Chapter 6
Prudence exhaled the minute Adam returned. It felt like she’d been holding her breath for the past seventeen minutes. Impossible, she knew. But that was what it felt like when her lifeline walked out of the room.
Until she figured out what was happening with her memory, she planned to stick to him like red on velvet. She hoped the move wouldn’t be too annoying or last too long. Then again, being with Adam wasn’t the hard part. Missing entire days from her life was scary.
What else had she done or seen that she was possibly suppressing?
Was there some trauma behind her current situation with Angel?
It made sense there would be. Then there was Prudence’s anxiety.
Normally, it was through the roof in unknown situations and places.
Sleeping over at a stranger’s house should have her clamoring for the front door.
Instead, she felt like she’d come home. Though that feeling was dependent on Adam being in the room.
Was she attached to him because he’d been her savior today?
A knight in shining armor, so to speak. Except said knight was one gorgeous, honorable, and strong cowboy?
Who wouldn’t feel a draw to someone like that?
“When do you think she needs her next bottle?” Adam asked, taking a seat on the bed in between her and the baby. The mattress dipped under his weight.
“Good question,” she said. “I’m thinking she’ll let us know.”
“And loudly, at that,” he said with a smirk.
Prudence laughed. She could watch that kid sleep for hours.
But she needed to rest while she could. If she could.
And that was a big if. The very real fear the day would be erased when she woke up the next morning caused an icy chill to race down her back, gripping her spine.
An uneasy feeling settled over her, like a dark cloud engulfing her.
“She’s a little bit of perfection,” she said. “I know someone out there must be missing her hard. No matter what the situation ends up being.”
“I can’t imagine how horrible it must be to give up or lose a child,” he said. “Not that I ever planned on having any of my own.”
“Really?” she asked before she could rein it in. His position on having a family wasn’t her business, and yet he’d said it so casually like it was set in stone.
“Why does that surprise you?” He cocked a dark brow, and she didn’t want to focus on how sexy it was, he was. The nightlight hit his face just right, highlighting his strong jaw. But then, there probably wasn’t any lighting that could make him look bad.
“I don’t know,” she stammered. “You come from a big family and grew up here on the ranch. This place is impressive to say the least. You are obviously close with Brax. I noticed that right away when I met him earlier. I just assumed all this would come with having a big family of your own someday.”
“Yeah?” He seemed genuinely caught off guard at her response.
“None of this guarantees a happy life. Not the big house. The Marshall lived here, and I guarantee you that man wasn’t content a day in his life.
He wasn’t close with either of his sons and now his death promises to divide the family further.
” He stopped himself like he’d caught himself in an intense moment, and then a casual smile broke out on his near-perfect face.
“But, hey, you didn’t come here for all that. ”
Prudence realized she’d overstepped her bounds. An apology didn’t seem fitting. Besides, she’d done that twice already. She actually wanted to know more about Adam, but he’d erected a wall the minute he realized he was sharing from deep down.
“Isn’t it funny how easy it is to make snap judgments about someone’s life?” she said. “It’s unfair.”
“Half the reason I’m alive today is relying on gut instinct. We aren’t usually wrong,” he reasoned, and his tone was much more thoughtful now. All the defensiveness was gone.
“True, which can make it all that much more awful when we are.” She bit back a yawn.
“I’m keeping you awake,” he pushed off the bed.
“No, you’re not.” She didn’t want him to leave and yet sleeping in the same bed felt a little dangerous if she was being honest. “I hate to admit this…but I’m afraid to go to sleep.”
“Because the last thing you remember is waking up?” he asked, but it was more statement than a question.
“Yes.” She pulled the covers up.
“I doubt we’ll get much more than an hour or two before Angel wakes up,” he said.
“So, how about this. I promise to remind you of everything that happened today. I’ll tell you all the details until they’re so etched in your memory that you won’t be able to forget them if you tried. How does that sound?”
Like a promise he might not be able to keep.
“Deal.” She didn’t want to deflate his chest and it really was a beautiful answer. “I just wish I had my journal with me.” Add her cell phone, purse, and a few other items to the list. She didn’t realize how much she would miss until they were gone. Gone might be a strong word, away from her.
“Goodnight,” was the last thing she heard before she nodded off.
It felt like she’d barely closed her eyes when she heard Angel fussing. She reached for her glasses. A quick glance at the clock said it was one o’clock in the morning. So, she’d gotten all of an hour of uninterrupted sleep.
The minute she moved, Adam was by her side. He froze the second they made eye contact.
“I remember,” she said, and he seemed to really exhale.
“That’s good,” he reassured, and it looked like a weight lifted off his shoulders. “I’ll run down and make a bottle while you try to soothe her. I watched Casey yesterday, so I should be good.”
Adam standing next to the bed with no shirt on and jeans slung low on his hips was the kind of image she could get used to waking up to.
Prudence threw the covers off as he disappeared out the door.
He must’ve fallen asleep on the loveseat because the other side of the bed was still made.
There were no wrinkles on the duvet. Seriously, the bed was big enough for both of them to sleep without ever touching each other.
She would bring it up when he got back with the bottle.
For now, her full attention was going to Angel.
“Hey, sweet girl,” she soothed as she picked her up. She located the binky, which had been spit out at some point in the past hour, and bit back a yawn. “This all must be very confusing for you, but we are going to take good care of you tonight.”
This little bean had quickly wormed her way into Prudence’s heart. As much as she couldn’t wait to reunite Angel with her parents, the moment would be bittersweet.
A laugh tickled her throat at the fact she remembered. She’d been so scared her mind would be a blank slate when she woke. Grateful for the small miracle, she couldn’t help but smile. The binky did its job, keeping Angel satisfied long enough for Adam to return with the real deal.
He handed over the bottle, but Prudence had an idea.
“How about you do the honors,” she said.
“I don’t know about that. She might not want someone else to do it,” he reasoned.
“Sit down next to me and give it a try.” She had no idea where her bravado was coming from. She wasn’t normally this straight-forward. But it was nice.
Adam did as requested. She handed him the baby, and her heart took another hit at the image.
She handed over the bottle next and then pulled the binky out of Angel’s mouth.
He didn’t have to score a direct hit. The little girl was already rooting for the nipple.
She contentedly sucked away the second she found it.
“We’ll need to burp her, and she’ll probably need a diaper change after her meal,” she said. They were figuring her routine out.
“Looks like we got four hours in between feedings,” he noted. “That’s an intense schedule if it’s twenty-four hours a day.”
The image of Adam Firebrand giving a baby a bottle would stick with her for a very long time. At least, she hoped it would when she woke in the morning.
Prudence’s memory loss was a real head scratcher.
With Angel’s feeding schedule, Adam saw that it would be difficult to accomplish much else in a day.
He tipped his hat to all the mothers and fathers out there, doing this every day, especially the ones doing this alone.
Don’t even get him started on folks who had multiple children to look after.
They deserved a medal as far as he was concerned.
He fed, burped, and changed the little girl with Prudence’s help. Then, he gently placed her back in the crib. Angel was back to doing what babies seemed to do best, namely sleeping in short bursts.
“The loveseat can’t possibly be comfortable,” Prudence said.
He had a crick in his neck to prove it, but he didn’t want her to feel like she was putting him out. “I’ve slept in worse places.”
“The bed is huge. You could sleep on the other side and our body parts wouldn’t get anywhere near each other,” she said with a boldness that didn’t fit the image of a woman who could blend in with the background.
She’d insisted they’d passed each other, and he believed her.
His main thought now was, How could he have missed her?
“It’s no trouble,” he countered, figuring he didn’t need to go there. Even a dirty jogging suit couldn’t hide those long legs of hers—legs with creamy skin that his fingers were itching to get lost on. The naked image of her in the shower had been difficult to wipe from his thoughts.
“We can roll up a blanket and put it in the middle,” she volunteered. “Or how about these pillows? They’re long enough to block any physical contact.”
She was tempting fire and didn’t seem to realize it.
The loveseat was uncomfortable, and he would be lucky if Angel gave them another four hours. Plus, Prudence seemed intent on not inconveniencing him.
“I promise not to touch you,” she added.
“Shame,” he said under his breath as he walked over to his side of the bed.
“Sorry, I didn’t catch that,” she said.