Her entire body stiffened as if he had sucker punched her. She realized how right he was, and there was no way she would not have his baby. Not by her choice, at least.
She turned away from him and started pacing. “You don’t understand anything. Do you know how hard this will be? I can’t be like the first time I almost became a mother. I spent all my time touching my stomach, feeling the awe and wonder and excitement. I read as many books and articles as I could with insatiable hunger. I bought every little trinket and gizmo anyone suggested. I indulged my nesting instinct. I was there, all in. So was Patrick. You deserve that. I can’t give you the experience you should be feeling. You didn’t kill your baby.”
His eyes tracked her frantic pacing, but he didn’t attempt to stop her. Letting her frenetic, nervous energy expel itself was part of his gift to her. He didn’t attempt to soothe her, or tell her to calm down. She appreciated that in him. He let her be. But she knew, down deep in her gut, all it would take was a simple word from her before he’d step up next to her and envelop her into his warm embrace.
That stopped her dead. It was a really liberating knowledge to have. Even if she didn’t take him up on it, she had his total support.
“First, I was never intending to have the experience. Until I met you, I never once entertained the notion or fantasy of wanting a baby, let alone, looked forward to the day I’d actually be having one. I didn’t intend to stay here for more than a few months at a time. There was no reason for me to stay. But now? There is. You. You’re my entire reason for wanting to do anything and everything.”
She scrunched her eyes shut and took in a deep breath that filled her lungs to capacity. A rush of passionate feelings swelled her heart: shock, disbelief, joy, anger, hurt, fear, anxiety and love. So much love overfilled her heart. Could he really have said that out loud to her? She was his reason? This wild, crazy, man who lived passionately with total abandon and no concern for society’s conventions or responsibilities, this man now wanted to abide by all that and willingly, simply because of her? She could not compute the magnitude of that. She thought of what he’d done already for her, and what he said he was willing to become for her. Glancing at them, never, ever would anyone think she could have inspired those things in him. And vice versa.
“Allison?” he said with a tender, soft, lilting tone to his voice. “Is it my hair? My tattoos? My bike? I can cut my hair, sell my bike, and wear more dad-like clothes, if you ask me. No one but you will ever see the rest of my body again, and it could just be our secret. If you ask me to conform more to you on the outside, as much as I do on the inside. I would. I will. It would be easy for me as long as I can be with you.”
Tears started to roll down her face as he spoke. “No. NO! That is not—none of this is because of how you look. I don’t want you to cut your hair, or not be who you really are. I know what kind of man you are: good, kind, loyal, smart and wonderful. It’s all you, Shane. You take my breath away. I love everything about you. I—” Her voice cracked before she rushed into his arms. He caught her easily. “I love you,” she finally finished.
His chest expanded and deflated as he let out a breath of total relief. “I’ve been waiting a while to know that for sure.”
“I know,” she finally admitted softly, her voice growing stronger. “But you don’t understand. I had that once. Patrick and I loved each other very much too. We wanted and felt all of… this. But look where that ended up. We could not survive it. Why would it be any different with us?”
“You’re so sure something is going to happen?”
“I’m sure it’s a distinct possibility that at some point, it will. And then? I can’t go through another break-up. It was just as awful to fall out of love and stop caring for Patrick as it was to lose Gabrielle.”
He tucked a hunk of hair behind her ear. His big hands always seemed so clunky whenever he fiddled with her hair, or tried to gently touch her. When wasn’t his touch totally soft and almost reverent on her? He made her heart swell with love. He was so unlike how his looks suggested he’d be with her. “I don’t know why that happened to you guys. I can’t guarantee anything. I know things will go wrong. You forget I’ve lost people I love too. Both of my parents. One day, I had them, the next, I had none. Then, Jack and a strange woman, who wasn’t my mother, started telling me what to do. I never got used to it; and I never forgave them for being here when my parents weren’t. I learned earlier than most kids that life happens, baby. Really, I get that. It’s what you do after it happens that matters. And I can only promise you that I’ll be right here. By your side. I won’t let you push me away. I would even tear my bleeding heart from my chest and hand it to you if that will prove my unconditional love for you.”
She leaned back and stared into his dark, compelling, green eyes as he spoke. His voice had a lilting, hypnotic quality that made it so easy to fall into a trance just listening to him. She touched her hand to his cheek. “I do forget. You don’t mention it often enough.”
He shrugged and put his hand over hers. “I didn’t want to be at the ranch during the last ten years. It reminded me of what I lost. When I was away, I found it much easier to manage the loss. You know? Not being here, it wasn’t something I thought about as much. When I came back, I could picture how Dad used to cross the yard from the barns, or Mom when she waited for me in the kitchen. I’d see Jack doing my dad’s old jobs and it made me so damn angry. Because it should have been my dad. Even if I hated the old bastard at times, I never wanted him dead.”
“I didn’t know you hated him.”
Shane shrugged and stepped away from her, his gaze now focused on the ranch and river that spread out before them. He kneeled down along the edge of the bank and picked up a small stone before throwing it into the river. “I wasn’t what Dad wanted in a son. I was a huge disappointment. After Jack and Ian… what did he need with a rebel? I didn’t dress or act or comply with his wishes. Everything that spoke to me, didn’t to Dad, and vice versa. We couldn’t find common ground.” Shane glanced back at her. “I would never do that to a child, Allison. I’ll accept our child however and whoever he or she is. Always.”
She walked forward and kneeled beside him, her eyes focused on the view too. “Assuming the baby lives.”
He glanced at her and a small smile tugged up one side of his mouth. “Is this how you’re going to be the entire time?”
“Maybe.”
He nodded. “Okay. You assume the worst; I’ll assume the best. And hopefully the future will lie somewhere between.”
She wanted to know what else he had to say about his family. She never heard him open up before, not like this. “Everyone else mentions your dad like he was such a great guy.” Allison heard of Henry Rydell quite frequently. He was spitting image of Jack. Almost a legend, he single-handedly steered the Rydell River Ranch onto the path of profit when most small family farms and ranches were going under. Henry Rydell expanded and improved their operations with unparalleled success. He left his sons a huge legacy that made them almost royalty around there. It was surprising to hear what one of his sons felt about his share of the legacy. Being anything but positive, Shane thought he was just lucky.
“He was. We never saw eye-to-eye on anything. From the time I was a little kid, something about me rubbed him the wrong way. So everyone else saw him differently than I did. But I didn’t want him to die. I regretted for most in my life that we could never find some kind of middle ground or compromise. Never any resolution between us.” He threw another rock that landed midway out in the river with a distant thunk.
“Then again, maybe we never would have gotten along. It isn’t like he’d want a son who looks like this.” Shane swiped his hand over his inked body. “Or spent the last ten years the way I have. But then again, when I look at you, I think he’d finally tell me I’d gotten something right. Maybe if someone like you could love me, he might believe there was something in me that came out right.”
“You d
on’t need me to prove what is right in you,” she exclaimed. “Shane, you’re an amazing man. How could you not know that?” She wanted to shriek her annoyance. How could any father not love this man?
He tilted his head at her. “Then maybe you could try and not hate the idea of me as the father of your baby.”
She jerked back and her mouth popped open. “Y—you think I hate the idea? No. God, no. I’m so freaking selfish. It’s not you. It’s me. It’s what happened before.” She started shaking her head in frantic denial. When she spoke, her tone hinted at her exhaustion in trying to cope with another seven months of pregnancy. “It’s that I’m so fucking scared to do this all over again. But most of all, to lose another baby.”
He turned and replied, “Maybe if you care so much about losing it, you really do want it. And you’re not selfish. You’re just scared. I get that. I know how deep that fear runs for you. So give it to me. All of it. Give it over to me. Let me do all the worrying. Let me be the one who gets you through this. Call me, be with me, and just let me love you through this.”
“I don’t know how to do that. It’s my body that has to experience it.”
“My body will hold up yours. Marry me, Allison. Baby or not. You’re all I want in life. You made me belong although I never wanted to; but actually, it turned out to be all I wanted. I just didn’t know how to live and abide by everyone else’s rules and conventions. But for some reason, with you, it’s all okay. I fit in. I finally discovered my place in life.”
“But I represent the very definition of all those rules and conventions.”
He shrugged. “You want me to tell you the logical explanation for why we love whom we love? I can’t do that. I can just tell you that I’m here. Forever. Marry me, baby. Come on. You said you loved me.”
She closed her eyes and he brought her against his chest. “I do,” she admitted.
“So… let me get you through this. I can do that, baby. I can be what you need.”
She drew in a sharp breath. Allison never had anyone need her like that. And maybe, she never needed anyone like that either. But his certainty of her, and of them, including the baby, was a comfort she couldn’t deny. He was so sure, and seemed to have enough confidence to bolster hers.
It was insane. She didn’t do things like that. She didn’t even believe in it. You should date for years. Only fools rush in. You don’t know about real life, or lifelong love until you are together long enough to be sure.
But then again, look how well that went for her and Patrick. They were the epitome of cautious. Dating all through college, abiding by the traditional plans and rules with plenty of thought and care. And still, life fucked them over. She opened her eyes and found Shane staring right at her. There were no answers, only giant leaps. She’d never been willing to take a giant leap based on faith. She didn’t know how to, but Shane did. She knew in her gut that he embraced life in ways she never could. But his exuberant confidence and powers of belief were intoxicating and contagious.
“Allison? Please, marry me. Now. Today, if you want. I don’t need to wait. I already know. I’ve known for a long while. I just knew you needed longer before you knew. So maybe this happened for that reason. You might never have taken a chance with me, so life took it for you. And I’m here. I can do this with you. Just let me.”
Let me. She started nodding as fresh tears rolled down her face. “Okay. I’ll let you. I’ll marry you. But you can’t… leave me. You can’t bail on me. I don’t have the strength to do this alone. I need yours.”
He drew her to his chest and calmly, quietly tucked her head close as his arms surrounded her. She expected a loud whooping for joy. Instead, he kissed the top of her head. “Okay. You got it. Forever.”
Something about his calm surety quelled her anxiety and panic. For the first time, she laid her hand flat on her stomach, and said, “I think it’s still alive.”
She felt his mouth on her cheek as his hand covered hers, pressing his fingertips gently on her skin. “I think so too.”
She closed her eyes. He didn’t mock her or get shocked by her crass words. He seemed to understand denying it was the only way she could stand to let it exist. “I don’t want to talk about it. The pregnancy, I mean. I don’t want to decorate a nursery, or buy anything. We don’t do anything until this is over. Okay?”
“Okay, when he or she is born, then we’ll do everything.”
She smiled at his eager compliance. “I don’t want to sit around discussing it either, or how I feel. I will go to the doctor and do the proper prenatal care. I’ll take care of myself. I promise you. But I don’t want to talk about it. I want to just live. Do our usual days and pretend like nothing is different.”
“Okay.”
She twisted around and looked into his eyes. She was humbled by the tender expression she saw there when his eyes softened at seeing her. The love she saw there was for her. “You don’t really mean that. Not talking. Not being excited. You—”
“I can take care of me. There’s no trauma for me. But there is for you. I can be however you ask me to be about this, and do whatever you need.”
“What if you start to think I’m a heartless bitch who doesn’t care about my own baby? It’s just… I did all of that once. And it was in the very last weeks that my own body killed my baby.”
He was quiet for a long, meaningful moment. The sun felt warm on their skin. The place was strangely quiet, with only the hum of a tractor in the orchard, and the soft twitters of birds. It was so peaceful. Like nothing bad could possibly happen in the world. She started to wonder if maybe living in this spot would make her feel like that, and she began to see why Shane liked it and found it so special.
Then he kissed the side of her face. “You didn’t kill your baby. It just happened. Sad things happen.”
She let his words stand, but her heart didn’t believe them. Her gut twisted as she pictured the moment all over again, fresh with the horror. “I felt it.” She finally admitted something she had never told anyone. Not even Patrick.
“What, honey?”
“I think I felt the moment she died.” Allison almost bit her tongue. It was such an ugly image, so sad and gross and awful; and it happened right inside her.
“Do you want to tell me about it?”
“I was standing in front of my classroom, explaining something to my second grade class and I suddenly stopped and had to bend over. I felt this strong flurry of activity in my stomach. I noticed it, and made note of it; it was that strong. And then… nothing. It stopped. I went back to the reading group I was facilitating. After that, I—I didn’t feel her move again. But I refused to acknowledge it for over a day. Maybe I was just in denial. Maybe somewhere in me I knew, I just knew, what happened. I finally went to the doctor and they couldn’t find a heartbeat… well, you know the rest. I don’t like to rehash it.”
“I know the rest,” he replied.
“So you see? You don’t really know how bad it can get. Most people never do. But my daughter died inside of me and then I carried her around like some kind of organic, breathing coffin… now, do you understand? You can’t really eradicate all the stress of this for me.”
He leaned his face into her neck and she jumped when she felt how wet it was. She turned and saw the tears filling his eyes. They were for her and what she had suffered. She could see the depths of his heartache for her. He heard her. She let out a breath. Rarely did people, besides Patrick of course, hear how bad it really was. There was a reason why she could not get over it, or let it go. It was the most horrifying experience of her life. And one of the most horrible she’d ever heard of.
“No, I don’t really know. But I refuse to accept that your life is over, Allison. Or that the same thing will happen again. I have to believe that this time will end differently. I have enough faith in that for both of us. And I can do whatever you need from me to make this more bearable for you. If I could undo it, believe me, I would. I would never ask you to go
through it. Just so we’re clear? I already accepted that we would never have kids. I was okay with that. I was going to marry you regardless, no matter what. Just so you understand what I’m doing here. We were happening, as far as I was concerned. But this happened too. I can’t undo it and neither can you. So we’ll go through it, and do the best we can. With no judgment on however that turns out. We’ll get through the next seven months, hell, we’ll get through the rest of our lives, together.”
Oh, those pretty, naive words. She and Patrick used to speak like that, as if they had any control over it. Or guarantees. But Shane’s certainty, and his belief seemed so genuine, she didn’t have the heart to argue the cruel reality of life and the best laid plans of even the greatest relationships. Neither could she resist his optimism. Or how sincerely he wanted to be there for her.
“Okay.”
He spun her around. His lips tilted up into the smallest smile and his heart was tripping. His mouth came down on hers and the kiss he started made her stomach tug in desire and pleasure. He leaned her back on the ground, and with the world spread out before them, made ardent love to Allison as if she were the most treasured gift of his life.
Chapter Eighteen
“I HAVE TO TELL you, man, I really never expected it to be you, doing this, here.”
Shane grinned at Jack. Ian was standing to the left of them and nodded in agreement. They stood, all three of them, dressed in suits that they usually reserved for church. They’d always gone all out for a lot of the major holidays, but today was special. They stood before a white trellis, which they spent the last weekend erecting on the bank above the river. They set it right on the spot where Shane proposed to Allison and then made love to her to seal the deal. But no one needed to know the particulars of that. That insane, unbelievable day when he managed to pull off what he never dreamed he could: getting Allison to marry him and have his baby.
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