by Cheri Chaise
We just had to get my son out of there to make room first.
And I was going to do my damnedest to make that happen.
Chapter Nine
Estella
Three days.
Three more long days, and I was still no closer to bringing this child into the world, despite the best efforts of my husbands. Their concern for my wellbeing had led Cole and Bret to lavish my sex with attention, though I doubted they were doing such purely for my benefit. They seemed to enjoy our nightly rendezvous even after hard days of work from sunup to well past sundown.
Rolls of pleasure sent clenching contractions all through my belly. Some I thought were surely hard enough to keep the cycle going. Eventually, however, they always stopped.
But where my body had failed thus far, the men had succeeded in making substantial progress on the new addition. The second floor had been laid and they’d worked hard last night installing the two small windows so they could raise the remainder of the walls and connect in a new roof to the existing structure today.
And none too soon.
We’d awakened this morning to heavy, gray clouds rolling in on a north wind thick with the promise of snow. The men hadn’t even stopped for a proper lunch, preferring instead to snatch up a biscuit or slice of roasted chicken in between raising logs with the pulley system Drew had so brilliantly designed.
I marveled at how beautifully everything was coming together, even while I continued to sweep up sawdust from where they’d cut doorways between the current living area and where my loom would eventually sit.
My loom. I’d longed for more than two years now to sit before it again. To feel the wefts beneath my fingertips. To hear the clack and clatter as I walked the treadles and threaded the shuttle. I almost laughed when it dawned on me that even once it was set up again, I’d be far too busy with two young children over the winter to bother with tapestry weaving.
All this trouble for a loom that might very well only take up needed space for the next several years. But I’d never complain, especially considering how helpful the nursery would be for keeping the little ones close by, and for the additional rooms upstairs as they grew.
I stopped bustling about cleaning the living room as a sudden jab of pain sent me hunching over. Sweat beaded on my lip, and I couldn’t breathe for a few moments as the muscles in my belly clenched.
All morning long I’d had a dull ache in my back and hips. But I’d brushed it off, even as the ache grew in intensity and began to show up more regularly. There was still so much that needed done outside and there was no need to alarm my husbands unnecessarily.
But this one came hard and fast, gripping all the way from my spine to my belly button as I breathed through it, no longer able to delude myself these were false pains.
The baby was coming.
Still, I wouldn’t say anything. Many hours would pass before this little one decided to grace us with his first lusty cries of life. So I simply busied myself between each grip and grasp of my womb.
Instead of continuing to clean, however, I set several pots of water boiling on the stove next to the soaking beans, and then stacked fresh linens in the bedroom.
I stayed as far away from the yawning doorway between our bedroom and the new nursery, having already had Bret move our Meghan’s crib into the dining area this morning to avoid the seeping chill from the cold turn outside while she slept.
Then I stoked the bedroom stove that usually kept us toasty warm in the winter when our post-lovemaking quickly cooled our sweaty bodies. As I worked to lay in fresh wood and kindling, my mind firmly steered toward preparations for giving birth and seeing my son for the first time.
My son.
Gone was the fear I’d experienced the first time with Meghan when the pains had hit me. I knew what was coming now and that I’d survive the agony that was going to rip through my body in order to bring new life into this world.
I focused on the joy of seeing this little one. Of the look that would soften Cole’s hardened and worried features, that had so weighed him down these last months. That moment when I placed his son in his arms for the first time.
How I longed to ease the burden that plagued his mind and colored his memories of everything he’d lost with Sky. To help restore to him the stolen years of grief and instill precious new memories to mend the broken places in his heart.
That’s what I focused on throughout the long afternoon. That’s what buoyed me even when the light outside dwindled into a darkness that should’ve brought the men indoors for dinner instead of lighting lanterns and continuing to saw and pound away.
Even as the first flakes of snow dotted the kitchen window pane.
Booted feet finally tromped onto the porch and inside. The workers merely grabbed cornbread from the table and dipped into the pot of beans without sitting down. Then with mumbled thanks, they all dragged themselves out to the bunkhouse for the night. Cole had yet to make an appearance though.
Bret popped a square of cornbread into his mouth and washed it down with a swig of coffee before pressing his hat back onto his head. “Gonna feed the horses.”
I stopped him with a hand on his forearm – and threatened to cut off his circulation as another birthing pain hit me full force.
Dark eyes immediately cut to mine. “You’re in labor.” It wasn’t a question.
I gritted my teeth through the pain radiating through my belly and merely nodded.
Evan stepped to the door. “Dirk and I’ve got the animals.”
“Just don’t shoot ‘em,” Drew called after them with a grin.
“Get Cole first,” Bret yelled as he escorted me toward my bedroom. “Drew, get some water boiling.”
“Already on the stove,” I hissed through clenched teeth.
“Then grab some clean cloths!”
“By the bed.” My knees nearly buckled as we pushed aside the bedroom door.
Bret took in the pile of linen on the chair at the end of the bed and the fire in the potbelly stove. “When did the pains start?”
I leaned over the bed while he worked to separate me from my clothes. “They started in my back.” I sucked in a breath. “This morning.”
He didn’t waste time berating me as Cole would’ve surely done. “And your waters?”
“Haven’t yet ruptured.” A fresh wave of pain sent a cry from my lips. “Meg…”
“Drew will look after her,” Bret confirmed as the youngest set the pan of steaming water on top of the stove.
Faithful Drew. Oh, how I looked forward to making him a father someday. But I had to focus on this one’s arrival first.
I crawled onto the bed and stopped, just resting in place on my hands and knees as I breathed through the receding discomfort, unconcerned with my nakedness as Cole barreled into the room, his green eyes wide and wild.
“Stella!” He rushed for me, but Bret held him at bay.
“Calm down, brother. She’s just breathing through a contraction.”
“But she…”
“Needs you to allow her to focus and let her get into bed,” Bret finished as he went to the pan and soaped and rinsed his hands.
Cole skittered around to the other side of the bed and stretched across it to plant a kiss on my sweaty forehead. “Can I do anything for you, Stella?”
I hadn’t moved from my position. Allowing my breasts and belly to hang down actually took some of the pressure from my spine. I allowed my hips to sag. “You can get this baby moving a little faster.”
The end of my sentence was punctuated with a cry as the contractions continued to hit me in wave after wave.
“But the pains have already begun, haven’t they?”
“Do you think?” I barked.
Cole looked over my shoulder to where Bret still stood behind me as he checked my progress. The pressure of his hand filling me was almost a relief.
“When did they start?”
I panted then ground my teeth together. “This
morning.”
“This morning?” Cole bellowed.
I didn’t even care that I was on all fours like one of Bret’s mares, or that they talked to each other over my naked body as if I wasn’t even there between them. My mind was already going to that place where I might focus on the coming end result instead of the sharp stabs of compressing agony.
“She’s almost there,” I heard Bret’s words from what felt like a far-off world. “Her waters haven’t broken though, so it’s going to be awhile yet.”
I groaned and hung my head as Bret’s pronouncement drew me from that more peaceful place in my mind. “Isn’t there something we could do in order to move things along faster again?” I panted hard as another contraction soared through my body.
“Well…there might be,” my dusky husband started, “but there’s a slight risk of…”
“I don’t give a damn about any risks,” I barked, sounding more like Cole with each passing minute. “Just do whatever it takes,” I cried out. “Before I split in two!”
“There’s no descent into the birth canal yet,” I heard Bret mutter. “That can’t happen until her waters run.”
“But you said there’s a risk,” Cole said as he joined him around the bed.
I didn’t hear the rest of their conversation as another contraction came right on top of the last one – and still no rupturing of my waters. Things were not going the same way this time. My waters broke well before the increase of birthing pains with Meghan. That pregnancy and birth seemed like a stroll down a country lane compared to this one.
The agony built. I just wanted it over with. Needed it over with as wave after wave swamped both body and mind. I just needed to allow this endless pain to recede into the dark recesses of my mind so I could focus on the joy my son would bring his father.
His father who had done this to me.
I snarled and snapped when Drew brought in the tray he’d made to serve me meals in bed when I’d last convalesced. I leaned on it and gripped the wood to ease my way through the fast-coming pains, still positioned on all fours at the bed’s edge.
Instead of the pressure of Bret’s hand this time, I felt the full head of one of my husband’s thick lengths slide through my spread thighs, uncaring of which one it was as he eased his manhood into my channel and slowly pumped. In and out. Faster and faster.
It had been so long since I’d been able to accommodate them. So long since I’d had their bodies between my folds or pressed against my puckered opening. Sensed the rising pleasure from having them inside me. Filling me.
I didn’t even need pressure on my nub before the quiver of my thighs spasmed straight through my womb, sending me toward a peak of release that momentarily washed away the hurting.
And they weren’t done with me. One-by-one they took me. One-by-one, each of my men slid inside and sent an explosion between my loins as they emptied their pent-up heat into me.
Everyone but dear Evan.
But apparently three was all I needed as a rush of waters emptied from my womb when the last one pulled out.
My son was ready to make his grand entrance in a most indecorous, but very Carston-like fashion.
Chapter Ten
Cole
Life had shrunk to yet another agonizing wait as the hours crept by.
We’d waited to start on the house addition. Waited for the milled wood and windows to arrive. Worked nearly around the clock as we waited for the season’s first snows to arrive.
Waited to see my son. To hold him in my arms for the first time.
I couldn’t help the tears that kept pricking at the corners of my eyes. With each of Stella’s cries, my heart stopped along with the pacing – however briefly. I was going to wear through the living room floor if the waiting continued much longer.
Dammit, I wanted to kick something. To rip off the bandage from my hand and tear at the new skin there. Anything to feel something besides abject terror while I waited to see if Stella survived what I’d put her through.
An unnatural dread spread through my veins. Our struggle with the addition felt like a portent of things to come.
We’d worked from sunup to well past sundown, trying to stay ahead of the coming weather and finish the expansion. We were so close too.
Both floors were stable, and we’d even gotten the last of the roof trusses in place with frozen fingers, using only lanterns to cut through the darkness and forgoing an attic in the rush to get on a roof.
But we still hadn’t made it before the storm hit.
All we could do was fit the old wagon covers over it to try and keep some of the snow out until we were able to get back up there.
And then we came in to find Stella fighting against birthing pains.
Everything had happened at once. And yet nothing was happening at all. Nothing was finished, and my mind swirled with what that might possibly portend. If we weren’t able to finish the roof tonight, did that mean Stella wasn’t going to be able to…?
“Breathe, brother.”
Evan’s steady voice cut through the incoherent ramblings of my mind. I looked up as if seeing him for the first time as he struck a match and lit his pipe. A pipe our father once smoked, I realized, as tendrils drifted aimlessly into the air.
A reminder that life continued on through each passing generation – as it would with my son.
I took a deep breath and then let it out.
And heard nothing but silence.
My head jerked toward the bedroom door. My focus narrowed until the only thing I saw was a tall rectangular piece of wood, behind which my wife lay.
Hidden. Silent. Alone.
Not alone, I reminded myself. Bret was with her. He’d make sure everything turned out alright. I had to trust that he wouldn’t let any harm come to Stella – or our son.
My lip twitched. Vision blurred. The minutes dragged by as I once again waited. This time for the doorknob to move. To twitch. Jiggle. Anything.
But it was the lusty cry of new life that greeted me instead. Washed over me like a dynamite blast. It was several breathless moments before I could think again. Several heartbeats before the knob turned – and Bret’s tired smile peeked out.
“Congratulations, my brother.”
I couldn’t move. No longer cared if the baby was a son or daughter. I clung only to the one simple word congratulating me on being a father again.
Then I was through the doorway and taking in a scene I thought for so many months would never arrive.
Stella lay against the bed pillows, the picture of serenity as she cooed softly to the tightly wrapped bundle in her arms. The moment she turned those glistening blue eyes on me, I melted like a snowdrift next to a fire.
“Cole…come meet your son.”
I hovered over the two of them before she rested him in my arms. My great, big arms that could so easily crush this tiny human being our love had created.
His little cheeks were bright pink as the small face peeked out from the swaddling. His eyes were closed and his lips parted just a bit, resting after all the trouble he’d caused. For such a cumbersome load all these months, he was much smaller and lighter than I expected.
“He’s so…” I didn’t have the words to describe the rush of emotions that poured over me. The relief that he was here at last. Both mother and son safe.
And I was determined to keep them that way. This time nothing and no one would take away what was so precious to me. Ever again.
“He’s smaller than I expected,” Stella confessed. “After all of that poking and jabbing, I half expected two would come out fighting.”
My clenched heart loosened, and I chuckled as I sat on the edge of the bed. “What are we going to name him, wife?”
“We haven’t really talked about any names.”
I hadn’t wanted to confess to Stella my irrational fear that by doing so, we might curse our baby before he ever arrived.
“I’m sure you’ve given it more thought than I have
after all these months.”
“I have.” The knowing smile slowly graced Stella’s face. The warmth of her hand slid over my arm and penetrated the sleeve of my work shirt – my still dirty work shirt. “How about Jake…after your father?”
My Pa. Always steady. Always sacrificing. A hard-working and tough man, but always fair. After all, he’d claimed Bret as his own when my brother’s pa disappeared that spring.
A reminder to me of how I needed to treat all of our growing Carston brood.
“Jake it is then.” I leaned forward to capture Stella’s lips with my own. Those eager, inviting lips. “Though his full name was Jacob.”
“Well, Jacob’s nice too.”
We shared a look then cast our gazes down at our sleeping son. “Nah. He’s gonna be too rough and tough for such a formal-sounding name.”
Stella opened her mouth to reply – but only a gasp came out. Her once serene face twisted into another grimace of pain.
“Bret!” she cried.
I’d been completely oblivious to my brother still cleaning up around the room. He immediately went to the foot of the bed and threw back the covers.
Bright red blood stained the sheet.
“Go!” he directed to me. “Take the baby and leave.”
I didn’t move. Watched as the splash of blood soaked across the bed, clutching my son to me.
“What’s wrong? Bret…”
“I said go, Cole.”
Stella screamed.
“Evan! Drew!”
Arms reached through the doorway and tugged me from the room. Away from my wife.
My dying wife.
“Stella!” I called, unaware of who had taken the baby as I pounded bruised and battered fists against the now blockaded bedroom door.
Warm, salty tears cascaded like a waterfall down my face. Warmth trickled beneath the bandage Stella had fashioned over my wound that morning. But my hand wasn’t the only thing bleeding.
My heart bled as it was cleaved in two.
