Chapter Seven #3
He nodded before continuing his narrative.
“Finn was the next—or maybe he was the first, because he’d actually hooked up with Avery in Dallas before we moved to Montana, but they only got married a couple months ago.
Their second wedding—after they’d already eloped—was a big, splashy affair in Rustler’s Notch, Colorado.
We convinced Hunter to bring a nanny along to help out with his daughter so he could have some grown-up fun, and now he’s engaged to the nanny. ”
“But going back to Logan and Sarah, it all started with the visit to the matchmaker,” Beth pointed out. “So maybe she’s done a better job than you’re giving her credit for.”
And though it wasn’t something she’d ever considered before, it occurred to her now that enlisting a professional to help her find a life partner might not be such a bad idea.
Because as much as she wanted to believe that her perfect match was out there waiting for her, she was twenty-eight years old and starting to doubt her ability to find him on her own.
“Or she’s secretly serving Homer Gilmore’s spiked wedding punch to her clients,” Wilder muttered.
“What?”
He waved a hand dismissively. “Never mind. That’s another long story.”
“So has this matchmaker turned her attention to finding a match for you now?”
“If she has, she’s destined for failure there,” he said. “Because I have no interest in being matched by her—and even less in being manipulated by my father.”
“Leighton always balked at being told what to do, too,” Beth noted. “Which is why I was so surprised to learn that she’d brought Cody to Montana, because from day one, I’d been urging her to contact his father.”
“Why do you think she decided to listen to you now?”
“I don’t know,” Beth admitted. “But I don’t doubt that she was doing what she thought was best for Cody.”
“Do you really think she’ll come back?” he asked, as Raina approached with their meals.
“I know she will,” Beth said, attempting to project more confidence in her voice than she actually felt. Because she wanted to believe it was true, though after five of days with no communication from her sister, she was beginning to have some doubts of her own.
Cody woke up when the server set their plates on the table, almost as if he expected there to be food for him, too. Instead, Beth gave him a pacifier to keep him busy—and quiet.
Still, his eyes followed her hand as she picked up a fry and moved it toward her mouth.
Watching him, she chuckled softly. “Yeah, I bet you’d like to try these, wouldn’t you?
But you need a couple of teeth before you’ll be ready to tackle something like this—although the way you’ve been gnawing on that pacifier, I wouldn’t be surprised if the first ones aren’t too far in the distance. ”
“When do babies usually get teeth?” Wilder asked.
“Usually around the six-month mark, but first teeth can show up as early as three months or as late as the first birthday.”
“How do you know so much about these things?” he wondered.
“I read a lot.”
“All those books you bought for Leighton?” he guessed.
She frowned. “Why do you assume I bought them?”
“Am I wrong?”
“No,” she admitted. “I just wondered why you leaped to that conclusion.”
“I won’t pretend that I knew your sister very well, but based on what I did know about her, she wasn’t the type to read about something if she could do it.”
“I think that’s why she asked me to be her birthing partner,” Beth said. “Because she knew I’d study the course materials and take notes in childbirth classes, so it wouldn’t matter if she didn’t pay attention because I’d be there to talk her through it.”
“So you were there—when she had the baby?”
“Yeah.” She looked at Cody and smiled at the memory of his face all scrunched up and red as he screamed at the indignity of being born. “I was there.”
He picked up his burger, bit into it.
She didn’t offer any more detailed information, because she wasn’t sure how much he’d want to know.
But when he’d finished chewing and swallowed, he asked, “What was it like?”
“The birth?”
He nodded.
“Long and sweaty and messy.” She smiled again. “And the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen.”
“How long?” he wondered.
“Sixteen hours,” she said. “Leighton was a trouper through it all. There were a few scary moments when labor stalled and they considered a C-section, but she pushed through.”
She’d thought her sister was afraid of being cut open—a not unreasonable fear—and only found out after the fact that what her sister had feared most was the possibility of a scar that might prevent her from wearing a bikini at the beach.
And though a lot of people might think it a shallow rationale, Beth understood the root of her sister’s insecurities.
Because while Leighton had struggled in school, she’d quickly learned that being “such a beautiful child” had a certain intrinsic value—and she’d capitalized on it.
She wasn’t just pretty, she was popular.
While Lisbeth spent her evenings at home with her head stuck in a book, Leighton was usually out with friends.
Because she had been known as “Lisbeth” back then. After all, it was what her parents had always called her and the name they’d put on her birth certificate. But the summer before Lisbeth started high school, Leighton had suddenly started calling her “Beth.”
The reason, she explained without apology, was that she didn’t want it to be so obvious to her friends and the other popular kids at school that they were sisters.
Even though Lisbeth would be in her junior year by the time her sister was a freshman, Leighton had no doubt that she’d be immediately accepted by the in-crowd and didn’t want anyone to connect her with “Little Miss Perfect.”
Beth could have protested, but dropping the first syllable of her name seemed like a small thing to help her sister. Or maybe she felt as if she owed her something, because learning had always come so easily to Beth while Leighton had struggled to attain good grades.
As a result, her sister had learned to exploit her other attributes.
Unfortunately, those attributes were superficial, so that even when she was laboring to bring new life into the world, she wasn’t able to embrace and celebrate that miracle without worrying about stretch marks and scars that might diminish her sense of self-worth.
“But Leighton battled through,” Beth said, continuing her explanation of her sister’s labor to Wilder.
“And, a few hours later, Cody was born weighing seven pounds ten ounces and measuring nineteen and a half inches. He also had a sprinkling of dark hair and a very healthy set of lungs.” She smiled at the memory of those lungs announcing his arrival to everyone in the maternity wing of the hospital, then her smile faded as she looked at Wilder across the table.
“I’m sorry you weren’t given the option to be there. ”
“So am I,” he said.
“Would you have wanted to be there?” she asked, surprised by the sincere regret she heard in his tone.
“I would have stepped up,” he assured her.
“That’s not what I asked.”
He took a long sip of his cola, then he nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “I would have wanted to be there.”
Before she could say anything else, Raina appeared to clear away their empty plates.
“Can I get you anything for dessert?” the server asked.
Wilder looked at Beth, who shook her head.
“No, thanks,” he said. “Just the check.”
He reached into his back pocket for his wallet as the server returned with the requested check.
But Beth was quicker, having already slid her credit card out of her wallet, and she immediately offered it as payment.
“What are you doing?” Wilder protested.
“Buying you lunch,” she told him. “It’s the least I can do, considering that I’m not paying to stay at your place.”
“Fine, I’ll let you buy lunch,” he relented. “But you can’t take out your wallet again for the rest of the day.”