Jamie nodded.
“Afterward, you’ll be drowsy from the pain medication and bleeding quite a bit,” Freda explained. “You’ll need to stay here at the clinic for several hours so I can keep an eye on you and then you can recuperate over at the ranch house for a couple of days.”
When she was finished at the clinic, Jamie walked over to the security office. Lester must have been watching for her. The door opened, and he walked over to his truck. “You walking or riding?” he asked.
“Walking,” she said and headed toward the stretch of road that led to the ranch house. She settled into a brisk pace then took a deep breath of the cold air, willing it to clear her head of all but pertinent thoughts. As her grandmother would have said, it was time for her to fish or cut bait. She needed to figure out how she was going to navigate herself through the next two months of her life.
It was not going to be easy.
Jamie still had no qualms about the practice of surrogate motherhood per se. Her disillusionment began when she realized that trust was not to be a part of her relationship with Amanda and her husband. And Jamie had always found it odd that the baby was going to be born on an isolated ranch in the middle of the Texas Panhandle. Amanda had gone to such lengths and expense to have this baby. Why would she allow it to be born in such a remote location without an anesthesiologist, obstetrician, and pediatrician in attendance? To some extent, Jamie had been able to put aside such concerns when she met Freda and saw the clinic. Freda was a certified midwife and no stranger to delivering babies. Deliveries sometimes turned into true medical emergencies, however. Why take the risk? Why not have the baby delivered in a hospital in Amarillo?
There was only one rationale that Jamie could see for having the baby at the ranch. If the baby were delivered in a hospital, she could screw up the whole deal by refusing to sign the adoption papers and simply walk out the door with the baby in her arms. Legally no one could stop her. At the ranch, she knew that the baby would be whisked away the minute it was born. Even if she refused to sign the papers, she knew that she would never be allowed to see the baby, much less leave with it.
Of course, if Amanda really was having a baby herself, it shouldn’t matter all that much if Jamie backed out of the deal-unless the baby she carried was Amanda’s grandchild.
God, it was all so confusing. At times her brain felt as though it had turned into mush.
Just have the baby and leave, she told herself. The words had become her mantra as she walked up and down dirt trails and gravel roads, as she paced up and down her living room, as she ate her solitary meals and lay sleepless in her bed.
There was nothing she could do to change the terms to which she had agreed. And she didn’t really want to do anything to jeopardize the life she had planned for herself. The child she carried was Amanda’s child and not her own, she told herself for the umpteenth time. She didn’t want a child at this point in her life. She wanted a chance to live for herself.
Except that Mary Millicent possessed a passkey left over from the days when she was the chatelaine of Hartmann Ranch and had come tiptoeing into Jamie’s corner of the castle. And the things Mary Millicent had told her made her afraid.
But Mary Millicent was a crazy old woman who disliked her own children, Jamie reminded herself. How could she possibly put any credence in her tales?
She remembered Lenora’s warning that powerful people have methods of getting their own way and that if Jamie signed the contract, she must be absolutely committed to upholding her end of the bargain and never looking back.
Just have the baby and leave. That was the only safe and sensible thing to do.
She tried to imagine what would happen following the baby’s birth. After she had signed away her legal rights to the child, Miss Montgomery or Freda probably would take him to Amanda.
How would she receive the money owed to her, Jamie wondered. And how soon after the delivery would she feel well enough and strong enough to leave? Not days. No way was she waiting around here for days. Jamie wanted to have her car packed, gassed up, and waiting for her in front of the clinic. With Ralph waiting in Freda’s office.
She imagined herself telling Miss Montgomery that she had decided to leave. Now. This very afternoon. After all, the housekeeper had no legal jurisdiction over her. She couldn’t lock her up in the tower and chain her to a bed until she delivered the child.
Except that was exactly what Jamie was afraid of.
Just have the baby and leave, she told herself once again as she arrived at the security gate. Ralph darted under it and stood waiting on the opposite side. Lester slowed as he approached and pointed the opener at the gate.
As soon as the gate had swung open a few feet, Jamie strode through. When she reached the portico, she climbed the steps and went inside without bothering to wave at Lester.
It was well past lunchtime. Her tray would be waiting for her. But instead of returning to her apartment, she marched down the corridor to Miss Montgomery’s apartment, where the housekeeper usually spent the early part of the afternoon.
Jamie knocked on the door and waited.
The housekeeper opened the door. Jamie could hear the voices of soap-opera characters dealing with their daily allotment of crises.
“What is it, Jamie?” Miss Montgomery asked in a reasonably pleasant tone.
“How will I be paid after the baby is born?”
Miss Montgomery frowned. “I’m not sure.”
“Well, I need to know,” Jamie demanded. “I want it taken care of as soon as the baby is born. I don’t plan to stay very long afterward.”
“I will inquire and let you know,” Miss Montgomery said, already pushing the door closed.
Jamie put her hand on the door. “And I want my car brought back over here. I want to start packing things and loading them into the car.”
“Isn’t it a little early for that?” the housekeeper asked.
“I want to be ready to leave when the time comes.”
“I will see if that is possible,” Miss Montgomery said.
Jamie shook her head. “I want the car brought over here this afternoon,” she said, making her point by carefully enunciating each word.
Miss Montgomery’s eyes narrowed.
“I would like to know about the money by tomorrow,” Jamie continued. “I want it wired to my bank in Austin as soon as I give birth, and I need official documentation that arrangements have been made for the payment and also for the annual stipend I am to receive.”
“I will see what I can do,” the housekeeper said curtly.
Jamie turned and headed back down the hallway, Ralph hurrying along behind her. She waited until she was halfway up the back stairs before allowing herself to breathe.
As she ate her lunch, she went over her conversation with the housekeeper. Maybe Miss Montgomery didn’t know how or when Jamie would be paid because no arrangements had yet been made. Maybe arrangements were never going to be made.
And what if Amanda wasn’t pregnant at all?
“Stop it!” Jamie yelled at herself.
Ralph jerked awake and began whimpering. Jamie opened her arms, and he jumped up beside her on the sofa then crawled onto what was left of her lap. She put her arms around him and buried her face against his neck. “Everything’s okay,” she lied. “We’ll always be together, you and me. I’ll always take care of you.”
Once she had terminated the conversation with Jamie, Ann Montgomery went back to her soap opera. But even though her favorite character was trapped in an abandoned mine shaft, she found herself wondering if she should call Gus and tell him about Jamie’s demands.