His Texas Runaway (Men 0f The West Book 41)

by Stella Bagwell

  “This is so nice, Chandler. Thank you for inviting me out tonight and bringing me to this beautiful little place. Don’t tell Reeva, but the food is out-of-this-world delicious. And speaking of Reeva, I hope you called to let her know we wouldn’t be eating at home tonight.”

  “I called. And she didn’t even yell at me,” he joked. “I suspect that after the big group she had for dinner last night, she was relieved to get a break.”

  Roslyn smiled as she sliced her fork into a piece of tres leches cake. “Last night was a surprise for me. No one had told me Joe and his family, and your sister, Vivian, and her family, were going to show up for dinner. I really enjoyed visiting with all of them.”

  Candler grinned. “I think you especially liked Little Joe.”

  Laughing softly, Roslyn shook her finger at him. “Tessa says everyone has to start leaving off the little part of his name or he’ll forever be known as Little Joe instead of Joseph Junior.”

  “Hah! I have news for my sister-in-law. It’s too late to drop the little. That part of my nephew’s name has already stuck.”

  She swallowed another bite of cake. “You’re probably right. But no matter what name you call him, Joe is adorable. And I’ll tell you another thing. If my child is a girl, I hope she grows up to be as lovely and vivacious as Hannah. She and Nick are quite a pair together, aren’t they?”

  She probably wasn’t aware of it, Chandler thought, but Roslyn had become a part of the family, too. But would she want to remain a part of it? She’d already left her home and her father back in Texas. What made Chandler think he’d be able to hold her at Three Rivers?

  Not wanting to dwell on that question tonight, he tried to push it out of his head and focus strictly on her and this rare time of being alone with her.

  “Hannah and Nick have a special bond,” he answered. “From the first time those two kids met, they hit it off perfectly. Which surprised the heck out of me. Nick is about a year or two younger than Hannah and for a long time she tended to boss him around, but he seemed to like it. Now that Hannah lives on the reservation, they don’t get to see each other every day. But their parents make sure the two of them still get to spend plenty of time together.”

  Roslyn nodded. “Katherine told me that one of the reasons Nick and Hannah clicked so much was that neither had a father.”

  “That’s true. Kat’s first husband died in a car accident and Vivian’s ex never had any desire to be a father to Hannah. Fortunately, both kids have two parents now. Blake is a good father to Nick and Sawyer is a great dad to Hannah. So everybody is happy.”

  She let out a wistful sigh as her gaze drifted down to the last of her dessert. “When I first ended my engagement I didn’t dwell too much on my baby not having a father. But here lately it’s been on my mind much more. Now that the baby is nearly here I feel guilty. My child isn’t even born yet and I’ve already failed him, or her.”

  He’d never heard her talk this way and it cut into him more than he wanted to admit. She’d been duped and betrayed by a man who’d never deserved her in the first place. Chandler didn’t want her to carry around a load of guilt or hurt for any reason.

  Reaching across the table, he wrapped his hand around hers. “You shouldn’t be feeling guilty. Just think about it. Do you think your baby would be better off with a father who’s a liar and a cheat? I don’t.”

  Beneath the veil of her long lashes, her brown eyes studied his face until a glaze of tears suddenly threatened to spill onto her cheeks. Then she glanced away and swallowed hard.

  “I know you’re right about that. But that doesn’t make me any less of a failure.” She turned her gaze back onto his face. “I should’ve had better judgment. I shouldn’t have wanted to please my father so much and followed my heart instead.”

  Her last words caught his attention. “You mean there was someone you loved before Erich, but your father didn’t find him suitable?”

  She shook her head. “No. Before Erich I never had any serious feelings about a guy. There were a few, if given a chance, I might’ve fallen in love with. But they were regular men with regular jobs. Being regular never stacked up good enough for Martin DuBose.”

  What did she consider Chandler? Just a mediocre country vet? Or was she thinking the Hollisters were too wealthy for her taste? Most folks would probably consider that to be a crazy question, but he didn’t. He’d noticed that Roslyn never talked about her family’s wealth, or the things it could get for her. He wasn’t at all sure that she even liked being wealthy.

  “You’ll fall in love soon enough and give your child a father.” The words coming out of his mouth sounded stiff and awkward. And why shouldn’t they? Just thinking about Roslyn being in another man’s arms made him sick, through and through.

  She pushed aside the dessert plate and picked up her coffee cup. “We’re always talking about me, Chandler. What about you?”

  “Me?” He shrugged nonchalantly. “My life is already settled. There’s not much to talk about.”

  Her head moved slowly back and forth. “I don’t believe that.”

  “Which part?”

  She grimaced. “The part about your life already being settled. I can’t imagine you spending the remainder of your years without a wife, or babies, or time for yourself.”

  He cleared his throat. She was giving him the opportunity to make a statement. He could ease his hand away from hers and flatly explain that he didn’t want any of those things. But the truth was, he’d be lying. Deep down he wanted to be like his married brothers. He wanted to experience that same joy and love that they were blessed with each and every day.

  “To be honest, Roslyn, having those things used to be one of my main goals. While I was in vet school I came close to asking a woman to marry me. But that didn’t work out. My studies took up too much of my time. Then later, after I’d started my own clinic, I met a woman I thought might be the one. She had her own career as a nurse. She understood about putting in long, irregular hours at work. And she was as dedicated to her profession as I was to mine.”

  “What happened?”

  “Actually, I had driven to Phoenix to find the perfect diamond engagement ring to give her when she called and said we needed to talk. You know, the old phrase that basically means ‘I’m dumping you.’”

  “But why? Had she found someone else?”

  “No. At least I didn’t have to bear that humiliation. She was honest enough to tell me that she’d never be happy living on the ranch, making a sixty- or seventy-mile commute to work every day. She wasn’t an outdoor girl. Nor was she an animal lover, so basically there was nothing at Three Rivers that appealed to her.”

  Her eyes softened and her fingers squeezed his. “There was you.”

  If the long room hadn’t been filled with evening diners, he would have leaned across the table and kissed her. As it was, he could merely gaze at her and wish.

  “Uh, well, I wasn’t enough. You see, I don’t think she ever really loved me. She dated me in hopes that I was the right one. But I wasn’t.”

  She let out a long breath, then flexed her shoulders. “It’s good that you didn’t make a mistake with either of them. But time has passed and I think...”

  A grimace wrinkled her brow as she pulled her hand from his and rubbed it against the small of her back.

  “What’s wrong?” Chandler asked with sudden concern. “Are you not feeling well?”

  “I don’t feel sick. This afternoon twinges started coming and going in my lower back. I thought that once I got off my feet the pains would quit. But to be honest, they’re getting worse.”

  “I’d better pay out. I think the baby is coming,” he told her.

  Her mouth popped open, very nearly making Chandler laugh outright.

  “The baby? But it can’t be! It’s still several days until my due date. And I just went for a c
heckup two days ago.”

  “Didn’t he tell you the baby could come early or late?”

  She bit down on her lower lip. “Well, yes, he did say that. But—”

  She didn’t finish speaking. Instead, she groaned and grabbed her back with both hands.

  Chandler promptly signaled to the waiter and after explaining the situation gave him a very large bill to cover the meal and a generous tip.

  With his arm around Roslyn’s waist, Chandler helped her outside and into the truck.

  As he steered the truck in the direction of the hospital, she gave him a wobbly smile.

  “I’m so sorry I’ve cut our evening short, Chandler. It’s the nicest date I’ve ever been on,” she told him.

  She was doing her best to smile through her pain and all of a sudden Chandler’s heart was so full of feelings for this woman he wondered if it might burst.

  “It’s the nicest one I’ve ever been on, too,” he said, his voice sounding like his throat had been sandpapered. “We’ll do it again. After the baby gets here and you’re back on your feet. Is that a date?”

  Nodding, she clutched the front of her stomach. “It’s a date, Doc.”

  Chapter Ten

  Since Maureen had already promised Roslyn she’d be with her in the delivery room, Chandler gave his mother a quick call as he made the short drive to the hospital.

  Unfortunately, the call went straight to her voice mail so he called the line in the kitchen, figuring Reeva would be sure to answer.

  “Chandler, what are you doing on the phone?” She fired the question at him before he had a chance to get one word out. “You’re supposed to be taking Roslyn out to dinner!”

  “We’ve already had dinner. I’m taking her to the hospital. Is Mom in the house? She’s not answering her phone.”

  “No. She’s still out with the hands. They decided to move some of the cattle down from Prescott today. It’ll probably be after midnight before she gets back,” the cook explained, then practically shouted in his ear. “Did you say hospital? Is Roslyn having the baby?”

  “Looks like it. And Mom was planning on being her labor coach,” he explained. “Now it looks—”

  “Coach, hell!” Reeva interrupted with a snort. “Roslyn doesn’t need a coach at her side. She needs a man! Don’t you think you fit the bill?”

  Chandler had tended hundreds of animal births. Many had been easy, while a few had ended tragically. Throughout, he’d determinedly kept a calm, level head because he was the man who was responsible for helping the new little lives enter the world. But none of them had been human. None of them had been the woman who’d grabbed onto his heart and now held it in the palm of her hands.

  “I’ll try, Reeva. Leave Mom a message, will you?”

  “She’ll get the message. And I’ll call upstairs right now and let Blake and Kat know what’s going on.”

  “Thanks, Reeva.”

  Chandler ended the call and finished the short drive to the hospital in record time. By the time he wheeled the truck into the emergency-room entrance and parked beneath a wide overhang, Roslyn was already experiencing contractions.

  He lifted her out of the seat and began carrying her toward the sliding glass doors, when a dark-haired nurse wearing navy blue scrubs met them with a wheelchair.

  “Has she started labor?” she asked.

  “It appears so,” Chandler answered as he gently deposited Roslyn into the chair, then stepped out of the way.

  The nurse wheeled Roslyn into the building while Chandler was left to follow. Along the way, the woman peppered Roslyn with pertinent health questions and Chandler was content to remain silent and allow the woman to take control. Until she parked the wheelchair in front of an admissions desk.

  “What are you doing?” He was boiling over with frustration. “There isn’t time for this. Roslyn is in labor! She needs care, not questions!”

  “I’m sorry, Mr., uh—I don’t believe you’ve told me your name,” the nurse stated calmly.

  He took note of the name tag pinned to the left shoulder of her scrub top. Mariana Reed.

  “My name is Hollister, Ms. Reed. Dr. Chandler Hollister,” he said with what little patience he could summon.

  Most everyone in the area recognized the Hollister name. Along with owning and operating Three Rivers, the family donated large sums of money to different local causes in the community, including this very hospital. But the skeptical arch to Nurse Reed’s eyebrows made him think she doubted he was actually a Hollister or a doctor.

  Apparently she thought he should be dressed in a tailored suit and wingtips instead of a cowboy who’d been in one too many feed lots.

  Nurse Reed loudly cleared in throat. “Well, Dr. Hollister, in your profession you should know the hospital has to have your wife’s necessary information before we can treat her. If you can provide it and her insurance card, I’ll be happy to take her on back to the labor room.”

  There was long list of things he wanted to tell the nurse. The main one being that if he waited around for paperwork to be completed, most of his patients would die before he ever got the chance to treat them.

  Chandler opened his mouth to give Nurse Reed a sharp retort, but by then Roslyn had recovered enough to interrupt the exchange. She reached for his hand and squeezed it as though he was the one who needed reassuring rather than her.

  “Chandler, it’s okay,” she said. “The last time I visited the doctor, Kat brought me by the hospital so I could fill out preadmission papers. Everything should be ready to go.”

  The nurse promptly instructed an older lady sitting at the admission desk to check for the information. After Roslyn supplied her birthdate and social security number, the clerk confirmed that the necessary info had already been registered.

  With a smug smile for Chandler, the nurse said, “Looks like your wife already has things under control. So if you’d like to follow us down the hallway, there’s a waiting room on the left, where you can make yourself comfortable while we take care of your wife.”

  “Oh, but can’t he come with me?” Roslyn asked anxiously.

  “Not right now,” the nurse answered with a shake of her head. “He may come back later on, after we get you settled in a labor room.”

  Roslyn glanced up at Chandler and the beseeching look in her eyes tore a hole right through his heart. “You will stay with me, won’t you?”

  “Wild horses couldn’t drag me away,” he promised.

  Nurse Reed’s stern expression softened with approval. “Now that’s the way a husband should be talking to the woman who’s about to give him a child.”

  Roslyn looked awkwardly from Chandler to the nurse. “But he’s not my husband,” she explained.

  The confession caused the nurse to pierce Chandler with a look of real disappointment. If she was trying to make him feel like a heel, she was doing a great job of it, he decided. But he’d rather have the nurse thinking he was a jerk, rather than put Roslyn through the awkward explanation of her broken engagement.

  “I should have guessed,” Nurse Reed said bluntly. “Then you—”

  “I’m the baby’s father.” The quick claim spurted out of Chandler’s mouth before he could even think about the consequences. “And I want to be present at the birth.”

  If the nurse was surprised to hear that a member of the Hollister family was having a child out of wedlock, she didn’t show it. Instead, she merely nodded.

  “Certainly, Dr. Hollister, I’ll let you know when you can join her.”

  Relieved, he bent down and placed a kiss on Roslyn’s cheek. “I’ll see you in a few minutes, darling.”

  A look of confusion filled her eyes, but pain quickly followed and before he had a chance to say more, the nurse was wheeling her away.

  As Chandler watched her go, he felt a big part of himself going
with her.

  * * *

  Five hours later, Roslyn gave birth to a perfect little daughter. Exhausted and exhilarated at the same time, tears streamed down her cheeks when the delivery room finally calmed and the baby was placed upon her chest.

  “Oh, my,” she whispered in awed wonder “You’re so beautiful, my baby daughter. So utterly beautiful.”

  She kissed the top of the baby’s damp head, then glanced up to see Chandler standing at the side of her bed, where he’d been ever since they’d entered the delivery room.

  Smiling at him through her tears, she said, “Come closer, Chandler, so you can see her better.”

  He bent over the bed railing and touched a finger to a bit of hair stuck to the newborn’s scalp. As Roslyn studied his reaction, she decided he looked as overwhelmed as she felt.

  “Her eyes are squinted,” she said. “I can’t really tell what color they are. Can you?”

  Her daughter was awake and squirming, but her face was squinched as though she was getting ready to let out a loud howl.

  “I’ve heard all babies had blue eyes.”

  “I don’t think that’s true. But maybe they are blue. Like yours,” she added impishly.

  A sheepish grin twisted his lips. “I hope you didn’t mind me telling Nurse Reed that I was the father. I thought it would make things easier for you—and me.”

  How could he think she would mind? Just hearing him claim the baby as his had caused her heart to swell with emotions she could no longer deny.

  “I didn’t mind,” she whispered. “I was...very grateful.”

  His gaze met hers and for a brief moment she thought he was going to kiss her, but the nearby voices of the attending nurses seemed to remind him that they weren’t alone.

  His attention returned to the baby. “She’s incredible, Ros. Just like her mother. And I told you it was going to be a girl, didn’t I?”

  The teasing smile on his face added to the warm emotions spilling from her heart and spreading to every corner of her body. “You most certainly did. I’ll never doubt your diagnoses again.”