Page 92 of A Baby for the Firefighter
“I… think my water just broke,” Griff said, staring at me.
Within an instant, I felt all color drain from my face. “Your water broke?” I repeated intelligently. Everything I’d read about what to do in this instance, all the knowledge I’d gathered, it was gone from my brain as if it had never existed in the first place. All I could think wasoh my God, oh my God, oh my God.
Not super productive, I admit.
It was a good thing Eli was there with us. He had a handle on things.
“Awesome!” he said with a huge grin on his face. “Looks like today is the day I get to meet my nephew!”
Griff looked to his brother and smiled as well. “Yeah, I guess we’re going to meet this little guy today.”
Meanwhile, I was still racking my brain for anything to say.
Eli glanced at me and laughed. “No need to panic yet. It’ll probably be a few hours before the kid gets here.”
A few hours.I was going to be a parent in a few hours. How was I supposed to keep calm knowing that?
“I’m going to take Fiona home,” Eli said. “And then I’ll meet you guys at the hospital.” He shot me another look. “Are you okay to drive?”
Was I okay to drive? Of course I was! I shook myself out of my stupor. I could get my pregnant mate to the hospital. It wasn’t like I’d never been around women and omegas in labor on the job.
Still, this was different. This was Griff, and that was my child he was about to give birth to.
Just get him to the hospital for now.
Right. “Guess we should get in the car, huh?” I asked Griff, trying to sound calm and collective and not the least bit panicky.
“Yeah, but we should also take the bag. We packed one, remember? For when my water breaks.”
“Yes, of course.” I’d completely forgotten about that. Damn, when had Griff turned into the more responsible one of us? I really had to get a grip. As Eli had said, it could take hours before the baby would be here, and I couldn’t act like an idiot for all that time. What if my baby’s first impression of me was that I couldn’t be trusted with adult tasks?
That was a silly thought, but still…
Giving it my best effort, I somehow managed to get Griff and myself into the car and drive us to the hospital.
There, Griff was wheeled into a room to wait for his contractions to get stronger. No one at the hospital seemed panicked, and the general calm let me breathe a little easier as well. We were going to be fine, weren’t we?
“Should we call your parents?” I asked, kissing Griff’s forehead after the initial check-up.
“Nah, the doctor said it would be a while yet, and I don’t want my mother running circles around me all the time up to the delivery.”
The image made me laugh. “Guess you’re right. She would do that.” I straightened. “Do you think we should talk about names again?” Because we hadn’t really settled. I took a deep breath. “I can’t believe we’re going to be the parents of a baby boy in a few hours.”
Griff smiled. “Maybe you could believe it if you’d spend the last nine months getting fatter and fatter.”
“You’re not fat,” I protested. “You’re beautiful. But good point.” I had to chuckle. God, how lucky was I to be with an omega who could make me laugh even when I felt so out of my element. Hospitals always threw me off. I liked to take action to help people, but here, I had to leave it all up to the doctors and nurses. All I could do for Griff now was provide moral support.
“I think we’re going to see what name fits best when the little one is born,” he said, playing with a corner of the bed sheets.
“Maybe you’re right… or you’re speculating that I’ll be so distracted by the miracle of birth that you get to decide by yourself.” After all, there were two names we were considering, and each of us liked one of them a little better than the other.
Griff tilted his head. “Oh, that’s a good idea.”
Darn, I’d given him a plan he’d never have come up with on his own. Still, I didn’t mind so much. Griff had done the most work in creating our child, carrying it close to his heart for nine months. If he wanted to be the one to give our son his name, that was fine with me. I wasn’t the kind of old-school alpha who needed control over everything. I just wanted my little family to be happy.
“I’m sure you’ll make the right choice,” I said, leaning down to kiss him.
We’d come this far, nothing was going to go wrong at this point. At least that was what I thought until about an hour later when his contractions started coming more rapidly.
