Chapter Eight
~ Macon ~
The air in the shop was clean and tight as a rifle bore. I’d spent most of the morning hunched over the cradle, teasing out the last bit of splinter from the edge with a fine rasp.
The project had become a kind of obsession—a place to dump the leftover aggression from a lifetime of waiting for other people to make the next move. Here, there was no waiting. Just wood, and steel, and the absolute certainty of right angles.
I ran my thumb along the inside rail, checking for any burrs. Nothing but glass. I exhaled slow. There’s a peace in making something that can’t break you back.
Then, from somewhere outside, the world detonated. The first scream was so sudden and raw it cut through every barrier: shop walls, double-paned glass, the tinnitus that never left me since Aleppo.
It was Jojo, and it wasn’t a noise he’d ever made before—louder, more animal, the kind that twists your gut and short-circuits every part of you not built for pain.
I dropped the rasp, didn’t even register the sound of it hitting the floor. My boots found purchase without asking my brain, and I was out the door at a dead sprint, wood shavings and fine sawdust haloing around me like a detonated tripwire.
The distance to the house was maybe forty yards. I cleared it in twelve seconds. At the door I slammed my shoulder into the jamb, half busting the ancient latch, and ran for the kitchen on pure autopilot.
It was chaos. Real chaos, not the kind you see on TV. Jojo was doubled over against the island, both hands white-knuckled on the countertop, his face so pale the freckles looked painted on.
Rawley stood behind him, one arm banded around his mate’s chest, the other bracing the side of Jojo’s neck like he could anchor him to the world with sheer will. But it was Rawley’s eyes that froze me—he looked more terrified than the time a convoy exploded five feet from our vehicle.
And Carter—barefoot, wild-haired, phone clamped to his ear—was already talking at triple speed, “—don’t know if it’s too early, the contractions started five minutes ago, he’s screaming.
Is that normal? What do I do—” and the answering end must have been the Black Butte nurse line because Carter kept repeating yes, yes, six months, and Jojo’s name like it was the only thing keeping him on earth.
I catalogued everything in under a second: blood on Jojo’s thigh, none on the tile; his knees bent, but not buckling; breathing fast but not gasping, hands shaking but not clawing.
Assess. Triage. Execute.
“He’s in active labor,” I said, voice steady as a shot of morphine. “How close are the contractions?”
Carter looked up, eyes wide and weirdly clear. “Two minutes. Maybe less. He says it’s like a knife in his back—”
“Get towels and the hospital bag,” I said, and Carter was already moving. “Rawley,” I barked, using the old command voice. “Get Jojo to the car. Now. We need to move.”
For a second, Rawley didn’t move, just held his mate tighter. Then Jojo bucked against the grip and Rawley snapped back into action, hauling him upright with a force that would have crushed anyone smaller. Jojo screamed again, the kind of scream that scrapes the soul on the way out.
My hands hovered at the edge of touching, waiting for Jojo to collapse or for Rawley to falter. Neither did. They moved as a unit, shuffling to the mudroom, every third step punctuated by another guttural sound.
I followed close behind, field of vision shrinking to only what was necessary. Flashback: a Navy tent in Kandahar, blood everywhere, someone screaming for a medic—except it wasn’t blood here, it was amniotic fluid, and instead of a war zone it was my best friend’s kitchen in rural Montana.
The next contraction hit as Jojo tried to step down from the porch. He buckled, knees giving, and would have face-planted if I hadn’t caught his upper arm in time.
The muscle felt like a steel cable. He was shaking all over, sweat pouring down his hairline even though the outside air was barely fifty degrees.
“Rawley, you drive,” I said. “We’ll follow.”
Rawley opened the truck’s passenger door, then hesitated, trying to get Jojo inside without folding him like a piece of luggage. I did the math and made the call: “Pick him up. Bridal carry. Careful of his hips.”
Rawley didn’t hesitate, just lifted Jojo like he weighed nothing. The moment Jojo was on the seat, another contraction seized him, and he screamed again, eyes squeezed shut, fists full of the seatbelt and his own hoodie.
I ran back into the house. Carter was already at the door, cradling the “go bag”—a beat-up messenger with formula, blankets, change of clothes, and every document Jojo had ever signed for the baby.
He moved fast, feet light on the old pine, but his hand kept drifting to his own belly, as if the adrenaline in the air might jump species.
Rawley eyes were laser-focused. “You’ll follow?”
“On your six,” I said. “Go.”
The moment the door closed behind him and Jojo, I let myself breathe. Then I went for the keys, grabbed the first jacket in reach, and jogged to the shop truck, Carter racing behind me.
The engine was still warm. I slammed it into reverse and fishtailed out of the driveway, tailing Rawley’s rig as it barreled down the dirt road like a missile.
There were no cars, no obstacles, nothing but two trucks and four people and a world that was suddenly too small for what was happening.
I took my eyes off the mirror and focused on the road. The horizon was flat and endless, the sky so blue it hurt. But the space inside my chest had compressed to the size of a bullet.
I hit speed dial on the hands-free. The hospital answered on the first ring.
“OB. Black Butte General. This is Jane.”
“O’Reilly,” I said, “I’m inbound with a six-month omega, water broke, contractions less than two minutes. We’re twenty out, running hot. Send someone to the lot to meet us.”
“Copy,” she said, cool as ever. “Name?”
“Stinson. Joseph.”
She repeated it back, then said, “We’ll be waiting. Tell your driver not to park like last time.”
I almost smiled, but the next contraction started—audible even through the closed windows and the distance between the trucks. Jojo’s scream echoed in my ears, bright and raw.
The drive to Black Butte General was a war zone made of asphalt, loose gravel, and the fear-sweat of men who had never learned to stop pushing the red line.
I tailed Rawley’s F-150 with the Dodge idling ten feet behind his bumper, both rigs spitting dust like it was napalm. For a while, the world was nothing but vibration and engine noise, the inside of the cab pulsing with the drone of the tires and the high-pitched whine of my own blood in my ears.
Carter sat shotgun, hands braced on the dash. I watched him in the periphery, saw the way his gaze tracked the horizon, his free hand drifting compulsively to rest over the gentle curve of his belly. His knuckles went white every time we hit a rut, but he never said a word.
Rawley set the pace—seventy, then eighty, the needle climbing in direct proportion to Jojo’s screams. Through the windshield, I could make out Jojo’s head, flung back against the headrest, and the flash of Rawley’s hand as it left the wheel to steady his mate’s thigh.
We hit the two-lane blacktop. Instantly, the F-150 accelerated.
I matched his speed, keeping formation, every sense strung taut.
For the first time in years, I felt out of control—not just of the truck, but of time itself.
It was collapsing around us, folding the future into a handful of heartbeats.
A mile marker flew past. Another. At the county road intersection, a white sedan rolled up to the stop sign. Rawley never slowed, just blasted through the cross, the sedan lurching to a halt and nearly skidding off the shoulder.
I swerved, missing the other car by a foot, and for a split second caught the face of the driver: mouth open, eyes bugged. He’d never seen anyone drive like this outside of a movie.
I risked a glance at Carter. Sweat beaded his upper lip, but his jaw was set, eyes locked forward. He looked more calm than any civilian had a right to be.
“You good?” I asked, keeping my eyes on the road.
He nodded. “Never better,” he said, but the words were hollow. “Do you think—I mean, it’s not too early?”
“Jojo’s tough,” I said. “And Rawley—he’d carry that kid on his own back if he had to. We’ll get there in time.”
Carter’s hand moved up, covering his own stomach. “That’s what I’m afraid of,” he said, voice so soft I almost missed it.
I wanted to reach over, to lay a hand on his knee, but I couldn’t spare the control. The truck fishtailed again as Rawley took a corner at fifty, and I had to counter-steer hard to keep us from going up on two wheels.
We barreled through a straightaway. The land on either side of the road was a blur of spring wheat and ditch weed, fence posts stuttering by so fast they were just lines in my vision.
A hundred yards ahead, a tractor pulled into the lane, ancient and slow. Rawley didn’t break stride, just swung into the oncoming lane and passed it with maybe three feet to spare.
The tractor driver never even flinched, just raised a hand in salute.
That was Montana: even the locals knew better than to get between a man and his kid.
We rolled into town with the F-150 leading. The speed limit was thirty; we hit the square at double that, blowing through a four-way with a chorus of honking and a spray of loose gravel.
For a moment I thought we’d be stopped, but the sheriff’s cruiser was parked two blocks away and the deputy just raised his coffee in salute as we screamed by.
Rawley’s driving got worse the closer we got. He was rattled—shakier than I’d seen him even under enemy fire. The usual precision was gone, replaced with desperate, jerky movements.
At the last turn before the hospital, he overshot and had to whip the wheel around, fishtailing so hard Jojo’s door swung open for a split second before latching shut again.