“Just a little cramping,” Wendy said. “It started when we got in the car. It’s probably nothing. Just take me home.”

“No way,” Drue said. She signaled and made a quick right turn into a shopping center parking lot. “You’re either going to your obstetrician’s office or the emergency room. Which is it?”

Wendy sighed heavily. “Okay, maybe you’re right. Dr. Dillard’s office is right next to St. Anthony’s.”

She closed her eyes and her face contorted again. She took her phone from her purse. “I’ll call to let them know I’m coming in. Happy?”

“Delirious,” Drue said. She pulled back into traffic. “Can you put the address in your phone so I can get directions? I don’t want to get lost.”

After several minutes had passed, Drue pulled into the parking lot of the midrise office building that Wendy pointed out. “Her office is on the fourth floor.”

Her face contorted again and she gasped and grabbed Drue’s arm. “Another cramp.”

Drue’s heart was pounding in her chest. She couldn’t think straight. “What should I do? Can you walk?”

Wendy nodded. “I think so.” She clutched Drue’s arm tighter. “I’m scared,” she whispered.

Drue pulled up to the curb, put the Bronco in park and jumped out. “Me too.”

A uniformed security guard marched up, his hand extended like a stop sign. “Ma’am? Did you see the yellow curb? This is a no-parking zone. You can’t—”

“Fuck off,” Drue said, opening the passenger door and taking Wendy’s hand. “This woman is four months pregnant and she’s having contractions. I’m taking her in to Dr. Dillard’s office. Unless you want her to bleed to death right here on your yellow curb?”

She dropped the keys into the speechless guard’s outstretched hand. “Just park it somewhere, okay?”

Wendy didn’t speak again until they were in the elevator. She was still clinging to Drue’s arm and leaning heavily against her. “They’re probably not contractions and I wasn’t going to bleed to death,” she said.

“He didn’t know that. And neither did I,” Drue replied. Her hands were shaking as she watched the lighted numbers on the control panel change during their agonizingly slow ascent. “Who puts an obstetrician’s office on the fourth floor?” she demanded. “How many babies have been delivered in this thing?”

Drue had never been good at waiting, especially in spaces that were dubbed waiting rooms, which, for her, had an unfortunate association with all the hours she’d spent in rooms like this one during Sherri’s final weeks of illness.

“Hi,” she said, approaching the reception desk. “I brought Wendy Campbell in about thirty minutes ago? Can you tell me what’s going on?”

The clerk looked up from her computer screen. “Sorry. Patient privacy regulations.”