The Homecoming Baby

It was just as well, Celia thought as she watched Trish walk away. She hadn’t known how she was going to finish that sentence anyhow.

Trish would simply have to see Patrick Torrance for herself. Then she’d understand.

The clinic door opened again, but this time it wasn’t one of the slow, smiling mothers-to-be coming in for a routine checkup. This time it was Rose Gallen, and the young woman was in obvious distress.

Rose was crying, limping slightly, her sobbing face half buried in the crook of a man’s arm, her hands holding tightly to his shirt.

Celia excused herself to the women who were still signing in and began to move around the counter. “Rose,” she said. “Rose, are you all right?”

Rose didn’t lift her face from the man’s chest. The face of the man himself was obscured by one of the lush potted plants that flanked the doorway, and the sunlight was so bright it was hard to be sure…

But he couldn’t possibly be Rose’s husband, Tad. Tad had a beer belly that made him look several months pregnant himself.

This man, on the other hand… He bent his head, obviously saying something comforting to Rose, and Celia’s heart did a strange wiggling maneuver. He looked up when she arrived at Rose’s side, and their eyes met.

This man was Patrick Torrance.

“She’s all right, I think,” he said. “But someone should look at her. She was arguing with some bastard in the parking lot, and he ended up knocking her down.”

“It was Tad,” Rose said in a voice muffled by Patrick’s soft blue shirt. “Tad is back. He’s so angry, Celia. He said—he said—”

“It’s all right, Rose,” Celia said, taking the young woman’s hand. She looked up at Patrick. “Is Tad still out there?”

“Might be,” Patrick said. “When we left, he was on his hands and knees. I think he was trying to remember his name.” He gave Rose’s shoulder a quick, light rub. “Maybe you’ll get lucky. Maybe he never will.”

Rose tilted her face up at Patrick with a watery smile. “That would be great,” she said. “Thank you so much for—” She sniffed. “You were so nice to—I don’t know what I would have done if—”

“It’s okay,” he said with a smile. That smile. Rose blinked as if she were looking straight into the sun. “I promise you, it was my pleasure.”

“We’d better get you looked at,” Celia said. She and Rose had a scheduled session this hour, but her physical safety must come first. Rose was only about four months pregnant. If Tad had been knocking her around…

She looked toward the door to the administrative area, wishing Trish would come out of Kim’s office. She wasn’t sure where to take Rose. Which of the examination rooms was open? And she ought to tell Lydia the situation, considering it had happened on the clinic grounds. But she didn’t want to leave Rose alone, even with Patrick standing by. The young woman’s emotional state was clearly fragile.

Luck was with her. At that moment, Lydia and Katherine Collins, the clinic’s full-time midwife, came through the door. They looked over at Rose, saw that there was a problem and hurried to her side.

Lydia could handle any emergency, and Celia expected her to handle this one with her usual dazzling efficiency. But to her surprise, Lydia stopped about five feet short of where Celia and Patrick stood, with Rose between them, and seemed to freeze in place.

Lydia never betrayed much emotion, especially in front of the patients. Her years of running the clinic had taught her to project calm control at all times. So this was completely out of character, and Celia watched curiously as Lydia stared at Patrick Torrance.

A clear jolting shock changed Lydia’s face, but only for a split second. Her gray eyes widened, then narrowed, deep crow’s feet appearing at the edges. Her angular, weathered face slackened momentarily, then tightened, closing in, as if creating a mask to hide her reaction.

Only her hand, which was fisted at the base of her throat, betrayed how the sight of him had affected her.

Katherine looked at Lydia, then stepped forward, her long, graying ponytail swinging down her back. “Rose, you poor dear, are you all right?”

“I think so,” Rose said shakily. “It was Tad. He—” She began to cry again.

“Of course. Tad,” Lydia said dryly. “Now there’s a man who could use some anger management classes. You might want to consider offering a workshop soon, Celia.”

Celia smiled, glad that Lydia seemed to be recovering her equilibrium. The older woman had relaxed her hand, let it drop from her throat and put it out toward Patrick.

“Well, it looks as if we have you to thank for taking care of our Rose, Mr….?”

She paused, giving him time to introduce himself.

“Patrick,” he said, accepting her hand and shaking it. For a moment their gazes locked, gray steel against blue ice. Celia, watching, felt a strange chill.

“Patrick Torrance. I’m from San Francisco.”

Lydia’s gaze dropped first, but she seemed completely composed again. So calm and normal, in fact, that Celia began to wonder if she’d imagined that first, lightning-struck reaction.

“And I’m Lydia Kane. The founder of The Birth Place. Thank you again, Mr. Torrance.”

Without waiting for an answer, Lydia removed her hand and turned to Celia. “I want to take Rose back and check things over. She might like to have you along. Do you have time?”

“Oh, yes, please.” Rose looked up with tired, red-rimmed eyes. “I’d like Celia there, too.”

“Of course,” Celia said. “I have time.”

Patrick was still looking at Lydia. “Mrs. Kane—”

“You’ll have to excuse us, Mr. Torrance,” Lydia said. “But I know Rose thanks you, too, for stepping in to save the day.”

Obviously that was an understatement. Rose hadn’t yet peeled her hands from Patrick’s shirt. She looked as if she’d like to drag him into the examination room. As if she’d like to cling to his strength for the rest of the day—or the rest of her life.

Celia had to smile. She wished Trish could be here to see this. Apparently Celia wasn’t the only woman who found herself eating out of Patrick Torrance’s hands the minute she met him.

Celia looked at him, wishing things were different, wishing they could have even a few moments alone. She wondered why he had been in the parking lot. Had he come here to see her?

But her patient must come first.

“Yes,” she added, equally polite, knowing Lydia was watching. “Thank you so much.”

“It was nothing,” Patrick said, completing the circle of courteous formality. “I’m just glad I was in the right place at the right time.”

Lydia extracted Rose from his arm. She shot one more quick glance at Patrick’s face. “Yes,” she said. “That was quite a coincidence, wasn’t it, Mr. Torrance?”

Patrick looked at Lydia, tilting his head so that the spring light caught the brilliance of his eyes and picked out the blue glistening in his black, black hair. His smile was enigmatic and had sharp edges that seemed to gleam.

“Actually, Mrs. Kane,” he said with a peculiar flatness in his voice, “I don’t believe in coincidences. Do you?”

Lydia didn’t answer. She pretended she hadn’t heard him, busying herself with Rose. But Celia knew she had heard, and had chosen not to respond.

Which Celia, staring over at the older woman thoughtfully, decided was very strange indeed.

AT THREE-THIRTY, PATRICK PARKED his car along Cooper Avenue, just down the block from the J. P. Linden High School. Impressive. The Linden family must have been big stuff around here once. Don Frost’s report had said that both Linden daughters had been disinherited. Patrick wondered why. Maybe the old man had found out about the baby and didn’t much approve?

School was just over. Patrick watched the kids come pouring out of the building like a liquid rainbow. Some of them lined up, noisily jabbing and teasing, to climb into big yellow buses. Others trudged along stoically, watching the sidewalk, heavy backpacks dragging on their shoulders.