by Janice Lynn
This pain was unlike any she’d ever had. Intense. Bone-breaking. Flesh-wrenching.
She opened her eyes, met James’s look of total disbelief. Laughter gurgled from her lips.
Laughter full of fear and on the verge of hysteria.
James stared at Melissa. Moisture beaded along her forehead. Her hands gripped the edge of the chair tightly. Her knuckles blanched a ghostly white and dug deeply into the knobby fabric.
“Melissa?”
Her wild-eyed gaze met his briefly before her eyes closed in a painful grimace.
“You’re having contractions, aren’t you?”
“My back hurts. Bad,” Melissa squeaked, placing her hand over her tight belly. “Yeah, I think I’m having contractions.”
His heart performed a contraction of its own, an intense one that caused every muscle in his body to compress sharply at what he knew was taking place.
Air was trapped in his lungs. He was a doctor, had seen babies delivered before, had even delivered during a rotation. But this was Melissa. In labor with his baby. Right this minute.
Cailee’s face swam before his eyes. Memories of walking to her crib, finding her lifeless body, his mother’s heartache, his father’s bouts of depression, the fights that had followed Cailee’s funeral, the guilt that he’d not been able to save her—all these things and more prostrated him.
“James?” she said, when he remained frozen.
Snapping out of his trance, he met her gaze. “We’ll call Dr McGowan, have him meet us at the hospital. It’ll be all right,” he offered, hoping to ease the tension flowing from her body, but more than anything to keep her from seeing the fear that coursed through his body.
“And you know this, how?” Melissa growled, not sounding at all like herself. “It isn’t your body being ripped in two.”
Wanna bet? But he didn’t say the words out loud. She didn’t look in the mood to debate the similarity of sensations they were experiencing.
“How far apart are your contractions?” James asked, kicking into doctor mode. “When did they start? Is the pain bad?”
“I don’t know, I’m not sure, and yes,” she responded.
She looked scared. He had to do something. Somehow make this easier for her. He pried her hands from their death hold on the armrests and clasped them.
“Everything is going to be fine. Dr McGowan is an excellent obstetrician. The best.”
He’d meant his words to comfort her. Instead, her fingers bit into his. Her eyes widened with surprise, and then she glanced down in horror at the growing stain on her pants.
“James,” she gasped. “My waters have broken.”
No turning back now. They were going to be parents. Soon.
He looked at her, wishing he could still the tremble in the abused lip locked between her teeth.
“I’m going to get you a towel, call Dr McGowan, and then get your medical bag. While I’m doing that, I want you to time your contractions.”
“Quit talking slow to me. I’m having a baby, not losing my mind.” She winced, her body tightening. “I am losing my mind. James!” His name came out as a cry. A cry full of pain and longing. Full of need.
For him to slay her dragons.
“Melissa, if that’s another contraction, they’re really close.” He mentally calculated how much time had passed, his heart picking up rhythm with the realization that she was close to giving birth. Too close. “I should check you.”
She scowled. “I don’t think so.”
“I’m a doctor.”
“Not my doctor.”
“Fine.” Stubborn woman. He hurried to the bathroom and grabbed a stack of fluffy navy towels to place between her legs to soak up the leaking amniotic fluid.
He tossed the towels onto the footstool.
“I’m calling Dr McGowan.” Keeping his eyes on Melissa, James hit the programmed-in number on his cell phone and informed the obstetrician what was going on.
“How far dilated is she?” Dr McGowan asked.
“I don’t know.” James watched Melissa’s face distort in misery. Sweat trickled down her brow. He glanced at his watch. “Her contractions are coming a minute apart.”
“A minute apart?” the obstetrician exclaimed. “How long has she been in labor?”
“Her waters broke about five minutes ago, but her back’s been hurting all day.”
“She doesn’t have time to get to Nashville. Check her cervix and you make the call, but I think you should call an ambulance to take her to Dekalb.”
Watching Melissa’s hands fist into tight bundles, James feared Dr McGowan might be right.
“Check her and let me know.”
He snapped his cell phone shut. “I’ve got to check you.”
“No.” Her denial came out as a breathy moan. He hated seeing her in pain, wished he could ease her suffering. Even more, he’d hate to put her in the car and head to Nashville an hour away and have her deliver somewhere along the icy drive.
“It’s nothing I haven’t seen before,” he reminded her.
She shot him a look.
Maybe not the smoothest line he’d ever used.
“With your contractions so close, Dr McGowan wants to know how dilated you are. He thinks I need to call an ambulance to take you to Dekalb.”
Cheeks flushed, she closed her eyes. “Fine, but it’s not like I have a spare set of stirrups just lying around to hike my legs up in.”
“This will be fine.” He eyed the chair and stool. “I’m going to get a flashlight and some gloves.”
James gathered what he’d need to check Melissa and scrubbed his hands and forearms. Her smothered cry of pain warned that she was having another contraction. From the sounds she was making he’d guess her pain was intensifying.
Helplessness seized him. A helplessness he’d sworn he’d never feel again after Cailee’s death. What if the baby was breech? Melissa’s life would be in danger, would be in his hands. He swallowed the lump forming in his throat. What had Kristen called Melissa? His heart’s desire. She was, and so much more.
And he was responsible for her life and their baby’s life. He didn’t want to do it, but there was no choice.
“I’m coming,” he called, wanting her to know she wasn’t alone, that he’d stay by her side. Forever, if that’s what she wanted.
“I need to push.” She moaned, making him think he couldn’t possibly have heard right. “James, I need to push.”
“Push?” He rushed into the living room and dropped his supplies in a heap next to her chair. “You can’t push.”
“Don’t tell me what I can and can’t do,” she growled, very un-Melissa-like. “My body says push.”
He helped her to her feet, winced at her whimper. With his assistance, she removed her wet maternity pants and underwear. Despite the urgency of the moment, he paused, staring at her rounded belly. Her creamy skin stretched tight over what could easily have been a lumpy basketball.
His knees threatened to buckle at the sheer beauty of her carrying his child. Would he be wrong if he dropped to the floor and praised her over and over for the precious gift she carried? A gift he couldn’t believe he’d once thought he wanted to live without experiencing because of a fear of Cailee’s memory, of a fear of love, of a fear of failure.
Just as he’d once thought he could live without Melissa.
Now he knew better. Not loving would be the biggest failure of his life. He’d take Melissa on any terms she’d have him. He’d find a way to help keep her grounded, focused on him and their child. Because these past few months, watching her, seeing her lovingly touch her belly, excitedly prepare the nursery, he knew she was going to be a good mother. To place their child’s needs above her own. Above those of her patients.
Her goodness and ability would balance out any fears on his part. He could live with coming in somewhere down the line. Just so long as he was still in the line.
She’d said she wished she’d married him when she’d
had the chance.
He wished he’d gotten down on his knees and begged her to be his wife, to share his life, for them to bring their baby into the world as a family, as one.
For that matter, he should have proposed the day they’d made love for the first time. He’d known even then that she completed him.
He thought of the diamond ring in the spare bedroom. The engagement ring he’d bought with all the excitement of a man in love. Because he had been. Was.
Why had he held back? For fear of hurting? Stupid. From the moment they’d met, he should have told her every day how he felt. Had he been open with her, perhaps they never would have grown apart. He should have told her about Cailee and his parents, about his fears of losing a child and how it had led to his foolish decision to not be a parent.
Not caring if she thought him a fool, he cupped her stomach, stroked his palms over the roundness, felt the outline of their baby.
Her cheeks pink, she seemed to want to cover herself, but knew there was no way to hide her burgeoning beauty.
And just so there was no mistake that he touched her as a man in awe rather than as a doctor, he sank to his knees and kissed her stomach.
Beneath his touch, the skin on her belly drew tight, the muscles constricting. She grabbed his shoulder and squeezed, her nails digging through his shirt.
She panted, squeezing harder and harder.
“I really need to push, James. It feels like he’s coming out.” Her pitch grew higher. “Right now.”
“Let me check you.”
Helping her back into the chair, he draped the blanket he’d brought over her waist, knowing she wanted some semblance of privacy.
“For the record,” she said, her contraction subsiding, “I don’t like this and am only agreeing because I swear he feels like he’s right there.”
“You don’t have to like it. It’s only a medical check. The same as if Dr McGowan was checking.”
“Yeah, right,” she said from between gritted teeth.
James spread her thighs and nearly had a heart attack at what he saw. At least, his heart sure felt like it had stopped.
Melissa felt the need to push because the baby’s head had crowned. She was fully dilated and didn’t have time to go to Dekalb, much less Vanderbilt.
“What’s wrong?” She craned her neck, trying to get a better look at his face. “James?”
“There’s no time.”
When he didn’t move, she asked, “You’re going to call the ambulance?”
“They won’t make it in time for the delivery.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I can see you’re fully dilated. A few big pushes and we’ll be welcoming our child into the world.”
“Oh,” Melissa mouthed, fear in her eyes. Another contraction hit. Involuntarily, her back arched.
Without moving away, he dialed for an ambulance.
“Tell me I can push,” she begged, the moment he’d hung up from the dispatcher who’d wanted him to stay on the line, but he hadn’t wanted the distraction. There was nothing she could tell him that he didn’t already know. Unlike with Cailee, he knew what to do.
“Because I need to push,” she continued.
Thanking God for his medical training, James quickly checked the baby’s position. Face down. Not breech, which he’d known from when he’d cradled her belly. Perfect.
He sent up a silent prayer of gratitude.
“Push, but remember to use your contraction to your advantage. Push in conjunction with your body’s efforts.”
“My back is breaking.” Her eyes were feral, begging his for reassurance, for relief.
“I know, babe,” he soothed, “but you’ve got to work with your contraction. Let’s wait till this one passes, and we’ll work together on the next one.”
She panted through the contraction, her fingers digging into the chair.
Seconds strung out, passing in slow motion. Finally the contraction ended and Melissa had a quick breather. Her hair was wet around her face, her skin glistened, and her knuckles remained embedded in the chair arms.
His heart swelled with love, with joy, with the pain she was enduring, with fear at what her body was going through, and that he would be facing his worst fear soon. But there was no time to dwell on any of that. Her abdomen tightened and her back arched. Another contraction was starting.
“Push as hard as you can, and we’ll have our baby.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
AS HARD as she could? Melissa glared at James. Was he kidding?
Right now it was all she could do to breathe, much less push. But the pressure did make her want to push. To relieve her body of the enormous heaviness weighing on her pelvis.
How had women done this for centuries?
Women gave birth and then went right back out to the fields to pick cotton? Lies. All lies. Had to be.
Drugs. She needed drugs. Lots of them. Anything to ease the torture she was suffering.
Bits and pieces of her maternity rotations came back to her. Pieces that told her how to regulate her breathing, how to naturally ease the pressure in her body.
It was time for their baby to enter the world, and she had to find the strength to help him. To push so mightily he couldn’t resist the lure of the world any longer.
She panted. Focused. Panted.
“Push, sweetheart,” James encouraged from between her legs. “You can do it. I can see the top of the baby’s head.”
He could?
More pain and pressure tore at her body. A pain so intense she’d swear her hips were being plucked apart.
“James,” she cried, bearing down as hard as she could.
“That’s it, babe. Push.”
Melissa pushed, holding her breath and bearing down, hard. Harder. Harder still.
“Breathe, hon, breathe,” James reminded her. “Breathe and push.”
“I can’t do both.”
“Yes, you can. You’re the most amazing woman I know. You can do anything, sweetheart. Anything. Now breathe.”
“No,” she cried, knowing her body was tearing in half. She could feel it tearing, feel her flesh ripping from her bones—that had to be what was happening down there.
Then there was the pressure.
The intense, almighty pressure that pushed against her insides, demanding she expand, grant passage.
“Lots of dark hair, Melissa.” James’s voice sounded hoarse, husky. “I see lots of dark hair.”
God, she wished she could see.
But that would require opening her eyes, and she’d shut them, squeezed them tight to the blinding pain.
“Breathe, Melissa, breathe,” James reminded her again, and she bit back the retort for him to shut up and breathe. “The contraction’s coming to an end. One more time. We’re almost there.”
We nothing. She was doing all the work. He was just sitting there, telling her to breathe. The pain in her body eased enough with the end of her contraction that she opened her eyes to tell him exactly what she thought of his we.
Only their eyes met and she forgot to breathe again. This time for a totally different reason. Not from pain, but because of love.
James’s eyes worshiped her, looked at her with such raw emotion that she suspected any wall he’d ever had had crumbled beyond repair.
Was it because of the baby? Was that why he looked that way? Had to be.
She searched his gaze, looking for answers to her heart’s questions and afraid to hope, to dream.
“Tell me again, Melissa,” he demanded in a hoarse whisper.
“Tell you what?” she asked, feeling the first new twinges of muscles pulling in her back and abdomen, signaling the onset of another contraction.
“That you wish you’d married me.”
Fighting the rising tension in her muscles, she did. “I wish I’d come home that night, that you’d been here to give me that ring. I wish you’d never left, because I need you.” Her words came out as pant
s now. “I want to be your wife. Always.”
What did it matter what she was telling him? Any moment she was going to die from the pain. It cut so deep she knew there was no way she’d survive. If she was going to die, she wanted James to know the truth.
“More than that,” she gasped, focused on pushing downward, using the contraction to make her efforts more effective. Quick pants. Hard pushes. “I want you to be my husband,” she panted.
“Melissa.”
The raw emotion with which he said her name forced her eyes to open, to stay locked with his.
“I’ve been yours since the moment we met.”
What was he saying?
A huge pressure shot forth, seeming to split her insides, and she cried out.
Oh, God.
“You did good, Sweetheart, but don’t push,” James ordered, no longer looking at her but working between her legs. “The baby’s head’s out.”
Although she knew he was moving between her legs, she no longer felt anything, just focused on the pressure inside her.
“Beautiful,” James murmured, clearing the baby’s throat. “Absolutely beautiful. With the next contraction, Melissa. Just one more.”
Hadn’t he already said that?
But there was no time to think, because the tight band around her stomach yanked again. She dropped back, her spine arching, her body intent on expelling the pressure, on easing her burden.
“James, I can’t do this,” she cried.
“You can, honey. Just a little more. Give a big push. Now.”
She did, feeling a rush of pressure and fluid and like her body had turned inside out.
“You did it, Melissa.” His voice choked up. She strained her neck, trying to see.
A startled, unhappy wail burst through Melissa’s chest, grabbed her heart, and clenched.
Her eyes met James’s shining ones, but only briefly as he continued checking the baby.
“Apgar score is ten.” A perfect score. “Meet your daughter.” He cradled the still-attached-by-the-umbilical-cord baby in his arms.
Daughter?
Melissa blinked at the tiny, messy bundle in his arms, watched him wrap a clean towel around her. She reached out to stroke her finger over a rosy cheek.