Baby Experts 02 (14 page)

She laughed. “What are you going to make?”

“I don’t know, but whatever it is, it will be delicious, just like our lovemaking.”

She’d smiled shyly. “I know I’ve fallen asleep the last couple of nights before you got home, but I didn’t mean to. I want to make love with you, Vince. I want that more than anything.”

One of the horses neighed and snapped Vince back to the present. They’d been kids, with roaring hormones and too much naiveté. Now they were realistic adults, and that’s why Tessa had left the barn with only a taste of what their passion could deliver.

He had to make some decisions before he could move forward with her. He’d have to make sure the decisions were the right ones for both of them.

Tessa tried not to think about Vince as she bought flowers at the gift shop then rode up the elevator. Last night she’d just wanted to cry. She’d walked out when she could have had paradise. But paradise for a night wasn’t the paradise she envisioned. And even in paradise, she and Vince would have to come to terms with losing a baby Sean couldn’t replace.

As she stepped off the elevator, she was surprised to see Vince at the end of the hall, speaking with two policemen. Without hesitating, she went toward him. The two patrolmen finished their conversation with him and passed her as they headed for the elevator.

“Trouble?” she asked, wondering why he was here.

“We had a DUI. He zigzagged from Sagebrush into Lubbock, hit two parked cars, so both jurisdictions were affected. The patient’s blood alcohol was off the chart. Someone has to explain to him that if he’s going to drink like this, he could end up dead or in prison. He was lucky he didn’t injure anyone but himself.”

“You’re taking on the responsibility of confronting him?”

“He’s forty-two, apparently with no family who cares. As soon as he’s clearheaded enough to talk to me, I’m going to take a stab at it. In the meantime, I thought I’d visit Amy.” He glanced at the bouquet of flowers in Tessa’s hand. “I guess that’s where you’re going, too?”

“Yeah, I thought I’d give her family moral support if nothing else.”

“Maybe we can both do that.”

Maybe they could…together. Surprising them both, she linked her arm through Vince’s. He looked down at her questioningly.

“Shouldn’t I?” she asked. “Is it bad for your image?”

“The hell with my image. I just want to know what it means.”

“It means I like you and we’re friends and we’re going to do this together.”

He studied her carefully. “Are you nervous about visiting Amy?”

Vince could always read her too well. “A little. In the past, I’ve felt…extraneous. I want to make a difference, but I don’t know if I can. Her family trusts me and I haven’t been able to deliver, not any more than anybody else has.”

Vince covered her hand with his. “All we can do is try.”

When Tessa walked into Amy’s room, she actually felt the love that surrounded the teenager. The room itself spoke of everything Amy cherished most. Pictures of her and her friends hung on the walls. There were photographs from a Halloween party, homecoming, a Christmas concert. Her favorite songs were playing on the CD player. Tessa knew her mom read her articles from the newspaper and her sister chattered about gossip from school. Her father, with several books on the cart beside the bed, had often read to Amy, trying to find that perfect something that would get through to his daughter.

After greeting the family, Tessa and Vince stood by Amy’s bed, not sure what to say or do.

After a moment, Vince cupped Amy’s shoulder. “Amy, you probably don’t know my voice. I’m Vince Rossi, chief of police. You’re mom’s probably told you this, but your schoolmates really miss you. Everybody misses you.”

Only silence and stillness permeated the room. But Vince went on anyway. “I remember what it was like to be seventeen and have the whole world ahead of me. You still have the whole world ahead of you, Amy. Can you give us some sign that you know we’re here? We want you back with us.”

Tessa could have sworn Amy’s eyelids fluttered. She could have sworn that the teenager’s little finger moved. Those could have been reflexive reactions, but were they?

Now Tessa stepped up to the bed on the other side of the teenager and took her hand. She spoke softly to her for a while as Vince had, mentioning the Great Chili Cook-off coming up on Saturday, recounting a story about one of her favorite horses at her dad’s ranch.

Amy’s mother’s eyes were filled with understanding as Tessa ran out of things to say.

After a few more minutes of conversing with Amy’s family, Tessa and Vince left.

Out in the hall, Tessa admitted to Vince, “I don’t know how her mother stays with her, talks with her, eats with her, reads to her every single day without any response. That’s got to be killing her.”

“What else is she supposed to do, Tessa? Just let her daughter lie there and fade away?”

“No, but…” Tessa rubbed her temples, then looked up at Vince. “Could you do it?”

“Without a doubt. Even if it made no difference, I would try. Having a child is about doing everything and hoping something works.”

They were at the stairwell now and Vince added, “It’s sort of like being with you.”

“Being with me?”

“I try a little bit of everything and hope something works.”

After he studied her face a few moments, he asked, “How about a real date? I’ll pick you up after rounds tomorrow night. We can stop and see Amy together, then we can have dinner and just chill.”

“Chill?”

“You
do
know what that means,” Vince teased.

“I know it means to hang out with someone you’re comfortable with.”

“Exactly. We’ll learn how to be so comfortable with each other that no situation will ever be awkward again.”

She smiled, in spite of herself. “You almost have me believing it.”

“Believe it. You can spend time with me, spend time with Sean, eat supper with us, just see what a night like that can be.” His voice was calm and casual, suggesting something that almost seemed mundane.

But for Tessa there were pitfalls that could send her scurrying away. Wasn’t it about time she grew up, accepted what was and saw what is? Vince was offering her the opportunity to be happy now, if not in the future. Life
was
short. Maybe she should just enjoy it. Maybe she should accept Vince just the way he was and go from there.

“All right,” she suddenly agreed.

“All right?” he asked warily.

“You asked me out on a date, one where I’d feel comfortable. I’m accepting. Tomorrow night is good,” she added softly.

She felt like a teenager again…feeling like that seventeen-year-old who’d believed in happily ever after.

Francesca stood at the chopper and exchanged a look with Emily, who was slicing strawberries into a pie shell. “We needed something to do with our hands so we could keep our thoughts from scurrying into places we don’t want them to go.”

Tessa sighed. “I know what you mean.”

“How’s your dad?” Emily asked.

“As stubborn as ever. The doc says he needs arthroscopic surgery but Dad doesn’t want to have it now. So he’s going to take anti-inflammatory medication and see a physical therapist for a couple of sessions to learn exercises to strengthen the muscles.”

“Will he be able to drive himself?” Francesca chopped tomatoes to add to the avocado.

“It’s his left knee so he says he’ll be able to. I talked to Rico and he says he’ll be on standby in case Dad needs a driver. Is there anything you need me to do? I’d like to keep
my
hands busy, too.”

“Salad,” Emily suggested, giving Tessa a look. “Where are
your
thoughts going?”

“I ran into Vince at the hospital and we visited Amy. I just feel so bad for her and her family.”

Crossing to the refrigerator, Tessa found the head of lettuce in the crisper drawer. She also grabbed carrots and a cucumber. Then she mentioned casually, “Vince and I are going on…a date tomorrow night.”

Francesca stopped what she was doing.

“We’re going to meet up after my rounds and I’ll spend the evening with him and Sean.”

“Cozy,” Emily said. “I told Dr. Madison I’d stay late tomorrow night and help input patient records into the new system.”

Tessa pulled a cutting board from a cabinet. “For professional reasons…or personal ones?”

Emily stiffened for a moment and then shrugged. “Both. When I’m around him, I can forget for a little while how Richard made me feel.”

Emily rarely talked about her ex-husband or her marriage and her life before she came to Sagebrush, so Tessa paid attention. “I don’t hear scuttlebutt around Family Tree about Dr. Madison. I’ve never heard anything about him dating. I think he concentrates on his twin daughters and his practice and that’s about it.”

“I know,” Emily agreed. “And he’s never made any indication that we have anything other than a professional relationship. He respects what I do. I respect what he does. But…”

“But?” Francesca repeated.

“But whenever we’re in the same room together, I feel this snap, crackle and sizzle.” She shook her head. “It’s probably all me. Maybe I just want to believe I can have a romantic life after Richard. For so long, I just felt…numb.” She paused then went on. “Still, nothing can happen. I’d have to tell him—” She stopped and bit her lip.

“What would you have to tell him?” Tessa asked gently, suspecting Emily needed to reveal something that had been jamming up her emotions for a long time.

Emily finished layering the strawberries, poured a glaze over the top and set the pie in the refrigerator. She took out the pitcher of iced tea. “Anyone want a glass?”

Guessing this was going to be a sit-down conversation, Tessa responded, “Sure.” She left the salad fixings on the counter and crossed to the table.

After Francesca ran the chopper, poured the guacamole into a dish and set it in the refrigerator, she did the same. The three women sipped their tea.

Emily stared at the ice cubes in her glass then confessed, “I’ve been keeping a secret from Doctor Madison.”

“Everyone keeps secrets.” Tessa realized she’d been keeping one from herself—her feelings for Vince.

“Do you want to tell us?” Francesca asked. “Or is it something you’d rather keep confidential?”

Tessa knew the three of them had become friends because they never pressured each other. They accepted each other just as they were.

“Maybe I should tell you so then you’ll understand why I keep things to myself.” Emily turned her glass in a circle then another. “Back in Corpus Christi, I was a midwife who attended home births.”

Tessa kept her surprise in check. Home-birthing was controversial. She knew some women preferred it, while other women couldn’t afford hospital care and so it was an alternative. But she also knew many obstetricians opposed it and wished they could do away with it altogether.

“I was an obstetrical nurse-practitioner before I became a midwife,” Emily continued. “Home-birthing was a need I felt should be addressed and I liked the idea of giving birth to a child in a loving atmosphere with familiar things around, being able to walk and stretch and snack during labor, talk to someone who’s a friend as much as a helper in the process. I became friends with my clients. That’s what being a midwife was all about for me—making bonds so that a baby comes into the world in the best possible way. I only took on low-risk pregnancies, women who didn’t have histories that could cause a problem during labor and delivery. I was good at screening. I also had an obstetrician to back me up and to take over at the hospital if I had to send any of my patients there. In all the deliveries I handled, I only tended to one labor that wasn’t predictable. As soon as I saw a problem, I sent her to the hospital. She had a C-section and mom and baby were fine. But then a year later, something I couldn’t predict happened. The mother was young, healthy and strong. The dad was there, helping all the way. But when I delivered their little boy, he was stillborn.”

“Oh, Emily.” Francesca’s eyes brimmed with compassion and empathy. As a neonatologist, she saw all kinds of conditions after birth. But at least she had a chance to make them better.

“I’m sorry, Emily, that that happened to you.” Tessa covered Emily’s hand with hers. “I’m so sorry for the couple.”

“They were devastated as any couple would be, and they wanted someone to blame. So they filed a complaint and my license was suspended during the investigation. But they weren’t satisfied with that. They filed a civil suit also, and I didn’t have malpractice insurance. It’s simply unaffordable for nurse-midwives who deliver at home.”

“So you had to go through a lawsuit?” Tessa asked, imagining the rigors of it and the emotional impact.

“Yes, I did, and the jury decided there was no malpractice. The autopsy didn’t show the cause of death. Unfortunately, that’s not unusual. Half of stillborn deaths are still undiagnosed. The licensing board also decided there was no malpractice and I retained my license. But the Wilsons had hired a shark of a lawyer who brought up the other case that had caused problems, insisted I had missed something as a practitioner, that I put the mother and child in danger, that I was only saved by the capable hands of an excellent obstetrician. I was strong at the beginning but as the weeks went by, as articles came and went in the newspaper, as I waited for the licensing board, prepared for the proceedings, paid legal bills out of Richard’s pension, I began to wonder. What if I had missed something in both cases?”

“Did you look at the facts?” Tessa prompted.

“I tried to. So much of it was insubstantial. There were questions without answers. And during this, Richard was trying to earn a promotion. He insisted the lawsuit and eventually my attitude toward his job were preventing that from happening. I didn’t feel like attending the cocktail parties that are so much a part of what he does, but he didn’t understand how I just couldn’t put on a mask and pretend everything was fine. A few weeks after the resolution of the lawsuit, he said I was a different person from the woman he’d married. He needed a go-getter, someone who wanted what he wanted, like a huge house and a BMW, a boat and a second home in Boca Raton. I cared about my mothers and babies, the lack of insurance for low-income mothers, the treatment of women in hospitals—all of it. Not material possessions. I guess Richard always cared about money and I just used it for what I needed. I was never an extravagant person. Before and after we married, we had fun together. We had picnics at the beach, concerts in the park, weekends that we wanted to spend together. But then something happened. His job became this all-consuming thing, and it wasn’t even the job as much as his determination to climb that success ladder. I think he wants to be CEO someday and that’s fine, but he was willing to give up too many important things to get there. I wanted to have children and he kept postponing them, saying when he got the next promotion, that’s when we’d do it. But the next promotion was never enough. And now…” She sighed. “I’m writing a check every month to pay him back for the legal fees.”

“That was decreed in your divorce settlement?” Francesca asked.

“Richard wanted it, but no, the judge said that shouldn’t be expected of me. Yet in a way, it was my liability that caused the whole situation so I feel responsible and I’m paying him back. It’ll take years, but I’ll do it.”

The women sat in silence for a few moments, then Tessa asked, “What’s the main reason you don’t want Dr. Madison to know?”

“There are lots of reasons. The main one is how many obstetricians view home births. I really don’t know how he feels. I never had the courage to bring up that subject. I didn’t want to go down that path with him. I guess my main concern is that a complaint was lodged against me and a civil suit. Even though I was cleared of malpractice, there’s a cloud that hangs over a professional just with the accusation. That could come into play in so many ways and he might feel he has to fire me. I like working for him. I don’t want to have to find another position.”

“We’ll keep this confidential,” Tessa assured her. “You don’t have to worry about that.”

Francesca nodded. “Absolutely. No one else will know.” Francesca reached out and grabbed Emily’s hand. “I’m glad you told us. We do all have secrets, and once the secret is shared, it’s not a secret anymore. But I think sharing it helps. That’s why I told you about my childhood.”

“Secrets become a weight that are just too heavy to carry,” Tessa agreed.

Emily lifted her glass and took a sip of iced tea. Then she smiled. “A year ago, I would never have believed I’d be sitting around a table with two women I share a house with, drinking iced tea and confiding in them about my life. You two have really helped me find myself again.”

“We didn’t know you were lost,” Tessa joked. “I know both Francesca and I liked you from the moment we met you. That’s why we asked you to live with us.”

“Maybe I was just hiding.” She smiled at the two of them. “So enough about me.” She glanced at Francesca. “Are you going to see Grady Fitzgerald again?”

Francesca had told both Emily and Tessa about her encounter with the handsome saddlemaker.

“No. It won’t work out. And the truth is, I just don’t want a relationship. I want to focus on my career and I don’t have time for one. But…” She swerved her gaze to Tessa. “I think
you
might. I heard a little twitter that you visited the moms-and-babies group and that Vince just so happened to be in that group.”

“Where do you get your information?” Tessa asked.

“Here, there and everywhere. I also heard one of the moms was smitten with him.”

Tessa wrinkled her nose as she remembered Lucy Atkins’s interest in Vince. “I didn’t stay long.”

“Yeah, I heard that, too. Are you going to let her run you off?”

Tessa knew her friend was teasing, but there was an element of truth there, too. “Don’t be silly. If Vince wants to start something with someone…” She stopped, realizing she’d better be honest with these two friends. Maybe then she could be honest with herself. “I think
I
want to start something with Vince again, and I keep telling myself I’m absolutely crazy. He’s probably not even going to stay here. He hasn’t made his decision about that yet.”

“And you don’t want to abandon your dad to follow Vince somewhere,” Emily added. “I can certainly understand that. If my parents were still living, I’d want to live closer to them as they got older.”

“Dad and Vince sort of cleared the air over the weekend, as much as they could…though there’s no love lost between them.”

“They’re both twenty years older,” Francesca offered. “They’ve changed. Maybe they’ll grow to like each other.”

“Maybe, but I’d settle for mutual respect. I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow night with Vince.”

“Are you sure about that?” Emily asked with a sly smile.

This was why she’d told them so she’d keep herself honest. “I’m thinking that maybe time with Vince now, even if he leaves, is better than no time at all. I can’t keep letting the past get in the way of the present. Or the future.”

Francesca stood and raised her iced tea glass. “To us and our friendships. What more do we need?”

Tessa loved her friends, but she was also beginning to realize she needed Vince and Sean in her life, too.

But did
he
need
her?