when she got to Angela. “Calm…” she muttered, while she studied the raindrops sliding their own little paths over her windshield. Some hit and trailed down in a straight line, never veering off
an imaginary course, while others meandered, winding in and out, joining with other raindrops to make fatter, more interesting trails. Yet some hit, bounced, and seemed to disappear before they had their chance to slide downward to a new, unknown destiny. That was her, she thought. Hitting, bouncing, disappearing from view before her trail carried her to where she wanted to be. Hers had always been a destiny of chance, or one out of her control, like the raindrops that splashed themselves into oblivion even with so many interesting choices ahead.
Raindrops and unknown destinies…
Well, so much for clearing her mind and relaxing, she thought, trying hard to let the mellow wail of the tenor sax coming from the radio lull her into a daze. Dulcet tones, honey notes, all slipping down into her soul. This was a good day to be lulled. But as she willed the easy mood on herself, trying to force calm to her soul for Angela’s sake, a thud on her bumper from the vehicle behind cut off all hope of calmness, sending her car pitching straight into the bumper of the car ahead. Not a hard impact but definitely a jarring one.
Twisting, Dinah looked into her rearview mirror to catch a glimpse of the perpetrator, but all she saw was an up-close image of a truck’s shiny silver bumper…and the truck was already backing away from her. Right off, she opened the car door, ready to hop out regardless of the rain and see to the damage, but the man behind her beat her to it by stopping then jumping from his truck and running forward. He was a big, imposing man in a bright yellow slicker, the dress of choice for most of the people she’d seen here so far. Except he didn’t come forward to her door like she’d expected he would. Rather, he got as far as the front of his truck, surveyed his bumper then hers, and that was as far as he went.
“Any damage?” she shouted, wishing she had one of those yellow rain slickers.
If he answered, she didn’t hear him. But the rain was noisy, so were the road noises. So, after she’d fumbled an umbrella from the back of her car and opened it overhead, she tried calling to him again. “You’re not hurt, are you?”
He didn’t answer this time, either, so she tried once more. Admittedly, getting a little perturbed. “Did it cause any damage?”
His only response was a wave on his way back to his truck…waving with one hand, clutching a cell phone to his ear in the other. “I can’t stay,” he yelled, and she did hear that. “Jason, the man in the car ahead of you, said he’ll take care of it, and…” The rest of his words were gobbled in a clap of thunder, and by the time it had rumbled on through, he’d jumped back into his truck and pulled around, stopping briefly at the car in front of her.
“You arrogant…” she yelled, slamming shut her car door and marching straight forward to catch him before he sped away altogether. She didn’t need this today. Just didn’t need this. And now, with this added delay, she was even more worried that Angela would try to get out in this storm on her own.
“You OK, Jason?” the man from the truck called to the man in the car she’d hit, who was beginning to climb out of his front seat. He, too, was dressed in a yellow slicker.
“What about me?” Dinah yelled, catching up to his truck and running to the window on the driver’s side. “Don’t you want to know how I am?”
The man who’d hit her did turn around in his seat, giving her a long, hard stare. “You’re not hurt, are you?”
“No, but—”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “But I can’t deal with this right now. Like I told you before, Jason will take care of the
details because I’ve got an emergency, and I’ve got to get back.” He paused then smiled. “I’m really sorry about this.”
He seemed sincere enough, his smile was…nice. But she didn’t trust nice smiles, and sincerity was easy to fake. If anybody knew those two things, she did! Yet as she was about to shut out that nice smile altogether and demand he step out of the truck regardless of what his other obligations were, a gust of wind caught her umbrella, turned it inside out, then ripped it from her hands. Unfortunately, it tumbled end over end across the road, leaving Dinah standing in water up to her ankles, with her long, auburn hair soaked and shaggy, and nothing to protect her. She was barely even noticing the rain, though, because at this point she was too angry. “You can’t just leave the scene,” she yelled at the man. He was going to leave, though. That’s what men did. They left. And she couldn’t stop him. Couldn’t stop any of them. Father, husband, fiancé, brother-in-law, strangers…all alike.
Before the stranger pulled away, though, he handed an umbrella out the window to her. “I’m sorry, but I can’t deal with this right now. So, please, step back. I don’t want to splash you…” He took a good look at her waterlogged state and grimaced visibly. “Don’t want to get you any wetter than you are.”
Well, she could step in front of his truck and stop him, or grab hold of the handle on his door. But there was something in his eyes…a look she knew. Not a malicious one, not even a little mean-spirited. For an instant, something so deep there grabbed hold of her senses, willed her to step back. So she did, immediately regretting that, once again, she’d let herself be taken advantage of by a goodlooker. In her life, trust amounted to betrayal. She almost counted on it, and that was a huge regret, too.
The proof of her regret was in the blow of black smoke from his tailpipe as he sped away from her, while she remained standing in the downpour, watching him, gripping his umbrella in a stranglehold, getting wetter and wetter.
“I’m glad Gabby has been such a good friend to you, especially since I haven’t been of much use these past months,” Dinah said to her sister.
Angela laid her hand on Dinah’s. “Not your fault. We all have our problems to solve. And I’ve been doing fine here on my own. Good friends, good care. Nothing to worry about.”
Except a cheating ski-bum of a husband who’d run away from Angela the moment he’d heard the word
pregnant.
“I’m your sister and I’m entitled to worry anyway. But like I said, I’m glad you’ve had Gabby here to help you get through.” Dr. Gabrielle Evans. Angela’s friend, and her doctor, who was on the verge of giving birth right this very moment, fully in labor. “So, how are you doing, Gabby?”
Gabby nodded, panted, grasped the edge of the bed while Angela wiped her forehead with a cool, damp cloth and Dinah positioned herself to see how dilated Gabby was. Dinah had been a pediatric nurse, but she’d had good experience in obstetrics. While there was supposed to be a doctor on the way to deliver this baby, and since taking Gabby to the hospital in this weather in her condition would be a crazy thing to do, Gabby was ready to deliver this baby right here, right now, doctor or not. And it was beginning to look like Dinah might have to come out of her self-imposed retirement to bring the baby that Gabby was already calling Bryce into the world.
“Can I do anything else?” Angela asked.
“Just sit down and relax. I don’t want you getting worked up and going into labor yourself,” Dinah said, truly concerned about the effect the strain of all this excitement could have on her sister. Two women on the verge of motherhood. She envied them. Once, a long time ago, she’d thought that’s what she’d wanted most in the world. But the marriage hadn’t worked out, and she’d gone in another direction with her life. Then, years later, along had come Charles, the man she’d hoped would be…well, it didn’t matter what she’d hoped. She’d been wrong about him, too.
Still, with all these babies coming into the world…“Relax, Gabby,” she said, as another contraction gripped the woman. “I think this is going to be over with pretty soon. Bryce is in position and he’s about to make his grand entrance.”
“I hope so,” Gabby forced out as the contraction came to an end. “Because I’m tired of this part of it.”
Dinah laughed. “But you’ll be a much better obstetrician for having gone through it yourself. At least, that sounds good in theory, doesn’t it? And now, when you tell your patients you understand, you really will.” She laid a hand on Gabrielle’s belly, felt the amazing stirring of a new life just under her fingertips. Suddenly, she was glad she was there, being part of it.
“Angela tells me you’ve quit nursing,” Gabby gasped. She was finally relaxing back into her pillows. But not for long, if her progression towards the birth remained this consistent.
“For now. I came here to cook for Angela while she’s off on maternity leave, then I’ll decide what I want to do after that.” Dinah’s sister was the executive chef at the lodge on one of the Three Sisters and, like Angela, Dinah had also gone to culinary school. But she’d quit part way through to go into nursing. Culinary school, like her first
marriage, had been a hasty decision, and not the right one. But nursing…she loved it. Missed it already.
Right now, though, with so many unresolved issues, she had to step away. The reasons were complicated, and she didn’t trust herself to make the right decision while she was still feeling the sting.
“I’m glad you can deliver a baby, because I didn’t want to do this by myself,” Gabby said, as another contraction hit. “And I was afraid I might have to.”
The contractions were coming fast. In the hour they’d been there they’d sped up considerably, telling Dinah that Gabby was in an unusually fast labor. It was time to get her in position and hope the doctor arrived in time, that the floodwaters outside wouldn’t hold him back. Or do what she had to do if he couldn’t get through.
Funny, how she’d quit nursing, not sure she could ever go back to it. Yet here she was, doing what she’d promised herself she wouldn’t do again until her life was in better control, if that were even possible now, and wondering if she’d made yet another bad choice by leaving the thing she most loved doing.
Which was the reason she’d had to leave. Because these days she was just…confused.
And sad.
Dr. Neil Ranard arrived in time to deliver Gabby’s baby, and the first thing Dinah saw was just how much he loved Gabby. Angela had already told her that the baby wasn’t Neil’s, but deep down Dinah believed that Neil would raise that baby, because the look she saw in Gabby’s eyes the instant Neil ran into the room said everything. It was nice. But what was even nicer was seeing that it was out there…true love did exist. Maybe not for her. But it was nice for others who were luckier than she was. Or smarter.
“Just one more push, Gabrielle,” Neil urged. “That’s all I need. One more push and you’re a mother!”
Dinah propped Gabby up into position, enjoying what she was doing, even if it was a little outside her nursing expertise. It was good to be useful again, good to help. For a while, the ache of missing it was eased a little.
“Bear down, Gabrielle, and push,” Neil said.
“I am,” Gabby gasped.
“Breathe,” Dinah said. “Come on, Gabby. Take a deep breath, then push that baby out.”
“He’s waiting for you, Gabrielle,” Neil prompted. “Bryce Evans is waiting for you.”
Gabby bore down for a final time as Dinah helped her through her final contraction. Then, suddenly, it was over. Bryce was here. But…dear God, he was blue. Dinah saw it immediately, felt her stomach roil, and exchanged a quick look with Dr. Ranard. A look that said everything.