Chapter 3 #3
A tiny grunt drags my gaze to the drawer.
“Aww...look at you, little baby. Are you wanting to stay up? C’mere, then, and let me hold you.
I’ll keep you company.” Emmaline’s slight weight is next to nothing as I lift her.
Hell, she’s too precious with the way her eyes roll around the room, catching on everything and nothing.
Shouldn’t she be wanting to sleep after a full belly?
“Soft pats,” I remind myself as I press her to my chest. “G’morning, little one. I’m your...” Hmm. What should she call me? Father feels a bit too stuffy, and Pop is what I call my own dad.
“Papa,” I try on for size. “I’m your papa. What do you think, Emmaline? Does that sound good?” A slight eye roll that makes me chuckle is all I get in reply. “You know how much that made you look like your pretty momma just now?”
My own eyes are feeling heavy still, especially since Mara’s still sleeping, so I ease against the headboard with our daughter to my chest. “I know she doesn’t believe me, but I meant every word I promised her.
And you, too, for that matter. I said I was gonna take care of y’all, and that’s exactly what I’m gonna do.
” I pat her itty bitty back and give a little grin when her eyes drift closed.
“Yeah, I’m still a little tired myself. But you’re gonna have to be the first to fall asleep, you hear me? ”
Another glance to my wife reminds me to keep my voice soft and low as I hum. But my sleepy brain won’t let me think of all the nursery rhymes and lullabies from my own childhood, so I serenade my little girl with a hummed rendition of Charlotte LaRue.
Good ole Charlotte works better than I thought she would, because the last thing I remember before sleep pulls me under is the rapid rise and fall of Emmaline’s tiny back beneath my hands.
Sleeping with a baby on my chest maybe isn’t the best of ideas because I find myself dreaming that she’s screaming her head off and nothing I do helps.
“Shh...I’ve got you, little one,” I murmur as I pat her back.
Of course, I don’t realize it’s a dream until I jolt awake and discover she’d only been making regular baby noises. “Papa’s got—oh, hey.”
I’m a bit surprised to see Jed and Dove hovering in the doorway, but I’m busting at the seams to introduce my new baby. “Look who I’ve got here. Little Emmaline.” Then I panic. Damn it, we never picked out a middle name. Umm... “Emmaline Hazel Shay.”
If her momma doesn’t like it, we’ll change it later.
“Shay?” Dove asks in her raspy voice.
My face falls as I caress my sleeping wife with my gaze.
“Mara doesn’t have anybody. Not a single person in the world who cares about her.
And I couldn’t let the child be born a bastard and leave Mara on her own, so I did what I had to do.
Called for Judge Ballard to marry us before she gave birth.
She didn’t like it then—hell, probably still won’t like it once she wakes up—but she’s got a husband to take care of the both of them now.
They need me.” A thought strikes me, making me smile a little as Mara moves in her sleep.
“Not quite the same as snatching her up in the middle of the night, but she’s mine now just the same. ”
I move my hand, intending to shift the slumbering infant on my chest, but something feels different, so I look down and freeze.
No way. “I don’t believe it,” I murmur. “She’s...
she’s holding my finger.” The woman who doesn’t want to be touched reached out to me and hooked her pinky around mine in her sleep.
Hope sneaks in at our small and simple connection. My wife touched me.
And then she wakes up on a sharp gasp, shoulders drawn up damn near to her neck until she realizes where she is. That is, until she notices our fingers. I don’t even think she see Jed and Dove yet. Not with the way she snatches her hand away and grits out, “Why are you touching me?”
At this point, the nose crinkles from her scowl are kinda growing on me. Kinda like a little kitten with its fur all puffed up as it hisses. “Since you’re the one who reached for me, I should be asking you that.”
“No.” Mara rubs where our fingers touched. “I did not.”
Happy and a wee bit smug, I say, “Suit yourself. Truth is truth, though, and reaching for your husband is nothing to be ashamed about.” A quick glance to the food I brought up earlier reminds me that Mara never ate.
It’s lost its warmth by a few hours at best. I can’t have my wife eating cold eggs.
“Here. Emmaline slept good on me, but now she needs the touch of her mother.” While her papa gets some fresh food for her momma.
As if I’d hit an electric switch to her emotions, Mara’s face falls blank. “No. I...I don’t want to see—”
My heart sinks like a stone. She doesn’t want to look at her.
Can she only see the face of the man who raped her?
Dove and Jed’s expressions show the unsettling mix of compassion and sadness that I tamp down.
It’s not Emmaline’s fault for being born nor the fault of her mother for falling pregnant with her.
“Here you go.” Softly forcing her to hold Emmaline, I wrap one arm around my wife’s stiff shoulders and forget about my brother and Dove.
“Don’t turn away, Mara. Look at this little girl.
See how beautiful she is with her mother’s eyes and hair.
” Emmaline’s nose disappears beneath my finger as I affectionately tap it.
“She’s got my nose and chin, though, and you can’t tell me otherwise. ”
A solitary tear is the only sign Mara hears me. I vaguely notice Jed and Dove leave, but my wife and child are my focus right now. “No matter who she grows up to look like, I’ll proudly tell anyone and everyone that she’s my blood. I swear it.”
Mara eases our baby closer to her, cradling the little one’s head before pressing her lips to Emmaline’s chubby cheek in a tentative kiss as another tear falls from her sad blue eyes.
The heaviness of responsibility hits the middle of my chest with the force of a grown man’s punch as I watch the bittersweet scene between mother and child.
I’ve charmed a few girls with my wide smile and offered them a dance or two at barnyard socials.
Even thought about how I’d settle down someday.
Following family tradition by throwing a soft, squirming female over my shoulder and keeping her all to myself until she agreed to be mine.
This weight of responsibility isn’t unwelcome, but I just didn’t know it’d be so soon.
Didn’t know how strongly I’d feel the need to protect this beautiful, fragile girl who glares at me and shies away from my touch.
But they’re mine now, the two of them, and I’m never letting them go.