Baby By The Book

“What?”

“Do it.”

She scrunched her eyes shut and squeezed his hand. “Twenty-five, twenty-four…” Suddenly she relaxed, loosening her grip.

“Bad one, huh?” He smoothed a loose strand of hair from her pale face, realizing too late how much like a caress his gesture was.

“Mmm.” She nodded.

Arnette, a plump Polynesian woman with a reassuring smile, came back into the room. “How’re you doing, sweetheart?”

Susan was still trying to catch her breath. “Feels like it’s not a baby inside me, it’s a buzz saw with a dull blade.”

“We can get you some medicine, you know,” Arnette said.

“No, I want to do it natural.”

“Then I’m just going to check your dilation.”

That was Rand’s cue to leave. He grabbed the clipboard with the completed forms, then wandered downstairs, thinking he might locate some coffee. Instead he found himself in the business office, talking with the same clerk. He handed her the clipboard. She smiled her thanks, but the smile died on her lips as she glanced at the form.

“No insurance?”

“Um, no.”

“She should be at the county hospital, not here,” the woman said frostily. “We don’t accept indigents.”

“She’s not—” Hell, he didn’t feel like arguing. To his utter amazement, he whipped out his credit card. “Put Ms. Kilgore’s charges on here.”

In for a penny, in for a pound.

THE NEXT FEW HOURS went by in a haze of anticipation, pain and cold fear for Susan. Arnette was there, reassuring Susan in her lilting accent that everything was progressing nicely. Clark and Alicia took turns telling her jokes. But nothing comforted her—nothing except Rand’s presence.

She wasn’t sure why she felt safer with him there. Maybe because he was a doctor, although it wasn’t like she was suffering from prickly heat. She just knew that when she felt most afraid, sure something was wrong, positive the labor would go on for eternity, she would catch him from the corner of her eye and instantly feel calmer.

He even did all those things she’d fantasized about. He held her hand. He blotted the perspiration from her forehead. He fed her ice chips. During those increasingly long and frequent contractions, she felt his attention on her in a visceral way, almost like he was willing her pain away.

In her less sane moments, she fantasized he was her husband, the father of her child, and that when the baby was born they would be a family. She knew it was a juvenile rescue fantasy, but she allowed herself to savor it. Anything to get through her labor, which really sucked, in her opinion.

At one minute to midnight, Penelope Kilgore made her appearance. Susan hadn’t thought much about names, but when Rand declared the newborn was bright and shiny as a new penny, the name sort of stuck. Penelope—Penny for short.

She was tiny—barely over five pounds—but she was perfect in every way, or so Susan thought when they put the baby into her arms. She was a miracle. How could Gary not fall in love with this precious scrap of life they had created, even if it was accidental?

Then a dose of reality hit her. This was real. She was a mother, now, and she had this child to feed, nurture and protect.

She looked up at Rand and forcefully dislodged the fantasy that had gotten her through labor. No beating around the bush, now. “I have to find Gary.”

Chapter Four

Rand remembered the first time he’d seen a woman hold her newborn baby. It was when his own mother had Alicia. He’d been only fourteen at the time, still reeling from his stepfather’s desertion and his sudden elevation to “man of the house.” His mother, like Susan, had been without insurance, and she’d had her baby at the Coastal County Hospital, classified as an indigent.

Rand had sat in a grubby waiting room, taking care of the seven-year-old twins, feeling scared and lonely and thinking that having a baby was the worst thing that could happen to a woman. But after it was over, Rand had been invited for a brief visit to his mother’s room and a peek at his new sister. He had never seen his mother smile like that.

Since that time, he’d seen all three of his sisters within minutes of delivering their children, and they all had that glowing, ethereal look about them the first time they held their babies. It was the only thing Rand had ever seen that struck him with awe.

Susan was no exception. They didn’t let her hold the baby for long. Because Penny was premature, they whisked her away to an isolette in the neonatal unit as a precaution. But during those few seconds when Susan held her child, she was the most beautiful woman in the world.

Rand wondered how it would feel to be a first-time father. Not that he’d ever know. Once upon a time he’d assumed a wife and family were somewhere in his distant future, but given his abysmal track record with women, he’d given up that fantasy.

It wasn’t something he’d worried much about, especially lately. He figured he’d waited a long time to have his house all to himself, and he wouldn’t give up his solitude easily. But for at least half a second, when he’d gazed on Susan and Penny, he’d yearned—yearned—to be part of a family, to be a father.

He’d come down to earth in a hurry when Susan had talked about finding Gary. It was ridiculous to think, for even a minute, that he had any proprietary relationship with Susan or her baby. They belonged to someone else—even if he was a jerk, even if he’d disappeared.

“So what do we do now?” Alicia asked. They were out in the hall, giving Susan some privacy while she cleaned up and dressed.

Rand shrugged. “I guess we go home. And I find another carpenter to finish the bookshelves or that room will still be a wreck when your wedding rolls around.” Alicia was getting married in a few weeks at his house, and she wanted the whole house to be in perfect shape for the big event.

“I’m not worried about that,” Alicia said surprising him. “What about Susan? She doesn’t have anyone.”

“She has Arnette, who appears to be a good friend.”

Alicia shook her head. “She just seems so alone.”

“We can’t take up for every lonely person we meet. We got her safely to the hospital, I made sure her medical bills would be paid. At this point she might like some privacy.”

Alicia didn’t look convinced, but she agreed they should at least let her rest.

That was before Susan declared she wasn’t staying in the hospital.

“The baby should stay here, of course,” Rand heard her telling the nurse who’d come to take her to her room. “But I’m not sick. I’ve just had a baby, which is a perfectly natural event, not an illness, and I can recuperate at home just fine.”

“And how are you planning to breast-feed the baby when you’re fifty miles away?” Arnette argued. “Susan, you know I’m a big fan of home birth, but I’m also in favor of mothers and babies being together.”

“But the doctor said Penny will be here several days,” Susan objected.

“At least stay overnight,” Arnette said soothingly. “You had a difficult labor, you’re very weak, and it’s the middle of the night. You’re not ready for an hour in the car and climbing two flights of stairs to your apartment.”

Rand knew he should stay out of it. But he figured if Susan understood she didn’t have to pay her hospital bill, she would be more reasonable. He went back into the room.

“Susan, if you’re worried about the cost, don’t. It’s taken care of.”

She sat on the edge of the bed wearing a hospital-issue gown and robe, looking very pale. She just stared at him, her blue eyes seeming even larger than normal.

“I don’t mind taking care of it,” he continued when she didn’t immediately seem grateful. “I can afford it.”

“That’s not the point!” she sputtered indignantly. She cast her gaze around the room, looking for someone to agree with her. Alicia, Arnette, and the nurse scurried for the door like rats abandoning a sinking ship. “It’s not your responsibility,” Susan continued. “You hardly know me!”

“I just spent fourteen hours with you, helping you bring a new life into the world,” he said quietly. “How can you say I don’t know you?”