less vulnerable, at least physically.
“Doc Barclay?”
“He’s the G.P. in these parts.” Cade decided he may as well give it to her straight. “He said there’s no way with this storm blowin’ full force that he can get here to deliver your baby. We’re lucky we’ve still got phone service.”
“And d-driving—” she pressed her fingers to her mouth for a moment, then tried again “—Driving to the doctor?”
“To be frank, you’d have to be related to yourself to be so simpleminded as to go out in this weather. It’s a total whiteout out there. Even in my dually four-by-four, we’d like as not end up goin’ off the road and get stuck in a ditch.”
“I see.” She bit her lip in a way that very nearly distracted him from the emergency at hand. “I guess I’m lucky to have found you.”
It was a narrow opening, to be sure, but he jumped on it. “Yeah, let’s talk about that a minute, if you don’t mind.”
He jammed his fingers into his front jeans pockets, knowing he was being contentious bringing the subject up when the woman was about to give birth, but he had the right to at least a couple of questions before then. “I didn’t see a car outside when I rode in, but that’s probably because it’s half-buried under a drift of snow. You said you don’t know who you are,” he said leadingly, “but what do you know, like how or when or why you came here?”
Her stance turned wary, her arm around her swollen belly protective, which did nothing to improve his confidence in her truthfulness. “I must’ve gotten here…oh, I guess two or three hours ago—by car.”
“Did you stop here at the ranch ’cause it was the first place you came to when you realized the weather was getting ugly?” he tried again.
“But I told you,” she answered. “I thought I was coming to you.”
Cade steeled himself against the appeal in those blue eyes. “Look, you said that before, but I’m obviously not making the connection. How on earth could you know you were comin’ to me?”
“I had a…a note in my coat pocket with your name and address on it,” she said, glancing around. “I must have left it downstairs.”
“A note?” Was it just him or was this whole situation becoming less believable by the second?
“Yes. It said ‘Sara—”’
“Wait a minute,” Cade interrupted. “So now you do know your name? You said before you didn’t remember.”
“I don’t remember.” She looked at him pleadingly. “All I know is that I have a note to a Sara, sending her into your care.”
Nope, it wasn’t just him, Cade thought. This was definitely the strangest situation he’d ever been in, bar none. “Well, if you don’t mind my askin’, who sent you?”
“The note didn’t say.”
He had to ask. “Y’think it could’ve been your husband?”
At the question, they both glanced at her left hand. She wore no ring, and Cade didn’t like the ensuing relief he felt. Didn’t like that he was being drawn yet further into a situation that had all the earmarks of trouble.
In fact, her next words only notched up his suspicions.
“Cade, please, I know it’s difficult to understand,” she said rather urgently, taking a step toward him. “Heaven knows I don’t. But all the way here I thought, if I could just make it to you, everything would make sense. I thought you might be…oh, I don’t know—that you might be my husband, or at least someone who knew me. Cared for me…”
Her shoulders slumped in discouragement. “But you don’t. You don’t know me at all.”
Her voice cracked, and she half turned from him, one palm still pressed to her belly, the other over her mouth, as if she sought to hold back her tears along with the birth of her child.
She was apparently successful, for she went on fiercely, her fingers closed in a fist, “I have to believe I had the right instinct in coming here.”
“The right instinct,” Cade doggedly pointed out, “would have been to stop fifteen miles back in Sagebrush where there’s a doctor with some skill at handling these sorts of situations.”
She pivoted back toward him. “I know for sure I didn’t pass through any place named Sagebrush,” she contradicted. “Besides, you’re a cattle rancher, right?”
“What the hell does my being a cattleman have to do with your giving birth?”
“You’ve probably delivered hundreds of calves, that’s what,” she said, her voice rising with panic. “You know how labor progresses and how—”
“They’re calves!” Cade broke in, his own voice sounding close to panicked, even to his own ears. “Deliverin’ a baby would be completely different!”
The room echoed with his doomsday words.
“In any case, no matter how I got here or why I was sent to you,” Sara said with just the whisper of a quaver in her voice that sent self-disgust slicing through him like a knife, “you’re all I’ve got right now, Cade.”
Abruptly, her face contorted with pain, and she sagged forward, hands spread on her stomach. Cade was by her side in a single stride, supporting her under her elbow as the contraction intensified, her fingers gripping his forearm, before it finally ebbed.
“How far apart are they?” he asked, still steadying her while she caught her breath.
She rubbed her forehead distractedly, as if that caused her pain, too. Had she hit her head and that was the reason for her memory loss? Cade wondered. Or had someone hit her?
The thought roused a fury of protectiveness in him.
“Maybe ten minutes or so,” she answered. “I haven’t been keeping track.”
“Well, let’s make sure we do that next time.” Her face sheened with perspiration. “Should you be up walking right now?”
“I don’t know! I’ve never had a baby before…at least I d-don’t think I have,” she said, that quaver creeping back into her voice, making him even more ashamed.
She was right, of course. The doctor had been extremely clear about a lot of things, but mainly that if Cade was this woman’s only source of support to get through this, then it was up to him to convey to her complete reassurance and trust in him. “The more fearful she is,” Doc had said, “the more she’ll like to have trouble. You know that, Cade. One of your mama cows goes into labor, ’specially for the first time, it’s a loving hand and calming voice that’s going to see her safely through.”
But this is no cow! Cade had thought, as just now he’d said.
Which he shouldn’t have. He hadn’t mentioned the amnesia to Doc, his own instinct deeming such information best kept to himself for now. Who knew the trouble this Sara might be in, or who in actuality
