A Family of Her Own (Dundee, Idaho #3)(54)
Author: Brenda Novak

He supposed he and Rebecca were becoming family.

AS KATIE’S BABY SUCKLED at her breast, she stared down at him, overcome by the powerful emotions she felt whenever she held him, thought of him or nursed him. The slight weight of Troy Matthew in her arms, bundled tight in delivery blankets, along with the sweet scent that clung to him, satisfied some deep inner craving. She was a mother. At this point in her life, she had few close friends, no computer and only a small cabin in which to live, but suddenly she didn’t care. She’d find a way to provide. This child was hers, and she was going to stand by him and protect him at all costs.

A dark-haired nurse breezed into the room, wearing a purple flowered smock, white slacks and white squishy shoes. “Hi there,” she said. “You just about done?”

Katie frowned at the sight of her. Not because she didn’t like this particular nurse but because the appearance of any nurse while she had the baby generally resulted in his being taken away and returned to the incubator in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.

“Can’t we take his temperature and see if he’s stable enough to stay with me a little longer?” Katie asked.

“We did that fifteen minutes ago,” she replied.

“Can we do it again? I’m waiting for someone.” Katie cast a hopeful glance toward the door, listening, as she had during the past few hours, for the approach of booted feet. She wanted Booker to see Troy now that he was a day old. She felt certain Booker would come. He’d been so good to her during the delivery, so strong and determined when she needed him most. His tenderness toward her throughout the whole affair indicated he cared about her, at least a little. Enough for a visit to the hospital, surely.

“I’d like to let your baby stay longer, Ms. Rogers,” the nurse said. “But I’m afraid he’s been out long enough.”

Stifling any further complaint, Katie relinquished her son. It was nearly ten o’clock, which was pretty late for Booker to arrive in Boise, anyway. Especially when he was facing a two-hour ride back. She’d probably been wrong to think he’d bother with such a long trip now that he knew she was in good hands.

Suddenly far more tired than she’d been only moments before, she decided to get some sleep. But once the nurse and the baby were gone, the hospital noises seemed amplified. How was she supposed to rest with so much activity going on right outside her door? Instruments beeping, rattling carts, low voices, nurses coming in every couple of hours to take her blood pressure, check her heart rate and monitor her bleeding….

Massaging her stomach the way the nurse had shown her earlier, to make sure her uterus was contracting as it should, she rolled over and stared at the wall, thinking of her family. Should she call them with the news of Troy’s birth? She hadn’t wanted to include her parents in her pregnancy. She’d wanted to stay completely away from them. But now that the baby was here, it seemed petty to withhold him from them, to withhold them from each other.

She looked at the phone, wondering how her parents might receive her call. She wasn’t sure she could endure much emotional upset tonight. But if her parents were even slightly positive, she thought it might be best to make peace. All the books she’d read said that grandparents and aunts and uncles were very important to a child.

Lifting the phone, she started to dial. But she didn’t have a credit card that would let her make a long distance call, and she couldn’t bring herself to call collect. Not after the way things had ended at the restaurant.

After replacing the handset, she got up and went to the bathroom. Seeing her messy hair and gaunt-looking face in the mirror, she tried to convince herself she was glad Booker hadn’t come. It didn’t quite work, but when she climbed back into bed she fell asleep at last.

KATIE FELT AS THOUGH she’d been sleeping for only about ten minutes when she heard a man’s voice calling her name. She struggled into wakefulness, thinking Booker had finally come. He was here. He hadn’t forgotten her. He was just later than she’d expected….

But when she opened her heavy lids and blinked, the blurry figure standing over her bed came into focus and she realized it wasn’t Booker at all. It was Mike Hill, holding a vase of tiger lilies. He was dressed in the same kind of clothes he wore most of the time—a blue button-down shirt, a parka and a pair of Wranglers—but he looked rumpled and unshaven.

She’d never seen him looking rumpled and unshaven….

“Mike,” she murmured, her brow furrowing. “What are you doing here?”

“Booker left a message on my voice mail telling me you had the baby, so I—”

“Booker called you?”

“Yeah. He thought I’d want to know, and he was right.” He set the flowers on her bedside table.

“Thanks,” she said, “but he shouldn’t have bothered you. You were away on business—”

“I’ve already seen the horse and agreed we should buy it. Rebecca and Josh said they’d handle the rest.”

“Oh.” She fumbled for the remote that controlled her bed, found it buried under the covers and pushed the button that would raise her into a sitting position. The light of day gleamed around the closed blinds, but she knew it was still early. “What time is it? You must’ve come the moment you heard.”

“It’s nearly eight-thirty. I was lucky enough to catch a red-eye out of Austin. And I had my car at the airport, so I was able to drive right over.”

“That’s good.” Obviously he’d gone to a lot of trouble….

“How’s the baby?” he asked.

A smile curved Katie’s lips. “Great. Want me to call a nurse so you can see him?”

“You bet.”

She pressed the button that signaled the nurse. “So, Rebecca and Josh are staying in Austin a few more days?”

“They want to continue meeting with the stallion’s owner, see what they can negotiate. This horse is special. We’d love to buy him, but at this point, the owner’s asking more than we’re willing to pay.”

Katie knew Mike and Josh owned a couple of million-dollar studs, so she couldn’t imagine how much that might be. “I see.”

Mike scowled as he sat in the recliner next to her bed. “When I returned Booker’s call last night, he mentioned something about Andy stealing your computer.”

“Can you believe that?” She wrinkled her nose in disgust.