Page 69 of Saving Shepperd

“I would love for you to know her. She’s the sweetest baby, I swear. Of course, not at three in the morning when all she wants is to nurse.”

I took the swaddle as carefully as possible and moved the blanket away from her angelic face. She was absolutely perfect and made a little squeaky sound as I readjusted her in my arms.

“She looks so much like Elijah, huh?” Hannah asked.

“Definitely. But I see a lot of you in her too. What color are her eyes?” I asked since the baby was sleeping.

“Well, they’re still blue. We’ll have to wait to see what happens there, but I’m secretly hoping she got his.”

Her husband had piercing ice-green eyes that were so unusual and striking, it was the first thing you noticed about the man. And that was saying a lot since the guy was as beautiful as a human could be.

“Her name is Elissa.”

“So pretty,” I commented, not really knowing what else to say.

We sat down on a moss-green velvet sofa that was so plush and comfortable, I wanted to curl up with this little baby and nap alongside her.

Hannah was explaining the origin of the child’s name while we got situated.

“It’s a combo, really, of Elijah’s name and Mom’s. I always liked the name, so it just worked out.” She shrugged with a little smile.

We were just making small talk, and we both knew it.

So I mustered the courage to talk about what had been on my mind. “I wanted to talk about what happened yesterday.” I waited for her to say something, but she was quiet. “Would that be okay?”

She nodded but still didn’t speak. This woman had as many triggers as I did and was probably steeling herself for a tough conversation.

Finally, Hannah asked, “Do you remember what happened?” She waited for me to slowly shake my head and said, “Yeah, me neither.”

I fussed with the baby’s blanket again.

“Elijah told me what he knows, but I can’t really piece much together,” she said. “Something happens when I’m in bad situations like that, and I completely shut down. He has theories.” She chuckled. “But he basically has theories about everything.”

Her words were filled with so much love and adoration, and it made me think I wanted to look like that to the outside world when I talked about Law. Maybe not with the intensity I saw in her features, because she and her man had been together a lot longer, but I wanted what she had in her relationship.

And what a revelation that was. I spent most of my life being jealous and resentful of Hannah. She got all our parents’ attention. She was the one the entire family would uproot plans for. She was the sister all the girls wanted to be friends with and all the boys wanted to date. I lived a lifetime of the world according to Hannah.

Now, here I was, still wanting what she had, but for the first time being ecstatic about it. I saw her life and her relationship as goal-worthy, not a cause for jealousy. Damn…it felt so good to see the difference for the first time.

Little Elissa stretched and made the cutest face. Unfortunately, there came a deafening wail hot on the heels of the cuteness overdose, so I quickly handed her off to my sister. She maneuvered the baby and her top like she’d been doing it her whole life, and the baby nursed contentedly in no time.

“Motherhood looks good on you,” I said honestly. “That little lady clearly has your lungs though.”

“Elijah says the same thing. I don’t think that’s all bad, though. If she’s going to look exactly like him, it’s only fair she sounds like me, right?” she said while stroking the baby’s wispy hair.

“So, these theories…” I trailed off, hoping she’d open up a bit more about our previous conversation. I needed to get to the bottom of what was going on with me, and her too. If she had answers, or at least a good place to start figuring it out, I wanted to hear them.

“I don’t know how you deal with it, but when someone starts telling me what they think I’m dealing with in here”—she tapped her temple with her free hand—“I get pretty defensive. It doesn’t feel good when people are always trying to fix me, you know?”

“Oh, I understand that probably more than you can imagine,” I muttered, but the way she held my gaze after I said it, I knew she heard me loud and clear.

“So, I processed what he was thinking might be going on with me. And mind you, this wasn’t an overnight type of discussion… I checked it out with my therapist.”

“Was he right?” I asked, feeling close to some answers.

She rolled her eyes and groaned. “Of course he was.” The comment started with a playful inflection but turned melancholy by the end. “Yeah, he was spot on, actually.”

“Can you explain it to me?” I asked genuinely.

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