A Fallow Heart (28 page)

She knew the doctor had told them Amy couldn’t have any more children after her last miscarriage, but what if it was worse than that? What if she had cancer or—

Her sister-in-law beamed. “Yes, we’re both fine. Better than fine.” Then she threw her head back and laughed before covering her stomach. “I’m pregnant.”

Jo Ellen blinked, then frowned, thinking she’d misheard them.

When she glanced toward her brother, he shrugged, not quite as ecstatic as his wife. “We decided to tell you first since you…helped us out so much the last time.”

Her mouth moved, but it took Jo Ellen a moment to sputter, “Oh my God.” Then the realization hit her. “Oh my God,
congratulations
!”

She sprang to her feet and rounded the table. Amy met her so they could hug and dance around the kitchen. Though jealously nipped at her—everyone and their dog seemed to be popping out babies these days…everyone but her—she ignored the envious burn and rubbed her sister-in-law’s still flat belly before hugging her again.

“And here I thought your doctor said you couldn’t get pregnant again.”

Still sitting in his chair resting his chin in his clasped hands, Grady spoke up. “Doc said she
shouldn’t
get pregnant, not that she couldn’t.”

Jo Ellen slid a worried glance from Grady to Amy and back to Grady.

But Amy waved a dismissive hand in her husband’s direction. “Oh, don’t listen to the party pooper. This is good news. Great news! I am
so
excited.”

“Well, then I’m excited too,” Jo Ellen agreed. “How far along are you?”

“Three months. Grady wanted to wait until the biggest chance of miscarriage passed before telling anyone. But I’ve already made—oh! Since you’re here, I’ll just show you. I taught myself how to make booties. They’re adorable. Wait here. I’ll go fetch them.”

As she flew from the room and all her excitement and enthusiasm left with her, Jo Ellen focused on her brother.

Plopping into the seat beside him, she patted his shoulder and forced a smile. “Well, is this family turning into a baby-making factory or what? Pretty soon, Caine is going to show up with a couple of kids in tow and then where will we be?”

Grady glanced at her, but didn’t smile. Deep grooves creased his face.

She frowned and nudged his arm again. “What is
wrong
with you? After years of bossing me around, you’re finally getting your own child to boss around.”

He shook his head and closed his eyes. “The doctor really is not keen on the idea of her having this baby.”

Jo Ellen sobered. “Is she in danger?”

He opened his lashes and met her gaze before slowly shaking his head. “Doc’s more worried about her not being able to carry it to full term but…I have a bad feeling. You saw what happened to her last time. I don’t want her getting her hopes up again, only to lose this baby like we did last time. I don’t…I just don’t think she could handle it.”

When he sighed and rubbed his forehead, Jo Ellen drew in a deep breath. “What’re the chances it’ll survive?”

Grady shrugged, then winced. “They can’t be good if Doc is already worried. He’s got her on a strict diet and prohibiting her from any heavy lifting. He’s insinuated she’ll go on bed rest in another couple of months.”

Though Jo Ellen bit the inside of her lip with worry, she squeezed her brother’s arm reassuringly. “Well, excited as that little mama is, I think she’ll do everything the doctor tells her to do. She wants this baby, Grady.”

“I know. It’s just...” Suddenly, he reached out and grabbed her hand, gripping her fingers hard. “You’d come back, wouldn’t you? If things don’t…if she needs you again like she did the last time, you’d come back to be with her, right? Because I can’t…I can’t reach her when she’s in that place.”

Jo Ellen’s heart went out to him, wishing she could do more than what he asked, wishing she could keep his baby strong and healthy and alive for him. After she studied him intently, she turned her fingers under his to squeeze his trembling hand. “Of course I would, Grady. But what happened to her last time isn’t going to happen again. Have a little faith, okay.”

Like Cooper had said at the hospital, whenever you didn’t have any control over a situation, you just had to hope for the best and try not to worry about the worst.

His shoulders wilted with relief and he nodded just as Amy breezed back into the room.

“What do you think? Am I a natural or what?”

When she flashed the booties, Jo Ellen immediately made the appropriate noises. “Oh, how adorable. Amy, these are amazing.”

Jo Ellen oohed and awed while Grady rolled his eyes.

“I don’t know what she’s going to do with all those pink booties when it comes out a boy,” he grumbled, finally falling into the spirit of things. He grinned at his wife, but Jo Ellen noticed something strange in his eyes, desperation, as if he frantically searched for the woman he’d married and fallen in love with.

“She wouldn’t dare be a boy,” Amy reprimanded as she puffed the lace on a delicate pink bootie.

Jo Ellen realized then as she watched them, not only had Amy suffered emotionally after their last miscarriage, but their marriage had suffered too. It broke her heart to see her brother look so lost and afraid.

Puckering out her lip as if pouting, Amy added, “I want a little girl to dress up and that’s that.”

“It’s going to be a child, not a play doll,” Grady teased.

As Jo Ellen watched the two banter back and forth, she thought of Cooper. For some reason, she couldn’t wait to see him tonight so she could unload her new worries—her sister-in-law’s health, her brother’s marriage, their unborn baby’s chances of survival.

Cooper would listen. He’d understand. And then he’d make her feel better.

Chapter Eighteen

So, where are we going?”

As Cooper met Jo Ellen at her parked car where she’d agreed to meet him at the end of his driveway, he took her hand in the dark. “You’ll see.”

When he broke into a light jog, she laughed. “Why are we running?”

“Because…” He tightened his grip on her hand and kept his pace. “It’s fun.”

Jo Ellen rolled her eyes but chased it with a grin, adoring his enthusiasm as she tried to keep up. “Is it very far away?” she panted.

“Just around this bend here.”

She followed curiously as they passed a row of wind-block evergreens. Once he led her around the tree line, she found herself in a path between more trees, different trees.

“Oh,” she breathed out in delighted surprise, glad he’d slowed them enough to finally walk. “I had no idea you had an orchard on your property.”

“My dad planted it for my mom the year they married.”

She reached up and touched a leaf, trying to squint through the dark. “What kind of trees are these?”

“Pecan. I guess the first pie my dad ever tasted of my mom’s cooking was pecan. He took one bite at some church function and declared her the best cook ever. He always told me the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.”

Jo Ellen smiled. “That’s sweet.”

“Yeah,” he muttered, his voice bitter enough to make her glance at him.

But he didn’t return the look. He squeezed her fingers and crossed between a pair of pecan trees to lead her down another row where she finally caught sight of a faint glow ahead, flickering from the ground.

She focused on the light. As they moved closer, she realized it was his lantern from the night before, already set out and resting atop his sleeping bag he’d spread open. But what charmed her most was the wicker picnic basket sitting beside the lamp.

“A picnic?”

He shrugged, looking bashful.

Lips tipping up, she had to tease. “So, are you trying to find out if the way to a woman’s heart is through her stomach as well?”

He laughed, and then kissed her cheek before whispering in her ear. “Maybe.”

A thrill shot through her. Maybe. Oh God, she hoped so. And yet she didn’t. As dangerous as the thought was, she wanted to start a relationship with him…she just wanted it to work and last.

As they approached, he stepped over something in the grass. Jo Ellen glanced down to find a rope. Realizing it circled the entire blanket he had laid out, she burrowed her brow. “What’s with the rope?”

She expected—or maybe just hoped—to hear another romantic tale about how she’d roped his heart, but he shrugged. “That’s just to keep the snakes away.”

She stopped dead in her tracks, all thoughts of romance gone. “Snakes?”

Immediately, names of some of Texas’s most deadly serpents tumbled through her brain. Rattlesnake, cottonmouth, moccasin, copperhead, coral—

“It’s just an old wives’ tale,” Cooper explained. “But I’ve heard laying a rope around a campfire will keep them away, so I’ve always done it when camping. And I’ve yet to wake up bedded down with a rattler.”

“Well, let’s make sure to keep this rope undisturbed then.” Jo Ellen carefully stepped over it, making Cooper chuckle.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart. I won’t let anything get to you.” He pointed out a flat spot on the sleeping bag for her to sit.

Trying not to imagine any creepy crawlers nearby, she eased down, and relaxed when the cushiony Bermuda grass under the blanket crinkled in greeting. The scent of citronella tickled her nose.

As her heart pounded a little harder, Jo Ellen’s emotions softened to mush. It was official; Cooper Gerhardt thought of everything, even a way to keep the mosquitoes and snakes at bay. Eager to receive his next considerate gesture, she crossed her legs, situating herself, and watched expectantly as he opened the basket’s lid before digging around inside and extracting two plastic baggies.

“It’s not much, mostly just leftovers I could scrounge up at the last minute. But let me tell you, nothing beats a cold meatloaf sandwich in a pecan grove at midnight.”

She shook her head, unable to stop smiling because she felt so undeniably happy. “Only you could make leftovers sound romantic.”

“What? They
are
romantic.” He sent her a lop-sided grin before handing over a wrapped sandwich.

She laughed again and eagerly accepted her midnight rendezvous snack. As he tore into his, she followed suit.

“Mmm, yum. This
is
excellent. I’m going to have to beg the recipe off Loren.”

He chewed and swallowed before answering. “Thanks, but I put saltines in the meatloaf instead of bread crumbs like her recipe said to do.”

She paused and covered her full mouth to ask, “Wait,
you
made this?”

“Sure.” He arched his brows. “You don’t think I simply free load off my mother and make her do all the house work and cooking around there, do you?”

“Free load?” Her eyes grew large. “Cooper, you moved in with her to keep her farm together. I’d say you’re about as far removed from free loading as a man can get.”

A thoughtful moment later, he responded. “I still don’t feel as if I’m doing enough. I’m just not Thaddeus Gerhardt. He was such an amazing man.” With a hiss, he closed his eyes and quickly revised. “I mean is. He
is
an amazing man.”

She watched him swallow hard on his sandwich then rustle around in his basket before drawing up two bottles of water. Handing her one, he lifted his brows. “Water was your preference as I recall.”

She smiled wistfully and accepted one. But as she watched him crack open his bottle and drain half the contents, she couldn’t help but see the misery on his face. “He’s in bad shape, isn’t he?”

Cooper let out a sigh after he swallowed. He stared at his water, then winced. “Yeah. They think he had a stroke at some point, which paralyzed half his face. So he can’t even talk or communicate with anyone anymore. Whenever I go visit him, he just walks the halls of the nursing home. Doesn’t even pause when he sees me. He has no clue who I am. It’s, uh…it’s been a while since he’s looked at me with any kind of recognition.”

Heart breaking, Jo Ellen reached out and stroked his arm. “I’m so sorry.”

“What’s worse, he’d be utterly horrified if he could see himself now, if he knew what he’d become. He’d ask me to put him down. I know he would. I can still remember what he told me once.
If a Holstein ain’t producing milk and doesn’t calve like it should, it’s turning into hamburger, Cooper. No use having it around if it can’t pull its weight
. That was his life creed. Everything should have a useful purpose. He would hate being useless.”

When he fell silent, Jo Ellen let him reflect on his thoughts. She didn’t think she could come up with anything brilliant enough to say to take his pain away, so she rubbed his arm and hoped her supportive presence was enough.

After a while, he forced a smile and touched her hand, silently letting her know he appreciated her efforts. “So, you saw Grady today, huh? How’s he getting along?”

Remembering how much she’d wanted to share her thoughts and feelings about her brother, she gasped. “I forgot to tell you. He and Amy are pregnant.”