“Wonderful. Just remember to breathe with the next push, okay?” She reached for Cameron’s hand, stroking it. “Puff, puff, puff. In and out. Tuck down your chin when you push to give it some extra oomph, okay?”
“Extra oomph.” Rafael’s laughing eyes met hers again. “You Americans use amusing words. I must take notes.”
“Well, do it some other time,” Cameron said tartly. “I’m more interested in getting this baby out than helping you write a thesaurus of American words.”
“Just trying to distract you from your hard work, Cameron. Another push now, please.”
He turned those green eyes back to their patient and Gabby realized she’d been briefly mesmerized—again—by that gaze. She glanced at the monitor wrapped around Cameron’s belly as she pushed again, and the reading jerked her mind back to work. “Fetal monitor is showing a decreased variability, Dr. Moreno.”
He glanced at it, too, and his expression turned serious. “Keep an eye on it during the next contractions.”
“What? What does that mean? Is something wrong?” Cameron nearly moaned the questions as she pushed again.
“Baby’s heartbeat is a little flat. But that may just mean she’s sleeping.”
“Sleeping? How could she possibly be sleeping when she’s about to be born?”
“She’s warm and cozy inside her mama, and also tiny because she is early. So sleeping is a possibility, though I agree it seems odd that babies sometimes are sleep before being born, doesn’t it?”
His eyes met Gabby’s, and she read the message in their serious depths. He wanted her to pay close attention to the monitor, and she gave him a small nod. She pressed the intercom around her neck as she watched the baby’s heartbeat. “I’ll give Neonatal a quick call to get them here and ready.”
As Gabby spoke soothingly and encouragingly, Rafael interrupted. “Baby’s head is crowning, Cameron! Not too much longer now. You are doing such a good job.”
“Yes, a few more good pushes and hopefully she’ll be here! Tuck that chin in again and give us another push, okay?” Gabby wiped Cameron’s forehead at the same time she glanced again at the monitor and froze for an instant. “Heart rate’s flat on the monitor, Dr. Moreno.”
“Stop pushing, Cameron,” he said in a sharp tone.
“Stop?” The woman looked at him, her tired eyes wide. “What do you mean? I thought you said her head was crowning!”
“The cord is around her neck. I need to get it off before she can arrive.”
CAMERON LET OUT a long cry full of dismay and fear, and Gabby held her hand tighter. “Hang in there, Cameron. Rafael’s getting his fingers under the cord.”
Gabby kept her voice calm and quiet but her chest squeezed hard when she saw the cord wasn’t just around the baby’s neck, it was wrapped round a full three times between her collarbone and her tiny chin. Dear God, this was the last thing a preterm newborn already bound to be in distress should go through.
Throat tight, she watched Rafael carefully wiggle his fingers between the cord and the baby’s neck. Gabby was pretty sure she didn’t breathe at all as the long, tense seconds passed while he worked gently to loosen it.
“What’s happening?” Cameron asked in a high-pitched voice. “Is...is she okay? Oh, God.”
“Working on it. Hold on.”
His fingers finally loosened the cord enough to slip it over the baby’s head, and air spilled from Gabby’s lungs in a relieved whoosh. “Cord’s clear now, Cameron. Get ready.”
“Looks like she’s been doing synchronized swimming in there to get so tangled up,” Rafael said as he flashed a quick grin.
How he managed to look so completely collected, Gabby wasn’t sure, and hoped she always exuded the same calm confidence whenever she had to deal with a tricky situation. “Rafael has her head and shoulders now. One more big push, okay?”
“Good. Perfect. And...here she is!” Rafael had the infant in his hands, his dazzling smile lighting up the room as he held her. “You were magnifico! Bravo!”
Gabby quickly laid a towel on Cameron’s chest so Rafael could briefly place the baby there for Cameron to see her for just a moment as the neonatal team swooped into the room. Cameron looked down at the tiny little face, not a good color yet, still too purple, but Gabby’s heart lifted when she saw the infant was already pinking up.
“My sweet precious,” Cameron whispered. Two wide eyes stared back at her, and the new mother promptly burst into noisy tears that pulled hard at Gabby’s heart. “I love you so much. Please be okay. Please be healthy and normal and not damaged because I didn’t eat enough and worked too much and squeezed my belts too tight when you were growing. Worrying about myself instead of you. Please, Skye. Please be the perfect angel I dreamed you would be.”
Skye. Cameron had airily claimed she had no idea what she’d name her baby, but Gabby had always suspected she just hadn’t been ready to share it. And as she looked at the tiny, scrawny baby’s blue eyes, she got choked up herself, knowing so well the guilt Cameron felt. Worries she hadn’t shared with Gabby. And she understood. Because she, too, didn’t share her guilt with anyone.
* * *
Skye was exactly the right choice for the new life in front of her. A pure and precious gift, like any baby was to its mother. Even those who never had their chance to grow up.
“Skye is a beautiful name.” Gabby gently wiped Cameron’s perspiring brow once more, thinking how the woman looked more beautiful at that moment than all the times her makeup was immaculate and her hair perfectly done by her professional stylists. Having worked so hard to bring her baby into the world, she looked vulnerable and scared and more like a real person than Gabby had ever seen her—not at all the ultra-confident screen persona and diva actress she projected to the world most of the time.
For a moment, she let herself watch a little longer. To see Skye whisked to the heat lamp by the neonatal team, a bulb suction quickly clearing her nose before the small oxygen mask was placed over her head. To marvel at the little body being cleaned up and swaddled tight as Gabby would have done if the baby hadn’t had the stress of the cord scare added to her being so premature.
Then she didn’t want to watch anymore. She turned to focus back on Cameron and caught Rafael’s eye. An eye that seemed to be searching right into her very soul, seeing far too much, and she quickly turned away from that unnerving green gaze.
“She is so beautiful, Cameron,” she said, wishing her voice wasn’t tight with unshed tears. “Hard work bringing her into the world, I know. But now she’s here, you can spoil her rotten.”
“Yes,” Cameron said in a wobbly voice as she watched the neonatal team take Skye from the room to the NICU. “Yes, I plan to do just that.”
* * *
“You did great,” Rafael said. “I’m not surprised that the real Cameron Fontaine is even more of a warrior than the parts you play.” The smile he gave the actress looked so sincere, Gabby wasn’t sure if he meant it or if he was as good an actor as their patient.
“Thank you,” Cameron said, but without the preening she usually responded with when given a compliment. “But what if she’s not all right?”
“No worries until we have to worry, right? What is it you Americans say? Don’t borrow trouble?” Another flash of white teeth. “I will get you fixed up,