PART 2
Dr. Sloan did not press the emergency button.
Her fingers hovered above it for one terrifying second, long enough for my heart to forget how to beat, then she pulled her hand back and reached instead for the phone mounted beside the monitor.
“Melissa,” she said calmly, though I could hear the tightness under her voice, “please ask Dr. Patel to step into Room Three when he’s available.”
Adrian’s hand closed around the edge of the examination chair.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
Dr. Sloan kept her eyes on the screen. “I don’t want anyone panicking.”
“That is not an answer.”
“Adrian,” I warned softly.
His jaw flexed, but he went silent. He had promised.
Dr. Sloan turned the monitor slightly away, studying the shifting gray image with a frown she was trying to hide. I watched her face because I could not bear to watch the screen. My daughter had been kicking me all morning, stubborn and strong, but suddenly every movement felt fragile.
“Is she okay?” I whispered.
Dr. Sloan finally looked at me. “Her heartbeat is steady. That’s good. But I’m seeing something I want another specialist to look at.”
“What kind of something?”
“Possibly a placental issue. Possibly nothing. At thirty-four weeks, we take every uncertainty seriously.”
Adrian moved closer, then stopped himself beside my shoulder. That small restraint unsettled me. The man I had married would have filled the room with commands until everyone obeyed him. This man stood with both hands at his sides, fighting every instinct he had.
“Can I do anything?” he asked me.
I almost said no.
For months, no had been my shield. No, I would not call him. No, I would not cry over him. No, I would not let his world swallow my child whole.
But fear has a way of stripping pride down to bone.
“Just stand there,” I said. “Please.”
He nodded once. “I’m here.”
Dr. Patel arrived five minutes later, a silver-haired maternal-fetal medicine specialist with reading glasses tucked into his coat pocket. He greeted me gently, glanced at Adrian only long enough to register the tension, and repeated the ultrasound himself.