Hoping

Ben Wade

Ben felt uncomfortable sitting next to Liana in the little intensive care room. He'd always had a touch of claustrophobia and this room was way too small for his liking. It was bearable, though, because he was too worried about his wife to be anywhere else.

Liana had all sorts of tubes and wires going into her body. The doctor had told him that she had lost a large amount of blood and that she was in shock. "She's young and strong and her chances are good," he'd told Ben. "But you should know Mr. Wade that there's also a chance she might not make it."

Ben had just stared at the man. Since he and Liana had been married, any time he'd thought of losing her, it had been because she'd leave him, not that she'd die. He couldn't even believe there might be a possibility.

He looked at her face, pale as porcelain on the pillow. Usually, it was tanned and flushed from spending time outside. Carefully, to avoid everything attached to her, he stroked back her dark hair.

"Darlin'," Ben said softly. "You gotta come back. That little girl needs you. I need you." He didn't think he could have said that to her if she'd been awake and looking at him. And he was amazed that it was true.

He thought back to when he'd first married her in the States, right before they'd come here. The marriage that hadn't been legal, although she hadn't known it. Still didn't. That had been a calculated move on his part. To make sure that her land and everything else that belonged to her had belonged to him. To make sure that SHE belonged to him. Ownership. Possession. It had been nothing more.

In all those months since then, though, things had changed. HE had changed. She'd become more than that. And he hadn't even noticed it.

He thought about that baby girl that he'd left downstairs with the midwife. And with Dan Evans to watch over her for him. She needed her mama. The same way he'd needed his mama when he was little, but she'd left him. There'd been nothing he could do to prevent it. Was there anything he could do now to prevent his daughter's mama from leaving her?

Taking Liana's still hand in his own, Ben talked to her again. "Darlin', we got this beautiful baby girl downstairs and you ain't even seen her yet. You come back to us now."