“Good night, gorgeous lady,” he said, and the phone went dark.
She hummed all the way into the house, where she dropped the first batch of packages in the living room and went back for more. When she’d brought the last of them inside, she found Jamie and Amanda sitting on the sofa. Jamie had poured two glasses of wine and one of water with a wedge of lemon.
“I’d brought movies with me to watch when I left a month ago. None of them are new, but they are some of my favorites. Have you seen Something to Talk About? It kind of seems fitting for tonight,” Jamie said.
“I heard about it, but isn’t that really old?”
“It is, but I think you’ll like it,” Amanda said.
“Then hand me that glass of wine and let’s get started.” Kate figured good wine and company would outweigh even a crappy movie. But it wasn’t, and by the end she agreed it was the perfect movie for the evening.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
At the end of the next afternoon, Kate was so hot, tired, and sweaty that she simply kissed Waylon on the cheek, told him she’d see him the next morning, and headed for the cabin. Big raindrops hit when she parked, and by the time she made it into the house, it was pouring so hard that she was drenched. Maybe that would break the heat.
“Well, you look like a drowned rat.” Amanda laughed.
A loud crack of thunder rattled the windows, and the rain came down in sheets, blowing hard against the house. “I swear, that one parted my hair,” Jamie said nervously. “August is showing July that it is a thing of the past.”
“I’m going to take a shower. Did y’all save any leftovers?” Kate kicked off her shoes and headed down the hallway.
“I made chicken Alfredo, and there’s still some in the skillet on the stove,” Jamie said. “Amanda cleaned today and made two loaves of bread and a chocolate pie.”
“You think we can keep her in this nesting phase for a little longer?”
“It would be nice, but when the baby comes and it’s up all night, nesting ends,” Jamie answered.
Kate shut the bathroom door and adjusted the water. The warmth beating down on her back felt wonderful right up until the electricity blinked once and then went off completely. Whatever water was in the small tank wouldn’t last through their showers if she didn’t rush, so she hurriedly rinsed the shampoo from her hair. She fumbled around for towels, wrapping one around her body and another around her head in the dark. When she opened the door, she went toward the flicker of light in the living room. Jamie must have found the candles.
“Got any more of those?” she asked.
“No, but there’s a flashlight in the kitchen drawer that you can use to get dressed,” Amanda told her. “What a time to get those stupid false labor pains again. I’m going to go lie down on my left side like they told me to do. It’s early yet, but after a day of cleaning, I feel like I can sleep until morning.”
“Good night, then,” Kate said.
“I’ll take that flashlight when you are done with it,” Jamie said. “Gracie and I are going to turn in, too, and I’m going to use the light to read books to her.”
“Take it now. The candle will throw off enough light for me to find my nightshirt,” Kate told her.
With the wind sounding like a freight train coming down the rolling hills and the rain pounding on the roof and against the windows, she couldn’t read, not even on her Kindle. Finally, she decided to call her mother, but there was no service. Next week she would check into buying a generator, because she was taking the sabbatical even if it pissed her mother off to the point that she fired her.
She fell asleep thinking about being there for the baby’s birth and for Gracie’s first day of school in the new place. At first she thought that she was dreaming, but then the screaming that had awoken her got louder. She sat up in bed so fast that her head spun in the semidarkness. Then she recognized Amanda’s voice yelling out her name. She stumbled across the hallway to find Amanda sitting up in bed and panting.
“This is the real thing. My water just broke. Call an ambulance. I don’t want to try to go to Wichita Falls. Just call the one from Seymour.”
“No phone service,” Kate said.
“What’s happening over here? Oh, my God!” Jamie asked. “Oh, no! Is it time? I’ll get dressed. We’ll have to drive her to Seymour.”
“How close are the pains?” Kate asked.
“Another one right now. Maybe a minute,” Amanda said.
“We’d better hurry, Kate. You drive. In a pinch I can deliver the baby on the way.” Jamie raced across the hall, throwing off her night clothes on the way.
Kate was so nervous that she headed out the door in her nightshirt and bare feet and had to run back inside to hurriedly dress in jeans and a T-shirt and slip on a pair of sandals. “You ever delivered a baby before?”
Jamie appeared out of her bedroom, fully dressed with Gracie in her arms. “One time I helped Mama Rita when her neighbor’s daughter went into labor like this. I mostly just watched, but I could do it if I had to. My van or your car?”