by Nancy Martin
“What are you suggesting? That we help them get married tonight? Now? So the baby has a father on her birth certificate? Or do we try to stop the wedding so he doesn’t die?”
“I dunno.” Emma ran a hand through the spikes of her hair. “My head’s jumbled up. I guess I want to discuss it. And call me crazy, but you’re the logical person to talk it over with. What should we do?”
“They should get married.” Libby was firm. “A child needs a stable family. That Man of Nora’s—deep down, he’s a family man.”
“Just the wrong kind of family,” Emma said tartly. “But what if Nora is widowed again? Could she handle it?”
“She’ll be devastated,” Libby agreed. “That Man is very special to her. More special than her first husband if I’m any judge of relationships—and we both know I am. They’re opposites, yet completely attracted to each other. He’s so deliciously …” Libby paused, fingering the bosom of her t-shirt while she searched for the right word. “He’s dangerous. Which must be catnip to a woman like Nora, who’s far more refined than the two of us, you have to admit.”
Emma grunted her assent.
Libby went on, “We’re indestructible, you and I. But Nora is different. She has different needs, and he’s the … the key that fits her lock. They have a karmic connection that’s—well, it’s very romantic.” She sighed, rapture obviously on her mind.
Libby believed in the mumbo jumbo of romance. And she could see a hearts-and-flowers destiny between a delicate woman like Nora—a woman who wore pretty dresses, and liked art and books, and meeting new people, and forging friendships—and a tough guy like Mick, who might have a few drawbacks in the morals department, but who loved Nora intensely.
Libby sighed again. “I wish I had a relationship that was both dangerous and romantic.”
“Stick to the subject, will you?”
Libby opened her eyes and fastened them on Emma with disconcerting clarity. “This is a step in the right direction for you, isn’t it, Em?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I know how you feel about That Man. You try to hide it, but I am astute when it comes to sensing sexual attraction. From time to time, you have harbored a dangerous—”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Emma snapped.
“Wait a minute.” Libby frowned. “I agree you are better suited to That Man than Nora is. But … Heavens, you’re not planning some kind of double cross, are you? You’re not trying to break them up?”
“Oh, I give up! Forget I mentioned any of this! Let’s go inside.”
Libby held back but eventually followed as Emma stormed across the sidewalk. The two of them managed to get the balloons and gift bags through the hospital entrance. Although there wasn’t a big crowd tonight in the lobby, where patients and family members waited in uncomfortable chairs, heads turned. Determined to shut Libby up, Emma stalked across the lobby and past the sleepy-looking security guard. She jammed a finger at the elevator button.
When the doors parted, Libby was there with her arms full of gift bags and took one look inside the elevator. “I don’t think there’s enough room for everything.”
Without a word, Emma took most of the balloons. She’d had enough of Libby’s ridiculousness. She back-tracked to the security guard and flipped out her driver’s license. “I’m taking the stairs, okay? How about giving me a security bracelet to get into labor and delivery?”
He woke from his reverie long enough to pass her the sign-in sheet and snap a plastic pink and blue bracelet onto her wrist. Then Emma pushed through the heavy door and went up the stairwell alone.
Her footsteps echoed in the stairwell as she headed upward. On the first landing, her phone gave a beep, so she pulled it out and checked the screen. Hart Jones. He hadn’t left a voice mail earlier, but now he’d texted her a message. She missed a step and nearly fell on her face. But she wasn’t ready to read his message. Damn him, he’d been out of the country for months, radio silence. And now what? An international booty call? She shoved her phone back into her pocket without reading what he’d written. She wasn’t some kind of starry-eyed teenager ready to jump the second her boyfriend snapped his fingers.
The stairwell was a part of the hospital Emma knew very well. She had used it to escape the maternity ward when she needed a cigarette after giving birth to Hart’s baby. The son of a bitch hadn’t called her that night, had he? And she’d taken the stairs again when she decided she had done what she needed to do and could leave the hospital—knowing the kid she’d carried for nine months was on his way to a better life with his dad and his rich wife. Too bad things hadn’t worked out quite the way they were supposed to.
In the privacy of the second floor landing, three suspicious characters were lounging against the wall, talking in mutters. Emma recognized the short one as a wise guy from Mick’s crew. She didn’t know his name, but he was probably assigned to keep the Godfather protected while Nora was in labor. Protected from what, Emma couldn’t guess.
The other guy was new to her. Emma hadn’t noticed him before, but he was a thug for sure. He had the closed face and hunched shoulders of a man who just then wanted to be invisible. The third person was a female nurse wearing scrubs that pulled tight across her pregnant belly. She had an illicit pack of cigarettes in her hand, but when she heard Emma approaching, she quickly handed off the pack to one of the guys, who palmed it behind his back.
They stopped talking when Emma came up the stairs to the landing. Without speaking to any of them, she turned the corner and carried the balloons up another flight to labor and delivery. If they started talking again, she didn’t hear what it was about.
Libby had already arrived and was arguing with a uniformed security guy, who didn’t want her to go past Checkpoint Charlie to the rooms where the moms were pushing out kids. He wasn’t going to give her a security bracelet—not without permission from one of the moms, that is. Libby flirtatiously asked him to hold two gift bags for her while she fished her identification out of her wallet,. Emma waved her bracelet and slipped through the door, balloons and all.
In the hallway, she almost bumped straight into Mick.
He was standing in the middle of the corridor, glaring at his cell phone. He had Noah balanced on his shoulder, and the baby was sleeping soundly. If he’d been running the halls as Libby reported, he’d clearly exhausted himself. A puddle of baby drool had already darkened Mick’s jacket.
Summoning a grin, Emma said, “You trying to book a flight out of the country, big guy? Having second thoughts about changing more diapers?”
Mick looked away from his phone and automatically put up one hand to steady Noah. He took note of the two dozen balloons in Emma’s grip and smiled. “Hey, Em. On your way to a birthday party?”
“You could say that. Aren’t you supposed to be somewhere right now? Cutting an umbilical cord, maybe?”
Even with the baby on his shoulder, he looked out of place in the sterile hallway—too tall, too much black leather, too much something dangerous lurking in his lazy-eyed gaze. He was built like a football player or a Greek god—Emma wasn’t sure which—the kind of body most women dreamed about. But with a lot of curly dark hair and a face that was both damaged and damned attractive. He certainly wasn’t the average father-to-be dweeb who loitered around the maternity ward.
Yeah, Libby was right. Truth be told, Emma wouldn’t have minded taking a stroll through the fifty shades with Mick. He was smart, sexy as hell, and maybe best of all he knew how to make a woman laugh. And the depth of his love for Nora was—well, it was the thing that kept Emma from stripping off his clothes almost every time she saw him. But it was also damn appealing. Any man who made no secret of adoring the woman in his life had a lot of charm. And his obvious love for children made him almost irresistible to most women.
Appearing to be not the least nervous about the arrival of his own kid, Mick hooked his thumb toward a clos
ed door. “Nora’s in there with a nurse getting ready. They told me I’d be happier out here for a few minutes.”
Emma could guess what Nora was experiencing just then, and yeah, she didn’t need an audience. Emma preferred to forget her own childbirth experience. She’d found it hard work and didn’t see the baby as any kind of reward. Not then, not now. For Nora, though, it would be different. “How’s she doing? Contractions not too bad?”
“She’s hanging in,” Mick replied. “She says she can stand anything for a few hours.”
“What about you? Need a drink? I could make a run to the nearest liquor store if —”
“Nah, I’m good.”
She pointed at his phone. “What’s up? You taking bets on football games?”
The Abruzzo family made most of their income from a vast illegal gambling operation.
“Nothing that easy.” He appeared unruffled by the subtext of her question as he glanced at his cell phone screen again. “I figure we have a couple of hours to kill while the baby takes her time, so why not get married?”
Emma congratulated herself. She’d guessed right. He was planning on making it official before his child was born. “Who you trying to call?”
“Father Tom. I thought he’d be able to get over here before ten o’clock Mass, but I can’t reach him.”
“Maybe he’s sipping the sacramental wine.”
He tried to smile back. “He’s not the type. I wish he’d pick up his phone, though.”
“I saw one of your guys in the stairwell just now. Maybe he’d go grab the priest for you.”
Mick’s head came up. “In the stairwell? Here?” Something new and sharp shone in Mick’s eyes as his gaze touched hers. “Which guy?”
“I don’t know his name. Short, kinda balding, but with a ponytail. I figured you had some of your posse here to celebrate the new arrival.”
Mick nodded, but his expression went flat. It was his Corleone look, Emma had decided long ago. When he was thinking about Abruzzo family business, he tended to put on a blank look that couldn’t quite hide the fact he was thinking fast. Calculating odds, or planning a knee whacking, or maybe just taking an inventory of firepower before going to the mattresses.
He said only, “Something like that.”
She didn’t have a chance to ask more. The double doors at the end of the hallway burst open, and Libby flung herself into view. She had lost a few of her gift bags and was waving her cell phone overhead. She looked like she was ready to explode with news.
Libby cried, “There you are! Oh, heavens, you won’t believe it!”
“Don’t blow a gasket, Lib. What’s the matter? What happened?”
Libby was breathless. “It’s Rawlins! He just phoned me. He got a call from that women’s prison where they’re holding That Awful Woman of His. She’s gone into labor, too! And they’re bringing her here! To this very hospital!”
“Zephyr?” Mick said. “She’s having her baby? Tonight?”
“Right now?” Emma asked.
Mick cursed, sounding dazed.
“Is Rawlins coming?” Emma asked. “I thought he didn’t want anything to do with his kid.”
“He’s not coming. He’s in England, silly. He called because he tried to reach Nora at home. He says they want her here to accept the baby when she’s born. Nora can be in the delivery room.”
“Not if she’s delivering her own baby at the same time.” Emma tried to hold back laughter as she turned to the prospective father and punched him in the arm. “I guess this means you have to be two places at once.”
3.
Mick Abruzzo had always thought he could handle pressure better than most. He’d been through two prison riots, numerous family blow-ups so epic the cops were called, and enough close calls with Nora to stop his heart. Hell, he’d even survived nearly being eaten by a tiger. But not this. Not having two babies at the same time. Things were moving faster than he could get his brain to accept.
Standing there between Nora’s two sisters—Libby, the melodramatic one with a few screws loose, and Emma, a stunner if you liked women hard-edged and blunt—he felt his head give a spin. They were both laughing at his predicament.
The nurse popped out of Nora’s room and said to him, “We’re ready for you now, Dad.”
She was a small, older nurse with a no-nonsense manner. The kind of woman who expected to be obeyed. On auto-pilot, Mick slid his phone into his pocket and unslung Noah from his shoulder. The boy didn’t wake, just released a sleepy sigh and kept snoozing.
Emma didn’t budge, so Libby put out her arms and took Noah. “Here, let me.”
“Thanks.” Mick slid his phone into his pocket and headed for Nora.
But Emma caught his arm. She let go at once, as if burned by the touch, then looked up into his face. “Listen,” she said, “you’ve got a lot going on right now, big guy. How about if I track down Father Tom for you?”
Mick knew Nora loved her sisters deeply, but there was something not trustworthy about Emma. So, automatically, he said, “Thanks, but—”
“Hey, I know how important this is to you.” Emma stood her ground. “You want to get married, right? So I’ll go get the priest. Hanging around here gives me the heebie-jeebies anyway.”
Maybe Emma had a good heart under her tough exterior. But again and again, she’d made bad choices: turning up drunk when her family needed her, giving up the baby who deserved to be loved by his real mother, setting a fire to hide evidence of a murder. Emma almost always did the wrong thing.
And now—well, there was a glitter in her pretty Blackbird eyes that gave Mick pause.
He needed to be with Nora. But at the same time, he wanted to be beating the bushes to find Father Tom in time to tie their knot. Maybe he wasn’t thinking straight, but here was Emma offering a solution.
He said, “That’d be great, Em. Thanks.”
She grinned and handed over a gigantic bunch of balloons. “Happy to help. Besides, I want to take another look at those people in the stairwell.”
Mick intended to make a phone call about that, too. But not right now. He took the balloon strings and carried them into the delivery room.
Nora was adjusting something medical taped to the back of her hand. She had scrubbed the makeup from her face and looked delicately pale and beautiful. Her eyes were luminous with excitement when she looked up at him from her spot on the bed.
She laughed. “Where did you get all those?”
“Emma brought them. She’s …” Mick turned to speak to Emma, but she had already disappeared. “She was here a second ago.”
“It’s me!” trilled Libby. She came sailing into the room like a cruise ship under full steam, holding Noah in her arms. “Darlings, I couldn’t stay away!
“Libby,” Nora said faintly. “You’re back.”
Libby dropped her pink bags and swooped down to give Nora a big kiss. “The silly security guard almost didn’t let me in. Said there was some kind of privacy request next to your name on his list. But I talked him into letting me through. See, I even got an official bracelet! Anyway, I wanted to tell you that I’m going home to drop off Noah and to pick up my Shanti chanting tapes! They’re just the thing if you get overwhelmed by a contraction.”
“I’m not overwhelmed. Not yet, anyway.”
When she leaned back against her pillows again, Nora looked as composed … well, as composed as she ever did around her sisters. While Mick was out in the hall, she had taken the time to sweep her dark hair into a fetching topknot, and although she was wearing a hospital-issued sack of some kind, she had managed to tie one shoulder closed in a way that gave it a high-fashion flare. Over Libby’s head, though, she shot Mick a look that called for help.
The nurse took over. “I’d say it’s getting a little crowded in here, and we’ve got to make room for the most important person, so how about if you step outside, ma’am? There’s a comfortable lounge just down t
he hall where you—”
“Oh, I’ll just stay a minute.” Libby perched her large behind on the edge of the bed, cradling Noah close. “There’s something I’d like to know about, and here we are in the perfect setting to learn.” She addressed herself to the nurse. “I’ve read about something very exciting—the childbirth orgasm. Have you heard of it?”
“The what?”
“It’s completely natural,” Libby rushed to say. “Through expert stimulation during the birthing process, the woman’s whole reproductive system unites both to block the central nervous system’s pain pathways and to simultaneously heighten the sensual response. The result is supposed to be a shattering orgasm. It’s especially likely to happen in women who have quick sexual response triggers. Or who regularly pleasure themselves. It hit me that tonight might be the perfect opportunity to suss out if it’s truly possible. Because I might be tempted to have another baby if it’s real.”
“Libby,” Nora said, “don’t frighten the staff. Why don’t you go home, and we’ll call you when—”
“I never heard of such a thing,” the nurse said flatly. “And I’ve been helping deliver babies for twenty years.”
“Are you sure?”
“Of course I’m sure.”
“Maybe women are enjoying the orgasm but not telling you about it?”
“I think I’d notice,” the nurse said.
Mick wondered what his own face looked like right then. Sick? Shocked? Or just grossed out?
“Hm,” A frown of disappointment pinched Libby’s forehead. “Well, it’s hard to find professionals who are both open-minded and scientifically adventurous.” Libby turned to Nora. “I was hoping the two of you would be up for trying. Why don’t I bring back my tapes and a vibrator? You might just need a little buzz to help the sensual properties of uterine contractions take over and—”
“No, Libby,” Nora said. “No, no, no. You should go home. Noah ought to be in bed by now. And you have other issues to consider.” Nora gave her sister a meaningful glare. “You know. The police matter?”