Chapter 3 - The Stranger in Blue|
The double doors of the delivery room clicked open at 3:15 a.m., breaking the heavy, suffocating silence that had settled over the suite.
A man stepped inside, pushing back the dark blue surgical cap resting on his forehead. He wasn't the senior attending Catherine had seen during her seven-month checkup, nor was he the soft-spoken specialist Michael’s family had hired to oversee the private wing.
He was broad-shouldered, carrying a quiet, unhurried presence that filled the sterile room without crowding it. His surgical scrubs were faded at the elbows, and his eyes—a clear, calm gray—fixed immediately on Catherine’s face.
"I’m Dr. Daniel Brooks," he said, his voice flat and steady, devoid of the frantic energy that usually accompanied high-risk deliveries. "Dr. Vance was called into an emergency surgery down on the second floor. I’m taking over your care."
Rachel stepped forward instantly, her arm crossing over her chest like a barrier. "We were promised the chief of obstetrics. Michael Harrison arranged—"
"Michael Harrison isn't here," Daniel said simply, not looking at Rachel, but keeping his eyes on Catherine. He pulled a pair of sterile gloves from the wall dispenser, his movements methodical and practiced. "You are. And your blood pressure is spiking."
Catherine turned her face away toward the dark window, where the rain was growing heavier, blurring the yellow streetlights below into long streaks of gold.
"I don't trust anyone in this hospital tonight," she murmured to the glass.
Daniel walked around the side of the bed, stopping just within her field of vision. He didn't offer a polite smile. He didn't offer the usual soothing platitudes doctors gave to frightened women in high-end private rooms.
"Then don't trust anyone tonight," he said softly, his gray eyes steady as stone. "Trust the next breath. Then the next push."
Catherine looked at him then.
May you like
He didn't look like the men who surrounded her husband—men who wore four-thousand-dollar suits and carried the heavy, metallic smell of expensive cologne and cheap violence. He looked like someone who spent sixteen hours a day fighting to keep people alive while the rest of the world slept.
"Okay," she whispered.
