Chapter 76: Labor and Delivery

*Layla*

I woke up in the middle of the night, a sharp pain radiating across my lower abdomen. At first, I dismissed it as another false alarm–I'd had plenty of those in the past few weeks. But as the pain intensified and became more regular, excitement and fear washed over me. This was it. Our boys were coming.

"Dante," I whispered, gently shaking his shoulder. He was instantly alert, his eyes scanning the room for danger before settling on me. "It's time."

The next few minutes were chaotic. Dante called the hospital while I tried to breathe through the increasingly painful contractions. By the time we were in the car, the contractions were coming every five minutes.

The drive to the hospital felt endless. Every bump in the road sent a jolt of pain through me, and I could see Dante's knuckles turning white as he gripped the steering wheel.

"We're almost there," he kept saying, his voice tight with worry. "Just hold on, Layla."