"It is? Oh, indeed it is! And the hockey player's ex-fiancée is going to decide whether to marry the lead singer of Purple Madness, who's been in the hospital waiting for a kidney transplant! Well, if you don't mind..." Aunt May hurried away.
They heard her in the sun room ruffling through the wrappers in her almost-empty box of chocolates and muttering to herself, "I wonder why they named the hockey player's dog Albert. That's such a funny name for a dog, and I wonder what the baby's name will be. Eve hasn't mentioned anything." The rest of her solitary conversation was lost in a loud torrent of words from the TV.
Alone with Derek, sure of his undivided attention and grateful to Aunt May for unwittingly supplying an opening, Eve said meaningfully, "That is a good question, you know—what to name the baby." Kelly had told Eve what names she had chosen; did Derek know what they were?
Derek felt distinctly uncomfortable and somehow betrayed. He was so worried about her that he could hardly sit still, and she wanted to talk about a topic that he'd been deliberately avoiding. He'd gone so far as to make a plan, sure, but the plan Derek had made did not include discussions of the baby. It would have to, eventually, he supposed, but Eve's remark left him at a loss for words.
Nevertheless, he figured there was nothing to do but answer her somehow. "I guess it depends on if the baby is a boy or girl," he said carefully after a long time.
"I guess it does." And Eve watched him over the rim of her mug as the melodramatic theme music from Love of Hope enveloped them in its crashing refrain. She was ready to tell him Kelly's choice of names, but as usual he seemed unwilling to talk about anything concerning the child she was to bear.
Why won't he confront the problem of the baby? Eve thought impatiently. She hadn't pushed him for answers; she'd waited as quietly and as patiently as she knew how. But soon—the baby's birth was little more than a month and a half away—she would have to know if Derek planned to keep this baby.
He was softening. As they became better friends, she saw the kind, thoughtful man that Derek Lang really was, and she didn't think he had the heart to give away his own flesh and blood. But the way his mind worked, with the guilt about Kelly's miscarriage all mixed up in his feelings about this baby, she knew he felt unworthy of being a father. And if his own unworthiness was all that was preventing him from accepting this baby, she'd have to make him see that he was wrong.
"Derek, you'd make a wonderful father," she said softly.
His head, which had been bent low over his folded hands, shot up sharply.
"That's what Kelly said," he told her.
"Kelly was right."
"Kelly was right about a lot of things." His eyes were clear now, not troubled. "She was right that you were the proper person to carry our baby to term. But today I feared for you, Eve. Seeing you in a heap at the bottom of the stairs—" He gestured helplessly with his hands, then folded them beneath his chin and leaned forward, elbows on his knees.
"Everything is all right." Her eyes regarded him seriously. He could scarcely look into their depths because to do so would reveal too much too soon. Why this reluctance for her to know what he felt? Was it because he was afraid of rejection? Or was it because of their business agreement?
It wasn't the baby he was thinking of. He simply couldn't think of the baby, because it was so seldom real to him. But Eve was real, Eve was here, Eve was Eve, and ever since Eve had moved back into this house, he'd felt like a new person. Eve filled him up, leaving no room for anything else.
"It was not the baby I feared for, Eve. It was you." He said this firmly.
What an inappropriate time for the Eve's cell phone to ring! It was like a scene from one of Aunt May's soap operas, the phone barging in at exactly the wrong time in order to keep the man and the woman apart. Exhaling sharply as Eve took the call from her warm spot on the couch, Derek stuffed his hands deep in his pockets and walked to the window overlooking the snow woman they had built.
Funny how he had sculptured a pregnant woman, all the while unaware that he was doing so. Freudian, as though he were aware of the baby on some deep psychological level even though he could hardly stand to acknowledge its existence most of the time. He didn't want to think about it, didn't want to talk about it. He only wanted to think about Eve, of her sweet laughter, of her gentle touch that he wanted to know more of and didn't know how to get.
Behind him, Eve laughed and said, "I'll meet you at two o'clock, Doug, on Friday as planned. Don't worry. No, I'm fine. Stop worrying, I said! Give Al and Nell my love."
A surge of jealousy washed over Derek in a giant wave. Who was the guy? What was his role in Eve's life? How often did he phone her? Where did she meet him? Was he some fellow she'd known before and to whom she'd return once the baby was born? Eve would be twenty thousand dollars richer, he thought cynically. Let's not forget that.
The television noise from the sun room ceased abruptly, and Aunt May wandered through the breakfast room, yawning. She popped a malted milk ball into her mouth and said through it, "Why don't you offer Eve more cocoa, Derek?"
"You do it," he growled in as sour a mood as he'd ever known, and while Aunt May clamped her mouth abruptly shut at his surliness, he stomped away upstairs and slammed his bedroom door hard.
He stared at his image in the mirror over the dresser. His chest heaved beneath the flannel shirt—a flannel shirt, for Pete's sake! She'd probably have him wearing gold chains around his neck next.
He had rearranged his life, changed his mode of dress, the way he spent his time. All for Eve, and why? Abruptly, he realized that she had a whole life apart from his and that he knew nothing about it.
He furrowed trembling fingers through his hair, leaving it uncharacteristically rumpled.
Once the baby was born, Eve would go back to the life she had left, although it appeared that she hadn't ever left it. Her previous life trailed along after her, disturbing her from her cell phone, luring her somewhere on Mondays, a persistent but apparently welcome force.
So what should he do? Ignore it? How could he? Eve had a past, and well he knew the influence of the past on the present and the future. Okay, so he'd have to learn about her previous life. Should he hire a detective? No, that smacked of invasion of privacy.
He'd get her to talk about it. Find out what kind of home she came from. Who her friends were. What job she'd had before she decided to become a surrogate mother.
He couldn't believe he'd ignored these things for so long. Of course, there'd been no reason not to ignore them. Because you always ignored things that were not relevant, and Eve had not been relevant. Until he had grown to care for her.
* * *
"I don't know, Eve. I want to buy Nell something nice for her birthday, but I'm not much good at choosing presents for women. That's why I wanted you to help me." Doug had dragged her out to the mall, insisting that the outing would be good for her.
"How about a nice cap and matching scarf?" She shook them out for his inspection.
"No, she has something like that already. Come on; let's walk over to Belk."
He offered Eve his arm, and she took it companionably. Crowds had thinned out, and even though the after-Christmas sales were almost over, there were still bargains.
"I can't imagine having a birthday so close to Christmas," Doug said. "Poor Nell. At least mine's in July. That means I get presents at two different times during the year."
"The baby's birthday will be in February," Eve told him. "Kelly and I planned that well, didn't we?"
"Mmm, you certainly did. Say, let me know if I'm walking too fast. I'm still worried over that fall you took."
"It caused no permanent damage, although I've got a bruise you wouldn't believe. Anyway, I visited Dr. Perry to reassure myself and everyone else, and everything is okay."
"I'm glad." They walked on, stopping to look in windows, pausing once to watch workmen removing a giant reindeer display.
"I keep thinking of the baby," said Eve as they watched
Rudolph being carted down the mall concourse. "Next year it will be having its picture taken with Santa. Somehow it's hard to imagine."
"It is, isn't it?" They walked on a few paces. "Has Derek decided to keep the baby or don't you know?"
"He seems to find it difficult to discuss. I was going to ask him this week if he would go to childbirth classes with me, but I don't think Derek's ready for that."
Doug gazed down at her and gently patted her hand where it rested on his arm. "If you ever need me for anything, Eve, I'm here. To drive you someplace, take you to the doctor, even to go to childbirth classes with you. You're not alone, Eve. I want you to know that."
"Doug, you've been the most supportive friend." She swallowed the lump in her throat, touched by what he was offering.
In Belk, Doug bought Nell a lightweight jacket. "She can wear it on the front porch when she's out there flirting with your dad," he said.
"Flirting?" Eve said, disconcerted.
"Seems like it. Does that bother you?"
"It's a relief to know that Al is having a good time without me hovering over him."
Doug grinned. "I figured you'd say that. Al says that now that he's got the hang of the oral history interviews, he and Nell want to conduct a few together. Since they're old-timers in the community, they have access to the homes of people who will open up to them."
"Good, because until the baby's born, I want to take a break from interviewing."
"Understood," Doug said.
"How are the negotiations going with the company that wants to convert the mill to an outlet center?"
"Very well."
"Who is it, do you know yet?"
"No one's saying. It's hush-hush." Doug opened the outside mall door for Eve, and she walked ahead of him into the cold air.
"If only—" she said, and then gasped. At first she thought the pain was due to the frigid blast of December wind she inhaled into her lungs, but when it happened again, she knew it was more than that.
She clutched at Doug. "Doug," she managed to breathe.
And she knew at that moment with agonized certainty that something was wrong. Terribly, terribly wrong.
Chapter 10
What is happening? What? Am I having a miscarriage? Why does it hurt so much? Derek! Derek!
Had she called Derek's name out loud? She didn't know, didn't know anything except that it was cold and it hurt, and she knew that the ambulance attendants didn't mean to be rough, but there was a spasmodic knifing pain in the small of her back. She was absolutely terrified.
"Eve, don't worry; we're rushing straight to the hospital," Doug said with unflappable calm, holding her hand tightly once they were inside the small confines of the ambulance.
The hospital! She tried to block out the wail of the ambulance siren, but it was impossible not to hear it. She clenched Doug's hand hard and fought the worst panic she had ever known. The pain wouldn't let her think about much else; her whole being was focused on it. Was it going to get worse? Her body always functioned at optimum efficiency, walking, breathing, getting pregnant, everything, but her body seemed alien to her now, a thing apart. She could not be in such pain. The worst pain she'd ever felt in her life before now was from a broken collarbone, but this was terrible!
She heard the ragged sound of someone sobbing and realized it was she who cried; out of sheer terror or pain, she didn't know which. Doug's familiar face, so worried, swam woozily in front of her, but it shouldn't be Doug; it should be Derek. Where was he?
She didn't know if she asked for Derek, but she must have, because Doug said gravely, "I'll call Derek as soon as we get to the hospital. I promise," and she sank back on the pillow and pressed a hand instinctively against the baby, trying to comfort the child she had carried within her all these long months, worrying that their journey together was ended, and if that was true, it was not good.
The hospital—noise and white uniforms blurring in front of her, the pervasive smells and sounds, the strange vocabulary and someone yelling "Stat!" too close to her ear, and a person wearing a mask looming over her, and Doug letting go of her hand, which felt like a lifeline being snatched away.
It wasn't what she had wanted, this chaotic way of entering the hospital. She had wanted peace and serenity for this baby, but nothing was peaceful or serene and the unfamiliar faces around her made her feel lost and misplaced.
"What week of your pregnancy is this?" a rasping voice behind her demanded. Without ever seeing who it was, Eve replied automatically, "Thirty-fourth week." The voice said crisply, "She's thirty-four weeks, six weeks from her due date. Has anyone palpated the fetus for size?" and then she heard, blessedly, Dr. Perry's familiar deep voice asking questions, and she fought the tears of pain and panic, wanting to keep her wits about her so that she could help him with whatever he had to do.
He examined her quickly but thoroughly.
"The baby's head is in position, and your cervix is dilating, Eve," he said somberly when he had finished. "We can't seem to stop your labor. It looks like you're going to have this baby."
"But it's too soon!" she cried.
"We have a wonderful neonatal intensive-care unit at this hospital," he soothed. "Your baby is premature, and it's small, but it will have a good chance at survival."
A good chance! Only a chance? But this baby was important, damn it, important for Kelly's sake, and because she had sheltered it under her heart, in her heart, this baby had to live!
She had a sudden mental picture of the baby the way she had envisioned it, a roly-poly cherub with fat rosy cheeks, an upstanding tuft of blond fuzzy hair like Kelly's, with eyes that would not change from the new-baby gray color but would remain gray, the color of the irises lightening until they were small replicas of Derek's eyes. And then the vision dissolved in a racking pain that was much worse than any of the previous ones.
Oh, Derek, why weren't you with me? she cried inwardly when the pain had passed, and as they wheeled her through the wide swinging doors to the delivery room, she thought with a jolt, What if Doug forgot to call him?
* * *
Derek wheeled his car recklessly into the parking lot of the hospital, damning the lack of parking spaces, damning the elderly flower-laden ladies who blocked his way, damning hospitals and life in general.
The phone call had interrupted an important meeting about the acquisition of the mill building in Wrayville, a meeting in which they were tying up all the loose ends, but none of that mattered to Derek. He'd startled everyone by leaping out of his chair in the conference room as soon as he scanned the phone message Maisie slipped to him. He'd raced from the building before she'd finished her explanation.
It was as though this crisis with Eve were Kelly's situation all over again, with Eve being rushed to the hospital too early. Only this time, he, Derek, was going to be there, no matter if work had to wait. This was his chance to make reparations for his absence when Kelly miscarried. Silly, maybe, because he knew it was too late to make anything up to Kelly. But it wasn't too late to do something for Eve. And he was convinced deep in his heart that he had a lot to make up to her.
"Eve Triopolous?" he said briskly to the pink lady, or whatever they called the volunteer workers, and she looked Eve's name up on a list, slowly running a manicured finger down the column of names until Derek wanted to scream with anguish at her lackadaisical attitude.
"Third floor," she said sweetly and with a smile. "Room—"
But he didn't hear her. He was running down the aisle to the elevator, then staring at his distraught reflection in the stainless-steel walls of it as it slowly climbed, stopping interminably on the second floor for a group of student nurses who giggled over something one of them said, and then he was out and running again but was stopped by a guy in a white coat with a stethoscope around his neck.
"Where do you think you're going?" the doctor demanded.
"Third floor, Eve Triopolous—she's pregnant," he blurted out.
"Well, if s
he's pregnant, you're on the right floor, the maternity wing. Don't recognize the name, though. If you'll—"
And then Derek spied the wiry fellow in blue jeans glowering at him from the waiting area, and he knew somehow that this was the guy Eve sometimes met, Eve's friend.
"Derek Lang?" the fellow said.
"Yes," he said, pulling himself up to his full height and appraising the other man.
The guy stuck out his hand. "Doug Ender. I'm the one who called your office."
"Where is Eve?" he demanded. "What's going on?"
"Actually, I suppose her doctor could tell you more about it, but he's with her in the delivery room now."
"The delivery room!" Derek rocked back on his heels, stunned.
Doug Ender regarded him coolly and without liking. "She's giving birth prematurely, Lang."
"Oh, God," Derek said, and sank down on the nearest chair.
Silence engulfed them, and surprisingly, Doug felt sorry for the man. He had expected to feel antagonism, anger, anything but sympathy. But it was clear that Derek Lang was deeply stricken by this news.
Doug cleared his throat. "I was with Eve when she felt the first pain," he began.
"She was in pain? How much pain?" Derek's words sliced jaggedly through the air, and his eyes were filled with a silent pain of his own.
Doug straddled the straight chair beside him. "I rode with her in the ambulance, and they did everything they could. They tried to stop the contractions with medicine but couldn't. They wheeled her into Delivery half an hour ago."
"The—baby?" Derek whispered hoarsely. "They can save the baby?"
"I don't know," Doug said slowly. "The doctor didn't tell me anything."
Derek closed his eyes, tight. If anything happened to this baby, Eve would be shattered. If anything happened to this baby—well, it was unthinkable, but he was thinking about it, and he wondered how he could ever have wished this baby dead.
"How could I have been so stupid?" he mumbled as if to himself. "How could I have been so blind?"
Ever Since Eve (The Keeping Secrets Series, Book 1) Page 13