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In fact, Drake was looking a bit pale-er.
Piper seemed to notice it too and chuckled before groaning again. “So, bloody guts you can handle but a laboring woman trips you up? Do you want to wait in the waiting room?”
“Please,” Drake darted out of the room without another word. His brother followed him shortly after, leaving me with Wynn and Marcus left to be with Piper.
“Anybody else?” Piper asked the room.
Wynn came closer to her and brushed her hair away from her sweaty face, kissing her temple. “I will leave when you wish me to.”
“Me too,” Marcus announced with the nod of his head, standing next to me.
Antoine walked in once more with the nurse not far behind.
“Everything has been taken care of. Darren is on his way.”
“What about Gretchen?” Piper brought up suddenly. “Should we tell Gretchen? Wouldn't she want to be here for this.”
Antoine paused and picked up his phone once more. “I’ll see what I can do. I can certainly call her.”
“Yeah, call Gretchen. I want her here too.”
“How much longer do you think she has?” Wynn asked the nurse. She took one look at him and then a second look, her face turning pink at Wynn’s attention.
“Any moment now, she's making pretty fast progress now. Faster than any I’d ever witnessed.”
“Did you hear that, Piper?” I told her, stroking her brow. “Any time now and we're going to be parents, can you believe it?”
She forced a pained smile at me. “Yup can't believe it. I’d believe it a whole lot more if it wasn't trying to kill me from the inside out.”
The nurse chuckled and the rest of us smartly kept our mouths shut. Which was the wise decision when Piper shot an intense glare at the nurse.
“What should we do?” I asked the nurse. “While we wait?”
The nurse shook her head. “There's not much you can do. Keep her company. Help her with breathing. Have any of you had any means of training for delivery? Did you guys go to any kind of Lamaze classes?”
“No, no classes. We were going to do a home birth. You know me, all natural.” Piper reinforced that sentiment with a bite of bitterness.
“I have,” Marcus spoke up.
We all looked at him in surprise.
“I've helped my sisters deliver their babies.”
Piper stared at him. “You have sisters?”
“I did.”
“Huh.” Just then Piper had another wave of contractions and the conversation was brought to a screeching halt.
“It's okay.” The nurse waved to Marcus. “Since you've had experience why don't you stand on the other side of her and help coach her through the breathing. I'm going to get the doctor to come check her out again.”
It wasn't more than twenty minutes before Darren appeared in the hospital room doorway.
Piper cried out and reached for him, stopping them mid practice of breathing. “It’s Darren! You're here.”
“And look who I brought with me,” Darren offered her a small smile, gesturing behind him where Gretchen came in followed by the twins and Antoine. It seemed like everyone felt that the time was coming and wanted to be here.
“Oh, my poor baby girl,” Gretchen came up to Piper's side, pushing me out of the way to reach her. “What have they gotten you into now?”
