Kate Thomas - Daddy By Design?

“Me?” Frowning, Trey took the phone. “Hello?” As he listened, his eyes widened and he stared at Cinda. “Her what? Birthing coach, if it comes to that? Oh, ma’am, we can’t let it come to that. Miss Cinda told me this baby is breach—what? That means it’s turned sideways? It is?” Sweat broke out on his brow. He ran a hand over his mouth. “Oh, lordy. No, I’m fine. I’ll do it. What? Hold on, and I’ll tell her.” He focused on Cinda. “She’s on her cordless phone. She and her nurse are already taking the stairs to meet us in the lobby when we get there.”

When we get there. Such a wonderful phrase. Still, Cinda had her reservations. “She’s running down fifteen flights of stairs? That poor woman. She ought to be in great shape when she gets to the lobby.”

“She’ll be fine, Cinda. And so will we…if there’s a God. In the meantime, I’m to relay her instructions to you and, uh, do what she says.”

Knowing what a birth coach had to do—and see—Cinda understood his hesitation and felt her face flame. “Maybe you won’t have to do anything. I haven’t had a contraction now for a few—” A sudden, hard pain tore across her abdomen and cut her breath off. She clutched at Trey and the handrail, and began her breathing exercises. “Okay, this one’s bad. Talk to her. Tell her. See what to do. Oh, God.”

Trey was wild-eyed. “It’s bad,” he said to the doctor. “She’s having a pain. Time it? I can’t. She’s holding on to my arm. I can’t get to my watch and hang on to this phone at the same time. What? Tell her to breathe?” With great pomp and seriousness, he told Cinda, “Breathe.”

Feeling as if her insides were being torn apart, Cinda shrieked, “I am, you jackass.”

“She is, you jackass,” Trey yelled into the cell phone before catching himself. “No. Wait. Sorry. Not you. I didn’t mean—do what?” The color drained from the man’s face. “Oh, I don’t think so. I can’t—okay, okay, I will.” He focused on Cinda and exhaled. “This is not my idea. But your doctor wants you to, uh, disrobe from the waist down. She says I may have to check your—”

“You’ll. Check. Nothing,” Cinda snarled, her upper lip actually curling. “You tell her I said people in hell want ice water, too, but do they get it? No. Not in a million years.”

Trey eyed her warily and spoke into the phone. “She said—oh, you heard that. What? You want me to breathe now?” He did. Deeply, slowly.

The elevator car lurched. Cinda gasped. Trey cursed. “It’s the elevator,” he explained to Dr. Butler on the other end of the line. “It jumped or something. Yes, we’re okay. Maybe. Wait. Hold on. I think it’s—yes, it is. It’s moving.”

As if it had never been problematical, the elevator car began a smooth and controlled descent. With her pain easing, Cinda stared up at Trey, wanting him to corroborate for her that she hadn’t lost her mind. “We are moving downward, right? And not in a free fall, right?”

“Right.” He then enthusiastically told her doctor, “Yes, Dr. Butler. We’re apparently on our way. Where are you now? The fourth floor? Wow. You must be a world-class sprinter. Us?” He looked up to the lighted panel overhead. “Eight…seven. We’re on our way. Yeah. See y’all in the lobby.” He punched the end button and handed Cinda the cell phone, which she plopped into her purse. “Dr. Butler’s meeting us in the lobby,” he said, as if reassuring himself as much as her. “With any luck, the ambulance has already arrived.”

Another mechanical lurch—a last-gasp one that didn’t slow the car down any—had Cinda clumsily falling into Trey’s embrace. With his coat open and only his chambray shirt between her and his bare skin, his body felt warm and solid, his scent clean and masculine. His arms about her made her feel the safest she’d felt since before she’d left her parents’ home to marry Richard. “I’m sorry for speaking to you like I did. And thank you for staying with me.”

His chuckle rumbled in his chest and vibrated pleasantly against her ear. “No apology necessary. But before you get all sentimental, remember that I didn’t have any other choices open to me.”

Cinda pulled back and looked up at him. “Still, I don’t think you’re the sort who would have left me even if you’d been able to.”

Looking suddenly embarrassed, he said, “You’re right. I would have stuck it out.” He frowned. “That didn’t sound right. What I mean is, I’d have stayed with you.”

AND STAY HE DID. Trey reflected that he’d had no idea, when he’d spoken those words a few moments ago, just how true they’d become. But now he did. The elevator doors opened onto the lobby. A cheering crowd, a virtual welcoming committee, met them. To him, the participants looked more like they belonged at a disaster scene, instead of at the celebration of a new life.

Outside, double-parked in the vehicle-clogged street were the blinking emergency lights of an ambulance, a fire truck, and several police cars—as well as a crowd of curious gawkers, some with cameras. Inside the lobby were several police officers warning people to stay back. Included among the bystanders were two smiling mechanics in greasy overalls. Obviously the heroes who’d fixed the elevator. With them were two emergency medical technicians, one to either side of a waiting gurney. In front of the crowd stood a woman in a white coat—Dr. Butler, presumably—pretty, dark-eyed, blessedly knowledgeable and in charge. A pony-tailed nurse who looked twelve years old but was clad in surgery scrubs stood behind the doctor. The only thing lacking was a partridge in a pear tree.

Though somewhat taken aback by the scene, Trey nevertheless started forward with Cinda at his side. They weren’t even out of the car, though, before everyone rushed forward and began talking at once. Cinda was tugged away from him by the paramedics and gently lifted onto the gurney. Then, with Dr. Butler and her nurse pacing alongside, they all hustled toward the exit. Trey stood where he was, just watching, figuring his involvement had ended. He should be glad, he told himself. And he was—for her. But a pang of something inside him told him he wasn’t ready for her to leave him just yet.

Just then, one of the mechanics came over and surprised Trey by shaking his hand and congratulating him on his impending fatherhood. Apparently hearing this, one of the police officers pushed him forward—toward the ambulance outside.

“But I’m not—” was all he could get out as he was hustled onward.

Outside, the crowd parted and Cinda was loaded into the ambulance. Dr. Butler climbed in. So did her nurse. One of the paramedics jogged around to the front, obviously the driver. The other EMT—a big guy who could have played football for a pro team—latched on to Trey’s arm and cheerfully tried to haul him inside. “Come on, Dad. We’re burning daylight here. Get in.”

Trey resisted. “But I’m not—”

“It’s okay. We’ve seen this nervousness before. In you go.”

And in he went. And away they went, the siren clearing the way for them. Standing at the back of the boxlike interior of the emergency vehicle, Trey tried his level best not to be in the way. He watched as people who knew what they were doing went about doing what they knew to do for Cinda and her baby. Evidently, from Cinda’s groaning and Dr. Butler’s steady, quiet voice alternately giving orders and soothing her patient, things were progressing a lot quicker than anyone would have liked. Trey realized his mouth was dry and his palms were sweaty. He didn’t want to watch such a personal moment for Cinda, but he was pretty much forced to by sheer proximity.

The ride to the hospital, with the ambulance dodging and skirting New York traffic, was, to Trey, like some wild and pitching ride at Six Flags Over Georgia. To keep from being tossed about and becoming the next patient, he hung on to a bolted-down metal shelf about shoulder height to him. In a blessedly few minutes, though each one had seemed like hours to him, they were pulling into the emergency bay of a big hospital. The back doors opened. More medical types in hospital greens reached in and hauled Trey out, again tossing him to one side as they concentrated on assisting Dr. Butler and her nurse with Cinda on the gurney. The EMTs who’d brought them here grabbed Trey up again, calling him Dad and carrying him along in their wake.