by Caro Carson
“Do you think he’s hungry?” she asked Caden. Him, as if he knew anything more about babies than she did.
“I don’t know. He’s furious about something, though, for sure. Maybe it was something I said.”
Tana grinned a little, even with a crying baby in her arms, but her mother was the voice of experience. “He’s hungry. At this stage, they’re either hungry or asleep.”
“He’s been wide-awake for Caden.” But Tana’s protest was mild. She probably didn’t want to test their fragile truce. “So, um...if he’s hungry...we’re trying to figure out the whole breastfeeding thing, so...”
Her dad left the room like it was on fire.
Caden managed not to laugh outright as he checked with Tana. “I’ll be going, then?” It was a question, because he’d promised her last evening that he wouldn’t leave her when she wanted him to stay.
She nodded, blushing profusely. Kind of adorable, after what they’d been through together. “I’ll watch for your fire truck out the window.”
“Fire engine.” The baby was wailing, and Tana was sort of patting the collar of her hospital gown, looking distressed. It was a really bad time to realize he didn’t have her number, and she didn’t have his. He spoke while backing out of the room. “If you need anything, just call the station. Anything at all. Anytime.”
“Oh—yes, I don’t have your number. My address is on the birth certificate. You should come see the baby.”
Her mother shooed him the rest of the way out of the room. “Come in a couple of weeks. Mothers and babies have a lot to figure out. People always give new mothers a couple of weeks before they start expecting them to receive visitors. Don’t visit if you have a cold, even then.”
It sounded so reasonable, but Caden hated it instinctively. Two weeks seemed like a very long time. He looked back at Tana to see if two weeks sounded right to her, but she’d untied the top of her gown and was holding a screaming baby, and she looked a little desperate for him to go, so he left.
Two weeks. Fourteen days. He could make it.
* * *
Ten days later, Caden couldn’t wait an hour longer.
He stood outside Tana’s apartment door with the tiniest pair of cowboy boots he’d been able to buy, one of the plastic toy fire helmets they gave kids at the station, which was still bigger than the whole baby, and flowers. He figured he could give Tana flowers even if they were just friends, because Ruby had left flowers in her hospital room that first day.
Caden knocked.
He felt like a little kid about to tear the wrapping paper off a gift to see what it was, only he knew the gift was Tana. The door couldn’t open fast enough for him. He would have been here at eight days, but he’d gotten forced at work, which was their slang for being assigned to work back-to-back twenty-four-hour shifts without notice. Forced was an even more accurate term than usual, since he’d had plans to come see Tana.
Ten days was his absolute limit. Her mother would just have to understand. He hadn’t laughed in ten days the way he laughed with Tana.
He heard a dead bolt sliding open.
Everything’s good. That’s what he’d say when the door opened. He couldn’t say I love you. Not yet. Someday.
Then the door opened, and Tana stood before him, and he couldn’t say anything at all.
She wore nothing but a man’s shirt.
His.
He’d last seen that shirt when he’d tucked it over her baby in the truck. It sure looked different now. The snaps were open at the top, exposing her throat and collar bones. The tails ended high on her thighs, making her long legs look longer. His gaze dropped to her bare feet, to the slender ankle he’d held more than once. That seemed intimate, suddenly, to know the feeling of wrapping his hand around her ankle. Her hair was coming undone from a ponytail, the way it would look if it were messy from a pillow. Messy from his hands, the night before.
She looked like she’d spent the night in his bed, and she’d raided his closet for something to wear for breakfast.
She looked like sex.
That wasn’t what she was supposed to look like. Not yet. They were friends for now. He was here to enjoy talking to her. Everything’s good.
“Caden. Hi.”
“Hi.” He nodded toward the mother-of-pearl snaps in the middle of her chest. “That’s my shirt.”
What a stupid thing to say. His brain had run away with his imagination.
“I’m so sorry.” She snapped two buttons up, standing right there in the doorway. “I was going to go to the fire station and return it. I washed it, but the baby spits up a lot, and I’m running out of things that button up the front, because—” She pressed her hand to her cleavage. “This. I needed something that wasn’t too tight, because—” She brushed her hand over her stomach. “That. I couldn’t find anything else that was clean, because I haven’t gotten any laundry done. Not the baby’s laundry, though. His stuff is all clean. I wash all the baby’s stuff, and I’ll wash your shirt again and return it. I just—I just needed it today.”
Somewhere in the middle of that explanation, Caden’s brain did a 180 and came back. Tana’s explanation was too long, almost babbling, and wholly unnecessary. He paid attention to her face, her eyes. She might be dressed like a girlfriend who’d spent the night, but she was a new mother, and her eyes looked tired.
His hands were full of gifts. He reached out to nudge her with the tiny cowboy boots. “Are you okay?”
For one unguarded moment, he saw how miserable she was.
Then she swallowed and stood up straighter and smiled at a spot somewhere in the hallway behind her. “The baby’s better than okay. He’s doing great. He eats a lot, every two or three hours. He’s supposed to. I got a book on it.” Then her gaze came back to Caden, brown eyes shining. “He’s so amazing, Caden. I stop what I’m doing and go watch him sleeping sometimes, because I love him so much. You should see him.”
“I’d love to.” He waited a beat. “Can I come in?”
“I have to warn you, the place is a mess. These boots are so cute. Thank you. I’ll put the flowers in water in a minute. I’m sorry the place is such a mess.”
He glanced around as she shut the door and locked it behind him, dead bolt and all, as if someone might intrude on their visit. There was a lot of clothing draped over the usual furniture. Nice couch, ladder-back chairs around a dining room table, everything piled with baby blankets and shirt after shirt after shirt. Some glossy junk mail stuck out from under a pile of towels on the coffee table, and several bouquets were lined up on top of a bookcase, all of them wilted and shedding petals.
He shrugged. “I’ve seen worse.”
“Where? At a fraternity house?”
Even when she was exhausted, she made him smile.
“You don’t have potato chips ground into your carpet.” He put the plastic hat on her head. “You should see my place after a poker night.”
“The hat’s for me?”
“It’s for Sterling. That’s the smallest I could find. I don’t expect you to save it until he grows into it. Could take a decade or two.” He shouldn’t have put the hat on her. She looked too much like a firefighter’s flirty girlfriend.
“The baby’s not awake yet, so here, sit here.” She started pulling clothes off a chair for him, piling them higher on another one. “Most of these are baby clothes and blankets. My neighbor gave them to me, since I hadn’t really done a lot of shopping yet. That was supposed to be last Sunday’s activity. Lamaze on Saturday, baby shopping on Sunday. Anyway, I washed them. I just haven’t put them away. I should have found something of my own to wear, but your plaid shirt was easy to spot in all these pastel baby things, so...”
“Tana, I’m not too worried about your laundry. I’m a dude.” He sat in the chair she’d cleared, so she would sit at the table, too.
“You don’t have to be so nice. I know it looks a mess. It’s afternoon, and I haven’t gotten around to a shower yet. I will, though, I hope. I need to wash my hair. I keep throwing it up in a ponytail. Maybe I’ll just keep this fire hat on from now on.”
“Seems practical. The house looks fine. You look fine, too. You look...” You look like you’re mine. My shirt, my hat, my sexy forever-girl.
She waited for him to finish his sentence. “I look indescribable?”
“You look cozy in plaid.” He was pretty proud of himself for coming up with that one. “Like a lumberjack tucked in a log cabin.”
She stared at him for a moment, and then she groaned and buried her face in her hands, but she was laughing, a real laugh, and it made his heart happy. “Now I know why you have ex-girlfriends. Never tell a woman she looks like a lumberjack.”
Caden knew that. He’d just wanted to make her laugh, and he’d succeeded.
She took off the hat and looked around. “I lost my water cup. I’m supposed to be drinking all this extra water. There’s a lot of things to do. The books are very clear on counting diaper changes, and... I forget the other things. Would you like a glass of water?”
While Caden was trying to decide if she was so chatty because she was exhausted or because he was making her nervous, he followed her to the kitchen. Like much of the university campus, this building was historic—which, in Texas, meant nineteenth century—so the kitchen and living room weren’t one open, modern space. He was too big to fit in the kitchen with Tana, so he stayed just outside the doorway. Dishes were piled up on every surface.
He was having a hard time trying to keep things light and friendly. His gut feeling was that Tana was normally the neat and tidy type, all clipboards and khaki shorts with crisp seams. Sure enough, she started apologizing for the mess again.
He interrupted. “Where’s your mother?”
“She left, um, sometime last week. What day is today?”
Mrs. McKenna had left her daughter. She’d told Caden to stay away, and then she’d left? Damn it, he should have listened to his gut. He shouldn’t have waited one day, let alone ten.
“What happened? You made things pretty clear at the hospital. Did she say something negative about Sterling?” The possibility made him so mad, so quickly.
“I didn’t kick her out. Everything stayed good between us with the baby. He wants to be held all the time, and it’s really hard to do everything one-handed, so she held him a lot. I got the laundry folded and put away. I cooked hot meals, too. But...”
Shouldn’t Tana have gotten to hold the baby while her mother did the laundry?
“What was I getting? Oh—water. My cup’s probably in the other room.”
He trailed her back to the living room. “But?”
“She said I was a good mother. That was nice to hear, but I apparently still don’t know how to load my own dishwasher correctly. Towels should be folded in thirds, and you shouldn’t top off the flower vases with water, you should dump it all out and then start with fresh water.” Tana wrinkled her nose, sending Caden right back to a September night and a patient he’d thought looked too cute when she wrinkled her nose. “She might have been right about the vases.”
She was even cuter now, obviously exhausted and going through big changes, but she was still hanging in there, still trying to find the humor in her situation. She still reminded him of his mare, the one they’d rescued on Thanksgiving. He’d officially adopted the horse in January, shortly after the swim meet. He hadn’t been able to stand the possibility that he’d go out to the ranch and find her gone, not after he’d let Tana go.
Since women didn’t take kindly to being compared to ranch animals any more than they did to lumberjacks, he kept the thought to himself.
“I felt good, so when Mom mentioned her book club meeting, I said she shouldn’t miss it. Everything was under control.” Tana picked up a huge plastic mug. Tick marks for the ounces were marked down the side, along with the hospital logo. “See? I’m drinking a lot. You don’t even have to ask.”
“Your mother left, so who’s been helping you out instead?”
He knew the answer was no one. He wanted to be wrong.
“Ruby?” he asked.
“She came over and gave me a new bathrobe. It’s around here somewhere.” Tana tugged a few inches of blue satin out from under a pile of terrycloth, then gave up. “It’s pretty. Needs to be washed on delicate and line dried. I’ll get it done. This isn’t as disorganized as it looks.”
Caden tried to remember who else she’d mentioned as a possible Lamaze coach. “Shirley?”
“She brought me a casserole when my mom was here.”
Shirley must have assumed Tana’s mom was staying longer, too. He was so angry at himself for assuming the same.
“You should have called the station.”
“There was no fire.”
“You know what I mean, Tana. You can call on me for help. Anytime.”
She turned away and started brushing dead petals off the bookcase into her palm, acting as nonchalant as if she were a hostess in high heels and a dress, instead of a woman with bare feet, wearing the last clean shirt she could find. “Why do you think I can’t handle this? I know the house has exploded, but I’m doing better than I look. I’m even writing a postseason summary for my performance review. It’ll go in the alumni magazine, too. Hopefully, we’ll get some donations to the swimming program. I can do this. The baby wakes up and I nurse him, and then he sleeps for two or three hours, so I have time to get my work done. Piece of cake.”
“Every two or three hours? For ten days?” Caden was shocked. No wonder she looked so exhausted.
There was nowhere for her to put the petals in her hand, so she put them back on the bookcase, a neat, pastel pile on one corner.
Through an open bedroom door, a newborn’s wail of distress pierced the silence.
“He’s awake,” Tana said, and she burst into tears.
Chapter Sixteen
The baby was crying.
Tana opened her eyes, but it was pitch-black in her bedroom. Was this the midnight feeding? The three a.m.? She couldn’t remember what time she’d gotten into bed. She usually just slept on the sofa between midnight and three, if she couldn’t keep her eyes open any longer. The bedroom was for that brief, heavenly nap between three and seven-ish. If it were seven, though, it wouldn’t be pitch-black.
This was so hard. She’d already lost track of the days of the week. Now she was losing morning and night.
She rolled over, ready to stick her hand in the bedside bassinet to pat Sterling and let him know she was there for him. If he didn’t cry too furiously at first, she’d be able to grab a granola bar, so she could eat while he was nursing. How many meals in a row could she eat granola bars before nutrition got to be an issue? Did the book say anything about that?
Her hand met air. Nothing. No bassinet.
She bolted out of bed, tripping over the bed sheets. The baby’s cry was coming from another room. What—who—how—?
It clicked: Caden. He must have rolled the bassinet out of her bedroom. He’d stopped by this afternoon with a pair of tiny cowboy boots, and he’d stayed. After she’d burst into tears, he hadn’t believed anything she’d said about everything being under control.
He was right. It wasn’t. But it could be. She just had to figure it out how other single mothers did it.
A little sleep was all she needed, and that was what Caden had tempted her with to let him stay. Nothing major—he could pick up Sterling when he cried, change his diaper, then bring him to Tana. She could stay horizontal, if not asleep, for more than two consecutive hours. If she showed him how to change a diaper, he’d be her butler, bringing her a baby who was freshly changed and ready to nurse.
A baby butler? She’d given in to the temptation.
She’d assumed Caden would leave. Midnight was when bars were closing, movies were over, people were going home. She hadn’t expected him to change the next diaper and bring the baby to her the next time, too. Why would he do that? He wasn’t her ex-boyfriend.
He’s so into you, you lucky witch. Ruby had always maintained that Caden had the hots for Tana.
The possibility scared her. Love made people put on rose-colored glasses, so they couldn’t see the truth until it was too late. She hadn’t seen her husband’s manipulation until it had derailed her swimming career. Jerry’s carelessness had derailed her coaching career—nearly. Not quite yet.
When will you learn? Why couldn’t once be enough?
Sometimes, her mom was right. Tana had to rely on Tana. She couldn’t withstand the whole love-him, change-your-life-for-him, lose-him routine, not again.
It seemed unlikely that Caden had romantic intentions toward her, no matter what Ruby said, but why else would a man be so thoughtful and caring at a time like this?
Because he was her friend?
Ruby was her friend. Shirley was her friend. Bob Nicholls was her friend. They weren’t watching over a bassinet for her in the middle of the night. Caden must have a different motive. He must.
Tana stopped just outside the baby’s room. The nursery had a diaper changing table and a rocking chair. The crib was still in its box, but it was neatly sitting in a corner. The nightlight had a soft pink tint to it. Unlike the chaos in the rest of the house, everything was calm and lovely for the baby.
So was Caden. As he changed the baby’s diaper, he kept up a gentle monologue. His deep voice would have lulled her back to sleep had she not been standing up.
“Shh, let your mommy sleep. Be patient for just another minute. This is only my third diaper change. It’s not like you’re an old pro here, either, little fellow.”