“She’s in the front room,” Dinah said, taking the medical kit from his hands and handing him a bath towel.
“You must be the nurse.”
“Dinah Corday. Used to be a nurse, now I’m about to be a professional chef.”
Nice smile, Neil thought, heading through the hall. She seemed competent, whether nurse or chef.
Entering the formal living room, he stepped inside the doorway and simply stared at Gabrielle. She looked…calm. Much more than he was, actually. And she was happy. “I expected something else,” he said, as Dinah rushed around him and wrapped the blood-pressure cuff around Gabby’s arm.
“What?” she asked.
“Maybe a little screaming. With what I had to drive through to get here, screaming would have been good because that’s what I’ve been doing for the past twenty minutes.”
Gabby laughed. “I don’t think I’m a screamer, but how about a good frown?” With that, she scrunched up her face, held the pose for a second, then started laughing again. “I’m fine, Neil. Really. And you’re the one who looks like he could scream.” She pointed to the little pile of mud that had dripped off him. “Or could stand a good shower.”
He glanced down at the mud puddle, a brown blotch standing out against the red hues of his ex-wife’s favorite antique oriental rug. How appropriate that he ruin it in service to a woman he’d finally let himself love. “You just can’t keep yourself out of trouble, can you? I mean, I sent you up here to keep you away from all the medical action, and now you’re the center of the medical action. What don’t you understand about keeping out of trouble?”
“Blood pressure’s fine,” Dinah said, next taking a listen to Gabrielle’s belly, an oddly intimate procedure he wished he were doing.
“I’m glad to see you, Neil. I really wanted you here…”
“Did you?” he asked, looking straight into her eyes. “Did you really, Gabrielle? After the way things have been between us these past weeks…” He glanced at Dinah, who was obviously trying to make herself inconspicuous in this clumsy moment, then glanced back at Gabby. “I wasn’t sure what you wanted.”
“We need to have a talk, Neil. There are some things I should tell you, and…”
Another contraction gripped her, the hardest one yet. Immediately, he took her hand in his muddy one, and held it for several seconds as she nearly squeezed the blood out of it. “You’ve got a lot of strength for a pregnant lady,” he said, shaking back the circulation once her contraction had subsided. “But I’ve still got a few more fingers for you to break if you need to, so we’re good.”
“I’m really happy you’re here,” she said, relaxing back on her pillows. “Even if Walt Graham had managed to drift in on his canoe, I’d have chosen you. And right now you’ve got about five minutes before I have another contraction, so maybe you’d better go take a fast shower, because yours are the only fingers I want to break.”
“Are you sure about that, Gabrielle?” Their eyes met briefly, and he saw the answer there, the answer he wanted from her. But she glanced away so quickly, so awkwardly, it gave him cause to doubt again. It was her feelings for him he doubted, though, not his for her.
“What I’m sure of, Neil, is that you can’t be part of this without a shower first, and I do want you to be part of it. So, go. Get yourself cleaned up, and come back ready to meet my son, because he’s ready to pop out to meet his uncle.”
As much as she wanted him here, it broke her heart just looking at his face…his beautiful, muddy face. She so
desperately wished that Bryce was his son. That had been the fondest wish of her heart for a while now, one that she was only now able to admit. But what was done was done. In all honesty, she wouldn’t change it, because one thing different in the whole sequence of events could have meant she wouldn’t have Bryce.
It was a bad situation, and such a pervasively painful one she wasn’t sure the hurt could ever fully heal. That was the sadness she saw in his eyes every time she looked. Yet Bryce was on his way now, and all the feelings, all the answers would have to come later.
“It’s Gavin’s baby?” Angela whispered, as she entered the room.
Gabby nodded. “Before I ever knew Neil, Gavin and I…” Another contraction grabbed her, much faster than it should have, and this time Angela surrendered her hand. But Gabby refused it, clutching at a pillow instead. “Go tell Neil it’s happening…now.”
“Just one more push, Gabrielle. That’s all I need. One more push and you’re a mother!”
She was exhausted. This was harder than she’d ever imagined it would be, and with no pain relief…
“Bear down, Gabrielle, and push.”
Neil sounded so calm, so assured. And she was anything but assured right now. All her medical training down the drain, she was any other woman in the throes of delivering a baby, and that’s all that mattered. “I’m pushing,” she forced out, as Dinah propped her up to a near sitting position and held her there while Angela busied herself wiping a cool rag over Gabby’s face.
“Breathe,” Dinah said. “Come on, Gabby. Take a deep breath, then push that baby out.”
“He’s waiting for you, Gabrielle,” Neil prompted. “Bryce Evans is waiting for you.”
Bryce Evans…The men in her life passed before her eyes…her father, her son, Neil, even Gavin…as she bore down for one final time. Then, suddenly, it was over. Bryce was here. She was exhausted, happy…“Let me see him,” she said to the deathly quiet room. “My baby…”
Dinah eased her back into a flat position, then hurried to the end of the bed—Neil’s big king-sized bed—and Angela immediately stepped away. Went to the other side of the room, slumped down into a chair. Which was when the cold chill hit Gabby, spreading its icy tentacles through her veins, bringing to bear a terror like she’d never known could exist.
“He isn’t crying,” Gabby gasped, fighting to sit back up. Thrashing wildy, she was trying to toss off the sheets covering her. “Neil, he isn’t crying! What’s wrong?”
Even after Gabby rolled onto her side to see, she couldn’t. Neil had taken Bryce to the other side of the room, to a dresser, and Dinah was with him, purposely obstructing Gabby’s view. “What’s wrong with my baby?” Gabby screamed, fighting to get up, even though she was too weak.
Dinah rushed back to the bed and gently pushed Gabby back down. “Look, Gabby. Neil’s working on your baby right now. He’s not breathing too well…”
“Did he aspirate?” Gabby choked.
“I’m not sure,” Dinah said. But from the look on her face, Gabby knew better. It was the look she saw on her staff when a baby was born with a serious problem. Or a stillbirth.
“Is he alive?” she screamed, her voice so broken it didn’t sound natural. “Neil, you’ve got to tell me, is he alive?” Neil’s back was to her. She could see him working, bent over the dresser and working. But from the bed she couldn’t tell what he was doing. “I’ve got to get to my
baby,” she said, suddenly launching herself up. But Dinah stopped her again.
“Gabby, let him do what he has to do.”
“There wasn’t a problem,” she cried. “Never was a problem, and I’ve had so many tests, just to be sure.” She rose up, watched. “Is that CPR? Is Neil giving him CPR?”
“Look, Gabby, I’ve got to go try and make a phone call. Do you hear me? I’ve got to leave the room for a minute, but I need for you to stay where you are, and be calm. Will you do that for me?”
A million things were running through her mind, none of them good, none of them that would allow her to be calm. “I want to hold him,” she whispered. “Please, I want to hold him.”
“Gabby, you’ve got to leave Neil alone now.” That was Angela. She was huddled in her chair, looking scared to death. “He knows what he’s doing, and you have to trust him. So, please…”
Gabby nodded. But she didn’t lie back. Couldn’t take her eyes off Neil’s back. Couldn’t
not
watch him fighting to save her son’s life.
“I’ll be back in a minute,” Dinah reassured, then ran from the room.
“Fight for him, Neil. You’ve got to fight for him.”
He didn’t answer, but she knew he was. Neil could do no less.
“Is he responding?” she finally asked, then watched Neil’s body language for an answer. But saw none there.
“He’s alive, isn’t he? Neil, please say something. Anything!”
“He’s alive, Gabrielle. But cyanotic. And he’s struggling.”
She nodded. At least now she knew. “Breathing at all?”
“Some, but not sufficiently.”
“Any guesses?”
This time he didn’t answer. Rather, he looked up as Dinah ran back into the room. She was soaking wet. “I finally got through to a woman named Fallon O’Gara, a nurse practitioner. Had to go halfway down to the road to get a signal, but she said to stay here, that she’s sending someone named Eric in with oxygen and an IV set-up. It’s too bad out there to attempt any kind of transport before we’ve stabilized Bryce.”
“Damn,” Neil muttered. “Three lousy miles to the hospital, and I can’t get there.”
Dinah laid a reassuring hand on his arm. “Your medic will get here,” she said. “Fallon told me he does mountain rescue, so I’m betting he’ll be here sooner than you think.”
He nodded gravely. Didn’t speak. And that wasn’t missed by Gabrielle, who’d finally managed to sit up and swing her legs over the side of the bed. One way or another she was going to get to her son. He needed her. She knew it. Could feel it deep down. So she pushed herself up, wobbled, and fell back. By the time she hit the bed, Dinah was at her side, ready to push her all the way in.
“You’ve got to stay strong for him,” she said as she pulled the blanket up over Gabby, who immediately kicked it away.
The blanket meant she was permanently in bed, down for the count. Not having it on her meant she could get up, could get to her baby when she had to. “I have to see him,” she said, this time her voice not quite so adamant. It was all beginning to sink in. Bryce was in trouble. Truly, honestly in trouble. But she trusted Neil to save him. “Please, before you take him away, I have to—”
“We won’t take him anywhere before you see him, Gabrielle,” Neil said. His voice was so tense it sounded as if it would snap in two. “Or hold him. I promise. But you’ve got to promise me that you’ll be still.”
She hated that promise, hated what was happening, hated more than anything that she was so helpless. So it was a hard promise to make. But she did, only because it was Neil who asked her.
For the next few minutes Neil worked on Bryce, and Gabby stayed in bed, watching everything and seeing nothing. But then, after the longest time of her life, she heard…a baby’s cry. It wasn’t strong. In fact, it was the cry she so often heard from a very sick baby. But it was Bryce, and he was alive, and crying the most beautiful cry she’d ever heard in her life.
“Do you want to hold him?” Neil asked, finally turning around. In his arms he held a bundle wrapped in a brown-and-blue Argyle sweater.
“Yes,” she cried, pushing herself up in bed to receive her son.
“Just for a minute. He’s still not doing very well.” Neil walked slowly toward the bed, never for a second taking his eyes off Bryce. Then he bent, and handed him over to Gabby. “Bryce, this is your mother, and she’s awfully worried about you.”
Tears of joy, and fear, streaked down Gabby’s cheeks as she took her son into her arms. He was a good size, and so beautiful. But he was struggling. His tiny chest was fighting so hard to take in breath, and when she put her fingertip to the pulse in his neck, she could feel his heart beat far faster than it should. And his lips…his precious little lips were blue-tinged from a lack of oxygen. So was his skin. He
was
breathing, though, and his heart
was
beating. Where there was life, there was so much hope, and for the next few minutes, as she cradled Bryce to her chest and told him stories about his grandfather, she hoped. Dear God, she hoped.
Neil looked down at his hands. They were shaking. So far, it was a miracle that Gabrielle’s baby—his nephew—was still alive. Considering that he had no equipment, no oxygen, no IV…it was the power of love and sheer determination. That’s all it could be. “He’s doing a little better,” he said, thirty minutes into the ordeal. “Pulse rate has come down a little, and he’s breathing better.” Not good enough, but enough to offer some hope.
“I know,” Gabby whispered. “He’s a real fighter.”
He might be a fighter, but if Eric didn’t come soon, Neil wasn’t sure how much longer the fight would hold out. “Just like his mother,” he whispered. He was sitting in bed with Gabrielle, his arm around her shoulders to support her, his eyes never once off Bryce, lest a change occurred that Gabrielle might miss. He was a beautiful boy. And he looked like Gavin in some ways. But he also favored Gabrielle. Bryce would have her smile, he guessed. He hoped.
“Neil!”
It was Eric. Eric, a former pediatric surgeon. Eric, the one who would make the real diagnosis and figure out what to do. Neil suspected the problem was something to do with the heart. The symptoms were all there, and with the proper diagnostic tools he was fairly certain he would discover transposition of the great vessels, where the two main arteries leaving the heart were reversed.
Normally, blood from the heart’s right ventricle was carried by the pulmonary artery to the lungs, and blood from the left ventricle was taken by the aorta to the body. In the case of TGV, it was just the opposite, leaving the oxygenated blood meant to circulate through the body being pumped back into the lungs.
This wasn’t something Neil could treat because he wasn’t a surgeon. But Eric was. And for once Neil was
grateful that their practice had such a pediatric influence. “Up here. My room.”
Eric flew through the door, headed straight to the bed, and stopped short when he encountered Dinah Corday there. “You!” he snapped.
“You!” she snapped back.
“You two have met?” Neil asked.
“No, we haven’t,” Dinah snapped as she yanked the oxygen mask from Eric’s hand.
“It was a slight tap,” Eric said defensively.
“And you didn’t stop to see if you’d damaged my car, or injured me,” Dinah argued back as she slipped the pediatric-size oxygen mask over Bryce’s face and turned on the emergency tank Eric had brought.