An Abundance of Babies. Marie Ferrarella

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СКАЧАТЬ had to push out the shoulders now. The hardest part. He tried to divert her attention from the pain he knew had to be consuming her. “Do you know the babies’ sex?”

      “Didn’t…ask. It was…supposed to be…a surprise.”

      Holly and Brett had opted not to know, so she hadn’t asked to be told, either. Now she deeply regretted that they hadn’t found out when they’d had the chance. At least they would have known if they were the parents of boys or girls, or one of each. She ached for their loss. And her own.

      Perspiration poured into her eyes, stinging them. Wasn’t this ever going to be over?

      Out of the haze of pain, she heard Sebastian ordering her, “Push, Stevi, push.”

      “I am!” she shrieked, the cry bursting from her swollen lips.

      Smooth as butter, Sebastian thought as the baby all but slid into his hands.

      Of course, he doubted that Stephanie felt that way about it, but then she was on the side that was doing all the work. Experiencing a myriad of feelings that only marginally had to do with the customary ones he felt whenever he attended the miracle of birth, Sebastian looked down at this latest citizen of the world.

      “Still want it to be kept a surprise?”

      “No…damn it.” Was he cruel enough to play games when she was so exhausted? “What…is…it? Boy or girl?”

      “You have a girl, Stevi.”

      He heard Stephanie suck in her breath. The second twin was on its way. Unable to hold the newborn, Sebastian took off his shirt and wrapped it around the baby. Quickly dumping out the canned goods, he placed her into the laundry basket.

      “All right, let’s see if she has a little brother or sister.”

      “Easy…for…you…to…say,” Stephanie managed to reply before the process began again in earnest, even harder this time than before. The pain ripped through her with long, sharp knives. “Oh, God, I’m…going…to…die.”

      Stephanie heard him draw in his breath, as if bracing himself for a fight. “Not on my shift you’re not.”

      She sincerely hoped Sebastian had learned to keep his word better than he had before.

      Chapter Three

      Stephanie could have sworn she heard the distant wail of sirens in the background.

      Or maybe those were just the noises ricocheting in her head, mixing with the vast array of lights and pain all swirling around within her mind and her body as she strained to give birth to the second twin.

      This baby felt larger than the first. Too large to push out. Even her scalp began to tingle as she strained. Sharp needles ran up and down her body, pricking her from the inside out.

      She would have never thought she could endure this much pain and still survive.

      Sebastian’s command of “push” echoed in her brain. Stephanie dug her elbows in close to her side, searching for some small scrap of energy to draw on. There seemed to be none within her reach.

      Tense, on his knees in front of Stephanie, Sebastian placed his hand beneath the small head, supporting it as it emerged.

      She was almost there, he thought. But there was a mile of pain between “here” and “there.”

      “That’s it, that’s it, Stevi, just a little more,” he coached, feeling his own breath hitch within his throat. “Just a little more. We’re almost there.”

      “We?” she panted, opening eyes that had been almost screwed shut with the effort she was putting forth. What was he doing without his shirt on? Had he been like that all along? She couldn’t remember. “You…want…to…take…over?” Breathlessness notwithstanding, the question had a sarcastic bite to it.

      Sebastian flashed her a grin as a fragment of the past echoed through his mind in response to the arch question she’d thrown at him. There was no daunting her fighting spirit, even now.

      “Wouldn’t know where to begin, Stevi. You’re doing much too good a job yourself.”

      Before his eyes, Stephanie stiffened, her whole body growing rigid. He recognized the signs. The final thrust was coming whether she was up to it or not. He forced himself to ignore the exhaustion imprinted on her features.

      “Now, stop stalling and get those shoulders out, Stevi.”

      He would have never spoken to any of his patients this way, no matter how well he knew them. But Stephanie always did better when she was goaded, when someone challenged her. It seemed only natural that she’d approach giving birth the same way.

      So he goaded her.

      He saw the flicker of anger in her eyes. God, but he had missed her. Missed the sound of her laughter, even the sound of her raised voice as she rode headlong into verbal battle with him. She’d never been anything short of magnificent.

      Sebastian banked down his thoughts—thoughts that were not his to think about. She was another man’s wife now and the past belonged where it was, in the past.

      The myriad of feelings flashed through him in a single intake of breath, less time than it took her to bear down for that one last push she had to make. Beside him, the baby’s twin was mewling in the basket, a good, healthy sound. And in the background, he thought he heard the ambulance approaching.

      Too late, guys, she’s almost finished, he thought, relieved that this part of Stephanie’s ordeal was almost over.

      The muffled, high-pitched noise caught his attention. Sebastian instinctively raised his eyes to her face for a second. Lips parted, teeth clenched together to keep back any sounds and writhing in pain, Stephanie looked as if she was going to turn purple.

      “You can scream, you know,” he told her. “It actually helps.”

      But she merely shook her head adamantly from side to side, refusing to be reduced to this most common of common denominators. She wasn’t going to allow herself to scream. This wasn’t the way it was going to happen. “No” was all she could manage to expel through her lips without running the risk of doing exactly what she was trying not to do.

      “There you go, Stevi,” he announced, his voice taking on the width and breath of excitement as the infant’s shoulders became visible. With one hand beneath the tiny back to support it, Sebastian eased the baby out.

      “What…what…” Near collapse, Stephanie didn’t have enough strength or breath left within her to form the question.

      She didn’t have to. Sebastian anticipated it. “You have a boy, Stevi. One of each. You and your husband’ll be evenly matched.” He had no idea what made him say that, or what to do with the sharp, hot stab of pain in the center of his chest when he made the remark.

      With both her head and body throbbing from the effort she’d just put forth, Stephanie hardly heard what he was saying. Except that she had a daughter. And a son. Was she going to be equal to them? Was she going to be able to give them СКАЧАТЬ