High Country Baby

by Joanna Sims

  “We are so sorry, Clint.” Barbara kept her hand on his arm. “We’re all here to support you and Taylor and your precious daughter. You must be so worried.”

  He couldn’t get any words out, so he just nodded. Barbara had always been kind to him. Even when he was just a scrawny, wild kid who was left to his own devices most of the time—Barbara Brand always took the time to speak with him—to teach him some manners, to give him some encouragement or praise.

  “Have you seen your daughter?” Barbara asked him.

  Again—no words—he shook his head.

  “I’ll take you,” Barbara said to him. To her husband she said, “I’ll be back in a bit.”

  Barbara Brand wasn’t someone you refused. She was just that woman on the ranch. He walked with her toward the NICU, toward a daughter who didn’t seem like his at all.

  “You care for Taylor, don’t you, Clint?” Barbara had her arm linked with his.

  “Yes, ma’am.” Clint finally found his voice. “I love her.”

  “I thought so. I saw you together—you didn’t know I could see you. The way you looked at her—the way she looked at you. I thought—that’s what love looks like.”

  He listened while she talked to him quietly as they walked toward the NICU—toward his daughter.

  “What you can do for Taylor, right now, is to take care of her daughter. That’s all any mother would want.”

  The doctor in charge of baby girl Brand filled him in on the medical status of the twin who had survived. Immaturity of the lungs and respiratory distress syndrome were the two diagnoses that stuck in his mind as he stared at the little girl hooked up to a ventilator and warmed by an incubator. The little girl, only two pounds ten ounces and thirteen inches long, was attached to all manner of medical machines: cardiac monitors, IV lines, electrodes stuck to her tiny pink foot. Her eyes were covered and when she cried she sounded more like a kitten than a human baby.

  “Her name is Penelope.” Clint stared at his daughter, wishing that he could feel some sort of attachment to her. “That’s her mom’s top pick for a girl.”

  “You can touch her hand—let her know you’re there.” The doctor told him. “We find that all of the baby’s vital signs improve when they’re touched by their moms. Or their dads.”

  Clint hesitated for a moment before he made the decision to cowboy up. In some respects he was helpless, surrounded by a team of people quietly going about their business—a controlled chaos—but he could comfort this little girl. If holding her hand would help her feel better, perhaps it would make him feel better, as well.

  Through the armholes, Clint reached into the incubator and ran his finger over Penelope’s tiny clenched hand.

  “Hi, Penelope.” He was the first to call her by her name.

  He rubbed his finger across the back of Penelope’s hand; she surprised him by wrapping her fingers around his pinky. Clint didn’t move—he didn’t want the moment to stop.

  It was surreal. Standing in the NICU with the beeping and the people and the monitors and the wires—he had a moment. That one simple move, his daughter holding on to his pinky as if she knew that he was there to protect her—touched his heart. So fragile and innocent—no one in his life had ever needed him in the same way as this little girl needed him. He had wondered how he could earn his way into a life with Taylor. Now he knew that he needed to begin by earning his way into the life of his daughter.

  Chapter Fourteen

  One week later—a week that seemed more like a month to Clint—Taylor was moved from ICU to a regular hospital room. Baby Penelope was stable in the NICU and the entire NICU staff was amazed by her resilience. She was gaining weight and had transitioned from the respirator to nasal oxygen delivery. The steroids she had been given prior to her birth had worked their magic and her lungs were in much better shape than originally thought. She was a fighter, like her mother, and she was determined to forge her own path.

  When Clint arrived at the hospital and didn’t find Taylor in her room, he knew where to look for her. If she wasn’t in her room, she had to be with Penelope. He was a familiar face to staff in the NICU; he tipped his hat and smiled at the nurses who were quietly and quickly moving around the room. By Penelope’s incubator, her temporary home to keep her warm, Taylor was sitting in a small rocking chair with the baby sleeping on her chest. She looked surprisingly well for a woman who had gone through so much. Taylor had her eyes closed and she was rocking slowly, humming softly to the sleeping baby. The hospital gown Taylor was wearing had been lowered enough at the neckline to allow Penelope to have skin-to-skin contact with her mother. A blanket was tucked around the baby’s body and she was wearing a tiny beanie cap with Penny written on the front.

  Clint watched the two—mother and child—for several minutes, not wanting to disturb the moment. He had spent a month on the CDT with Taylor, so he knew that she was a force to be reckoned with. She was what his mother used to call a steel magnolia—pretty and sweet on the outside, but a spine of steel on the inside. But even knowing that about her, he hadn’t been prepared for how gracefully she would handle the loss of her son and the complications of the premature birth of her daughter. Perhaps focusing on her daughter, and putting all of her energy toward her welfare, had allowed her to refocus her sorrow. She had cried for her son—a son she’d named Michael—but she had a single-minded focus on making sure that her living child survived and thrived.

  Taylor opened her eyes and saw him standing nearby. She smiled at him, as she always did. “Come see her—she’s wearing her preemie hat for the first time.”

  He stood next to mother and daughter—he couldn’t resist reaching out and touching Penelope’s hand, which was balled up into a tiny fist. Her fist was the size of his thumbnail. He still couldn’t believe how little she was.

  In a whisper, Taylor said. “The staff love you here—especially the nurses,” she teased him. “They’ve all told me how much time you spent with her those first couple of days when I couldn’t be with her. Thank you for that.”

  “It was the only thing I could think to do for you...”

  “It was the best thing you could have done for me, Clint. You didn’t sign on for any of this, but you really came through for me. And for Penny.”

  When Taylor referred, in a roundabout way, to the deal they had struck, it made his gut hurt. He had signed his parental rights away—even though Taylor had listed him as the father on the hospital documents, legally, Penelope wasn’t his daughter. It bothered him. He didn’t want that to be the reality of his situation.

  “Have you held her?” she asked him.

  He shook his head. The staff had tried to get him to hold her, but he’d been too intimidated to do it. All of those wires and electrodes and how delicate she was—he couldn’t muster the nerve to do it. And part of him wondered if he had the right.

  “I think you should hold her, Clint,” Taylor said quietly. “But only if you want to.”

  “I’d like to,” he explained, “but she scares the heck out of me.”

  With the help of the staff, a still sleeping Penelope was transferred from her mother’s arms to his. He unbuttoned his shirt so she could benefit from the warmth of his skin, and then the blanket was draped over Penelope’s back and legs.

  Her abdomen was so sore, Taylor stayed sitting in the rocking chair—but she asked the nurse to take a picture of Penelope and Clint with her phone so she could hold on to this moment. She had quickly learned to lean on the NICU staff—she was still recovering from the C-section physically, and the loss of her son, emotionally. In order to do her best for her daughter, her angel blessing, she had to give up some control, some of her autonomy, and let others help her. One of the people she had learned to lean on was Clint. She couldn’t have known how much it would mean to have him watch over Penelope for her—but it had me
ant more than words. She had loved him before, as a friend, as a lover—now she took him into her heart as the father of her child. It was a love she didn’t know existed.

  “She looks content with you,” Taylor said quietly.

  “She just yawned,” Clint said in amazement, as if Penelope had just invented the act of yawning.

  They stayed with the baby in the NICU for a while longer and then Clint wheeled Taylor back to her room. The nurse helped transfer Taylor back into her bed—the exertion of the day had drained the color out of her face.

  “I should let you rest.” Clint stood at the end of her bed, his eyes concerned.

  “No—don’t go just yet. I want to talk to you.”

  Taylor gestured to the chair next to her bed.

  “I am so grateful to you Clint—the way you looked after Penny—you didn’t have to do that, but you did,” she said. “And I will always love you for what you’ve done for the both of us. But I don’t want you to feel like you have to hang in there to the bitter end. I know you’ve already missed several rodeos—you’re not going to win a championship hanging out here with me...”

  Clint ran his fingers through his hair a couple of times as he considered what Taylor was saying to him. He was worried about his chances at winning a championship—if he was gone from the circuit too long, he’d have to give up on this year and shoot for next. He knew he had a championship win in him—he just needed to take his career seriously for once.

  Winning a championship meant more than prestige—it meant endorsements. And endorsements meant money. He didn’t have that many more years left in him—the sport was brutal on the body. If he won a championship, he could retire with a sweet little nest egg. But what about Penelope and Taylor? How could he just walk away from them now when they needed him the most?

  “Are you giving me my walkin’ papers?” he asked jokingly.

  Taylor shook her head. “No. No. I love having you here. But you and I both know that this wasn’t part of the deal. I made the decision to bring these children into the world. You shouldn’t have to give up what you want because of a misplaced sense of obligation.”

  “Look—I appreciate you letting me off the hook and all. But I haven’t been thinking too much about leaving. I’ve been worried about you. I’ve been worried about Penelope.”

  He stopped short of saying that he was worried about the arrangements for the funeral service for Michael. There was no way he was going to leave before they put his son in the ground. There was no way.

  “I just want you to know that I support any decision you make. If you need to go—I understand. That’s your career. That’s how you make your living.”

  “Well—thank you.” Clint nodded his head. “But I ain’t goin’ nowhere just yet.”

  * * *

  Taylor had thought that the worst day of her life was the day her divorce was final. Looking back, she couldn’t imagine why she had ever thought that could be the worst that ever happened to her. The worst day of her life was the day that she watched her son’s small casket being lowered into the ground. Family surrounded her at the graveyard, and she was glad for them, but she had never felt more alone.

  Michael McAllister Brand, so named by her to honor both sides of his lineage, was laid to rest beside Hank and Barbara’s second eldest son, Daniel, who had been killed in the Iraq War. Side by side, these two Brand males had been taken too young. Daniel died in his thirties and never had the chance to meet his unborn son. Her angel, Michael, was gone before he could have any life at all.

  How could God be so cruel? How could God be so cruel?

  She had stood beside Clint, holding on to his hand through the entire ceremony for support. Taylor was so grateful that her cowboy had refused to leave. How would she have ever gotten through the day without his quiet, strong, reassuring presence?

  “You need to eat something.” Aunt Barb came into the study where Taylor had retreated to be by herself after the wake.

  “I’m not hungry.” Taylor shook her head.

  Barbara looked at her niece with compassionate eyes; she had lost a child. She understood the pain. It just wasn’t right for a mother to lose a child.

  “Scooch over...” Barbara said. Her niece was sitting in the coveted chair-and-a-half with matching ottoman. It was, undeniably, the most comfy chair in the study.

  Taylor scooted over for her aunt to join her. She could take the comfort from Barbara—she had been a mother figure to Taylor all of her life. And she had lost Daniel. It was a club that nobody wanted to join, but once you did, only the other members of the club could possibly understand what it was like to be the mother of a lost child.

  “I love you.” Aunt Barbara put her arms around Taylor’s shoulders. “And it doesn’t feel like it now, but the pain will become tolerable.”

  “I know I can’t lose myself in it, Aunt Barb—I have to be strong for Penny. But it hurts—it hurts so much.”

  Aunt Barb reached over and wiped Taylor’s fresh tears away. “I know, baby. I know.”

  Her immediate family—her father, mother, sister and brother—hadn’t been able to attend the funeral. Casey, a special education teacher, wanted to take off from work, but Taylor convinced her to save her money for a visit during the summer break. It was such a long trip for her sister to make for such a sad event. And Aunt Barb and Sophia went a long way to fill the void.

  “If the offer is still open, Aunt Barb—I’d like to take you up on your offer and bring Penelope back to the ranch when she’s discharged. I don’t think I can face that nursery...just yet.”

  There was two of everything in that nursery. Two cribs, two blankets, two mobiles—it made her feel sick to her stomach just thinking about removing one of everything.

  “You can take the rooms upstairs—the crib Sophia used for Danny is in the attic. Or you’re welcome to use Tyler’s cabin. Tyler, London and the kids are all going to be here for Thanksgiving, but it will be vacant until then.”

  “I think I’ll go back to the cabin, if that’s okay with you,” Taylor said. “I want Clint to be able to visit Penelope without running into Hank too much. Hank won’t even acknowledge him when they’re in the same room.”

  “I know—I’ve talked to him. But the man is stubborn. And old-fashioned, God love him. Just be patient and he’ll come around. He always does...in his own time.”

  * * *

  Spending time with Penelope, loving on Penelope and learning about how to take care of Penelope was Taylor’s saving grace during the week directly following Michael’s funeral. Clint was with her every step of the way. He had been by her side, quietly and solidly, at the funeral and at the wake. He had been there when she was too tired to take a shift with Penelope and to remind her to eat.

  In their own way, they had “dates” in the hospital cafeteria and took walks around the hospital grounds while Penelope was sleeping. A friendship that had started by accident, when they were thrown together on that memorable trip on the CDT, had turned into so much more. And even though there had never been a right time to talk about “us,” she knew that she was more of a team with Clint than she had ever been in her marriage.

  And, no, they had never had a conventional relationship—but why did it have to be? The only thing that mattered was that they loved each other, that they respected each other, that they supported each other’s dreams and that they enjoyed being together. All of that, and much more, was true about her relationship with Clint. She never would have seen it coming, but her perfect match was rough-around-the-edges, professional bull rider Clint McAllister of Montana.

  * * *

  “Look what we made.” Taylor was on one side of the incubator and Clint was on the other.

  Penelope had her right hand wrapped around Clint’s pinky and her left hand wrapped around Taylor’s pointer finger
. That was the moment when Clint knew exactly what he needed to do for the rest of his life. Yes, he knew he loved Taylor. Yes, he knew that he wanted to be a father in every sense of the word to Penny. But not every piece of the puzzle had fit into place until right this moment. When he looked at Taylor, he saw the beautiful woman he loved. When he looked at Penelope, he saw the tiny little girl, his daughter, who needed him more than anyone ever had. They were a family—unofficially. He needed to make it official. If Taylor would have him, he would be honored to call her his wife.

  “I got to get going.” Clint slipped his finger out of his daughter’s grasp.

  Penelope began to protest, wrinkling her forehead, kicking her legs and crying a couple of times.

  “I know, sweetheart—I don’t think he should leave, either,” Taylor said to Penny. “Where are you going?”

  Clint picked his hat up off the nearby chair, put it on and then gave Taylor a kiss on the lips. “Don’t you worry about it—I’ve got some errands to run.”

  “What errands?” she asked.

  “You’re on a need-to-know basis and you don’t need to know,” Clint said with a conspiratorial wink to the nurse who walked by and heard the exchange.

  “I’ll see you at the cabin later on—around five, do you think?”

  “I was going to spend the night here,” Taylor said.

  “She’s in good hands, Taylor. You gotta take a break every once in a while so you don’t burn yourself out.”

  She agreed to meet him at the cabin for dinner. When she arrived, Clint led her out to the deck overlooking the lake where he had lit the fire in the fire pit.

  “I’m cooking my famous CDT fish tonight.” Clint held her chair for her.

  “Out here?”