Vicki Thompson - Bachelor Father

Almost like an obedient child she picked up the sandwich, but having only the use of one hand, she fumbled with it. Some of the filling spilled out as she tried to maneuver it to her mouth.

She obviously needed some help so she could eat properly, but Zeke didn’t want to volunteer to hold Amanda. Funny things happened to his insides whenever he ended up touching that baby. “Would you like me to get her seat out of the truck?” he asked.

Katherine glanced outside where the rain cascaded off the front porch roof in a continuous waterfall. “No sense in going back out in that until it lets up. But I could put her on your bed, if you wouldn’t mind.”

“She won’t roll off?”

“She can’t roll yet.” Katherine pushed back her chair and stood, holding Amanda in both arms.

“Today might be her day to start.”

“Not likely. I’ll put her blanket and changing pad on your bedspread to protect it.”

“I’m not worried about that. I just think it’s dangerous to leave her there with no rails on the bed or anything.” Zeke surveyed his little cabin for a better solution. “Hang on a minute. I think I have just the thing.” He walked over to the fireplace and took the kindling out of an oval copper kettle he’d bought at a garage sale. He turned the kettle upside down and tapped it to get any scraps out, then crossed to the bed and took the spread off. Folding it, he tucked it into the kettle, letting the excess spill out and pad the sides.

Feeling proud of himself, he set it down next to the table. “How’s that?”

“That’s...” She looked at him and her eyes started to fill. She quickly averted her face.

He was crushed. “Okay. Stupid idea. Of course you don’t want to put her in an old kindling kettle. I don’t know what I was thinking.” He stooped down to pull the bedspread back out.

“No, stop!” She sniffed and wiped at her cheeks with her free hand. “It’s a perfect idea. I love it.”

He stared at her, completely at sea. “Then why are you crying?”

“Because...” She swallowed. “Because, when you put that bassinet together, it was almost as if...well, you were acting like a f-father. And I didn’t realize how m-much I wanted you to...oh, forget it.” She choked back a sob and crouched down to lay Amanda in the makeshift bed.

Zeke stood there, hands clenched at his sides as he fought the urge to take her in his arms and tell her he’d do whatever she needed him to. He wanted to promise that he’d do his best to shield her and the baby from whatever disasters came their way, that he’d be the anchor she so desperately seemed to want.

But he’d be making empty promises. He couldn’t follow her to New York and live in her world in order to keep those promises, and he doubted she wanted him to. He wasn’t the sort of warm, easygoing man that women liked to have around on a regular basis, and Katherine had proved that by leaving last summer. So he said nothing and returned to take his seat at the table.

She fussed with Amanda for quite a while, and he figured she was getting herself under control. She’d had a hard time the past few months, he was sure. She’d said the pregnancy hadn’t been easy, and from what he’d heard childbirth was no picnic, either, especially when you had to face it alone. He probably didn’t want to know what she’d been through bringing Amanda into the world. He’d only have the urge to make it up to her.

“There.” She sat down at the table again, clear-eyed. “Shouldn’t you try the phone again?”

“Yep.” He got up and went over to pick up the receiver. “It’s still out.”

“Oh, well.” She’d adopted a breezy air. “I’m sure it’ll be connected soon, and then we can get out of your hair.” She started on her sandwich.

“I’m sure you’ll be glad to get back to New York. You must be good at your job if Naomi Rutledge wants you to take over the whole magazine.” Talking about her work felt safe—it reminded him of the distance between their very different worlds.

She swallowed a bite of tuna. “She blew me away with that news. Sure, we get along well, and she’s been super through this pregnancy, but I never in the world imagined she wanted me to be her replacement.”

“Sounds like a lot of responsibility.” He’d hate being tied down like that.

“It is.” She took another sip of her beer. “And I’m sort of scared, but the time I spent in Yellowstone last year has given me more confidence in myself.” She glanced at him. “Up until I fell into the river, at any rate. That was pretty inept. But before that I’d been alone for almost two days and I really had time to think and evaluate my strengths and weaknesses honestly. I decided I was more capable than I gave myself credit for.”

He shoved away his empty sandwich plate. “Time alone can be a good thing.”

“I would expect you to think so. I don’t hunger for that kind of isolation all the time, but I learned a lot during that trip.”

Maybe that had been why she’d made love to him so eagerly, he thought. Feeling self-sufficient in the wilderness could give someone a real high. Add to that the adrenaline rush of nearly dying, and it was no wonder she’d wanted the earthy physical release sex could bring. It probably had nothing to do with him. Any reasonably decent guy would have served the purpose.

“I didn’t know you were raised on a boys’ ranch,” she said.

He grew uneasy. “That’s something you probably shouldn’t tell Amanda. She could trace me in no time if she knew to start at Lost Springs.”

She finished her sandwich and picked up her glass of beer. “You honestly don’t think you’ll ever want to see her? Not even when she’s an adult and wouldn’t require any caretaking?”

He picked up their plates and carried them over to the sink. “Look, Katherine, I don’t know the first thing about being a father. I never knew my own. The Duncans, the people who ran Lost Springs when I was there, were wonderful to all of us, but it wasn’t the same as having your very own father and mother who had all your baby pictures and remembered when you said your first word and got your first tooth.” He rinsed the plates. “I wouldn’t have the foggiest idea how to treat a daughter, but you obviously do, so the best thing is for you to handle this alone.”

“I guess you can’t be any plainer than that.”

He dried his hands on a towel hanging by the sink and turned back to her. “I’m trying to be as honest as I can, both with myself and with you.”

Her smile was tremulous. “Same here.”

“Then I guess we understand each other.”

“I understand.” She blinked, but there were no tears this time. Then she glanced down at the kettle where Amanda lay. “And I’ll figure out some way to make her understand, too.”

It was a sucker punch, and he felt it down to his toes. Amanda lay cradled by the green bedspread, fast asleep. As a kid he’d raised dozens of baby animals whose mothers were killed by predators or on the highway. As a ranger he was still doing it. Yet in all that time of nursing young wildlife, he’d never seen any creature look more vulnerable and in need of care than this tiny baby. And he was turning his back on her.

CHAPTER FIVE

SITTING IN A COOL CABIN in damp clothes gave Katherine goose bumps now that she didn’t have Amanda to keep her warm. At least that’s what she told herself. It couldn’t be nerves, or the fact that without the baby in her arms, she began wondering what it would be like to hold Zeke again.

She looked for a thermostat on the wall and found none. She guessed that the fireplace provided the cabin’s only heat, and she couldn’t ask Zeke to build a fire when they could be leaving at any moment.