Chapter 45
FORTY-FIVE
The lights were low, just the way she liked them.
Tuck had dimmed the panels himself. Claire remained unconscious, propped at a gentle incline on the monitoring bed.
A thin oxygen line ran beneath her nose, her skin still pale, the blood pressure cuff on her arm inflating with slow, mechanical hisses every fifteen minutes.
Reid sat beside her, one hand gently laced with hers, the other pressed flat to her belly. He could feel the faintest shifts like a whisper of life still trying to speak beneath the skin. A belt ran across her, holding a monitor in place that measured the heartbeat and contractions.
Tuck stood at the foot of the bed, sonogram wand in one hand, gently pressing against the gel-slicked surface over her lower abdomen. Patrick hovered nearby, meds flowing into the IV being logged on a tablet at his side.
“Anterior placenta.” Tuck studied the grainy image on the screen.
“The placenta is still covering the cervix. But there’s no sign of a major separation, which is good news.
There is a small pocket of blood between the placenta and the wall of the uterus, which is most likely what caused the bleeding earlier. ”
“Can you treat it?” Reid asked, voice low, rough.
Tuck didn’t look away from the screen. “We are treating it.”
Patrick chimed in, “IV fluids and a magnesium sulfate bolus to relax the uterus and prevent contractions. Adding tranexamic acid to slow further bleeding.”
Reid swallowed hard. He didn’t know the drugs, not all of them, but he heard what they meant. Stop the bleeding. Keep the baby inside.
Tuck finally looked at him. “She’s stable, but this was a warning shot. No more walking the building. If she so much as dreams about overextending herself, you call me.”
Reid nodded once. “Got it.” But his voice caught.
He looked at the tight lines on her face, the shadows beneath her eyes, and the curve of her hand over her belly even while unconscious.
And for the first time, he understood what it meant.
What she carried not just in her body, but in her mind. The burden, the silence. The waiting.
He’d been under, fighting for his life in the dark. But she had stayed awake through all of it. His hand moved up, brushing hair from her temple. She didn’t stir, but her fingers shifted slightly in his. “I should’ve told her sooner.”
Tuck just finished the scan, gently wiped away the gel, and covered her abdomen with the sheet and blanket. “We’re keeping her here at least tonight. We will bolus with steroids. No unnecessary movement, and no secrets.”
Reid nodded again, gaze still locked on her. “She held me through the coma. Now I hold her.” He leaned closer and whispered, forehead to hers, “I’m right beside you.”
The door clicked closed behind them, a soft sound belying what had just happened inside.
Reid stood with his back to the wall, arms crossed tight, watching through the hallway window as Claire slept, her face still too pale, a halo of wires and soft blankets around her.
Tuck stood next to him. Patrick leaned against the far end of the corridor, hands in his pockets, but his expression was carved in granite. No one spoke for a long moment.
Then Tuck exhaled. “She’s tough, but this isn’t a fight she can brute-force her way through.”
Reid nodded once. “I know.”
“She can’t keep running point on this Vos shit,” Patrick added bluntly. “Not while she’s carrying a baby, bleeding, and refusing rest.”
Reid kept his eyes on the woman inside the room. “She wouldn’t stop if I begged.”
“Then you don’t beg,” Tuck said. “You lead.”
Reid turned to him. “What does that mean? Bed rest? Lock her in a room?”
Tuck gave him a look that cut clean. “It means you protect her from anything that raises her pulse. Stress. Fear. Conflict. And you.”
Reid stiffened. “You think I’m the problem?”
“I think you’re the one she’d die for,” Tuck said evenly. “And that means she’ll push herself further for you than for anyone else. If you so much as raise your voice, if you look at her the wrong way, if you even hint that she’s failing you, she’ll break herself in half to prove you wrong.”
Patrick stepped forward, arms crossed now. “She’s already carrying you almost dying. You want her to carry guilt too?”
Reid dropped his gaze, throat tight. “I should’ve told her the minute I knew Vos was circling,” he said. “I was trying to protect her.”
“You were trying to delay the inevitable,” Patrick said. “Now she knows, and it nearly cost her everything.”
Reid’s jaw flexed. “I won’t let it happen again.”
“Good,” Tuck said. “Here’s what’s next.” He stepped in closer, lowering his voice.
“She stays in the suite. Full monitoring, both electronic and an OB nurse. I’ll move my office to the suite next door.
All I need is a laptop and my phone. You and Claire can share the bed.
You will not let her get up unless one of us clears it.
That includes going to the bathroom. I’ll keep doing biweekly scans.
We will push betamethasone early to prep the baby’s lungs. ”
Patrick added, “I’ll rotate in with the maternal trauma team and help manage her emotional stress. But it has to be consistent with no new threats and no new fights.”
“And Vos?” Reid asked.
Tuck didn’t hesitate. “Tree Town One’s on him. Let them work. You keep her off the warpath and off her computer.”
Reid nodded, then finally spoke the truth he’d been holding since the moment he saw her collapse. “She and the baby are all I have.”
Tuck clapped a hand on his shoulder, grip strong. “Then let’s make damn sure they make it.”
As the monitors ticked softly, Claire blinked awake. The overheads were dimmed, and the world felt padded, muffled. It was a sterile hush with warm edges. The room smelled like lemon wipes, soft linen, and Reid.
He was in the recliner beside her bed, long legs stretched out, arms crossed—not sleeping. He was watching her. The dim lamplight made his features soft, but his eyes were anything but.
“You look like you haven’t moved in hours,” she murmured.
“I haven’t.”
She tried to sit up, but the pressure low in her pelvis reminded her of what had happened. The fear came back first and then the shame. “I should’ve called you with what I found.”
Reid moved to the bed. “No, I should’ve told you what we knew.” His hand found hers, warm and anchoring. “You were right to be furious. But I should’ve never let it reach that point.”
Claire’s eyes burned. “I don’t want to be fragile.”
“You’re not,” he said. “You’re fierce. But right now, you’re fierce on bedrest.”
She laughed once, weakly, against the lump in her throat.
He leaned in, kissed her forehead, then brushed a thumb along her cheek. His voice dropped lower, the way it always did when it was just the two of them. “I thought I lost you today.”
“You didn’t.”
“I almost did.”
Claire swallowed hard. “Reid?”
“Yeah?”
“If something happens to me… promise me you’ll protect her.”
Reid touched her belly lightly, then her face. “Nothing’s going to happen to you.”
“But promise me anyway.”
He nodded. “I promise. But only if you promise to fight like hell to stay.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” she whispered.
“Good,” he curled beside her in the bed, “then marry me.”
Now she was wide awake. “I’m dreaming.”
“Claire, you’re the love of my life. Even when I didn’t know your name, I knew you were important.
My head is clear. You’re carrying our child.
That first minute I saw you in that ballroom, I knew.
You’re mine. My sweetness. My love. So will you have a man who will try to be worthy of your love every day for the rest of our lives? ”
Tears filled her eyes, and as one slipped down her cheek, she whispered, “Yes.”
He wiped it away with the pad of his thumb. “I love you, Claire Bowman.”
Claire laid her head against his chest, listening to the slow, steady beat of his heart. It was warm and constant, the thing that had pulled her through so much. She let herself fall asleep in his arms.
MONTENEGRO – PRIVATE VILLA – SAME TIME
The air smelled of pine and salt, not the pristine sort that tourists adored, but metallic and faintly brackish. It clung to the walls of safehouses meant to look like luxury.
Vos sat upright in the leather chair by the window, one hand resting on the cane he didn’t need but still used as a force of habit, control and perception. The other hand traced the edge of the healing incision near his ear, beneath a face that wasn’t entirely his anymore.
The surgeon had done good work. The final version of his jawline was stronger, more angular. The scar at his temple was hidden beneath his reshaped hairline. But the eyes? Still his. Still dangerous.
Heather sat across the room in silence, a cooling compress on her cheek. The swelling was down, with her bruises faded to amber. She hadn’t spoken since breakfast. That suited him.
Scour stood by as he turned his gaze to the file in front of him with ultra-thin paper from Czech military stock.
It had arrived with the new passports and the map overlay from the Balkan corridor, routes into Albania and Kosovo.
But he wasn’t planning that exit yet, not before one more trip where he would put the last of his plan into action.
The burner phone beside him buzzed once with a single text from the contact in the medical center: Viability scan complete. 24+ weeks. Previa developing. Obstetrician recommends enforced rest.
Vos smiled faintly. “She’s still trying to play soldier,” he muttered. “Even with a war inside her.”
Heather finally spoke, voice low. “You’ll never get near her with Chase Security watching.”
He didn’t look at her. “I don’t need to get near her—yet.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Then what are you waiting for?”