Morgan's Child (20 page)

"It is," Kate assured him. "And one more thing. The baby's father wants to marry me."

He walked to his chair and sat down. "You expect advice from me?" he asked abruptly, raising bushy eyebrows. "You get yourself into this bizarre situation and you think I can tell you what to do?"

"You can't tell me whether to marry him or not, but I—um—I don't know if making love would be good for the baby," she said.

"Making love? Why not? You think lovemaking is only physical? You have emotional needs, too, Kate. As long as you're healthy and there are no physical reasons to restrict lovemaking, why, I say go ahead! I'm more worried about your being stuck on that damned island with no way to get to the mainland than I am about dire consequences befalling you if you decide you want to make love," he said.

"Gump knows to watch for the SOS flag on the pole in front of the lighthouse like he did when Dad was sick," Kate told him, glad to ease him away from the topic of lovemaking. "And anyway, the baby's father—Morgan—lives on the island now, too. He's been, well, thoughtful and—um, helpful."

"Oh. I see. Well, maybe I should talk to the man about getting you away from there the last couple weeks of your pregnancy."

"Morgan wants to talk to you, but not about that. Besides, I've convinced him that I want to remain on the island. You know how important it is for me to stay there as long as possible."

"I know, I know. You and your father have always harbored some kind of fixation about that island. Nice place, but I'd as soon live on the moon—it's about as accessible. Well, where is this Morgan fellow? Did he come with you today?"

"He's in the waiting room," Kate said, and she went to summon him.

Morgan accompanied Kate into the small office, supremely self-assured as always, and sat in the chair beside her. Alan Thomas looked him up and down and seemed satisfied with what he saw. He said bluntly, "Kate tells me that you're the father."

"Yes," Morgan said. He met the doctor's gaze coolly and directly. "The reason I'm here is that I wanted to discuss being in the delivery room when the baby's born."

The doctor's eyebrows lifted in surprise as he considered this. "You are the father," he said finally. "It's certainly possible if that's what Kate wants. Although it's my experience that unless there's a bond of some sort between the mother and any nonmedical person in the delivery room, there's no point in it. No point in it at all. Kate tells me—oh, well, it sounds like there's a bond, all right. Why do you want to be in the delivery room—curiosity about the process?"

Morgan cleared his throat. "I care," he said in a low tone. "Not only about the baby, but about Kate as well."

"Hmm. So she told me. How do you feel about having him there with you, Kate?"

Kate's eyes sought Morgan's. He was gazing at her with tenderness and deep feeling. Her heart turned over. Why couldn't she simply agree to marry him? She almost couldn't pull her eyes away because she wanted to go on looking at him, at his dark hair, now tipped with sun streaks, and at his eyes, so full of his soul.

"I want him there," she said clearly, watching his face.

"So be it." The doctor shuffled the papers on his desk and plucked a few pamphlets out of the jumble. He presented them to Morgan with a flourish.

"Here, these are about what goes on in a delivery room. Read them and call me if you have questions," he said.

Morgan took the booklets and studied them briefly while the doctor turned back to Kate.

"Kate, your due date isn't until the end of July, so I'll see you again in two weeks. And remember, I'd rather respond to a hundred false alarms than allow you to have this baby all by your lonesome on Yaupon Island."

The doctor stood and offered his hand to Morgan. "I'm glad you came in, Morgan. Kate, you take care of yourself. I mean it."

When they were outside on the sidewalk, Morgan said, "Your Dr. Thomas thinks I'm an interloper."

"He likes you," Kate countered.

"He's a real character."

"He's a fine doctor," Kate said defensively.

"Mmm. Say, do we have to go back to the island right away?"

"Well—"

"Isn't there a nice quiet restaurant where we could eat an early dinner?"

"Preacher's Inlet is the kind of town where McDonald's is considered a trendy place," Kate told him, her lips curving upward in an amused smile.

"I was thinking of someplace where I can snap my fingers and they bring out a tray of desserts," Morgan said.

"I know of a steak house on the highway to Charleston. I've never been there, but I've heard it's first-rate," she said.

"Want to try it?" Morgan asked, holding his breath. Kate seemed much calmer now, and perhaps the doctor had reassured her.

"Sure," she said, smiling at him. "Let's. It's so early that I'm sure we won't need reservations."

When they arrived, they found that the steak house had recently been converted to a hibachi grill called Fuji, like the Japanese volcano.

Kate was dismayed and looked to Morgan for his reaction. She didn't think this was the kind of restaurant he had in mind.

"I love a sushi bar," Morgan said. "How about you?"

"As long as it doesn't include oysters," Kate said with a laugh as the hostess guided them to a room divided from the others by shoji screens and insisted that they take off their shoes. Kate clung to Morgan's arm in order to keep her balance as she slipped off her flats, and it wasn't easy to kneel on the little mat that was provided.

"Now that I'm down here, don't expect me to get up anytime soon," Kate warned him.

"Good, you can't run away," he said.

Outside the room where they sat was a salad bar built into what was supposed to look like a Japanese temple.

"Great," Kate said when she realized what it was. "I'll have to get up again to get my salad."

"I'll go for both of us," Morgan said.

"I hope you say that when it comes time for me to go to the rest room," Kate said gloomily, but Morgan only grinned and came back with two plates.

"By the way," he said after he had chewed and swallowed, "I looked around when I went to the salad bar and decided that you're easily the best-looking woman here."

"I wish you wouldn't say things like that because I don't know how to act when you do."

He leaned forward and spoke earnestly. "Acting is the last thing I'd expect of you. I like you because you're completely without pretension."

He rested his hand upon hers—a hand so strong that it conveyed instant reassurance. For a moment Kate imagined what being pregnant would be like without Morgan. In a flash she felt the loneliness, the rejection, and the anguish she'd experienced in the days following Courtney's announcement that she no longer wanted the baby. And then Morgan had come along to share the burden with her, and his involvement had changed everything. She smiled a tremulous smile. It seemed strange to have someone she could depend on—strange, but reassuring.

After dinner, which Kate thought was dismal but Morgan proclaimed passable, they unfolded themselves painfully from the floor mats and, after Morgan paid the check, walked to Morgan's car swinging hands. "Do we have to go back to the island?" he asked impulsively.

"If we don't we'll miss the last ferry," she said. One foot was still asleep, so she stopped and shook it, leaning on Morgan's shoulder.

"That wouldn't be all bad," he said as they resumed their walk.

"We aren't going to miss it, Morgan," Kate said with a stern look.

"What did you and your father do when you wanted to go to a movie? Or anyplace at night?"

"We hardly ever did. Sometimes we stayed overnight with Alan and Gloria Thomas, but it wasn't often necessary because there's only one movie theater in Preacher's Inlet, and they run to films like
Kung Fu Race Car Driver
and
Nightmare in Loch Ness."

"I used to think that the
B
in B movie stood for
bad,"
Morgan said, unlocking the car door and seeing that Kate was comfortably seated before going around to the driver's side.

"I've seen some passable B movies. Have you ever seen
Vulture Voodoo?"
she asked as they headed toward the dock.

"It couldn't be any better than
Sturgeon General,
where this two-thousand-year-old fish is thawed from a glacier and turns into a man who terrorizes pygmies in an African hospital."

"You're making that up!" Kate said.

"No, I'm not," he said, and Kate snickered.

Morgan parked the car in the lot near the ferry landing and they boarded the waiting
Yaupon Island Belle,
realizing only after they were seated that they were the only passengers going to the island on this, the last trip before the ferry ceased operating for the night.

"Gump's not here," Kate said.

"What do you mean? Isn't he required to be?"

"Yes, but if there are no passengers for the last ferry, he's been known to close up shop early." She stood up. "He's in the Merry Lulu," she said with conviction.

"You sound pretty sure of that," Morgan said.

"That's where he always is," Kate said. "We'll have to go drag him out of the tavern if we want to get back to the island tonight."

"We could enjoy the scenery for a while," Morgan answered, reluctant to break the happy mood that he and Kate shared.

"You don't understand. Gump will retire when the lighthouse becomes a museum. He's got a short-timer's attitude these days, and he's spending more and more time in the tavern. It's not good for him. Come on, let's go."

Kate set off at a fast clip across the ramp and down the dock, Morgan following reluctantly, and when they reached the Merry Lulu, Kate marched right in, brushing aside the curtain of fake fishnet at the door to survey the scene.

A clutch of sunburned tourists sat on plastic-and-chrome stools at the bar, which had been salvaged from a wrecked vessel. Kate and Morgan peered through air thick with the smell of beer and saw immediately that Gump slumped in a booth, snoring wheezily. He was sound asleep.

Kate poked his ankle none too gently with her toe. "Wake up, Gump," she said.

His eyes flew open and he opened and closed his mouth a few times. "Well," he said finally. "I was wondering when you'd get back."

"You don't look in any shape to take us to the island," Kate observed with a glint in her eye.

"The truth is, I had a few beers."

"Your eyes are as glazed as day-old donuts. You should be home in bed."

"Now wait just a minute," Gump said indignantly. "No reason I can't run you back to Yaupon Island. Kate, my girl, in your condition, you get too impatient." He struggled to a sitting position.

"Come along, Gump, I'll take you home. Morgan, give me a hand." Kate appropriated one of Gump's arms and Morgan supported the other.

"Where does he live?" Morgan asked as they guided Gump past the other curious patrons at the bar.

"Only a few steps away, thank goodness," Kate said.

"Thing is, Kate, I got kind of thirsty," Gump said querulously.

"Thing is, Gump, you get too thirsty too often," Kate retorted.

"Ridiculous," Gump muttered. "Purely ridiculous."

"He's always making much too merry at the Merry Lulu," Kate told Morgan under her breath.

"If it's any consolation, he's going to have a lulu of a hangover tomorrow," Morgan whispered back.

"He keeps a spare key on top of the doorframe," Kate told Morgan as Gump, weaving and mumbling, fumbled in his pocket at the door to the tiny bungalow where he lived.

Morgan found the key and swung the door open. Gump stumbled through a small door to the left of the entrance and landed on his bed, with Kate following and clucking as she removed his shoes.

"Shh," Kate warned Morgan, holding a finger to her lips as she backed out of the room. "Let's not wake him up."

"Wake who up?" Gump demanded, lifting his head and letting it drop back on the pillow. In less than a minute he was snoring again.

Kate turned out the light as they left, and she and Morgan stared at each other beneath the lone streetlight illuminating the deserted street.

"Well, now what?" Morgan said. "We're stranded in Preacher's Inlet until morning unless we want to look up the Pribble boy and ask him to run us over to the island. He did it for Courtney."

Kate could not face Willadeen Pribble again so soon after their last encounter. "I'd rather swim," she said.

"In an hour we could be at my place in Charleston," he said, holding his breath.

"Dr. Thomas lives one block over. He and Gloria—" Kate felt her face flush. She knew what Morgan was thinking, and she was thinking the same thing. Alone, together, anything could happen.

"My place in Charleston," Morgan said more firmly, and all thoughts of staying with the doctor and his wife flew out of Kate's head.

Anything could happen,
Kate thought again. And then she said, "Your place in Charleston."

* * *