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Now, who but Kelsey would ask for ecru towels?
Forcing Kelsey and the way she’d looked in her white satin gown from his mind, he dashed back to the Thunderbird.
“How’re you doing?” he asked the woman inside, bum knee aching and slightly out of breath from adrenaline.
His heart sank when, once again, all he got from her was a weak nod.
“Okay, well, at least you’re not worse. I’m going to open your door,” he said, doing just that. “And then I’m going to lift you out of there.” With the door open, he saw that she couldn’t have been much over five feet. Good thing, since her car probably wouldn’t hold anyone over five-three—and certainly not his own six-foot frame.
She wasn’t wearing her seat belt, so he slipped his left hand beneath her knees and his right behind her back, easing her out of the car and deeper into his arms. She wore a black sundress, not all frilly and floral like the ones women wore in these parts, but severe in its shape.
All straight lines and business.
Even with the baby, she weighed nothing, and he cradled her close, mumbling something he hoped was comforting during the short walk to his truck.
In the fading sun, he noticed from the long silky waves kissing his left cheek that her hair wasn’t mere red, but fire streaked with a hundred shades of blond. He’d never been big on hair colors beyond the basics, but even he could see that this gal’s head was something special.
And her smell. Her perfume was a spicy, musky, sexy-hot Oriental blend that somehow matched the jade he remembered hiding behind her now closed eyes.
“You’re gonna be just fine,” he murmured, stopping just short of instinctively kissing her forehead. Geez, he’d been in law for twelve years and had yet to kiss one of the Jane Q. Publics he’d sworn to protect. Further proof that he shouldn’t have come within three counties of Kelsey and Owen’s big day.
His attraction meter was all screwed up.
At the back of his truck, Noah placed his good knee on the floorboard, then eased her inside, covering her with a blanket she pushed away.
“Hot—so hot,” she said, voice scratchy and weak.
“Okay, um, let me see what I can do.”
He’d just hopped down, planning to close up the truck and turn on the A/C, when she reached for him, locking her fingers around his black leather belt.
“Please, stay,” she said, eyes welling with tears just before she squeezed them shut and started funny panting breathing that felt way too intimate for him to witness. “I—I thought I could do this alone.” She grimaced. “I do everything alone, but—” There she went with that breathing again. “Oh God, it hurts. Oh God, what am I going to do?” Somewhere in all of that, she’d raised her knees, then spread her legs wide, furrowing her lovely forehead with a grimace of what he could only guess was mind-numbing pain.
He matched that with his own case of vertigo.
Good Lord, she wasn’t gonna have this baby right now, was she? He’d seen training videos on this sort of thing, but…
Suck it up, bud. This ain’t no drill and you ain’t no Boy Scout.
Noah looked over his shoulder for the ambulance, but no such luck.
“Okay, um, can you hold it?” he asked, taking yet another look.
“Nooooooo!” Thrashing her head from side to side, she emitted an otherworldly scream that startled a flock of crows into noisy flight.
Noah rolled up his sleeves and took a deep breath before assuming his usual professionalism. This was no longer about Kelsey, or his own fears, this was about saving this woman’s life, and the life of her child.
“What’s your name?” he said, knowing they were about to get real close—real fast.
“Cassandra—Cassie.”
“Nice to meet you, Cassie. I’m Noah.”
Though her beautiful face was all scrunched with pain, she nodded before cutting loose with another of her banshee wails. “It huuuuurts!” she cried.
“I know,” he said, patting her knee. “I mean, obviously, I don’t know, but—oh, man…”
I’ve gotta pull myself together.
Latex gloves. Definitely need those. Too bad the box of them was in the back of his county-issued Blazer.
Okay, so he had to somehow wash his hands. He was gonna need those towels, too.
Shooting into action, he grabbed the box with the towels, unwrapped it, then, stopping just short of pulling them out, he ran back around to the rear of the truck to grab one of the gallons of fresh water he kept on hand for busted radiators or the occasional dehydrated lost hiker.
In the first-aid kit, he fished out a couple of prepackaged alcohol wipes, ripped one open with his teeth and scrubbed his hands as best as he could. Next, he poured water over them before giving his hands another good scrub.
Okay, now he was in business.
Hands clean, he grabbed a couple of the new-smelling towels and spread them under Cass’s backside.
Another of her wails hurried him along.
She was now clutching at her dress, dragging it up lean, tan legs he had no business looking at, but had to. “My panties,” she said. “T-they have to come off.”
He nodded, then reached for the first-aid kit’s scissors, and clinically snipped at robin’s-egg-blue silk.
Oh boy—or girl!
There—right there between her legs was the crown of her baby’s head!
“Okay, Cass, you’re further into this than I thought.” Grabbing her hand, he said, “Squeeze, darlin’. Squeeze me as hard as you can and push!”
Eyes wild, she did.
“Again,” he said, keeping one eye on her and the other on the baby. Instinctively, he pushed her legs wider. “Push, Cassie, push. Come on, you can do it.”
“Easy for you to say!” she snapped.
“That’s right, darlin’—give me hell. Come on, I can take it! Give all men hell—especially your husband!”
“I—I’m—arggghhh—not married! I d-don’t need a man!”
“Great, then I’ll head back to town and grab a beer.”
“No,” she said through another grimace. “I do need you.”
“Good,” he said, eyes welling at the miracle unfolding before him. “Because a truckload of TNT couldn’t tear me away from this spot. Push, darlin’, push!”
“I’m trying!”
“Try harder!”
“I am—arrrrgggghhhhh!”
“Oh my God, I’m holding its head. Just a little more. A little mooorre. Got it. Oh my God,” he said laughing through his tears. “It’s a girl. You had a beautiful baby girl, Cassie!”
With his pinkie finger, he cleared the baby’s mouth, and when the tiny, redheaded dream cut loose with a wail every bit as powerful as one of her momma’s, with his spare hand he managed to spread a towel across Cassie’s tummy before presenting her with her child—cord and all, which he planned on letting the paramedics cut.
Cassie’s fiery hair hung in damp tendrils, and her complexion was misty with sweat, but never, in all of his days, had Noah seen a more beautiful, downright mesmerizing sight.
Then that gorgeous face of hers once again scrunched with pain.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “The baby’s here.”
“A-another one,” she said with more pants. “Twins. Oh God, help me, please help me,” she said, writhing her head from side to side, still clutching her baby girl. “Noooo, something’s not right. It hurts—oh, it hurts!”
Heart hammering, Noah looked between her legs and not since seven years earlier on the night of that accident had he experienced such terror. Instead of a head, he saw a toe.
Sweet, merciful Heaven, why?
Okay, Noah…think.
Growing up in rural Arkansas, he had a lot of friends who’d lived on farms. He’d seen breech births with cattle—even a horse, but…
Okay, only difference is size. Sort of.
“It hurts, Noah! It hurts…” Cassie’s agonized cries turned to racking sobs.
No. Not again.
Please Lord, don’t let this be another night like that one on Blue Springs Road. I couldn’t bear it. It wouldn’t be right. That woman hadn’t deserved to die, and You wouldn’t let me save her. Just like Cassie, she’d had kids—a family.
Sure, Noah’s friends had told him a hundred times over he hadn’t been to blame, but by God, he’d been the one on the scene and he’d been the one holding her when she’d asked him to tell her husband and kids she loved them.
Too many times in his life, he’d been unable to fix things. It happened over and over in his job, then there’d been the messy breakup with Kelsey. Way before that, his folks’ crappy marriage—or for that matter, his own. Not a damned one of those situations had he been able to fix. But this one…
With a light shake of his head, he told himself no. This wasn’t going to be a replay of that night.
No one was taking this woman and her babies from him—not even almighty God Himself!
Fumbling across Cassie’s still rounded belly, he felt the baby’s head, and said, “I’m not gonna lie. This is probably—well, hell, there’s no probably about it—this is gonna hurt real bad, and I’m sorry, but there’s no other way.”
Teeth gritted, she nodded, but her fire was gone, and her cries had faded to whimpers.
“Stay with me,” he said, squeezing his eyes shut, frantically trying to remember that cheesy emergency labor video he and the guys laughingly winced their way through. Teeth gritted, he said a hundred more prayers in his head, then felt for one tiny foot, then the other, and gently tugged the baby by his or her ankles.
“Please don’t let my baby die!”
“Nobody’s dying here,” he said. “Push!”
“I can’t! I’m so tired.”
“Push, dammit! Nobody’s dying on my watch! I’m responsible for you—all of you. You hear me? Nobody’s dyin’ today! Now push!”
“I caaaaaan’t!”
“That’s it! I’ve got this little princess’s behind. Come on, Cassie, give me all you got!”
Thankfully, she did, and he rotated the infant’s trunk to get one arm. Another slight rotation earned him another.
“Come on, Cass! You’re almost there!”
“Arrrrggghhh!” In one last superhuman effort, she pushed and the baby’s head popped out.
Noah trembled so hard he feared dropping the second baby girl, but he held tight, reaching for another towel that he could hardly see through his tears.
He cleared the baby’s mouth, and when she cried, he cried and started shaking all the harder. “You had another girl, darlin’. You did it.”
Clutching both babies close, Cassie cast him a luminous smile before saying, “We did it. Thank you.”
Bracing himself against the truck’s frame, Noah shook his head and smiled.
Hot damn, what a rush.
Chapter Two
Cassie Tremont opened her eyes just enough to see hazy morning sun silhouetting one of the most handsome, kind and concerned faces she’d ever seen.
Noah.
Her savior. Her babies’ savior.
Fast asleep in an orange vinyl guest chair he’d pulled to the head of her hospital bed. If only she’d come across a guy like him before meeting Tom, maybe her life would’ve turned out differently.
Maybe she’d even still believe in happy endings, because she wouldn’t have had her dreams twice shattered by grim-faced company representatives standing at her front door. What were the odds of first, Tri-Comm reps telling her when she’d been just eight years old that her father had died of a heart attack while on the corporate jet. Sorry. We’re so sorry. Then later, years later, Jubilee Cruise Lines reps telling her that not only had Tom, her husband, died, but he’d died on holiday with another woman. A woman who’d claimed to also be his wife! We can only imagine your pain.
Tom hadn’t even been in the right country. He’d told Cassie he was on a business trip to London. In reality, he’d been on a Caribbean cruise when he and his legal wife—a woman named Felicity—died in a freak diving accident.
The day Cassie had found out she was carrying twins, she’d been so happy—they’d been so happy. Tom had held her hand during the ultrasound, kissing the tips of her fingers, telling her she looked beautiful and was going to make the best mom in the world. His loving touch combined with the fierce love she already felt for the tiny miracles growing deep within her had made her teary with joy.
Even though the doctor warned Cassie that multiple births meant multiple risks, she hadn’t cared. The only thing that mattered was that she and her beloved husband would soon have not one baby to love, but two.
She’d been twelve weeks pregnant when her world crashed around her. Tom’s death had been hard enough to take, but hearing that their whole life together had been a lie—that was almost worse than knowing he was dead.
She’d been with Tom since college.
The night of her twenty-first birthday, when she’d taken legal possession of the millions her father left, Tom had proposed. She’d been so dewy-eyed with adoration for him, she’d taken his words of love at face value.
