Page 17 of Dusty

“Well?” He grinned again, telling her that he was going to have to let her know in a bit. That it took further investigation, and he was one very thorough man. “Good. Also, you should understand that they’re tender, too. Just a little, so be nice to them. Their job duties have ramped up.”

It took his addled mind a bit more to understand that she was serious. After having her ask him twice to be gentle, he pulled his head from her and looked at her. Dusty could see, too, that whatever had been going on then, she was happy about it. Then it hit him.

“You’re pregnant?” She nodded. “You’re going to have a baby. Is that why you’re tender? When?”

“Yes, I’m going to have a baby in about eight months.” She pulled his hand down to her belly—still flat from all the exercising she’d been doing in the service. “Not just any baby either, I’m going to haveourbaby.”

Dropping to his knees, unsure of himself for a moment, he laid his head on her belly and listened. His child was there, he had told himself. They had made a baby, and it was right there. Pulling Shipley closer, he tried to hear anything that would tell him that his child was growing there, but all he heard was her belly gurgle. Laughing, he looked up at her.

“I went to the doctor today. I thought about doing the test myself, but I was sure that if it came back positive, I’d think that I screwed it up or something. Then, when he called back with the news, I had to call him back twice to ask him if he was sure. I’m positive that he thinks that a loony is now working in the hospital and that he’s going to have to keep an eye on me so that when I do have the little guy, I’ll not lose him.”

“Him? You know it’s a boy?” She told him that she didn’t know, actually but she was guessing. “Twins? Do you suppose we’ll have twins like you and Amanda? I’d be happy with anything we gotbut I’d so love to have twin girls. That look just like you.”

He stood up and carried her to the bed. It was funny to him, even now, that he had taken so much care in lying her on the bed and covering her up. He also should have figured out that she wouldn’t allow him to pamper her too much before she put her foot down. His little momma was going to be a wonderful mother.

They had made love slowly that night. He couldn’t help but worry, too, about him poking at her. Of course, in his stupidity, he had said that to her that he didn’t want to poke anything important, and she rolled out of the bed laughing. It had been an innocent comment, made in the heat of the moment and she laughed at him for hours—more than likely was still getting a giggle out of his comment even now.

“Dusty?” He looked at his brother, wondering why he was in their bedroom for a second. “You look goofy. What the hell is wrong with you? You’re looking sappy, I was going to say, but that’s not it. You and Locke are forever looking sappy now that you’re married. What’s up?”

He couldn’t tell him. Dusty wanted to shout it to the world but he couldn’t. Not until Shipley had her first appointment. She wanted to be positive about the baby when they told everyone, and she was still, him, too, wondering if they had messed up the lab work or something like that.

“Just being sappy. Can’t a man be in love with his wife and get sappy over her? Shit, August, it’s the best feeling in the world to be sappy about someone.” He told him that he’d have to take his word for it. “You might feel this way soon enough. I know that I can’t help but hope that the rest of you get someone to be sappy over as well. You’ll love it.”

“Nah. I’m not a man for being caught up with one woman all the time. I want to play the field. If I do meet someone special, she’s going to have to be all right with me playing the field. I don’t mean sex but just having a great time with women. They’re the best things that have ever been created, but I don’t want to settle down with just one of them. There are just too many of them out there to be stuck with just one.” He told him he’d better not let Alex or Shipley hear him saying that. “No. You’re right on that. I think they’d castrate me or something. But I’m going to happily play the lone bachelor and make sure that no woman feels like I’ve shafted her by getting married. No sir, marriage and settling down is not for me.”

“I hope you change your mind.” He told him that he wasn’t. That’s just the way that he was built, to be a flirt and a lover of women. “I might just tell Shipley what you said just so that we can make fun of you when the right woman comes along for you. Boy, I’m going to tell her too. That’ll make for some fun conversations.”

As his brothers showed up, their orders were taken for lunch. Dusty wanted to make sure that they met at least once a month like this so that everyone was on the same page when it came to their investments. And he had some great news, too, to go along with the money that they’d made in the last quarter, thanks in part to him being able to think outside the box. And man had he thought outside the box a couple of times this quarter.

Too, if he was right and the other brothers found themselves wives, they’d be a bit more busy and with their own families. He wanted to savor this time with them so that they could still talk about just being brothers. Missing out on any part of their lives would be sad to him. He hoped too that they’d want to get together, too, even after they were old and gray.

After going over all the prior commitments that they had made in the form of investments, he told them about the hospital as well. They had gone ahead and cut the funding that they invested monthly and they were beginning to feel the pinch. He had letters from each of the other board members about how the hospital wasn’t working as well as it had before and that their bonuses, huge six-figure ones that he’d not known about, weren’t going to be as high this year.

“What I’ve done is cut the hospital down on their donations again. We’re now paying a little less than a quarter of what we were paying them for support over the last several years. If they’re getting bonuses because we’re donating money, then that has to stop. I feel that they shouldn’t be getting any kind of kickback, what I was told that it was, to get new doctors and nurses to come here because we’rea state-of-the-art hospital, simply because of our money. Also, The Grable Foundation will no longer be supporting the wing that was built in Martha’s name. I have set it up for maintenance work, but now the bulk of the money, less than half of it, is going to be set up as a fund for nurses and doctors that wish to further their career.” Locke asked if he had done this or he was going to. “I did it. There isn’t any reason that if we don’t agree on this that I couldn’t put it back the way it was before. But I will admit that I was angry when I heard the amount of bonus that were going to the board. The very fact that I only just happened upon it, me being a member as well, makes me pissed off. I wonder what the amount was when we were paying everything for those three months when the hospital was in the red.”

“I have the amounts.” Grinning at his brother, he told him that he had mentioned it to Alex, and they knew that she’d be right on top of things. “I was going to talk to you about it today anyway. I’m sure that we’ll all be happy about doing this. The amounts they got was staggering.”

After finding out what they were getting in a yearly bonus, he thought about taking more of the funding away. But Knox said that they had to be careful about taking everything away, or they really could make it difficult to have a hospital.

“I’ve already filed a motion for them to be fined. This is a not-for-profit hospital, and the fact that they’re taking profits makes me mad, too. So I’ve taken legal action against them. Also…” Knox handed out paperwork that he’d collected. “They’ll be fired for their parts in the class action suit against them as well. I think that we’ve been fair with these people and I keep coming back to the fact that we had to tell them that we’d stop funding if they didn’t fire a man that they were well aware of him stealing.”

“Good. That was going to be my next topic. Also, I’ve looked into this, and we won’t take the money that is awarded to us should we win, other than legal fees. It will all be funneled back into the hospital for funding, such as the nurse and doctor foundation—I don’t have a name for it yet so open to that. But I will say that the money awarded will be a godsend to a lot of people and their billings.”

After they all agreed that it would be a good way to keep their profits high at home, none of them were keen on the idea of shorting the hospital. It was a place that a great many people used and they were going to need it as well when their baby came along.

Chapter 8

August watched the man trimming around the hedges. It was part of his being here today to go and see the finished project of his design. He didn’t want to be here. It was like by coming back, every flaw that he’d made during the construction of the building and landscaping had been right there, front and center to him.

“Mr. Erickson, is there something that I can help you with? Did you find that we’ve done something wrong with the landscaping?” That was another thing that he hated. Being called Mr. anything, especially Erickson, as that had been what people had called his dad when he’d been alive. And his father no more deserved the respect that came with the title than he felt that he did. He told the man that he was just chilling out. “Well, that’s not a good person to chill out to. She’s been working here since before the building was put in the ground, I think. Her father and brothers all own the same landscaping company. It was one of the ones that your family recommended to do the work. I think that today, they’re just sprucing things up before the big meet and greet tonight. Let me think a moment. It’s an odd name. Anyway, Jack, there is the boss to the grounds here but she’ll pick up a tool and work just as hard as her men as well. Mostly men, too. Women, I’d like to say that they’re not cut out for this kind of labor and outdoor work but she’s right there as a shining example that I’m wrong on that. Or perhaps, what I really think is that she can’t fit in with real women and is compensating for it by being a heavy worker like the men. That’s what a lot of men think about her, too.”

“From here, I thought it was a man.” The man might have said something to his statement, but he caught eye of someone storming toward Jack—is that what he called her? And they didn’t look all that happy to be around either. “That looks like trouble. Who is that other person? Do you know?”

“That’s her mother. The woman striding toward her, I mean.” He nodded, watching as the woman was waving her arms around to no doubt catch the attention of Jack. “They get going at times but I’d hate to be anyone that tried to come between them. Mrs. Blackman—that’s it. Blackman Soils. Anyway, they’re a close-knit family, but they bicker all the time, too. The old man is set to retire soon. I’ve heard that he’s thinking of leaving it all to his oldest. Now, there is a man that I can get behind. Good guy with a club on the fairways, too.”

He didn’t comment as the woman, the missus, got closer to the younger Jack. She turned off the weed eater that she was using—he could no longer hear the hum of it from where he was— and stood waiting for the other woman to get to her. It didn’t look to him like either of them were giving an inch. While he wouldn’t say that they were arguing, it looked to him that the mother was giving her daughter an earful.

August had no idea why he thought that. He couldn’t hear their conversation. He wasn’t even close enough to tell if they looked alike, either. Didn’t know if there were raised voices. Nothing at all about the two of them sent him vibes that he could relate to the two of them. They were just two people that caught his attention on a lawn that he had designed. When the older woman, which he was assuming that as well, turned on her heel and left, Jack stood there watching her. When she turned to look at him, not even a glance but a full minute of looking in his direction, he felt the need to cover his balls. Again, he didn’t know why he felt that way. It was just as much there as his love for all things chocolate.

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