“How could you have been waiting for me if you didn’t know I existed?”
“I knew you were out there somewhere, and the good Lord would see fit to send ye to me when it was my time t’ go.”
“You’re not making any sense.” Jilly laid her palm against Addie’s forehead. “And no wonder.”
Addie knocked away her hand. “I’m not out of my head. Everyone knows that when it’s time for a magic woman to leave this earth, another one comes.”
“Magic woman? Me?”
“Who else?”
“No, Addie. I don’t believe…”
Jilly’s voice trailed off. She’d almost said she didn’t believe in anything she couldn’t sell, but if she could admit to the possibility of ghosts…
Well, wasn’t anything conceivable?
Magic. Power. Even love?
Jilly put the last thought out of her head. Love was something she couldn’t deal with right now. Not with Addie so sick.
“What should I do?” Jilly asked.
“A little more practice, a few more days, maybe weeks, then you’ll be ready to take my place.”
“Addie, I can’t.”
“Of course ye can. Are ye tellin’ me ye don’t enjoy the work? That ye don’t like the people and the animals?”
Jilly looked around the sparse cabin. No heat, no electricity, no plumbing. “I can’t stay here.”
“Never said ye had to. Ye can work out of the inn. Watcha been fixin’ it fer?”
“To sell.”
“I figured ye’d have changed yer thinking on that by now.”
“Why? I need the money.”
“Do ye? Do ye really?”
“Of course. I’ve got nothing.”
“Ye’ve got a lot more than ye think, Jilly Hart.”
Jilly opened her mouth to protest, and someone knocked on the door.
A young girl, who seemed to be no more than seventeen or eighteen, waddled into the room. She appeared about eight years pregnant.
“The Lord works in mysterious ways,” Addie murmured.
“How you figure?” Jilly couldn’t take her eyes off the young woman’s huge belly.
“Ye need t’ learn how to deliver a youngun. Here’s Belinda all ready to go, and she even came to us.”
“You want me to—?” Jilly squeaked.
“Who else? I’m not up t’ it.”
“A doctor would be an excellent choice.”
Addie hoisted herself out of bed. “Women been birthin’ babies without the help of a doctor for centuries. Now strip the bed.” Addie pointed at a pile of fresh sheets. “Remake it with those. I’ll boil the water.”
Jilly’s eyes met the young woman’s. “You want me to drive you to the doctor?”
Belinda shook her head, then sat heavily in a chair next to the door. “Can’t afford no doctor. Addie brought me into the world. I trust her.”
“But she—”
“If she says you’re the new doctor, then ye are. I trust ye, too.”
Warmth spread through Jilly’s chest. The girl trusted her. She was delusional, but Jilly felt blessed nevertheless.
“You’re sure?” She tried one last time.
Belinda caught her breath and water seemed to come from nowhere, cascading over the chair and splashing at her feet.
“She’s sure,” Addie said briskly. “Now move. Belinda’s ma had her in less than an hour.”
“Does that mean something?” Jilly asked as she yanked the covers from the mattress.
“Means that even if she took ye up on that offer of a ride to the hospital, ye’d be deliverin’ her baby on the road. Daughters follow their ma’s in little else but havin’ babies. Better ye help her out here, with me at yer side. I have done this a few times before.”
“How few?”
“Less than a thousand. More than a hundred.”
Jilly frowned, and Addie waved her worries away. “I’ve seen it all. I know what I’m doin’ and soon you will, too.”
“Delivering babies is serious business, Addie.”
“Darn tootin’. So let’s get serious.” She tugged a chair nearer to the bed. “Get my ax from the woodpile and be quick about it.”
Jilly, in the middle of spreading a plastic sheet over the mattress, paused and turned. “What?”
She struggled with horrific images of what the ax might be used for.
“Get the ax, put it under the bed.” When Jilly continued to stare at her blankly she stated, “To cut the pain.”
Belinda chose that moment to moan. Jilly glanced at her. The girl was gripping her belly and making a terrible face.
“How about some morphine instead?” Jilly suggested.
“No drugs,” Addie insisted. “The ax will help. Do what I tell ye.”
Jilly did, bringing the dusty implement inside and shoving it beneath the bed as instructed. When she walked past Addie, the old woman took her arm and whispered, “Mind over matter. If she believes it’ll help then…”
“It’ll help.”
Addie nodded with a satisfied expression as Jilly assisted Belinda into the bed.
Addie was right about more than the ax. Within the hour, Belinda held her brand-new son, and Jilly knew more about childbirth than she had ever wanted to. Birthing babies was sweaty, painful, messy work—even for the mother.
Watching Belinda and the baby, Jilly understood she’d done something special, something real, something—
“Magic,” she whispered.
EVAN WOKE A SECOND TIME that morning to find Larry, Jerry and Barry staring at him. He started and reached for Jilly, but she wasn’t there.
He vaguely remembered her saying she was going to the creek, then she’d make breakfast. He didn’t smell any coffee.
“What’s the matter?” he croaked, sitting up and peering around the room for his clothes.
“Lookin’ fer this?” Jilly’s underwear hung from Barry’s finger.
Evan snatched it away and shoved the garment beneath the sheets.
Barry laughed. “No cause to be embarrassed. About time you two went at it.”
“We didn’t go at it,” Evan muttered, crawling out of bed and digging fresh clothes from his bag.
“No? Too bad. If I was a younger man, I sure would.”
“You three keep your traps shut. This is between Jilly and me.”
“My lips are sealed.” Barry snapped his gums together. “Oops.” He reached into his pocket and inserted his teeth, then clicked them once for good measure.
Evan glanced at Larry, who covered his eyes. Jerry stared out the window. He hadn’t heard the conversation in the first place. Maybe they were safe from loose lips.
“Is Jilly downstairs?”
“No. That’s why we came up. We need our coffee. It’s purt near seven in the mornin’.”
Evan didn’t like the sound of that.
He threw on his clothes and ran downstairs. No coffee. No breakfast. No Jilly.
Unease made him head to the living room. Peter was asleep in the corner with Zorro. Mario had piddled on the floor directly in front of the door. He did that a lot. Evan despaired of the animal ever understanding the difference between inside and outside. Sometimes he wondered if Mario had a brain in his head. But he was sweet and funny, and Evan already loved him.
He hunted for the doodle, found him curled up behind his cage fast asleep. Evan frowned. It wasn’t like Jilly to leave Mario free and unsupervised. She hated cleaning up piddle even more than she hated…talking about love.
Evan shifted his shoulders. Hell. Had she run back to California, after all?
“Jilly?” he called.
The only answer was Henry’s meow. Evan glanced onto the porch, where the black kitten had deposited a dead chipmunk.
“Thanks, pal. Not hungry.”
Evan walked outside, ignoring the disgusting gift.
“Jilly?” he shouted.
Lightning appeared around the corner of the house. He snorted and
shook his head.
“Where is she?”
The ancient horse plodded across the field in the direction of Addie’s. He stopped, as he always did, at the property line and neighed, once, twice, three times.
Evan crossed the expanse of grass and wildflowers, then left Lightning behind as he ran down the hill to Addie’s house. He burst into the cabin, nearly fainting with relief when he found Jilly there. Addie was asleep in her chair, as was a young woman in Addie’s bed.
Jilly glanced up from the bundle in her arms. At first he didn’t comprehend what he was seeing. Then the bundle squirmed and started to cry.
Evan couldn’t tear his gaze away from Jilly’s face. For an instant she resembled the picture of the Madonna his mother kept on her nightstand.
“Wanna take a peek?” she asked.
Evan shook off the odd sensation and joined her. Together they stared at the squalling, red-faced infant.
“I used to think every baby looked like Winston Churchill,” she murmured.
“And now?”
“Now I think they look like…themselves.”
The baby’s cries increased in volume. Jilly glanced at the young mother and Addie. “Shh.” She kissed the baby’s downy head, but the child wasn’t interested.
“Here.” Evan held out his arms. “I’m pretty good at this. Really.”
She shrugged and handed him the baby. Kim’s daughter had been a royal pain in the butt until she was six weeks old. In truth, she still was, but he liked her that way.
He brought the child close to his chest and did the universal motion for quieting babies, the one he’d observed both his mother and his sister perform with Zsa Zsa. The one he’d perfected over many an afternoon with his niece while Kim escaped to anywhere but there. Evan did the mommy sway and, like Zsa Zsa, the baby quieted.
Jilly stared at him openmouthed and he shrugged. “I’m good with women.”
“That’s a boy.”
“Oh.” He frowned at the still-red baby face. The child might not resemble Winston Churchill, but he didn’t look like a boy. Or a girl, either. “Well, I’m good with babies, too.”
“You have amazing talents.”
He wiggled his eyebrows. “I thought you’d never mention them.”
She blushed and glanced at Addie, but the old woman was still sleeping.
“Delivering babies must tucker her out. She isn’t as young as she used to be.”
“I delivered the baby.”
Evan nearly dropped him. “You?”
She stiffened. “You don’t think I could?”
He stared into her determined face, then at the baby’s head. “I’ve told you before, I think you can do anything.”
“You know what?”
Lifting his gaze to hers, Evan was captured by the combination of budding strength and fading fragility. Jilly Hart was an amazing woman.
“Right now, so do I.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE WEEKS THAT followed were better than the weeks that had come before. Jilly spent every night in Evan’s room. She let the critters have hers. She didn’t need it.
Evan taught her things in the darkness that made her blush in the light. She never grew tired of touching him, kissing him, of just being with him, and he appeared to feel the same way about her.
Addie had improved. She still tired easily, still spiked a fever now and again, but she was able to teach Jilly more every day.
“You’ll do fine,” Addie assured her.
“I didn’t say I was going to stay.”
“What else ye gonna do with yer time?”
Addie had a point. Jilly’s life, which had seemed a success thus far, now appeared appallingly futile. Who cared if her hair was highlighted, her nails done, her clothes and makeup perfect? Certainly not Jilly, and while this should disturb her, it didn’t. She had far too much to do in any given day to worry about such foolishness.
Folks had taken to pounding on the door at all hours. Evan and the brothers had fixed up the parlor on the first floor for an office.
Jilly had treated so many diseases—some she recognized and some she did not—that she’d lost track of them. Those people she couldn’t help, she sent to the doctor or took there herself.
Amazingly, the natural cures worked more often than not. The mind over matter nature of Addie’s medicine could not be denied.
But the most astonishing development was the progress at the inn. In lieu of payment, people pitched in. The place could be ready to go on the market as early as next week.
Jilly sighed as she made supper. Lightning appeared in the window and sniffed the aroma of pork chops and wild rice. She’d gotten so used to him hanging his head over the sink, she didn’t know what she’d do if he wasn’t there to talk to every night while she cooked.
“I almost wish…” Jilly began.
Lightning snorted, blowing horse snot all over the dishes in the sink.
“Hey! You’re lucky those were dirty.”
He nickered—half laugh, half apology. Once, what seemed a lifetime ago, she hadn’t liked him. Back when she’d been Jillian Duvier. Now she was Jilly Hart, healer of the Ozarks. She felt like a comic book heroine, and she wanted to stay that way.
“I wish the inn wasn’t nearly done. What am I going to do then?”
She’d have to make a decision. Would she stay or would she go?
“Hi.” Evan’s soft greeting made Jilly’s stomach flutter. He slipped his arms around her waist and kissed her neck. “What’s for supper?”
“Is that a serious question, or is it code, like breakfast?”
“Do you want it to be code?” He slid his hand under her shirt, then beneath the elastic of her bra, holding her breast and teasing her nipple in the same motion.
Lightning eyed them with interest. “Shoo.” Jilly flicked the dish towel at his nose and he backed away. “You really need to watch what you’re doing in front of the children,” she teased.
“That horse is older than I am.”
“How long do horses live, anyway?”
“Hell if I know.”
He had both hands up her shirt, and she was starting to forget something she really needed to remember. His erection pressed against her back. His mouth latched on to her neck as he rolled her nipples between clever, callused fingers.
“What do you say we christen the kitchen?” he murmured.
They’d christened each room as he’d finished it. They’d even christened the creek. His pickup. The back porch. At first she was nervous about having sex here, there, everywhere. But Evan had a way of making her forget anything but him.
“Yoo-hoo!”
Jilly tore out of Evan’s arms an instant before Naomi, then Ruth, walked in the door. Suddenly she remembered what she’d been meaning to tell him.
“Ruth and Naomi are coming for dinner.”
“I see that.”
She glanced at him, afraid he might be angry, but he was smiling. Evan was the most easygoing man she’d ever met. He winked at her, promising delights for later that she’d better not think about now.
“I’m going to take a shower.”
One other change—plumbing. As much as Jilly regretted how quickly the inn was being completed, she didn’t regret running water and indoor facilities.
“Weren’t the Seitz brothers coming?” Naomi asked.
“Crap.” Jilly’d forgotten that, too. She was supposed to ask the brothers Seitz to stay. For some reason, Naomi, or maybe Ruth, liked them.
Her only excuse for being so absentminded was a case of stomachache in a seven-year-old boy. No fever, no tenderness; most likely he’d snuck too much candy, so she’d spent the better part of the afternoon mixing horse-mint tea and gathering wild ginger to ease his discomfort.
“I’ll…” Jilly was going to say call them, but she didn’t have a phone. Even though the electricity was working, she and Evan had decided they didn’t need one yet.
Another example of ho
w things had changed. Jilly Hart, who’d never left home without her cell phone, hadn’t had access to wireless service for over a month, and she didn’t miss it.
“I’ll walk over after I shower,” Evan offered.
“Thanks.” She gave him a smile.
He wiggled his eyebrows before he headed upstairs.
“Can I help with dinner?” Naomi set a glass bottle on the table.
“No, thanks. Everything’s done that can be done for the moment. What’s that?”
“Mama sent it over. Her special brew.”
“Brew? Like beer?”
Ruth grinned.
“Not hardly,” Naomi said. “This’ll take rust off an old ax and the edge off any problems you might have.”
“Moonshine.”
Jilly had heard whispers of stills that had been passed down through the generations. Most moonshine was used for medicinal purposes these days. Addie kept a big jug under her bed. Of course, around here a hang-nail required a good dosing on many an occasion.
“We like to call it home brew,” Naomi insisted. “Want some?”
Jilly shrugged. “Why not?”
She brought glasses, and Naomi splashed in generous helpings of the clear liquid. The three of them tapped rims. Jilly sipped while Naomi and Ruth gulped.
The moonshine went up her nose and straight to her brain. She coughed. Naomi laughed and urged Jilly’s glass toward her mouth again. “Better take another.”
She did and the need to cough went away. Jilly could understand why folks drank the brew medicinally. If the moonshine didn’t cure whatever ailed you, the stuff would definitely kill it. Barring that, you wouldn’t care.
She chuckled, remembering Evan’s tale of peppermint schnapps and the Daughters of the American Revolution. Certain cures appeared to cross the boundaries between North and South, young and old.
They sat at the kitchen table. Naomi filled their glasses again. The more Jilly drank, the better the stuff tasted.
“We have a favor to ask.”
“Mmm?” Jilly asked midsip.
“Ruth and I…well, really Ruth, but I’m interested, too.”
Ruth made an impatient sound. “Git on with it.”
Jilly blinked at the low rumble of Ruth’s voice. She’d never heard it before. She stared at the woman as if Lightning had suddenly walked in and started singing. For Ruth to speak, the favor must be very important.
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