Colton James scolded with a smile, redirecting her daughter by holding out a teething ring River’s Native American grandmother had fashioned out of thin strips of rawhide.
“Can you believe how much she loves this thing?” Sophie asked Emily, who was holding her own teacup out of the baby’s reach. “I’ve threatened to start calling her Fido, but River just laughs and says his grandmother raised a lot of kids and knows what she’s doing. I suppose so,” she ended, grinning down at Meggie, who had just learned how to lower herself to her plump bottom and was now chewing on the teething ring for all she was worth.
Emily watched as Meggie actually cooed at the rawhide circle, then stuck it in her mouth once more. “It is ugly, isn’t it? I know Mom told me about the thing when Maya’s little Marissa was at the ranch the other day, just about gnawing on Mom’s shoulder because she’s cutting another tooth. In fact, I think Mom said she wishes she’d had a gross of the things when we were growing up,” Emily said, grinning down at the contented baby who was happily drooling all over her pretty pink coveralls. “Of course, she also said she’d often thought about keeping us all on stout leashes, but I think she might have been kidding about that one.”
“Mom’s great, isn’t she? She’s back in stride, handing out love and advice, just as if she’d never been…well, never been away,” Sophie said, lifting her teacup. “I can’t tell you how happy we are that Meggie’s finally learned how to get back down once she’s pulled herself up. I think Riv and I slept about three minutes all last week, always having to go into her bedroom and lay her back down in her crib. But when I told Mom about it, she said to put the pillows over our heads and let Meggie cry, because eventually she’d let go and figure out that she can get back down all by herself. To hear Mom tell it, we weren’t doing Meggie or ourselves any favors by constantly running to her.”
“Did you let her cry?” Emily asked, reaching for a homemade cookie Maya’s mother, Inez, had baked only that morning and asked her to take with her to Sophie’s house.
Sophie winced. “Not for the first night after Mom’s advice. We just couldn’t do it. I kept thinking she’d fall, hit her head, all that good stuff you swear you’ll never think about, but that you think about all the time once you have babies of your own. But the second night Riv made me watch the clock for ten minutes, and only go to her then—or if we heard a bang,” she added, shaking her head. “Seven minutes later, everything was quiet. Riv waited a few minutes more, then sneaked into her room and there she was, sound asleep on her belly, with her rump stuck up in the air. We haven’t had a problem since.”
“Moms and grandmothers,” Emily said, sighing. “They give good advice, don’t they? Or they think they do.”
“Oh, now that sounds ominous,” Sophie said, picking up Meggie, who had begun rubbing her eyes. “Let me put this one down for her nap, and I’ll be right back. Because being Inez’s cookie delivery person wasn’t the only reason you rode over here this morning, was it?”
Emily watched as Sophie and Meggie headed for the hallway and stairs, then sat back in her chair, admiring the way her sister had decorated the living room. Part Mission, part antique, somehow Sophie had made it all work beautifully, from the western prints on the walls to the Oriental carpet on the broad-planked floor.
She’d like her own place, her own apartment, but the Hacienda de Alegria was so large that it would be difficult to explain to her mom and dad that she felt cramped, felt the need for her own space. Especially now, with Meredith only back at the ranch for less than two weeks. It had never been right to leave Joe, who had been so unhappy, and it couldn’t be right to leave now, with Meredith home again at last.
Still, much as they loved her, Emily was beginning to feel smothered by that love. They watched her, as if she were a fragile vase teetering on the edge of a mantel, ready to fall, smash into a million pieces on the hearth. And now not only were her parents watching her, but Dr. Martha Wilkes was also here, living in the house, eating at the table, being so nice and kind and caring.
The woman was wonderful, really. But Emily felt as if she were constantly under a microscope, so that she was careful to always keep her guard up. Keep smiling, keep helping around the ranch, keep her hurt and despair hidden, locked behind her bedroom door, crying only in the shower, so that no one would hear her. She’d been taking an awful lot of showers lately….
Sophie came back into the room and sat down on the couch with a sigh. “There, that’s done. She’s been changed and put into jammies, and we’ll have blessed peace for about two hours, if we’re lucky. Then playtime with Daddy, a bath and dinner—and probably another bath, as Meggie’s gotten pretty good at blowing raspberries at us with her mouth full. That’s a real treat when she’s eating mashed beets, let me tell you. Riv puts her down for the night and sings to her—but you didn’t hear that one from me, okay, as he’d probably deny it. He’s a wonderful, wonderful father.”
Emily looked at her sister, at the smile on Sophie’s lovely face, a face still carrying the scar of a mugger’s attack. Funny. When Sophie had first run back to the ranch, to hide there, hide her face, it was assumed by everyone that she’d have plastic surgery the moment the surgeon said it was time. But then she’d gotten pregnant, and then there’d been Meggie to take care of, and it was as if Sophie had forgotten the scar even existed. She was too busy living her life, loving her life, to see it.
“You’re happy, aren’t you, Soph?” Emily asked, knowing the answer. “I mean, you have a sort of glow about you.”
“Oh, dear,” Sophie said, sitting up straight. “It shows? We wanted to wait until Christmas to tell everybody, but if you see it, Mom and Dad are bound to see it.”
“See what?” Emily asked, confused.
“That we’re pregnant again,” Sophie announced, lightly pressing her hands to her flat belly. “We hadn’t planned another baby this soon, but now Meggie will have a little brother or sister to play with, and we like that idea. Riv is already planning an addition to the house.”
“That’s how Mom and Dad started, isn’t it? And the Hacienda de Alegria just grew and grew. I’m so happy for you.” Emily smiled, while inside she sighed, silently crossing off the idea of coming to live in Sophie’s spare room for a few weeks—at least until Dr. Wilkes went back to Mississippi. It had been a bad idea anyway, one born of desperation.
Laughing, Sophie answered, “True enough, Em, but Riv and I don’t have plans to repopulate the entire earth—just our small part of it. Okay, now tell me what’s on your mind, and don’t tell me ‘nothing,’ because I won’t believe it.”
“I’m that transparent, huh? I thought so, which is one of the reasons I was hoping to come hide out with you guys for a while,” Emily heard herself admitting, so that she quickly picked up another peanut butter cookie and shoved half of it into her mouth—right next to her foot.
“You want to get away from the ranch? Why?”
Emily pushed a hand through her hair, tucked a heavy lock behind one ear. “Okay, I’ll tell you. Mom’s sicced Dr. Wilkes on me, that’s why, among other things. The other things I can live with, but Dr. Wilkes gives me the creeps. It’s like she can see straight through me.”
“And can she?” Sophie asked, doing a fair job of looking straight through her sister herself.
“Oh yeah. Straight through me, Soph. It’s scary.” Emily put both hands to the back of her neck, then pushed up, so that her mass of wavy hair all piled high, then fell to her shoulders once more when she moved her hands, making a chestnut cloud around
