The Cowboy And The Baby. Marie Ferrarella

and grandchildren in turn. “Can’t you people see that he’s been through a lot, too?” Turning toward Cody, Mrs. Moretti smiled at him, the perennial, protective mother. “Don’t pay them any mind, Cody. They’re just looking for something exciting to talk about over dinner tonight. You don’t have to say anything if you don’t want to.”

      “There’s not much to talk about,” Cody told her, taking a seat and glancing around at the others. He was grateful for the woman’s concern, but he was also very familiar with and understood a small-town mentality, especially since he’d become one of Sheriff Rick Santiago’s deputies. “I was running late and only noticed the truck on the side of the road when I heard screams coming from it.”

      “She was on the side of the road?” Wade Hollister, one of the patients, asked.

      Cody humored the man, despite the fact that he felt the answer was self-evident. “Well, she was in labor so I don’t think she really felt like she was able to do any driving.”

      Rusty Saunders scratched his head. “Hell, what was she doing out there in her condition, anyway?”

      Cody laughed quietly as he eased Layla out of Mrs. Moretti’s arms. The woman looked at him skeptically, and then smiled and surrendered her precious package.

      “I didn’t get a chance to ask her,” he told Rusty. “I was kind of busy at the time. We both were.”

      To underscore his point, he smiled at the baby in his arms.

      “You delivered that?” Nathan McLane asked Cody. He was as close as possible to a permanent occupant at the Murphy brothers’ saloon. His weathered expression was creased with awe.

      Cody had never been one to embellish on a story or give himself credit if he could avoid it. He shrugged now. “I was just there to catch her. She more or less delivered herself,” he told Nathan and the rest of the waiting-room occupants.

      Travis Wakefield, ever the practical man, was obviously trying to work out the logistics to Cody’s story. He’d gone to the window to look again at the truck Cody had driven over.

      “You leave your truck back there?” he asked. “’Cause the one out there sure isn’t yours.”

      That was when Cody suddenly remembered. He looked up. “My horse.”

      “What about Flint?” Red Yakima asked, getting up and moving closer to Cody.

      Cody had risen to his feet as well and now walked over to the bay window, scanning as much of the area as he could make out from his present vantage point. Flint was nowhere in sight.

      “I couldn’t tie him to the back of the truck because I had to drive fast,” he told Red. “I told him to follow me.”

      “You ‘told’ him to follow,” Rosie Ortiz, one of the occupants in the waiting room, repeated skeptically. “And what, he said, ‘Sure’?”

      “Horses are smarter than most people,” Red tonelessly informed the woman. He turned his attention back to Cody. “You want me to go out and see if I can find him for you?” the man offered.

      Cody turned the matter over in his head. He could either take the man up on his offer or turn the infant back over to Mrs. Moretti—and he did want to hang around to make sure Devon pulled through. There was a chance that she might not, although he really didn’t want to entertain that idea for the baby’s sake.

      He had no idea why, but he felt that if he remained here, she wouldn’t die. He knew he was being superstitious, but everyone around here had some superstition they clung to. His was that if he walked out, the door would be left open for bad things to transpire.

      Cody looked at the weathered ranch hand he had known for most of his life. “I’d appreciate that, Red.”

      “Don’t mention it,” the man told him, waving a dismissive hand. “I’ll stop at the sheriff’s office and tell them you didn’t fall into a ditch or off the side of the cliff, put Rick’s mind at ease,” Red added matter-of-factly.

      “I owe you.”

      Red smiled for the first time. “Hey, buy me a beer next time we’re at the saloon together and we’ll call it even.”

      “You got it,” Cody agreed, although in his opinion it didn’t really even begin to repay the man for taking the trouble to track Flint down.

      Red walked out of the clinic.

      Less than a minute later, Holly came out, an apologetic expression on her face. She looked around the waiting room at the patients.

      “It’s going to be a while, I’m afraid,” she told them. Braced for complaints, she was surprised when none were voiced. “The doctors have got their hands full. Your names are all on the sign-in sheet. If you’d like to come back tomorrow, you’ll be seen in the order that you arrived today,” she said, once again looking around the room, waiting for some sort of descent or grumbling.

      “How long is ‘a while’?” Oral Hanson wanted to know, obviously weighing his options.

      Holly answered honestly. “At least a couple of hours.” Honesty forced her to add, “Maybe more.”

      The man shrugged his wide shoulder. “Got nothin’ I’m doing anyway, not since my boys took over the ranch. Seems they’re always telling me to ‘go take a load off’ anyway, so I might as well do that and stay put.” Smiling at the baby in Cody’s arms, he added, “I’d like to find out if the little one’s mama pulls through.”

      Most of the other patients were not of the same mind as Oral. They had busy lives to get back to, so they decided to leave the clinic and return the next day as suggested.

      But a few, including Mrs. Moretti, remained. When Cody looked at the older woman quizzically, Mrs. Moretti said, “I thought maybe I’d stick around, give you a little help if you need it. You’ll want to have your hands free if they call you back in there.” Lowering her voice, she added, “You know, just in case.”

      It was obvious to Cody that Mrs. Moretti had already convinced herself that there was more going on between him and the woman he’d found today.

      Anita Moretti wasn’t a gossip by any stretch of the imagination, but the woman did enjoy a good story, both hearing one and, occasionally, passing one along. He couldn’t fault her for being human, even though what he knew she was thinking was entirely a fabrication.

      And Cody knew better than to protest or try to set the woman straight. Saying anything to the contrary would only get him more deeply entrenched. Mrs. Moretti would go on believing what she chose to believe.

      Connor had always maintained that when you lost control of the situation, the best thing to do was to politely say “thank you” and then back away as quickly as possible.

      “I appreciate that, Mrs. Moretti,” Cody told the woman.

      Because he was agitated and didn’t know what to do with himself, Cody began to walk the floor. Layla seemed to enjoy the rhythmic movements and before long obligingly dozed off.

      Making no secret of the fact that she was watching him, Mrs. Moretti smiled and gave him the thumbs-up. “You’re a natural,” she told Cody, beaming.

      “I’m not doing anything but walking,” Cody pointed out.

      He heard the door behind him opening. Turning, he was about to tell whomever had come in that service was temporarily on hold until further notice.

      But he didn’t have to say anything. It wasn’t a new patient. Red had returned to the clinic.

      “Couldn’t find Flint?” Cody asked the older man. Red hadn’t been gone very long, but, then, Cody had no right to expect him to scour the area. After all, Flint belonged to him, not Red.

      “Didn’t really have to look,” Red replied. “That is one loyal stallion you’ve got yourself there, McCullough. Saw him coming right