Daddy's Home

This wasn’t one of those times. Nor was it a debatable issue.

“Let me explain something to you,” she said, her voice splintering with restrained anger. “I very frankly don’t give a snip what your story is. I don’t even want to hear it, though I’m sure you’ve spent many hours rehearsing for my benefit.”

His scowl darkened and he grunted in protest.

“No, really. It doesn’t matter. Nothing you say matters. What matters is that I’ve bonded with this baby, and nothing is going to convince me to give him away. Most especially to you.”

With a sharp intake of breath, he sat back in his seat and pounded a fist on the tabletop, making the silverware rattle.

Water from her cup splashed onto the surface of the table, and she quickly wiped it with the edge of her napkin, her face flaming with anger and embarrassment. She hazarded a glance at the neighboring booths, wondering if anyone had noticed his outburst.

“Even before you’ve heard what really happened?” he asked through clenched teeth, his chest rising and falling with the exertion of each angry breath.

She lifted one sardonic brow. “Astonish me. You were abducted by aliens. You’ve been in a coma. You had amnesia. What, Christopher? What’s your story?” As much as she tried to keep her voice low, it lifted with each word to a higher crescendo until she’d reached well beyond shrill and piercing.

Now she was the one causing the scene, and it was his fault. She didn’t care how irrational and childish the thought was. She clamped her jaw shut and glared defiantly at Christopher, and then at the patrons staring at her. Life had freeze-framed, with everyone’s attention on her.

She blew out a frustrated breath, furious that he had provoked her to make a display of herself.

“Jazz,” he began, reaching out with both hands in a conciliatory gesture.

She threw her napkin down on the table and stood. “I thought this meeting was a good idea when you first suggested it,” she said slowly, articulating each syllable in a low, precise tone. “I was mistaken.”

She looked blindly out the window, then back to Christopher. “I love Sammy, and he’s staying with me. End of subject.” She met his gaze briefly, willing her strength to hold out until she could flee from his presence. “Goodbye, Christopher.”

She turned and walked away from him, holding her chin high and staying steadfastly determined not to look at the patrons she felt were staring at her.

Christopher could pick up the tab on the check. It served him right. Her blood boiling, she wished momentarily that she’d ordered a full-course steak dinner instead of just hot tea.

When she exited the café, she pulled in a deep breath of mountain air, closing her eyes as fresh, cool oxygen flooded her lungs. If only she could dissipate the heat in her brain as easily.

Walking away from Christopher was the hardest thing she’d ever done. He was suffering in his own way, she realized, and her presence affected him as much as his did her.

All the more reason for them to stay away from each other, she decided, fortifying her decision with every justification available to her.

Her heart said a father should be with his son. Her mind said Christopher forfeited that right when he walked away from Jenny and his unborn baby.

She had to cling to reason, no matter what her emotions were doing. Sammy’s well-being depended on it. Probably her own happiness, too. She loved that baby. And for now, maybe for always, that love would have to be enough.

Christopher ate his food in silence, ignoring the curious stares and speculative talk around him. His mind was so preoccupied with his troubles that he barely tasted his food, and had to order a second milk shake to wash the hamburger down his dry throat.

He loved Jasmine more than ever. He thought the feelings had faded some with time, but sitting across from her today, he knew he was fooling himself. The ache in his chest only shaded his deeper feelings. He would do anything to wipe the pain from her eyes, and it was the ultimate irony to know he’d been the one to put it there in the first place. Sure, Jasmine was being harsh and stubborn, but who could blame her? He knew it was her fear of losing Sammy that was speaking for her. She’d always been an all-or-nothing kind of woman, a fact Christopher admired. Her obvious devotion and loyalty to her nephew only made him love her more.

Pain lanced his temple, and he reached a hand up to rub it firmly across his brow. Nothing was going as he had hoped.

He knew without a doubt that when she walked away today, she wouldn’t meet with him again, at least not intentionally. She’d run the other direction whenever she saw him, screaming inwardly if not in reality.

Which meant his next move must be furtive. He’d have to follow her around until an opportunity presented itself to speak with her again—in a time and in a location where she had no place to go except into his arms.

God would give him that opportunity. Or maybe he’d have to make his own.

Jasmine didn’t immediately return to Gram’s apartment, where she was staying with Sammy. She knew Gram would take care of the baby as long as necessary. And right now, Jasmine needed to be alone, to have time to think.

Not entirely conscious of where she was going or why, she found herself parking in front of Jenny’s cottage. There was still a lot of work to be done, she supposed. And it was quiet here, a far cry from the hustle and bustle of the medical clinic.

Once in the small cabin, she started to absently box up Jenny’s things, beginning with the books in her room. She picked up an empty apple box from the pile and began stacking various romance novels spine up, mixed with some hardbacked classic literature.

Jasmine laughed to herself, trying to picture her flighty sister reading the classics. Fashion magazines were more her style.

Had been her style. Jasmine quickly sobered. How well had she really known Jenny? She suspected not as well as she should have, especially in the last few years.

They’d been close as children, though there was four years difference between them. But they had drifted apart when Jasmine reached high school and got interested in friends, makeup and boys.

In Christopher.

And when Jenny caught up, she’d taken a different road than Jasmine, who’d been class president and received straight A’s. Jenny hung out with the flashy crowd, the ones with too much money and too much time. Jasmine had always wondered what Jenny could have in common with her friends.

She didn’t have money, and she wasn’t collegebound. She just didn’t seem the type. But she appeared to be happy, and Jasmine had left it alone. How she’d ended up with a simple cowboy like Christopher was beyond Jasmine.

And then she’d gone off to college herself, thanks to the grant from the city, increasing the emotional distance between the two sisters. As far as she knew, Jenny had grown into a beautiful, self-assured adult, a relative stranger she greeted with a kiss on the cheek when she came home from the holidays. Had Jenny been seeing Christopher even then?

There was always laughter in the house during vacations and holidays. Jasmine puckered her brow, straining to remember if her sister had been part of the joyous festivities. Or had she been off with friends? Jasmine couldn’t remember. Probably, she’d been too busy with Christopher to notice, a thought which gave her a guilty start.

Shaking her head to clear her introspection, Jasmine carried the box of books into the living room, where the rest of Jenny’s boxed goods were stored, and went to Jenny’s room to begin stripping the bedclothes. Her sister’s sweet, airy scent still lingered on the sheets, and she brought a pillow to her face, inhaling deeply.

“We never said goodbye,” she whispered aloud, hugging the pillow to her chest. She wished she had one more minute, just one, to give Jenny a hug and tell her how much she was loved.

Jasmine shook herself from her melancholy with some effort. Funny how grief hit her at the oddest moments. She’d think her emotions were under control, and then in a second’s time, grief would wash over her and overwhelm her, sometimes for no apparent reason.

Those were the toughest times, the moments before she found the strength to tuck her grief back away and go on living, because that’s what she had to do. Because she was here and Jenny was not, and baby Sammy depended on her.

She reached for the other pillow, but when she yanked at the corner to pull off the pillowcase, Jenny’s Bible fell to the floor.

Jasmine had forgotten all about it. She’d slipped it under the pillow when Christopher had shown up. She was relieved to find it now. It was a part of Jenny she wanted to keep.

Heart in her throat, she reached down and scooped it up, tenderly smoothing the bent pages before closing the cracked leather. Sitting on the stripped bed with one leg tucked under her, she ran a hand across the front of the Bible, considering whether it would be right to read more of the notes Jenny had written in the margins.

She was so confused, so hurt. And she missed her sister terribly. Would it be a breach of trust to read a little, to bring Jenny near through her words, her thoughts and dreams and faith? Who knew but that maybe, in some small way, it would help her know what to do about Christopher and Sammy.

She could only hope for such a miracle, even if she didn’t believe in miracles anymore.

Chapter Four (#ulink_d9c8f417-4198-5e12-9db3-ecef900ca62a)

The next morning, Christopher eyed the two-room log cabin, turning over the possibilities in his mind. After leaving the diner, he’d phoned an old high school football buddy, who’d lent him this place for the weekend. If God was willing and he planned right, it would be his and Jasmine’s for at least one completely uninterrupted, if not happy, day.

Loose gravel and pine needles crunched under his feet as he approached the cabin, his friend’s fishing hideaway. Nothing spectacular—it didn’t even have electric heat. But for what Christopher had in mind, it was perfect.

He’d purposely picked a cabin tucked up just far enough into the Sangre de Cristo mountain range to keep the clinic from sending in emergency equipment right away, yet far enough from town to warrant Jasmine’s personal attention.