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But it was too late now.
“Ready or not,” she said, “I’m having this baby. And I’m having it now.”
“Oh, damn,” he uttered.
Thank goodness he made no effort to leave, even though she could see the anxiety brewing in his eyes.
They were stuck—just the three of them, one man, one woman and one baby. Strangers thrown together by Fate on a lonely, stormy night.
“Oh, God,” she whispered. “Don’t let my baby die.”
Greg paled at her words, and his eyes watered. Then he blinked several times and seemed to rally. “Ah, Connie. Don’t worry. I can do this. Hell, so can you. Women have been having babies since the dawn of time. This is no big deal. We’ll handle it together. And we’ll probably laugh about it later.”
No way would she find anything funny about this later. But she appreciated his attempts to calm her, to provide some peace of mind in order to face the challenge ahead. But before she could thank him, her body again took charge, and she heeded another order to push—harder still.
After the urge finally passed, Greg removed the sheet that was covering her legs.
“Take off your panties,” Greg said.
“What?” Her expression, she suspected, had morphed into something sort of stupefied. But his comment had struck her as…odd. Under the circumstances, it just…sounded funny, that’s all.
“I can’t very well deliver the baby if you keep them on,” he said patiently.
As Connie worked to remove her underwear—as luck would have it, an extra-large matronly styled pair that Granny had purchased for her—she began to smile. Then a chuckle erupted. One of those nervous, stress-relieving giggles Connie sometimes made at the most unsuitable times and in the most inappropriate places.
“Lucky me,” she said. “I wonder how many women can say that Greg Clayton asked her to remove her panties.”
“Very funny.”
She suspected there had been quite a few—a legion of them, no doubt. She knew how many groupies had flocked around Ross and the other guys who played in the South Forty Band, and they weren’t anywhere near as handsome and popular as Greg was.
“Of course,” she added, “I suppose this particular experience is unique to the two of us.”
“You’ve got that right.” Greg chuffed.
“For what it’s worth, after what I’ve gone through tonight, I can assure you that I won’t ever agree to take off my panties for another man again. And if one even suggests it, I’ll crack him over the head with the first heavy object I can find.”
Greg tossed her a grin. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Then he took a deep breath and reached for the cell phone on his belt clip and dialed the number Doc had given him.
“What are you doing?” she asked, feeling the urge to push again.
“Doc is going to have to coach me through this. Like you said, the baby’s coming whether we want her to or not.”
As Connie pushed until she was blue in the face, she had to agree. Apparently, she was one of those rare women destined for a speedy delivery. And the only one available to help her bring her child into the world was Greg.
She hoped the handsome singer was up for the task.
As Greg prepared to deliver Connie’s baby, his movements grew stiff and awkward. The sweat beaded upon his brow, and he used his arm to wipe it away.
Damn. The guys in the band were never going to believe this. Hell, he didn’t believe it. If his hands weren’t busy, he’d pinch himself.
His cell phone was lying beside him, set on speaker, as Doc Graham talked him through the scariest, most nerve-racking night of his life.
He glanced at Connie, her expression set in a grimace, her face red as she did her best to push her baby into the world.
Was this how Father Gregorio felt when Greg’s mother had been giving birth? Scared spitless? Completely out of his league?
The fact that his mom had died in childbirth was enough to spike his spinal fluid with ice water, but he shook off the nervous fear and focused on the task at hand. He had to help Connie have her baby whether he wanted to or not.
“The head is out,” Greg told both Doc and Connie, as he followed the directions of the experienced country doctor.
Moments later, the baby slid into his hands. His own breath held as he waited for it to cry, to breathe. As the tiny little girl let out a wail that pierced the silence and announced her arrival, he blew out a huge sigh of relief.
His movements were almost robotic, but he did everything Doc told him to do, step by scary step. And as the minutes ticked away, as everything proceeded the way Doc said that it would, wonder overcame the fear that had been dogging him since Connie’s labor had started and the birth became imminent.
After he cleaned up the screaming, flailing baby girl, he bundled her in flannel like a little burrito and handed her to her mother.
Connie, with tears streaming down her face, took the baby from him and cooed at her. “Hello, sweetheart.Welcome to the world.”
Asense of awewashed over Greg, and he found himself experiencing an unprecedented high, a mind-boggling sense of wonder.
“Oh, my God.” Connie looked up from the newborn long enough to latch onto Greg’s gaze. “Look at her.”
He had been looking. And while the tiny little newborn was scrawny and wrinkly and gooey and had an uncanny resemblance to E.T., the extra-terrestrial, he couldn’t help thinking she was the cutest little alien he’d ever seen.
“She’s beautiful,” he told Connie. “Are you still going to call her Amanda?”
“I don’t know. Does she look like an Isabella to you?”
She was asking him for an opinion? “It sounds like an awfully big name for a little baby, but I guess she’ll grow into it.”
“I could nickname her Bella. Or Izzy.”
Greg looked at the little flannel-wrapped cherub, at the rosebud mouth, the wispy dark hair.
“Not Izzy,” he said, thinking of a ton of rhyming words that kids might use to tease her, Dizzy or Frizzy or Lizzy Lizard. Kids could be thoughtless, he’d learned. And cruel. “But Belle or Bella suits her. Either one would make a good name for a little princess.”
Then he tore his gaze away from the mother and child, doing whatever he could to make Connie more comfortable.
Yet even when his job appeared to be nearly over, when he finally had an excuse to close the door and leave them to rest, he hadn’t been able to do so. Instead, he kept looking for reasons to stick around.
Had he really been the first human to touch that baby girl? The one to cut and tie the cord?
He sat in silence for the longest time, basking in a slew of emotions he couldn’t quite peg. Feelings he’d never experienced, never expected to.
As he got to his feet, he continued to watch them like some kind of voyeur. Or maybe he’d taken on a protector role. Either way, he couldn’t help feeling a bit envious.
Not that he expected to bond with the new little family of two; he’d done his part and could now go on his way. But as Connie whispered loving words to her new daughter, he found her voice soft and mesmerizing, the sight warm and touching.
When the baby looked at her with eyes that crossed, Greg damn near choked up. Again, he wondered if he really ought to be privy to this special moment, yet he was unable to move.
Awed by what he’d just seen, he was also caught up in admiration for thewoman who’d bravely fought pain and fear to bring her newborn daughter into the world, a woman who now bore a maternal glow and a mesmerizing beauty he couldn’t explain.
Connie, who cuddled her infant daughter in her arms, looked up at him and smiled. “Thank you, Greg. I don’t know what I would have done without you here.”
“It was no big deal,” he said.
But it had been bigger than big. It had been huge.
He didn’t think he’d ever forget this moment. He’d witnessed a miracle, and what had once seemed like the worst night of his life had somehow become one of the best.
The kind of night that made a musician want to grab his guitar and sit up until dawn, trying to re-create a memory in song.
Chapter Three
The telephone rang shortly before daybreak, and Greg snatched it from its cradle so the noise wouldn’t wake Connie or the baby.
They were both resting now, and he wanted to keep it that way. Connie had been through hell the past couple of hours and a peaceful rest had been well earned.
“Hello?” he whispered into the receiver.
The age-worn voice boomed over the line. “It’s Doc Graham. How’s our patient doing?”
“Okay. She and the baby are both asleep.”
Of course, that in itself didn’t mean that everything was fine, which was why Greg kept checking in on them every few minutes. He wanted to make sure they were still breathing and that their coloring was good.
“But I’ll sure feel better when you get here,” he told the doctor. “Then you can validate my diagnosis.”
“Itwon’t be long,” Doc said. “I’ve just driven past that lowspot in the road and should be at the ranch in about five or ten minutes.”
“Good.” Knowing Doc the way he did, Greg figured he’d been parked near the flooded area and had driven through the moment he believed it was safe.
“By the way,” Doc added, “you did a great job.”
Greg didn’t know about that. Connie and the baby had done all the work, so he didn’t feel right taking credit for the minor role he played. “I didn’t do all that much. I’m just thankful there weren’t any complications.”
“Me, too. How are you holding up, son?”
“All right.” Especially now that it was all over.
“I’m sure it’s been a long night, so you’ve got to be tired. As soon as I get there, you can go to bed.”
Actually, Greg didn’t feel the least bit sleepy. Ever since the baby’s birth, he’d had a head-in-the-clouds buzz, one that didn’t appear to be fading in the least.
“Well,” Doc said over the slightly static telephone line, “I’ll see you in a few minutes.”
“All right.” Greg hung up, but his hand remained on the receiver. For the first time since Connie’s water had broken, he finally felt a sense of relief, and it dogged him into the kitchen, where he put on a pot of coffee.
Yet instead of taking a seat or watching out the window for Doc to arrive, he returned to Connie’s bedroom and took another peek at her and the baby—just to make sure they were still breathing, that they were resting easy.
And they were.
Connie, her expression softened by something soft and maternal, continued to doze, her head on a fluffy pillow, her brown curls splayed on the white cotton case. She wore no makeup, no sexy clothing, yet Greg was still struck by her beauty.
He’d found her attractive the first day he’d met her, yet there was something even more appealing now.
Maybe it was the strength and bravery she’d shown during the terrible pain she’d endured last night. Or maybe it was something altogether different.
All he knew was that he was inexplicably drawn to her.
She still held the baby next to her, under her arm and close to her heart. They’d called the child Isabella for a while, but for some reason the name didn’t seem to fit, and Connie had decided to stick with Amanda, which seemed perfect now.
With tufts of downy black hair, Amanda was a precious little thing. Her head was a bit pointed and misshapen, though.
Greg had asked Doc about it—privately, of course. And he’d been told that it was normal, that it would even out in a few days. He sure hoped so. If it did, he suspected Amanda was going to be the prettiest little girl this side of cherubville.
He leaned against the doorjamb, watching them longer than was necessary. Finally, convinced that an unexpected complication hadn’t arisen, he headed to the living room to unlock the door for Doc Graham and to wait on the front porch for his arrival.
Moments later, as he leaned against the wooden railing, watching the pink and orange fingers of dawn stretch across the horizon, he relished the sights and smells of the raindrenched ranch. At times he missed this place, missed the people who’d become important to him. Yet whenever he came home, he missed the guys in his band, too. The rush of standing onstage. The thrill when he announced a new song he’d written, a song that was met with a roar of approval from the fans.
As Doc Graham’s pickup, a red Chevy S-10, pulled into the yard, the front tire struck one of the many puddles that speckled the yard and sent a splatter of dirty water flying.
Greg watched as the old man shut off the ignition, slid out of the driver’s seat then reached back for his medical bag.
“Good morning,” Greg said.
“It certainly is.”
As Greg opened the screen door, Doc wiped his feet on the welcome mat. Once inside the warmth of the house, he shucked off his damp raincoat and left it on the hat tree in the entry.
“So, tell me something,” Doc said. “Are you going to turn in your guitar for a stethoscope?”
“No way. But delivering a baby was definitely an experience I won’t ever forget.” Greg wasn’t sure if Doc would understand what he was feeling. After all, in the last half century, Dr. Graham had undoubtedly delivered thousands of babies. So the whole birthing miracle had probably become routine to him.
As Greg led Doc down the hall, he walked lightly so he wouldn’t wake Connie or the newborn.
“Well, look who couldn’t wait to have her first turkey dinner,” Doc said from the doorway of Connie’s room.
The new mother’s eyes fluttered open, and she blessed the doctor with a pretty smile. Then she gazed at the baby sleeping in the crook of her arm.
“You know,” Doc said, easing closer, “I do believe that’s just about the most beautiful newborn I’ve ever laid eyes on.”
Greg watched from the doorway as the doctor examined Connie first. For a moment, Greg wondered whether he should slip out into the living room to allow them some privacy, but he just couldn’t seem to turn and walk away.
What if he’d messed up or had forgotten to do something he’d been told to do?
