cut him off. “I’m not addled, I’m fine. We’re both fine,” she insisted, looking at her daughter who now dozed. “And we don’t need to go to the hospital.” She just wanted to be left alone to enjoy her daughter. And rest.
His eyes narrowed. Something was off. For an ordinarily sensible woman, she was protesting too much. “What are you afraid of?”
“I’m not afraid,” Eve retorted, but he kept on watching her as if he didn’t believe her, as if he was waiting for her to tell him the truth. She pressed her lips together and looked up toward the ceiling. It kept the tears from flowing. “The last time I was in a hospital, it was to see the E.R. doctor pronounce my father dead. I just don’t think I can handle being there.”
The sound of approaching sirens pushed their way into the stillness, swelling in volume.
“Too late,” Adam told her. “Besides, this is a completely different situation. Don’t you want to know if Brooklyn’s all right?” he asked her. With his free hand, he stroked the baby’s head ever so gently. Something warm moved through him. He felt fiercely protective of this little being, instinctively knowing that he would kill for her if it came down to that. “I mean, she looks perfect, but just to be sure, you need to have a pediatrician confirm that.”
She didn’t think it was possible, not after all Adam had put her through, not after all the disappointment she’d felt when she discovered that he’d been lying to her the whole time they’d spent together, but her heart softened to hear him call their daughter perfect.
And she knew he was right. Her baby needed to be checked out by a doctor.
Much as she didn’t want to, she had to go to the hospital, not for herself, but for her baby’s sake. For Brooklyn.
She nodded toward the knife he’d brought. “I want you to cut the cord before they get here.”
“Okay.”
With one quick, clean movement, he severed the physical connection between mother and child. The moment Adam placed the knife down, he heard the front doorbell ringing.
“Looks like the cavalry has arrived,” he told her. Turning on his heel, he left the room to admit the paramedics.
“No,” she said softly to her daughter, glancing toward Adam’s retreating back, “the cavalry’s already here.”
Rather than riding with Eve and the baby in the ambulance, or opting to go back home now that he’d helped Eve give birth to their baby, Adam decided to follow the ambulance to the hospital in his car.
Arriving at the hospital a half beat behind the paramedics, he left his vehicle parked in the lot designated for emergency room patients and stood at the back of the ambulance before the doors even opened. When they did, the first thing he saw was Eve’s face. She was looking for him. When their eyes met, her smile widened.
It still got to him, that thousand-watt smile that always seemed to light up the room, or, in this case, the inside of the ambulance.
And the inside of him.
He supposed there was only so much a heart could be hardened.
This wasn’t good, he admonished in the next moment. He needed a clear head to do what he was doing. Any distraction could prove fatal, not just to his operation, but to him, as well. He shouldn’t be here.
Eve didn’t need him. She was in professional hands now. These people were trained for this. They could more than take care of her and anything that she needed. As long as Eve was here, in the middle of a bustling hospital, she’d be out of harm’s way.
Besides, as far as he actually knew, no one in this region knew about their connection. His connection, the self-centered college student, Sederholm, didn’t know about Eve. This was all a preemptive strike on his part.
But he lived the life too long to be at ease, to hope that everything went well and that there would be no mishaps, no reason to believe that either Eve or the baby would be in jeopardy. He’d learned that when one of the agents had grown lax during the last undercover operation, he had gotten blown away. Literally. From where he stood, it was far better to be safe than live with a lifetime of regret.
“I need you to call Vera for me,” she said to him the moment the paramedics mobilized the gurney, snapping the wheels in place. They immediately began to guide the gurney in through the automatic sliding doors.
Adam hurried to keep pace with the gurney. The name she’d just tossed in his direction meant nothing to him. “Vera?”
“Dr. Vera Lee. She’s the veterinarian who works with me at the Laguna Animal Hospital. She’s going to have to take over the appointments and have Susannah reschedule the ones that aren’t emergencies until I can get back to work.”
Which wouldn’t be for a while if he had anything to say about it, he thought. Childbirth might be natural, but it could knock the hell out of a woman and Eve needed to give herself some time to recover.
“Susannah?” he repeated. Another name that meant nothing to him.
“Susannah Reyes. She’s my tech and she doubles as a receptionist.” Wanda Peeples had been her father’s technician and receptionist for thirty years, but when he died, the woman, already in her seventies, had retired. Grief-stricken, she’d debated selling the practice for all of five hours, then decided to take over, rebuilding it from the ground up.
Frustrated, Eve shook her head. “I really thought I was going to have more time.”
Who was it that said life was what happens while you were busy making plans? “Life’s full of surprises,” Adam told her.
And he should know that better than anyone, he thought, looking down at the infant cradled in her arms.
“All right, I’ll call Vera and Susannah. Anything else?”
“Yes.” She took a breath, then raised her head. Her eyes met his. “Thank you.”
Adam hadn’t been expecting that. Hearing Eve voice her gratitude brought a smile to his lips. “You’re welcome.”
The moment was quickly dissipated by the authoritative, stocky nurse who came up to him and hooked her arm through his. “You the husband?” the woman demanded.
Eve spoke up before he had a chance to. “He’s the father.”
Picking up on the difference, the nurse declared, “Good enough,” and thrust a clipboard with several sheets clipped to it at him. “I need you to fill out some information.”
Adam quickly scanned the top sheet. There was no way that he knew even half the information that was being asked. “Look, I can’t—”
“I’m preregistered,” Eve called out as the paramedics, rattling off pertinent information regarding both mother and child, turned her over to an orderly and another nurse. The duo paused for a moment as the gurney changed hands.
“Saved you some trouble,” the stocky nurse mumbled to Adam, taking back the clipboard. Then, as Adam turned to continue following Eve’s gurney, the woman placed her hand against his chest, stopping him in his tracks. “You
