by Skye Taylor
“You’ll do,” he told the dogs as he dropped the sodden towel on the floor and hurried back to Zoe’s side. He steadied her until the puffing stopped.
“How long has this been going on?”
“I don’t know.” Zoe looked up at him, her eyes wide. “Jake. I’m scared.”
She’s scared? I’m terrified! I have to call someone. I have to get help. I can’t do this again.
Jake pulled Zoe into his arms and hugged her hard. “Don’t worry, babe. Everything’s going to be okay.” While he was reassuring her, another contraction hit and she tensed. He rocked her gently, waiting for it to pass and tried desperately to get a grip on his escalating panic.
“Let’s get you into the living room where you can get comfortable.”
Zoe took a shuddering breath and nodded.
Jake shrugged out of his slicker and tossed it into the corner with the sodden towel. He put a supporting arm around Zoe and guided her toward the living room. As soon as he could get her settled he’d start calling for help. Starting with the fire station. Or his father. Dad would know what to do.
He eased her into her favorite chair. Then he fumbled for the holster on his belt. But when he pressed the on button there were no bars. He dialed anyway. Nothing happened.
Fear sliced into his heart. Jake forced himself to breath slowly. And think. What should he do first? What did he need to do until he could get a signal and get help?
Some light. They needed light.
“Where are your candles? You do have candles around, don’t you?” They needed to be able to see, and his flashlight wasn’t enough.
Zoe nodded. “In the cabinet over the fridge.”
“Hang tight. I’ll be right back.”
“Jake!” Zoe grabbed for his hand and clung, her eyes shut tight.
Jake waited the contraction out, his mind frantic with disjointed thoughts. As soon as Zoe relaxed again, he dashed back to the kitchen, flashed his light into the cabinet, and found the jumble of candles and holders. He grabbed the hem of his T-shirt and pulled it away from his body to form a pocket, then shoveled the candles into it along with the box of kitchen matches he’d found sitting on the counter.
Back in the living room, Zoe was huffing and puffing again. Jake dumped his load onto the ottoman and reached to hold her hands while she worked her way through the contraction. He still fought to keep fear at bay, but now that he was doing something, he’d begun to gain a semblance of control. In a minute he’d try the cell again and call his dad. He had to stay calm. Panic wouldn’t help Zoe or Molly.
He glanced at his watch. Eight twenty. Quickly, he began lighting candles and setting them in places they wouldn’t be likely to get knocked over.
“You got any blankets down here or anything?”
“In the dryer.” Zoe pointed back in the direction of the kitchen.
Jake made a second dash to the kitchen, yanked open the dryer, and scooped out a freshly laundered pile of sheets.
“Jake, what am I going to do?” Zoe asked when he returned to her side.
He dropped the sheets beside the chair and knelt next to her.
“I promised I’d . . . call when it . . . started,” Zoe whispered with tears in her eyes.
“I don’t think Bree will be able to get here. The big tree is down across our road. I’m just praying we can get an EMT in here.”
“I promised my dad. And—” Zoe looked up at him with desperation in her eyes. “And Porter.”
Chapter 34
PORTER’S NAME, uttered with such urgency, dumped a pail of ice water over Jake’s pounding heart. In the last crazy half hour since he’d found Zoe in labor, he’d forgotten all about Porter Dubois and his claim on Zoe and her baby.
He’d been so busy trying to calm his own terror and hers that he’d forgotten to wonder what else Zoe needed. Beyond the obvious. Beyond the physical needs of a woman in labor.
But, I’m here, babe. And I love you. “We’ll call your dad as soon as I get a signal. And”—Jake hesitated, hating Porter, resenting Zoe’s promise to call him—“and Porter.”
“Oh, God—” Zoe began panting again.
Jake held her hands. He had to go for help. He had no idea what he should be doing. It was too soon. Way too soon. Zoe needed someone qualified to do all the right things. Jake wasn’t it. He glanced at his watch again. It had been less than two minutes.
“I need to go get help,” he told Zoe as soon as she was breathing normally again.
“No!” Zoe clutched at his hands, her eyes dark with distress. “Please. Can’t you just call for help on your cell?”
“There’s no signal. And even when I do get through, the ambulance won’t be able to get in here. The oak tree on the corner is down. Someone needs to clear a way, and I’ve got a chain saw.”
“I’m scared.” Her voice trembled.
So am I, babe! You have no idea how scared!
“It’s going to be okay.” Please God, let that be true.
Jake grabbed his phone off the floor where he’d dropped it and punched in 911 again. Still no bars up. He put it to his ear and listened anyway. Nothing.
If only he knew how much longer she had. Maybe he could calm her down enough so she’d let him get back to his van and drive to the station to get someone better qualified than he was. He tried to think of the questions he’d be asked when he did get through to someone. The fire department had brought in a doctor to discuss a number of scenarios a Good Samaritan might run into and how to handle them until qualified help arrived. One of the topics was untimely childbirth. At the time, Jake had been so busy denying it could ever happen to him again that now he had to scramble to recall what the doctor had told them.
“Has your water broken?”
Zoe nodded, but didn’t say anything as her face contorted with another effort.
“Any blood or anything?”
Zoe shook her head side to side, still panting hard.
“Do you feel like you need to push?”
Again she shook her head. Then her face began to relax, and her panting slowed to a stop.
Jake desperately wished he could talk to his father. Dad would know what to do. How much time did she have? He tried punching in his father’s cell number but got the same dead air result. He closed his eyes and tried to recall everything he’d learned in that session at the fire station about how labor progressed.
The first thing that came back to him now was a disconcerting discussion about the stages of dilation. The idea of looking to find out just how advanced Zoe’s labor was made him squirm with embarrassment. But what if the baby’s head was already showing? Oh God! What if it’s just like Karen?
Jake didn’t want to think about that night with Karen. “Mind if I . . . kind of take a look and see . . . see if I can . . . see anything?” What would he do if he could see Molly’s head? His gut tightened and his heart raced.
When he’d happened upon Karen Ostringer’s car at the side of the road, he’d thought he was stopping to help a motorist in distress. What he’d found was Karen sprawled across the back seat, her knees spread and a baby’s head already emerging. He hadn’t had time to be either embarrassed or afraid before the tiny mite slipped into his shaking hands.
“I don’t mean to embarrass you, but—”
Zoe nodded, looking equally uncomfortable with the request. “Good thing I didn’t get upstairs to get clean panties when my water broke.” She giggled nervously. A hot rush of mortification surged into Jake’s face in spite of the urgency and fear.
“We’re going to get through this, Zoe. Try to relax between contractions. I’m going to get a couple of those towels. I’ll be right back. I promise.” He was delaying, and he knew it. But he had to get out of there for a minute. He had to get a grip
on himself.
He snatched up his flashlight and hurried to the kitchen. He grabbed two more towels from the drawer by the door, then stopped at the sink to get one of them wet. He noticed the little blue box sitting on the windowsill. Closed now, but still there. He wondered if the ring was still inside. Then he heard Zoe call out. He forgot about the box and dashed back to the living room.
Zoe was panting hard again. Man, but the contractions were close together. Please, God, he prayed, not sure what he was praying for.
“Do you want to lie down or stay where you are?” he asked when the contraction had passed.
“Lie down, I think,” she answered in an uncertain voice.
Jake grabbed one of the clean sheets he’d dumped earlier and spread it out over the carpet. Then he helped Zoe from the chair and eased her down onto the floor. Pillows! She needed pillows. He checked the couch but there were only two tiny decorative ones there.
He started for the stairs, but Zoe grabbed his hand. Another contraction was starting. While he waited for it to pass, he remembered the little rabbit Marsha had used to help her concentrate when they’d gone through childbirth classes. Did Zoe have a talisman? He ran through other things he should collect when he made a dash upstairs. Baby things. Receiving blankets at least. But first he needed to look and see if the baby’s head was showing. He couldn’t avoid it any longer. There might still be time to go for help.
“Zoe?” Jake pushed her damp curls off her face. “First I’m going to take a look . . . down there. Then, I’m going upstairs to get some pillows and stuff for the baby. Do you have a talisman? Something you practiced with, I mean?”
Zoe smiled weakly. “In a blue overnight bag, beside my closet door. There’s a—just bring the whole bag down.”
Jake gave her hands a reassuring squeeze and then let go. As he slid the hem of her skirt up past her knees, embarrassment made his skin prickle. He took a quick look, then sucked in a lungful of air. He’d been holding his breath and hadn’t realized it. Nothing showing. Nothing except the parts of Zoe he had no business looking at. Intimate places. His face felt beet red.
“Look, Zoe. I can’t see Molly’s head or anything. So there’s probably still time for me to get out to my van and go after medical help. You should be—”
“Noooo!” Zoe’s panicked voice rose to a squeak as she shot up and grabbed for him.
Jake pulled her into his embrace, burying her face against his chest. “Okay, babe. Okay. I won’t go. Just—take it easy.” He was so far from taking it easy it amazed him his own voice didn’t squeak.
Get a grip, he admonished himself. So maybe he wasn’t a trained EMT, but he had been trained to keep his head in an emergency. He just needed to focus on Zoe and stay cool. Lots of preemies made it just fine without any special help.
He felt her body clench with tension. He rocked her gently, waiting for the spasm to pass. “It’ll be okay, babe. I promise,” he whispered into her hair.
“Bree told me you delivered a baby once,” Zoe said as soon as the contraction let up.
Jake didn’t want to think about it. “Yeah, once. But I didn’t have a choice that time.”
“So, maybe you don’t have a choice this time either.”
“But—”
“Please, Jake. I’m afraid to do this alone. What if you go, and then you can’t get back again?”
That possibility hadn’t occurred to Jake. He knew he could get back to the van, and he’d been focused on that as his only alternative to get help with his cell phone not working. But there could be flooding. There could be more trees down. The idea of Zoe delivering her baby alone and terrified sent a shock wave of horror through his system that successfully overrode his own desire to turn this whole mess over to someone else. If only he could talk to his father. Reluctantly, Jake gave up the idea of going for reinforcements. “Okay. We’ll do this together. But I have to run upstairs and get those things.”
Jake took the stairs two at a time. He found the bag right where she’d said it would be. Then he tucked all four pillows from her bed under his arm. On the way across to the nursery, he pulled his cell out and tried again, hoping against hope that he might get a signal up here. Still nothing. Must be a tower down or something.
In the nursery, he opened a drawer and shined his flashlight into it. Tiny socks and lots of little pink outfits. He yanked open the second drawer and found blankets, T-shirts and onesies. He scooped up a fistful of blankets and one shirt. A stack of diapers sat right on top, so he grabbed a couple of those as well. He took a quick look around, but nothing else leapt out at him as necessary, so he hurried back downstairs with his haul.
When he got to the living room Zoe had her eyes closed and her mouth pursed as she blew out short little puffs of air. He waited until she was done, then put the overnight bag next to her. He lifted her shoulders and shoved the pillows behind her. “Better?”
“Much!” Zoe shuddered gratefully and shifted her weight against the pillows. “Jake?” She swallowed convulsively. “Thank you. For coming back to check on me. And for not leaving me alone.”
He reached out to push a tangle of sweaty curls behind her ear. He hoped his own fear and inadequacy didn’t show. She was already calmer now that she had extracted his promise to stick with her.
Zoe rummaged in her little bag and finally drew out a little blue Smurf. She seemed a little self-conscious as she set it down on the edge of the ottoman. Jake glanced at it and snorted, temporarily surprised out of his fear.
The little blue Smurf was rigged out in a yellow fire jacket with a fire hose in its hand.
“Anyone you know?” His heart skipped a few beats.
“I named him Jake. I hope you don’t mind.”
Confusion and hope warred in Jake’s chest. The jeweler’s box still sat on her windowsill, and Zoe had wanted to call Porter. But she’d named her talisman Jake. And it was a fireman, not a lawyer.
“Tell me about the other baby.” Zoe cut into his thoughts.
“What other baby?”
“The other . . . one you . . . delivered.” Zoe gasped and began panting.
Jake reached for the Smurf fireman and held it where she could see it. “Focus, babe. Focus.” She held his free hand in a punishing grip but kept her eyes on the little fireman as directed.
When the contraction was over, Zoe prompted, “Tell me about the other baby.”
“That was a long time ago.” The less she knew about that outcome, the better.
“But not likely something you’d forget.”
Like he could forget how tiny the little mite had been. Or how still. Or how helpless Jake had felt trying to breathe life into its premature lungs.
“But you don’t want to tell me about it?” Zoe urged, her eyes calmer now and bright with interest.
“I’d rather not.”
“Why?”
“The story doesn’t have a happy ending.”
Zoe frowned. “Bree said you were like a Good Samaritan, or something.”
Jake closed his eyes, trying to think of a good reason not to tell her the whole sorry story. He heard her gasp and start breathing hard and kept his eyes shut. Maybe she’d just drop it.
Zoe whimpered, and Jake’s eyes flew open. She had hers pinched shut, and a look of pain radiated across her face. Already he was failing her.
He touched her cheek. “Open your eyes, babe. Look at Little Jake. You can do this.”
She opened her eyes and focused on the Smurf. Of course she could do it. The question was, could he? That other woman had meant nothing to him.
Zoe sagged against the pillows and relaxed her grip again. “You’re not going to tell me, are you?”
How could she be so determinedly focused on this in the midst of her own crisis? “I’ll tell you later.
Right now I need to focus on you.” And he needed to get visions of Karen and her doomed infant out of his head.
Jake leaned down to kiss Zoe’s forehead. She began to pant again. Jake snuck another peek under her skirt. Still no head showing. At least this time, he didn’t blush, and he took long enough to assess what he was looking at. He held the little Smurf fireman for her to focus on. It felt like it might have been longer since the last contraction. He checked his watch. It had been. Should he be worried about that? He wished he could at least talk to his father.
Jake settled Zoe back onto her pillows. Then he checked his cell again. Still no signal. “Relax, babe, I think it’s going to be a while. You need to save your energy.”
Zoe squirmed with mortification. Five minutes ago . . . a half an hour ago, or however long it had been since Jake had found her squatting by the kitchen door overcome with pain, she’d been too terrified to feel embarrassed. But suddenly the intensity had faded, and the reality of her situation hit home.
Maybe there was time for Jake to go for help. Maybe even time to get to the hospital. Should she let him try?
A bolt of panic shot through her all over again. Her mother had been alone when Zoe’s baby brother was born. By the time someone found her, she was unconscious. Bobby had lived, but her mother hadn’t. Zoe had been told her mother’s uterus had just worn out. Too many babies had robbed it of the resilience needed to contract and stop the bleeding. Zoe was younger, and this was her first baby, but the thought of being alone still terrified her. Alone was far worse than the indignity of Jake seeing her like this. If she couldn’t have Bree, Jake was the next best friend she had.
Hurricane Gertie howled outside. Zoe’s windows whistled under the onslaught, and bits of debris and broken branches rattled against the sides of the house. It would have been scary enough even if she hadn’t been in labor.
“Please, don’t leave me.” She sounded like a coward, but she couldn’t help it.