A Family of Her Own

“You’re not making me feel particularly comfortable here.”

Nothing.

Booker searched his mind for something he could say or do. “Can you feel the baby move yet?” he asked at last.

The question obviously took her off guard. Rising onto one elbow, she stared at him. “I felt the baby move for the first time while I was driving here.”

“What did it feel like?”

Her expression mellowed. “Like…like a butterfly’s wing inside my belly. Why?”

“Because you need to remember that moment. Tomorrow you’ll get up for the baby,” he said and left.

LETHARGY WAS SPREADING through her like a slow-moving drug, incapacitating one muscle after another until she felt almost paralyzed. She’d been in bed for two nights and a day, but it didn’t seem to matter how long she slept. She was more tired now than when she’d first hit the sack. Worse, she knew she looked terrible, but she didn’t care. Brushing her teeth was suddenly too much effort.

There was a brisk knock at her door.

Katie didn’t respond. She was afraid it was Booker coming to make her get up, and she wasn’t ready. She needed more time.

He didn’t seem to receive her telepathic “Stay away,” because he came in anyway. But he didn’t say anything. He paused briefly at the foot of her bed. Then he opened the blinds and left.

Grateful for the reprieve, Katie rolled over on her side and stared at the square patch of sky he’d revealed. The sun was just beginning to rise, painting the horizon a delicate pinkish-orange. Booker had said she’d get up today—for her baby—but he didn’t understand. She couldn’t get up for anything.

Booker’s truck started outside.

Tomorrow, she promised herself as he drove away. She’d get up for her baby tomorrow. Surely she’d feel better by then.

“THAT OLD CADILLAC’S RUNNING, but I can’t promise how long it’s going to last,” Chase said, standing in the doorway of Booker’s office.

Booker glanced up from his cluttered desk to acknowledge his mechanic’s words. Chase was only nineteen, but he had a real talent with engines. “It’s old. There’s nothing we can do about that.”

“You wanted the keys?”

“Yeah.”

Chase tossed them over. Booker caught them and slid them in his pocket. The Cadillac might be running, but Katie wouldn’t be driving it anywhere if he couldn’t get her out of bed.

“Go ahead and start the tune-up of Lila Bronwyn’s Jeep,” he told Chase. Then he turned down the radio they had blasting and tried to reach Katie. He let the phone ring nearly twenty times, hung up and called again. But she wouldn’t pick up.

“Answer, damn it,” he muttered, losing patience.

“What’s wrong?” Delbert wiped his grease-covered hands on a rag as he and Bruiser came into the office. “Are you mad? Are you mad at me, Booker?”

“I’m not mad,” Booker said, but he was getting worried. What was he going to do with Katie? She’d completely withdrawn from life. She wasn’t getting up. She wasn’t eating. She wasn’t doing anything.

He thought of her parents. Should he have told them that she couldn’t work? Would it have made a difference?

He certainly wasn’t the best person to handle this, but remembering how Tami had treated Katie at the door, how both her parents had reacted to him at the donut shop, quickly convinced him that they were part of the problem, not the solution. And it wasn’t as if he saw anyone else stepping up to help her…. She’d been gone too long and apparently hadn’t kept up with relationships. Which meant, crazy as it seemed, he was the closest thing she had to a friend.

Mike Hill’s new Escalade cruised by out front, catching Booker’s eye. Watching Mike turn on First Avenue, he thought of all the times he’d heard, from almost everyone in town, that Katie had had a crush on Mike nearly her whole life. She’d once told him herself, flat out, that she wanted to marry Mike Hill someday. But Booker hadn’t taken her too seriously. He’d never seen Mike show any interest in her, couldn’t imagine them together. They were both…good. In his opinion, they each needed a counterbalance.

But Mike was rich and dependable. Maybe the best thing Booker could do for Katie and her baby was to throw them into Mike’s lap. A friend would do something like that, right?

Picking up the phone, he called Rebecca at the salon.

“Hello?”

“Is Rebecca there?”

“Hi, Booker.”

From the voice, it was Ashleigh Evans. “How’s it going?”

“Good. Where’ve you been? I’ve missed you.”

They’d danced last Friday at the Honky Tonk, but Booker knew if he pointed that out, she’d just say Friday seemed too long ago. “I’ve been busy.”

“You promised me a ride on your bike, remember?”

How could he forget? She reminded him whenever he talked to her. “I’ll stop by the salon sometime.”

“I’m looking forward to it.”

The phone changed hands and he heard Rebecca’s voice. “I think she has a thing for you.”

“Ashleigh?”

“Yeah.”

Booker already knew that. She’d been coming on to him ever since she’d broken up with that bull rider from Boise. She’d even invited him to her place last Friday night, but his response had been decidedly lukewarm. “I need a favor,” he said.

“Really? Wow! You’ve never asked me for anything before,” Rebecca said. “You must be desperate.”

He ignored her teasing because it hit a little too close to home. He didn’t like asking for favors. He didn’t like needing anything. But this wasn’t for him—exactly. “Katie’s looking for a job.”

“I heard she’s pregnant.”

Booker braced himself for her reaction. “That’s true.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked, her voice filled with accusation.

“I figured you’d find out soon enough.”

She released a long sigh. “Some people have all the luck.”

Booker pictured how rumpled and dispirited Katie had been sitting up in her bed last night and doubted she was feeling very lucky. “I’m sure Katie would be surprised to hear you say that.”

“I’d do anything to have a baby, Booker. Especially Josh’s baby. Sometimes I love him so much I can’t even breathe, and yet I can’t give him the one thing we both want most in the world.”