One More Dance Roxanne Rustand (best non fiction books of all time TXT) 📖

“We’d get ourselves established, and in a few years we’d have a nice house and would start thinking about a family. Not now. Dear Lord, not now.”

“You are serious.”

“Am I laughing?”

After a long silence, Jared dropped his chin to her shoulder and rested his cheek against hers. “Tell me how you feel about this. Really.”

“Scared. Worried. Confused.” She swallowed hard. “Afraid of what you’re going to say next.”

Another silence stretched so long that she finally squeezed her eyes shut and gathered the remnants of her courage. “Your mom told me how ending your other engagement cost you a very advantageous marriage. How that will hurt your future. Or your sister’s. And now...now this. I am so, so sorry. If...if you want your freedom, I’ll understand. I can be out of here in a few hours, and—”

“Stop.” His voice was low and fierce. “Unless that’s what you really want.”

“I know you’re an honorable guy. It’s one of the things I love about you. But if you don’t want to saddle yourself with all of this, I’ll understand.”

“Just tell me one thing. Do you want to keep this baby?”

Aghast, she pulled away and turned to face him. “You don’t need to even ask that question. I may not have experience with anything except a dysfunctional family, but there’s no way I could ever end this life inside me. And there’s no way I could ever give it up. So you see? This is a good chance for you to leave—before things get messy and complicated.”

He swore softly under his breath. “You don’t know me at all if you think I’d walk out on you. I’m your husband.”

“And that can be fixed. Just ask your mom and her friend Lionel.”

Jared rested his hands on her shoulders. “There’s nothing I need to ask him. It’s you and me, babe—now and forever.”

Her heart lifted on an ember of hope. “Really?”

He sighed with obvious relief. “We can make it. It’ll maybe be a little tough for a few years, but hey—we’ve got scholarships and good loans, and with our part-time jobs...” He kissed the tip of her nose. “We’re in this together for the long haul. And hey—this way, we’ll be young enough to really enjoy our family.”

She leaned against him, absorbing his warmth, savoring the solid muscle of his chest. Was it possible that things could work out? “I love you,” she whispered against his shirt. “There couldn’t be a more wonderful guy than you in the entire world.”

He rocked her in his arms, as if slow dancing to music that only he could hear. “You and I

are more alike than you know. Neither of us had it easy as kids. But we’re going to do this right.”

THE NEXT EIGHT MONTHS passed in a blur. Late-night study sessions. Tests and papers and labs. Spring term followed by summer school, and then the start of the fall semester. By then, Kate felt as unwieldy as a Holstein ready to deliver triplets.

The summer job she’d started in June at a nearby drugstore had helped keep groceries on the table, but now unseasonably hot and humid September weather had descended. The air conditioner at the store couldn’t keep up, and even with the fans blowing and the windows open at home, she felt miserably hot and sticky. She spent more and more hours at the library, just trying not to melt.

She’d been able to hide her pregnancy until this month with baggy flannel shirts over loose overalls—a common uniform for ag students on campus, luckily. But T-shirts were more revealing, and the manager had frowned at her today, then muttered something about cutting her hours.

Lifting boxes in the back storeroom probably hadn’t been the best idea, but she’d been desperate to prove that she could still pull her own weight.

With temperatures approaching ninety and the humidity at least that high, even the library didn’t provide enough respite, so she’d gone home to study.

She stretched, glancing at the clock and wishing Jared was home. But he’d gone to a two-day law conference in Chicago and wouldn’t return until tomorrow night. Lucky guy—conference hotels were invariably air-conditioned to almost chilly, which would feel just about right today.

She winced as a muscle cramp tightened across her lower back.

Despite lifting those boxes earlier, she’d been careful to avoid doing anything that might endanger the baby.

Another muscle spasm radiated across the same area. More intense this time—and a frisson of alarm shot through her.

It was too early. The doctor at the free clinic had given her a due date four weeks from now.

And worse, Jared wasn’t in town.

She swallowed a bitter laugh as images from recent TV commercials flashed through her thoughts.

Perfect, sunlit nurseries.

Doting grandparents, smiling into a lace-festooned bassinet, hugging the daughter who had given them a precious grandchild.

There’d be none of that for her.

When she’d first called her mother to tell her about the pregnancy, Francine had blearily said it was bad news and would ruin Kate’s life.

Sylvia, her usual friendly and loving self, had been appalled at this additional complication that would ruin her precious son’s future. She’d been coldly polite over Easter and the Fourth of July, and she’d never called for any warm and happy chats about the baby, though Jared always brought the subject up anyway, each time they saw her. Julia—wide-eyed and subdued—had clearly heard their mother’s diatribes at home and kept her own careful distance from them.

Nope, it was just the two of them, and now Jared wasn’t even here. But this was just a simple muscle spasm, nothing more. It had to be that. Please, Lord...

But that "spasm" came back again, and again. And for the first time in her life, Kate knew she’d come up against something she couldn’t face alone.

ALONE had certainly needed clarification. Even with an army of strangers surrounding her, she’d never felt more alone.

Kate’s contractions started in earnest an hour later, then rapidly escalated to a steady eight minutes apart. By three o’clock in the