went on alert. “Are you all right?”
“Fine,” Claire said, releasing the word with a cleansing breath. “Been having Braxton Hicks all day.”
René quirked a brow. “All day? Why didn’t you say something?”
Claire shrugged. “Second-kid syndrome?”
Since Claire wasn’t due for another few weeks, she’d keep her eye on her as the meeting continued.
Phil shot up, forcing her to crane her neck toward the ceiling. His longish dark blond hair swept back from his face in a cavalier manner. Tanned and too handsome for his own good, he read his obligatory monthly OSHA report, and tortured them with rules running the gamut from what chemicals were acceptable to how to dispose of soiled dressings. She prayed the pulmonary faction of their group wouldn’t tell them it was time for another disaster drill. And if he did, how soon could she schedule a vacation?
Claire let out another gasp, this time grabbing her back. René checked her watch. It had only been one minute since the last one.
Chapter Two
JASON flew to his wife’s side, the one she was holding with both hands. “Sweetheart, is there anything I can do?”
Claire diligently practiced her birthing breathing as René knelt in front of her. She put her palm on Claire’s rigid stomach. The baby had dropped from yesterday’s appointment and, from the feel of the rock-solid mound, was already engaged.
“I have an idea,” René said. “Why don’t we adjourn this meeting, and I’ll take you to my office and examine you?”
“No argument from me,” Claire said.
The confirmed bachelor of the group, Phil, had noticeably paled beneath his Santa Barbara tan. “I guess I’ll take off, then,” he said, looking relieved.
Jason gingerly assisted his wife to stand, and escorted her, like the deliciously doting soon-to-be father he was, to René’s examination room in the clinic.
Jon stood perfectly still, obvious wheels turning in that wondrous mind of his. He glanced at René. “You need any help?”
“Don’t know yet,” she said, as she rushed out of the kitchen-turned-conference room. “Why don’t you stick around just in case?”
Five minutes later, René placed Claire’s feet in the stirrups on the table, gowned up and donned gloves, then started the examination. Holy smokes! Not only was she almost effaced and dilated, but her waters had broken.
“We’re having a baby here,” René called over her shoulder, which had Jason rushing into the room.
“That’s what I was afraid of,” Claire said, worry knitting her brows.
“Do we have time to get her to the hospital?” Jason asked, sounding breathless.
“Not at this stage.” René gave Jason an assertive glance, then she saw Claire’s questioning expression. “Don’t worry, Claire. I’m here. I’ll take care of you.”
“Ask Mrs. Densmore if she can keep Gina tonight,” Claire said to Jason.
He stood at Claire’s side, eyes dilated and wider than René had ever seen them. “Everything’s going to be fine,” he said, squeezing his wife’s fingers with one hand, fishing out his cell phone and speed-dialing their babysitter with the other.
From outside the door, she heard Jon’s voice. “How can I help?”
“Get a case of the absorbent towels, and warm some baby bath blankets, then start an IV for me,” she said.
A familiar-sounding scream tore from Claire’s chest. “Jason, get our morphine supply and an antiemetic. It might help Claire take the edge off before she goes into transition.” René waited for the contraction to diminish, then positioned the fetoscope to get an initial heart rate. She delivered babies at the local hospital, not in their clinic, and electronic fetal monitoring wasn’t available here.
“Oh, and call for standby ambulance transportation,” she added. After the birth, both mother and child would need to be admitted to the local hospital for observation. René bent her head and concentrated on timing the strong and steady beats. One hundred and thirty beats a minute. Good.
René stared into Claire’s stressed-out green eyes, sending her calming thoughts. Only thirty seconds later another contraction mounted, and perspiration formed around Claire’s honey-colored hairline. René continued listening for abnormal deceleration of the baby’s heart rate with the contraction, and was relieved to find a normal variation. Only a ten-beat dip.
Jason lurched back into the room with the IV supplies, and when his hands proved too shaky to stick his own wife, Jon stepped in and started the IV as Jason titrated a tiny amount of morphine into the line to help ease Claire’s pain in between the contractions. She didn’t want Claire too relaxed when it came time to push; the baby could come out floppy instead of vigorously crying.
The labor went on for another hour and a half, when René felt the rigid beginnings of a massive contraction. Now fully effaced and dilated, Claire had moved into transition.
“Push,” René said.
Though Claire seemed exhausted, she gave her all. This time the head fully crowned. When the next contraction rode in on the tail end of the first, René continued her encouragement. “Use the contraction, Claire,” René said. “Push!”
Jon hovered at René’s side. “I’ll get a basin for the afterbirth,” he said. “Are you going to need to do an episiotomy?”
“Don’t think so, but get a small surgical kit for me just in case.” She intended to do her part to slow down the passage of the head to avoid any tissue tear.
Jon dashed out of the room as if he were the expectant father, and when he returned, René put him to work tracking the baby’s heart rate through the fetoscope so she could concentrate on the birth. Not only was he fascinated with the listening device—typical of him—he was most likely figuring out a way to make a better one.
All was well, but the contractions came so quickly and hard that Claire didn’t have time to relax in between. Wringing with sweat, she looked exhausted, ready to give up. Along came another contraction.
“Bear down, Claire! Push! Push!” René urged, as she cupped the baby’s head in her hands and moved it downward as Claire pushed with everything she had. Her legs trembled and she let fly words René hadn’t heard since the last Lakers basketball game she’d attended.
She slipped the umbilical cord free of the baby’s face, and assisted as first the head, then one shoulder and then the other, slipped out. No sooner had the mouth cleared the birth canal, than the baby cried.
Obviously relieved after delivering the hardest part—the head—Claire wept.
René glanced up long enough to see tears fill Jason’s eyes. “Oh, my God,” he said. The room went blurry for her, too, but she couldn’t dwell on the swell of emotion taking over; she had a baby to finish delivering.
