“I have an excuse.”
“What?”
“I’m pregnant.”
Nathaniel laughed.
“That covers everything now?”
“For several months.”
“Convenient.”
Their intimacy grew carefully.
Some nights they only talked.
Some nights Nathaniel slept beside her holding one hand across the enormous curve of her abdomen, waiting for movement he could not yet feel.
Then came the first unmistakable kick.
January.
After midnight.
Adeline suddenly grabbed his wrist.
“Nathaniel.”
He woke instantly.
“What?”
“Here.”
She pressed his hand against her lower stomach.
He felt nothing.
Then a tiny movement.
Not dramatic.
Just a flutter beneath layers of softness.
Nathaniel stopped breathing.
Again.
A small kick.
His face changed.
Adeline watched.
He whispered:
“Was that…”
“Yes.”
Nathaniel’s eyes filled.
He tried to hide it.
Adeline did not let him.
She took his face between both hands.
“You can cry.”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“It’s dust.”
“In bed?”
“Old house.”
She kissed him.
Nathaniel kept his palm against the place where the baby had moved.
Something happened to him that night.
Not all at once.
But enough.
He stopped thinking of the baby as Samuel’s.
Not because Samuel no longer mattered.
He did.
Adeline kept one photograph of him.
Nathaniel never asked her to hide it.
But the child became someone separate.
A person approaching them.
A stranger they would both meet.
February brought trouble.
Samuel Price’s brother arrived.
Caleb Price.
Tall.
Thin.
Angry.
He rode into Cole Ranch just before supper.
Nathaniel met him outside.
Adeline saw from the window.
Her face drained.
She stepped onto the porch.
“Caleb.”
Nathaniel looked between them.
Caleb stared at her enormous body.
Then at her stomach.
“So it’s true.”
Nathaniel’s shoulders tightened.
“What do you want?”
Caleb ignored him.
“Mother heard you married.”
Adeline said:
“I did.”
“To him?”
Nathaniel almost laughed.
“He’s standing here.”
Caleb glared.
“That baby is Price blood.”
Nathaniel’s expression changed.
Adeline stepped forward.
“You said it wasn’t Samuel’s.”
Caleb looked uncomfortable.
“That was before.”
“Before what?”
“Before you married money.”
Nathaniel’s jaw tightened.
Adeline said:
“You have no claim.”
“My mother disagrees.”
“Your mother told me to disappear.”
Caleb looked at Nathaniel.
“We’ll take the child after birth.”
Silence.
Nathaniel moved one step forward.
Caleb’s bravado weakened.