Chapter 25
Twenty-Five
HARLEY
The delivery is blurry in my memory, more shadow than detail.
There were bright lights, masked faces, the steady chant of orders barked over the sound of my own cries.
I remembered the tearing ache in my body, the burning fear in my chest, and Easton’s voice, ragged, pleading, telling me to hold on.
Then absolutely fucking nothing.
What I do remember is the silence that followed.
No newborn cry.
No tiny wail breaking open the air. Just silence, and the world collapsing in on itself.
When I wake, my arms are e mpty .
My stomach is empty .
My heart is empty .
And my mind is filled with panic and dread so sharp it steals my breath.
I blink hard, trying to force the blur from my eyes as I search for the one thing I should see first. A swaddled bundle, a tiny chest rising and falling, a cry waiting to shatter the quiet.
Instead, all I find is Easton slumped in a chair beside my bed, his long frame folding in on itself.
His hand is still half-stretched toward me like he doesn’t want to let go, even in sleep.
The ache in my body is nothing compared to the ache in my chest. I ignore the sting from my stitches, the heaviness of the IV taped to my arm, the machines hissing and beeping at my side.
Where is my baby?
The room is too clean, too still. I prepared myself for exhaustion, for noise, for the wild chaos of new life. But not for this. Not for silence so thick it presses on my lungs.
My breath quickens. I grip the sheets, my voice coming out hoarse, breaking. “Easton.”
He stirs, head jerking up, eyes wide and bloodshot. Relief washes over his face the second he sees me awake, but it isn’t enough. I need more than him. I need answers.
“Where—” my voice cracks “—where’s our baby?”
His eyes are red and swollen, his jaw tight like he’s been holding himself together for too long.
“The baby’s alive,” he whispers, the words cracking halfway through. “It’s a little girl. She’s breathing. She’s strong. But she’s in the NICU for now.”
Girl. Alive. Strong. NICU. The words swirl, collide, refuse to land in the same place. My stomach flips. “Why isn’t she here?”
Easton’s grip tightens. “Because she needs help. Just for a little while. A week or two, the doctors said.”
But all I hear is the silence that followed the delivery. The silence where there should be crying. And the longer I sit there with nothing in my arms, the more certain I become that I’ve already failed her … and Easton.
“What does she look like?” I whisper, my throat tight, desperate to pull together a picture in my mind. Have I even seen her? In the chaos, the pain, the blur of voices … I can’t remember. It’s like my body has been split open, and everything stolen from me before I had a chance to hold onto it.
Easton’s face crumbles. His eyes shine as he leans forward, both of his hands closing around mine.
“She’s small, Harley. So, so small … but she’s strong.
She’s got this thick dark hair already, and her little hands—” His voice breaks, and he swallows hard.
“She keeps grabbing at the wires like she’s already fighting to get free. ”
Tears blur my vision. My baby. Our baby. I try to hold onto his words, to build her in my head, but the thought of wires, of glass between us, makes me want to scream.
“Why can’t I hold her?” My voice shakes, the words barely more than a breath.
Easton pulls my hand against his chest, right over his heartbeat, steady and strong. “You will. You will, I promise. They just need to make sure she’s safe first. She’s fighting, Little Bird. Just like you.”
Easton helps me into a wheelchair, his hands steady on my shoulders even though I can feel the tension running through him. I hate how weak I feel, every movement tugging at the stitches in my body. Yet, the ache in my chest is so much worse.
The hallways blur together as we pass, bright lights and nurses in scrubs moving with purpose. The faint smell of disinfectant clings to everything. My heart beats faster with every turn.
When we reach the NICU doors, Easton pauses. He crouches in front of me, his big hands covering mine. His blue eyes search my face like he’s afraid of what this will do to me.
“She’s right inside,” he says softly. “She’s hooked up to a lot of things, but don’t let that scare you. She’s strong, Harley. Stronger than she looks.”
I nod, but my throat closes anyway. I can only grip his hand tighter.
The doors open with a hiss, and it’s the sound that hits me first—a steady chorus of beeping monitors, soft whooshing of machines, the muffled shuffle of nurses moving between incubators. Rows of tiny bassinets and isolettes fill the room, each holding lives that seem too fragile for this world.
And then he wheels me up to one.
My baby.
She’s smaller than I imagined, her skin-tinged pink under the glow of the warming lamp with a tangle of wires and tubes surrounding her. Her tiny chest rises and falls with a stuttering rhythm that makes my own breath falter.
My hands tremble in my lap. “Oh, God …” The words break out of me, strangled. “That’s her?”
Easton’s voice cracks. “Yeah. That’s our girl.”
He rests his hand gently on the glass, as if touching it could somehow bridge the space between us. I can’t move. Can’t breathe. She’s mine, ours, and yet she feels so far away, more machine than baby, like something I dreamed instead of carried for eight months.
“I can’t do this,” I whisper, hot tears spilling over. “She needs someone stronger. Not me.”
Easton crouches in front of me again, forcing me to look at him. His eyes are fierce, desperate and unflinching. “Don’t you say that. You made her. You carried her. And she’s fighting right now because of you. She needs her mom, Harley. She needs you. ”
But I can’t look at her again. The wires, the machines, the rise and fall of her fragile chest … it hollows me out. I turn my face into my hands and weep.
Easton stays kneeling, one hand on my knee while the other presses against the glass where our daughter lies, fighting for every breath.
I blame myself.
For the stress. For the trial. For pushing my body too far. For saying yes the night before when I should’ve said no. If I was stronger, calmer, smarter, if I was anyone other than me, maybe my baby would be in my arms instead of behind glass.
Easton wheels me back to my room after the visit, but I still feel hollow, like I left every ounce of strength in that glass box with my daughter.
She isn’t in my arms. She isn’t pressed against my chest. She’s surrounded by wires and plastic, a machine counting her breaths because I wasn’t enough.
I lie back in the bed, staring at the ceiling tiles until they blur. Easton sits in the chair from before, and neither of us move when a nurse comes in with a small kit.
“Harley,” she says gently, placing it on the tray table beside me. “We’ll want to start expressing colostrum. Just a few drops can make a big difference for preemies.”
My mouth dries. “Colostrum?”
“Yes, your first milk,” she explains, her smile soft, practiced. “It’s thick and golden, packed with antibodies. Even if she can’t nurse yet, we can collect it and feed it to her in the NICU. It’ll help her fight infection.”
I stare at the kit, at the tiny sterile syringes lined up like something out of a lab. “I don’t … I don’t think I can.”
The nurse tilts her head. “It might be uncomfortable at first, but we can help?—”
“I said I can’t.” My voice cracks sharp, too sharp, and Easton flinches in his chair. The nurse hesitates, then nods. She sets the kit aside without a word.
When the door closes behind her, silence spreads again.
Easton reaches for my hand. “Baby, she’s just trying to help.”
I pull my hand back, staring at the wall. “She needs more than a few drops of milk. She needs a better mom than me.”
“Don’t.” His voice is low, breaking. “Don’t say that.”
But the words won’t stop. They keep spilling out, raw and jagged. “If I’d been stronger, if I’d eaten more, if I hadn’t been so stressed, I wouldn’t have gone into labor early. She wouldn’t be in there, hooked up to machines. It’s my fault, Easton. All of it.”
He’s out of his chair in a heartbeat, kneeling by the bed.
His hands grip mine so tight it almost hurts.
His eyes shine, fierce and broken all at once.
“No. Stop blaming yourself. None of this is your fault. You fought for her every day she was inside you. And you’re going to keep fighting now. For her. For us.”
I want to believe him. God, I want to. But all I feel is empty.
When he presses my hand to his chest, steady heartbeat under my palm, I can’t bring myself to look at him.
I don’t deserve her. I don’t deserve either of them.
Easton doesn’t push right away. He sits with me, holding my hand until the silence stretches on for too long. Until it becomes unbearable. Then he speaks softly, like he’s coaxing me back from the edge.
“Harley … will you try again? For her?”
I shake my head, tears already burning my eyes. “I can’t. I don’t even feel like her mom. What if nothing comes out? What if my body fails her again?”
His thumb brushes over my knuckles. “Then we keep trying. Or we find another way. But please, don’t give up before you’ve even started. She needs you. I need you.”
The weight of his words presses down on me. I hate myself for hesitating, for wanting to crawl further into this hollow hole where nothing hurts. But the way he looks at me like I’m the only one who can save him, save her … it breaks my heart.
I nod once. “Fine. I’ll … try.”
Easton stands immediately, relief flooding his face as he steps into the hall. When he comes back with the nurse, she gives me the same practiced, patient smile as before.
“We’ll go slow,” she promises, pulling a chair closer to the bed. She sets the kit down, the little syringes gleaming too bright in the sterile light of the hospital room. “Just a few drops at first. That’s all we need.”