Page 100 of The Devil Gets His Due

The old Keeley would make a joke here, something about bikini season or her vagina. But she just nods. Everyone is moving, someone’s on the phone issuing urgent demands and things are being unclipped. The only person in the entire room who is still and settled…is Keeley.

No, not settled.Resigned. She reaches for my hand. “Graham,” she says quietly, “you’re going to be such a good dad, and she’s so lucky to have you—”

“Stop,” I demand. “You’re fine.”

“I’m sorry,” says the nurse. “We need to leave now.”

They push the bed from the room and Keeley grips my hand as I walk alongside her down the hall. “Listen to me, okay? I love you. I love this baby, and I don’t regret any of it. Convincing you to marry me is smartest thing I ever did.”

I open my mouth to tell her to stop talking like this. To tell her she’s going to be fine, and that the truth is thatIwas the one who wanted all of this, that I was the one who convinced her to go to Vegas. But we’ve reached a set of double doors and a nurse moves in front of me.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “They have to put her under, so you can’t come back with her.”

I look from her to Keeley. There is so much I need to say and there’s just no time. “I love you,” I whisper.

Tear well in her eyes, but her smile is quiet, and peaceful. “I know.”

The doors open and she’s gone. Someone leads me to the waiting room, and I go blindly, struck by the way we just said goodbye. It felt...final.

I call my mom, and Ben, and Keeley’s father, and within thirty minutes, they’re all here.

“I didn’t even know she was pregnant,” her father says, taking the seat across from mine.

“You’re lucky I called you at all, after the way you let your wife treat her,” I reply.

Harsh, perhaps, but true. And he fucking knows it. He simply nods, and then buries his face in his hands.

Gemma barks at Paul to move and takes the seat beside me. Her hand slips through mine.

“It all happened so fast,” I whisper. “There was so much I should have told her.”

She squeezes my hand. “I’m sure she knew.”

Staff from other parts of the hospital are trickling in now, huddled around the nurses’ desk, whispering, and I don’t know what it all means, but it doesn’t seem good.

Julie enters Labor and Delivery at a jog and nods to me as she heads to the nurses’ station. She converses with someone and then takes a phone call, her face increasingly grim before she walks in my direction. I jump to my feet and Gemma is right behind me, followed by Ben, Keeley’s dad, and the guys from the building. “They’re still in there,” she says, wiping her arm across her forehead. “The baby’s in the NICU. Nothing to worry about but she was breathing a little fast so they’re keeping an eye on her. But Keeley…” She swallows. “Graham, her blood pressure went too high during the delivery. She had a seizure.”

Ben’s hand lands on my shoulder, keeping me in place.

“A seizure,” I repeat.

She nods. “I’d like to tell you that she’s going to be okay, but…”

“But?” I ask weakly.

Her gaze meets mine. “I’m sorry. There’s no way to tell.”

I want to ask how bad things might be, but I already know. I alreadyknew, simply from the worry on the staff’s faces.

“Can I see her?”

She isn’t meeting my eye. “Not yet,” she says. “They’re still finishing up. They’ll want to make sure she’s stable first.”

Julie returns to the nurses’ station, and Keeley’s father begins to cry, as if he already knows what’s going to happen. I just sit, feeling numb. All these responsibilities I once thought I didn’t want…now I’m not sure how I’ll continue to exist without them.

It feels like hours have passed by the time Dr. Asif appears, quietly conferring with Julie before turning to me. Her face is strained as I propel out of my seat and toward them.

“Congratulations,” she says. “You have a beautiful five-pound, nine-ounce baby girl.”

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