by Terri Osburn
ALSO BY TERRI OSBURN
Ardent Springs novels
His First and Last
Our Now and Forever
Anchor Island novels
Meant to Be
Up to the Challenge
Home to Stay
More to Give
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Text copyright © 2016 Terri Osburn
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Montlake Romance, Seattle
www.apub.com
Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Montlake Romance are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.
ISBN-13: 9781503935037
ISBN-10: 1503935035
Cover design by Michael Rehder
For Lynnette
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
About the Author
Chapter 1
“We’ve got action in room four.”
The coffee Haleigh Mitchner had been pouring when Nurse Dottie Parish burst through the break room door splashed onto the counter. She resisted the urge to slurp the black fuel off the Formica.
“We’ve had three false alarms in the last six hours,” Haleigh said, dropping paper towels onto the mess. “At this rate, I might as well change careers from delivering babies to delivering pizzas. At least that would be a sure thing.”
And oh, how such a career downgrade would drive my mother bonkers.
False alarms came with the job description, as Haleigh knew well, but they made for a boring shift. County General served at least four towns in the surrounding area, which meant lots of babies took their first breath beneath its roof. Tonight, lots of babies were preferring to stay right where they were.
“You’re a laugh riot, doc,” the nurse said, holding the break room door open. “This one is not a drill. Now forget that mess and let’s go.”
“What do we have?” Haleigh asked, following the nurse into the hall.
“Jessi Rogers. Nineteen years old. BP 140 over 85. First pregnancy and it doesn’t sound like she’s had much prenatal care.” Dottie gave Haleigh a skeptical side-eye look. “She thinks she’s thirty-eight weeks. Fully dilated, we’ve had her pushing for fifteen minutes and she’s progressing fast.”
Adrenaline lit through Haleigh’s system. “Is the OB kit ready?” she asked. Even after bringing hundreds of babies into the world, the exhilaration never ebbed.
“All set up with a box of six and a half gloves, thanks to those false alarms.”
“Is she by herself?” Haleigh asked. Childbirth was scary in the best of situations. Being a petrified teenager with no support only made it more so.
“Not alone,” Dottie said. “She’s got a vise grip on a guy who looks about as scared as she does. Serves him right for messing with a girl so young.”
Haleigh ignored the censure in the nurse’s tone. During her four-year residency in Memphis, she’d seen enough unlikely pairings to know lust didn’t discriminate or encourage high standards. A muffled scream echoed from behind the next door down.
Picking up her pace, Haleigh said, “Time to go to work.”
Dottie charged through the door first with Haleigh close behind. Two steps into the room, she stopped cold.
“Cooper?”
What in the world was Cooper Ridgeway, the most upstanding guy Haleigh had ever met, doing with a pregnant teenager? Surely her best friend, Abby, would have mentioned if her own brother were on the verge of parenthood.
“Jessi, is it?” she asked, catching the mixture of panic and surprise that crossed Cooper’s chiseled features. Haleigh hadn’t seen much of her former classmate since returning to town six months before. Though the pictures around the house she shared with Abby revealed a man larger than the boy she’d known in high school, film didn’t do the mechanic justice.
Between the greasy ball cap, bulging biceps, and tattered Carhartt jeans, Cooper Ridgeway looked like a redneck body builder. A mute one if his current drowning fish impersonation was any indication.
“Jessi, I’m Dr. Mitchner, and I’m going to help you meet your little one.” Sliding on the gloves Dottie passed her way, Haleigh eased onto the stool at the end of the exam table. “I need to see where we stand. You’re going to feel some pressure.”
Dottie’s report had been accurate. This baby was coming fast.
“Is everything okay?” her patient asked, speaking for the first time. The accent wasn’t local. Contrary to what many assumed, there were countless variations on the Southern accent, and as a lifelong Tennessee native, Haleigh knew immediately that Jessi was not from the Volunteer State.
“All good.” Haleigh shared a reassuring smile. “We should be meeting this little one in no time at all.”
“Wait,” Cooper said. “I’m not—”
Jessi bore down with a growl, and Dottie said, “That’s right, honey. Chin to your chest and push through it. Don’t forget to count for her, coach.”
“Count?” Cooper asked. The green eyes that cut to Haleigh silently begged for rescue.
Haleigh ignored him. She didn’t know how he’d landed in this particular mess, but she couldn’t resist letting him see this mission through. Cooper had a knack for playing the white knight role. He’d certainly done so for her once upon a time. And in a somewhat similar circumstance.
“Up to ten.” Dottie barked at Cooper, lack of patience heavy in her tone. “You’ve got to step up for your girl here. Let’s go.”
“But she isn’t—”
“Tell me this is almost over.” Jessi threw her head back on the pillow propped behind her while a drop of sweat rolled down her temple. “I knew it would hurt, but I thought I’d get some good drugs. Why can’t I have drugs?”
“You’re too far along for an epidural,” Haleigh said, focusing on the task at hand. “The baby is crowning now. You’re doing great, but we need a few more pushes.” Casting a furtive glance Cooper’s way, Haleigh said, “You want to have a look?”
“What?” Green eyes went wide. “Heck no.”
Haleigh struggled not to laugh. Abby was going to love this one.
“Here it comes again,” Jessi cried and curled forward.
“Grab that knee,” Dottie said to Cooper, who reluctantly followed the nurse’s order. “You can do it, Jessi. Get that baby out here.”
As Jessi pushed for all she was worth, two newcomers entered the room.
“Looks like we’re just in time.” Edgar Lauden, the pediatrician on duty, stepped into Haleigh’s peripheral vision. “Nurse Felicia and I almost missed the little guy’s e
ntrance.”
“It’s a girl,” Jessi corrected through clenched teeth.
Haleigh looked to Dottie as she asked the patient, “Did an ultrasound show that?”
Jessi shook her head. “I had a dream. She’s a girl, I know it.”
Not the answer Haleigh wanted to hear. “Did you ever have an ultrasound?” she asked.
The young girl shook her head no, her body still clenched in half.
Haleigh nodded toward her fellow doctor, giving a silent warning to get ready. “A couple more pushes,” she said. “That’s all we need.”
Two minutes later, Haleigh held Jessi’s screaming baby girl in the crook of her arm. As Dottie slid the clamps into place, Haleigh met Cooper’s eye. “Are you ready to cut the cord?” she asked.
The mechanic’s face went sheet white as he shook his head. “I’m not cutting anything,” he said. “I don’t even know this girl.”
Haleigh Mitchner was more beautiful than ever. And downright evil.
When she’d walked into the tiny exam room, Cooper had nearly forgotten that his hand was locked in the bone-crushing grip of a total stranger, who was in the process of trying to evict another human being out of her body. One look into Haleigh’s dancing brown eyes and he knew she’d guessed right—that he didn’t belong in that room.
But had she saved him? Hell no. She always did have a wicked sense of humor.
No amount of brain bleach was ever going to get those images out of his head. Women were right. If men had to give birth, the human species would die off quick. And to think, his mother had given birth to two at the same time. No wonder he and Abby didn’t have younger siblings.
This was not the way he wanted to run into his high school crush.
Before she became Dr. Mitchner, Haleigh had been the prettiest girl at Ardent High—smart, ambitious, and out of Cooper’s league. A gearhead with grease-stained hands, who couldn’t spell calculus let alone pass it, didn’t stand a chance with a girl like Hal. But that never stopped him from wanting her.
“Are you pursuing a second career as a birthing coach or is this a one-time deal?” Haleigh asked as she joined Cooper in the hall.
Her golden-blonde hair, pulled tight into a ponytail, still mimicked the flecks of gold in her expressive brown eyes, while the grin that showed off perfect teeth and a full bottom lip still hit him in the solar plexus. Though her face had defied aging, this wasn’t the girl he’d pined for as a young man. Haleigh the MD was sleek, professional, and even more out of Cooper’s reach than ever.
“I didn’t mean to be in there,” he said. “I tried to tell you.”
Hugging her white lab coat tight over her chest, Haleigh smiled. “I assume you aren’t the father?”
“Come on,” he answered, shocked that she’d make such an assumption. “She’s a kid. You know I wouldn’t be knocking up some teenage girl.”
“I was joking, Cooper,” she said. “If anyone knows your penchant for stepping in for lesser men in situations like this one, it’s me.”
Neither of them had ever talked about what happened that summer after senior year when Haleigh had gotten herself into a delicate condition and Cooper had attempted to play the white knight. In response to his marriage proposal, she’d jerked him out of fantasy land with a flip, “Don’t be ridiculous.” As far as he knew, Cooper was still the only person aware of how Haleigh had dealt with the situation.
“Two times in thirteen years doesn’t make it a habit,” he corrected. “And this isn’t exactly the same thing.”
“You’re right. This one is very different.” The laughter went out of her eyes as Haleigh dropped her hands into her lab coat pockets. “So why were you in there?”
Excellent question. One Cooper had been asking himself for the last half hour.
“Because somebody had to be, I guess.” Which was true. No one should have to go through that alone, especially not a frightened teenager.
“But you say you don’t know her.”
“I don’t. I found her in the storage building behind my garage. Spence and I fixed a hole in the roof last week and I wanted to make sure it was holding up in the rain. That’s when I found Jessi huddled against my old Thunderbird. I thought she was hurt at first. When I realized she was in labor, I rushed her here.”
“And you stayed.” Haleigh pressed.
What was she getting at?
“She was scared and alone, so I stuck around. But I never meant to be in there for the whole show.” And Haleigh was at least partly to blame for him having to witness that. “Thanks again for the assist there. You could have helped me get out.”
The grin returned. “Where would be the fun in that?” She followed that teasing statement by poking him in the chest, and then looked surprised when he didn’t budge. “Seriously. Do you fix cars or toss them for sport?”
The look of female appreciation as she tested his biceps threatened to short-circuit his brain. “I work out.” Now he sounded like a caveman.
“That’s obvious.” She snorted. “It’s hard to believe you’re the same lanky guy who sat behind me in World History.”
The only class Cooper ever looked forward to in his entire high school career. He’d even passed it, thanks to Haleigh’s tutoring.
“Still me, just bigger,” he said. “You’re as tiny as ever.”
“I only look tiny because you’re so tall.” Haleigh had a point. He had her by nearly a foot in height. “So what do you know about this girl?” she asked.
“Not much,” he said, replaying what little the new mother had shared. “On the way here, I offered to let her use my phone, but she turned me down. I suppose the panting would have made talking difficult.”
“I’m sure she’ll want to call someone now.” Haleigh reached for the handle to Jessi’s room, but Cooper needed to know something before they went back in.
“Did everything really go okay in there? I saw a lot of blood on my way out.”
“What you saw was normal.”
Normal? That shit was not normal.
“You can’t be serious. That’s how it always goes?”
“Well, not always that smoothly. Jessi got lucky that her little girl was in a hurry. I don’t know how long she suffered in your storage building, but first births can take anywhere from four to twenty-four hours. Sometimes longer.”
“You’re shittin’ me.”
The response earned him a giggle. “You’re right,” she said, shaking her head. “You’re still the same old Cooper.”
His ego prickled at the comment. She made him sound like a hound dog to be scratched behind the ear.
“But bigger,” Cooper reminded, wanting her to see him as something more. Even if only physically.
“Oh yes,” she agreed. “The bigger part is hard to miss.” As the hidden innuendo floated between them, Haleigh blushed. “That sounded way more innocent in my head.”
“Innocent is overrated,” Cooper replied, surrounding her with an arm braced on each side of the door frame. “And you’re still pretty when you’re flustered.”
Brown eyes narrowed as he loomed above her. “Are you flirting with me?”
With one brow raised, he pressed his luck. “Maybe.”
Haleigh crossed her arms as she relaxed against the door. “I’d be flattered if I didn’t know that you could flirt with furniture.” She poked him in a particularly ticklish spot on his side, making him drop his arms. “Save your moves for a more susceptible female. One who never saw you in your underwear at age fourteen.”
She’d only caught him in his skivvies because he’d been trying to catch Haleigh in hers. By high school he’d learned to hate her floor-length pink bathrobe. Was a bare ankle too much to ask for?
As she reached once again for the doorknob, he said, “I look a lot different in my underwear now.”
Her husky laugh shot straight to his groin. “I bet you do. Too bad we don’t have sleepovers anymore so I can see for myself.”
Co
oper would let her see a lot more than his underwear if she’d only take him seriously for once. Disheartened but not defeated, he said, “You’re never too old for a sleepover.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” she replied before spinning away to become the doctor in charge once again.
Chapter 2
Heaven help her but the man was hot. If Cooper Ridgeway had been harmless back in high school, at this moment, he was anything but. Not that he hadn’t always been a flirt—he’d simply never turned his talents in her direction. And even if he had, she’d have laughed him off, same as she’d done just now.
A few extra muscles didn’t change who he was. As much time as she’d spent in the Ridgeway household, they might as have well have been brother and sister. Not that she felt very sisterly toward him today, but that was nothing more than hormones. As a doctor, Haleigh knew better than anyone that women were preprogrammed to respond to the kind of physique that Cooper clearly worked hard to maintain.
Very hard. He could have stepped right out of a mechanic-of-the-month calendar.
And she’d been going solo in the bedroom for more than six months, which meant her libido was on high alert. If he were anyone else, she might take him up on that sleepover offer, but they shared too much history for her to use Cooper to scratch an itch. He deserved a nice girl-next-door who would give him a comfy home and a pack of dimpled, green-eyed babies.
In fact, she couldn’t help but wonder why he was still single. Surely there was a girl in Ardent Springs who knew a solid catch when she saw one.
“How are we doing?” Haleigh asked Jessi, who was staring at her infant with a combination of shock and awe.
“I can’t believe she’s finally here,” the young girl said. “She’s so beautiful.”
Black hair streaked with bright red highlights hung over the right side of Jessi’s face, while the left side had been buzz cut, giving her an edgy, punk rock look. Smudged black makeup outlined bright blue eyes that didn’t carry near enough age or experience to deal with the responsibility in her arms.
“What’s her name?” Cooper asked, stepping close enough to look down on the little cherub sleeping against her mother’s chest.