Chapter 13
Lenore Rhinehart huffed as she climbed the steps to the house, a certain weariness deep in her bones. At least today was her last day of work out here, and with the sun halfway to setting, Lenore had decided that her farm chores were done.
Brandon was finishing the gate that their goats kept dislodging, and then he’d be in as well.
Lenore had planned an easy dinner of cheddar brats with sautéed onions and peppers using food she’d previously prepped and frozen, and she moved into the kitchen to take out the veggies she’d heat up to go with the brats.
Those only took a few minutes in the pan as well, and Lenore meal-planned so that the two of them could eat an entire bag of hot dog buns in a week.
They’d already used a couple of the buns for garlic toast with their pasta night, and three buns for their sloppy joes though most people probably ate those on a hamburger bun.
They had three left, as Brandon ate twice as much as her and would eat two brats tonight, the way he’d eaten two sloppy joe sandwiches. But this way, Lenore didn’t have food going bad, and Brandon never complained about eating something in sandwich form.
She smiled at the thought of her good husband and placed one hand on her very pregnant belly. “You’re going to love your daddy when you meet him,” she whispered.
She and Brandon were due with a little girl in only eight days.
Her due date had been adjusted multiple times throughout her pregnancy, moving from July thirty-first, to the twenty-first, and then to the twenty-eighth.
She couldn’t wait to meet her, especially now that they’d made it so close to the due date.
She’d prayed for the little girl to wait, because Lenore did not want to go into labor out at the homestead.
She and Alex Baxter had been working on connecting their two properties through the woods, but that had not been completed yet, what with the dust storm that had thrown so many farms and ranches into cleanup mode, and then this summer’s extreme heat.
People only did work outside that needed to be done, and the road between their homestead and Coyote Pass had been put on hold.
Therefore, to get off the homestead and down the dirt roads and around the entire town of Three Rivers to the hospital took almost an hour.
Because Lenore could have an Olympic gold medal in worrying, she’d called the hospital months ago to ask about one of the adjacent apartments reserved for families of long-term patients.
They were based upon availability, and Lenore had had to call only two days ago to find out if there was somewhere for her and Brandon to stay for the week leading up to the delivery of their baby.
Thankfully, there was, as most of the cases at the hospital right now were normal surgeries and other short-term stays, or people dealing with heat stroke and heat exhaustion.
Those cases were usually treated within forty-eight hours and sent home, and she and Brandon would be able to stay in a quaint, cozy, one-bedroom apartment only a half-block away from the hospital.
They’d leave in the morning, and once Lenore had the food out of the freezer that she needed for dinner, she went down the hall and into the master suite to finish packing.
Her belly tightened as she zipped up the bag, and Lenore placed both hands over it.
She was used to being a little bit off since she’d gotten pregnant.
She’d been violently ill in the beginning, and even now, if she ate too much, she didn’t sleep well, or if she ate the wrong thing, she’d be sick all night.
She took out her phone and typed in pajamas and toiletries on the packing list, the last items she’d put in their bag in the morning after they’d gotten up and brushed their teeth.
They could go to the apartment anytime tomorrow, and Brandon had said he would do their morning feeding, and then they’d go.
His brothers and their friends had agreed to come do their basic farm chores while Lenore and Brandon were near the hospital, waiting for their baby to arrive. She didn’t worry about their ability to do so, but she was still getting used to asking for help and then accepting it.
But Dawson, Brandon’s older brother, had said that he could come stay in the second cabin for the entire week if they needed him to, as Duke had two grown boys now that could help on their family farm. Brandon had agreed, and all he had to do was call Dawson, and he was all set to come.
Lenore was grateful for such good people in her life. She moved into the bathroom as she felt like she always needed to go. The pressure in her abdomen now intensified, and she hurried a bit faster.
Shock poured through her when she didn’t make it. She quickly sat down on the toilet and realized that she hadn’t wet herself. She pulled in a breath as terror streamed through her, for she had not lost control of her bladder.
Her water had broken.
And she’d left her phone on the bed.
She felt frozen in place, not quite sure what to do. Her mind raced, but the extreme tightening of her belly stole all thoughts. This was not just something weird from the past nine months.
“It’s a contraction,” she said. She did have to go to the bathroom, and she didn’t think she’d be able to stand up until she did.
The contraction intensified, and Lenore placed both hands over her belly, a groan involuntarily coming out of her mouth. She had no idea how long it lasted, but it finally passed.
Lenore managed to lumber to her feet. “Brandon,” she called, though she knew her husband hadn’t come in off the homestead yet. The goats were out on the south side of the barn, and he wouldn’t be able to hear her if she called from the house.
She made it to the bed, but her clothes were wet, and she needed to change. Her mind splintered into many directions, and she tried to focus.
She quickly swiped up her phone and tapped to call her husband. “Come on, honey,” she whispered to herself. She turned around to go into the bathroom to get their toothbrushes and then Brandon’s shaving supplies.
“Hey, baby,” he said, his voice as jovial as ever.
“My water broke,” she said. “I’m getting our bag and I’ll meet you out front. How close are you to being done?”
Brandon didn’t say anything, and that alone told Lenore how shocked he was.
“Brandon.” She needed someone with a level head in this situation, and she’d always known it wouldn’t be her.
“I’m coming over right now,” he said. “I’m not done, but I’ll call Dawson.”
“Or Finn or Alex,” Lenore said. “Are the goats going to be roaming free?”
“If the goats get out, they’ll be fine,” Brandon said. “I’m on the way.”
Lenore nodded as tears spilled down her face. She’d only needed another twenty-four hours. “But you don’t have it,” she told herself firmly. “Get your things and get out front.” She grabbed the few toiletries and moved back into the bedroom to get their pajamas.
“Lenore!” Brandon called before she’d even managed to do that, and she’d never felt so slow and dim-witted as she did in that moment. She turned just as a dull ache radiated through her, turning sharp as the tightening intensified.
It had to have been several minutes since the first contraction, and she braced herself against their dresser as the pain spread down her legs.
Brandon darted into the room and stopped. “Are you okay?”
“It’s the second contraction,” she told him through gritted teeth. “I had one right after my water broke.” She looked at him with tears in her eyes. “We have to go now. It’s an hour to the hospital.”
Fierce determination entered his gaze. “We’re going right now.
” He picked up their bag, which Lenore had just put their pajamas in.
“Come on, honey.” He shored her up with one arm and helped her walk down the hall and out of the house.
Everything seemed to take ten times as long, but finally, she sat in his truck, and he jumped into the driver’s seat and started the engine.
Lenore took out her phone and noted the time. “Four-ten,” she said. “We’ve got to time the contractions.”
“Okay,” he said, and then he tapped on the screen of his truck and said, “Call Dawson.”
“Calling Dawson,” the truck said.
Lenore tuned everything out as Brandon told Dawson that her water had broken and that they were on their way to the hospital.
Dawson said he would call Finn and Henry and Alex and Libby—everyone who lived and worked on the north side of town.
Someone would come make sure the goat enclosure was secure.
The call ended, and still, Brandon drove.
Lenore pressed her eyes closed and prayed.
“Hey, are you okay over there?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said. “I’m just trying not to panic.”
“We’re going to make it,” he said.
“We’re not even off the dirt roads yet.” She opened her eyes and looked over to him as another contraction started. She looked down at her phone. It said four-seventeen, and it changed to eighteen as she watched.
“My contractions are about seven minutes apart,” she said. “Maybe eight. We have time. I just don’t want to have the baby in the car.”
“We’re not going to have her in the car,” Brandon said. “We’re going to make it, and she’s going to be born in the hospital, right where you want her to be.”
Lenore forced herself to take deep breaths, but what she really needed was a distraction. “Are you sure you’re okay with naming her after my mother?”
She looked over to Brandon and found his grip on the steering wheel so tight.
She sometimes forgot that he was experiencing this pregnancy right alongside her, and in fact, he’d been there every step of the way.
Every time she was sick, every time she was too tired to get out of bed, he’d been at her side, bringing her meals or something to drink, and taking care of everything on the homestead.
“Of course I am,” he said.
“Julia is just such an old-fashioned name,” Lenore said. “And it’s so common.”