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So I sat there with her for a long time. Neither of us said anything because what the hell do you say in a moment like that? For most of that hour, I didn’t know.
And then it came to me.
I was speaking before I knew what I was saying. “If you let me take you to the hospital now, I will help you become a mother,” I swore to her. “I will help you make a baby. Use me. Let me.”
The shudder on my spine turns to a shiver of pain as yet another contraction tears through my body. I bite down on my tongue and force myself back to my feet.
I promised Rose I’d bring her baby into this world.
I’ll be damned if I back out on that now.
I locate my phone where I dropped it on the carpet and pick it up with some effort. I dial in Pavel’s number, but wherever he is, there’s no signal. “Who else?” I ponder out loud, pacing back and forth along the foyer. “Who else, who else, who?—”
That’s when her name jumps into my head. Rogan! Dmitri always relied on her in a bind. She was older, yes, but she was sharp as a whip and capable.
I find her number in my contact list and dial. She answers right away, and the sound of the line connecting is like manna from heaven. I sink to my knees and sob. “Hello, Mrs. Egorov. How can I help?—”
The words come out in a rush without pauses for breath between them. “I’m in labor and Dmitri and Aleks aren’t picking up and I can’t get out of the penthouse because I don’t have the access code and… and… I’m freaking out!”
“I see,” she says, calm as a glacier. “Don’t worry; I will call in reinforcements.” What does that mean? “They will be there in the next five minutes.”
Click.
I take the phone off my ear and stare down at the screen. “Did she just… hang up on me?”
I almost scream when a heavy mechanical clunk sounds behind me. Turning in equal parts horror and amazement, I see the elevator start to move.
But it doesn’t open to my floor.
It goes up.
If some sweaty construction worker putting in overtime on the upstairs renovations comes down to deliver my baby, I swear to God I’ll strangle Dmitri with the umbilical cord next time I see him.
The elevator reverses course. The cables whine. The car descends, closer and closer and closer toward me…
The light flashes green. The doors open.
Ding.
And when they part, there is one person standing there, wearing a soft cotton jumpsuit and a sheepish, apologetic smile.
“Hey, babe,” Bee says to me, like everything is fine. Like she didn’t die months ago. “Guess it’s go time, huh?”
And since I can’t comprehend who this person is standing in front of me, since I can’t think of what to say in response, I do the only logical thing a person can do in my position: I let go.
Darkness makes more sense than life right now, anyway.
40
WREN
I wake up from the scorching pain reverberating in my stomach.
My first thought is, Well, this is bullshit.
I mean, it’s bad enough that I died during childbirth. Why the hell am I still in pain? Shouldn’t I be floating somewhere on a magical cloud? Or getting ready to meet my maker? Or being reunited with Rose and Bee?
To be fair, Bee had made an appearance. It was suitably dramatic, yet strangely underwhelming at the same time. As my memory serves, she came in on an elevator, not a chariot flown by unicorns, and she was wearing a blue cotton jumpsuit, whereas I would’ve expected ethereal white robes and a halo. Or at least?—
