The Bravo Bachelor. Christine Rimmer

checked the display. “Sure enough.”

      “Hand it here. I’ll call her back.”

      He gave her the phone. “I’ll just get some coffee…”

      She nodded, pressing the key to return the call, putting the phone to her ear with one hand, holding Ginny with the other, looking tired but happy as he slipped out.

      He was just out the door when a ward clerk approached with a tray of food. “Is she awake?” the woman asked.

      Gabe nodded and held the door for her.

      Giving Mary a little time to talk to her baby’s grandma in private, Gabe got coffee and a sandwich in the cafeteria. He wolfed down the food, suddenly realizing that he was starving. His BlackBerry buzzed while he was sitting there. He ignored it, though the soft sound seemed to nag at him. It reminded him that he was getting a little bit overboard about this, that it was way past time he told Mary he was leaving and got back to his own damn life.

      He glanced at his Rolex. Seven-fifteen. He rubbed his grainy eyes and wondered at how the day had raced by with him hardly aware it was passing. He’d missed a couple of meetings in the afternoon.

      Plus, there had been a lunch he was supposed to go to, hadn’t there? With his dad, his brothers Ash and Matt and a couple of BravoCorp’s biggest investors. He knew he shouldn’t have blown that off. His assistant, Georgia, had probably spent the day going nuts, calling him over and over, wondering where the hell he’d gotten off to. He should have called her when he decided to take Mary to the hospital.

      And he needed to stop putting off calling his dad. Davis was probably past being annoyed with him and starting to get worried. He didn’t want that.

      But then he thought about Mary. And Ginny.

      And somehow all that crap that added up to his real life…? So what about that?

      Later. For all of it.

      He was still hungry, so he got another sandwich, more coffee and a piece of chocolate cake. That time he ate slowly, letting Mary have all the time she needed, to talk to Ida, to eat her own dinner.

      Almost an hour had gone by when he poked his head back in the door of her room. She’d switched off the lamp by the bed. Only the dim recessed light in the ceiling, turned down low, bathed the room in a dim glow. The remains of her meal waited on the swinging bed tray, which she’d pushed to the side. She seemed to be sleeping, her head turned to the far wall. He couldn’t see the baby, but figured she must be in the bassinet on the other side of the bed.

      He started to duck back out again, thinking how it was time, after all, for him to go. He could slip away without disturbing either of them, and get in touch in the morning, to make sure she was doing okay.

      But Mary turned her head with a sigh and saw him, her eyes half-open, a slow smile curving her soft mouth. She whispered his name. “Gabe…” And she held out the hand without the IV hooked into the back of it.

      His heart strangely lighter, he slipped into the dim room and let the door shut silently behind him.