Danae Brooks buttoned her shirt and slipped on her shoes, trying desperately not to get her hopes up. The dressing rooms in her doctor's office were more like something in an upscale spa — heavy fringed drapes curtained private alcoves decorated with framed art prints, and flameless candles flickered on tiny side tables. Soft strains of Mozart wafted through the building. Of course, for the fees her obstetrician charged — or rather, her "reproductive endocrinologist," as his nameplate declared — the luxuries felt well deserved.

She gathered her purse and continued to the window at the nurse's station.

Marilyn — she was on a first-name basis with most of the nurses by now — looked up with a practiced smiled. "You can go on down. Dr. Gwinn will be with you in just a minute."

Danae had quit trying to decipher the nurses' demeanor. So far, month after month, every smile, every quirk of an eyebrow, every wink, had meant the same thing: she wasn't pregnant. Again. Still.

She walked down the hall to the doctor's sparse office and was surprised to find him already sitting behind his desk. She forced herself not to get her hopes up, but she'd always had to wait for a consult before. Sometimes twenty minutes or more. Could it be?

"Come on in, Danae." He looked past her expectantly.

"Oh. Um ... Dallas isn't with me today. He ... couldn't get off work." Of course he could have if he'd really wanted to.

"I understand. No problem. Come on in and have a seat." She took one of the duo of armchairs in front of his desk, feeling a bit adrift without Dallas beside her.

Dr. Gwinn scribbled something on the sheaf of papers in front of him, then slipped them into a folder before looking up at her. She knew immediately that there was no baby.

"Well ..." He pulled a sheet of paper from the folder he'd just closed and slid it across the desk, pointing with his pen at an all-too-familiar graph. "Nothing has changed from last time. Your levels are still not quite where we'd like to see them, but we're getting there. I'm going to adjust the dosage just a bit. Nothing drastic, but you might notice an increase in the side effects you've experienced in the past."

"It hasn't been too bad."

He steepled his fingers in front of him and frowned. "That's good, but don't be surprised if the symptoms are a little more marked with this increase."

Dr. Gwinn wrapped up the consultation quickly and suggested she call his office if she experienced any problems on the new dosage.

For some reason, his warning encouraged her. Maybe this boost in meds would be the thing that finally worked. As quickly as the thought came, she tried to put her hope in check. Almost every week there was something that got her hopes up only to have them dashed again.

But Dr. Gwinn sounded so hopeful this time. Of course, they'd all been hopeful. For more than three years now, a string of clinics had offered endless hope — and had happily accepted their checks for one fertility treatment after another. But despite test after test, a string of doctors in a string of clinics could not seem to find any reason she and Dallas could not have a baby together. "Unexplained infertility" was the frustrating diagnosis. They'd done just about everything but in vitro. Or adoption. And though Dallas was adamant they would not take that route, Danae was beginning to think it might be the answer. The only answer.

At the reception desk, Danae slid her debit card across the counter. Another three hundred dollars. She dreaded Dallas seeing the amount in the check register. She wasn't sure how long they could keep draining their bank account this way before her husband said, "Enough."

The woman handed her a receipt. "We'll see you in two weeks, Mrs. Brooks."

"Thank you." She forced a smile and sent up a prayer that next time she wouldn't have to endure the shots and medication — because she'd be pregnant. But it was getting harder and harder to be optimistic. And she wasn't sure how long she could hold up under repeated disappointment.

She shoved open the door as if shoving away the discouraging thoughts. Or trying to. The late September air finally held a hint of autumn, and she inhaled deeply. As she unlocked the car door, her phone chirped from her purse. Dallas's ring. She fished it out of the side pocket. "Hey, babe."

"Hey yourself. How'd it go?" The caution in his voice made her sad.

"Same ol,' same ol'. But he upped my dosage a little."

An overlong pause. "It's not going to make you bonkers like the last time they did that, is it?"

"No." She hadn't meant to sound so irritated. She'd kind of forgotten the incident Dallas referred to — like the worst PMS in the history of the world according to her husband. Which was funny given she'd never really experienced PMS, so how would he know? It was probably an apt description though. "That wasn't even the same drug I'm on now, Dallas. And even if it was, everything went back to normal as soon as they cut my dosage back again. Remember?"

"I know ... I know." His tone said he was tiptoeing lightly, trying not to start something — and trying too hard to make up for not coming with her to today's appointment. "So, do you want me to pick up something for supper on my way home?"

"No, I'm making something." No sense adding expensive takeout to the financial "discussion" that was likely to happen after he saw the checkbook. "Maybe scalloped potatoes? It actually feels like fall out here today." She held up a hand, as if he could see her testing the crisp air.

"I need to go, Danae. We'll talk tonight, OK? But you did remember I'm going to the gym with Drew after work, right? Can I invite him to eat with us?"

"Dallas ..." She gave a little growl. "It's Tuesday. You know we're going to my folks tonight."

"Oh, yeah. Sorry, I forgot."

"Did you think we were only having scalloped potatoes for supper?"

"I didn't think about it. Sorry. Well, I'll invite Drew another night then. We can —" A familiar click on the line — the office call waiting signal — clipped his words. "Hey, I've got to take this. See you tonight."

"Sure." She spoke into the silence, feeling dismissed. Sometimes she thought Dallas preferred his brother's company to hers.

She climbed into the car and buckled up, imagining the day when she'd be buckling a precious baby into a car seat first. Please, God. Please. After three years, this shorthand had become the extent of her prayers.

Pulling out of the parking lot, she was tempted to come up with an excuse to get out of going to the inn tonight. She'd almost come to dread these weekly family dinners for fear of all the questions about their quest to have a baby. But the truth was, her family had grown weary of the subject and had mostly quit asking. Maybe that was just as well.

She rarely volunteered information to her parents and her sisters now that it had become obvious they'd run out of encouraging things to say month after month.

For the first year after they'd started seeking medical treatment, Dallas hadn't even wanted to tell anyone. But she convinced him that she needed someone else to confide in. Once tests had confirmed that the fault was hers alone, and that Dallas was fully capable of fathering a child, he had been more willing to talk with friends and family about their issues. Now she sensed he was losing interest in the whole subject as well.

She turned toward home. Home. It still felt a little odd to turn into the new neighborhood. The divided, stone entrance was an elegant introduction to the upscale development. She and Dallas had traded houses with her sister in August — almost two months ago now — and she still felt like she was going to visit Corinne and Jesse whenever she pulled into the driveway. She and Dallas had traded a paid-off mortgage for a house payment. They'd put a nice down payment on the house, and they could afford it, but it had definitely made things a little tighter than they were used to. And made writing checks for the fertility treatments even more painful.

She pulled into the garage and pressed the remote to lower the door. She loved this house and was slowly adding her own touches to the decor. The trade of homes had been a real blessing to Corinne and Jesse at a time when they needed to downsize quickly, and Danae had no regrets. She and Dallas had been looking for a house big enough for the family they hoped to have, and this place was perfect.

Corinne had given up a lot to make it possible for Jesse to go back to school and get a teaching degree. Danae felt for her sister. She couldn't imagine Dallas suddenly deciding to switch careers after almost a decade of marriage — and three kids. Now the Penningtons' family of five was crammed into the little two-bedroom house she and Dallas had owned. And yet, they seemed happy. She sensed it was still hard for Corinne to see someone else in the house that had once been her dream home, and it had strained the sisters' relationship, but Danae thought time would take care of that. Hopefully Jesse would have a teaching job in a couple of years and things would get back to normal for all of them.

And hopefully, hopefully, she and Dallas would have a baby by then. Because if they didn't, she wasn't sure she could go on believing in a loving, caring, fair God.

* * *

It was only nine thirty when the last of the kids pulled out of the driveway, the taillights of the minivan casting a red glow on the new sign Grant Whitman had just erected in front of the Chicory Inn. Watching the vehicle disappear down Chicory Lane, he patted the head of the chocolate Labrador panting at his side, and inhaled the crisp night air.

He caught the scent of wood smoke from their nearest neighbor's chimney half a mile up the lane. Tonight was probably the last time the weather would allow them to eat outdoors, although Audrey usually managed to talk him into one last wiener roast before they stored away the lawn furniture and put the gardens to bed for the winter.

He sighed. "Come on, Huck. Let's call it a day." He bent to scoop up the last of the stray paper cups that had blown off the tables and caught in the corners of the vine-covered pergola. The trumpet vine enveloping the structure was beginning to turn a rainbow of autumn colors.

Grant had instituted these Tuesday family dinners more than a year ago, and he still wasn't sure whether the kids truly enjoyed them or merely tolerated them. The evenings had gone well throughout the summer, but already, now that Jesse and Corinne's oldest was in school — and Jesse too — Grant saw the handwriting on the wall. Now there would be early bedtimes to worry about, and at least during the school year, his kids would understandably want to cut the evenings short.

Chase and Landyn's twins were starting to be a handful, too, now that they were semi-mobile. He smiled, thinking of little Emma and Grace. The babies were growing faster than he could keep up with. Born nearly bald, they'd both quickly turned into carbon copies of their curly-headed mother. And speaking of growing ...

Landyn had done some growing up since the twins were born. Watching his daughter with the babies tonight, Grant had been so proud of her. She'd turned in to a devoted, conscientious mother. He suspected a lot of people thought Landyn was his favorite because she was the baby of their family. But like any father, he had a soft spot in his heart for each of his daughters — and for his daughter-in-law, Bree.

And the truth was, that soft spot was reserved for whichever daughter was hurting. And right now, it was Danae who clutched at his sympathies. Their second child — "my second favorite daughter" he always teased her — Danae was the one with the tender heart. And so pretty he'd wanted to lock her up and throw away the key when she turned ten.

Danae was pretty still. She wore her distinctive pale blonde hair shorter now, but always sleek and stylish. But it just about killed him to see the premature lines creasing her forehead, the spark gone from her lively blue eyes. He still saw glimpses of that spark when she looked at her husband — thank the Lord for that — and when she played with her nieces. But even then, he detected pain. He knew God had a purpose in all this ... He always did. "But please don't wait too long to give them children, Lord," he whispered.

"What'd you say, Grant?"

Audrey's voice startled him. He hadn't realized she was still out here. "Nothing ..." He reached for her and drew her close. "Just thinking out loud." He planted a kiss on the top of her head. "We've had a pretty good life, haven't we?"

She pulled back to study him. "We have. But ... um, it's not over yet, dear."

"No, but it could be. It could all be over in the blink of an eye. A kumquat could fall off the shelf at the grocery store and bingo, I'm history."

She cracked up, which, of course, had been his goal. He did so love making her laugh.

She gave him a dismissive kiss and wriggled out of his arms. "You go ahead and stand there with that smug grin on your face. I'm going in to load the dishwasher."

"I'll be there in a few minutes." He squatted to pull Huckleberry close. If he couldn't hug his wife, there was always the dog. Despite making Audrey laugh, he felt the melancholy creep over him again. Huck seemed to sense it and leaned heavily against him.

Eyeing the dark sky, the ache of sadness — one that autumn always seemed to bring — grew heavier. It would pass. It always did. But something about the death of everything in nature, and the long winter to come, caused his heart to be heavy.

Before heading in to help Audrey with the dishes, he checked the yard one last time for the usual Tuesday night detritus of errant paper plates and the occasional pink sock. Five granddaughters now. That ought to be enough to lighten any man's heart. But still ... Danae ...

He walked slowly toward the house, watching his wife silhouetted through the kitchen windows. As much as Audrey loved these family nights, they were a lot of work for her.

When he opened the back door a few minutes later, she looked up from a sink full of pots and pans. "Everything OK?" The question in her eyes said he must be wearing his worry on his sleeve.

He didn't want to open a can of worms, but he didn't think he was imagining things either. "Did you think Danae seemed a little ... off tonight?"

"How so?"

"I don't know. It just seemed like she was distracted, kind of off in her own world."

"Why? What happened?"

"I don't know that anything happened ... she just seemed a little down. And she was short with Corinne. That's not like her."

Audrey winced. "I think it's hard for her to be around the babies. Especially the twins. But I hope she's not taking it out on her sisters. They can't help it that they have kids." The way she said it made him wonder if she knew more than she was saying.

"I know, but it's got to be hard seeing them both having babies left and right when she wants one so badly. I just hope she's the next one to get pregnant."

Audrey stilled. Then sighed. "Too late for that."

"What? What are you talking about?"

She turned and leaned back against the sink, pressing her palms on the counter ledge behind her. "Corinne's pregnant again."

"What?" He put his dish towel on the counter. "How did I miss that announcement?"

"Oh, there hasn't been an announcement yet. At least not that I know of."

"When did she tell you?"

"She didn't. A mother knows these things."

He cocked his head. "That's a pretty serious ... accusation, Audrey."

"Prediction. A mother knows," she repeated.

"You think a sister knows, too?"

Audrey shook her head. "I don't think so. But Corinne is probably waiting as long as possible, knowing it will be hard news for Danae to hear. Especially in public."

"Well, that might explain the tension between them. But why wouldn't she tell us?" Grant frowned. "Has Danae said anything about how they're doing on that front?"

"The baby front?" Audrey shrugged. "I haven't asked in a while. Lately it seems like she'd rather not talk about it." She took the damp dish towel from his hand and replaced it with a fresh one.