Just the Man She Needed

by Karen Rose Smith

  Mark was waiting for her, asking a bunch of questions—“Was Mr. Coleburn cold in the barn last night? Was he going to stay? Did he know how to ride?”—one after another before she hardly had time to answer the first. Some she didn’t have the answer to and she told Mark that. He could ask Mr. Coleburn himself. Then she’d really see whether the man had patience or not.

  She’d scrambled eggs, set bacon to frying and warmed homemade bread in the oven by the time Slade came in.

  “Smells great,” he said. After he hung his hat on the rack near the door, his down parka joined it on the hook underneath.

  Just as she was about to dish the scrambled eggs onto the plates, she glanced at him, and her hands stopped in midair. He was wearing a blue-plaid flannel shirt and jeans almost tight enough that she could see his thigh muscles. His shoulders were broad even without the parka. He was all man—dark good looks, ruggedly chiseled features and obvious physical strength. She told herself the sensation in her stomach was the baby moving, and the rush of heat to her cheeks she blamed on hormones.

  Mark ran the same litany of questions he’d asked her past Slade. But Slade didn’t seem to be bothered by it. He answered with “Nope,” “Maybe” and “Yep” then he looked up at Emily as he pulled out a chair. “It looks to me as if you could use a few repairs—the house and the barn need to be weatherized for winter.”

  “I told you, I can’t pay.” She thumped his plate down in front of him, wondering why her heart was beating so fast, wondering why she was more conscious of him than she’d ever been conscious of anybody.

  “And I told you, room and board would do it. I could handle the heavier chores. Certainly you can’t do all of it up until the day you deliver.”

  “I can sure try. It hasn’t been a problem up till now. Mark’s a big help.” After she put a plate at Mark’s place and then hers, she sat across from Slade. “We say grace.”

  Slade gave a small shrug.

  After a short thanksgiving for their food, she said to Mark, “You’ll have to hurry a little or you’re going to be late for the bus.”

  “What about checking out my references, then making your decision?” Slade pushed, continuing their conversation.

  “Is work so hard to find?” she asked.

  “When you don’t know how long you’re going to be in one place, it is.”

  From what he’d said, she’d gathered he was a wanderer. Why he wandered, she didn’t know, and she knew she shouldn’t ask. She was already feeling much too curious. “All right. I’ll make the calls after I take Mark down to the bus stop. And before you offer, no you can’t do it. It’s just a little ritual he and I have. I need to see him on that bus and wave goodbye to him every morning.”

  Slade’s expression suddenly looked pained.

  There’s a longing there, she thought, and wondered what had caused it. But whatever it was, it disappeared with his next forkful of eggs.

  After she walked Mark to the bus stop, she mixed a batch of bread. She’d heard the fall of the ax as she’d walked up the snow-covered road and figured Slade Coleburn was going to cut her a very large stack of wood. She had to smile, thinking about his determination. She would appreciate the pile of wood when she had an infant she couldn’t leave alone for any length of time.

  The bread was rising when she made the phone calls to check Slade’s references. There were three names and addresses—two in Idaho and one in Wyoming. One was a construction company; the other two were ranches. All three employers reiterated what she’d read in the letters he’d given her—Slade Coleburn was dependable, reliable, and stayed until he got the job done.

  But then he moved on, she thought to herself.

  In spite of her determination to get everything done that she’d planned, she became more tired as the morning wore on. Still, she made a pot of soup for lunch and baked the bread.

  Slade came in around eleven when she was ladling out the soup. “Need help with that?” he asked.

  “I’m fine.”

  “I guess you lifted that pot filled with water to the stove by yourself?”

  She gave him a silencing look, but it didn’t seem to affect him.

  “You know, don’t you, that pregnant women are supposed to take it easy?”

  He was the voice of her conscience, making her think of her own good. So she made a decision. “I called your references. If you’d like, I can give you room and board for a list of chores and repairs. There’s a small bedroom down that hall with a single bed. You can sleep there.”

  Coming to the sink, he washed his hands and dried them on the towel. She was standing at the stove, and he was much too close to her.

  “What kind of husband did you have that you’re so used to doing everything by yourself?”

  Always a private person, she bristled. “That’s none of your business. Just because we’ll be sleeping under the same roof doesn’t mean you’ll be moving into my life.” The feelings jumping inside her—the fluttery excitement that made her breath hitch and her mouth dry—scared her.

  He didn’t look upset by what she’d said. “Fair enough. We don’t poke into each other’s lives. Sounds good to me.”

  Sighing, she sneaked a cautious look at him. She hadn’t meant it exactly that way. Now maybe he wouldn’t tell her any more about himself. He reached for the bowls of soup at the same time she did, but she avoided touching him. “I’ll get the bread,” she murmured.

  Slade spent the afternoon becoming familiar with every aspect of the ranch. During lunch, he had learned Emily was due in three weeks. He’d also learned she ran about forty head of cattle. A neighbor had been dropping feed for her since her husband had died, but Emily had told Slade that she sent baked goods to the family every weekend in repayment. She was a stubborn little lady, but he had the irrational desire to know everything he could about her. As intensely private as she was, he knew that might not happen. He kept telling himself he couldn’t be attracted to a pregnant woman almost ready to deliver. But that didn’t stop the heat from surging to very particular parts when he was within a foot of her.

  He was in the barn, cleaning out stalls when Mark came running in after school, slamming the barn door. “Mom said I can watch you, if you don’t care.”

  Smiling at the boy, he shrugged. “I don’t care. In fact, you can help if you want.” He handed Mark a small shovel.

  “Mom says you’re gonna stay. How long?”

  “I’m not sure about that yet.”

  “I’m gonna have a brother or sister soon.”

  “I know you are. Are you glad about that?”

  “I guess so. I won’t know till him or her is here.”

  Slade laughed, and the conversation continued like that until suppertime. Mark was open and inquisitive and quick, and Slade wondered again about the man who had been his father. But he wouldn’t pump a child for information.

  After supper Mark asked Slade if he’d play a board game with him.

  “You don’t have to.” Emily’s look at her son was tolerant.

  “I don’t have anything better to do, unless you want me to start weather stripping now,” Slade responded with the quiet amusement Emily was coming to expect from him.

  “I think tomorrow will be soon enough for that.” She’d give him an hour. With Mark’s constant questions, she predicted Slade would escape to his room as soon as he could.

  The baby hadn’t been active since early morning, and the aching in Emily’s back had begun in the afternoon. She thought she might have strained some muscles when she’d lifted the heavy soup pot. The discomfort persisted throughout supper, and as she sat on the sofa and chose a marker for the game Mark had spread out on the coffee table, she plumped a pillow in back of her. With Mark chattering, there was no room for personal talk, and she was just as glad.

  When nine o’clock rolled around, she urged Mark up the stairs, then read him a story as she usually did.

  Her son asked, “Can Slade come up and say good-ni
ght?”

  She hadn’t anticipated that one. “You’ve already said good-night to him.”

  “I know, but it’s not the same. Can he, please?”

  She couldn’t give her son much in material things, but she could give him love and affection and all the time he needed. Now, it seemed, he wanted time from someone else. “I’ll go ask him, but he might have already turned in.”

  “Nah, he wouldn’t go to bed before me.”

  She didn’t think so, either, but she could hope.

  As she went down the steps, the twinge in her back became sharper, and she continued to try to rub it away. It couldn’t be the baby. She still had three weeks to go, and Mark had been a full ten days late. After she walked through the kitchen and down the short hall, past the half-bath, she stopped at Slade’s door.

  Knowing her son would be disappointed if she didn’t ask Slade to go upstairs, she listened for movement inside, but didn’t hear any. Finally she rapped softly. “Mr. Coleburn?”

  There was a scuffling of boots, and then he opened the door. “Is something wrong?”

  He’d rolled up his flannel shirtsleeves and unbuttoned the top two buttons of his shirt. Dark brown hair curled there. It was as dark as the beard shadow outlining his jaw. “No. Nothing’s wrong. Mark just wondered if you would come up and say good-night. I know it’s an imposition—”

  “It’s not an imposition to say good-night to a little boy. But you shouldn’t be going up and down the steps so much, should you?”

  “In moderation, exercise is good for a pregnant woman, Mr. Coleburn.”

  “Slade.”

  It was hard for her to say it aloud, though she’d called him by his first name in her thoughts. She knew if they were on a first-name basis, they’d breach the boundary of formality. But he was sharing meals with them, and he was going to say good-night to her son. “Slade,” she repeated softly.

  When he gave her a tilted smile, her heart jumped. Turning away from him, she headed back upstairs. There were three rooms there—the larger bedroom, Mark’s room, then a smaller room she had used for sewing that would soon be the nursery. Not so long ago, she’d painted Mark’s light blue. He’d hung up a poster of his favorite baseball hero, as well as some school projects and a photograph of the horses. Every night before he went to bed, he picked up his toys, but the toy chest lid wasn’t quite closed.

  Slade followed her inside and stood beside the single pine bed, a twin to the one down in his room. “Your mom said you’d like to say good-night.”

  “Yeah, I would. Know any good stories you can tell me?”

  “Mark…” she warned. “He’s stalling,” she said to Slade. “I already read him one of his favorite books.”

  “Maybe another night,” Slade offered.

  “Did you say your prayers?” Emily asked her son.

  He nodded his head vigorously.

  “All right, then. You sleep tight until morning.” She gave him a huge hug and kissed his cheek.

  Stepping closer to Mark, Slade made a pretend chuck under his chin. “See you tomorrow, pardner.”

  Mark’s smile was wider than Emily had seen it in weeks. As she and Slade stood at the rail of the stairs, another twinge of pain sharply pierced her back. She tried to hide it, but Slade asked, “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I overdid it today. A good night’s sleep is all I need.”

  “And you’ll take it easy tomorrow?”

  “We’ll see,” she said quietly. “Good night.”

  “Good night.”

  Even as she walked to her room, the huskiness of Slade’s deep voice stayed with her. Readying herself for bed, she thought about how good a massage would feel, and then an unbidden picture of Slade—his large hands, a bottle of lotion in them—filled her mind. But before her imagination could take it any further, she put on her nightgown and slid into bed.

  She’d hardly turned out the light when the pain in her back became sharper. With a sigh, she pushed herself up and managed to stand again, walking back and forth across the room a few times. The muscles were cramping, that was all. She would take it easy tomorrow.

  But her pacing didn’t help, and after a few more strolls across the room, the sharpest pain she’d ever felt twisted at the base of her spine as she fell to her knees. She couldn’t get up again, and she knew Slade would never hear her if she tried to call. Reaching for the book she’d laid on the nightstand, she managed to grab it and pounded with it on the floor.

  Chapter Two

  Lounging on his bed, thinking about driving to the Billings courthouse the next day, Slade suddenly became alert when he heard a thump on the ceiling. Since he’d said good-night to Emily, he’d been elementally aware that she was in the room above him.

  Had she dropped something?

  Then he heard the pounding. It was strange, sort of methodical…three thumps, then another three. He didn’t have to wait any longer to realize she was trying to send him a message. Instantly on his feet, he strode down the hall, then took the steps two at a time, faster than he could say jackrabbit. What he found when he reached Emily’s room made his heart pound dangerously hard in his chest.

  She was on the floor and looked terrified. “Labor,” she gasped. “It didn’t happen this way before.”

  He didn’t know much about labor and childbirth, but he could see that Emily was in distress. Crouching down beside her, he said, “Let me help you to the bed.”

  “I have to go to the hospital.”

  “Did this just start?”

  She bit her lower lip. “I guess it’s been building all day and I didn’t know it. With Mark I just started having contractions about a half hour apart, then fifteen minutes apart, and it lasted about seven hours. This just started all at once—” As she said it, she gasped, and he could see that she was in pain.

  “Emily, what can I do?”

  As she panted, she held up her hand for a few moments. When the pain seemed to pass, she wiped her hand across her brow. “Can you take me to the hospital? I know this is a terrible imposition—”

  “Hell, Emily. This isn’t an imposition. It’s a crisis!”

  Gaining a bit of her composure back, she gave him a small smile. “It’s just childbirth, Slade.”

  “Looks like a crisis to me,” he muttered.

  “We’ll have to get Mark up. I’ll try to make it downstairs.”

  Spunk was one thing, foolishness was another. “You’ll do no such thing. I’ll take you down, then I’ll come back up here for Mark.”

  “Slade, I’m just having a baby…” But her words trailed off as another contraction swept over her.

  “Yeah! And probably sooner than later. Don’t you have an ambulance or something out here?”

  “This is Montana. We can be halfway to Billings till the ambulance gets here.”

  He wasn’t sure of that logic, but he wasn’t going to argue with her now. Before she understood what he was going to do, he scooped her up into his arms.

  “Slade!” she protested.

  “This is quicker, Emily. The last thing I need is you falling down the stairs.”

  “And what if we both fall?” she asked with raised brows.

  He shook his head. “You’re the most stubborn woman I’ve ever known.”

  “You’ve only known me a day.”

  “That tells you something, doesn’t it?” he said with a hard look as he carried her to the top of the stairs, then down into the living room and deposited her on the sofa. “I’ll be right back.”

  Returning to Mark’s room, he awakened the boy and told him what was happening. It was just as well Mark knew the score.

  “Is she okay?” the little boy asked.

  “She will be. But we have to get her to the hospital in a hurry. Think you can get yourself dressed while I look after her?”

  Mark’s head bobbed.

  Slade left Mark to it and went to take care of
Emily. But, of course, she wasn’t still on the sofa. He could tell she was going to be a bigger handful than Mark ever could be. When he found her, she was sitting on a kitchen chair with her coat on, trying to pull on one boot.

  With a shake of his head, he went over to her. Taking the tall black boot from her, he held it while she slipped her foot into it.

  “They’re tight,” she said, looking embarrassed.

  “You’re pregnant, Emily. I’d imagine everything is tight.”

  When she laughed, her laugh was as exciting as everything else about her. This was the first he’d heard it. By the time he’d helped her ease into the other boot, Mark had joined them in the kitchen, blinking sleep out of his eyes.

  After Emily got to her feet, she took a set of keys from the windowsill over the sink. “I have a van parked in the bigger shed over by the barn. It doesn’t look like much but it runs real well. And it has a full tank of gas,” she added with a little smile.

  The ranch and Emily Lawrence had filled his world for the day and he’d forgotten all about his almost-empty gas tank. “Don’t move,” he warned her, as he snatched his hat and coat from the rack and hurried out to the shed.

  Slade seemed to work on autopilot as he carried Emily to the van amid her many protests, then made sure Mark was safely seated in the back. He tried to do everything quickly without panic so as not to alarm either of them. But he knew the danger of this trip to the hospital. Anything could happen when a baby was trying to be born. He just wanted to make sure Emily was safely in the care of competent doctors when it happened.

  Twenty minutes down the road, Emily gasped, and it was a different sound than she’d made before.

  “What is it?”

  In a low murmur, she said, “My water broke and the pressure—”

  His foot pushed down harder on the accelerator. But after another five minutes she doubled over in the seat.

  “Emily?”

  “I think I’m having this baby, Slade.”

  He could hardly make out her words. “Now?”

  “Right now.”

  He swore, then clamped his lips shut as he remembered Mark in the back. Seeing a light farther up the road, he asked, “Can you give me five more minutes?”