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“Everything all right in here?” he asked, coming inside.
Sebastian reacted the instant the doors were being opened. He threw the hem of Stephanie’s dress back down over her legs before turning to look at the person who was climbing in. The paramedics had arrived. It was time to retreat.
“Just in time to take the lady and her kids to the hospital,” Sebastian told the older man, moving out of the way.
Even as he did so, he felt a reluctance taking hold. He wanted to remain, to hang around in case she needed him. Which was exactly why he had to get out. With the paramedics on the scene, there was no excuse he could tender that would allow him to stay, other than his own desire.
But desire, dormant or not, had no place here. Stephanie was a wife and a mother and he had nothing to do with either.
The baby he still had in his arms squirmed. Something tightened in his chest. This child could have been his. Stephanie could have been his.
If he hadn’t been so damnably noble.
“Sure looks that way,” the paramedic was saying. “And you look like you could use a shirt,” he commented.
Sebastian looked down. He’d all but forgotten that he’d stripped his shirt off to wrap the first twin in. “I guess I could at that.”
“I think we’ve got something we can fix you up with in the ambulance. You did a great job—” the man glanced at the opened black bag “—Doc. Took us only fifteen minutes to get here from the time we got the call. You are one fast lady,” he said, giving Stephanie a toothy, genial grin. “Lucky for you he came along.”
“Lucky,” she murmured, trying to make out whether or not Sebastian was even looking her way. The angle of the invasive light made it difficult for her to make out his expression. Maybe it was better that way, now that the crisis was over.
Another paramedic, younger than the first, entered the van. “Here, let me take him,” he offered, nodding at the infant in Sebastian’s arms.
“There’re two,” Sebastian told him, indicating the tiny being in the laundry basket.
It occurred to him as he surrendered the baby to the paramedic that he’d delivered and held nearly twenty babies so far in his budding career, yet he was far more aware of giving up this one than he had been of the very first infant he’d delivered.
That little boy should have been his hallmark, not this nameless little creature.
But then, he hadn’t loved that first baby’s mother as he did this one’s. Once. Sebastian underlined the word firmly in his mind, knowing he would have no peace otherwise.
What had been was not now. He had to remember that. Seven years had passed. Seven years of sunrises and sunsets, of life moving on.
“There’re two in here, Murphy,” the second paramedic called out to someone standing outside the van. “Call Bedford General and tell them to get two more bassinets ready.”
“Harris Memorial,” Stephanie corrected him, relieved that she could gather together enough breath to form more than just a single isolated word at a time. “My doctor’s at Harris Memorial.”
The older paramedic looked at her apologetically. “Sorry, ma’am, we’ve got to take you to the closest hospital in the area. I don’t have the authority to just arbitrarily pick another—”
Sebastian cut him off. “I’m on staff at Harris Memorial. Whatever paperwork has to be done to get her there, I’ll take care of it.”
It was a lie, one he figured he could bluff his way through once the time came. Harris Memorial was the hospital where his application was pending as he waited to be accepted. It wasn’t a done deal yet. But he didn’t want Stephanie subjected to any more undue agitation. In the total scheme of things, he felt he owed it to her.
The older paramedic exchanged looks with his partner, and then he nodded his assent.
“Okay, you’re the doc. I’ll square it with dispatch later. Guess that means you’ll be riding along with the mother in the ambulance.” He made the assumption without waiting for a comment.
Sebastian paused, trapped. It hadn’t been his intention to accompany Stephanie to the hospital. He was just going to step out of the van and out of her life again, returning home with the videos fate had had him come get just at this exact moment in time. But after what he’d just said, he didn’t see that he had much choice in the matter.
“Guess so,” he agreed. He purposely avoided looking at Stephanie. But he could feel her eyes on him.
Emerging out of the van, he stepped into a surprising round of applause.
The people who’d gathered around the initial scene of the accident, including the owner of the black SUV, had obviously all hung around to find out if Stephanie had indeed given birth.
“What did she have?” someone called out.
Sebastian didn’t bother trying to attach a face to the voice, merely turned in its direction. “A girl and a boy.”
Suddenly, there was a slightly disheveled man in his late thirties at his side, a dog-eared, much-used notepad in his hand.
“Can I get your name?” the man pressed, his pencil poised over a new page. When Sebastian looked at him quizzically, the man added, “I’m from the Bedford World News,” citing the small, weekly local paper. “Newborns Make Their Appearance in Apothecary Parking Lot,” he declared, using his hands to frame an imaginary headline for an article. He grinned, satisfied. “It’s a nice human interest piece, don’t you think?”
It was on the tip of Sebastian’s tongue to say no. He didn’t like sharing his privacy, or having Stephanie’s invaded. But she wasn’t his to protect, and he reminded himself that he was no longer a private man, either. His medical degree had seen to that. Now he had to be available to the general public. On call at all hours. This included during his private hours.
With a certain amount of resignation, he gave the man his name, saying “the woman” hadn’t given him hers. In the strictest sense of the word, it was true, she hadn’t.
As the local journalist began peppering him with questions, Sebastian took his arm, pulling him back out of the way as the gurney was lifted into the van. Less than two minutes later, it was back out again, with Stephanie tucked in between the wide belts. On either side of her was a paramedic, each holding a whimpering baby. Each infant was now wrapped in a clean white receiving blanket.
“Time to go, Doc,” the lead paramedic called out to him from within the vehicle.
Taking his cue with relief, Sebastian acknowledged the man. “Be right there. Sorry, gotta go,” he said to the reporter as he quickly got into the ambulance.
“Hey, wait,” the journalist called after Sebastian. “I need details.”
“Maybe later” was all Sebastian said just before the doors were closed.
With a sigh, Sebastian turned away from the doors to look at Stephanie. He expected her to say something about the reporter. Instead, he found that she was asleep. The strain of giving birth had finally gotten to her, draining her.
Sebastian sat down gingerly beside her. It was better this way, he thought, resisting the urge to take her hand in his. He’d do what was necessary to get her admitted into the hospital, and once that was taken care of, he’d slip away. He intended to be long gone before Stephanie’s husband came on the scene.
He felt his jaw tightening. In his present emotional state, he strongly doubted if he could behave in a civil, detached manner. Not in this case. He didn’t believe in putting himself into situations where he wasn’t in control, and it didn’t take a genius to know that right now, his control was nil.
“Here, Doc, it’s the best we’ve got, I’m afraid.” Sebastian looked up to see the first paramedic offering him a blue shirt that resembled his.
Taking it, he put it on. “Thanks.”
“I think your shirt’s ruined.” The paramedic looked at the wadded-up article. “Unless you’ve got a wife who works miracles.”
“No,” Sebastian said quietly, looking down at Stephanie. “No wife, no miracles.” Seeing her sleeping like that, a thousand thoughts ran pell-mell through his head. He couldn’t seem to stop them.
He remembered the last time he had seen her like this…
The only time he had seen her like this, Sebastian corrected himself.
The sentimental smile came out of nowhere, unbidden as he relived moments he’d locked away more than seven years ago. He hadn’t meant for the things to get out of hand that night, but one thing had led to another and he had made love with her.
Beautiful, exquisite love. Innocent and pure. He could feel his breath evaporating now as he remembered it.
Locked away in his mind or not, that single night was probably what had sustained him through all these long, lonely years.
And what had haunted him.
There was no need for him to remain.
In truth, it turned out that there really was no reason for him to have come in the first place. In true Stephanie fashion, Stephanie had taken care of all the details way ahead of time and registered herself at the hospital against her due date.
He was surprised to discover that Stephanie was preregistered under her maiden name. But then, Stephanie had always been so fiercely independent, retaining her name was something that would have been typical of her, Sebastian realized.
Since the paperwork had been taken care of ahead of time, there was no need for him to fill out any forms. And no need for him to remain any longer.
With no excuse to hide behind, Sebastian made his way to the public phones to call a cab that would take him back to the car he’d left back in the strip mall’s parking lot. When he heard the hospital’s PA system go off, he didn’t really pay attention to it. It had been doing so with a fair amount of regularity since he had arrived with Stephanie. The names being paged only vaguely registered in the peripheral corners of his mind.
This time the name over the PA system did more than just vaguely float through his brain. Sebastian paused to listen. The doctor being paged had the same last name as he had.
“Dr. Caine, please report to the fifth-floor nurses’ station.”
Had to be a different Dr. Caine, he thought. After all, it wasn’t that unusual a last name and no one knew he was here.
“Dr. Sebastian Caine,” the voice was saying, “please report to the fifth-floor nurses’ station.”
So much for it not being him, he thought. But why were they paging him?
Unless—
Worried, afraid that something had suddenly gone wrong with Stephanie, he hurried back to the bank of elevators he’d just left in the rear of the building. Pressing the up button, he waited exactly two beats before considering taking the five flights up via the stairwell.
But as he turned to go toward the stairs, the doors of the elevator car farthest away from him opened. Pivoting on his heel, he did an about-face and hurried into the emptying car.
Impatient, trying not to speculate why he’d suddenly been paged, he punched the button marked five. It felt like an eternity before the elevator reached the fifth floor.
With his lanky stride, it took him less than five seconds to make it from the elevator to the nurses’ station.
“I’m Dr. Caine,” he told the nurse who was just beginning to leave the area. “I was just paged to come here. Is something wrong with Ms. Yarbourough? The woman who was just brought in with twins,” he added when the nurse looked at him blankly.
“There’s nothing’s wrong with Stephanie, Doctor. On the contrary, she couldn’t be more right.”
Sebastian turned around to see a cool-looking, slender blonde wearing a white lab coat and a warm smile walking toward him, her hand extended in greeting.
“I’m Sheila Pollack, Stephanie’s doctor,” she told him, shaking his hand. Her sharp eyes quickly took measure of the man before her. She liked what she saw. Cool competence. And there was something in his eyes, something she couldn’t quite read but that had the markings of concern. The man had obviously gotten more than just professionally involved. “I just wanted to tell you that you did a fine job.”
Relieved, Sebastian mentally upbraided himself for jumping to dark conclusions. But then, in all fairness, there hadn’t been all that many bright spots in his life to draw on. Stephanie had represented one of the very few. And Stephanie would have been enough, if…
His thoughts weren’t supposed to be going in that direction any longer, he chastised himself silently.
Never comfortable with praise, Sebastian acknowledged the woman’s compliment with a careless shrug. “She made it easy.”
Sheila laughed. The look in her eyes was one of familiarity, even though they hardly knew each other. Between them, they shared Stephanie, and for Sheila, that was enough to make a start. “Stephanie doesn’t make anything easy.”
He smiled then. “No, I suppose she doesn’t.” He had to be getting back. He had a feeling the tapes he’d left on the front seat of his car were melting. “Well, Dr. Pollack, if there’s nothing else—”
“But there is,” Sheila told him, interrupting. “She’s asking for you.”
Chapter Four
Stupid to feel nervous like this.
Sebastian upbraided himself as he walked down the corridor to Stephanie’s room. He’d entered hundreds of hospital rooms. None, not even his first one as a medical student, had ever made his palms feel as if they were damp.
Unconsciously drawing in a deep breath, Sebastian pushed the door open and peered in. Despite the summons, he was hoping that she was asleep. That way, he could say he had stopped by as asked, but would be off the hook.
She was awake.
The hook sank in a little deeper.
“Hi.” As he said it, the single-word greeting sounded particularly lame and hollow to him, given their history and what they’d just gone through together.
She didn’t think he’d come, even though she’d asked Sheila to page him for her. She thought that he’d just leave the hospital. Now that he was here, she wasn’t sure what to say, or even why she was putting herself through this.
Too late now for second thoughts, she told herself.
Stephanie pressed the remote attached to her bed and the upper portion began to rise, allowing her to look straight at him instead of up.
“Hi.”
He nodded over his shoulder toward the corridor beyond the closed door. “Met your doctor. She said you wanted to see me.”
The irony of the words struck her. More than you’d ever know, Sebastian. More than you’d ever even begin to guess.
Silence played through the room, drawing itself out, encompassing both of them.
There were hundreds of questions crowding her head, and a hundred more accusations and recriminations beyond that. But she knew the futility of re-hashing things. Nothing would be settled by bringing up the past and nothing would be resolved. What was done was done. He’d made his choice seven years ago, left her after her father had made it apparent to him, her father had told her, that she and the family money were not a package deal. Her father went to great lengths to make sure she was painfully aware of that. That Sebastian had left her because she would no longer be in his will.
Maybe that was why there was such a schism between her and her father now.
Sebastian was waiting for her to say something. Manners were important in the world she came from. Outward badges of breeding that hid a myriad of blemishes, she thought cynically.
Stephanie said the most logical thing that came to mind.
“I didn’t get a chance to say thank you for what you did.”
Sebastian shoved his hands into his front pockets. His degree, the long, hard years spent earning it as well as the respect of his peers in the medical profession, all fell mysteriously away. For a second, he was just Sebastian Caine again, a seventeen-year-old senior from the wrong side of the tracks, way out of his league by trying to strike up a conversation with the daughter of one of the most well-known lawyers in the state. Never mind that she was his friend’s sister. His mouth had turned to cotton just looking at her.
A little like now, he thought.
All he’d had then to see him through was his bravado. That, and an attraction so strong, he couldn’t even breathe when he was in the same vicinity as Stephanie.
Sebastian dug deeper now, telling himself he was a fool for the momentary jolt of insecurity. He’d come a very long way since then. He’d made something of his life, not wasted it away in the pursuit of some meaningless job the way her father had predicted.
In an odd sort of way, he supposed he had her father to thank for all that, for becoming the doctor he was now. It was the image of Carlton Yarbourough’s smirking face that had goaded him into meeting challenge after challenge long after he had ceased to willingly go out tilting at windmills. It had been his determination to show the snide bastard up that had made him endure the spirit-draining schedule of holding down two jobs and attending medical school, all on next to no sleep.
Funny how things turned out sometimes. The man who had clearly hated him had become one of the reasons he had attained his goals.
The westerly oriented room embraced the sunlight that spilled into it. Sebastian took another step into the room. Another step closer to her.
“I’m a doctor. If I stumble across a woman giving birth, it’s my job to stop and help her. It’s clearly spelled out in the Hippocratic oath,” he added.
She couldn’t help the smile that came to her lips. “Same eloquent way of saying things, I see.”
He shrugged carelessly, looking away. The woman had just given birth and wasn’t supposed to look enticing in any manner, shape or form. So why did she? “Yeah, well, can’t expect much from a guy dragged up on the wrong side of the tracks, now can you?”
She looked at him, trying to still the numbing pain his cold tone had suddenly generated within her. He’d always been a brooding soul, but not like this. When had he become so bitter?
“I always did,” she told him quietly. And she had. Expected great things of him. Which was why having him abandon her without a word of explanation had been so devastating to her.
He laughed shortly. She lied well, he thought. In the end, if they had stayed together, it would have been just like her father said, her soul squashed by a life of deprivation. “Well, that would have placed you in the minority.”
She was trying very hard not to let her emotions into this. “I don’t think so.”
Sebastian looked at her and felt that old feeling wash over him. The one that reduced him in stature and strength. He wasn’t going to stay and get pulled in by those huge blue eyes of hers. Wasn’t going to stand here, looking at her mouth form words and wishing he could silence it with his own.
He’d only be making himself crazy.
Slowly, he began backing away toward the door. “Look, I’ve got to be going.” He thought of the initial errand that had caused their paths to cross. “There’re videotapes dissolving in my front seat.” His hand was on the door. “Glad you’re okay.”
He left before she had a chance to say she was sorry to see that she couldn’t say the same for him.
When had he returned to Bedford? How long had he been walking the streets, driving the roads, without letting her know he was here?
Loneliness blanketed her.
Suddenly feeling very, very tired, Stephanie closed her eyes and sank back into her pillow as she slowly lowered the bed down again.
“Did they move the video place to Seattle?” Geraldine Caine’s teasing voice reached Sebastian just as he let himself into the house.
Pocketing his key, he turned toward the family room and watched her approaching. Something sad and angry twisted inside of him as he saw her leaning so heavily on the cane that never seemed to leave her side now. He couldn’t help remembering the way this bright, vibrant woman had initially encouraged his love of track and field sports by jogging alongside him when he was just a boy.
Now all that seemed left of that woman was her wide smile and that brilliant sparkle in her eyes. Except that right now she looked worried. That was his fault, he thought with a prick of guilt. He knew she was trying not to show just how concerned she must have grown. Being a good mother in her book meant sublimating her own needs, her own fears and putting his life first. It was the way she had always operated. He’d always come first. She’d never said a word when he left home seven years ago. Only that she would always be there for him if he should need her. She was one in a million. Which was why he’d returned when she’d needed him.
“Sorry,” he said, tucking the two videos he’d brought in under his arm, “I should have called.”
Geraldine had long since come to the conclusion that mothers only stopped worrying once they were dead.
“You’re a thirty-year-old man, Sebastian. There’s no need to keep your mother apprised of your every move.” And then she smiled, creating a small space between the thumb and forefinger she held up. “Maybe a little phone call,” she allowed.
She led the way to the kitchen, knowing he had to want a cup of coffee. He’d developed a fondness for the brew at the age of eleven, when he used to come to the restaurant after school and do his homework, waiting for her to get off work. Over the years, his affinity for the drink had only intensified.
Unable to contain her growing curiosity any longer, she turned from the coffeemaker on the counter and asked, “So, what was it that kept you from promptly returning from the video store? An old friend you ran into? A wave of nostalgia that took you past the university?” Filling the two cups that stood waiting on their saucers, she waited for Sebastian to jump in.
He sat down on the stool beside the counter and pulled the cup and saucer over to him. “The former.”
“Oh?” Geraldine laced her own coffee liberally with a creamer, wondering if she was as bad at sounding innocent as she thought. “Who?” Sebastian raised his eyes to hers and then she knew. Knew without his having to say a word. Geraldine felt her mother’s heart constrict just a little within her breast. “How is she?”
Sebastian took a long, silent sip, then laughed softly, shaking his head in disbelief. Not that she hadn’t managed to do this “magic trick” of hers before. “You know, you really should have never let that mind-reading talent of yours go to waste.”
Eyes the same color as his crinkled as she smiled at him, this serious boy who had grown into such a serious man. “Only works on you, I’m afraid. Not much of a calling for mothers to make revelations about their children on the open market.”
He thought of the tabloid headline he’d seen recently at the supermarket: Country Star’s Mama Sings the Blues About Her Son. “Unless you’re the mother of a celebrity,” he told her.
Geraldine set down her cup again. “Oh, but I am.” She tucked one arm around his and gave him a quick hug. “I’m the mother of an up-and-coming doctor who gave up his budding practice to rush to the side of his ailing, pain-in-the-butt mother.”
Leaning over, he kissed the top of her head. Affection laced through him. “You were never a pain in the butt.” And then he grinned down at her. “It was more like a pain in the neck.”
Relieved that he could still joke after seeing Stephanie, Geraldine feigned a serious expression. “Show a little respect, you hear?”
He drained the coffee cup, then helped himself to another serving. “You started it, remember?”
She watched him set the coffeepot back on the burner. He was agitated. He always drank a lot of coffee when he was agitated, which only made him more so. It was a vicious cycle.
“I’m your mother, I can start anything I want.” She sobered, dropping the bantering tone. Treading lightly on the sensitive ground, she approached it again. “So, you didn’t answer me. How was she?”
Just as damn beautiful as ever. More. I wish I’d never seen her.