The Birth Place

“What the hell did you just do?”

“Hope came here asking for a job, Parker, and I gave her one. Okay?” Lydia raised her brows. “We owe her that much, don’t you think?”

He scrubbed a hand over his face. “We might owe her,” he said. “But I’m pretty sure we can’t afford to give her anything.”

“You’re overreacting, Parker. She’s only going to work here. That doesn’t mean anything. We don’t even know how long she’s going to stay.”

“It means I’ll have to see her every day.”

“So will I.”

“She could destroy The Birth Place—destroy you.”

“I know.”

“She could take Dalton away from me,” he said, his voice gruff with emotion.

“She’s not going to take Dalton away. She doesn’t suspect anything. She just needs a break.”

“You’re a fool,” he said angrily, and walked out.

Lydia stared after him. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

MILLS & BOON

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Dear Reader,

The comment I received repeatedly from people who read this book when it was only in manuscript form was that it’s “compelling.” I hope that’s true, because as I wrote it, the characters seemed to come to life, and the choices they made truly moved me. They prompted me to take a closer look at issues that have always intrigued me—what makes some of us do the things we do, believe what we do, accept or reject what others tell us is “right”? I don’t pretend to have the answers to those questions. But I certainly enjoyed watching Hope draw her own conclusions.

The research for this story took me to Hillsdale and Colorado City, a small community straddling the Utah/Colorado border and inhabited by polygamists. Yes, as hard as it is to believe, they still exist. Many of them live there, in rambling houses that are purposely left unfinished. The only grocery store is a co-op, to discourage trade with outsiders. There is one gas station and a sprinkling of businesses. The people are unique, and I think visiting there added color to my story.

It was a pleasure to be able to work with such talented authors as the five who have written the rest of the books in THE BIRTH PLACE series—Darlene Graham, Roxanne Rustand, C.J. Carmichael, Kathleen O’Brien and Marisa Carroll. I hope you’ll have the opportunity to enjoy their books, too.

I’d love to hear what you think of Sanctuary or any of my other work. Please feel free to contact me at P.O. Box 3781, Citrus Heights, CA 95611. Or simply log on to my Web site at www.brendanovak.com to leave me an e-mail, check out my news and appearances page, win some great prizes or learn about my upcoming releases.

Best wishes,

Brenda Novak

Brenda Novak

Sanctuary

To Thad, the youngest in the family

and a little boy who’s larger than life. Thad, you might be

only six, but you already possess the heart of a lion.

The way you deal with the difficulties you face each day

leaves me shaking my head in wonder and admiration. You

go, sweetheart—nothing can ever stop a man with courage

like yours. If you forget everything I’ve ever taught you,

remember this: my love is everlasting.

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

PROLOGUE

The Birth Place

Enchantment, New Mexico

June, 1993

LYDIA KANE had keen, shrewd eyes. Hope Tanner stared into them, drawing strength from the older woman as another pain racked her. The contractions were coming close together now—and hard, much harder than before. Her legs shook in reaction, whether from pain or fear, she didn’t know. She didn’t feel as though she knew much about anything. She was barely seventeen.

“That’s it,” Lydia said from the foot of the bed. “You’re getting there now. Just relax, honey, and breathe.”

“I want to push,” Hope panted. Though the baby wasn’t overdue, Hope was more than anxious to be finished with the pregnancy. Lydia had put some sort of hormonal cream inside her—on what she called a cervix. The older woman said it would send her into labor. But the baby was proving stubborn. The pains had started, on and off, at sundown, and only now, when it was nearly four o’clock in the morning, were they getting serious.

More of God’s punishment, Hope decided. She’d run away from the Brethren, refused to do what her father said was God’s will, and this was the price she had to pay.

“Don’t push yet,” Lydia said firmly. “You’re not fully dilated, and we don’t want you to tear. Try to rest while I see what that last contraction did.”

Hope stared at the ceiling as Lydia checked the baby’s progress. She was tired of all the poking and prodding, but she would never say so. Lydia might think her ungrateful. After being alone for most of her pregnancy, wandering aimlessly from town to town, Hope wasn’t about to do anything to anger the one person who’d taken her in. Lydia was so decisive, so strong. As much as Hope loved and admired her, she feared her a little, too. Lydia owned the birth center and had to be sixty years old. But she wasn’t a soft, sweet grandmotherly type, certainly nothing like Hope’s own patient mother. Tall and angular, with steel-gray eyes and hair, Lydia often spoke sharply, seemed to know everything in the world and had the ability to make other people—and apparently even events—bend to her will. She took command like Hope’s father, which was an amazing concept. Hope hadn’t known women could possess so much power.

“Is everything okay?” Hope asked, weak, shaky, exhausted.

“Everything’s fine.” As Lydia helped her to a few more ice chips, the pendant she always wore—a mother cradling an infant—swayed with her movements and caught Hope’s attention. Hope had long coveted that pendant. She craved the nurturing and love it symbolized. But she knew she’d never experience holding her own child so close. Not this child, anyway.

After mopping Hope’s forehead, Lydia went back to massaging one of her feet. Lydia claimed that pressing on certain points in the foot could ease pain—she called it reflexology—but if reflexology was helping, Hope certainly couldn’t tell. To her, its only value seemed to be in providing a slight distraction.

“It shouldn’t be long now,” Lydia assured her, but she kept glancing at the clock as though she was late for something and as eager for the baby to be born as Hope. “I’d transfer you to the hospital if I was the least bit worried,” she continued in the same authoritative voice. “This is dragging on, I know. But the baby’s heartbeat is strong and steady and you’re progressing. First babies often take a while.”

Lydia had once mentioned that she’d been a midwife for more than thirty years. Certainly after all that time she knew what she was talking about. But Hope was inclined to trust her regardless of her professional experience. It was men who always failed her—

Another contraction gripped her body. Biting back a tormented moan, she clenched her fists and gritted her teeth. She didn’t know how much more she could take. It felt as if someone had a knife and was stabbing her repeatedly in the abdomen.

Except for the music playing quietly in the background, the place was quiet. Parker Reynolds, the administrator, and the other midwives and clerical people who worked at the center were long gone. They’d left before Lydia had even induced her. She and Lydia were the only ones at The Birth Place. With its scented candles, soft lighting and soothing music, the room was meant to be comfortable and welcoming, like home. But this room, with its turquoise-and-peach wallpaper, Spanish-tile floor and wooden shutters at the window, was nothing like the home Hope had known. She’d grown up sharing a bedroom with at least three siblings, oftentimes four. If there were candles it was because the electricity had been turned off for nonpayment. And the only music she’d been allowed to listen to was classical or hymns.

“Good girl,” Lydia said as Hope fought the impulse to bear down.

At this point Hope didn’t care if she caused herself physical damage. She felt as though the baby was ripping its way out of her, anyway. She just didn’t want to displease Lydia. The ultrasound she’d had several weeks earlier indicated she was having a girl, and Lydia had promised that her daughter would go to a good home. Hope didn’t want to give her any reason to break that promise. Mostly because Lydia had painted such an idyllic picture of her baby’s future. Her baby would have a crib, and a matching comforter and bumper pads, and a mobile hanging above her head. She’d have doting parents who would give her dance lessons, help her with her homework and send her to college. When the time was right, they’d pay for a lovely wedding. Her daughter would marry someone kind and strong, have a normal family and eventually become a grandmother. She’d wear store-bought clothes and listen to all kinds of music. She’d feel good about being a woman. Better than anything, she’d never know what she’d so narrowly escaped.

Hope wanted sanctuary for her child. She wanted it more than anything. After her daughter arrived and started her princesslike life, it wouldn’t matter what happened to Hope.

She would already have given the only gift she could.

She would have saved her daughter from the Brethren.

“THE DEAL’S OFF,” Lydia stated flatly, entering her office cradling Hope’s new baby.

Fear nearly choked Parker Reynolds at this announcement. He glanced briefly at his father-in-law, U.S. Congressman John Barlow, who’d been waiting with him, before letting his gaze fall on the baby they’d come to collect. “Is something wrong?” he asked. “Is Hope okay?”

“Mother and baby are both fine, but—” she split her gaze between them “—it’s a boy.”

A boy…Parker’s heart pounded in his chest like a bass drum. A boy could change everything. “Does Hope know?”

“I haven’t told her yet, but—”

“Perfect!” his father-in-law interrupted. “You were worried how it would look to have Parker and Vanessa receive a newborn baby so soon after Hope gave birth. Now they won’t have to relocate, and you won’t have to hire a new administrator. There’s no chance of anyone putting two and two together.”

Torn, Parker shoved his hands in his pockets and turned toward the window. After two miscarriages, his wife had never been able to get pregnant again. Now her health was too bad to continue trying. She was ill and miserable and so depressed she couldn’t get out of bed even on good days. She claimed that having a baby would make all the difference, that it would give her the will to survive.

He believed it would. He believed it was his responsibility as her husband to save her somehow. But because of Vanessa’s health, there wasn’t an adoption agency anywhere that would work with them. This was his only chance….

“The baby’s sex played a big part in her decision to give up the baby,” Lydia explained.

“I don’t give a damn if it did,” John replied. “She can’t provide for a boy any easier than she can a girl. She’s a seventeen-year-old runaway, for crying out loud. What can she offer this child?”

Parker felt his commitment to what they were doing waver even more. Two weeks ago, when he’d approached his father-in-law with this idea, it had all seemed so simple. Vanessa needed a baby. Hope’s baby needed a family. Lydia needed money to keep the center afloat. But it didn’t seem so simple anymore. It seemed almost surreal.

“Hope deserves the right to make an informed decision,” he said.

“Like hell,” John countered. “She doesn’t deserve a damn thing. From what you told me, Ms. Kane has housed her and cared for her during the last two months.”

“I had no ulterior motives when I took her in,” Lydia said.

“I’m not here to argue about the purity of your motives,” John replied. “Just keep the bargain. I’ve already paid you the money.”

Lydia tightened her hold on the baby. “I’ll pay you back.”

“When?”

Parker knew that wasn’t an easy question to answer. For the past six months the center had been inches away from closing its doors. The money had been spent on payroll and utilities and supplies.

“As soon as I can,” she snapped.

“Considering that you pump every dime you have into this place, I don’t think you’re a very good credit risk,” John said. “And I don’t want the money back. I want the baby you promised us.”

Lydia looked beaten as she gazed around the office. “This center has been my life,” she said. “It’s what I’ve fought for and loved for more than thirty years. But this time I’ve gone too far. What we’re doing goes against everything I believe in.”

“What we’re doing?” John said. “You’ve already done it, Ms. Kane. You did it when you took my money.” He motioned impatiently with one hand. “But you’re making a bigger deal of this than it has to be. You’re not doing anything that’s going to hurt this baby’s mother. So you’ve told her you’re putting her baby up for adoption. In a way, you are. It might not be through a legitimate agency, but that doesn’t matter? You—”

“Doesn’t matter? How can you say that?” Lydia interrupted. “What we’re doing is illegal, Congressman. You, of all people, should know that.”

Parker’s father-in-law assumed his “political” face. “The legality of the issue isn’t the point here. The point is that this child isn’t in any danger. He’s going to a good home, and you and I both know it.”

Lydia stared down at the baby for a long moment before lifting her gaze to meet John’s. “Your daughter is ill. As much as I hate to say it, and as much as you two might not want to face it—” here she gave Parker an apologetic glance “—there’s a chance she won’t make it. That’s why she couldn’t get a baby through the regular channels.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Parker’s father-in-law thundered, forgetting his “let’s smooth this over” act. “I know my daughter isn’t well. That’s why I’m not about to tell her she won’t be getting this baby!”

Parker was watching their reflection in the glass, sometimes trying to see beyond the pane to the wooded landscape outside. He’d been tempted to jump in at several points and voice an opinion. But he wasn’t completely sure if he agreed with John or with Lydia. He knew how badly his wife longed for a baby. He wanted to give her one. But now that the tiny infant he was supposed to take home had arrived, he was more bothered than he’d expected to be by the fact that he had no legal or blood right to claim him—more bothered than he’d expected about lying to young Hope. There was something so fragile, so innocent about the girl. Her pretty face lit up whenever she received the smallest kindness. Though part of him trusted that a baby would somehow help his wife improve, the rest of him felt lower than dirt for taking advantage of a vulnerable girl’s desperation and trust—and letting his father-in-law buy something he had no right to buy. Especially because he’d grown up living just down the street from Lydia. He’d known her most of his life; she’d recruited him just after he’d graduated from college. He hated that he’d also taken advantage of her desperation to save the clinic.

“What difference does it make where the baby goes so long as he’s well cared for?” John asked Lydia. “If you put the baby up for adoption, there’s no guarantee he’ll go anywhere better. At least you know Parker and Vanessa will love the child and care for him as their own.”

“It’s still selling a baby,” Lydia said, her shoulders drooping.

“Then pay me back someday if it’ll make you feel better, but let Vanessa have her baby.”

Pivoting away from the window, Parker finally broke his silence. He understood Lydia’s pain, felt responsible for it. But they’d come too far to turn back. “Lydia, you know I’ll give this child everything I have. And he might make all the difference to Vanessa.”

She stared at him for several seconds before slowly crossing the room. “Then you’d better take him home,” she said. “And I don’t ever want to talk about this incident again. As far as I’m concerned, it never happened.” With that she swept from the room, leaving Parker holding his son for the very first time.

CHAPTER ONE

Ten years later

GRIPPING THE STEERING wheel until the knuckles of both hands turned white, Hope Tanner drove into the very last place she wanted to be: Superior, Utah, population 1,517. Part of the town immediately brought back fond memories—the family-owned grocery where, when she was little, Brother Petersen had often given her a licorice rope; the elementary school she’d been permitted to attend for two years, the place she’d discovered art and that she enjoyed creating it; the town hall, with its tower and four-sided clock, which had always infused her childish heart with a sense of pride.

But there was also the meeting house with the hard pews where she and her twenty-nine siblings had sat for hours each Sunday to hear the Holy Brethren extol the virtues of polygamy and communal living, or the “principle” as they called it; Aunt Thelma’s bakery, where they ordered the wedding cakes for each of her father’s weddings; the old barn where—

Briefly, Hope squeezed her eyes shut. Not that memory, she told herself. Not for anything.

It had been eleven years since she’d run away from Superior, eleven hard years, but she’d survived, and she had an education now, a steady nursing job and a small rental house three hours away in St. George. As much as she missed her mother, she would never have come back to this place if not for her sisters.

Steering the old Chevy Impala she’d bought from one of her neighbors through the intersection that marked the middle of town, Hope turned left at the park, the easternmost part of which served as a cemetery, and swung into the gravel lot. Because it was barely noon and most members of the Everlasting Apostolic Church were still in church, the park was empty. But soon it would be crowded with women and children and possibly a few men, those who weren’t sequestered at the meeting hall deciding who would give the sermon next week, whose daughter would become the plural wife of which elder, which family’s claim for more grocery money was based on need and which on greed. It was Mother’s Day, and on Mother’s Day, after worship, practically everyone came out for a picnic. If Hope was lucky, she might see her sisters. If she was extremely lucky, she might even have the opportunity to talk to one or more of them while her father and the rest of the Brethren were still at the church.

Hope’s hands grew clammy around her keys, and her heart seemed to rattle in her chest as she got out of the car and stepped into the shelter of some cottonwood trees, where she hoped to go unobserved until she was ready to venture forth. The smell of cut grass and warm earth permeated the air as butterflies, mostly black, fluttered from one daffodil to another. The gleaming white headstones in the neighboring cemetery seemed to watch her like a silent audience, waiting in hushed expectation for the drama of the day to unfold.

Turn around, go home, her mind screamed. What are you doing? You’ve spent eleven years recovering from what happened in this place. Eleven years, for God’s sake. Isn’t that enough?

It was more than enough, but Hope wouldn’t let herself leave. Maybe Charity, Faith, Sarah or LaRee wanted out.

Maybe, sparse though her resources were, she could help them.

Fortunately, it wasn’t long before she saw what she’d been waiting for—a group of women and children walking down the street, carrying bowls and baskets and sacks of food. They entered the park near the jungle gym in the far corner, and the children immediately scattered, laughing and calling to one another as the women made their way over to the picnic tables. Dressed in plain, home-sewn dresses that fell to the ankles and wrists—somewhat reminiscent of pioneer women—they wore their hair high off their foreheads and braided down their backs, and no makeup.

The Brethren frowned on any show of vanity or immodesty, just as they opposed modern influences that might entice their women and children away from the church, influences such as education or television. Consequently, few if any of these women had a college degree. Most hadn’t graduated from high school. To outsiders, they pretended to be sisters or cousins to the men they’d married while living cloistered lives with very defined roles. Men worked and gave what they earned to the church, had the ultimate say in everything and took as many wives as they pleased. Women, on the other hand, were relegated to cooking, cleaning and bearing and raising children; they were threatened with eternal damnation if they were too “selfish” or “unfaithful” to share their husbands.

Hope was one of the rebellious. She hadn’t been able to make herself comply with her father’s dictates, hadn’t been able to live the “principle.” Not for God. Not for her beloved mother. And certainly not for her father. In the minds of her family, her soul was lost. And maybe it was. Hope wasn’t sure if she was going to hell. But she felt pretty sure she’d already been there.

She crept closer, staying among the trees as she began to recognize people. A thick-set woman in a blue floral dress looked vaguely like the first Sister Cannon, while the tall crone was probably one of Garth Huntington’s wives. Raylynn Pugh Tanner, the youngest of her own father’s wives—at least when Hope was around eleven years ago—stood in the middle of the chaos, as plain as ever with her wire-rimmed glasses and thin brown hair pulled into a tight braid. She wore a dress loose enough to make Hope believe she was either pregnant or had just delivered a baby, and was busy pointing to a willowy girl that Hope, at first, didn’t recognize. “Don’t put the desserts on that table, Melanie,” she called. “Can’t you see we don’t have it covered yet?”

Melanie? Hope’s fingers dug into the trunk of the tree she was using both for support and for cover. Melanie had been a baby when she’d left. Look at her now! How many more children had her father had? How many more women had he married?

The last Hope knew, Jedidiah Tanner had six wives. Sister Joceline—Hope had always been required to call her father’s wives “Sister” because they were all daughters of God and sisters in His kingdom—was his first wife and had given him four boys and five girls. Sister Celia had followed Joceline, even though she was a few years older. Hope had once heard that Celia had difficulty conceiving. Or it was possible that after the initial newness of the marriage wore off, her father had simply refused to visit her bed. They’d never seemed particularly compatible, which made plural wives quite a convenience for a man. Jedidiah could simply go to the other side of the dilapidated duplex Celia lived in or to the trailer across the street and bed down with another of his wives. In any case, Celia only had two children, both girls. Sister Florence, her father’s third wife, had six boys and two girls. Marianne, Hope’s mother, had born five girls and, to her father’s tacit disappointment, no sons.