by Carol Arens
Lantree entered the dining room, wiping his hands on a white apron, wrinkled and smeared with blood.
He seemed different, even than he had when she’d left him a moment ago. This was something she felt more than she could see.
His grin was broad, his eyes alight with pleasure because things did point to Hershal’s recovery.
But there was something else about him... Perhaps a part of himself that had been missing, had been restored.
“He’s made it past the first and biggest hurdle,” he announced. “I think he will recover.”
“I don’t think it,” Barstow declared. “I know it.”
“He’s a tough old coot,” Tom said.
“Too full of love for us all to not pull through,” Melinda added.
“Anybody else wonder about the music?” Jeeter asked. “Was it maybe her calling him to come to her? Scared me out of my pants.”
“Or—” the line between Melinda’s eyes deepened while she thought “—maybe she was encouraging him to live.”
“That must be it, since that’s what he’s going to do.” Barstow stood up and clapped his hands. “Anybody hungry? I could eat a bear all of a sudden.”
Johnson rose from the chair he had been sitting on for the past two hours, silent for the most part.
“So, in your professional opinion, I don’t need to charge any of those fools tied up in the barn with murder?”
“Only attempted.”
He nodded, his long beard sliding up and down. “I’ll be on my way in the morning. See you all next time you’re in Coulson, if the town’s still got anybody in it by then.”
With a tip of his hat, Johnson opened the front door and ducked out into the rain to spend the night in the barn with his captives.
“Jeeter...Tom, make up a stretcher, will you? I’d like to get Hershal moved to his own bed before he comes to.”
The scent of fresh rain blew in the doorway when they went outside.
“That was the longest two hours of my life,” Melinda declared then used her crutch to ease down into one of the big stuffed chairs placed about the fireplace.
“You haven’t been standing on it all this time, have you?”
“How’s a body to pace fretfully while sitting in a chair?”
“You’ve stressed it tonight. Better let me have a look.”
Lantree ran his hand over her shin. “There doesn’t seem to be any damage. And...as fetching a look as it is, you might think about getting those snakes out of your hair.”
“I don’t know...some women wear bird nests in their hats. I might start a fashion.”
Rebecca laughed, she couldn’t help it. Maybe it was the relief of letting the stress go.
“I know what you are laughing at! What would Mama say if she could see me now?”
She nodded because she couldn’t speak. When she was spent, she fell into the extra-large chair that Grandfather had given her and closed her eyes.
“Keep off that leg all day tomorrow.”
“Yes, Dr. Walker.” Melinda gave Lantree a radiant smile. “And someday when I have a baby, I want you to bring it into the world.”
From where he still knelt beside Rebecca’s chair, he glanced over at her. Their gazes locked.
Something shifted in her husband’s eyes... It fell into place within him and she knew what it was.
She was married to a physician.
Epilogue
Nine months later
Rebecca placed her hands at the small of her back trying to rub away the ache.
By the saints, there wasn’t much chance of rubbing away the early stages of labor.
Lantree had told her what to watch for, had quizzed her each morning before he rode out to check the herds for cows ready to give birth.
“At least you don’t have to ride the hills looking for me,” she had told him that morning with a playful nudge to his ribs.
And a very good thing, too. She’d had a mild cramp an hour earlier and now another one.
“Sit down, Rebecca,” Grandfather said. “You’ll wear the wax off the floor.”
“You are going to spoil that bird with all the peppermint sticks you give him. Last time I tried to give him a nut, he dropped it on the floor.”
“I like spoiling him.” Grandfather made kissing noises to Screech, who made kissing noises to his candy.
She stroked her belly. Her normally vigorous child had become quiet of late.
Her very own Dr. Walker had assured her that was often how it went in the hours before birth.
He would know. Since September he had delivered several babies for the settlers arriving by train.
The area was becoming more populated every day. Lantree had put out his shingle on a building that he rented behind the sawmill. He went downriver once a week to see to his patients. Generally, it was an overnight trip to get there, tend those in need and then get home again.
Even though Lantree had taken up his former career as a physician, he hadn’t quit the one he had at Moreland Ranch.
The ranch was his now...and hers.
She had fallen in love with a cowboy and was glad that the earthy, dusty man had not really changed, only become the person he was meant to be.
A horse’s hooves sounded in the yard. Rebecca went to the window, disappointed to see that it was not her husband.
There had been another cramp and only twenty minutes had passed.
Melinda came down the stairs, looking fresh in a pale blue gown with a ruffled white apron.
She twirled about then stopped, letting the gown settle about her ankles.
“Well, what do you think, Becca? Do I look like a nurse?”
She didn’t, not quite, but she would certainly cheer the patients up, if nothing else.
In the beginning, Rebecca had gone to the mill with Lantree to help him, but lately she had grown too cumbersome for that.
Melinda was going to take her place.
“I saw a man in the yard,” her cousin said. “I’ll find out what he wants.”
“Take Grandfather with you,” Rebecca called but Melinda’s laughter echoed behind her and out onto the porch.
While the men who had been a danger to them were dead or in prison, that did not mean that everyone who rode up to the door in this remote area was good and kind.
A moment later Melinda escorted the fellow into the great room.
Slightly built, he held his hat in his hand and twisted it as though he were nervous.
“This is Mr. Stanley Smythe, come to see Lantree,” Melinda said. “He assured me that he has nothing contagious.”
Rebecca extended her hand in greeting at the same time as a stronger cramp threatened to double her up.
“Please have a seat, Mr. Smythe.” She indicated one of the seven in front of the hearth. “Mr. Walker will be here shortly...I hope.”
“You do?” Melinda eyed her sharply, looking back and forth between her belly and her face.
“Yes.”
“I’ll go fetch him.”
“Let Jeeter do it. Maybe you can—” She took a long slow breath, the way Lantree had instructed her to do. Yes, that worked, much better now. “Get some refreshment for Mr. Smythe.”
“I’ll fetch Jeeter to fetch Lantree.” Grandfather rose from his chair, only a bit slower than he had been at this time last year. Considering all he had been through he was doing remarkably well.
Rebecca eased down onto her chair. “Is there something I might help you with, sir?”
“No, this is business for Mr. Walker, and him alone.”
“I see,” she said, but she didn’t and wanted to very badly.
Lantree needed to get home and in a hurry.
&n
bsp; By George...here came another cramp, sooner and longer than the last one.
Melinda returned carrying a coffee mug in one hand and a plate with an assortment of pastries in the other.
Apparently, her cousin was also desperate to know Mr. Smythe’s secretive business, because she sat down beside him and shot him a winsome smile while she handed him the treats, then the coffee.
“How very brave of you to come all the way here to deliver a message. You must have encountered at least a few wolves and bears.” Melinda twirled a lock of hair about her finger, shivered her shoulders delicately. “Of course, you must be bursting to speak with Lantree... What a pity we do not know when he will return.”
“Straightaway, I would imagine,” Mr. Smythe said, shooting a glance at Rebecca then slanting a frown at Melinda.
That was odd. Very few men frowned at Melinda.
“Well, one never knows,” Melinda continued, clearly undaunted by her inability to instantly enchant Mr. Smythe. No doubt she now considered him a challenge and was redoubling her efforts. “Perhaps you would like to rest from your travels upstairs. Mrs. Walker and I will be pleased to deliver your message.”
“I don’t doubt it.”
Boots pounded the front stairs two at a time.
Lantree burst into the room breathing hard, a fine sheen of sweat glistening on his brow.
He greeted her with a long, slow kiss just like he always did. She melted into the scent of him, the press of his muscular body against hers...never mind that there was a stranger in the room.
“Lantree, this is Mr. Stanley Smythe. He—”
Lantree spared Mr. Smythe a brief nod, then ignored his diminutive presence completely. “Jeeter says it’s your time.”
“I think so...pretty sure, by George.”
Lantree scooped her up and carried her upstairs to the room they planned to use for the birth and confinement. Not that she planned on being confined for long.
He set her gently on the bed, tossed up her skirt then got down to the business of determining what was going on down below.
“Won’t be long now, Mama,” he announced with a grin. “I love you, Becca.”
“I love you, too.” She patted his cheek, rough with stubble. “Send up Melinda, then find out what it is that Mr. Smythe wants.”
“Here, let’s get you into something more comfortable.”
Lantree reached into the wardrobe, shuffled clothes about, then drew out the gown she had planned to labor in.
“Lie down, I’ll get your cousin.” He set the gown beside her on the bed.
As soon as Lantree left the room she got up and began to walk from the bed to the window, the window to the bed. Her husband might be the doctor in the family but during her time at the ranch she’d seen a number of animals giving birth. She had rarely noticed them lying down during labor.
Melinda hurried into the room with an armload of clean linens.
“It’s a girl, I feel the kinship clear to my bones. I do get to be called Auntie even though I’m a cousin?”
“Yes. Is Lantree speaking with Mr. Smythe?”
“Oh, well, no...I believe he forgot him in the rush to sterilize things.”
“I’m going back down.” Rebecca waddled toward the door. “It’s hardly right to ignore Mr. Smythe when he’s come all this way.”
Melinda walked beside her, clearly ready to assist if she became overcome by a contraction. Rebecca was fairly confident that it was not going to happen.
“If we hurry we might not miss what he has to say,” Melinda said.
Under her cousin’s watchful eye, she reached the bottom step.
Mr. Smythe was alone in the room, sitting on the couch, his head nodding sleepily.
“I don’t think we missed a thing,” Rebecca murmured, feeling relieved.
Lantree burst into the room with an apron full of shiny instruments.
“What are you doing downstairs?” he said.
He took her elbow as though he believed he could hustle her right back up.
All of a sudden Mr. Smythe stood.
“Mr. Walker, I’ve come on a matter of great importance.”
“Not now,” Lantree said, hustling her back toward the stairs.
“It’s concerning your brother, Boone Walker.”
Lantree released her elbow and spun toward Smythe.
“My—”
“Brother?” Rebecca supplied, because it seemed that her husband had suddenly forgotten how to string words together.
“Boone,” Melinda added helpfully.
“What do you know about him?” Lantree’s full attention shifted from her to Smythe.
“That he was arrested, tried and found guilty.”
Glum silence weighted the room. This was the worst possible news delivered at the worst possible time.
Not much could make this moment more alarming. Except for the gush of warm liquid dripping down her legs.
Lantree sat down hard on his chair and motioned for her to sit beside him. She shook her head. The last thing she was going to do right now was move from this spot and reveal the puddle.
“I was at the trial,” Smythe said. “So I’m compelled to say that there was some injustice done to your brother.”
“He did commit the crime,” Lantree pointed out.
“Such as it was.” Mr. Smythe lifted his chin, squared his shoulders and stood as tall as his small frame would allow. “Mr. Walker, I’m a lawyer, new to the practice I’ll admit, but with your backing, I’d like to represent your brother, get his verdict overturned.”
“Why?” Lantree asked at the very instant a cramp made her half-dizzy.
She thought that the lawyer’s answer had to do with wanting to make a name for himself, although it was hard to know for sure since her hearing had gone momentarily fuzzy.
Since she could postpone this no longer, she lifted her skirt.
“My water broke.”
Lantree bounded up from his chair. “See to Mr. Smythe, will you, Melinda?”
He swept Rebecca up in his arms for the second time this morning and carried her up the stairs like she, in her large condition, weighed no more than a sack of flour. By the saints, she’d never get used to his amazing strength.
Closing the bedroom door behind her with his foot, he lay her down on the bed then helped her out of her clothes and into her birthing gown.
“I think it’s time,” she gasped.
He checked her. “Not quite, love.”
“But it must be!”
He shook his head, grinning. “But everything looks as it should.”
“In that case, I’m thirsty.”
“I’ll send Melinda up while I finish with the lawyer.” He kissed her forehead. “I’ll be right back.”
Melinda brought up tea.
“What a pretty day to be born,” her cousin announced, twirling into the room and setting the tray on the bedside table.
She sat down on the mattress beside her, smiling and clearly excited over everything that was going on.
“In the event that it does happen today. I feel like my insides are coming out and all my doctor says is ‘not yet’...and then he grins.”
“Well, he is a man.”
“And if he weren’t I wouldn’t be—” she had to stop speaking and concentrate on a wave of pain “—doing this.”
She began to shiver and feel sick to her stomach. Surely things were changing now.
She hadn’t noticed Lantree come into the room, but he was stroking her hair and saying something that made no sense to her because her concentration was focused on riding a contraction.
“Only another hour, is my guess.”
“Only! Are you insane?”
> “Could be sooner. I love you, Becca. You are doing a wonderful job.”
“Well, I resign... I...I need to push.”
“Let me check again and see if it’s time.”
After a moment, his head popped up from between her spread knees. He was grinning even broader than before.
“I’m going to, no matter what—”
“Go ahead, Becca. Bring our baby into the world.”
And so she did.
An hour later her baby girl, her pink and pretty miracle, suckled at her breast.
Rebecca drifted in a haze of contentment then woke up with a start near sunset.
Where was her daughter? Had she fallen asleep while suckling the baby? Had her baby slipped off the bed?
But no, there she was, cradled in her papa’s big arms while he strolled about the room humming a soft tune.
She drifted off again then woke with Lantree lying on the bed beside her, still holding the baby.
“I’m in love.” She sighed.
“Me, too.”
“I’ve never seen someone so beautiful.” And she truly had not.
“She looks like us both, I reckon, with those long fingers and toes.”
“I see her being very tall...and lovely,” she murmured.
“Like her mother.”
“I love you, Caroline Rose,” she said at the very same time Lantree said the same thing.
They laughed. Then, leaning across their sleeping infant, they kissed...long, slow and with a lifetime of joy arching between them.
* * * * *
Keep reading for an excerpt from RAKE MOST LIKELY TO REBEL by Bronwyn Scott.
We hope you enjoyed this Harlequin Historical.
You dream of wicked rakes, gorgeous Highlanders, muscled Viking warriors and rugged Wild West cowboys from another era. Harlequin Historical has them all! Emotionally intense stories set across many time periods.
Enjoy six new stories from Harlequin Historical every month!
Connect with us on Harlequin.com for info on our new releases, access to exclusive offers, free online reads and much more!
Other ways to keep in touch:
Harlequin.com/newsletters