The Bride He Replaced novel · Chapter 22 of 24

Chapter 22: Blue Socks

Hannah's POV

Bea reached the hospital before we did.

She had driven herself, in her dressing gown and her good shoes.

She walked straight past the front desk with her old badge held up.

"This is my girl," she told the charge nurse. "Thirty-seven weeks, third contraction, and she's cursing in full sentences. Get her a room."

I laughed, and then I stopped, because it hurt.

They put me in a room on the floor where Bea had worked for thirty years.

A nurse who had been at table nine at the benefit came in and took my blood pressure.

"I've been waiting for you since the stage," she said.

Duncan stood in the corner with his hands in his pockets.

He had not said anything since the car.

"You can stay," I told him. "If you want."

"I'll stay as long as you want me here."

"I want you to wait outside."

He didn't flinch.

"This part is mine and Bea's," I said. "I don't know why. I'd like it that way."

"Then it is."

He kissed my forehead, once, and went out into the hall.

The labor took eleven hours.

I won't tell all of it, because most of it I don't remember.

I remember Bea's hand, which was small and dry and did not let go.

I remember the nurse saying, "Breathe through it, honey, don't fight it."

I remember Bea saying, "She only fights what she can win. Give her something to push against."

I remember a window with a grey sky, and then a window with an orange one.

Near noon, a younger nurse put her head in.

"Mrs. Moran?" she said, low. "There's a man in the corridor in a very nice coat. He says he's the father."

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