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“Do you have plans tonight?” Kade asked, wondering if a stranger should be left alone with Rinty. Technically, Annmarie was a stranger, but she would have been prepped about the risks of Rinty around small children. He trusted that she would take the warnings seriously.
A smile spread across Annmarie’s hot pink lips. “I was hoping you’d stop by later.”
Shock didn’t even cover his reaction. He almost slipped and said his child was being born in the hospital behind them, then realized Annmarie didn’t know that.
She ran her finger along the top of her door before giving him a seductive stare. “Thought I might help you figure out a few reasons to stick around town once the will is settled.”
Annmarie was an attractive woman. She was his sister’s roommate and his nephew’s sometimes caregiver. She was nice. But there was no chemistry. Not on his side.
“Bree needs me to stay here,” he said before coaxing Rinty out of the passenger side and into Annmarie’s vehicle. Other than that, he didn’t know what to say to Annmarie. This wasn’t the time for a long conversation or to search his brain to find a way to let her down easy. So, he stayed all business. “She’s about to have a baby alone.” That should ring a bell, considering Annmarie had been in the same position once.
“Right. Zeke.” Annmarie flashed sorrowful eyes at Kade. “I forgot.”
Kade would never forget, any more than he would forgive himself, for not saving Zeke. It should be Zeke at this hospital with Bree, no matter how much the voice in the back of Kade’s mind argued the baby’s father had more of a right than anyone else. However, Bree was in love with Zeke. They’d been about to marry and raise the baby together.
Why did the thought burn a hole in the center of Kade’s chest? Zeke didn’t know the baby wasn’t his. The news would have shattered him, broken his heart. Zeke had been head over heels in love with Bree, and a piece of Kade had wanted her for his own.
“I gotta go,” he said, cutting off those heavy thoughts before the unfairness of the situation could take root in his soul.
“Okay,” Annmarie said. “Maybe I’ll see you around then.”
Considering the fact that she lived in the same trailer as his sister, she could bet on that fact. “See you soon.”
Annmarie smiled, waved, and then reclaimed the driver’s seat. Rinty sat dutifully next to her. He did fine with adults. Most of the time. Would he do as well with an infant?
Kade couldn’t abandon Rinty any more than he could walk away from his own child. Like it or not, Rinty was stuck with Kade.
Now, though, his family needed him, and he intended to be there for Bree.
After racing through the ER and being directed to the maternity floor, Kade took two steps at a time. He flew out of the stairwell.
“Hold on, sir,” an orderly said as he practically bum-rushed him. The husky worker blocked Kade. “Where do you think you’re going?”
“My…”Hell, what?“Bree Kyndall is in labor. I’m with her.” He did his best to look around the big guy and get a peek down the hall.
“Are you next of kin?” the orderly asked.
“Technically, no,” he admitted, not ready to share with the world that he was the father of Bree’s child. Not until the two of them had a conversation about what that meant, what his role would be, and how they would tell everyone the baby belonged to Kade and not Zeke.
“You can wait for her in the room over here.” The orderly motioned toward a door across from the nurse’s station.
Should Kade blast the truth? That he had every right to be in the room where his child was being born?
Saddle Junction was a small town. Rumors spread like vines.
He raked his fingers through his hair in frustration as his gaze landed on a tall male wearing scrubs and some kind of head cover hovering in front of a doorway down the hall. “Is that Bree’s room?”
The orderly followed Kade’s finger as it pointed. Scrubs immediately turned his back to them and quickly disappeared down the hall.
“Who was that?” Kade asked. For a split second, he thought about throwing a punch, but what would it accomplish? Kade might knock the big guy off balance, and he might even throw him to the tile floor, but Bree’s room was being protected. He should probably be happy about the fact.
The orderly shrugged. “Probably someone doing their job.”
“I won’t keep you from doing yours then,” Kade said, realizing he might be endangering Bree and the baby by distracting the orderly who’d been assigned to keep everyone, including him, away from her.
What use was Kade to anyone, especially to those who needed him most?
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