Page 89 of Wyoming Promises
She smiled at his pale face. But unless it held more confidence than she felt, he wouldn’t gain much courage from her expression.
“Pour some in the basin,” she said. He set one bucket on the floor and hefted the other. Steam frosted the mirror, obscuring his firm jaw and scarred cheek.
The strike from Ike’s gun handle had cut a gash along his neck, but the bleeding looked to have stopped. He should have ice to keep swelling at bay, and perhaps even a stitch or two.
Grace struggled on the bed. “Too soon, too soon,” she moaned.
Bridger would have to wait.
She washed her arms to the elbows and dried them on a clean towel before moving to the end of the bed.
Bridger paced near the head, out of Grace’s line of sight. “What do I do?”
She nodded to a bowl with a limp rag. “Keep her cool and calm.”
He moved stiffly to the stand and wrung the cloth before placing it across her forehead at an awkward slant. He patted Grace’s shoulder as she murmured, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. “You’ll be fine, Miss Grace. Lola’s here, and she’s the next best thing to the doc, all right?”
Grace nodded, eyes squeezed tight.
“Soon you’ll look back at this day and be plenty proud your baby was helped into this world by the first lady doctor in these parts.” His gaze locked on Lola’s, and he smiled.
Lola focused on the task at hand, but the notion filled her with warmth. Papa was gone, and Pete and Mr. Anthony. But the man responsible would find his eternal justice, even if he escaped a far more lenient one on earth. No one could hold her back. It was up to her to push forward and see where the Lord might lead.
The baby’s head started to crown and she adjusted the sheets. “Get ready to push, Grace!”
A glance at Bridger found him gripping Grace’s shoulder as tightly as he did the bedpost. “Miss Grace, if it’s all right by you, this would be a fine time for us to pray.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Bridger slumped in Lola’s rocker with an ice bag on his neck and watched sunrise glow through her window. Frank lay on the davenport, long legs sprawled to the floor in a position anything but comfortable. His soft snore testified to the fact it didn’t prevent sleep.
Jake paced across the braided rug. Bridger had heard husbands describe the wait of childbirth, pacing outside a door and the long hours of uncertainty and helplessness. All that paled in comparison to the way he felt before Jake made it back with Doc Kendall in tow. He escaped just before the baby made its appearance.
The vision of Lola preparing to deliver a wee one left him with almost as much awe as the sight of Grace in labor. Birth may be a terrifying event to most men, but he counted it a mighty privilege to behold Lola’s confidence.
Jake ran a hand through his hair, making it stand on end. “What’s taking so long?”
Bridger rocked forward and removed the cold pack from his neck. “They said everything’s fine. They’ll call us soon as the baby’s ready. Relax.”
The creak of footsteps upstairs punctuated his words. Lola’s skirts swished against the stair rails. She peeked around the bottom with a smile as wide as the Tetons. “Doc says you can come up for a quick hello if you stay quiet.”
Frank roused, the quilt that covered him slipping to the floor. He rubbed his eyes. “All of us?”
Bridger caught her gaze, a thrum of excitement in his chest. She winked. “All of you.”
They bounded up the stairway, Frank leading the way to the room where he paused to allow Lola’s entrance. Bridger grabbed his sleeve at the last moment. “I think you may want the privilege of the first look, Jake,” he said, nodding him through the door.
The marshal grinned like a boy with his first puppy and went in.
Silas Kendall washed strange-looking tools in the basin, then pushed his glasses along his nose and smiled when the troupe of them bounded in. “Looks like you all had quite a night.”
Lola shushed him from the head of the bed, where she stood near Grace. She ran a tender finger over the baby’s wealth of dark hair and along its unmarred cheek before she handed the bundle to his mother. Strange warmth tingled deep in Bridger’s chest at the sight, bearing a dream of his own children...with this woman at his side to build a family and home.
Exhaustion lined Grace’s face, and yet she held a new beauty as she took the tiny baby wrapped in a snug blue blanket. “Gentlemen,” she said, her voice soft and raspy, “let me be the first to introduce you to my son, Peter Franklin Capland McKenna—Cap for short. I am certain he is pleased to make your acquaintance.”
The baby’s round face crumpled with a strong cry.