Page 37 of Loving Jake

Jake and Carly followed the nurse through the pristine corridors in silence.

Kimberly would be all right. Jake felt like shouting his joy to the world. She and the baby were fine. The baby. The muscles in his back stiffened. He took a deep breath and tried to control the tension that flowed through him. Carly said to trust her and he would, at least until he had the chance to speak to Kimberly alone.

“He’s so small.”

“He is, isn’t he?” Jake breathed in awe. He couldn’t remember seeing something so tiny, so beautiful, so perfect. He pressed his face closer to the glass separating visitors from the newborns.

A nurse noticed Jake and Carly admiring the latest addition to the nursery, and she walked over to where the baby laid curled on his side, his eyes pressed shut in slumber. The nurse wheeled the portable crib closer to the glass pane. She smiled and turned to say something to another nurse in the room, before she walked to the nursery door.

“Excuse me, Mr. Taylor?”

Jake hated to drag his eyes away from the baby. He hated even more knowing he had to clear up the misunderstanding of his relationship to Kimberly and the baby. “Yes?”

“He’s such a cutie, isn’t he? He’s doing great for a preemie. After we receive authorization from his pediatrician, we’ll arrange for you to hold him. In the meantime, I hate to bother you, but we have some forms that we need your signature on, including your son’s birth certificate form. It’s the top paper.”

The nurse pointed to an area down the hall. “There’s a table and chairs over there. Just bring the forms back to the nursery when you’re finished.” The nurse smiled warmly and handed him the clipboard. “Your wife is in room 205. Dr. Holloway left word that she can receive visitors from immediate family, but only for a few minutes at a time.”

“But you don’t understand?—"

“Take them, Jake.”

Jake swung his head toward Carly, and his eyebrows shot up toward his hairline. He searched Carly’s eyes, and she simply nodded.

Jake reached out and took the clipboard from the nurse. His hands trembled. His palms were damp with a layer of perspiration. What was going on? What in the hell was going on?

He glanced down at the clipboard in his hands, and his knees immediately went weak. He blinked rapidly, positive his eyes played tricks on him.

Certificate of Live Birth, it read.Zachary Taylor Urbane. Mother: Kimberly Rose Urbane. Father: Jacob Samuel Taylor.Jake felt his heart stop. “I, ah, how?”

“Come on, Jake. I think we better sit down.” Carly placed her hand on his forearm and gently led him down the hall.

“I don’t understand,” Jake finally said once they were seated in a small alcove not far from the nursery. The clipboard of papers, the birth certificate form in particular, were the only things that kept him from believing he was caught in some bizarre dream.

“Jake, all I can tell you is what Kimberly told me when she first found out that she was pregnant, and that was that you are the baby’s father. I believed her, and I’ve never had any reason to question her again.”

“But—"

“Jake, anything else you want to know, you’ll have to ask Kimberly herself.” She paused and rose from her chair. “Now, that looks like a big stack of papers that need your signature. Why don’t you get started on them while I go get us each a cup of coffee?” Carly smiled reassuringly at him and then provided him with a sisterly pat on the shoulder before she walked away.

Jake nodded automatically, but not before he realized he had done that a lot today, been ordered around and then nodded in acceptance. He had definitely lost his grip on reality.

Unable to help himself, his eyes drifted to the baby’s birth certificate. Correction. His son’s birth certificate, if Carly was to be believed. And if that was the case, he decided with fierce determination, then a few things on his son’s birth certificate needed changing. Specifically, his name.

Kimberly had named their son after his grandfather, somethingthat meant more to him than anything else she could have ever done for him. It was the baby’s middle and last name that Jake had a serious issue with, one he corrected immediately. He scrawled a line through his son’s name with quick precision, and with bold black letters, wrote Zachary Urbane Taylor. He would be damned if any child of his would not be a Taylor.

He spent several minutes staring at his son’s name before he continued through the pile of forms, signing his name and changing his son’s.

“Almost done?” Carly asked from behind him. She placed a large foam cup filled with coffee on the table for each of them.

“As a matter of fact, I’m signing the last one right...now.” Jake scrawled his signature on the last form. He lifted his head, and the strong coffee aroma filled his senses. “Thanks for the coffee. I definitely need it.” He took several large swallows of the hot drink before he placed his cup back down on the table.

“If you wouldn’t mind returning these papers to the nurse, I think I’ll visit Kimberly now.”

“Sure.”

Jake didn’t miss the apprehension in her voice. She was nervous for her sister, and although he had lot of questions for Kimberly, Carly had no cause for worry. He loved Kimberly, probably never realized how much until now.

He handed Carly the clipboard with the birth certificate on top. Inevitably, she would see the blatant changes he had made to it, but he didn’t care. Kimberly, and obviously everyone else, had decided that his child was not his concern. That was about to change. As of this moment, he silently vowed that he was in charge, of his sonandKimberly.

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