Jordan’s head snapped up, and his eyes found us instantly—like he’d known exactly where to look. Maggie was waving frantically beside me, and I clung to the rail, pale and shaking, but locked on him.
The crowd laughed at first, thinking it was some kind of joke. Thenthe noise shifted, confusion and murmurs rippling through the stands until the whole stadium seemed to hold its breath.
The mic caught the stunned crack in his voice.
“Oh shit, are you serious?!”
It boomed across the court, echoing off the rafters. The interviewer froze, blinking at him in bewilderment. “Wait…what just happened?”
Jordan let out a laugh that shook with joy and disbelief, raking a hand through his hair as he turned back toward the mic. His voice carried across the stadium as though he didn’t quite know what to do.
“God, sorry. My fiancée’s not due for a few weeks, but looks like our little man’s got other plans.”
And then the place erupted. The sound rolled over us in waves, cheers, whistles, the pounding thunder of twenty thousand people on their feet, while Jordan just stood there, grinning like his whole world had been lit up..
And then he dropped the mic. Like, literally dropped it and sprinted toward the stands.
He climbed the steps two at a time and reached me just as another contraction hit.
“You alright?” he asked, breathless, hands already on my face, my bump, my hands.
“Been better,” I panted, voice shaking with a mix of laughter and pain. “But I think you’re about to meet your son.”
He wrapped his arms around me and helped me to my feet.
Cameras were flashing like fireworks, but I didn’t care. Nothing else mattered but us and the baby. The crowd kept roaring as we made our way down, hand in hand, flanked by medics and officials guiding us to the car. To the start of everything.
Chapter Seventy-One
Jordan
I’d never been soafraid in my whole life.
The ride from the stadium to the hospital was a blur—sirens from the police escort, flashing lights, Kate gripping my hand like she was trying to keep the world from pulling her under. Her fingernails dug into my skin. She was pale, clammy, trying to stay calm, but I knew that look in her eyes. She was terrified. It mirrored everything I was feeling.
I couldn’t let her see that, though. Not now.
Her water broke in the car. One moment she was hunched forward, bracing through another contraction, knuckles white against the seatbelt, and the next she gasped, panicked, and turned to me with wide, terrified eyes. For a second, the world narrowed to just that look.
Fear surged through me, hot and blinding. My instinct was to panic, too. But I couldn’t. Not when she needed me so much at that moment. So I gripped her hand tighter, pulled her closer as best I could, and pressed a frantic kiss to her temple. My voice came out rough. “It’s okay, Katie. You’re okay. I’ve got you,” I said, even if my heart was hammering like it might give out at any second.
We weren’t supposed to be here yet. Not for another few weeks.Not in this country, not like this, not with her body shaking beside me and our son already forcing his way into the world. None of it was how I’d pictured it. But it didn’t matter anymore. Because ready or not, he was coming. And I had to be the anchor she could cling to when everything else was breaking open.
The plan didn’t matter anymore. The season didn’t matter. The win didn’t matter. None of it. Only her, our son, the way she was shaking beside me and the sheer, suffocating need to make sure they both made it through this okay.
When we reached the hospital, everything blurred into white lights and hushed Italian voices. The nurses moved quickly, guiding us through a quiet private wing, and thank God,thank God, a few of them spoke English. One of them, a nurse with kind eyes and a calm voice, looked me in the eye as they wheeled Kate into the suite and said, “Pre-term, but stable.”
I latched onto that word like it could save me.
Stable.
Kate was tethered to a mess of wires and monitors, lines snaking from her arms and across her stomach, spilling over the bed like she’d been dropped in the middle of a war zone. The steady beeps and flashing numbers made it feel more brutal than safe. My stomach turned when they pinned her arm down mid-contraction and drove an IV into the crook of her elbow.
They told me it was precautionary. Something about infection risk. The words rattled around, but didn’t process. Precautionary didn’t look like that, didn’t look like her flinching and gasping while strangers held her down. To me, it looked cruel.
I wanted to tear the wires off, shove them away, tell them she wasn’t just a body to work on. She was Kate. My Kate.
But I couldn’t move. My brain was scrambling to catch up, and all I could do was stand there with my fists clenched, locked on her.
