Newborn Needs a Dad (16 page)

“Do you?” Gabby asked, not to be contentious but more because she wanted to know the answer.

“None of this has been easy, Gabrielle. Not for either of us. But whatever’s happened, it has nothing to do with Bryce. He’s an amazing little boy who’s fighting his way through a tough situation, and he’s going to need all the love he can get for a while.”

“Only for a while? Because if that’s your condition, then maybe you shouldn’t be here. Because my son…Gavin’s son…needs and deserves more than only your conditional love. He needs it strong, and he needs it forever. And if you can’t give it to him that way, go back to your hotel, or back to White Elk. Or go anyplace you want to go so long as it’s not here.”

Gabby spun away and went though the NICU doors. Her hands were shaking. She wanted to cry. And scream. And kick the wall. Most of all, she wanted to go back outside and tell Neil that she loved him and she wanted him in her life…in Bryce’s life. But on her terms, which were forever. When she looked back through the doors, though, he was gone. Beyond that, she couldn’t think because she was rushed into the NICU for her first ten-minute visit, top of the hour, every hour thereafter.

Bryce looked so helpless, lying there in the crib, hooked to oxygen, hooked to an IV. She needed to hold him, needed to feel the intimate bond she’d had with him before his birth, but that had been breached and she couldn’t. In this impersonal room full of machines and other worried parents, there was no place to whisper the things to him she’d whispered over the months, or to sing him the lullabies. But she touched him—laid her fingers on his tiny chest and felt him breath for those ten minutes. It wasn’t nearly enough, but she was grateful. Because when she looked at her son lying there, sound
asleep and oblivious to all the things causing her so much pain, she saw a miracle. Seven months ago, when she’d learned she was pregnant, she’d known it was a miracle. And now that Bryce was here, and on his way to being healthy, she was filled with overwhelming gratitude to the man Neil hated. So maybe that situation couldn’t be rectified. As much as she wanted it to be, she just didn’t know. “What will be, will be,” she whispered to Bryce, as she kissed him on the forehead just as her visit was up. “But no matter what, Mommy loves you and that will never change.”

“I
THOUGHT
you might like some hot chocolate.” Neil handed over a plastic cup, and sat down next to Gabrielle, who was stretched out in bed, staring at the wall. The hospital had checked her into a private room, more as a guest than a patient, partly as a medical privilege, partly because of her condition.

“I didn’t know you were still here.” She took the cup, clutching it like it was her life blood. She’d been so cold since she’d come here, so cold since she’d had to walk away from Bryce and leave him all alone in Intensive Care, and the warmth felt good on her fingers.

“I couldn’t leave, Gabrielle. Right now, I’m as mixed-up as you are about how this will work out, but the one thing that I knew for sure was that I couldn’t walk away from you and Bryce.”

“I don’t want you to leave, Neil.” Gabby sucked in a sharp breath, held it for a moment, then let it out. “If that’s what you think you have to do, I won’t stop you. I’ll honor your wishes, whatever they are. But just so you’ll know, my wish is that
you’d be part of our family. Bryce and me. You and me.
Especially
you and me.”

Neil laughed. “You never mince words, Gabrielle. That was one of the first things that attracted me to you. When I was married to Karen, I never knew where I stood. With you, I always do.”

“Life’s too short to play games, and I think I’m only just now coming to understand what that really means.” It was a bit of her father’s wisdom she’d taken to heart a long, long time ago. “My dad always said that when the opportunity arises, grab it and hold on for dear life, because you might never get that opportunity again.”

“He was a wise man. I wish I could have met him.”

“I wish you could have, too. You would have liked him. And I think he would have liked you.”

“Maybe I’ll get to know him through his grandson.”

“Is that what you really want, Neil? Because while he’s Bryce Evans’s grandson, he’s also Gavin Thierry’s son, and that’s never going to change.”

“Tell me about my brother, Gabrielle. You know things about him I need to know.”

Yes, he did need to know. Finally. She took a deep breath to brace herself. “We met at a medical seminar in Chicago, about nine months ago, as it turns out. It was also just a few weeks after I’d buried my father, and I was so…alone. My dad was, quite literally, the only person I had in the world. No other relatives, except a few distant cousins. We were very close, probably closer than most fathers and daughters because he was the one who raised me. So, pretty much, it was just the two of us. Anyway, I wasn’t back to work yet, was pretty sure I didn’t want to return to that particular practice when I was ready to work again, and I needed something to keep me occupied until I figured out what I wanted…I was
pretty lost. So I went to a pediatrics seminar and figured that since I deliver babies, it might do me some good to learn some advances in pediatrics.”

“And that’s where you met Gavin.”

Gabby nodded. “He was a lecturer. Brilliant, so passionate in his love of pediatrics. I think I fell a little in love with him when I heard him speak, because I’d never heard anyone with such excitement about his work. He lectured on operating a small-town pediatric practice, talked about how important pediatric specialties were to the more rural or isolated areas, and outlined ways to get better service to those areas. Maybe the most important thing he did was tell those of us who came to his lecture to consider small-town practice when we were weighing our options, and not to write it off too quickly. He was brilliant, Neil. People approached him afterwards and told him that he’d given them something to think about.”

“Really?”

Gabby nodded. “He was respected. Well researched, well-spoken. All that, and he was nice to me when I desperately needed someone to be nice. He…he distracted me from the things I didn’t want to think about yet. One thing led to another. So at a time when I was lower than I’d ever been in my life, Gavin and I connected. I might have been a little in love, or maybe a better way to put that is infatuated. But it wasn’t permanent. Wasn’t meant to be anything more than it was, and we knew that after a little while. But for a couple of days we were two people who were both going through some lows, trying to pick each other up.”

“He was going through some lows?”

Gabby nodded. “He didn’t say anything about it, but you could see it in his eyes.” Eyes that were so much like Neil’s. And she’d seen that same distance in his eyes, too.

She shifted in bed, settled back more into her pillows,
raised the head a little. And shut her eyes, trying to picture Gavin. Funny thing was, all she saw was Neil. They really didn’t look so much alike, except the eyes. Bryce’s eyes. “It didn’t turn into a real relationship, Neil. We were careful, even though no one would have ever believed I could have a child, but apparently Bryce was meant to be. I wanted Gavin to be part of his son’s life, if he wanted to. I was going to give him that opportunity.”

“As possessive as you are about Bryce, didn’t that scare you?”

“It did. I mean, he could have wanted full custody, or partial custody. He might have wanted to have influence in ways I wouldn’t approve of. There were a lot of risks, letting him know.”

“So why, ultimately, did you decide to do it when he probably would have never found out?”

“Because it was the right thing to do. Bryce had a right to his father, and his father had a right to Bryce.” Overhead, the hospital light seemed especially harsh shining in her face, and she reached up to shut it off. Then she twisted to have a better look at Neil. “Everything was going so well in my life…I was having the baby I never thought I’d have, and falling in love with the man I thought I’d never meet. It was so perfect, and I didn’t want it to end. But that day in the hospital, when I saw Gavin’s name on the plaque…how could anyone be prepared for a situation like that? How could anyone even know what to do? Gavin had hurt you, and here I was, having his baby and falling in love with you.” She stopped. The words had run out. There was nothing more to say that he hadn’t already heard. So now it was up to Neil to make the next move. And there were so many ways this could go, it frightened her to the very core because she wanted to be a family with him. The three of them. Living in White Elk. Happy.

Only she didn’t know if Neil could do that. So, now was the moment of reckoning. Her destiny laid out before her, and the choice was Neil’s.

“Gavin and I were…at the time he died we were almost getting along again. He’d changed. I saw it after he’d come back from his medical seminar. He was…calm. Maybe a little more contented. And that was something I’d never seen in him before. Ever. But he’d called me and we’d talked a few times. He’d told me how sorry he was for breaking up my marriage. He, um…he begged for my forgiveness and I told him I wasn’t ready yet, but maybe sometime in the future. It was the best I could do.”

“That’s good,” Gabrielle said, her hopes growing even though she was trying to hold them back.

“Not good, but better. There were too many hard feelings to clear up in a matter of days or weeks. And I think he understood that.”

“Maybe that was the sadness I saw in him. The regret for what he’d done. We all make mistakes, and maybe he was at a point where he was realizing that his biggest mistake was losing his brother.”

Neil shrugged. “Maybe. But we’ll never know, will we?”

“What we know is that the man I met wasn’t the man who stole your wife. Something changed him, Neil, and while we’ll never know what that was, it would be nice to think that Gavin’s desire to have a relationship with you again caused the change. Honestly, I think he found his heart and his happiness through his medicine and, perhaps, that’s where the change in him started. And you know what? I think his lecture was about White Elk, even though he didn’t mention it by name. It was his passion, like it’s yours.”

“Karen and I weren’t getting along when Gavin stepped in. She was such a…mistake. More like a lapse in sound judgment. And, to be honest, I didn’t miss her when she was gone.”

“But did you miss Gavin?”

“Not for a while. I remember telling him something to the
effect that I never wanted to see him again…something about not crossing his path until hell froze over.” He cringed. “It was reactionary, but I had a right to my reactions. And not because of Karen. She wasn’t even significant in the matter. My wife was poison. She would have destroyed me, destroyed my career. And after I’d found out they’d been having an affair, I laughed at Gavin for being so gullible, told him he was welcome to her.” Neil shook his head. “And the hell of it was, I never knew why they did it. Karen was easy to figure out. She was a child who got bored with her toys easily. But Gavin?”

“It could have been something complicated like a deep-rooted jealousy left over from childhood—like he perceived you were the favored one, or something as simple as being hurt that his father knew you were following in his footsteps, but didn’t live long enough to know that Gavin was, too. It’s hard to say what caused him to do what he did, and speculating is a waste of time because we’ll never know. But the way you reacted…you said what you said because you were hurt. Gavin wouldn’t have held that against you. I mean, there aren’t rules governing a situation like that. But you rebuilt your life. Honorably. And in the end, even though you’ll never have the answers you want, you’ll have to make your life enough without those answers.”

“It is enough. More than I ever thought I’d have, and I’m happy. Probably happier than Gavin ever was, and I’m sorry for that. Truly, deeply sorry.”

Tears of pain trickled down her cheeks, and she swiped at them with the back of her hand. “The man I met had regrets, Neil. I saw that in him and I wish now I’d asked him.” Yet how could she have anticipated, then, how her future would be eternally entwined with Gavin’s? Or his brother’s? Or his son’s?

“Gavin and I, we’d agreed to meet. After months, I’d finally said yes, stipulating that the first meeting be on neutral ground
somewhere other than White Elk. We’d have lunch, talk. We’d agreed to one step at a time. Gavin wanted to go faster, I wanted to be cautious. But we were going to sit down together and see if we could find a starting point.” He swallowed hard. “I didn’t know he changed his will to leave everything to the hospital pediatrics ward. He was atoning for what he’d done in the past, I think.”

“Yes, I think he was.”

“Even with all his faults, Gavin was a brilliant doctor. I would have liked to have heard his lecture in Chicago.”

“Would you like to read my notes of it?”

He nodded, but didn’t speak for a moment. Then, finally, “Gavin and I had a long way to go to make up. He said he understood that, and was willing to do whatever he had to. He was sincere, Gabrielle. I know he was sincere.”

“Because he was a changed man,” she said.

“Yes, I think he was. And I don’t suppose I would have known how much if you hadn’t…”

He cleared his throat and shut his eyes for a moment. Thinking. Processing. Trying to put it all together. The agony on his face was so strong it turned into her own agony. She could feel it. Feel the heavy burden he carried. If only there was something she could do, something more than listening. But maybe that’s what he needed most. Maybe letting him unburden himself was the only thing she could do to truly help. So she waited quietly until he was ready to speak again, hoping he could feel her silent support.

“Anyway,” he finally said, “Gavin wanted to see me and I had finally convinced myself it was a good thing. I wasn’t looking forward to it, although I wasn’t dreading it either. But I had a patient who went bad that morning and I couldn’t leave the hospital. So I called Gavin, told him we’d have to reschedule, and that I’d call him in a day or so to see what we could
arrange. Well, Gavin was insistent. He said he was coming to White Elk to see me, that he was ready to do it, and he had things to say that couldn’t wait any longer. So he came to White Elk, and that’s when…when he was killed. Traffic accident right before he got to the valley.”

“Neil, I’m so sorry.” Gabby scooted to the edge of the bed, dropped her legs over the side, then leaned forward and took Neil’s hands in hers. “So sorry you two never had the chance to talk.” She couldn’t even begin to imagine what it would be like to be involved in a relationship that needed resolution as badly as Neil’s and Gavin’s had, and never have that chance. When she’d lost her dad, everything had been said between them. No resolution was necessary, because they’d expressed their love, fought their fights and forgiven each other along the way. Even thinking that something between them could have gone unresolved made her feel sad. For Neil, for Gavin. And for Bryce, because he was very much a part of this.

But more than ever it made her realize that she and Neil had a situation to resolve between the two of them, and that they couldn’t let another day, another hour pass without saying all the things that needed saying.

“I know you can’t go back and change things, and I’m sure you thought, like most of us do, that you have all the time in the world to make things right. It’s just not like that, though. My little boy almost died yesterday, and that’s the first time I’ve really understood how precious and short time is. Gavin was a good man. I knew him differently than you did, saw him in a way you’ll never get to. But he was a good, kind man, and I have to think he learned from his mistakes and patterned himself after you. Because you’re a good, kind man, too. His older brother…the best kind of example. He knew that, and I truly believe that hurting you was what made him sad. So maybe you didn’t have enough time to make it right, but you
would have, Neil. Given enough time, you two would have made up. He wanted to, and you wanted to.”

“Maybe we would have. But I’ll never know, will I?”

The truth was, he wouldn’t. And that wasn’t something she could fix. She could help him through it, though. Support him through the lows. If he would have her. If he would have Bryce. “I don’t want to leave White Elk, Neil. I want to stay there and raise my son there. And I want to be happy there. When I first arrived, I didn’t know what I wanted, or where I wanted to be. But I found everything…
everything
there, and I don’t want to leave it. But I can’t stay, if my being there makes you unhappy.”