Well Suited (Red Lipstick Coalition #4)(82)

Sparrow handed me the wrung-out, folded towel, but my hands were busy rolling up towels.

“Cool her forehead.”

She did.

I kept talking, catching her gaze and holding it. “When I was in Girl Scouts, a girl in my troop named Farrah Silver used to terrorize me at camp. Ants in my bed, stole my soap, threw my sheets in the mudbank of the river. The works.” The tear of the sheet, the flash of my hands. “Once, she replaced one of the other girl’s shampoo with Nair, and after that, she was everyone’s best friend. It was that or baldness, and no twelve-year-old girl would pick anything but asskissing under those odds.”

A flicker of a smile, tight with pain, touched Sarah’s lips.

“So, we were at camp, heading out to trail ride. We headed to the stable, and Farrah walked straight up to the biggest horse they had—Diablo. Why they had a stallion evil enough to be named after Satan at Girl Scout camp is beyond me.” I positioned the rolled-up towels from hip to knee on either side. “Our leader had ridden up ahead of us to check the trail was all right after a rainstorm. Farrah, of course, started showing off and spurred Diablo, but he barely moved other than to buck her off. I swear, she flew ten feet and hit the ground in a puff of dust.”

“That little girl was a menace,” Mom said with a shake of her head.

“I’m sure she’s either in prison or is a CEO. Anyway, everyone just stared at her while she wiggled around on the ground, yelling. Not crying. Yelling obscenities at us. And no one helped—they just laughed. Laughed! Especially Rachel, the bald one. So, I got off my horse and made a brace out of sticks and a T-shirt.”

“You gave her your shirt?” Mom asked.

“Nope. I used hers. She put ants in my bed? Well, I saved her ankle by exposing her stuffed training bra to the troop.”

She laughed.

Sirens wailed in the distance just as I took Sarah’s hand. “It’s going to be all right. I know it hurts, but it will be better soon. They’re going to have all kinds of good stuff for you, like morphine and ice packs.”

The doorbell rang.

“I’ll get it,” Mom said, rushing to the door.

I expected to hear strange voices of paramedics, not my mother gasping.

“Dave! What are you doing here?”

My head snapped around so fast, I nearly got whiplash. My father sagged miserably on the stoop.

“Honey, I’ve missed you. I’ve been going crazy without you all this time. I know I haven’t loved you like I should, but I came to prove I’d cross the world for another chance. Let me make it up to you, babe. Let me love you like you deserve.”

“Oh, Dave,” she sighed, falling into his arms. “I’ve missed you, t—oh!”

The noise of the sirens rose to ear-splitting decibels just as a fire truck squealed to a stop beyond the door.

And then the commotion really began in the way of half a dozen first responders, my crazy parents, the gravely injured grandmother of my child, and a contraction so intense, I thought I might split in two from the extraordinary blinding heat of it.

And all I could do was hang on to Sarah’s hand and hope.



?





Theo

Chaos.

The cab screeched to a stop just down the street, which was blocked by an ambulance and a fire truck.

I threw the door open and ran, leaving Tommy and Amelia behind me.

Chaos, red and frenetic, sirens and lights, strangers in uniforms with no familiar faces.

I wound through paramedics and firefighters, bolting through the open door of my house, my gaze darting across faces, looking for one I knew.

Then I found one, a pale face wrenched in pain and drenched in sweat.

“Ma,” I called, beelining for her.

Two EMTs were moving my mother onto a body board, her body so small. She reached for me.

“Teddy,” she croaked, her voice trembling and tight.

I clasped her hands. “What happened?”

“I fell, tripped on the coffee table like a clumsy old fool. Katherine took care of me.”

“Kate,” I whispered.

Her brows tightened even more. “Honey, check on her. I think she’s having contractions, but she’s too proud to admit it.”

I froze, my heart stopping for the fourth time since I’d rolled out of bed that morning.

“Go. I’m okay,” she insisted. “There’s nothing anyone can do for me that hasn’t already been done. Go make sure she’s all right.”

I kissed her forehead, trading places with Tommy before wheeling around to look for Katherine.

I caught sight of her in the kitchen, face hard as stone, pacing a rut in the floor with her mom in her wake. The closer I got, the worse my dread.

“Theo,” she breathed when she saw me, the hard facade she’d put in place cracking and crumbling. She launched herself into my arms.

“Kate.” I cupped her head, holding her to me. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. God, Theo—it happened so fast. She stood and took a step, and I couldn’t catch her. I tried to get to her, but she fell and—” A noisy hiss, and her body locked, curling in on itself.

I let her go to inspect her. “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.” She ground the word out like grain against stone.