Page 96 of Tides That Bind

I shut her dresser drawer. “I’ll come back and get you whatever you need. We should go.”

Harper shakes her head. “Not today. God, not today.”

I don’t know what’s freaking me out more, the fact that Harper is in labor or that she’s not willing to accept she’s in labor even though her water broke all over that damn rug.

“Harper.” I kneel in front of her. “I need you to pull yourself together. Like now. At least until I get youto the hospital.”

Lose your shit there with medical professionals around,I want to say, but I’m trying to be nice. Because she’s about to have a baby.

Early.

Without her husband.

Without…anyone.

Just me.

I reach out and put my hands on her shoulders. “Can you stand? Let’s get you in the car before you have another one.”

I’ve been trying to time these things as best as I can, like the nurse on the phone told me. The last two came six minutes apart. I’ve got another minute and a half to get her in the car.

“Come on. We’ll get you to the hospital and everything will be alright.”

It will. Babies come early all the time, right?

Reluctantly, Harper takes my hand and lets me pull her to her feet. But by the time she stands, she lets out a scream that shocks me so much I nearly jump back.

But she reaches out, her fingers digging into my arms and presses the top of her head into my chest as she whines.

I look at my watch. That was four and a half..

“What should I do?”

“I don’t know,” Harper grits out. “I don’t know.”

I’m so uncomfortable I want to crawl out of my skin. But judging by how intensely Harper squeezes me, she’s more uncomfortable.

Obviously.

“Breathe,” I tell her, because there’s nothing coming from her mouth now but short pants and that can’t be good, right? She needs oxygen. A lot of it because the baby needs oxygen and gets it from her. At least that’s what I think. “Just try to breathe.”

It’s another ten long fucking seconds before Harper’s body finally relaxes, but she doesn’t pull back, doesn’t return to the bed. She leans into me for support. I can feel the exhaustion in her body already.

“We should go now,” I tell her.

Harper begins to cry again.

I’m about to scream,I need you to calm down, but I know that’s never the right thing to say to a woman under normal circumstances so it definitely can’t be good to say to a pregnant woman in labor.

“Nate…” is all Harper cries against me. And I swear, when Nate comes back from Afghanistan in one piece, I’m going to kill him for putting me in this position. The past four months haven’t been easy with Harper. But they’re a cakewalk when you compare them to just the last hour.

But I think of Nate, what he would do, what he would want me to say.

“You’re doing amazing,” I say, because I know he loves to lift people up. “I know you’re totally freaked out but I’m here, okay?”

Harper nods. “Okay,” she spits out. “Okay, let’s go.”

I’ve never walked down a flight of stairs so carefully.

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