by Jane Toombs
“How long did that one last?” he asked. When she told him, he realized the contractions were lasting a little longer each time.
For several minutes she watched him pile the pieces of cloth onto the coffee table he’d pushed aside. “I’m certainly inconveniencing you,” she said finally.
“Emergencies are what cops are for.” He reinforced his words with a smile. Poor kid, she needed all the reassurance he could dig up.
“I’m so glad—” she paused, wincing. “Another one. Really powerful.”
A minute or two later, she said, “Um, Dan?”
“What is it?”
“I didn’t have a partner for my birthing classes. If I tell you what to do, would you mind holding my hand and helping me breathe the right way?”
Between contractions, she explained his role. He edged the chair closer, took her hand in his and breathed with her. “You’re doing fine, Fay. We’ll get through this together.”
“Together,” she murmured and then moaned, caught up in a contraction he thought would never end.
“Come on, breathe with me,” he told her.
Damn. He figured that pretty soon he’d have to do more than put a hand on her abdomen and that scared the hell out of him. The baby’s head comes out first, he reminded himself. Normally face down. That’s when he was supposed to tell her to push. He thought he remembered the instructor saying to try not to let the baby pop out too fast because it might injure the mother. He gritted his teeth, unsure of how to prevent that. Tell her not to push?
When the contraction ended, he got up, hurried to the phone and lifted the receiver. Still dead. As it undoubtedly would be until the storm was over. He straightened his shoulders. Okay. It was up to him. He could do this. He’d never failed an assignment yet. He’d never had one this tough, though.
“You’re limping,” Fay said.
To think she’d noticed with as much strain as she was under. “My leg’s almost healed,” he said.
Her contractions came closer and closer together. “I think something’s leaking out,” she said after the last one. She’d already put her knees up, with her feet flat on the couch, legs spread apart.
“I feel like pushing.” She gritted the words out.
He didn’t want to keep the baby from coming out, but he placed his hand against the opening as she pushed.
Fay’s breathing came in gasping grunts now and he took his hand away and saw the baby’s head. He then caught the baby as it slid out.
But something wasn’t right. She wasn’t crying. Was she breathing? The instructor’s voice came back to him. “Hold the baby upside down, insert your little finger in its mouth and extract any mucus that might be blocking the baby’s airway.”
Holding his breath, he followed through. A glob of mucus dribbled from the baby’s mouth, she coughed, then emitted a tiny wail. A moment later she was howling full throttle. He expelled his breath in a great sigh of relief.
“She’s a girl,” he told Fay as he laid the baby on her abdomen.
Fay raised her head to look at her daughter and smiled. “Isn’t she beautiful?”
“She sure is,” he answered absently, alarmed anew at the amount of blood soaking the towels.
“Is it all over?” Fay asked after a minute or so.
“Not yet.”
“In my prenatal class, they said the nurse would massage my abdomen after the baby was born to help expel the afterbirth.”
Dan was willing to try anything. He slid the baby higher up on Fay, and as gently as he could, he began to massage Fay’s abdomen.
“I think you have to do it harder,” she said.
He increased the pressure. The afterbirth came out and the blood flow diminished. But it seemed to him she’d lost quite a bit. A lot more than that woman who he’d helped deliver her fifth child. Too much?
“All over,” he told her.
Once he’d tied off the cord and severed it, he wrapped the baby girl in one of the small blankets he’d cut and lifted her cautiously, supporting her along his left arm while holding her there with his right. He eased her into the wood-box and returned to Fay.
“Got to get you cleaned up,” he told her. “I’ll let the back of the Morris chair down and carry you over there while I fix up the couch. You’ll be able to look into the crib from there.”
As she watched him, she said, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a chair like that. It’s sort of like a lawn chair but made of wood.”
“Really old—my grandfather’s.”
“Put plastic over it first.”
Dan obeyed, then lifted her into his arms, surprised at how light she felt. Once she was settled into the Morris chair, he disposed of everything that had been on the couch.
“I wish I felt strong enough to clean up my baby,” she said when he returned. “I’m pretty well out of commission right now, though.”
“Don’t worry about it. After what you’ve been through, you need to rest.”
Her gaze met his and, for the first time he noticed that her eyes were hazel, somewhere in between green and brown. Her pallor disturbed him.
“After what we’ve been through,” she corrected. “You said we’d do this together and we did.”
Her words warmed him as he put new plastic on the couch and covered it with the last of the flannel sheets.
“If you’ll get me a basin of water,” Fay said, “I’ll clean myself up a bit before I go back to the couch.” She nodded toward the remainder of the old towels he hadn’t used. “If you just put those on the back of the couch so they’ll be handy later, when I need them.”
Dan busied himself with gently washing the baby while Fay washed herself. When she finished, he carried her back to the couch and she stretched out with a sigh as he covered her with the quilt. He’d no more than turned away, when the baby began crying.
“She may be hungry,” Fay said.
Damn. He hadn’t even thought of the baby needing nourishment. While there was food enough for him and for Fay, there was nothing for a baby.
“If you’ll bring her to me, I’ll see if she’ll nurse,” Fay said.
Stupid of him not to think of that. He was more rattled by all that had happened than he’d thought.
Fay had bared a breast by the time he carried the baby to her and, fascinated, he watched as the tiny girl found the nipple and began to suck. Then, realizing he was staring, he flushed and turned away, muttering, “Sorry.”
“I don’t mind,” Fay said. “Nursing a child is a natural act, after all, just like childbirth.”
It was certainly true he found nothing sexual about it. He’d felt privileged to have assisted at a miracle.
Turning back he touched the baby’s head lightly with his finger. “She is beautiful,” he said softly.
As he seated himself in the Morris chair, he realized Fay was also beautiful, something he’d been too distracted to notice until this moment. She was unnaturally pale right now; she wore no makeup, and her dark brown hair hung limply around her face. Still, none of that mattered. Beauty wasn’t always a matter of the right clothes, right hairdo or the right makeup.
As for the baby, holding that tiny body had made him understand for the first time his ex-wife’s inner need to have a child. There was something about the warmth and helplessness of a baby that triggered something deep within. Yes, even in him, the man who’d vowed never to bring a child of his own into this dangerous and imperfect world.
Chapter Two
Once the drowsy baby finished nursing, Dan carried her back to the improvised crib. When he turned to Fay, he saw her eyes were closed. Good, she needed to sleep. Since neither of them required his help for the moment, he used this chance to duck out to the garage and start the generator. They needed electricity not only for the lights, but for the well pump, so they could have running water. He’d warm the water in the wood kitchen range for bathing the baby and for Fay.
He got into his winter gear, tied a scarf acros
s his face and headed for the back shed. As he opened the shed door, Fay cried out, “Don’t leave me!”
He turned and saw her sitting up, staring at him.
“I wouldn’t do that.” He realized there was more indignation in his tone than reassurance. Didn’t she know he’d never desert her?
“You’re going out into that storm,” she wailed. “What if you can’t find your way back?”
“Just to the garage to turn on the generator. We need electricity. The garage is close to the back shed. Believe me, I won’t get lost.”
Fay watched him step into the shed and close the door, cutting off her view of him. She sank back down onto the couch, clutching her hands over her now deflated abdomen, feeling more tired than she could ever remember. Daniel Sorenson was her lifeline. Hers and the baby’s.
She took deep breaths, trying to control what she knew was illogical panic. The emotion was strange to her. Cool, competent Fay Merriweather had always been the one others turned to when things went wrong. She’d never realized giving birth would make her feel so vulnerable. But then she’d never expected to have the baby in a wilderness log cabin during the worst storm she’d ever seen.
In a hospital there were doctors and nurses to take care of everything. Here all she had was Dan. If anything happened to him… She blocked that line of thought.
I have to be strong for my daughter, she told herself firmly. I will be strong.—which was easier said than done. But Dan would be back, he’d said so. She glanced toward the wood-box that was being used as her baby’s bed, and she smiled slightly as she made a decision.
She’d planned on the name Marie if she had a girl, but circumstances had changed her mind. Marie would be her daughter’s middle name, not her first. Fay’s eyes drooped shut. Half-asleep, she heard Dan reenter the cabin. She sighed and plunged into oblivion.
The sound of a baby’s wail roused her. For a moment or two, seeing unfamiliar surroundings, she couldn’t place where she was. Whose baby—? Then she heard a man’s voice. She turned her head and saw Dan lifting a baby—her baby—into his arms. She could tell it was daylight through the window, but the roar of the wind let her know the storm was still raging.
“You are one wet little peanut,” he said in a soft, teasing tone she knew was meant for the baby. “Good thing I got the generator going so I can use the washer, ’cause we definitely have a limited supply of dry diapers. Not to mention baby blankets. And only two safety pins.”
She watched as he laid the baby on the table and somewhat awkwardly removed the wet diaper and replaced it with a dry one, then wrapped her in a blanket. He picked her up again and turned toward Fay.
“Good morning,” she said.
“In some ways,” he agreed. “We’re okay, but the storm’s still stuck fast in the Upper Peninsula.” He crossed to her and handed down the baby who’d begun to cry again. “I think she’s saying she’s hungry.”
“You can call her Marie,” Fay told him as she arranged the child at her breast. For a moment, fully occupied with making sure Marie was sucking, then wincing just a little at the cramp nursing brought to her lower abdomen, she wasn’t looking at him. When she did, she saw he’d turned so he wasn’t facing her.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
Thinking he’d noticed her wince, she said, “Yes. Nursing is supposed to help interior healing.”
“That’s good.”
“You don’t have to keep looking away from me while I’m nursing,” she told him.
“I know it’s a normal process,” he said, “but it’s new to me.”
A tiny giggle escaped her. “New to me, too. It’s lucky Marie didn’t need to be taught what to do.”
He faced her again and nodded. “I—it’s sort of a personal thing between mother and child.”
Since he was looking at her almost with awe, Fay couldn’t help but understand how moved he was by watching her nurse little Marie. She found this incredibly touching.
After the baby finished nursing, Fay felt exhaustion creeping over her again. “Marie needs to be burped,” she said. “I don’t think I’m quite up to it at the moment. Maybe tomorrow. Could you—?”
Dan blinked. “Burped? How do I do that?”
“You hold her up on your shoulder so any air bubbles in her stomach can rise and come out. Otherwise they might make her stomach hurt.”
Fay watched him take the baby from her and position her carefully. It seemed to her each time he held Marie he did so with more confidence. They smiled at each other when they heard a soft but unmistakable burp. As he shifted the baby down to hold her in the crook of his arm, Fay noticed what had accompanied the burp.
“Uh-oh, she spit up a little on your shirt.”
“No problem. She couldn’t help it.” He looked down at Marie, his expression positively doting, which both amused and touched Fay.
As he crossed to lay the baby back in her makeshift bed, Fay threw back the quilt, sat up and plucked one of the old towel pieces from the couch back. She swung her feet to the floor, but when she started to get up, everything whirled alarmingly and she sank back down. Rats. No way could she make it on her own. She was going to need Dan’s aid to get to the bathroom and back. As if the poor guy hadn’t been already burdened enough.
“Need some help?” he asked, crossing to the couch.
“I’m afraid so. Sorry.”
“No need to be. You’ve been through a lot in the past eight hours.”
Once she reached the bathroom, Fay assured him she’d be okay until the trip back. Even if she had to do it by pure willpower alone, she thought. She had a vague memory of him undressing her and putting her in the shower before the baby was born, then dressing her in this way-too-big pajama top. Woozy as she’d been, she distinctly recalled the feel of his warm fingers against her breasts as he’d buttoned the top. The least she could do now was tend to her private needs alone, rather than embarrass them both.
But she was glad of his strength when she leaned against him as he led her back to the couch. He covered her with the quilt and it was all she could do to thank him before she fell into another deep sleep.
By the time Dan gathered up all the wet and soiled flannel sheets and diapers and baby blankets, he had a full load. Thank heaven his dad had installed the small washer with the dryer above it when he’d redone the bathroom.
If anyone had told me I’d be spending my administrative leave washing baby diapers, he thought, I’d have asked what he was on.
He wiped at the wet spot on his shoulder and stared at the few tiny milk curds on his fingers. Fay’s breast milk. He took a deep breath. Watching her breast-feed had triggered a strange new emotion, one he’d never felt before. It had nothing to do with lust or sex, but he was damned if he could figure out what it meant. Just like holding the baby and caring for her made him feel as though he’d been awarded some kind of privilege.
Whatever emotion it was unsettled him and he tried to reason it away. So they both needed him. So what. As a cop, plenty of people had needed his skills at one time or another. No reason to get all cranked up about it.
He started the washer, returned to the main room and put another log on the fire. He’d meant to make a meal for Fay, but she was sleeping so soundly he decided to wait. Rest was probably more important than food at the moment anyway. He’d sure hate to go through what she had, especially alone with a stranger in a cabin isolated by a storm.
He thought of his ex-wife and frowned. He couldn’t imagine Jean being as brave as Fay under the same circumstances. He stared down at Fay, dark lashes contrasting with too-pale cheeks, her brown hair tangled. Her eyes, he knew, were hazel, a sort of gold-green. She looked so vulnerable asleep, looked as helpless as her baby actually was.
He had no notion of how long it took a woman to recuperate from childbirth. Maybe she’d feel stronger tomorrow, as she’d said.
Little Marie whimpered, and he quickly moved to her side. She wriggled a little, but didn�
��t open her eyes. Blue eyes, he knew. Like his.
Come on, man, he scolded. Probably she had her father’s eyes. Besides, hadn’t he heard somewhere that babies’ eyes changed color when they got a little older?
The fine fuzz on top of her head was blond, also like his. He frowned impatiently. Marie was certainly not his daughter.
That had been one of the reasons he and Jean had gone their separate ways. He didn’t want children and she did. Something clutched at his heart as he looked down at the sleeping baby. What a world Marie would face as she grew up, danger lurking around every corner. He wasn’t a cop for nothing; he knew what kids had to cope with. None of his would ever have to, that was for sure. But it troubled him to think this little one would.
The next morning, when Fay tried to get up, she found she could make it all the way to the bathroom herself if she held on to furniture or the wall. But she still felt incredibly weak.
“I’ll have to ask you to go on taking care of Marie for another day,” she told him after she made it back to the couch. “I’m still sort of noodle-kneed.”
At his worried look, she added, “But I’m sure it’s only temporary.” What she meant was she hoped it was only temporary. Still, it had to be, didn’t it? “Any sign the storm’s letting up?”
He shook his head. “Usually these spring storms are three-dayers. Can last four, but no longer. We’re stuck here for a while yet.” As he spoke he brought her a tray of food, pulled the coffee table closer to her and set down the tray.
She eyed the toast and eggs with real hunger. “That gives me at least one more day to recuperate enough to ride into town, then.”
“More than one or two. The road’s private, so the county plows don’t come in here. The plow’s still on my truck, though, so I’ll get us out to the main road when the time comes. No use starting out from here unless the highway is cleared, and they won’t begin ’til the storm’s pretty well over. What I can do when the wind dies down is to go look for your car and bring back your stuff. Any idea how far you were from the cabin when you had the crash?”