Mike scooped her up and carried her inside. An orderly swooped down on them and took them straight up to labor and delivery, where less than two hours later black-haired, blue-eyed, David Michael Marshall entered the world screaming his head off to protest the indignity of it all.
By nightfall Donna and Darryl were gone and Jane and Mike were alone with their son. They regarded the six-pound-three-ounce baby with awe.
“How did we ever create anything so beautiful?” Mike wondered.
“He started out with a pretty decent gene pool on his daddy’s side,” Jane said pointedly.
“Better on his mother’s.”
“Do you want to hold him?”
There was no hesitation at all. Mike reached for him eagerly and settled into the rocker beside the bed. As Jane drifted off, the last thing she heard was Mike explaining to his son that he would always, always be there to protect him.
“You can count on it, son.” He glanced at Jane. “So can you.”
But she had already fallen asleep.
CHAPTER 7
Mike couldn’t seem to take his eyes off of his son. From the moment he’d held the baby in his arms at the hospital, he’d felt an incredible mix of love and pride and joy. Nothing had prepared him for the overwhelming sense of protectiveness that had washed through him.
David was so tiny, so astonishingly fragile, yet the boy could bellow loud enough to be heard from the hospital nursery all the way to Jane’s room. He was clearly going to be a kid who would make his displeasure known.
Staring down into that tiny face, Mike wondered if his father had felt the same way after the birth of each of his kids. It made him think about the way his father had struggled over the years trying to support his family, trying to protect them, always falling just a little short. He’d seen how defeated his father had looked every time he failed to be promoted, every time another job ended.
Mike had watched, felt his father’s pain and vowed never to let that happen, to always go the extra mile for his employers, to be so good at what he did that he’d be indispensible. He knew that was what was driving him now, that it was behind his refusal to give up the opportunity he’d been given in San Francisco. That job enabled him to give Jane and his son anything they wanted or needed. How could he walk away from it?
And yet that job was the very thing that seemed destined to keep them apart.
He sighed, glanced over at Jane and smiled. She was finally asleep. She had shown amazing strength and bravery in the delivery room. He’d been in awe of her. She deserved to sleep for a month and he intended to see to it that she got all the rest she needed for as long as he could. He just wasn’t sure how long that would be.
He’d told his bosses he’d be back in San Francisco after the baby’s birth. He’d assumed that would be sometime in late January. Since the baby was a few weeks early, they would expect him sooner, probably right after the first of the year.
He couldn’t help wondering what Jane’s reaction was going to be when he said he had to go. He wanted desperately for her to come with him, but nothing in the past couple of weeks had indicated she’d softened her stance against leaving her home. And he knew that jobs as satisfying and challenging as the one he had in San Francisco were too few and far between to walk away from.
Was he being selfish to want to hold onto that kind of career satisfaction and financial security for his family? Or was it Jane who was at fault? One thing was for certain: Neither of them seemed willing to break the stalemate. Love, which supposedly conquered everything, couldn’t seem to make a dent in this.
The door to Jane’s hospital room opened and a nurse stepped in just as the baby began to whimper in his arms again.
“Just in the nick of time, I see,” the woman said, reaching for the baby. “I’ll take him for his bottle and put him down in the nursery so you and your wife can get some rest.”
Mike relinquished his son with reluctance.
The nurse grinned. “Don’t worry. I’ll bring him back first thing in the morning. I promise. Believe me, you’ll be glad you’ve had a full night’s sleep tonight, once you get him home. This may be the last you have for some time to come.”
Mike sighed when they’d gone. She had no way of knowing that his sleepless nights would be over in a couple of weeks at most. Then Jane would be left with the full burden of two a.m. feedings and pacing the floor with a cranky baby.
How could he let that happen? How could he possibly leave the two of them behind and go back to San Francisco? What kind of pleasure and satisfaction could he take from a job that had cost him his brand-new family? What good was financial security if it cost him the very family he was trying to protect?
He was still struggling with that when he realized Jane was awake, watching him. His mouth curved.
“Hey, you, why aren’t you sleeping?”
“Where’s the baby?” she asked.
“Back in the nursery, so you can sleep. The nurse suggests we both take advantage of the peace and quiet while we can.”
“He’s okay, though?” she asked, gazing worriedly toward the door.
“He’s perfect.”
“You’re sure?”
“Janie, you saw him. He couldn’t be healthier or more beautiful.”
She struggled up. “I want to see him.”
He recognized the stubborn jut to her chin and gave up the fight. “Let me get you a robe. Donna ran out and brought one back from the mall. She said you’d want to wander out of here in the middle of the night and you couldn’t do it with your backside showing through that indecent hospital gown.”
“I knew there was
