Fool for Love (Montana Romance) (41 page)

“Besides,” he filled in when she stumbled, cradling the side of her face with his strong hand, “you just said you loved me.  That’s the only gold I need.”

He leaned in to kiss her.  His lips, warm and possessive against hers washed every other thought out of her mind.  She did love him, more than anything.  She could feel her soul loosen and expand through her body, filling her with warmth, but her mind continued to falter.

“Does Curtis know that you know about the mine?” she asked when he broke their kiss.

“Why should he?  We’ve never talked about it.  Besides, it’s on his half of the land.  He can do whatever he wants with it.”  He moved in to kiss her again.

“No, Eric, that’s where you’re wrong!”  She kept him at arm’s length.  “The deed says it’s yours.  It-”

She wasn’t able to finish her thought.  Another wave of pain took her breath away and with it all thoughts except for the moment.  She groaned and held onto Eric’s arms.

“It’s all right now,” he said, his voice as gentle as ever.  “It won’t be long now.  You’re gonna be okay, Amelia, you hear me?  Everything’s gonna be all right.”

She nodded, pinched with pain.  In the back of her mind she wondered if he spoke this way to cows in the midst of calving.  She would have laughed at the notion if she had had any room to laugh.

“How are we doing?” Delilah asked as she swept back into the room, arms full of pillows.  She plopped them all on the bed behind Amelia’s back and set about straightening them.  “Sorry it took me so long.  It’s laundry day.”

“We’re doing just fine,” Eric told her, never pulling his eyes off of Amelia.  “Never been better.”

“I’m sorry,” Amelia moaned, ignoring Delilah.  “I’m so sorry, Eric.”

“What for, darling?”  He stroked her face as she dug bruises into his arms.

“For everything.  For who I am, for what I’ve put you through, for hurting you.”

“Who you are is the woman I want to spend the rest of my life with and what you’ve put me through is the greatest happiness I’ve ever known.”

His generosity, even now, was more than she could stand.  She wept freely, the regret in her heart so thick that she couldn’t form words.  The pain in her body and soul was almost constant now.  All she could do was shake her head.

“But I’m not your wife,” she said, barely audible.  “I’m not.”

“Shush, Amelia, yes you are.”

“No.  I should be, but I’m not.  I’m sorry.  I was a fool to say no so many times.”

He eased her back against the mound of pillows that Delilah had arranged.

“Yeah, you were,” Eric switched his tune to determination.  “You shoulda said yes a long time ago.”

He stood up, breaking away from her.  The loss of the stability of his body sent Amelia spinning.  She sagged against the pillows.

“Just you hold on,” Eric said, pointing not at her but at her stomach.  “Hold on.”

He turned and strode out of the room.

“Eric?” Amelia whimpered.  It would have been a shout if she’d had a fraction of her normal strength.  “Where is he going?”

“I don’t know, honey.”  Delilah took the seat on the bed that Eric had left.

“No, he can’t go!”  Panic welled up in Amelia again.  “He can’t go!  He can’t leave me!”

But even as she cried out, a stab of guilt hit her.  For months she had been planning to leave him.  She had tried to flee, just as he was running from her now.  She wept bitterly.  All those months of planning to leave and now she couldn’t bear for him to leave her.

“I love him, Delilah!” she cried as another wave of pain crept up on her.  “I love him!”

“I know, honey, I know.”

“Don’t let him leave me!  Don’t let him!”

“I don’t think he’s going anywhere, sweetie.”

She didn’t hear the comforting words.  The pain overtook her.  She saw or heard no
thing more as it clamped down.

Dr. Greene arrived, dragged by Mabel and Charlie and muttering, “If another one of you women drag me away from my lunch to have a baby, I’ll … I don’t know what I’ll do.”

He was roundly ignored.  Mabel and Charlie broke away from him to tidy up the room and help Amelia out of her dress and into an old shift Delilah had brought up with the pillows.  Delilah stepped out into the hall to tell Roy to bring up as much hot water as he could.  Preparations for the birth passed in a blur of activity and agony.  The whole time Amelia kept calling, “Eric!  Where’s Eric?”

“I saw him heading toward the courthouse,” Charlie told her, worry painting her face.

“No!” Amelia gasped.  “I told him not to!  Eric!”

“I’m right here, darling,” Eric answered, striding into the room and toward the bed.

Amelia collapsed with relief, weeping into her hands.  Dr. Greene mistook her relaxation for a fit and brushed Eric aside to test Amelia’s pulse.

“Get out of my way, Dr. Greene,” Eric shoved his way past the man.  “I got something important to do.”  He sat on the side of the bed and held out a paper and a pen.  “Sign this, Amelia.”

Tears and sweat streamed down her face.  Her breath came in sharp gasps.  The pain and heaviness of a baby about to be born pressed on her.  And yet all Amelia could do was gape at Eric and snap, “What?”

“It’s a marriage certificate,” Eric told her, folding the pen into her hand.  “I had Christian draw it up weeks ago.  All you have to do is sign it.  Well,” he conceded, “there’s a little more to it than that, but signing it’ll do for now.”

“Are you out of your mind?” Amelia shouted, fully aware that half a minute ago she had been crying out for him.

Before he could answer Curtis appeared in the doorway, waving a paper.  “There you are, Eric!” he said.  “You left before-”

When he saw the state Amelia was in, he flinched to the side.  It didn’t stop him from marching across the room. 

“Look, I know you’re busy, but if you could just sign this new deed….”

“Who the hell let you in?”  Delilah charged across the room to grab Curtis’s arm in an attempt to get rid of him.

“Who let any of you in?” Dr. Greene shouted above the growing din.  “This is a birth, not a circus.”

“I’ll be out of your way as soon as Eric signs this,” Curtis said, wrestling out of Delilah’s grip and pushing her off balance.  Delilah hollered in protest, but Curtis ignored her.  He thrust the paper and his own pen at Eric.  “It’ll take three seconds.”

Amelia groaned as a strong contraction hit her.

“Hold on,” Eric told Curtis.  “Amelia, I’m asking you to marry me.  For real this time.”

“Now?” Amelia growled through the pain.

“Yes, now.  I don’t want this baby to come into the world without a father,” Eric said.

“Sign the deed first!” Curtis insisted.

“In a minute!” Eric shouted.

“No!” Amelia cried.  “I don’t want my baby coming into the world without a home!”

“Fine with me!”  Eric leaned forward and kissed her forehead.  “Curtis, get out!”

“But the ranch,” Curtis stammered.  “We made a deal!”

“I don’t think that matters right now.”

“But the deed!”

Eric turned and swatted the deed out of Curtis’s hands.  “To hell with your deed.”  He ripped the paper to shreds.  “Now get out!  And if you know what’s good for you, you’ll pack your things and be out of the house and off the ranch before we get back.”

Curtis stumbled backwards.  “You can’t throw me out of my own home!  I own half that ranch.”

“No,” Amelia gulped through her pain.  She gestured to Mabel.

Mabel gasped and scrambled for the pocket of her apron.  She pulled out the deed and shook it at Curtis.  “You lying dog!”

“Now is hardly the time,” Dr. Greene began in a voice designed to silence the room.

“Give me that!” Curtis ignored him.

He lunged for Mabel.  Mabel screamed.  Delilah flung herself at Curtis’s back, wrapping him in a bear hug.  Curtis tried to shake her off, succeeding only in stumbling backwards.  He crashed into the wall.  Delilah let out a painful grunt.  Charlie shouted and rushed to kick Curtis in the shin.

“Stop this!  Stop this at once!” Dr. Greene bellowed.

Eric pushed past him and grabbed the deed from Mabel’s hands.  Curtis froze.  Charlie gave him one more kick before looking to Eric.

Silence sizzled through the room as Eric stared at the deed.  Amelia watched the color rise to his cheeks, watched his eyes lose their focus as he looked right through the paper.

“See, it says right there.”  Curtis panted, eyes wild.  “I own half the ranch.”

Eric snuck a desperate glance at Amelia.

“He’s lying,” she grunted through her pain.

“Why would I do that?” Curtis laughed, high-pitched and feverish.  “We’re family, Eric.  Always have been and always will be.  It’s what your Pop and Mama wanted.”

Eric lowered the deed, darting a glance from Amelia to Curtis.  He took a deep breath and swallowed.  “Then how come they don’t mention a word about you in this deed?”

Amelia let out a groan halfway between laughing and crying.  Eric couldn’t read the deed, but he believed her.  He trusted her.

“That’s not what it says!” Curtis sputtered.  “Eric, you know-”

“If you’re not off my land by the time I get home, you and your crew of troublemakers, then I’m calling in the state marshal to get rid of your sorry, lying ass.”

“But Eric,” Curtis protested on cue, “I’m the only family you’ve got!”

“No you’re not.”  Eric handed the deed back to Mabel.  “I don’t have any more time for you.  My wife and child need me.”

He turned away from Curtis and rushed to squat by Amelia’s side, taking her hand.  Amelia wept in relief, her heart so full it hurt.

“But Eric!”

“Here, Curtis, let me help you.”  Delilah clamped a hand over Curtis’s arm and wrenched him back.  Mabel grabbed his other arm and the two of them wrestled him into the hall.

Eric twisted back to Amelia.  “Amelia, will you marry me?”

“Oh, Eric!”  Amelia would have felt the impact of the gesture far more deeply if the circumstances hadn’t been so dire.  Curtis fought to stay in the doorway in spite of the two women tugging at him.  “I know you mean well….”  There was no finishing the sentence.

Eric laughed.  “Hell, I never was any good at timing.”

There was no time left.  Eric squeezed Amelia’s hand.  Charlie moved to take Amelia’s other hand as Dr. Greene announced.  “I see a head.  The baby’s coming.  Push now.”

Amelia pushed.  Everything else, the insanity and noise of the room, Curtis hollering as he continued to struggle to get back into the room, Delilah and Mabel calling him every name in the book as they held him, Eric’s words of encouragement, none of it mattered.  All of Amelia’s being, all of her past and her future, narrowed in on the moment.  She had to push.

Then suddenly it was done.  The confusion and pain ebbed.  The room grew silent, holding its breath, until the wail of a newborn infant filled the air.  Even Curtis stopped struggling.  Amelia gasped at the sound, her mouth open in disbelief.  Eric echoed her cry of wonder.

“It’s a girl,” Dr. Greene announced.  “Somebody get me some water.”

Charlie jumped up and brought a pitcher of water to Dr. Greene’s side.  He worked for a few precious seconds and then held the screaming, wet baby up for Amelia to see.

She was the most beautiful thing Amelia had ever laid eyes on, and so tiny, so helpless.  Tears streamed down Amelia’s face as she reached for the baby, her daughter.  Her wonderful, precious daughter.

Charlie found a towel and took the baby from Dr. Greene.  She wrapped her carefully then stepped around the bed to hand her to Eric, saying, “Congratulations, papa.”

If there was any sight that could rival the joy of seeing her daughter for the first time, it was the look of pure love and delight in Eric’s eyes as he held her close.  His face shone and his eyes were bright with emotion.

“Hello, little one,” he said in a voice that shook with joy.  “I’m your papa.”

It didn’t even dawn on Amelia that it wasn’t true.  Eric cuddled close to her, passing the baby into Amelia’s arms.  Her heart was so full with a new kind of love that she’d never imagined was possible.  She brushed a hand over her daughter’s head, kissing it and closing her eyes.  Eric held her.  It was as perfect a moment as she had ever known.

“And now, will everyone
please
leave the room!” Dr. Greene insisted.  “There is a shocking risk of infection unless I’m able to see to mother and child properly.”

“You don’t need to tell me twice,” Delilah said.  “Congratulations, honey,” she wished Amelia and nodded to Eric before putting her shoulder into Curtis as she and Mabel shoved him out of the room for good.  Curtis was too stunned to resist.

“Do you need me to stay and help, Dr. Greene?” Charlie asked.  “Amelia was there for me and I want to be there for her.”

“Yes, why not,” Dr. Greene sighed.

Amelia didn’t mind the man’s surliness.  In that moment all she cared about was the happiness and warmth she felt holding her daughter, Eric by her side.  This was her child, her husband, her family.  This was her new life.