“What? What did she say?”

“You don’t want to know. I’m sure she’s just shocked. Hopefully she’ll come around.”

Walt’s voice dropped. “You don’t have to protect her. I know she can be difficult.”

“Believe me, I’m not protecting her. I’d have to like her to want to protect her. Right now she’s on the generic Christmas card list, you know, the one you have to send even though you don’t want to.”

Walt paused. “You still send out Christmas cards?”

Laughing, she moved the computer off her lap and left her palm over the baby bump. “You need me.”

“Yes, I do.”

She liked that. “Guess what I bought today?”

“A minivan.”

She cringed. “Lord no. But an SUV of some sort might need to make the list. My tiny Beemer will be a pain with a car seat.”

He laughed. “What did you buy?”

“A new wardrobe. Guess who started looking pregnant this week?”

“Really?”

“I kept thinking, no way, it’s too fast, but then I looked at the calendar and realized that we’re nearly at the halfway point.”

“Little Horance isn’t giving you trouble, is he?” They’d started saying the most ridiculous names in an effort to spark the right one.

“Philomena is fine. Not one headache. I started moving stuff out of the guest room.”

“Wait until I get home. I don’t want you lifting anything heavy.”

She sighed, snuggled into the three pillows she had behind her. “When are you coming home?”

“I moved my flight up two whole days. I’ll e-mail you the confirmation.”

“You mean you didn’t use Fairchild again?”

“He offered, I said no. Oh, guess who I heard from?”

She liked this, the day-to-day anything and everything about a committed relationship. This she could get used to, even if Walt had to be away once in a while. “Who?”

“The FDA. Looks like the Eddy nasal foreign-object extractor has made it through their system. I’ve already had two competing companies asking for a contract.”

Walt was following his father’s example in some ways. No, it wasn’t with a cardiac clamp helpful for a cardiologist, but something every ER doctor came across in his or her career. Kids were notorious for shoving crap up their noses. Walt had used every device available at work. Some were successful, but his own modified paperclip device worked the best.

“That’s awesome. I’m so excited for you.”

“I’m pretty stoked myself. After four long years, it looks like I might have use for my dad’s lawyers after all. I don’t have the first clue about how to negotiate this kind of deal.”

“Have you talked to him about it?”

“No. I thought maybe if we visited over Christmas I could bring it up then.”

They’d talked about the holidays but hadn’t made any commitments. “Let’s get through Thanksgiving first.” And discuss Christmas and his mother later.

“OK.” He yawned.

“You need to go to bed, Doc.”

“I do.”

“I miss you.”

“Call me crazy, but I like knowing you do. I miss you and little Sebastian.”

Sebastian . . . good Lord, that was not going to happen. “Beatrice is right here when you get back.”

“Sleep well, Mama.”

“We will, Daddy.”

After hanging up the phone, she placed a hand over her belly. “We’ll find the right name for you, don’t worry.”

She picked up her laptop, placed it back on her legs. That’s when she felt it. A flutter deep inside her womb. She’d heard of butterflies in her stomach, but this was low and deep. “Oh, baby.” Dakota sat up and waited, when it happened again, she knew. Her child, their child, was saying hello for the first time. The desire to pick up the phone and call Walt passed and she grinned. “This is just you and me right now.” And that was perfectly fine. Walt wouldn’t be able to feel anything anyway, even if he were there.

Putting aside her work for the night, Dakota sat in the dark waiting for another flutter, another wave. Even though she was alone, she wasn’t. There was someone an entire country away thinking of her, and one much closer depending on her.

Life wasn’t so bad.

Thanksgiving plans changed the minute Walt realized how awful his mother had been with Dakota while he was in Florida. Neither one of them wanted to endure the drama of family, and luckily, they had friends who embraced them.

Walt helped Dakota and Mary with their luggage for the weeklong stay on the East Coast. Monica and Trent were doing the traditional turkey along with ball games. When they sent a plane to pick them up, Dakota jumped at the idea.

“Besides,” she’d told him after Monica offered, “my publisher scheduled a couple of interviews and New York is only a two-hour drive from Monica’s.”

“And we can go shopping,” Mary chimed in. “I love it when we go to New York without a conference. And then there’s ice skating . . .”

“I think I’ll take a rain check on the ice skating this year,” Dakota said.

The plans were sealed after that. Thanksgiving, New York, and shopping . . . the girls were happy and Walt could spend some of his time working out contract details with the Fairchilds when it came to Borderless Doctors. The job was paperwork heavy, lots of recruiting would happen after the holidays, lots of international travel. The good news was, Dakota was willing to travel with him, before and after the baby was born, so long as his destinations didn’t involve contagious disease outbreaks. As she said, she could write anywhere.