God, he'd wanted her. And still did. Which made him feel like a pervert. He'd slept beside her all week and he'd made sure to keep on his side of the bed. He'd tried hard not to inhale the enticing scent of her hair or brush against any exposed skin. He set his alarm for five, so that he and his erection could get out of bed before waking Lorna.
"Jess."
He looked up at Chelsea again. "What?"
"You're not listening to a word I'm saying."
"No," he agreed. "I'm not. Sorry. Try me again." He tossed his pen down and leaned back in his chair.
He wished he could prop his boots up on the desk, but he'd be sure to knock over the files and then have to spend another three hours putting them in order. Carter walked in and hung his hat by the door.
"Hey," he said. "How's it goin'?"
"Hey," Jess said. It was as much of a greeting as Carter expected. Chelsea ignored the deputy.
"I'm leaving early," she said slowly, as if she was talking to a two-year-old. "I have a date and I need to get ready."
"A date?" Carter ambled over as if he hadn't a care in the world, but Jess recognized the signs of a jealous male. Poor Carter. The kid didn't know he was dealing with one of the smartest young women in the county. "Who with?"
"It's really none of your business," she said, and turned sideways so Carter could get a good look at her legs, then hopped off the desk. "I'm leaving early," she repeated, "if you don't mind, boss."
"Go."
Carter wouldn't stop. "It's not like I won't know," he said. "I'll see you around town tonight. I'm working, you know."
"I know," she said. "If I see you I'll wave." She picked up her purse and was out the door in three seconds flat.
"What's up with her?"
Jess shrugged. "She's got a date."
"She's usually nicer to me."
"You usually ignore her," Jess pointed out, then wondered why the hell he was giving advice. He leaned forward, restacked his files and looked at the dock. "I'm going home early, too, Carter. The place is yours."
"Really?"
"Yeah. I hope it's as quiet as last Friday night was. If not, you know how to reach me."
He was going home. To move furniture, build shelves, give the future dining room a second coat of white paint…and to stay as far away physically from his wife as possible.
* * *
"I'm concerned about your blood pressure," Dr. Bradford said, setting aside Lorna's chart. "It's still too high. We're going to do a few tests to see what's going on. I don't think it's a case of preeclampsia, but I want to make sure."
"And preeclampsia is—?" Lorna prompted. She gave Jess her hand and he helped her sit up on the examining table. She didn't let his hand go.
"A condition of pregnancy that produces high blood pressure, swelling in the face and hands, excessive protein in the urine. It can be dangerous if not treated properly, but it goes away once the baby is born. Let's not worry about it until we know whether you have it." She smiled reassuringly, but Jess didn't feel at all reassured. His wife looked as calm as if she'd been told something about the weather.
"What do I do about it?"
"Are you still working at the café?"
"No. I haven't been for a couple of weeks, since we got married."
"Good. And congratulations on your marriage, by the way." The doctor turned to Jess. "Your wife is going to need plenty of rest. Can you see that she gets it?"
"Of course," he replied. "Is there something dangerous going on here?"
"We'll know after we run some more tests," she replied. "It may be as simple as pregnancy-induced hypertension, but we're not going to take any chances." She looked at the chart again, then to Lorna. "You have nine weeks left, Mrs. Sheridan. And we're going to make sure you have a healthy baby. I'll send the nurse in with instructions for the next few weeks plus the paperwork for the lab tests."
"Thank you," she said, but Jess didn't say a word. She attempted to release his hand, but he wouldn't let go. "Jess?"
"What?"
"You can let go now."
"Oh." He looked down at their joined hands and loosened his fingers. Then he turned to face her. "Are you okay?"
"Scared to death," she admitted. "But down deep I think everything's going to be okay."
"How?"
She shrugged. "I don't know. I just feel it."
"It's my fault."
"Why do you think that?"
"I should never have had…have done…well, you know. The wedding night."
"I don't think sex and high blood pressure are connected."
"I hope you're right," he managed to respond. He wanted to wrap his arms around Lorna and not let go until he was sure she and the baby were safe, but he felt helpless. It almost seemed as if his heart had turned stone cold with fear. What the hell was going on?
He'd never thought that anything could go wrong. But then, that's what he'd thought when he was married to Susan, too.
* * *
For Lorna, this seemed like the slowest weeks days of her life. Elizabeth and Emily visited, passing the time with talk of decorating nurseries and what to name the babies. Her father drove down four times and brought frozen chicken pot pies, fresh fruit salads and various bags of cookies.
And Jess went to work and came home again, polite and kind and distant. He was a man doing his duty, Lorna realized, and he intended to do it well. But showing affection was out of the question.
Expecting affection was only setting herself up for disappointment. And here she'd thought – foolishly, she knew now – that somehow everything would work out just fine. Their forced marriage would become one of love, she and the baby would defy high blood pressure and be fine, and the world would spin happily along without problems to solve or pain to endure.
She was wrong. Her hormones must have made her delusional. Her husband didn't love her and didn't show signs that he ever would, except for those two times in bed.
Even that advantage was gone. Lovemaking was impossible now. Unthinkable now. She wondered if she would ever want to make love to Jess again. Emily had assured her that she was only going through a phase and after she'd given birth and the baby started sleeping through the night, then the man in the bed beside her would start looking pretty good again.
If there was still a man beside her in the bed when this was all over with.
So Lorna lay on the couch and read magazines. She slept. Emily taught her how to crochet and Elizabeth brought her a needlepoint kit, with pastel alphabet letters, to make a picture for the nursery. The Bennett children brought cookies and let her read stories to them. She wrote thank-you notes for the amazing array of wedding presents, she sent Chelsea flowers for organizing the reception, and she worried about using disposable diapers or fabric ones. She took her blood pressure daily, having been loaned a machine by the doctor. She rested on her side, as advised. She went into the office once a week for tests and she counted the days until this would be over.
Meanwhile Jess went to work each morning, unless he was on the evening shift. He bought groceries, he made dinners and he helped her in and out of chairs.
All in the line of duty.
* * *
"We need a name."
"For what?"
There was no answer to his question, so after a long moment of silence Jess looked over to the couch where Lorna was resting for the evening. She had a stack of books beside her and a notebook in her hand.
"For the baby." The look she gave him made it clear she thought he was an idiot.
"Oh." He put down his pen and set his paperwork aside. Criminal statistics and triplicate reports could wait. He hated it when Lorna looked at him like that. Come to think of it, she'd looked at him like that a lot today. "Shoot."
"Do you have any preferences?"
"As long as it's not Jester, Junior."
"Family names? Friends? Your father?"
"My father is Jim. My grandfather was Jester. His father was a James. We
don't need to keep that going," he said.
"Why is your sister named Ricky?"
"It's really Rebecca, but she thought that sounded too tame for a rock and blues singer."
"Rebecca's a nice name for a girl," Lorna mused, scribbling something on the pad.
"For someone else's girl."
"Oh." She frowned at her list. "I'm having trouble with girls' names. What do you think of Sarah, Leah, Beth, Heather or Jane?"
He stared at her. "I can't picture a girl. And I can't picture a girl with any of those names."
"Then picture a boy." Now she was starting to sound exasperated.
His pager went off, which, come to think of it, was pretty good timing. "I have to go."
He paused on his way out the front door, but he couldn't think of anything to say. Lorna looked beautiful and tired and very, very sad. "I'm sorry, Lorna. About the names. About having to leave. About everything."
"It's okay," she said, looking up at him with blue eyes that held tears. "Really, it is. Don't worry about the names. I'll come up with something acceptable."
Jess wanted to go to her, but he stood there as if he was nailed down to the wood floor.
"We'll talk about it in the morning," he promised, and hoped that would be true. What could he say to make anything better between them? They were two strangers living together who had no choice but to make the best of things.
"Jess?"
He paused with his hand on the doorknob. "What?"
"Happy Valentine's Day." Her voice was soft, her expression almost wistful. In other words, he was in deep shit.
Thirty minutes later and in a bar ten miles north of town, Bobby Calhoun agreed with him.
"You forgot it was Valentine's Day? I thought you married guys were smarter than that," he said, finishing his beer.
"You thought wrong."
"You could probably get some flowers at the grocery store," the young man said. "You want a beer?"
"Can't I'm on duty. Carter needed help breaking up a fight out front. I just came inside to make sure it was quiet."
"It's a busy night," the young cowboy said, looking around at the couples cozied up to the bar. "I've got a dinner date myself."
"Guess I'd better go buy flowers."
"Don't forget the card."
"Right." He started to leave, but Bobby hollered to him.
"Hey, Sheridan?"
"Yeah?" He hoped the grocery store would be open for a while longer. Maybe they would have roses again. Yellow ones to match her hair.
"Did you get my message?"
"No." Or daisies. Lorna seemed like the daisy type. She might not think he was an idiot if he brought daisies and one of those cards with lots of glitter.
"The lawyer has the papers for the ranch. Look 'em over and let me know what you want to do."
"Yeah, thanks. I'll do that first thing tomorrow."
Bobby waved, and Jess hurried out of the bar. He wondered why his deputy was still hanging around the parking lot, but he didn't stop to ask. There wasn't time.
He was almost back in Beauville when the accident happened.
* * *
Lorna was just about finished with the new list of names when her water broke. Suddenly the backache she'd experienced all day seemed more intense and the pressure in her lower abdomen increased. She managed to get off the couch and retrieve the phone, but suddenly nothing was easy. She called her doctor, whose assistant suggested she come to the hospital in Marysville to be examined.
She called Jess on his pager number, but it was Carter who called her back soon after she called Emily. And it was Carter who brought Chelsea to the house at the same time that Emily hurried across the street. Bobby Calhoun walked in right behind them.
"Where's Jess?" she asked everyone standing in her living room.
"He's, uh, still at another emergency," Chelsea said. Her earrings, rows of glittery red hearts, dangled to her bare shoulders and matched the short red dress that barely covered her thighs. Lorna spared one sigh of envy for Chelsea's waist before another contraction hit her.
"Can you tell him I have to go to the hospital now?"
"Sure," Chelsea said. "I'll get word."
Bobby stepped forward. "Want me to drive you? I've got the Caddy and it goes real fast when it has to."
"Maybe we should call the ambulance." Emily put her arm around Lorna's shoulder and eased her into a chair. "Just in case. This baby is eight weeks early."
Carter shook his head. "Can't," he said. "It's bein' used."
Lorna sucked in her breath and waited for the contraction to pass. "There's only one ambulance?"
"It's a small town," Carter said, as if that explained everything. Chelsea glared at him.
"Carter," she snapped. "We'll take your car. You can turn the lights and the siren on and we'll get there in no time at all."
"We?" he asked.
"What about dinner?" Bobby's face fell. "I got roses in the car for you."
Chelsea ignored both of them and turned to Lorna instead. "I have some paramedic training from when I was in the volunteer fire department. I guess that'll have to do."
"I guess," Lorna agreed. According to all the books she'd read, these contractions weren't supposed to come this fast. But then, according to the books, the baby wasn't supposed to come this early, either.
Emily didn't look at all convinced. "Have you ever delivered a baby, Chelsea?"
"Just once. After a fire."
"That's good enough for me," Lorna said. "Help me get to the police car, will you?"
"I'm going, too," Emily declared. "Bobby, go across the street to my house and tell George what's going on. And then go find the sheriff."
"Yes, ma'am," the cowboy said, helping Lorna to her feet. "I'm real sorry about your Valentine's Day, ma'am. I know the sheriff went off to buy you some flowers, so don't be too mad at him."
"I'm not mad at him," Lorna said. "Just because he forgot about Valentine's Day and isn't here to take me to the hospital to have his baby, doesn't mean I'm mad."
"Yes, ma'am," Bobby said, but he backed up a step. "You sound real happy to me."
* * *
Chapter 12
«^»
"Is my husband here yet?"
"Not yet, Mrs. Sheridan," the nurse said. She checked the various monitors and machines that Lorna was hooked up to. "But this seems to be a big night for having babies. We've got husbands all over the place."
"But not mine." Lorna was beginning to feel very, very sorry for herself.
"Don't worry. He'll show up sooner or later."
"He's a sheriff," Lorna insisted. "He has a car with lights on top. He went to buy flowers. How hard can it be to find him?"
"I'm sure he'll walk in the door any minute."
Lorna wasn't so sure, despite the nurse's soothing tone. How could Jess disappear like this?
"Knock, knock," Emily said from the doorway to Lorna's room. "Feel like company?"
"In between contractions," she said. "They're coming faster."
"What did the doctor say?"
"The baby can survive being eight weeks early, but will be monitored for lung problems and anything else." Another contraction began again, so Lorna panted and breathed and counted the way the book had instructed until it subsided.
Meanwhile Emily made herself comfortable in a bedside chair and held Lorna's hand. "All set?"
"Yes." She leaned back against the pillows. "I wish I'd had time to attend the birthing classes at the library. Has anyone seen Jess?"
"Chelsea's working on it. She has a cell phone, a pager and some kind of little computer. Do you think she carries all that stuff around in her purse?"
"She has the confidence of ten women. Did you see that dress?"
"Half the doctors in the hospital have passed by the waiting area to look. She's caused quite a commotion all over the hospital"
"Those were the days." The women shared a smile, but then Lorna's expression changed. "He might
not come tonight. He had to marry me, Em. He never wanted the baby and he never wanted me."
"He'll be here," her friend promised. "I know he will"
"Maybe. He'll do his duty." Lorna braced herself for another contraction. "But right now I don't think that's going to be enough for me."
* * *
Chelsea knew if she were left alone to run the world – or at least her small part of it – things would go a lot smoother. Off-duty sheriffs would not land in the middle of car accidents, pregnant women would give birth exactly when scheduled and deputy sheriffs would be less handsome and a heck of a lot smarter.
"I said," she repeated to Carter via cell phone, "find out if the sheriff was in the accident." She couldn't hear his reply and since using cell phones wasn't allowed in the hospital, she clicked the off button, then folded the phone and tucked it in her purse.
"Answer the page, boss," she muttered, afraid to think of the one reason he wouldn't call her back. She'd heard from Jess, a garbled message about an accident. She'd notified the ambulance and given them what little information she had. Immediately afterward Lorna had called to tell her husband she was in labor. Bobby had arrived to pick her up and found her talking into two phones. Carter, finally acting jealous, had followed Bobby to her house.
Both men had eyed that red dress for a nice long time, Chelsea remembered. Carter had looked like he wanted to cry. "We won't tell Lorna about the accident," Chelsea made them promise. "Not until we know the boss is okay."
Now they really had lost him. She'd checked with the emergency room twice, but there was no sheriff. And everyone was too busy to tell her anything, except for one young resident who wished her a Happy Valentine's Day and asked her if she was free at midnight to have a drink.
She told him she'd keep that offer in mind. After tonight's events, alcohol might be especially welcome.
Chelsea pulled out her phone again and, ignoring all hospital rules, dialed Jess's pager again. "Answer, damn it," she whispered. "Your wife needs you."
* * *
Jess needed more than a Valentine's card and a bunch of flowers wrapped in colored tissue, but he hoped for the best when he arrived home to deliver them to his wife. He would have to tell her about the accident, about Mike Monterro's fatal heart attack while driving home from town. There would be tears, but he would comfort her. He intended to be better at that sort of thing from now on.
BLAME IT ON BABIES Page 13