Chapter 36

Gigi

“Only two weeks left,” Camryn says with a smile as she slips her gloves off of her hands.

“I’m not ready,” I confess.

I knew Dad shouldn’t have sent Jameson on this last mission. Both promised me it was a quick job, and he’d be home before I knew it.

“First-time parents never are,” she cajoles. “But you’ll know what to do when the time comes.”

I’ve spent the better part of an hour asking her all of the questions I could easily research online, but I wanted to hear them from a professional, not a book or online chat rooms. I mean, I look at those too since I’ve become obsessed with all things childbirth.

“I want to see you next week,” Camryn says before walking to the door. “Make sure you make the appointment before heading out.

I sigh, rolling off of the exam table and get my lower half redressed.

Kid is waiting for me in the parking lot, but the smiling man I’ve known all of my life is gone, having been replaced with a man filled with anxiety. He won’t even look at me as he helps me inside of the SUV.

“We have to head back to the clubhouse,” he informs me as he climbs inside and backs out of the parking space.

“I needed to grab a few things from Target,” I whine, knowing he’s probably in a pissy mood because Khloe is still getting hit on at school. There’s been tension between those two since the spring semester started at her school.

“Not today,” he says shutting down any rebuttal I might have had planned.

Pissed, I turn my head to look out the window and rub the tightening spot on my stomach.

The clubhouse is frantic by the time we get back there. The guys who didn’t head out on the last job are running around. Shadow is barking orders, and there’s a tension in the air that makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up. Something’s wrong. I can feel it in my bones.

“How the fuck did that happen?” Dad bellows. The anger in his voice travels out of the open door to the conference room. “I won’t calm the fuck down! I lost a man today, and you’re telling me to calm down?”

No. No. No. No.

I arrow toward the conference room, standing in the doorway. I almost break at the sight of my dad with his head hung low, one hand clutching his cell phone and the other gripping the top of his shaved head.

“Daddy?” The one word is a guttural plea.

I just know my world is going to come crashing down around me by the devastated look on Dad’s face.

I shake my head. “No, daddy. Please.”

I’m a twenty-one-year-old woman, but I’ve turned into a child needing her father to make her world make sense again.

“We lost Catfish.” He’s broken, torn down, but that doesn’t stop the relief I feel in my bones.

I’m a horrible person for being thankful that someone else, someone other than Jameson, is dead.

I clench my stomach, the tightness that’s been present increasing to the point of excruciating pain.

“And Jameson?” I ask when the pain subsides marginally and look up to see the same wrecked look in Dad’s eyes.

“It all went to shit.”

The pain is back, and he forgets who’s on the phone as he stands from the table and rushes to me.

“Jameson?” I ask again, his name the only word I can manage with the pain in my stomach.

“We need to get to the hospital,” he says, the calm I remember from childhood taking over his voice. He does so well in chaotic situations, and today is no different. He places a soothing hand on my back before barking orders through the open door.

My pulse, pounding in my ears like a damn snare drum blocks out the conversation around me. It isn’t until I’m scooped up in my dad’s arms that I focus again.

“Where’s Jameson?” I’m sobbing by this point.

“We need to focus on the baby, Georgia. You’re in labor.”

I shake my head. “I can’t do this without him.” I tremble, my hand gripping his t-shirt to the point my knuckles turn white. “He’s supposed to be here!”

“Get Camryn Davison on the phone. I want her at the hospital by the time we get there.” I hear a ‘yes, Sir.’ “And make sure they have a room ready for her. We’re not spending a damn second in the waiting room.”

I fight to get out of the SUV when Dad places me in the back seat and struggles to get the seatbelt around my swollen stomach. The tremble in his hands betrays his distress.

“You’ll be fine.” I turn to see Mom sliding in beside me. “You get to meet your daughter today.”

Her eyes are swollen, and I know she’s been crying. They’re both lying to me.

“Just tell me,” I beg, my own tears renewed as I watch her face.

She shakes her head, tears brimming and threatening to fall. “I don’t know anything.”

“Please,” I beg. “Please don’t lie to me.”

I don’t miss the relief in her eyes when the next contraction begins and demands all of my attention.

The hustle into the hospital is quick and seamless. Dad cradles me in his arms, much like he did when I was a kid and fell asleep on the couch watching TV. He doesn’t have to bark orders here in public. The commands he made back at the clubhouse have been carried out perfectly. We go straight to a room, and Camryn is waiting for us.

“My phone,” I hiss after I shed my clothes to get into a hospital gown, and she tries to take my clothes away. “The back pocket of my jeans.”

I tap out a text, watching the screen with hope. The three little bubbles don’t pop up. The device in my hand doesn’t buzz or begin to ring.

“What the hell is going on? Where is he?”

My mom clears her throat. “I don’t know.”

“Where’s Dad?” I push past her in the small bathroom and enter the room.

Camryn is there, waiting, but I can tell from the look on her face that she knows something I don’t.

“Someone needs to tell me what’s going on,” I demand.

“You’re going to have that baby a little early it seems,” Camryn says with the nicest smile she can manage. She closes the distance between us and helps me climb into the bed. “I don’t want you to worry. Two weeks early isn’t huge, especially for a girl. Their lungs mature quicker than a boy’s would.”

Once I’m on the bed, nurses are all around me strapping monitors around my stomach.

My dad is gone for what seems like forever, and my mom won’t look at me. She types away furiously on her cell phone and checks it every second when her fingers aren’t flying over the keypad.

When Dad enters the room, his eyes find mine before they search for my mother. My whole life, he’s looked for her first, as it is in his blood to make sure the other half of his soul is safe before worrying about others.

I swallow, shaking my head as he reaches my head. I’ve been demanding answers, begging everyone to tell me the truth, to tell me something. Now that the moment has come, I can’t even look him in the eye.

“Georgia,” Dad says softly.

I don’t lift my eyes to his. I focus solely on the texture of the faded fuchsia blanket covering me.

“Please don’t, Daddy.”

The machines by my side beep, alerting me to another contraction. My epidural an hour ago has numbed the pain to the point it’s my broken heart that is destroying me and not the child trying to be born while her father is…

I sob, refusing to think in my head what my heart is already feeling.

A gentle knock and Camryn entering the room keeps my dad from ripping my useless muscle from my chest.

“It’s time, Gigi.” Camryn stands at the end of the bed and pulls a sterile towel from the top of an instrument tray. She dons gloves and looks back at me. “Are you ready?”

I shake my head and earn a small smile from her lips.

“Diego, are you staying?”

It’s then that I meet his eyes. They plead with me, much the same way mine did to him when I begged him not to make Jameson go on another mission. The way I looked each and every time he got orders after we started making plans for our future. My dad is the one responsible for the empty life, the single parenting I’ll be forced to do. He doesn’t get the right to stand there and cheer me on when he’s the sole reason my world is crashing down around me.

“He’s not welcome in this room.” I expect him to argue, to insist that he’s there for his little girl as she brings her own daughter into the world. He doesn’t. He nods, kisses the back of my hand, and walks out.

“You have about a minute,” Camryn says with her eyes on the monitor at my bedside. “Then I need you to push.”

I lie back, not acknowledging my mom when she clasps my hand in her own. Normally warm, the coolness of her fingers is a shock to my system, but I don’t respond to that either. My eyes trace imaginary patterns on the ceiling. I ignore the pain and Cam’s voice instructing me to bear down.

I shake my head. “I won’t do this without him.”

Mom begs.

Cam rubs my calf giving me encouragement hinted with agitation.

I don’t know how long it goes on. Seconds? Days? Years?

“Listen to me,” my mother spits, yanking my chin and forcing me to look at her. “You have to push.”

“Jameson,” I sob. “I need him.”

“You have to do this without him.” Tears fill her eyes once again. “He’d want you to carry on.”

Oh, God. That’s as good as confirmation that he’s gone.

“I don’t want this without him.”

“You’re killing her, Georgia.” I shake my head. I’d never do anything to hurt my daughter. “Her heart rate is all over the place. If you don’t push, they’re going to take you in for an emergency C-section.”

I shake my head. “No.”

I don’t know what I’m denying. The loss of him, the fact my baby is in danger? Am I still refusing to push? I don’t have a damn clue.

“Please turn that damn thing off,” my mom snaps, but she’s already reaching to my side.

It’s only then I hear my cell ringing.

“Oh, thank God,” she says as I see the facetime call from Jameson.

“Jameson,” I sob when the video connects.

“We’re having a baby today,” he whispers as if talking too loud will ruin the moment.

“I need you here,” I cry. “I can’t do this without you.”

“I’m here, gorgeous.” I nod, conceding that this is the best I can get.

My adrenaline is through the roof, my entire body shaking uncontrollably. I hate myself for losing faith so quickly.

“Focus, Gigi.” My eyes snap back to his. “Give Emmalyn the phone, so you can concentrate on getting my baby here.”

I nod and do as he says.

“Head’s out,” Cam says.

She asks me to stop pushing, and it’s only when my eyes flutter back to the screen that I take him in fully for the first time. His face is battered, covered in blood, and his voice, although soothing is low and weak. There are people around him, insisting he lie back.

“One more push,” Cam urges.

“You can do it, gorgeous.” I smile at his encouragement and bear down even though the medicine is strong enough to keep most of the pain away.

“She’s here,” Cam says.

There’s a rush, nurses shuffling around.

The baby cries, the most amazing sound in the world.

“Amelia Kate,” Jameson whispers. Her name on his lips is the second most beautiful thing in this world.

And it all shatters again when I hear the long beep of a heart machine. The same one you hear on TV when someone dies. Confused, I look over at my monitors, but nothing seems wrong. Amelia is still wailing, so I know she’s fine.

When I look back, I watch Jameson’s eyes roll back. There’s a shuffle, the phone pointed at nothing.

“He’s coding!” I hear before the call is disconnected.