Evergreen Springs

“Can we take these?” Ty asked Devin, holding out his inflated glove.

“Of course,” she answered. “I’ll warn you, they might start to lose air pretty soon.”

When they were just about ready to go—mittens found, beanies adjusted—Jazmyn turned contrary.

“I need to use the bathroom,” she suddenly declared. The girl was quite a character. She could have gone anytime in the past fifteen minutes but she had waited until she knew her father was in a hurry.

“Can’t you wait until we get home?” Cole asked.

“No. I have to go now.”

“Fine. Go ahead.”

She headed to the ladies’ room just off the lobby. “You need to go?” Cole asked his son. The boy shook his head, content to toss the rubber glove balloon into the air and catch it again.

“Thanks for keeping an eye on them,” Cole said to her.

“No problem. They’re fun kids. How old are they? I didn’t have the chance to ask.”

“Jaz is eight going on about thirty-six and Ty just turned six.”

“Those are fun ages at Christmastime. Still young enough to believe in the magic and old enough to appreciate the wonder of it all.”

“I guess. I’m not sure any of us is in the mood for Christmas this year,” he said, his tone rather bleak.

Why? What was the story here? She wanted to ask but decided it wasn’t her business. “You said you had a bag of your sister’s?”

“Yeah. I guess she’s had a hospital bag packed since before she came out to Idaho. She threw it in the truck before we left the house. Mother’s intuition or something. Apparently it contains a few necessities like magazines and slippers.”

“Handy.”

“I guess.” He looked around the empty waiting room, then back at her. “I’ve got to tell you, Doc, I’m still not convinced this is the best place for her and the twins. I can’t help thinking maybe the smartest thing would be to pack her up right now and take her to a bigger hospital in Boise.”

Devin ignored the little pinch to her pride. “I understand your concern. I told Tricia that’s a decision she can certainly make. I will tell you, we have a state-of-the-art facility here, brand-new in the last two years, with every possible advanced fetal and maternal monitoring capability and a couple of excellent specialists in the area who will be taking a look at her tomorrow. If at any time your sister feels uneasy about the care she’s receiving here, I would be the first to encourage her to transfer to a different facility. At this point, we’re dealing with a sprained ankle and contractions that currently appear to be under control. I would advise against moving to another facility far away from her family, but that’s, of course, her choice.”

“Yeah, she was quick to remind me of the same thing,” he said, his voice wry.

“Sisters. What can you do?”

He almost smiled but seemed to catch himself at the last minute as his daughter came out of the ladies’ room, wiping her just-washed hands on her coat.

He unpeeled from the wall. “Thanks for keeping an eye on them for me. Come on, kids. Let’s grab the bag for Aunt Tricia, then take off back to the ranch before that snow gets any deeper.”

Devin watched them walk outside, their faces colored by the blinking Christmas lights around the front door as snow swirled around them.

“I can’t believe how much snow has already fallen,” Brittney said, looking out after them.

Before Devin could answer, Callie appeared. “There you are. We just got a call from Dispatch. Paramedics are on their way to the scene of a three-car accident and they’re warning us to get ready for multiple injuries.”

So much for her relatively quiet evening.

She put the very sexy cowboy and his cute kids out of her mind so she could focus on the job at hand.

* * *

SHE DIDN’T HAVE the chance to check on Tricia again until several hours and two more weather-related accidents later.

Devin’s friend had been moved to a room on the obstetrics floor, the third floor of the hospital, where each room had big windows offering lovely views—in daylight, anyway—of the Redemption Mountains and the beautiful unearthly blue waters of Lake Haven.

On a quick break, Devin took the elevator up and headed to the obstetrics nurses’ desk. She found Tricia’s chart and saw that the contractions appeared to have stopped. Dr. Randall, the ob-gyn, had made a visit a short time ago and Devin sighed when she read his recommendation. As she had feared, Dr. Randall agreed with her and thought this was one of the rare cases when hospital bed rest was indicated.

That wouldn’t be easy for anyone—especially not Tricia.

Thinking she would just take a peek inside to see if her patient was sleeping, she cracked the door only a little. A light was on above the bed, she discovered. Tricia sat upright in the bed with her leg propped on a couple of pillows, hands clasped over her distended abdomen.

When she spied Devin, she gave a small smile and quickly tried to wipe away the tears on her cheeks.

Devin didn’t give another thought to the peanut butter and honey sandwich she had planned to eat during the break. Her patient was in distress and that was far more important.

She pushed the door open and walked inside. “Oh, honey. What’s wrong? Are you having pain? How’s the ankle?”

Tricia shrugged. “It hurts, mainly because I don’t want to take any heavy pain medication that might harm the babies. But at least it’s not broken. Mostly I’m upset because this isn’t the way I planned to spend the last few weeks of my pregnancy. Alone, on bed rest in a strange hospital.”

“I’m so sorry.”

Tricia sniffled and Devin handed her the box of tissues that was just out of reach on her bedside table. She grabbed one and wiped at her eyes. “So you heard?”

“I was just reading your chart.”

“Dr. Randall thinks I should stay here on hospital bed rest for the next week so they can continue monitoring things. I’m dilated to a three and twenty percent effaced, which makes the risk of premature labor high, and now I can’t even walk to the bathroom on my own. The stupid ankle is complicating everything.”

“I know it’s hard but this might be the best thing for all of you. You want to keep those little ones inside there as long as possible, trust me. In just a few weeks, they’ll be considered full-term and the risks of neonatal complications drop considerably.”

“I know. But I don’t have to like it. It stinks.”

“You won’t get an argument from me. I get it, believe me.”

She didn’t, really. She could understand and empathize on a clinical level but she didn’t really know what it was to be pregnant and frightened. That was something she would never be able to appreciate, except theoretically.

The ache in her chest was as familiar as it was unwelcome.

“I’m sorry I bothered you,” she said quietly. “Sleep is really the best thing for you and those kidlets.”

“I was sleeping until a short time ago, but then I had a bad dream that woke me.”

Devin tried to lighten the mood. “I hate that. A few nights ago, I dreamed I was the grand marshal of the Lake Haven Days parade but instead of riding on a float, I had to do cartwheels the entire parade route, all the way down Lake Street in front of everyone in town. My hands were killing me, even in the dream.”

As she hoped, Tricia smiled a little at the ridiculousness of Devin’s subconscious. “The mind is such a strange thing, isn’t it?”