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“But…but….”
“Well, you’ve got time to think about that. But for now, it’s time for the internal, and you need to wait outside.”
“Okay. Okay, sure.” He reached up and gave Maya’s hand a squeeze before he left. Then he met her eyes, held them for a long moment, and without even knowing he was going to, he leaned down and kissed her very softly. Then he straightened, realized what he’d done and wondered why. It had just seemed…like the thing to do. “I’ll…be right out there…if you need me.”
She stared at him as if too stunned to speak, and he turned and fled.
In the waiting room, he paced. Hell, he didn’t like this. He didn’t like believing her without question, and he liked even less that he knew right to his toes that he was right to believe her. She wouldn’t lie to him. She wasn’t up to anything. She didn’t even want him around, much less want his money, and even if she did, she wouldn’t have to resort to scamming to get her hands on it. She could just ask. He would give it to her. All of it. He would give her everything he had, if she wanted it.
She was carrying two babies, and they were both his. His children. His babies. He wanted to be there when they were born. In the delivery room, right there. She was incredible…that she could do this thing, perform this miracle, give life to his offspring. It was mind-boggling to him.
Minutes ticked by. He spent the time pawing through the pamphlets, of which there seemed to be hundreds. He flipped through all of them, took several. Then added a couple of parenting and natural childbirth magazines to his collection. Finally the door opened, and the doctor called him back in. “It’s not going to be long,” she said. “I don’t think you’ll go another week, Maya.”
“Thank God. I don’t think I can take another week.” Maya grimaced at the doctor as she got herself up into a sitting position on the table. “We’re going to want a paternity test done as soon as they’re born. Dr. Sheila,” Maya said.
The doctor lifted her brows. “Sure. But I can already tell you their blood types. Not that it would prove you are the father, Caleb, but it could eliminate you.”
Caleb shook his head. “I don’t need that. I don’t need—”
“I want it settled,” Maya told him.
“I believe you, Maya. You don’t have to prove anything to me.”
She lowered her head, keeping her gaze from his. He couldn’t even try to read her eyes. She said, “That…means a lot to me, that you’d say that, Caleb. Thank you.”
“No. Thankyou.”
Lifting her head, meeting his eyes, she drew a breath. “Caleb, you’re…who you are. The question of paternity is going to come up, sooner or later—someone’s going to want proof. Maybe it won’t be you. But it’s going to happen. So I’d just as soon we get this done right away.”
He thought about what she’d said, realized she was right. It would come up eventually. “All right. Okay, you’re probably right.”
The doctor flipped open the charts without so much as shooting Caleb a curious glance. He liked her. She was a pro. “Well, according to the amnio, the babies are both type O-negative. That doesn’t match Maya, so it has to match the father. Do you know your blood type, Caleb?’’
He lifted his head slowly. “Yeah. It’s O-negative. And it’s not a common blood type.” He turned to face Maya. “I’d like…very much…to be in that delivery room with you, Maya. If you think you wouldn’t mind too much.”
Frowning until her brows touched, she sighed. “I…don’t know.”
Dr. Stone eyed them both. “When you make a decision, let us know, okay? The hospital needs to be forewarned.”
“Thanks, we will.” Caleb watched the doctor go and turned back to Maya. “I didn’t mean to put any pressure on you. I mean…if it would make you uncomfortable, then—”
“We have a tree to cut down,” Maya said. She started to slide off the table.
Caleb reached for her, picked her up and gently lowered her to the floor. Their eyes locked as he did, and Maya’s cheeks went pink. Then he grabbed her coat and held it for her. But she shook her head slowly and glanced down.
He looked, too, and saw that she was standing there in her socks. Her warm suede shoes stood nearby. She, too, looked at the shoes. Then at him. Then at the shoes again. She kicked them closer to the chair where he’d been sitting earlier, then sat down and, biting her lip as if preparing to face some great challenge, bent to reach for the shoes.
Caleb got there first. “Let me do that.”
“I can put on my own shoes.”
“Lean back in the chair, Maya. You bend over any further and my kids are going to be born with no necks. You’re squishing them.”
“I am not.” But she did lean back.
Caleb knelt down. He grabbed a shoe, then slid it gently onto a socked foot. He pulled the laces snugly and tied them up. “Just like Cinderella,” he quipped, picking up the other shoe.
“Yeah, but those aren’t exactly delicate glass slippers.”
