Page 3

My eyes stung.

“Then, when everything is done, and you’re here, and everyone has stopped crying and taking a million pictures, I give you to them, and I go home and eat my weight in cinnamon rolls. That was the deal.”

I looked down at my regular serviceable watch, not the fancy kind of watch with its own phone number, and made note of the time. I needed to track exactly how long between each contraction. When were things going to get really real?

Snow piled up against the side window.

I don’t know how long I continued to talk to my niece, but it seemed like hours. It was really only a half hour but my teeth were starting to chatter.

Headlights reflected off my side mirror.

They cut through the swirl of white like a miniature sunrise, too bright and too close. For a panicked second, I thought the car was coming straight for us, but then the beams swerved, slowed, and eased to a stop on the shoulder above my ditch.

A dark truck. Four-wheel drive. Big tires.

Salvation on rims.

“Oh, thank god,” I breathed.

The driver’s door opened. A man dropped down, tall and broad in a heavy coat, knit cap pulled low. For a weird half-second, I thought, please don’t be a serial killer, and then another contraction hit and I decided I’d take my chances.

He picked his way down the slope, boots crunching on packed snow, and rapped on my window.

I pressed the button for the window to roll down. Of course it didn’t, because my damn Jeep didn’t have any juice. I opened the door halfway, cold air knifing in.

“You, okay?” he called over the wind. His voice was deep, steady. I swore I heard a kid’s voice talking from somewhere behind him—inside the truck, maybe—high and urgent.

“I—” I started, and then a sharp, undeniable pressure bore down low in my pelvis. My breath hitched. “Define okay,” I managed.

His gaze dropped to my belly, then sprang back to my face. His eyes were blue. Very, very blue.

“I’m stuck,” I said, because that was easier than I think I’m in labor in a ditch.

“I see that.” He nodded. “We need to get you to my truck, and get us to Knoxville to ride this out.”

“I don’t think we’re going to make it to Knoxville,” I grimaced.

“My truck can make it, trust me.”

“You don’t understand. I’m having a baby.”

“Yeah, I noticed.” His left lip twitched upward.

“Now,” I said succinctly. “I’m having a baby now. You can’t be driving.”

His eyes widened. Just for a heartbeat. Then something shuttered down, like a switch flipping from “civilian” to “crisis mode.”

“Right,” he said. “Okay. I’m Adam. I’m going to help you.”

“Zoe,” I blurted. “I’m Zoe. And this isn’t my baby.” Because that seemed important to clarify before things got really weird.

That same corner of his mouth twitched again. “That sounds like a longer conversation,” he said. “Let’s get you out of this ditch first.”

The contraction started to climb.

“Yeah,” I gritted. “About that…we might have to multitask.”

Because of course. Of course, my life was about to introduce itself to this stranger with a snowstorm, a crash, and the world’s second most complicated birth story.