Ghost (Boston Underworld #3) - A. Zavarelli Page 0,93

through the delivery and cutting the cord. Kissing her forehead and holding his daughter for the first time with blinding love.

It makes me ache.

I won’t have that. I will go through it alone, just as I always have been.

Mack says she will be there with me, but it’s not the same. It’s just not the same.

I keep telling myself that I have more time to prepare. That by the time that I go into labor, I will be stronger. That I will be mentally prepared.

Only, that isn’t true.

Because my water breaks two weeks early when I’m alone in my bed. I’m fumbling for my cell phone when Lachlan’s guard comes in to check on me.

He’s young, and his name is Conor. He’s been staying at the safe house with me, watching over me. And right now, I’ve never been so grateful for his presence.

“Everything good?” he asks.

His eyes widen when I flip off the covers and he sees the bed.

“No,” I tell him. “It’s time. Now.”

“Now?” he squeaks.

“Yes, now,” I growl. “Help me, please.”

“Right.” He steps into action, coming at me like he has no frigging idea what to do. Which he probably doesn’t.

“Just take me to the… ugg.”

I double over in pain with a contraction. “Take me to the hospital.”

Conor gets me into the car and asks me what else we need to bring. But I don’t know. Because I haven’t packed anything. I barely have anything.

“Just take me,” I groan.

And he does. He drives like a lunatic which only makes it worse. But I’m sweating, gripping the door handle, and trying to breathe through the pain.

Something isn’t right.

I know it in my gut.

It’s happening too fast. The pain is too intense. This baby is coming now.

“I don’t know if I’m going to make it there,” I tell Conor.

“You have to,” he shouts. “I can’t deliver a baby.”

“Pull over!” I scream at him. “And call an ambulance.”

He does. And while he’s on the phone, I’m delivering in the backseat of the car.

“I need your help!” I yell. “Fucking Christ.”

Conor comes around to help me and nearly passes out when he sees the baby’s head.

“Just breathe,” he tells me.

“I am fucking breathing.”

I arch back in pain as the contractions come hard and quick. And it’s happening. Three more pushes, and my baby is born. In the backseat of the car, in the middle of Boston.

The ambulance arrives just in time. And the paramedics quickly usher me and the baby onto a stretcher. Everything is in chaos around us, but I can only look at him as they bundle him into my arms.

He looks so much like his father.

I’m crying. I’m in shock. And I’m in love.

They start to close the doors with Conor still outside, looking lost and traumatized.

“You’re coming with me,” I tell him.

“What?” he looks horrified by the idea. “No.”

“Yes.”

He comes.

I grab onto his arm as they start checking our vitals. “You have to call him.”

“Lachlan?”

“Alexei. You have to call Alexei.”

He blinks in confusion.

“Now.”

“Okay, okay. I’m calling him. What do you want me to tell him?”

“Just tell him I need him here. Please.”

And then they are wheeling me into the hospital.

53

Alexei

I am vaguely aware of someone trying to wake me, but I ignore the hand on my shoulder and keep my eyes closed.

When they are closed, I can dream of her. I can forget for a brief time that it isn’t real.

But the hand on my shoulder becomes more insistent. When I blink up and see Nikolai, I shove him away. He has not left my house for the last three days, and he is grating on my last nerve.

This is what I’m thinking when the ice water hits my face, followed by a stinging slap. I’m already wheeling back my chair, preparing to murder my half-brother once and for all, when I am met by Magda’s angry gaze.

“Pull yourself together,” she demands. “And drink this, you will need it.”

I look down at the coffee in her hands and try to reach for my cognac instead. But she grabs the bottle and throws it against the wall, smashing it to pieces.

“Magda.”

“No.” She forces the cup into my hands, and I have never seen her look so crazed. “I have news for you, Alyoshka. But you must pull yourself together first. You look like death.”

I don’t know what other news she could possibly have, but when Magda is insistent I know there is no arguing about it. So I drink the coffee while they both watch me. When I