“There’s …”
The baby’s cry grew louder. Someone knocked at the door. “I’d hoped to have a few more minutes to ease into this,” Jena said nervously on her way to open the door.
Mandy, the wife of one of Ian’s army buddies who’d been killed in Iraq, stood there holding a tiny, red-faced, screaming infant while a second tiny, red-faced, infant squalled from a stroller, and her toddler cried in a kid carrier on her back.
“I’m so sorry,” Mandy said. “I know you said seven o’clock, but Abbie’s hysterical and we couldn’t calm her down. Then she set off Annie. And now Maddie.”
Jena reached for the baby in Mandy’s arms and a heavy weight of doom settled on Justin’s shoulders. No.
“This little consequence’s name is Abbie,” Jena said brightly holding up the baby dressed in pink. “That one is named Annie.” She motioned with her elbow to the stroller where Mandy was unstrapping the baby dressed in yellow. “This is why I asked Ian to bring you down tonight. Now that you know, you can go.”
What? Justin opened his mouth to reply, but no words came out. He stood there idly, unable to move, watching Jena, her expression worried as she paced, patting the baby’s back, trying to calm her.
Girls. Annie named for Jena’s mother. Abbie, for his grandmother? Who’d done her best to impart a mother’s love and wisdom, and fill in the gaps left by a disinterested father too busy for his own son. Maybe if she’d lived past his eighth birthday, Justin wouldn’t have followed in his father’s pleasure seeking footsteps, avoiding attachments and commitments with women.
Twins.
His.
There’d be fathers toasting, high-fiving, and laughing to the point of tears all around the tri-state area when the news got out. “I can’t wait for the day someone like you shows up at your door to take out your daughter. I hope he’s as careless with her heart as you’ve been with …” Justin couldn’t remember the daughter’s name. One of dozens of silly girls who’d hung on his every word, offered themselves to him then got their feelings hurt when he didn’t reciprocate their professed caring and love.
What goes around comes around.
Justin wanted to run, to close himself in the quiet of his condo, alone to think. But he would not be dismissed like one of her servants. “I’ll go when I’m good and ready to go.”
“Right,” she snapped. “Because you only do what you want when you want with a total disregard for what another person might want.”
Maybe so, but she was far from perfect, too. “Unless someone resorts to deceit to get me to do otherwise.” He glared at her.
Unaffected by his retort or his scathing look she fired back, “And you’re so easy to trick because you’re so darn shallow you only see what you want to see, a pretty face and a pair of breasts.”
Jaci ran out of the back bedroom, followed by Ian. “What happened?” Jaci asked, taking the baby in yellow from Mandy while Ian lifted Maddie out of her carrier and handed her to her mom.
“Something’s got Abbie all worked up and she got the other two crying,” Jena explained.
Ian walked over to Justin. “You okay?”
“You knew about the babies and didn’t tell me?” Justin asked, finding it hard to breath. No warning? No chance to adjust or digest? To figure out how to respond? What the hell to do?
“Jena wanted to tell you herself.”
“How long have you known?” The screaming echoed in his ears. Dread knotted in his gut. Life as he knew it was over.
“Since the benefit for Jaci’s crisis center.”
Almost two weeks. “Jena was at the benefit?” Justin had run security for the event. How could he have overlooked her?
“You really need to work on telling the two of them apart,” Ian said. “It’s not all that difficult.” After a moment Ian added, “Time to man up and help Jena with your daughters.”
Daughters.
Justin didn’t want daughters. Didn’t want to be a father. Did not want his life to be contorted into something unrecognizable.
CHAPTER TWO
JENA missed Marta something fierce. She bounced Abbie gently while patting her tiny back. Knowing her old nanny had been a few doors down the hall had eased many of Jena’s new mother insecurities and fears. Of course the girls had been perfect angels then. Textbook infants.
Nothing like this. Abbie arched her back and let out an unusually shrill cry.
“It’s going to be okay, sweetie girl,” she whispered against the baby’s cheek, hoping hearing the words would make her believe them. It didn’t work. Jena’s heart pounded. Don’t panic. You’re a nurse. You can handle this.
“When did she last eat?” Jena asked Mandy, starting with the most basic reason the twins cried.
“Mrs. Calvin and I fed them about an hour and a half ago.”
Moving on to diaper, Jena walked down the hall and set Abbie on the changing table where she writhed and kicked her tiny legs making it difficult to unsnap her outfit.
Diaper dry. Shoot.
Jena stripped off Abbie’s clothes and examined her naked body for signs of irritation or anything out of the ordinary. Aside from a red face, the only unusual thing identified during her careful head to toe assessment was a firm, maybe a bit distended, belly.
Please be gas.
“Jaci told me to give you this.” Justin walked into the room and handed her a bottle. He stared down at Abbie, still looking a bit shell-shocked.
“I’m sorry you found out like this,” Jena said, fastening a new diaper. “I’d planned to give you some warning before—”
A milky-looking fountain spurted from Abbie’s mouth. Jena flipped her onto her side and rubbed her back. “Hand me a cloth.”
Justin did. “Is she okay?”
“I don’t know.” Worry seeped into her voice. But maybe after spewing out the contents of her tiny tummy Abbie would feel better.
Wishful thinking, because she sucked in a breath and started to cough and sputter.
“She’s choking,” Justin so helpfully pointed out, pushing Jena closer to all out panic.
No. Think like a nurse. She sat Abbie on the changing table, and, supporting her chin leaned her forward and patted her back.
Airway clear, Abbie’s screams turned even more intense, desperate for her mommy to do something to help her. But what?
Helpless tears filled Jena’s eyes as she struggled to dress her squirming infant in a soft cotton sleeper. She picked her up and tried to give her the bottle while she hurried back into the living room. Abbie clamped her lips closed and turned her head, refusing the nipple. “How long has she been like this?” Jena asked Mandy.
“A good forty-five minutes before I brought her back. Mrs. Calvin and I tried everything we could think of to calm her.”
If Mrs. Calvin, Jaci’s upstairs neighbor who’d raised five children and had been helping out with the twins since Jena’s return, couldn’t solve the problem, Jena had little confidence she’d be able to.
“She said sometimes babies just need to cry,” Mandy said.
But not like this. For close to an hour. And what if Jena weren’t here to see to the needs of her daughter? Would Abbie’s unknown caregiver allow her to cry, alone in her room, for hours and hours, totally unconcerned with her discomfort and distress, thinking ‘sometimes babies