a-soft-place-to-fall by Rakhibul hasan (free e books to read .TXT) 📖

a greedy woman would ask the gods for one more chance at heaven.

"You should buy yourself one of those home pregnancy tests," Sweeney suggested once Annie was back behind the counter.

"Can you see me trying to slip one of those things by Ceil at Yankee Shopper?" Annie had to laugh. "She would know the results before I did."

"So would her next-door neighbor," Sweeney admitted. "I'll buy one for you." Annie shook her head. "You don't have to. I have an appointment with Ellen this

afternoon."

"Have you told Sam yet?" "There's nothing to tell."

"There will be," said Sweeney. "Honey, this time I think you've hit the jackpot."

#

Annie told Claudia she was going for her annual pap smear and exam and Claudia feigned a ladylike shudder.

"One day they'll learn how to warm up their instruments," Claudia said, "although probably not in my lifetime."

"Ellen's pretty good about that," Annie said as she slipped on her jacket and grabbed her purse from the hook. "I think she's been on the receiving end of cold metal a few times herself."

"You take your time, dear," Claudia said. "I'll watch the shop. In fact, it's been slow today. Why don't you take the afternoon off? You must have a lot to do for your seminar."

Annie looked almost embarrassingly relieved. She kissed Claudia on the cheek, grabbed her jacket from the hook behind the door, then flew from the store with wings on her heels.

"Bless you, Annie," Claudia whispered as the door swung shut behind her daughter-in-law. "Bless you and your baby."

#

The waiting room was empty when Annie arrived. She hung up her jacket then let Janna, the receptionist, know she was there.

"Good timing," said Janna, grabbing Annie's chart. "We had a cancellation. Dr. Markowitz can see you right now. Leave us a specimen and we'll get started."

Annie followed her down the pale blue hallway to Room #2. Janna stuck the file folder in the plastic holder and gestured toward the screen.

"Change, put on the robe, you know the drill. The doctor will be with you before you get out of your pantyhose." Janna winked and hurried back to her desk.

How many times had gathered up all of her hopes and dreams and brought them into this cold impersonal room to be inspected? She could see herself as a bride of eighteen, a wife of twenty-three, an exhausted and scared woman of thirty, sitting there on the edge of the paper-covered table with her feet dangling and her hands folded in her lap, waiting

for the doctor to tell her what she already knew. I'm sorry, Annie, but you're not pregnant.

She had no reason to believe this time would be any different.

"Good to see you, Annie." Ellen Markowitz knocked twice as she opened the door. "How're you doing?"

"Pretty well," Annie said, noticing the goose bumps racing up and down her bare legs. "New hair style?"

Ellen wrinkled her nose. "Hope springs eternal. Saranne at Hair Today swears she understands curly hair but I'm not convinced. I think I look like the love child of Bernadette Peters and Don King."

Annie laughed out loud. "I think it looks terrific," she said. "I should pay Saranne a visit myself."

Ellen slipped her glasses on and scanned Annie's chart. "So you're here for your annual pap and checkup." She scribbled a note. "When was your last period?"

Annie scrambled for a date. Her periods, her finances, her life – everything had been screwed up since Kevin died. "I don't know exactly," she said. "Late August, maybe."

Ellen looked up. "You're sure." "Fairly so."

Ellen flipped some pages. "Your cycle ranges anywhere from 26 days to 45 so we're still in the ballpark."

See, Galloway? You're late. You've been late before. You'll be late again.

"Any symptoms I should know about?"

Annie hesitated. "I've been tired a great deal during the day then I have a burst of energy at night."

"I hear you're working on some statuary for Warren's museum. That must keep you pretty busy."

"It does," she said. "I'll admit to being more than a little obsessed with the project." "Well, that could certainly explain the fatigue." She met Annie's eyes. "Anything else

I should know about?"

Annie took a deep breath. "Morning sickness." She forced a laugh. "Or maybe I should say sickness in the morning."

Ellen nodded and scribbled another note. "One second." She lifted the wall phone and pushed two buttons. "Janna, did you run the Galloway specimen yet . . . okay . . .

great . . . add a number three, please . . . thanks."

This isn't really happening. I'm almost forty years old . . . I've just managed to pull my life back together . . . I've found a wonderful man who has never once said a word about kids . . . .

"Lie back and relax," said Ellen as she went over to the sink to wash her hands, "and we'll see what's happening."

The paper crinkled loudly as Annie settled herself in position. Men hadn't a clue how awkward the whole thing was. Did any of them realize the way women obsessed about proper footwear in the stirrups? Bare feet? Socks? Shoes? Silly thoughts designed to take her mind off why she was lying there on that table with her heart even more exposed than her body.

Ellen positioned herself at the foot of the table. "Scoot down a little more . . . good . .

. let's see . . . there are some cervical changes in keeping with early first trimester . . .

tender here?" "Yes." "Here too?" "Ouch! Yes."

"Your uterus is slightly enlarged which may or may not mean anything." She pulled off her surgical gloves and tossed them in the receptacle. "You can sit up, Annie."

Easy for you to say, Ellen. "So what do you think?" she asked, wishing her voice didn't sound so vulnerable. "Am I --?" She couldn't say the word. It held way too much power.

The intercom buzzed before Ellen could answer. The doctor lifted up the receiver, listened, asked a question, then hung up. "Congratulations," she said to Annie. "You're going to have a baby."

#

Ellen Markowitz had seen many reactions to a positive pregnancy test during her six years as an ob-gyn. Some women cried with joy. Some cried from sorrow. Some women cursed their husbands or boyfriends or birth control method of choice. Some women had no reaction at all beyond a stolid acceptance of the will of God. She had seen young couples embrace each other with such abandon that she wondered if they were trying to conceive a second child on the spot. She had seen older couples start fighting over a peri-menopausal surprise.

But she had never seen the look of almost holy wonder that she had seen in Annie Galloway's eyes.

Annie's joy was so deeply felt, so deeply private, that Ellen's eyes teared up and she turned away and pretended to scribble some notes on her chart. It wasn't often that she envied one of her patients, but that afternoon she envied Annie Galloway from the bottom of her heart.

#

Hall had just parked his Rover in the reserved spot near the door to the Medical Arts building when he saw Annie dash down the steps. Her hair was loose, a long tangle of waves and curls that glinted gold and red in the fierce autumn sunshine. The look on her face – Jesus, he could live to be two hundred and never forget the look on her face as she darted past him. She glowed from within. There was no other way to say it. She had always been beautiful to him but now she was radiant. Her hair, her skin, the ripe lushness of her body. But now there was something else added to the mix, a sense of wonder and magic that could only mean one thing.

"Annie!" He stepped out of the Rover and waved to her.

If she saw him, she gave no indication. She floated past him and drifted across the parking lot in the direction of the main street and Annie's Flowers.

He grabbed the sheaf of papers on the passenger seat then locked the car. His source in New York had come through with more information than he had anticipated, none of

which cast Sam Butler in a good light. If any of the allegations mentioned in the notes were true, there was a good chance Butler would be serving some serious jail time very soon.

"'Afternoon, Doctor Talbot." Janna favored him with a friendly smile. "Your three-fifteen called. She'll be a few minutes late."

He nodded and headed back toward his office, the image of a radiantly glowing Annie Galloway still in the forefront of his mind. He couldn't ask Ellen. There was nothing professional about his concern and they both knew it. Nobody would stop him if he plucked Annie's chart from the mix and browsed through it but he wasn't sure he would like the man who did such a thing. Then again he had done a lot of things these last few weeks that he wasn't sure he liked. Digging into Sam Butler's background, for one.

He flipped the lights on in his office and was shrugging out of his jacket when Ellen popped out of her office across the hall.

"You're late," she said with mock disapproval. "Forget to set the alarm?" "Twins," he said, tossing his packet of papers down on his desk. "Newborn or age of consent?"

He couldn't help but laugh. "The Pelletiers delivered early." "Healthy?"

He rapped his knuckles on the side of his credenza. "So far, so good. They'll need a little hospital time until they build up their weight, but it all seems routine."

"Great." The furrow between her brows seemed to deepen despite the good news. "After all they went through trying to conceive those babies, they deserve a happy ending."

"Don't we all," he said, settling down his desk. "I saw Annie Galloway on her way out."

Was he crazy or was Markowitz glowing now too? "Did she say anything?"

"No," he said, "I don't think she even knew I was there." Ellen nodded but said nothing.

"Is she okay?"

"She's fine," Ellen said as a smile broke across her narrow face. "She's just fine." And that was how he learned that the woman he had loved and lost was going to

have a baby by a man who might be welcoming in the New Year behind bars.

#

Annie hurried past the window of Annie's Flowers, past the book shop and DeeDee's Donuts and ran straight for her truck. She turned the key and slammed it into reverse without giving it even a second to warm up. She would make it up to the Trooper one day but the need to be with Sam was too strong to deny.

A baby . . . I'm going to have a baby!

She repeated the words out loud and she still couldn't quite believe they were true. Seven months for now, on a warm day in June according to Ellen, she would give birth to a baby whose ribbon of DNA would link her and Sam together forever. A baby whose very existence was proof of their love.

"Any questions?" Ellen had asked her before Annie left the office. "Yes," said Annie. "How on earth did this happen?"

Ellen, bless her heart, bypassed the easy joke for an honest answer. "I don't know," she said. "All I know is that there couldn't be a luckier baby in the world."

A baby . . . a tiny, helpless, demanding infant whose needs and desires would take precedence over everything for a long time to come . . . .

"A miracle," she whispered. A one-in-a-million kind of miracle sent to two people who had believed their chance at real happiness had passed them by.

That's how you feel, Galloway, but are you so sure it's how Sam feels?

They had only talked about