The Nurse Who Saved Christmas (8 page)

“Aw, honey, don’t cry.” He’d done this to her. It was his fault they were sitting here, wondering if they’d created a life. If only he’d not instantly been attracted to Abby. If only he’d not let the death of that little girl and her mother get to him. If only he hadn’t found such comfort in Abby’s arms. Sweet solace like none he’d known since Sandra and Shelby’s deaths.

He could “if only” all day to no avail. If onlys wouldn’t help them. Not at this point.

He wiped his finger along Abby’s cheek, catching a runaway teardrop. “It’ll be okay. One way or the other, it will be all right,” he promised, although he wasn’t sure he believed his words.

If Abby was pregnant, nothing would be all right.

She stared at him, opened her mouth, but no words left her tremulous lips.

“I’m sorry, Abs. So sorry.” He leaned over and kissed her, gently, hoping to make the trembling stop, reminding himself that this was what had caused what they currently faced. Still, he wasn’t able to stop.

Her mouth was warm and pliant, accepting his kiss, accepting him despite the fact he didn’t deserve her.

“Oh, Abs, what have I done to you?” he whispered against her lips, threading his fingers into the soft waves of her hair.

“You didn’t do anything to me, Dirk,” she assured him, her voice catching slightly. “Nothing I didn’t want.”

“You didn’t want this,” he scoffed, gesturing toward the pregnancy kit.

“No, I didn’t.” She pulled back from him. Her eyes glistened with tears, but he’d never seen her look more sure of herself. “Not like this. Never like this. But if that test is positive, I will be okay.”

“You’ll keep the baby?”

She nodded.

“I’m sorry.”

She stared him in the eyes, overflowing tears silently streaming down her cheeks. “For?”

“This. Taking advantage of you that morning.”

“You didn’t take advantage of me any more than I took advantage of you. We needed each other.”

“What we did shouldn’t have happened,” he reminded her, so why was he holding her, leaning in to press another kiss to a teardrop on her cheek?

“No,” she agreed, “but it did happen and we can’t change the past.”

“Or the consequences of that past.” If only he could. Damn, there he went with another if only.

“True.” She sighed, closing her eyes, opening them with strong resolve replacing her tears. “A baby wouldn’t be the end of the world. Regardless of what the test shows, I will make the best of what life gives me.”

She would, too. Dirk could see the determination and willpower reflected in her eyes. Knew enough about her to know Abby always made the best of any situation life presented. She was a glass half-full kind of woman.

Dirk had moved beyond glass half-empty years ago. His glass had been drained dry the moment his wife and daughter had taken their last breaths. After that, he’d tossed the cup against the wall, shattering the remains to bits.

“That’s big of you, considering you’re talking about the rest of your life.” He couldn’t keep the pain out of his voice. “A child is a big responsibility.”

An odd expression on her face, Abby searched his eyes. “The biggest, really.” She gripped his hand tightly in hers, a glimmer of uncertainty surfacing. “Promise me you’ll try to be happy, too. Maybe it’s crazy, but I need to hear you say that before we know, Dirk. Please.”

Happy? She had no idea what she was asking of him. How could he be happy if he’d made her pregnant? He’d given all his love to his wife and a beautiful little girl
with straw-colored hair and big blue eyes, and that love had been ripped from his soul. He couldn’t do that again.

When he didn’t answer, Abby sighed, dropped her forehead against his. “Maybe it’ll be negative and all of this will have been for nothing. It’s probably been three minutes.”

Dirk was sure it had, but he didn’t move away from where he stared into Abby’s eyes. He wasn’t a fool. He could see that she did need to hear him say he’d try to be happy. He didn’t understand why, couldn’t begin to fathom why, but in her eyes he saw beyond the happy front she put on to the world and saw real need. Need unlike any he’d ever experienced. Need that made him feel emotionally impotent and protective at the same time. Abby’s need gutted him.

The thought of disappointing her filled him with mixed emotions. She was the kind of woman a man felt inclined to protect, a sweet, wonderful, generous woman who gave a hundred and ten percent of herself to those in her life.

She’d welcomed him into her bed when he’d needed her.

Sex with her had been phenomenal and had provided his first moments of peace in years. Yet he’d known Abby didn’t give her body lightly, that if they continued, she might fall for him and want things he didn’t.

But whether or not he wanted those things, if Abby was pregnant, he’d be forced to accept what fate dealt him.

She wanted him to say he’d try to be happy if the test was positive, if she was pregnant with his baby.

He couldn’t do it.

“You read the test,” she urged, her eyes searching his.

Without a word, he picked up the test, registered the unmistakable plus sign and felt his stomach drop down the chimney lickety-split. “You’re pregnant.”

“I am?” Abby grabbed the test from his hand, studied the results. “I’m pregnant.”

He’d said that.

“I’m pregnant, Dirk.” Dropping the test back onto the coffee table as if the plastic had scalded her hand, she turned to him, wide-eyed and stunned, grabbed his hands and squeezed. “We’re going to have a baby.”

A baby. What could he say? He couldn’t hurt Abby, couldn’t suggest they consider their options, because even if he could ask, she wouldn’t do that. He didn’t have to hear the words to know that.

“Oh, God, I’m going to have a baby.” Her chest rose and fell rapidly. Her eyes grew bigger and bigger. Her face grew paler and paler, as if she was on the verge of a panic attack. “What am I going to do with a baby?”

“You’ll be fine.” Had that really been his voice? Had he really sounded normal? He didn’t feel normal. He felt as if he’d been dipped in ice water and stuck to the North Pole.

“Other than from nursing school, I don’t know anything about babies. Nothing.” Was she even talking to him? Or just thinking out loud? Talking to herself?

She grabbed his arm, shook it as if to get his attention. “What if I don’t know how to take care of him or her? Then what?”

“You’ll be fine,” he repeated, unable to think of
anything better. Unable to think, period. Abby was pregnant. With his baby. He was going to be a father again. He didn’t want another baby.

Yet he couldn’t look away from Abby’s pleading eyes, couldn’t shut out the need he saw there.

But he wanted to. He wanted to run from her Christmas-filled house and never look back. Never have to face the fact that he’d fathered another child when he didn’t have a heart to love him or her with.

Leaving Oak Park to escape his family and friends this holiday season had backfired. He’d jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire.

He pulled his hands free, turned from her to stare at her Christmas tree. God, he hated Christmas. Hated having to dredge up the past, but since she was having his baby, there were things Abby needed to know. Things she wouldn’t like. By the time he was finished, she wouldn’t like him. Which was fine. He hadn’t liked himself in a long, long time either.

“I was married.”

“M
ARRIED
?”
Jack Frost zapped a frigid coating of ice over Abby’s spine. Surely she’d heard Dirk wrong. Hadn’t she been thinking earlier about how little she really knew about him? For all she knew, he could still have a wife and family back in Oak Park where he’d come from.

How could she be pregnant by a virtual stranger?

Only when he’d kissed her, made love to her, he hadn’t been a stranger. Far, far from it. He’d known her better than anyone, had touched her soul right along with her body. She’d looked at him and felt she’d known the essence of who he was, all she’d needed to know.

But she hadn’t. She hadn’t known he’d been married.

She was pregnant. Dirk had been married. Why wasn’t he saying more? Why was he sitting there with his hands tightly fisted in his lap, with his jaw clenched and his eyes glazed over as if he were fighting demons? Had his marriage been that bad?

Was
. That meant he wasn’t still married, right? Why wasn’t he explaining his bombshell statement?

“You were married?” she prompted.

He took a deep breath, raked his fingers through his hair. “Sandra and I married too young. I was still in
medical school, gone most of the time, didn’t have two nickels to rub together, but we loved each other. Then Shelby came into the picture.”

Another layer of ice settled over Abby’s nerves.

“Shelby?” Was she a girlfriend? A mistress? A brief fling he’d had on the side? A—?

“My daughter.”

His daughter? Abby blinked, sure she’d heard wrong. He had a daughter? Why hadn’t he mentioned a daughter? How could she have not known such pertinent details?

Then again, why would she have known?
She wasn’t important to Dirk. Why would he have told her? Disgust filled her. How could she have been so foolish?

Outside work she’d spent a total of four—
four!
—days with him. The day she’d gotten pregnant, his Santa stint, the Christmas party, and today, the day they’d found out she was pregnant.

God, what must he think of her?

Then again, she hadn’t been alone in that bed. She refused to abide by some double standard that said it was okay for him to sleep with a woman he barely knew, but that for her to do the same made her less of a woman.

He had a daughter. A wife, hopefully former wife, but the fact he’d not clarified that point worried her. He had a whole other life she knew nothing about. A whole other life he hadn’t shared with her. Would he ever have if she hadn’t gotten pregnant?

God, she was going to throw up.

“Do your wife and Shelby live in Oak Park?” She asked each word slowly, controlling each breath to keep from gasping air into her aching chest.

Was that why she occasionally saw the look of pain in his eyes when he treated a child? Was that why he never seemed completely comfortable in a child’s presence? Because seeing children made him miss his daughter? Had he and his wife had problems? She should have suspected something the moment he admitted to not liking Christmas!

“No, Sandra and Shelby don’t live in Oak Park. They don’t live anywhere.” His voice caught, his jaw flexed, he swallowed. “They died in a car accident four years ago. Shelby was only two years old.”

“Oh, God.” Which explained why he’d reacted so emotionally on the day they’d made love. The mother and daughter dying in the car accident must have stirred up memories of his own losses. Dirk had had a daughter who’d died. A wife who’d died. Abby’s heart twisted inside out at the thought of how much that must hurt, at what he’d been through. “I’m so sorry, Dirk.”

She placed her hand over his, hoping he sensed how she wanted to comfort him.

“It’s not your fault.” He pulled his hand free, raked his fingers through his hair, looked tormented, as if he was erecting every defensive wall around himself. “Just as this pregnancy isn’t your fault. I’m the one who’s sorry.”

She had a thousand questions, things she wanted to know, to understand him better, really know this man whose baby grew inside her. But he’d closed his eyes and, she suspected, the subject of his past as well.

Still, she ached for him and, as awkward as she felt doing so given their current predicament, she wrapped her arms around him and gave him a hug. A big hug. She
held on to him, hoping he knew how much she wanted to ease his burden. He sat stock still, never moving, never budging, never talking. Just sat.

“I don’t blame you for my pregnancy,” she assured him, “if that’s what you’re wondering. We’re both consenting adults. We used protection. Neither of us could have known this would happen.”

She traced her finger over his, laced their hands. Although she wasn’t sure he welcomed her hold, she squeezed. “We’ll figure this out, Dirk. Somehow, all this will work out okay.”

But even as she said the words, Abby wondered if they were true. Wondered why she was having to play the role of the strong one when really she just wanted to curl up against him and cry. She wanted his arms to be wrapped around her, to have him holding her, giving comfort. She wanted to be the one taken care of, the one who got to let her emotions loose, and be comforted.

Instead, she’d be raising a baby, possibly by herself, and would never have the dreams she’d clung to since childhood.

Dreams of magical Christmases with a man who loved her and their happy family. Dreams of someday sharing the magical news of a pregnancy with a life partner who would rejoice with her at the news. Dreams of a happily ever after written just for her and her special Prince Charming.

From the first, she’d hoped Dirk would be that man, but not under these circumstances. Unable to hold back the erupting emotional volcano, Abby burst into tears.

And although Dirk wrapped his arms loosely around her, she found no solace in his embrace.

How could she when he was only holding her because he was trying to do the right thing and not because he loved her or wanted her pregnant with his child?

Did Dirk really think no one was going to suspect something was up when he kept babying her?
Argh
. Abby was going to strangle him if didn’t quit treating her so differently. Their coworkers weren’t stupid.

And neither was she. After the halfhearted way he’d held her while she’d cried, she’d known she had to protect herself. After he’d left, she’d cried more, this time for the great grief rocking her insides, grief that she’d entangled her emotions so irreversibly with a man incapable of returning her sentiments. Even if he wanted to, he’d locked his heart away years ago and thrown away the key.

Dirk was a good man, but one without a heart to give, which meant she needed to guard hers with all her being.

“Here, let me do that.” He stepped into her personal space, taking over where she was helping to transfer a patient from a gurney onto an exam table.

Biting her tongue because she didn’t want to draw more attention to what he was doing, she shot him a back-off look and tried to continue with her job, to no avail since he didn’t step away as they vied for a hold on the patient.

As their coworkers were looking back and forth between them, and even the patient had a curious look on her face, Abby held up her hands.

“Fine, Dr. Kelley. I’ll go check on bay three’s X-ray
report.” At least she sounded professional, even if he was making her look like an invalid.

What was wrong with him anyway? Why was he acting like she couldn’t do a thing for herself without his help? She was pregnant, not disabled.

“He’s quite taken with you, isn’t he?”

Abby spun to look at the medical assistant who’d only been working at the hospital for a few weeks. “Who?”

The girl, who couldn’t be much older than high-school age, smiled. “Dr. Kelley, of course. I saw you together at the Christmas party. You make a lovely couple.”

Abby swallowed the lump in her throat. She’d thought they made a lovely couple, too. Now, she knew they’d never be a couple. Perhaps if they’d had more time prior to her pregnancy, perhaps if they’d met years ago, before Dirk’s marriage. Now it was too late.

“We’re not a couple.”

Dirk didn’t do couples. Just because she was pregnant it did not mean she expected that to change. Neither did she want it to change because of her pregnancy.

She wanted Dirk to care enough for her to want to be a couple with her. Because of her. Because of his feelings for her.

She wanted him to love her.

The young girl frowned. “Really? I’m surprised. You looked like you were having a good time together.”

That had been before they’d been interrupted and he’d said he wanted to just be friends. Before they’d known they were going to be parents. Before she’d realized Dirk was incapable of giving his heart to her.

“We were having a good time. As friends.”

“Oh.” The assistant didn’t look as if she knew what else to say.

“No problem,” she assured the girl, keeping an “it’s no big deal” smile on her face in the hope of waylaying more curiosity. Particularly in light of Dirk’s odd behavior since she’d clocked in. “Do you know if the X-ray reports are back on the fall patient in the next bay?”

Looking chastised, although Abby hadn’t meant her to, the girl nodded. “They are.”

No wonder the girl had thought they were a couple as they’d left in such a heated rush from the Christmas party and with the way Dirk had acted tonight.

She really was going to have it out with him the first private moment they got. Although they’d have to establish some type of relationship for the future, his overbearing, almost paternalistic attitude had to go. Besides, for now, Abby wanted a break from him. Later, after the holidays had passed, she’d figure out how she and Dirk could coexist in the world of parenthood.

“Hello, Mrs. Clifton,” she greeted her patient, a friendly smile pasted on her face in the hope of reassuring the woman. “Dr. Kelley will be by in a few minutes to give your X-ray results.” She pulled up the tests and flagged them for his attention. “How are you feeling?”

“Foolish.” The woman in her early sixties gestured to the arm she held very still. “I still can’t believe I slipped and did this.”

“Unfortunately, falls happen.” Abby lightly pinched each of the woman’s fingertips, observing how quickly the blanched skin returned to its natural pink color. Almost immediately. Excellent.

“I guess this will teach me to be more careful of ice.” The woman shifted, trying to get comfortable.

“Who knows, this might save you a much worse accident later down the line.” Abby checked the automatic blood-pressure cuff that was wrapped around the woman’s uninjured arm. One twenty-six over seventy-eight. Great. A normal reading.

The woman laughed lightly. “You’re one of those positive people who always sees the best in everything, aren’t you?”

“Usually.” Only she hadn’t been seeing the positive in her pregnancy. Only the negative. Only that her dreams for her future were undergoing a drastic transformation.

She was going to have a baby. A beautiful, precious baby that she and Dirk had made together. A baby to share her life with. To be a family with. To share Christmas with. Abby had never met anyone other than Dirk who she’d want to have a baby with. No one she’d want to share the rest of her Christmases with. Just Dirk.

If they weren’t meant to be more than friends, then she’d deal with that, would love and cherish their baby without letting Dirk break her heart. Somehow.

“Nurse?” Mrs. Clifton eyed her curiously.

Pulling her thoughts together, Abby smiled at the elderly lady. “Thank you.”

The woman’s forehead creased. “What for?”

“For reminding me that it’s much too wonderful a season to be down.”

Especially over something that so many women would consider a blessing. She’d been given a gift, an unexpected, unplanned-for gift, but a gift all the same.

Just because that gift hadn’t come at the time in her life she’d planned or in the way she’d hoped for didn’t make a baby any less of a blessing.

Yes, there was still that part of her that didn’t want this, wanted her and Dirk to have the opportunity to get to know each other without a pregnancy shadowing their every thought and word. She didn’t have that luxury.

She was going to be mother to Dirk’s child.

“Were you down?”

Abby considered the question. “Not really. I just wasn’t seeing the miracles of Christmas clearly.”

“Christmas is the best time of year, isn’t it?” Her patient’s gaze fell on her immobilized arm. “Only this year someone else will have to do the cooking because I suspect I’m not going to be doing much of anything.”

Helping reposition her pillow, Abby nodded her agreement. “I suspect you’re right. I hope you have your shopping finished.”

“Mercifully, yes. I’m one of those crazy women who gets up before dawn and does all my shopping on the day after Thanksgiving.” The woman chuckled self-derisively. “Fighting the crowds is a bit rough at times, but the bargain buys are worth the effort.”

“Aren’t they just the best? I do the same thing.”

Dirk stepped into the area, his face going pale.

Abby bit back a sigh. Did he really dislike Christmas so much that just hearing a discussion about shopping bothered him? How would she explain to her child that his or her father didn’t like Christmas?

Avoiding looking at him, Abby entered her nurse’s notes while Dirk went over the X-ray results with Mrs. Clifton, explaining that she needed to schedule an
appointment with her primary care provider in addition to seeing the orthopedic surgeon the following day.

He left the room long enough to grab some patient education materials, flipped the pamphlet open to a page with a photo of magnified images of a normal bone and an osteoporotic one.

“Your arm broke more easily than it should have because your bones are thinning due to a condition called osteoporosis,” Dirk explained, pointing out the difference in the bones in the pictures. “This happens when the bones lose mass, weakening, leaving them in a state where it takes much less force to cause a fracture. Sometimes even something as simple as taking a step can cause the bones to crush in on themselves when the bones have weakened.”