Beauty & the Blue Angel

In this day and age, who would expect two completely respectable, intelligent families to be so involved in a vendetta?

“You get out of my place,” Sal told him hotly.

“Hey, I was just going.”

“And you don’t pay for your meal. We don’t need Barone money.”

Disgusted, Alex said, “I’m not taking anything from the Contis.”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Daisy muttered, stepping between the two men, only to be pushed gently aside by Sal. You couldn’t work at Antonio’s without learning about Sal Conti’s quick, volcanic temper. But Daisy was also well aware that the man didn’t have a violent bone in his body and that his temper disappeared as swiftly as it erupted.

But in this case she was pretty sure both men were nuts. Standing in the middle of a nice restaurant yelling at each other about ill fortune and curses was just crazy, no matter how you looked at it.

“You go sit down, Daisy,” the older man said absently. “Get off your feet for a while.”

She groaned, winced a bit and whispered, “I think it’s too late for that.”

A heartbeat or two passed before both men turned as one to look at her. At any other moment, she would have thought their twin expressions of sheer terror were funny. However, at the moment she had other things on her mind.

Daisy felt the contraction grab hold of the middle of her back and twist her spine into a pretzel. Every square inch of her suddenly erupted with a deep, throbbing pain that seemed to blossom and grow with every passing second. This was nothing like the annoying little twinges she’d been experiencing.

This was the kind of labor pain they wrote books about.

“I think I need to go home. Call the midwife,” she whispered.

“Oh boy,” Sal muttered, reaching for her left arm just as Alex grabbed her right. “You’re okay, honey,” her boss continued. Then he shouted, “Tony!”

Someone in the kitchen yelled back, “Yeah?”

“Call an ambulance. Call a hospital. Call somebody!”

Daisy managed a chuckle at the panic in Sal’s voice, but when the contraction ended and was quickly chased by another, stronger one, that laughter faded into a low, deep moan of misery.

“I’ll take her to the hospital,” Alex said, and she shifted a glance at him. Navy pilot and a hero.

“No you won’t,” Sal countered, pulling Daisy closer to him. “We don’t need help from a Barone.”

“I’m not helping you,” Alex pointed out. He gave her arm a little tug, pulling her to his side. “I’m helping her.”

“What is this,” Daisy asked, yanking free of both of them, “a tug-of-war?”

“Hey, boss,” Tony yelled from the kitchen. “Ambulance’ll be here in fifteen minutes.”

“Cancel it,” Alex shouted, then looked down at Daisy. “I’ll get you to the hospital. Let me help. Trust me.”

She stared up into those chocolate-brown eyes of his and read determination there, along with an eagerness to help. And right then Daisy wanted all the help she could get. Besides, waiting fifteen minutes for an ambulance seemed like a lifetime.

“Okay,” she whispered, dropping one hand to her belly. “Okay, good. Let’s go.”

“Daisy, I think—”

“It’s all right, Sal.” She looked at the older man who’d been so kind to her and forced a smile for his benefit. “I don’t want to wait for the ambulance and— Ohhh…” She bent over, cradling her unborn child and biting her bottom lip to stifle the moan clogging her throat.

“That’s it,” Alex muttered, scooping her up into his arms. “We’re outta here.”

Waiters, customers and kitchen staff called out good wishes as Alex headed for the front door. The hostess rushed ahead and held the door open for him, reaching out to give Daisy’s arm a pat as they passed.

Out on the street, Alex paused, Daisy in his arms, and looked to where the guys should have been waiting in their rental car.

Only one problem.

It wasn’t there.

And neither were the guys.

“Oh, man…”

“What?” Daisy lifted her head from his shoulder.

“I think the guys took off.”

“They left you behind?”

Alex grimaced and hitched her slight form a little higher in his arms. Amazing. Even pregnant, she was so slight, so fragile that she seemed to weigh almost nothing. But even as tiny as she was, it would be a long run to the closest hospital. Damn you, guys.

“Yeah,” he said tightly, finally answering her question. “We do that sometimes. Go somewhere, then abandon one of the guys to make his own way back to the base.”

“Why?”

He glanced at those blue-green eyes and lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “A joke. One I used to think was pretty funny.”

“Swell.”

Then she inhaled sharply and Alex felt her body tense. Terror rippled along his spine. He had to get her to help. Fast. “Cab. We need a cab.”

And since he needed one, naturally there wasn’t a single taxi to be seen. Ordinarily, a man could cross any Boston street by walking across the hoods of the cabs waiting in traffic. But not tonight. On this warm summer night, the air was still and so were the streets.

As horrible thoughts of running back into the restaurant to ask Sal for help raced through his brain, Alex realized exactly where they were. If he’d had a free hand, he’d have slapped himself in the forehead.

“No problem,” he said, “we’re good.” He started walking at a long-legged, hurried pace.

“Where are you going?” Daisy demanded, already seeing the lights of Antonio’s slip into the distance. The hospital was uptown and he was headed in the wrong direction.

“My sister’s place,” he muttered.

“Your sister?”

“Just a couple blocks away. She’s a registered nurse. She’ll know what to do.”