Chapter 6
ALESSANDRA
Aunt Nora leans against the wall next to the door, waiting for Dr.—
Crap, what’s his name?
Boggs?
I’ve seen so many in the last several hours I don’t even remember their names, let alone what each one’s specialty is or why they are seeing me. Forcing a smile, I nod, pretending I have the faintest fucking clue what he’s trying to relay.
Nora raises a blond brow at me from over his shoulder.
Dr. Boggs stops talking, his gaze following mine to her and then cutting back to me. “Do you have any questions?”
About a zillion, but I will not be asking you when you talk like an encyclopedia.
I shake my head, and the corners of Nora’s lips twitch because she knows damn well I’m going to ask her to dumb it down to non-medical terms as soon as he leaves and give me the bare-bones, bottom-line info.
The older man offers me a kind smile and pats my hand. “You’ll be okay, sweetheart. You have Dr. Hawke and Dr. Clarke watching over you.”
My spine stiffens at the mention of Pope, who has remained absent since I first woke in the hospital, confused as hell about how I got here.
He’s avoiding me.
And after what happened, what I told him, I can’t say I blame him for not wanting to see me. If the roles were reversed, I don’t know that I could look him in the eye after a confession like that.
Dr. Boggs leaves my room, and Nora closes the door behind him, then settles into the chair beside my bed, ready to delve into her non-doctor explanation of what happened to me that I’ve been waiting for since I woke up.
But I stop her before she even starts. “How’s the baby doing?”
Her eyes light up, and she grins. “Just like the last time you asked, he’s completely fine. He’s in the nursery, and I can tell you, the staff there is taking incredibly good care of him.”
The tiniest bit of tension coiled inside me releases, but no matter how many times she tells me everything is fine with him—reiterating what Pope told me when he first examined him after the birth—there’s still a part of me that worries because he came so early.
And for what his arrival means for us all.
I suck in a sharp breath and let it out slowly, my chest tight each time I try to get some oxygen. “What did that doctor say? Something about an echo something or other.”
Nora nods. “Pope was worried when you passed out that you might have internal bleeding, something that he wouldn’t have any way to stop there at the club. I think you sucked a little bit of life out of him during that hour he was there with you while you were unconscious and he could do nothing but wait before those firefighters who finally found you.”
I rub at the spot over my heart. “And the echo whatever?”
She instantly slips from aunt mode into doctor mode, her humor fading. “You have postpartum cardiomyopathy. Basically, your heart is struggling and not working properly. It can cause shortness of breath, irregular heartbeat, water retention, and in extreme cases, it can get very severe and life threatening.”
Life threatening?
My baby just came into this fucked up world and impossible situation, and now, I might not even be here to raise him.
God, could this get any worse?
Nora squeezes my hand tightly. “Don’t panic, Al. You’re going to take some medication, ones chosen because they’re still safe if you want to keep breastfeeding. And you’re going to have to be monitored very closely.”
“Will it go away?”
Her smile this time doesn’t come as quickly, reservation in her gaze. “About fifty percent of people fully recover, fewer partially, and there’s a percentage who never do.”
“And what does that mean if my heart doesn’t recover?”
The couple of seconds pause she takes before answering tells me all I need to know before she even says the words. “Then you would need a heart transplant.”
She moves from the chair to the edge of my bed, wrapping her arms around me to intervene before I go into full meltdown mode. “But the chances of that happening are slim. All right? You’re healthy otherwise. Your drop in blood pressure from this condition is what caused you to pass out. There’s every reason to believe that with the proper medication and a little bit of time, your heart has a chance to recover. You shouldn’t be thinking worst-case scenario.”
A tear trickles out of my eye, and I bury my face against her shoulder. “Not think worst-case scenario? I had my baby at the club during a hurricane, for Christ’s sake. Now you’re telling me my heart might be failing?”
“I know it’s a lot, Al.” She pulls back slightly and offers a half-grin. “But just like you’ll improve, so does the weather. The hurricane has moved inland and is already dissipating, which means in a few hours, cleanup is going to start.”
“How long do I have to stay here?”
She releases me and stands. “A few more days, to make sure you’re stable on the prescribed medications and your heart hasn’t suffered any further damage, then you can go home.”
Home.
Panic claws at my chest, remembering the last time I was there, when Dan blocked me and tried to force me to go with him.
That place has been home for so long.
All the years I shared it with Angelina, where it was our safe space.
Our place to sit on the couch and binge shitty television and rant about the long days spent on our feet at The Grind.
Even after she moved in with Jude, it still felt like home—my place. Where I had prepared for the baby’s arrival. Where I planned to raise him and create a warm, loving place for him to grow up despite the complications I was bringing him into—if I didn’t have to flee New Orleans altogether to escape Daniele.
Nora makes her way to the door and grabs the handle. “Can I get you anything? I know your parents, Angelina, and Jude are going to leave Nana’s as soon as the roads are clear enough to get here. Then one of them will sit with you, but I need to head back to the ER.”
No mention of Pope…
“I’m okay.” I put on my practiced fake smile. “I promise.”
“You’re a tough girl, Al. I’m proud of you. You did good. He’s beautiful.” She pauses. “Have you thought of a name yet?”
Everything happened so fast that I didn’t even have the chance to tell anyone what I’ve been considering for his name.
I look down at my hands and twist them in the thin hospital blanket covering me for a moment before I meet her gaze again. “I was thinking about Benjamin.”
Nora freezes, her body stiffening.
“Yeah”—I nod at her reaction, the same one I expect from everyone—“I wanted to talk to my mom and dad and Ang first. Make sure they were okay with it…”
Unshed tears shimmer in her eyes, and she clears her throat like there’s something stuck in it. “They’ll be fine with it. I think it’s a wonderful tribute to him.”
“I never knew him, but Mom and Ang talk about him so much…all their happy memories. I’ve heard the same stories from them and everyone else for so long that I feel like I lived them and did know him.”
She swipes away a tear from the corner of her eye. “It’s a great name, but I won’t say anything to anybody until you talk to them, okay?”
I nod, unable to speak through the emotion. Nora slips out of my room, the door clicking shut behind her, and I relax back, staring up at the tiled ceiling.
After so many hours stuck in the dark with Pope, even the low lighting in the room seems bright, harsh to my eyes, and I let them drift closed, running through the cyclone of events that have left me here.
One mistake after another.
All mine.
Tears leak from my eyes and move down to the pillow under my head while my guilt threatens to drown me.
I brought all this onto myself, onto all the people who love me and will risk themselves, trying to correct my mistakes. Each and every one of them will bend over backward to protect me and the baby from the demon I invited into their lives.
That realization and the bone-deep exhaustion I’ve been battling since I woke finally get to be too much to fight. I roll slightly onto my side, wincing at the twinge of pain that reminds me I just gave birth, and snuggle until I get as comfortable as you can be in a hospital bed.
The first fingers of sleep start to creep into the edges of my mind, but one truth keeps screaming at me through the encroaching darkness.
Once the storm ends, the real tempest is going to begin.
I may not be safe from what’s coming after this hurricane blows over, but at least for now, in this brief moment, I can pretend like I am—before the hard stuff starts.
A soft knock sounds at the door, and I lift my head, blinking away those first vestiges of sleep. “Come in.”
The door opens inward, and a nurse in pink scrubs comes in, carrying Benjamin snuggled in her arms. I push myself up and shift slightly until I’m sitting better.
She approaches and speaks softly. “He just woke up. I thought you might want to try feeding him. I checked with Dr. Boggs, and he cleared it. But if you’re not up for it, we have formula in the nursery. He took that well while you weren’t available—”
I shake my head. “No, I want to.”
Even though I’ve only spent a few hours away from him, the thought of her taking him now that he’s here makes me want to leap out of this bed and snatch him from her arms so I can keep him with me—never let him out of my sight again.
That protective, mama bear instinct has certainly kicked in.
I hold out my arms, and she slips the tiny bundle into them. Cradling him against my chest, I get my first real look at him in the light after only seeing him in Savage’s dark office during the storm. He stares back up at me with familiar Caribbean blue eyes. “Will his eyes stay blue?”
The nurse smiles. “I don’t know. A lot of babies have them and they darken or change as they get older. But considering how many members of your family I’ve met with that very color blue, I’d say it’s a strong possibility he keeps them.” She brushes her fingers over his thick mop of dark hair. “I’ll come back in a little while for him, okay? Unless you want me to bring a bassinet in here for you so you can keep him with you?”
“I can do that?”
She nods. “Of course. They needed to get you stabilized and wanted to give you some time to rest, but we can absolutely move him here. There’s no reason he needs to be in the nursery.”
“I’d feel a lot better if I had him here with me…”
A knowing smile curls her lips. “No problem. I’ll let your doctor and the other nurses know, and we’ll get one in here.”
She leaves my room, and he releases a little wail, clearly annoyed he wasn’t immediately fed upon waking.
“Sorry, buddy. I’m new at this…”
Failing from the beginning.
I tug down the side of my gown, giving him access to feed, and he latches on, snuggling in close. His eyes flutter closed as I hold him tightly to me, never wanting to let go again. Examining every detail of my son in the light.
He’s so tiny.
So perfect.
Absolutely angelic.
And he sure drew the short straw to end up with me as a mother.
I’ve managed to fuck up everything, and I’ve only just started.
Dragging my finger across his nose and over his soft cheeks, I search for the resolution to our current predicament—the same one I’ve been looking for since I first realized who Dan was.
“What do you think, Benjamin? Are we going to be okay?”
I wish he could give me an answer because I sure don’t know it.
* * *
POPE
My knee bounces rapidly,the only movement in the room besides the rise and fall of Allie’s chest and the occasional shifting of the baby resting in the bassinet set up next to her bed.
I watch her eyelids flutter in her fitful sleep, her soft, pink lips parted slightly, breath alternating between short, hard spurts and level, normal rhythm.
Whatever she’s dreaming about, it isn’t completely pleasant.
My fingers itch to reach out and touch her. To brush the thick, dark strands back from her face. To place a comforting hand on her and tell her she’s safe. But I force myself to stay seated beside her bed in the god-awful, hard-plastic chair, terrified I might wake her inadvertently when her body so badly needs the rest.
Peripartum cardiomyopathy…
Jesus…
I scrub my palms over the rough stubble on my face and relive that horrific hour again and again in my head. When she wasn’t responding. When her breathing was so shallow. Her heartbeat erratic and slow.
It could have killed her.
It still could.
It doesn’t matter that I know—medically speaking—she has a very mild case or that it’s treatable with the medications she’s on. That doesn’t guarantee recovery.
This disease doesn’t work like that.
It’s an unpredictable monster that often shows up out of nowhere—like with Allie—and can seriously harm a new mother.
She could be fine in two months, or if things take a turn for the worse and her heart muscle doesn’t heal, she could end up on a damn transplant list.
Benjamin could lose his mother.
I could lose her.
Not that I’ve ever really had her. Even when I did, it was sneaking around and constantly worrying about anyone finding out what we were doing. It was secrets and dark corners and praying we wouldn’t get caught. And then, it was ten years of throwing myself into school and this job while she led the life she was never meant to have, all because of what I did to her.
Boy, did that backfire.
The thought that I might never get a chance to explain to her why I did what I did has been rolling around in my head since that moment she passed out on me, and something tells me it’s not going to go away, no matter how clearly I know I can never say the words I want to.
Too much time has passed.
Too much pain has been endured.
She’s a different person now, not that sweet, innocent, inquisitive, bright-eyed girl who wanted to explore the world that she was at sixteen. No matter how peaceful she may look sleeping in between her fits of nightmares, internally, she’s a woman torn apart and in agony.
And having me around only makes things worse.
Which is why I should go before she wakes up.
I start to push to my feet as the door clicks open behind me. Dad and Gabe enter quietly, and Dad’s eyes dart over to her. He starts to back out when he sees that she’s sleeping, but Allie shifts up onto her elbow, blinking lazily.
Her gaze lands on me first, and she jerks a little, like she’s surprised to see me. “Were you sitting there, watching me sleep?”
Despite the distress currently filling my heart, I can’t fight the quirk of my lips. “Maybe.”
She rolls her eyes. “Yeah, because that’s not creepy.” Her attention darts to her other visitors. “Saint, Uncle Gabe, is anyone else here?”
Gabe shakes his head as he advances into the room, toward her and the bassinet, Dad hot on his heels. They stand over Benjamin’s bed and lean down to stare at him, their large hands gently ghosting over his hair and tiny fingers and anything they can get away with touching without waking him.
Finally, Gabe looks up at her and grins. “Wow. And I thought I had the whole calamity-during-a-hurricane belt formally won. But you just had to outdo me, didn’t you, kid?”
Allie grins at him and shifts in the bed, wincing slightly.
I immediately climb from the chair, scanning her face for signs of further distress and the heart monitor beside her bed. “Are you in pain? I can order—”
She holds up a hand. “I’m okay, Dr. Clarke.”
Ouch.
Dr. Clarke…
I shouldn’t be so quick to jump down her throat and into action. I’m not even her treating physician now that she’s here in the hospital. But seeing any discomfort makes me want to fix it for her. Even if it isn’t my place.
Dad’s dark gaze cuts to me, then to the baby and Allie, silently asking the question they came here to discuss.
“So…” I release a heavy sigh, bracing myself for the coming onslaught of anger from Allie when she finds out what I’ve done. “I know it wasn’t my place to say anything, Al, but you were unconscious. I didn’t know what was wrong, and I—”
Her shoulders tense, and her eyes dart up to Gabe and Dad. “You told them.”
Lowering my face into my palms, I wince at the note of hurt in her voice. “I had to.” I pull my hands away to meet her accusatory glare. “We already know Roselli and Satriano have both hacked the hospital system in the past, and even with our attempts to make upgrades on the tech since then, we don’t know that they didn’t see you get registered as an inpatient…” My focus drifts to the baby. “Or that he was.”
She presses her lips together firmly.
“I had to make sure we got both of you safe, extra security on your room and the nursery—”
“Did you tell Nora, too? She didn’t say a word while she was in here.”
I nod. “I’m sorry.”
She may never forgive me for telling everyone her secret, but there are so many things on that list now that one more doesn’t matter. The number of mistakes I’ve made when it comes to Allie could fill the damn gulf and then some. And I just seem to keep doing it.
Her bottom lip quivering, Allie lies back against the pillow, staring at the ceiling. “So, everyone knows what a fuck-up I am.”
Dad steps forward and leans over her, pressing a kiss against her forehead. “You’re not a fuck-up, Al. No one knew. Roselli did a damn fine job keeping his son protected. Either Daniele was never part of the business and was simply the musician he appeared to be, or it was one really good deep-fake, a way to infiltrate us and have nobody question it.”
As the man in charge of security for the entire Hawke Enterprises empire, those words should mean something coming from him, but given the tears falling to her pillow, I don’t think they’re much comfort to Allie.
Gabe nods his agreement and crosses his arms over his chest, leaning back against the wall beside the bed. “And if it’s that, then we all fell for it, hook, line, and sinker. Every single one of us sat there and listened to him perform when he played at The Grind and none of us saw it. None of us suspected a fucking thing—not even when Roselli showed up twice while Dan was performing.”
Again…hindsight.
Dad watches her carefully, considering his words, not wanting to scare her. But he and Gabe have worked far too hard for far too long protecting this family to mince words in a situation like this. “But you were right to be worried, Al.”
Now it’s time to really get down to brass tacks. This is going to be a very uncomfortable conversation for her, and she knows it, shifting nervously on the bed.
She stares up at Dad, her brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”
He glances from me to Gabe. “I mean, you were right to think he would be a problem if he knew he was the father. If he came to your apartment in the middle of a fucking hurricane to grab you and take you against your will, then there’s nothing that’s going to stop him now that the baby’s born.”
Gabe nods. “If it were my son, I’d burn down the world to get to him.”
Fucking hell.
I cast a glare toward him. “Did you really have to put it like that? You’re going to scare the shit out of her.”
Allie starts trembling, her eyes immediately darting to the baby, soundly asleep despite us talking around him. “What can I do? How do I protect him?”
Gabe issues a long sigh,as frustrated as I am with a lack of good options. “I have already talked to Stone and Isaac, and they’re going to work on some protective orders. But”—his broad shoulders rise and fall—“do you really think a piece of paper is going to stop a Roselli?”
It’s the painful, ugly truth she knew deep down the minute she saw Dan for who he really was. That’s why she’s been terrified. It’s the reason for all her secrecy and desire to hide away from all of us.
A sob slips from her throat, and she shakes her head. “No.”
I reach forward and pull her hand in mine, squeezing it. “We’re not going to let anything happen to you or the baby.”
Her gaze cuts to me. “But how can you say that? How can you promise it? You can’t know that. You can’t—”
“Yes, I can.”
She tugs her hand from mine and pushes herself up until she’s sitting, her bottom lip still quivering, the tears streaking her face. “Once I leave the hospital, he’s going to find me.”
Her statement is so definitive.
But that will never fucking happen.
A surge of rage rushes through me, igniting a fire deep in my belly I only felt before one other time—when she told me what that fucker did, trying to take her from her apartment. “He’ll never get to you, not if you’re with me.”
Her eyebrows fly up. “What?”
Gabe pushes off the wall, stepping closer, narrowing his eyes on me. “What do you mean ‘with you?’”
Running my hands over my head, I pace alongside the bed. “Look, I’ve been thinking about this. She obviously can’t go back home, right? Like, ever. He knows that apartment. He knows she lives there. He was waiting to fucking ambush her. She can’t go back there.”
Allie releases another small sob. “All my stuff, all the stuff for the baby…”
Gabe glances at her. “We’ll pick it up. We’ll get everything you need. But he’s right. What are you thinking, Pope?”
I chew on my lip as I consider any other option that isn’t going to piss her off as much as this one. But I don’t come up with any. The only way this works is the plan I came up with while she was undergoing all the testing—the one sure to upset more than just her. “She’s going to need constant medical attention, monitoring to make sure that her heart is functioning properly and isn’t deteriorating any further.”
Dad nods. “So, she goes to stay with Gabe and Skye. She can—”
“No.” My objection comes a little too forcefully, enough that Dad’s dark eyebrows fly up.
Gabe fights a smirk.
I hold up a hand to him. “Look, Skye is a very talented nurse practitioner, but we’ll need to do echocardiograms and ECGs, and I would feel a lot safer if I could personally monitor her and make sure she was doing okay.”
Allie releases a shocked little sound. “Don’t you have a job”—she waves her hands around—“here, at this very hospital, that you need to do? You can’t just—”
I approach the bed, standing over her the same way I did at Nana’s what feels like an eternity ago, looking down at a broken woman I can’t walk away from when I can help her. “I already took a leave of absence.”
Dad whirls to face me. “You did what?”
Shit. Maybe I shouldn’t have sprung this on him like that.
After all the years of special summer school programs that I made him and Mom put me in because I always knew what I wanted to do and was determined to do whatever it took to get here, then college and medical school—I’m walking away from it.
But it will only be temporary.
And I don’t see any other way we can do this and protect Allie and the baby.
Dad worries his jaw, then motions toward the door. “But your residency…”
“Will be here when I get back.” My gaze drifts over Allie and the sleeping baby. “This is more important.”
A flush spreads over Allie’s pale cheeks, and she averts her eyes, reaching into the bassinet beside her bed to fuss over Benjamin even though he’s still sleeping soundly.
Gabe returns to his position against the wall, drumming his fingers against it. “What do you plan on doing? You can’t bring her to your place. Anywhere connected to the Hawkes isn’t safe.”
I nod slowly. “I know, which is why I was thinking we have to take her somewhere no one would ever look, and it has to be just me. Of everyone in the family, I’m the one who’s almost never seen with her. I’m the person they would least expect her to be with. They’re not going to search for me.”
Dad and Gabe exchange a look while Allie cuts her gaze to me.
“And I don’t have any say in this?” She looks to the other two men for help. “Why can’t I go to Mom and Dad’s or Gabe and Skye’s? Gabe is perfectly capable of protecting me there, and Nora can show Skye how to do any tests I need.”
Gabe gives her a half-smirk. “While I appreciate your confidence in Skye and me, Pope’s right. It would be the safest thing for you and the baby to get out of town, away from here, somewhere they’ll never look for you until we can handle the Roselli situation. Besides”—he motions toward the lone window in the room—“the city’s a fucking mess, flooding in some areas, lots of wind damage. The Hawke Enterprises Foundation is going to be busy helping clean up, which means a lot of us will be pulled in different directions. Plus, there was some damage to the hotel…”
Her brow furrows. “Was it bad?”
Gabe runs a hand through his hair and shakes his head. “Nothing too serious from what we can tell so far. Kennedy, Cass, and your mom and dad will be heading over there once the last of the storm clears to do a better visual inspection. They’ve been going off what they can see from the cameras at the site.”
“Shit.” She glances up at me, telling me in no uncertain words that she doesn’t like this idea at all. “Is this really our only option?”
I should be used to seeing this trepidation in her blue eyes when she looks at me, but it still stings, knowing I’m her last choice. “This is about protecting you, Al, you and the baby, making sure you’re healthy and safe.”
If that doesn’t guilt her into agreeing to it, nothing will.
No matter how messed up this situation is, one thing I know absolutely, without a shadow of a doubt, is that she will do anything to protect her son.
She looks over at the baby again, then releases a heavy sigh. “You know, I thought about leaving New Orleans…” Her eyes meet mine, then drift to Dad and Gabe. “I thought I could hide out somewhere he would never find me and have the baby, and maybe I could just”—she shrugs—“find a way to be safe.”
A little hiccupped sob slips from her lips.
“But that never would have worked.” She shakes her head. “I don’t know the first thing about surviving on my own or taking care of a baby. I need everyone to help me. I can’t do this by myself. I can’t protect him—”
I sit on the edge of her bed, taking her hand in mine again. “I can. Until this gets sorted. Okay?”
She hesitates for only a second this time before she nods. “Okay, but where are we going?”