It was an unusually quiet morning at Braglewicz & Lazarus, a darkly foggy Tuesday without much to do. Mark was glaring at a case file like he held a grudge against it and sipping coffee that had to be cold by now. Justin sat across the room with his feet kicked up, manipulating a deck of cards the way he had in the old days, flipping and slipping them to turn jacks into aces and twos into kings. The new hire, Barnaby, pecked nervously at the typewriter, doing some menial task or another. It wasn't that they didn't have work to do, but London bore too near a resemblance to pea soup for any quality investigating. Not as bad as twenty years ago, but not clear enough that anyone wanted to tail a suspect if they didn't have to.

Susan was in the back, forty-one weeks gone and catching up on the filing. James had begged her off coming in today, as he had every day for the past ten, only today he had the excuse of the weather.

"Stay in today," he suggested brightly over toast and tea, as if the thought had just occurred to him. "I'll light a fire, we can have a lie-in and read."

Susan didn't believe his earnest schoolboy act for a second. "Nice try," she said, heaving herself up from the breakfast table. "No cigar."

She'd caved to his request that she call a hansom instead of walking or taking the omnibus to Robin Hood Yard, in part because there was no way the omnibus was going in this weather and partly because walking more than six inches seemed to send a lightning rod straight up her asshole. Strong cramps enveloped her massive belly, threatening to bring her breakfast up. Emma had warned her about the random aches and pains that came from growing a life inside you, as had Greta, but she'd thought them dramatic. As it turned out, no.

She didn't like the fog. Some of the worst days of her life had been foggy ones - the frigid nights after she fled the workhouse, the days when she and Emma were sure Justin had abandoned them or worse... the day Cara died. Susan was not superstitious, she'd been a spiritualist's familiar for Christ's sake, but still. She didn't like fog, and she didn't like what it brought. So she went to work, despite the stomach pain and swollen feet and literal, genuine arse ache.

And just after lunch, while standing over the filing cabinet with a stack of papers so disorganized that she'd begun fantasizing about corporate acquisition by double murder, she had a most embarrassing accident.

Her first reaction was horror. Then, she registered what was happening, and her second reaction was rage. Of course those cramps had been... Christ. Jesus. Fuck.

"Stay calm," she muttered to herself, forcing her calmest, most confident voice. If she betrayed any emotion, the reaction from the front room would quickly become a riot. Justin had been asking her daily for updates, pretending to inquire on Nathaniel's behalf, but she saw the mix of thrill and concern in his quick grey eyes. Barnaby treated her as if she were made of glass, that poor sweet little fruit. No, this was a job for the only reasonable tool in her arsenal.

"Say, Mark?"

She heard the Braglewicz of the partnership set his cup on the desk and rise from his leather chair with no hint of hurry. He entered the room with a face that expected a paperwork-related scolding, but Susan had never minded being the bearer of surprises.

"Wotcher, Sukes?"

"Mark," Susan repeated, in the same nonchalant tone she used to get his signature on her expense reports. "Can you close the door for a moment? It's a tad sensitive."

His brows furrowed and he nudged the door shut before taking a step closer. "Oh?"

"It would appear," she said, low voice wavering slightly. "That I am having this baby."

The eyebrows flew heavenward. "Right now?"

"The very time and place."

"Oh, ja pierdolę," Mark muttered, running his hand across his face. He'd grown a beard in recent years to compensate for his receding hairline, and it suited him, but paired with the moment's fatigued exasperation, it made him look rather like a drunk Father Christmas. "Should I fetch Laz?"

"Get him the hell out of here," Susan said, bracing against another contraction. "Tell him you want a drink at the Jack. Barnaby, too. Get word to James, and send for Emma."

"Do you need a hospital?" Mark asked.

"Get Jus out of here, get word to James and send for Emma," she repeated. "And tell her to bring me new bloomers - ah, shit." She doubled over, clutching her stomach, and Mark rushed to help safely lower her into a chair. Even in his mid-fifties, Mark was still notably muscled and keen to brawl as ever. Susan suspected sharing one's bed with a professional acrobat was strong motivation to stay fit, but that was none of her business.

His face was a mask of worry, but he knew better than to ask her if she was sure, and she silently thanked him for that.

"If I take the boys to the Jack, you'll be alone for a bit."

"I know," she said.

"You want I should send for Pen?" he asked, in the sort of way one asked if they could help after your arms were already full. "He helped Greta a lot with the twins."

"They're siblings," Susan said. "And I do not need an audience for what's about to happen." She paused. "Thank you, though."

His eyes were warm, looking at her like she was still twelve. Mark had met her as a rage-filled urchin, caught fighting girls in the schoolyard, face beaten to full mourning. He'd mentored her as a rage-filled young woman, recently abandoned and no longer pregnant, ready to burn the world clean down to the foundation. He'd put an arm around her as a rage-filled thirty-year-old, when she'd burst into tears right there at work having discovered James Bloody Vane was one of the Lilywhite Boys

She'd spent many hours sparring with Mark in the gym as he taught her to channel her anger into effective self-defense, and he wasn't any easier to pin for the one arm. He'd given her an education in handling herself in this job, the way her governors had given her street smarts and book smarts and opportunities. She was as grateful to Mark Braglewicz as anyone who raised her.

Susan was rocked from her reverie by another bloody contraction.

"Mark?"

"Yeh?"

"Get the fuck out of here."

"Right-o."