The Midwife's Secret (25 page)

He dropped his chin with a contented sigh. Lying in the grass, he turned his body to face her, propping his head on his palm as he watched with heated rapture.

“Should I charge you admission for this performance?”

“I’ll pay anything you ask.”

“There you go, overextending yourself again.”

He laughed, then grew thoughtful. “Do you know that I love you?”

She basked in the knowledge, letting her gaze mingle with his for a long, serious moment, letting herself marvel in the sheer joy the words brought.

“Well,” she said, smiling again. “For that, I suppose I should reward you.”

“Please do. Feel free to reward me in any way you feel is fair.”

“Ah, I think at least one breast is in order.”

His eyes widened in glorious shock.

Sliding out of her blouse, she unhooked the corset’s laces until the corset was completely free down the middle. With no hesitation, she opened it to reveal her bare left side.

His eyes dropped from her face to her jiggling bosom. “Amanda, come here….”

“I’m not done yet,” she said, revealing the other side. The heat on her bare nipples felt extraordinary.

Both of his brows shot up at what she was doing. His face flushed. He pressed his hands into the grass, but before
he could run at her, she tossed the corset to him and jumped away.

“Now it’s your turn,” she instructed.

“What?”

“I’d like you to stand up and take off your clothes. One at a time.”

His mouth dropped and he laughed. “It’s one surprise after another with you. You want me to strip for you?”

“Just like you asked me the other night. I’d like nothing better.”

He tossed off his Stetson.

“Hats don’t count,” she said.

“Do you want me to leave it on?”

She nodded and giggled. “I think I’d like to see you naked with nothing on but your hat.”

Trying to stifle his laughter, he planted the hat back on his head, then began unbuttoning his shirt.

Her pulse began to hammer beneath her breast. She took a heady breath of air as he unpeeled his shirt, revealing acres of tanned skin and softly curled dark hair.

Fighting with his denim pants, his body twisted and turned, his biceps rippling with his graceful movements.

As soon as he unbuttoned the line of buttons at his crotch, she felt her muscles heat. A bead of perspiration drizzled down her temple, beneath her heavy hair, trailing down her throat and down between her jutting breasts.

Stepping out of his boots, then pants and underwear, he stood on the grassy hill across from her, naked and beautiful, with such yearning in his eyes she felt it in her heart.

When he came toward her, enveloping her in his arms, his bare flesh pressed against hers. His hard shaft met with the cloth on her hips. He swooped her up and pressed her to the ground beneath him, trapping each of her wrists against the grass.

Desire welled up inside of her, making her shiver, hardening her nipples and pooling the moisture between her thighs.

He kissed her eyelids, grazed her lips then worked down her throat to her breasts. He kissed one nipple, then the other.

“Is this what you want?”

“More,” she answered.

He bracketed his palms against the sides of her breasts, letting his tongue trail a path over one circle, down beneath the undercurve of her creamy breast. His gentle probing tickled down her soft stomach till she nearly screamed.

Undoing the button at her waistline, he slid her skirt over her hips, then tugged off her bloomers.

“I want a life with you, Amanda. I want to wake up beside you every morning and know that you’re my wife.”

She listened to him say it.

He continued. “Do you believe me when I say I’ve thought about our future, and I’ve worked it out in my heart?”

She nodded. “I love you for telling me.”

His voice grew husky. “I can live without children of my own, Amanda, but I can’t live without you.”

His mouth throbbed with passion; a knot rose in her throat. For the first time in a long, long time, she was happy to be who she was.

Grasping his fingers between her own, she lifted them up to her lips and kissed. “Not too long ago, I thought I’d be alone for the rest of my life. You don’t make me feel alone anymore. Let me love you, Tom.”

His look was so rooted in hers, a shudder passed through her. She felt his flesh shiver next to hers.

He surrendered to her seduction, and she to his. They
lost themselves in exploration, he still wearing his hat, she searing a path down his neck. Together, they culminated in the ultimate union, and the sweet, delicious promise of many years ahead.

Five years later

T
om sank himself into the comfortable chair on the porch, swung his booted feet over the cedar railing, took a sip of ice-cold lemonade and scrutinized his little slice of paradise.

Josh, now nine and tall for his age, joined the neighbors’ children, who jumped and played among the trees, their delighted screeches echoing through the forest. The adults—a combination of family and neighbors—were fussing over the great meal they’d prepared for Canada’s July First Dominion Day. Amanda would be back from her call at any minute to join them all for Saturday lunch.

Tom tugged his hat low over his brow and sipped again. Ice was a marvelous thing in this summer heat, and next to Amanda’s original root cellar, they’d built their own ice shack.

It wasn’t part of Amanda’s original plan, but then neither was this cabin. After they were married, he’d had to double it in size to allow for all the spare rooms. One for their daughter Margaux—who was now living down the road with her husband, Pierce O’Hara—another for their son
Josh, Miss Clementine’s in the back, Amanda and Tom’s in the front side, and of course, the large spare room for taking in more children when the need arose. It was empty at the moment, but Amanda had placed six more children and three babies in the homes of loving families since Margaux and Josh had first stepped off the mud wagon.

Tom was mighty proud of her.

He swatted at a bee that hummed around his boots. Peering into the forest, he spotted Wolf doing what he loved most—chasing groundhogs and fetching sticks for the youngsters. Sunset, preening her orange fur, was lying in the sunshine, big and fat and content.

Strolling around the corner into his view, Margaux and her young husband walked hand in hand, he carrying a bowl of something to add to the bowls already there, and she, waddling alongside him, nine months along and due any day now.

Tom watched his family, gazing at his beautiful adopted children. Tom couldn’t love Margaux and Josh more if they were his own blood. He couldn’t imagine a life without them. Or Amanda.

He heard a bell tinkle on the road, looked that way, then watched Amanda ride her bicycle toward him, pretending as if she was aiming to mow him down. He gave her a lazy nod and smiled beneath his hat.

Riding her bicycle had kept her slender, and she wore her wavy black hair more down than up these days, but it was the familiar spark of humor that he loved so much.

No, sir, life didn’t get any better than this.

“Well, don’t you look comfortable,” she said.

“That’s my job in life. Come join me.”

“I think I will.” She propped her bicycle in the rack he’d built, trying to balance it between the half-dozen other bicycles their guests had already placed there.

This one was different than her first. This one had pneumatic tires filled with air, not solid rubber. Thank goodness bicycles were mass-produced in factories now, so less pricey. Tom was able to get it for less than a hundred bucks.

Giving him a kiss on the cheek, Amanda fell into the chair beside him.

“Hey, what kind of a kiss was that?”

She glanced to the crowd. “You know we’re in public.”

“I don’t care.” He leaned over and planted a full, rich kiss on her lips, and she responded with the sweet sensuality with which she always did.

“Happy anniversary,” he whispered against her lips.

She kissed him back. “I love you.”

Folks didn’t normally celebrate their anniversaries, so it was only Amanda and Tom who remembered the significance of the date. They were celebrating their fifth wedding anniversary, but most of the other folks here were celebrating Canada’s birthday.

“It’s about time you got back,” said Miss Clementine, walking past them, down the front stoop with a tray of roasted potatoes. She was a little heavier than she used to be, but with the same youthful braids rolling down her back. Tom noticed that lately she’d upgraded her wardrobe and wore only the finest dresses, likely due to her bout of good fortune with her new bicycle shop.

Pa and Miss Clementine had become business partners. Two years ago, Tom had funded the opening, and they’d already paid him back. As owners of the only bicycle shop in Banff, they were amassing a small fortune selling and renting bicycles to the folks in town, especially to the wealthy tourists. Much to James Jefferson’s dismay, his daughter Fannie had been their first customer.

“I was hopin’ you wouldn’t miss the party,” Miss Clementine said to her granddaughter. “Everything go okay?”

“Just a routine checkup on a new mother,” Amanda answered. “They’re all fine.”

“That’s good.”

Tom’s pa stepped up to the stairs to help the older woman with her tray of potatoes. Pa still occasionally had his forgetful spells, but Tom was grateful they weren’t getting any worse.

Peering over the railing, lifting her long-sleeved arm, Amanda waved at Beth and Quaid.

“Glad you could make it,” Quaid hollered, cupping his hands over his neatly trimmed, short mustache. Beth patted his shoulder as she fussed around the dishes. She enjoyed running in a hundred different directions, she’d told them, eager and begging to help organize the big party. Under the tree beside them, their young boy, Timothy, was playing with Ellie O’Hara’s five-year-old son, who Amanda had also safely delivered that same year.

Tom leaned back into his seat. If all went well, he’d be lucky enough to have his youngest brother living in Banff soon, along with the rest of them. Just last week, Gabe had wired that he’d finished law school, soon to be joining them, bringing along his new bride. One from Nova Scotia, he’d written, as bonnie as they come. Everyone was eager to meet her.

Tom hadn’t heard again from Zeb Finnigan. The Mounties had moved him to Toronto to serve his sentence, with the judge tacking on another eighteen months to his original five years for the three more men who’d arrived with an invalid deed. None of them had regained their money, but Frank Finnigan had at least received his brother’s fine horse and saddle, and was able to buy back his small plot of farmland.

Tom felt great, seated here at Amanda’s side. Too bad their secret place in the woods had been discovered by an enterprising fellow, who’d built a sprawling dining house and small hotel on it, but Tom and Amanda were having fun discovering new spots on the mountain. Ones where they could rest after a long day, share their private conversations and enjoy the spectacular view.

Josh came running over, interrupting Tom’s train of thought. The boy’s brown hair glistened with perspiration, his face red from running. “I’m hungry, Ma,” he said. “Whaddya have that I can eat?”

“You’re always hungry,” said Amanda, playfully swatting him off the porch.

“Aw, come on,” said Josh, pronouncing each word with perfection. “How about one radish?”

“Well, then, go ask your sister. I saw her by the vegetable platter. She’ll sneak you one.”

“I’ll sneak him one what?” Margaux’s head peered from above their heads. With Pierce attentive at her side, she sat beside Amanda on the porch, struggling to get into position with her huge belly. Tom saw a lovely young woman when he looked at his daughter, one still protective of her brother. The freckles on her skin faded into a tan above her nose, and the wire-rim spectacles framed her pretty brown eyes.

“Your brother’s hungry,” Amanda said to her, moving close to Margaux. “I thought you were over by the food, but I guess you aren’t. You can get the radish yourself, Josh.”

“All right.” Josh turned and ran toward the table.

“My troops,” Amanda said, sighing and looking over her clan.

Tom wrapped his arm around her.

Men from the sawmill, and their wives and children, began pouring into the yard. Twenty men in total.

“They’re having fireworks tonight at the big hotel,” one of them shouted.

Tom glanced at Amanda and winked. “You don’t say. Amanda and I love fireworks. We’ll have to go out for a stroll later, won’t we, sweetheart?”

Amanda gave him a soft smile. “Whatever do you mean?”

He grinned at their private plan.

“Hey,” said Quaid. “Let’s play kick ball.”

With lots of laughter, they divided into two teams. The men against the women.

Tom was convinced the men just enjoyed watching their wives running through the grass in their long skirts and full blouses. A few of the bravest were following the latest fashions and no longer wore corsets.

“Too restrictive,” Amanda had told him when she’d tossed hers. “We can’t breathe, how hard they’re squeezed against our ribs. Especially riding a horse, or gardening.”

“Well, by all means, take it off,” he’d told her, which caused her to toss a shoe in his direction.

She’d replaced it by a looser-fitting garment, shaped like a corset but without the whalebone strips, and laces pulled not quite so tight. He was still as mesmerized by her today as he was that first day they’d met.

When Amanda finished playing ball, she fell into a heap beside him.

Margaux groaned from the picnic table. Amanda was by her side in a flash. “What is it?”

“I think the lemonade went down the wrong way.”

“Are you sure that’s all it is?”

Amanda exchanged a concerned look with Tom. Was it time? Tom walked over to Margaux’s side, trying to be
tender and concealing his own fears for her labor. He recalled the day when Amanda had explained to him about Margaux’s first menstruation. It felt as if it had only been yesterday.

Quaid noticed them and appeared beside Tom. Ellie O’Hara, the soon-to-be grandmother, strolled casually to join them.

“Ow-ww, there it goes again.”

Amanda placed her hand on Margaux’s firm abdomen. “It’s a contraction, Margaux, normal and nothing to be afraid of. We’ll time this one,” she said.

“What can I do?” asked Pierce.

Ellie smiled and placed her slender arm across her son’s shoulders. “Amanda will take good care of your wife. And Quaid is here, too, promisin’ he’ll help if you need it.”

Twenty hours later, with all of them standing outside the door, Amanda delivered a healthy newborn girl.

Margaux gave her a long name; much too long, the men teased, but the women adored it. Jillian Amanda Rose O’Hara. Jillian after Margaux’s cherished natural mother, Amanda after the mother Margaux had grown to love and respect as her own, and Rose, named after the little baby Amanda occasionally spoke so fondly of, when it was just between the two of them.

It made Amanda’s eyes shimmer with love, and Tom knew, all was right with the world.