Close Range Christmas

by Nicole Helm

  There were a few more practicalities, but before Sarah could really study Gage’s note to her liking, she was being ushered out the door to head to her doctor’s appointment.

  Cody was driving, and they’d decided to take Brady’s truck since he’d yet to get a note with his name on it. Though it was only a matter of time, it seemed smarter to avoid a vehicle specifically owned by someone who’d already been “sentenced.”

  Once Cody drove out onto the highway, a cop car pulled behind them. Following them toward town.

  Sarah sat in the back with Nina, who she could all but feel studying her. Sarah didn’t know what to say, so she kept her mouth shut.

  Until Nina broke the silence. “You really...slept together?”

  Sarah gave Nina a doleful look. “That is how babies are made.”

  “Why didn’t you tell anyone? For nine months?”

  Dev’s gaze met hers in the rearview mirror. She didn’t know what to say. Sure, she could give the truth. He probably wanted her to. But it wasn’t exactly the whole truth, no matter how she’d convinced herself it was.

  Turned out, with the actual possibility of Dev as a father to her child, as a partner, she could admit to herself she’d convinced herself of the insane plan because she’d hoped for this. She just hadn’t dared plan for it.

  “It’s complicated,” Dev said before she could think of what to say. “And we have a few more complicated matters to focus on.”

  Nina frowned at the back of his head, but she didn’t press the matter. They finished the drive in tense silence, all eyes on the world around them as they drove. Wondering if something would jump out and harm them.

  It was a terrible way to live. Sarah wished she could be doing something, but instead she had to walk into the medical building and wait for what felt like eternity to be led back to one of the exam rooms. There was the weighing, the peeing in a cup and then more waiting.

  Dev looked large and uncomfortable in the small chairs in the exam room. He kept adjusting his weight.

  “Honestly, you’d think you were the one nine months pregnant in a paper gown.”

  He glanced at her in the paper gown, then looked up at the ceiling. “You’re not exactly covered up very well.”

  “That’s because she’s going to shove her—”

  A knock cut off what Sarah had been going to horrify Dev with. The doctor stepped in, then stopped short at the man in the chair. “Well, hello. I’m Dr. Marks.”

  “Dev. Dev Wyatt.” He shook the doctor’s hand. “I’m the father.”

  “Well, lovely. Let’s get started then, shall we? Everything looks good with your weight and blood pressure and sample. We’ll do the heartbeat, then do an internal.”

  Sarah had to bite back a laugh at the way Dev paled. Her humor faded, as it always did, when the doctor put the monitor on her stomach and the quick, mechanical womp womp filled the room.

  “Heart rate is good,” the doctor said.

  Sarah hadn’t noticed Dev had come to stand beside her, she’d been so focused on the heartbeat. His fingers intertwined with hers and she looked up at him. There was sheer awe on his face—she knew because she felt it every time. But it was bigger, more emotional with him here to share it.

  She hadn’t come to these appointments alone. She’d always had one of her sisters insist on coming with. She’d always known she wouldn’t raise this baby alone, but knowing she—or this baby—had reached Dev and brought him here...where he could experience life. And wonder. And joy.

  She wanted to cry, but she blinked the tears back.

  “Now to check your cervix.” Casually explaining what she was doing and why to Dev, the doctor went through the exam. When she was finished, she gave Sarah a sympathetic smile.

  “No dilation. I think he’s content to stay put for a while longer yet. We might even want to schedule an induction for after Christmas. We don’t want him hanging out in there too long.”

  “Even with the contractions she’s been having, you think he’s going to stay put?”

  The doctor smiled indulgently. “Anything is possible, Mr. Wyatt. She could have him tomorrow. But the likelihood of him coming early at this point is slim. First-time births are notoriously late and slow. She should have plenty of warning when he’s coming.”

  “So, what you’re saying is it’s perfectly safe to stay out at the ranch through Christmas, even if the weather forecast is bad,” Sarah said.

  The doctor paused, looked from Dev’s scowling face to Sarah. “Well. It’d be good to pay attention to the weather forecast. You wouldn’t want to be caught too far away from a medical facility. But I think you’re pretty safe as long as there aren’t any more contractions. Considering how far you are from the hospital, I’d say you start getting regular contractions, even if they’re pretty far apart, you’d want to make your way close. Especially if the weather is bad.”

  Sarah gave Dev a triumphant smile.

  “If he’s not here for Christmas, we’ll see you back next week. I’m out of the office until the new year, but my nurse practitioner can check you out, and I’ll be on call for any births. You both have a nice holiday. Take your time getting dressed.”

  Sarah thanked the doctor before she left. She needed Dev’s help to get herself off the table. Getting undressed in front of him hadn’t been that big of a deal because she’d had the paper gown to put over her before she’d shimmied out of her pants.

  Now it was a little more awkward. Especially when he handed her her pants. Still, she felt more weird about asking him to turn around or close his eyes or something, so she twisted and turned to pull her pants back on while keeping the paper in place.

  Of course, then she had to slide it off to put on her shirt, but that was... Well, her bra was no different than a swimsuit really.

  Uncomfortable but unwilling to say so, she let the paper gown drop and took the sweatshirt Dev handed to her. But before she could pull it over her head, he placed his hands over her belly. His bare hands on her bare belly. “I can feel him kick you. I heard his heart beat. But he still doesn’t feel...real.”

  No, none of any of this felt real, most especially Dev touching her like this. But it would. At least the baby would. “He will. When you hold him. When he’s here. It’ll feel more real than we can imagine.”

  “You’re so sure?”

  “I watched Gage and Felicity. Pretty intently, since I was starting to hatch my plan then. So, yeah, I’m sure. Something changes when he actually gets here. Something big.”

  He looked at her then—her—not her belly. The gaze was searching. Open. There was something in those hazel eyes that had her breath catching in her throat.

  But then he only dropped his hands and stepped back. “We should get going. Don’t want to be separated any more than we have to be.”

  Sarah could only nod, because her throat was too tight, and everything she’d dreamed of was too close. But instead of reaching for it, demanding it, she kept her mouth shut and followed Dev back out to the waiting room where Nina and Cody were.

  Because there was still a madman torturing them, and no dreams were going to be realized in the midst of that.

  * * *

  DEV KEPT EXPECTING something to happen, but they were back at the ranch by suppertime safe and sound. Not even the hint that anyone had followed, nor had anything new happened at the ranch while they were gone.

  After supper, Sarah went to bed early. They’d agreed on four people staying awake for four hours, then another four people for the next, to get them through the night. Dev was on the first shift tonight.

  He stood in the kitchen while his brothers said good-night to their kids and wives and people slowly settled into bed. He should be thinking about Anth. About the notes and sentences and the dead bodies.

  But all he could think about was that doctor’s office. He
’d heard his child’s heartbeat. An odd noise. Not really human. Not really...

  It hadn’t been magic. He didn’t suddenly think he’d be some amazing father, or that Sarah didn’t deserve better. Like he’d told her, it still didn’t feel real. But it had touched something inside of him. Something he’d preferred to have left dead.

  Life was easier that way. Easier without all this...this...

  This.

  But now that the Pandora’s box was open, there was no shoving it back.

  When Jamison, Cody and Gage all walked into the kitchen and instead of determining lookout posts, grabbed four beers from the fridge and handed him one, Dev blinked. “What’s this?”

  “The Dad crew,” Gage said, clinking his bottle of beer to Dev’s. “Welcome.”

  “I’m not a dad yet.”

  “Dad enough,” Cody said with a grin. “The real terror is just beginning.”

  Dev shifted uncomfortably. “We’ve got actual terror to deal with first.”

  Gage laughed. “Buddy, you don’t know real terror ’til that baby is crying at two in the morning and you ain’t got a clue as to why.”

  “Or your eight-year-old looks up at you and says, ‘Daddy, where do babies come from?’”

  Gage snorted out a laugh at Cody’s rendition of Brianna’s high-pitched questions.

  “We just wanted to congratulate you,” Jamison said. “Whatever the circumstances that brought you here, being a father is... It’s a big thing. It’s a good thing.”

  Dev wanted to shrug away all that...emotion. Before his brush with death, he’d wanted to model himself after Jamison. Then he’d realized he was such a coward. He’d given up on that dream. So having any kind of Jamison’s approval felt like a noose. “Maybe for the likes of you, but I’m pretty sure it’s a terribly selfish thing for me.”

  “Selfish?”

  “I wasn’t going to be involved. Before you get that battle light in your eye, Jamison, Sarah didn’t want me to be. Or at least, she said she didn’t. But when all the danger started, I got to thinking about how we weren’t protected when we were babies. We had each other, but we didn’t have a parent who’d lay it all down to keep us safe and I just... I wanted to be that. Isn’t that selfish?”

  His brothers were silent and Dev wished he’d kept his big mouth shut.

  “I think we can convince ourselves of a lot of things,” Jamison said at length. “That we’re the most selfish. Or the most noble. I think it’s human nature to cast ourselves in some role—hero or villain. Maybe most especially when we grew up with nothing but villains.”

  That made a little too much sense to Dev, who’d often wanted to cast himself as the villain because... Well, he hadn’t been as good as the heroes in his life. But he hadn’t been as bad as the villains in his life, had he?

  “Maybe it’s part selfish to want to give someone what you didn’t have, but being a father isn’t a selfish act. Giving isn’t... It can be for selfish reasons, but it’ll change you. Having that kid. It changed me and I didn’t meet Brianna until she was seven.”

  “Gigi isn’t mine in the biological sense of things,” Jamison said carefully. “When you choose to be a father—when we choose to be fathers—I don’t think you could ever separate what Ace was to us, did to us, from that choice. Maybe it’s selfish, but... We’re human. You can’t separate your humanness from your relationships with other people—the ones you choose, the ones you don’t. Life’s complicated. It isn’t black and white.”

  Gage clapped Jamison on the back. “My God, an old dog can learn new tricks.”

  “Ha. Ha,” Jamison replied with an eye roll.

  Before they could say anything more to make him feel...confused all over again, Liza walked into the kitchen.

  “Everyone’s down for the night pretty much. You guys are officially on lookout. But I just wanted to warn you not to play hero and not wake us up,” Liza warned, and while Dev figured that warning was mostly for Jamison, she looked at all of them. “We’re in this together. Always.”

  “I promise,” Jamison replied.

  Cody and Gage followed Liza out of the kitchen to their posts at the front of the house. Dev was assigned the kitchen window and door. Jamison was supposed to have the basement, but he stood there not moving for his station.

  Dev shifted uncomfortably under his brother’s assessing gaze. “What?” he demanded. “We had our little heart-to-heart. Now it’s time to do our jobs.”

  But Jamison didn’t stop looking at him like he understood all the horrible depths of his soul. He reached out and squeezed Dev’s shoulder. “I don’t think you’ve ever given yourself room to be human, Dev. You always wanted to be more or better, but sometimes being you is enough.”

  Dev didn’t know how that could be true, but he also didn’t know how to refute his oldest brother’s words. And they hung with him as Jamison left for his post, as he spent four hours watching out. As he went to his room, where Sarah was asleep in his bed.

  He didn’t disturb her, rolling out a sleeping bag on the floor, but he couldn’t sleep because Jamison’s words haunted him. His own thoughts haunted him.

  If he could be enough...what might the future hold?

  Chapter Thirteen

  Sarah was happy to wake up naturally, even if it was a bit late. She yawned and pawed on the nightstand for her phone. Really late. Almost noon. No one should have let her sleep that long.

  She lumbered out of bed, winced a little at the pain in her stomach. Not like a contraction. More achy than sharp. Probably just slept on it wrong. Or just her muscles aching from all this weight she was hefting around.

  She took care of practicalities and got dressed, wondering where Dev had slept and if she’d missed anything terrible happening. It would be nice to wake up and just...have a normal life again.

  When she walked down the hall and into the kitchen, it was bustling. Almost like that normal life she’d wanted had showed up as ordered.

  Of course, real life wasn’t sleeping in Dev’s bed or walking into Grandma Pauline’s kitchen at nearly noon after having slept through chores, but it was nice nonetheless.

  The two older children were at the table with a variety of dishes. Claire was in her high chair banging happily at the tray. Grandma Pauline and Rachel were hunched over the counters, mixing together what looked like cookie dough.

  “What’s all this?”

  “We’re going to decorate for Christmas,” Brianna said, bouncing in her seat. “Daddy and all the uncles went to get a tree!”

  “And we’re going to make cookies, and have hot chocolate tonight when we decorate,” Gigi said, matching Brianna’s excitement.

  Sarah might have smiled at their enthusiasm, but Brianna’s statement had her moving over to Grandma Pauline. She couldn’t think of one time in her life where she’d dared question Grandma Pauline, but the words came out of her in a hissed whisper she couldn’t bite back.

  “We’re being threatened and you sent them to cut down a tree?” It was usually a Christmas Eve tradition anyway. While at the Knight Ranch they’d had their tree up since the beginning of December, Grandma Pauline’s family had always done it on Christmas Eve, and she was a stickler for tradition.

  Until, apparently, danger was in the equation.

  Grandma Pauline spared her one cutting look. “Christmas will come one way or another, Sarah.”

  Sarah felt chagrined, even though she shouldn’t. “Yes, whether we put a tree up or not.”

  Grandma looked at the girls, happily browsing through bottles of sprinkles. “I suppose we should let this ne’er-do-well ruin their Christmas, hide in closets until the danger has passed...if it ever does. I suppose I should have never had a Christmas for those boys when Ace was always a threat.”

  Sarah didn’t have anything to say to that, and she noted Rachel kept her head down
over the counter.

  “Those men are out doing chores, don’t know why they couldn’t cut a tree down all the same. You go on and sit yourself down.”

  Sarah didn’t know what else to do but listen. In a few short minutes, Grandma had a lunch plate in front of her. A sandwich, a clementine and a handful of pretzels. Even worried about the men out chopping down Christmas trees, the gesture made her smile and feel ten years old again.

  Sadly, she wasn’t ten. A ten-year-old didn’t need to worry about people’s lives or her baby being born. Sarah rubbed a hand over her stomach. She choked down a few bites of her lunch, though she wasn’t hungry at all.

  She feigned interest in the Christmas decorations, but mostly she studied her phone, where she had pictures of all three notes. She read them over and over again, still sure there was a pattern just out of reach.

  The men returned, all seven of them stomping and shedding their winter layers. They left the tree in the mudroom so they could scrounge up the stand and get that set up first.

  Grandma had lunch plates put together in no time. Dev took a seat next to her and peered at her phone screen.

  “Looking at it won’t change it.”

  “No. It won’t. But there’s a pattern. There’s a...reason. I can feel it. I just can’t work out what it is.”

  “Maybe you should have been a cop. Some kind of detective.”

  “All those rules to follow?” She wrinkled her nose. “No thanks.”

  He smiled at her. An actual smile. Like he enjoyed her company or liked looking at her or something. It had a warmth warring with an odd jittery feeling that this was all wrong, even though it was what she wanted. What she’d always wanted.

  Now it was here and she didn’t quite know what to do with it. With him.

  “Whichever two of you are done first go on downstairs and get the decorations,” Grandma Pauline said, still working on the cookie dough with Rachel. “They’re in tubs in the crawl space.”