Todd and Chance looked at each other.
“What are you waiting for?!” I didn’t intend to end the sentence with a scream, but another contraction hit me mid-sentence, and I howled like a strangled cat. The EMTs froze in place.
Todd almost dropped the radio, but he buzzed through. Chance took my hand and tried to lead me through the breathing exercises we’d done in our birth preparation course. I elbowed him in the chest. “Stop it,” I wheezed. “Just stop it!”
His face registered panic as he looked up at Corabelle. She shrugged. “It’s not like the classes,” she said.
I kept Chance’s hand in a death grip. I knew this sucker would end eventually. Then we could get Dylan down here and do the words. He could sign the paper later. It would work. By the time it mattered what was filed where, we’d have it all squared away.
I turned back to Corabelle. “Call my mother. She’ll get there when she can.”
“Shall we put you inside now, ma’am?” the male EMT asked.
“No!” I said. “Not…until…we have…Dylan!”
The lights over the back parking lot had a haze over them. The pain was intense but the cool air helped. Maybe I’d just have the baby out here.
But he was early. Or she was. God, I would find out what we were having!
“Dylan’s coming,” Todd said. “The Titanium Overlords are going to extend their set to cover for him.”
“NOW can we put you inside?” the female EMT asked.
I nodded, trying to breathe, trying to listen, and trying to stay in control of the situation.
This might be my finest hour.
The contraction began to settle as the EMTs slid the gurney into the back of the ambulance. Corabelle stayed down, her eyes wide, and I knew she was thinking about when she last rode in one, after almost drowning in the Pacific. Gavin had pulled her from the waves. What a day that had been.
Chance got in beside me.
“Come on,” I said to Corabelle. “I need my witness!”
She climbed inside.
We heard footsteps approaching, then Dylan’s face appeared in the door. “Hot damn,” he said. “I always wanted to be part of an emergency wedding during the birth of a baby!”
“Get your ass in here,” Chance said. “Jenny won’t go to the hospital unless we’re married.”
Dylan hopped inside, glammed up for his concert. Behind him, a roadie with a video camera squeezed in.
“This is too many people for the capacity of this vehicle,” the female EMT said sternly.
I tried to sit up again. “Then I’m not going.”
“I’ll get out,” Corabelle said.
“No!” I glared at the EMT. “Kick yourself out if someone needs to go.”
Chance waved to the male EMT, who was still standing outside. “Just go,” he said. “It’s only a few miles.”
The female EMT tried to push forward, but the video camera guy aimed his lens at her. “Smile, you’re about to be the most hated figure in a viral video!”
She hesitated. “I don’t get paid enough for this,” she said.
“We’ll make sure you get a hefty Christmas check,” Dylan said. He winked at the male EMT, who still waited on the ground outside the door.
“We good?” the EMT asked. He didn’t wait for an answer, but shut the door.
“How are you going to get back?” Chance asked.
“Todd’s following in his car,” Dylan said. “We got it all taken care of.” He grinned down at me like I was the best thing ever.
“Can we get more lights in this place?” the video guy asked.
The female EMT glared at him, and he shrank back. “I’m all good,” he said.
Despite the ongoing pain, I felt elated. We were going to get this done. I wrapped both my hands around Chance’s.
“You know what the hell you’re doing?” Chance asked Dylan.
“It ain’t rocket science,” Dylan replied.
The video guy shifted toward Dylan and turned on a long, narrow light over the lens. “And…go,” he said.
Dylan’s face got all serious. “Mawwaige,” he said. “Mawwaige is what bwings us together today.”
Corabelle groaned, but I laughed. If we had to get married in an ambulance, between contractions, by a rock star who’d only been ordained so he could hook up a Kardashian, we might as well have a good time with it.
Chapter 3: Tina
When I got the text from Corabelle that Jenny was getting married in an ambulance by the singer Dylan Wolf, I dropped my phone.
Darion looked up from his sketch pad. “Everything okay?”
“We have to go!” I told him.
I stuck the caps on all the open tubes of paint and rubbed my messy hands on my shirt. New stripes of color layered over all the splotches and spatters from other days.
Darion set down his charcoal. “What’s going on?”
I lunged for my tennis shoes. “Jenny is in labor and getting married in an ambulance. If we can get to the intersection of Balboa and Clairemont in five minutes, we might catch them.”