A wave of pain, sharp and blinding, crashed over Anna, stealing her breath. She gripped the cold marble of the kitchen island, her knuckles turning white against the gray veins of the stone.

“Vince, something’s wrong,” she managed to gasp into the phone, her voice shaking. “I think… I think it’s happening.”

On the other end of the line, he heard an exasperated sigh, a sound he’d come to know with chilling familiarity. It was the sound of his own irrelevance.

“Annie, relax,” Vince’s voice was soft, distant, already miles away. “You don’t expire for another two weeks. It’s probably just Braxton Hicks. Take an aspirin.”

“It’s not Braxton Hicks,” she insisted, as another contraction gripped her, forcing a pained moan from her lips. “This is different. It’s so bad. Vince, please, I’m scared. I’ve never begged you for anything, but please…”

“Look, I can’t drop everything and run backward for every little pain,” he said, his tone hardening into cold steel. “I told you, this conference in Miami is critical. The keynote address is in two hours.”

She knew there was no conference call. His golf clubs had been nestled in the trunk of his Porsche when he left. The briefcase he’d carried was a Louis Vuitton weekend bag she’d never seen before. But she had no fight left. “Call an ambulance, Vince, please,” she whispered, her legs threatening to buckle. The phone felt incredibly heavy.

The line was already dead. The dial tone buzzed in his ear, a final and definitive declaration of his indifference. He hadn’t just dropped the call; he’d cut a lifeline.

Tears of pain and betrayal streamed down her cheeks. Her son, she thought, a new wave of agony twisting inside her. This is her son too. How can he?

Her phone slipped from her slick fingers and clattered on the polished wooden floor. She sank afterward, her body screaming in protest. With trembling hands, she swiped across the screen and dialed 911.

“911, what’s your emergency?” asked a calm, professional voice.

“Please… I think I’m in labor,” Anna choked out, her words fragmented by the all-consuming pain. “I’m… I’m alone.”

She recited her address in the sterile, gated community, the sprawling, empty house that had felt less like a home and more like a gilded cage. Then the world began to tilt. The edges of her vision blurred, darkening into a tunnel. The dispatcher’s voice faded into a distant echo as a deep, blissful silence replaced the pain. For the first time in hours, there was only darkness, a soft, floating peace.

Dr. Evans entered the ICU, the soft squeak of his loafers the only sound in the hushed stillness. He approached the bed where Anna lay, a pale figure lost in a sea of ​​white sheets and tangled wires. He scanned the monitors, frowned, then turned to the head nurse on duty.

“Any changes, Nenah?”

Nenah shook her head, her kind face etched with concern. “None, Doctor. Her vital signs are stable, but she’s completely unresponsive. So young. It breaks your heart.”

Dr. Evans nodded. “We need to get this young woman’s husband. She’s in a medically induced coma, and the next 24 hours are critical. Frankly, from the state she was in when the EMTs brought her in, she’d been in danger for a while. He needs to answer for that.”

“I was just about to, Doctor,” Nenah said, picking up the chart from Anna Hayes. She squinted at the emergency contact information. The digits, scrawled in hasty blue ink, swam before her eyes. She really needed to find a chain for those damn glasses. Still, the numbers seemed clear enough. She started tapping them into the phone, her finger closing on the last two digits. A nine or a zero? It looked more like a nine. She pressed it firmly.

The phone rang twice before a man’s voice, clear and professional, answered. “This is Andrew.”

“Good afternoon,” Nenah began, her tone a practiced mix of official and gentle. “I’m calling from Northwestern Memorial Hospital. Your wife, Anna Hayes, was admitted to our maternity ward earlier today. The delivery was… complicated. She’s currently in the ICU, and we felt you should be here.”

A profound silence spread over the line. It wasn’t the silence of shock or pain, but one of profound and bewildering confusion. Finally, the man spoke, his voice hesitant. “Anna… Hayes?”

“Yes. Her husband is listed as the primary contact.”

Another pause. “Okay,” he said, the words spilling out. “I’m on my way.”

Nenah hung up, a frustrated huff escaping her lips. “The men they have these days,” she muttered to herself. “He acts like he doesn’t even know his own wife is pregnant.”

Miles away, Andrew Cole stared at the Chicago skyline through the floor-to-ceiling windows of his 45th-floor office. The phone call had felt like a ghost approaching from a life he’d buried five years ago. Anna, in a hospital, giving birth. It didn’t make sense. He hadn’t seen her since the day she’d stood in front of him, unable to look him in the eye, and told him she was going to marry his best friend, Vince—the friend who’d sworn he’d steal her away just to prove he could.

He’d loved Anna since they were teenagers. He’d always assumed their future was a shared one. Then Vince, with his easy charm and cruel competitive streak, had decided Anna was a prize to be won. And he had won.

Now, a nurse was calling him, Andrew, telling him his wife was in the ICU. It had to be a mistake. But if Anna was in trouble, he knew with a sick certainty exactly who was to blame. Vince. He always went back to Vince. He grabbed his keys. No matter what, Anna was alone. That’s all that mattered.

Andrew’s sleek dark gray Audi sped through the afternoon traffic. His mind was five years in the past, replaying the scene that had been burned into his memory. He’d just closed his first big real estate deal. He’d bought a ring. He made the mistake of telling Vince about a whiskey.

Vince had smiled. “A ring? You’re still playing by the rules. I bet I could have her in two weeks.”

“Take that back,” Andrew had said, his voice dangerously low.

“Why? Because you know it’s true?” Vince had mocked. “Do you think she’s in love with you, or just with the safe, predictable future you represent?”

The ensuing argument was bitter and ended with a fight. Two weeks later, Anna met him for coffee and whispered to him that she was in love with someone else. Vince. They were getting married.

Now, as Andrew pulled into the emergency entrance of Northwestern Memorial, the puzzle pieces clicked into place. A complicated delivery, a husband who wasn’t there, a wrong number on an emergency form. His old number and Vince’s must have been off by a single digit. He crashed the car in the parking lot. Vince had finally gone too far, and this time, Andrew would be there to pick up the pieces.

He found Dr. Evans in a small consulting room. “Are you Anna Hayes’s husband?” the doctor asked.

Andrew decided honesty was the only way. “Not exactly.” He explained the history, the rivalry, the almost identical phone numbers. Nenah, summoned to the room, gasped at the small faded zero on the chart she’d mistaken for a nine.

“Oh, dear Lord. I’m so sorry. I didn’t have my glasses,” he stammered.

As Andrew explained, Dr. Evans dialed the correct number and put it on speakerphone. A lazy, confident voice answered. “Yes?”

“Hello, my name is Dr. Evans. I’m calling from Northwestern Memorial. We have a patient here, Anna Hayes…”

“I know, I know,” Vince cut him off, his voice laced with annoyance. “She called me earlier, overreacting as always.” In the background, Andrew could hear the faint sound of steel drums and a woman’s high, smug laughter. “Vinnie, come on! They’re waiting for us at the swim-up bar!”

Dr. Evans’s expression hardened. “Sir, your wife’s condition is extremely serious. She’s unconscious in the ICU.”

“Right,” Vince sighed, as if talking about a delayed package. “So what can I do about it from here? I’m out of the country. When’s it scheduled to be released? A week? Great. It should be back by then. I’ll stop by and pick it up.”

The line clicked dead. Dr. Evans stared at the phone, then looked from Nenah’s horrified face to Andrew’s somber one.

“The problem is,” the doctor said, shaking his head in disbelief, “she needs a specialized blood thinner that our formulary doesn’t cover. The insurance has already backed out with no upfront payment.”

Andrew stood, his decision made in an instant. “Forget him,” he said, his voice ringing with authority. “For the next week, as far as you’re concerned, I’m her husband. Bill me for everything. Get her medication. Get her a private room. Fly her to a specialist if necessary. Spare no expense. Just save her.”

He was no longer the boy Vince had cast aside. He was a man who could move mountains, and he moved every single one for the woman lying in the hallway.

Twenty-four hours later, Anna drifted from the depths of a dreamless sleep. The first thing she registered was the soft, steady beeping of a machine. The second was the gentle weight of a hand holding hers. She turned her head. It was Andrew.

“Andrew,” her voice was a dry whisper. “What…?”

“Hey,” he said softly. “Welcome back. How are you feeling?”

“Where am I?” she asked, her eyes scanning the private hospital room. “The baby? Is the baby okay?”

“You’re at Northwestern,” he said. “And I’ve seen her, Annie. She’s beautiful. Absolutely perfect.”

A single tear traced a path down her temple. Those were the words she’d longed to hear from Vince. Hearing them from Andrew was both a comfort and a sharp, fresh pain.

” How are you here?” She asked, frowning. “How did you know?”

“It’s a long story,” he said with a small, sad smile. “Let’s just say I’m here now, and you don’t have to worry about anything.”

The next few days settled into a calm rhythm. Andrew was a constant presence. He brought food from her favorite deli, went to daycare, and returned with photos of the baby on his phone. “Katie said hello today,” he announced with the pride of a new father. “The nurse said it was just a reflection, but I know what I saw.”

She named the baby Katie so naturally that soon Anna and the nurses did too. The baby was no longer a number on a chart; she was Katie.

The day before she was scheduled to be discharged, Andrew walked into her room as she rocked a sleeping Katie. “Annie,” he said, his voice serious. “We need to talk.”

He told her that Vince’s flight lands at 3:00 pm, an hour after the day’s flights ended.

“I know,” he said quietly. “He called me this morning. His first call. He told me to take an Uber or wait for him.”

Andrew was shocked. “An Uber? With a newborn baby, after what you’ve been through? Anna, I have to ask. Do you love it?”

“He’s Katie’s father,” she trailed off, the words a shield she’d been hiding behind.

“That’s not what I asked,” Andrew said, stopping in front of her. “I know he’s the biological father. That’s a scientific fact. I’m asking about your heart.”

Her composure finally broke. “What do you want me to say, Andrew? That I regret it? That I was a stupid girl who fell for a flashy smile and empty promises? Of course I did. It’s the biggest regret of my life.” Her voice cracked. “I have to go home. I have to keep pretending, for Katie’s sake.”

“Why?” Andrew’s voice was raw with emotion. “Do you really think he’s the best thing for her?”

“What is the alternative?” She cried.

“She has a father,” Andrew said quietly. “Me. I suggest you come home with me, Anna. I never stopped loving you. And in the last week, I’ve fallen completely in love with Katie. Let me be her father. Let me be your husband. For real this time.”

He was offering her the life she’d thrown away, a second chance she never thought she deserved.

Vince drove home to his sprawling suburban house, mentally preparing his speech: Sorry you missed the birth, stressful trip, here are some gems. It always worked.

But the house was dark and eerily quiet. “Anna?” he called out. Nothing.

Cursing, he drove to the hospital, holding a huge bouquet. “I’m here to pick up my wife, Anna Hayes,” he announced at the reception desk.

The nurse looked at him with cold indifference. “Anna Hayes was discharged today at noon. She’s already been picked up.”

“Picked up by whom?”

“I can’t give you that information, sir,” she said, a hint of a smile on her lips. “But he seemed like a wonderful husband. New car seat, beautiful car. A real Prince Charming.”

Puzzled, Vince stepped out onto the cold street and dialed Anna’s number. “Hello?” It was her voice, but it sounded different. Louder.

“Anna, where the hell are you? I’m in the hospital.”

“Is that you?” she answered, her voice icy. “For the first time in eight days. I’m surprised you found the place. Don’t call me again. I’m with Andrew now.”

Before I could process it, a man’s voice came on the line. Andrew. “The game’s over, Vince,” Andrew said, his voice calm and lethal. “The days when you could push me around are long gone. Trust me, you don’t have the clout to play in my league anymore.”

The line went dead. Stunned, Vince called a contact in the city’s real estate circles. “Hey, have you ever heard of a guy named Andrew Cole?”

His friend laughed. “Are you kidding? The guy’s buying up half the West Loop. It’s a monster. Frankly, the way it’s expanding, I’m worried about my own wallet.”

Vince let the phone slip from his hand. It crashed to the asphalt, the screen splintering into a spiderweb of cracks. He had lost. He had lost everything, and he hadn’t even realized they were playing. In the quiet luxury of his Porsche, with the overpriced flowers wilting on the passenger seat, he was utterly and completely alone.