The Texan's Baby Bombshell

by ALLISON LEIGH,

  She fumbled with Linus’s stretchy outfit, finally managing to extract his legs so she could change his diaper. “No wonder you were wailing,” she crooned. “All wet like this.”

  Considering she hadn’t been hands-on with Linus since he’d been a couple weeks old, she changed his diaper with impressive speed. Then she was maneuvering his legs back into the sleeper and she picked him up from the changing table.

  Adam lifted the baby out of her arms. “Go and take your shower,” he said gruffly.

  “You’re going to stay, then?”

  He grabbed the soft blanket hanging over the side of the crib and the colorful ball from the floor, and sat down in the rocking chair. “For now.”

  When Laurel came out of the bathroom twenty minutes later, Adam was still holding Linus on his lap in the rocker, face mask askew.

  And both of them were sound asleep.

  She pressed her hand against the ache in her chest and just stood there, watching them and memorizing the precious sight.

  Then she heard the soft, distinctive ping from Adam’s phone where it was sitting on the counter near the door and she finally moved again. She lightly brushed her fingers through Linus’s wispy-soft hair. Then she slipped the empty baby bottle from Adam’s lax fingers and leaned over and lightly brushed her lips over his before adjusting his mask and then her own.

  He didn’t stir a muscle.

  She straightened and quietly gathered up the tote and pocketed some of the cash. She also picked up Adam’s phone and slipped out of the room, pulling the smoothly heavy door closed after her. She pulled off her mask again, pressing her lips together for a moment, savoring the lingering warmth she’d felt from his.

  There were two nurses at their station, laughing over something, and they pointed the way to the laundry when Laurel asked. It was empty when she got there and she dumped every piece of clothing save the T-shirt and shorts she was wearing into the machine. There wasn’t a charge for it, though there was a collection kitty next to the industrial-sized containers of supplies. She pushed a crumpled bill through the slot in the kitty and with the washing machine clicking and whirring busily through its cycle, she swiped the screen on Adam’s phone and an image of the two of them from the balloon in Durango appeared, stealing her breath for a long moment.

  Was it a random coincidence? Or did it mean something more?

  She entered his password then pressed the call icon, and the image was replaced by the keypad. She started to press the first number, but then she hesitated, struggling against the spurt of nerves that felt way too familiar and way too old.

  But if she wanted to prove to herself once and for all that she was as capable as she’d claimed, she needed to start somewhere.

  She still felt vaguely nauseated as she dialed the number that had been the same for her entire life.

  It rang precisely four times before the line was picked up. “Yes?”

  In her mind’s eye, she saw him sitting at his desk in his ubiquitous gray suit and red tie.

  She straightened her shoulders as if he were able to see her standing in the middle of the small laundry room, wearing second-hand clothes. “Hello, Father. It’s Laurel.”

  * * *

  The room was cool, dark and silent when Adam opened his eyes. He was disoriented for half a second, his tired mind tripping through states and motels and hotels and miles spent on the road.

  But the weight of the baby stretched across his lap, and the prickles in his numb arm rapidly grounded him. It wasn’t entirely dark in the room. Not once his eyes adjusted.

  He could see the shapes of the furniture. The darker rectangle of the opened bathroom door. And no slender shape of a woman at all.

  He edged carefully off the rocking chair and gingerly moved to the crib. Moving at a sloth’s pace for fear he’d wake the baby, he leaned over and settled him in the center of the crib. And then he waited even longer before pulling his hands from beneath Linus’s warm head and diaper-padded butt.

  By the time he finally straightened, his back ached from the awkward position. He arched, rotated his arms and shoulders and neck, but he still felt like a hot metal poker was jabbing him in the middle of his spine.

  He carefully pulled open the room door, wincing at the loudness of the latch, and stepped into the cornea-searing brightness on the other side.

  He didn’t close the door all the way. He was afraid he wouldn’t hear Linus if he woke.

  The nurses’ station was unoccupied but the commercial-sized coffee urn located against the back wall was hot and full. He tugged the mask off one ear while he filled one of the disposable cups nearly to the brim. The clock on the wall told him it was still early. Not even eight o’clock.

  Which meant he’d slept in that chair for close to three hours.

  He flipped open the pink bakery box sitting next to the coffee machine but the two lone muffins inside looked as though they’d been there for days.

  He dropped the cover back down and followed the signs to the play area, where two kids in pajamas were playing video games and a grandmotherly woman sat nearby, her knitting needles clicking softly and flashing in the light.

  The kitchen area had two refrigerators and three long tables, picnic style. At the end of one, a man stared morosely into the plate of food in front of him.

  Adam backed out unnoticed.

  The laundry was next to the kitchen. But Laurel wasn’t there, either.

  He didn’t want to feel alarmed. But that didn’t stop it. He went back to the kitchen. “Excuse me.” The guy looked up. “Have you seen a slender woman?” He held his hand up. “This tall? Long brown hair. Prettiest blue eyes you’ve ever seen?”

  The man shook his head and turned back to surveying his plate again.

  Adam repeated the question to the knitter and the two gamers with the same result.

  He left his coffee sitting on the raised ledge surrounding the nurses’ station. All of the patient rooms were positioned like spokes on a wheel with the nurses in the center. He strode the entire circuit but still didn’t find Laurel.

  On the white board hanging outside of Linus’s room, Angelica’s name had been replaced by the night nurse’s. Penny. He didn’t know if he needed to wash up again before re-entering the room, so he did it anyway and pulled his mask back in place. Then he went back into the room, leaving the door open so he could see without turning on the light.

  The chart was still sitting on the counter beside the door, along with the envelope that Eric had left. But Adam’s phone was gone and he was sure he’d left it there.

  So she had his phone.

  And every room in the transplant unit had a wired landline. He snatched it up and dialed his cell phone number. It went straight to voice mail.

  Either she was talking on the phone or the battery was dead.

  He went back to the playroom where he’d noticed a computer and pulled out the chair. Another whiteboard on the wall beside the monitor gave the name of the Wi-Fi and the password of the day. Soon, he’d accessed his phone account and he breathed easier at the sight of the bright red pin sitting squarely at the address of the hospital.

  He propped his elbow on the table and exhaled. She was still on the property, then.

  Somewhere.

  He exited his account and returned to Linus’s room. A dim line of light circled the ceiling and Penny the nurse was there, smoothing out a sheet on the mattress topping the bench that was now twice the size it had been earlier. She wasn’t wearing a mask. “You can lose the mask now,” she said when he asked. “Dr. Patel is satisfied they’re no longer needed. You can also bring your own bedding if you want,” she said softly. “Fits a full-size sheet. Just make sure everything is freshly laundered before you bring it into the unit.” Her shoes squeaked slightly as she crossed the room. “I’ve put in an order for housekeeping to bring
another set of towels, too. Knowing them, it’ll probably be midnight before they show up, though. The door has a lock if you—Oh, hello.” She smiled when Laurel appeared in the doorway. “I was just saying the door has a lock if you want to make sure nobody interrupts your sleep at night.”

  Adam peered at Laurel, but the ambient light was too dim to read her expression above the mask she was wearing.

  “Medical staff can override the lock,” Penny was still talking, “but unless there’s an emergency, we generally try to give everyone some uninterrupted privacy at night.” She patted the cabinet hanging on the wall next to the door. “Extra formula and bottles for Linus are in here. He usually wants one around three, but don’t worry if he sleeps through.”

  “Angelica told me earlier,” Adam said.

  “Perfect. Use the call button if you need anything.” She clipped her pen onto her lanyard and squeaked out of the room. A moment later, she’d slipped into the room next door, leaving Adam and Laurel alone.

  “Hope you don’t mind.” She held up his phone before setting it on top of the medical chart.

  “No.” Though he was mighty curious about whoever she’d called.

  Her canvas tote was looped over her shoulder and she unloaded the clothes inside into one of the drawers built into the wall near the crib. Then she looked down at Linus and lightly covered his legs with the edge of the blue blanket.

  “How’s the mattress?” she asked in a low whisper.

  “Didn’t try it.” Adam hadn’t planned to spend the night. There was too much to take care of at Provisions in the morning. And the rental car. And the insurance. He literally had a dozen tasks that needed handling.

  Laurel slipped around him and sat experimentally on the corner of the mattress. “More comfortable than it looks.” She patted the space beside her. “Give it a try.”

  “If I do, I’m not going to want to get back up.”

  “You of all people have earned some sleep. More than you got in the rocking chair.”

  “I wasn’t thinking about sleep.”

  She gave him a quick look before her lashes swept down again. “Give it a try,” she said again. Even more softly.

  The words sank through him. Tempting. “Not a good idea.”

  “Because...?”

  “Because we’re both too raw after the last few days.” He walked over to her and closed his hands around her face, tilting it upward. Her pale blue eyes seemed to glimmer in the dim light. “Because it’s been more than a year since I’ve touched you and when I do, I don’t want it to be in a hospital room with our baby sleeping two feet away. But even more, because I’m not sure I can survive another dose of Laurel Hudson.”

  Her eyes were solemn. “I’m that poisonous?”

  “Ah, sweetheart.” He leaned over and deliberately pulled off her mask to press his mouth lightly, lingeringly, against hers. It would take nothing, nothing at all and his tenuous hold on practicality would scatter like dandelion fluff. “You’re that addictive.” He dropped the mask in her lap.

  Then he moved to the crib and leaned over the side to kiss his son’s soft cheek. “Take care of Mommy,” he whispered.

  Then he straightened and scooped up his phone before reaching for the door. “I’ll be back tomorrow.”

  “Adam?”

  His hand tightened on the door handle. He looked back at her.

  “What’s going to happen to us when Linus is ready to come home?”

  “I don’t know,” he said honestly. “But we’ll figure it out. All right?”

  Her fingers were pressed against her throat. She nodded. “All right.”

  He pushed down on the door handle.

  “Adam.”

  He steeled himself yet again. “Yeah?”

  “I wish I had said yes.”

  There was no pretending he didn’t know what she meant.

  But a lot of years and a lot of words had happened since then.

  With the knot in his throat nearly strangling him, he pushed open the door and he left.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Adam turned off the truck engine in front of the clay-tile-roofed house and looked at Laurel, sitting on the seat beside him. “Here we are.”

  Laurel exhaled audibly. Her eyes skipped to his and then away. Ever since they’d left the hospital in Houston that afternoon for what he dearly hoped was the last time, she’d grown increasingly quiet. More quiet than Linus was being in the back seat, at any rate.

  Sprung from the hospital with Dr. Patel’s and all of the nursing staff’s heartfelt blessing, Linus had jabbered and chortled and played with the raucously noisy toy his uncle Kane had given him the entire way.

  “You’re sure about this? About staying here?” He spread his fingers, taking in the house in front of the truck. “Just because Callum offered the place doesn’t mean we had to take him up on it.” Adam hadn’t even agreed to his cousin’s offer until Callum had accepted Adam’s insistence on paying monthly rent for the place. Family or not, Adam didn’t take charity. “You and Linus could have it all to yourself if you’d be more comfortable.”

  She gave him a look as she unsnapped her safety belt and pushed open her door. “Don’t start that again. Linus should have both of his parents with him. We agreed on that a week ago.”

  A week ago, he’d figured they’d be returning to the bungalow where Kane’s presence would help keep Adam from forgetting that they weren’t just any regular family. But that was before Callum’s brilliant idea that they move into the empty guesthouse situated on the grounds of the Fame and Fortune Ranch he’d purchased nearly a year ago.

  “Yeah, but if you change your mind, all you have to do is say so.”

  “Have you changed your mind?”

  “No.”

  “Then stop harping on it!” She hopped out of the truck and closed the door a little harder than necessary before she opened the rear door and began unbuckling Linus from his car seat.

  Adam got out, too, and lifted his duffel and the small suitcase that had replaced her canvas tote bag from the truck bed, and they headed toward the front door. “Kane should have dropped off the crib and the rest of the boxes of baby gear by now.” He’d have liked to refuse the stuff Eric had sent to the bungalow on a JLI truck a few days ago, but Linus shouldn’t have to suffer just because his father was churlish.

  Laurel’s head was like a swivel as she took in their surroundings. “When you said this wasn’t a working ranch, I didn’t expect to see so many horses.” She rubbed her nose against Linus’s. “Want to learn how to ride, sweet pea? I was a year old when I was put on the back of my first horse.”

  “Let’s put a pin in that for now,” Adam suggested as he pushed open the front door for her. “We haven’t even gotten used to his starting to crawl.”

  Her eyes sparkled humorously as she carried Linus inside. “City boy. I bet I could get you to like horses, given the opportunity—” She stopped so abruptly Adam bumped into her from behind. She jumped as if she’d been scorched and crossed the furnished great room to stand in front of the tall windows overlooking an open range. When she gave him a quick look, her cheeks looked red. “It’s lovely here.”

  It was.

  But he was thinking more about the sight of her standing in front of the tall windows than the leather furniture and the fresh flowers that had welcomed them.

  Callum had said the place was furnished. Adam should have realized his cousin hadn’t meant it was furnished with items similar to what he and Kane had picked up from Mariana’s Market.

  “You’re going to put a million fingerprints on these windows,” she was telling Linus as she carried him through the house, obviously intent on exploring the new digs.

  Adam dumped the bags on the couch and went the other direction, just to give himself an opportunity to breathe easier. For the last
week and a half, he’d been preparing for the time when Linus would be ready to leave the hospital. When Adam wouldn’t be seeing the baby and Laurel for just the few hours that he’d managed each day, traveling back and forth between Rambling Rose and Provisions and the hospital in Houston.

  Now that the day had arrived, instead of thinking how lucky they were where Linus’s recovery was concerned, all he could think about was the fact that there were real beds in this house and no nurses working on the other side of the hospital room door.

  A bucket of daisies sat on the table in the breakfast nook, too, and when Adam opened the fridge in the kitchen, he found it had been stocked with fresh food.

  Between Callum and his wife, Becky, they hadn’t missed a trick. If Adam and Laurel had really been a family, the guesthouse would seem like a dream come true. Instead, he was feeling more caged than when they’d been crammed into a rental car driving across the country together.

  “The boxes are here,” Laurel’s voice called to him from the other side of the house. “Kane put them in the nursery.”

  He exhaled. Avoiding Laurel wasn’t going to solve anything. Particularly now that they were under their “own” roof. He went into the living area and grabbed her suitcase and cursed under his breath when the sketchbook tucked in the pocket on the side slid out and fell on the floor.

  He leaned over and grabbed it but stopped when he saw the sketch of Linus.

  He set down the suitcase and paged backward through the book. It was the same one she’d used back in Seattle and he felt bad that he hadn’t thought to make sure she’d gotten a new one. She’d sketched flowers. And Jerry the security guard’s face. Dr. Granger, with a chewed pen tucked in her gray hair.

  Then he turned another page and saw his own face.

  And another page. And another sketch of him. Like the doodling a teenage girl might do, they were small sketches, large sketches, partial sketches. They covered page after page after page until he reached the front cover of the book.

  He exhaled. Told himself it meant nothing and he pushed the book back into the pocket again. More firmly so it wouldn’t fall out again.