Chapter 4
I’m sitting on Alexa’s bed stroking her curls while watching her sleep peacefully when Charlie Chief enters the suite to inform me that Lily is in recovery.
My heart rate spikes and my veins flood with adrenaline, the relief I feel is all consuming. I kiss my princess on her forehead and stand and look toward Charlotte.
“I’ll watch Alexa, go be with our girl, Harrington.”
“Thanks, Charlotte.” I say.
I move quickly and exit the room, I’m grateful that Charlotte is watching over Alexa and Davies, having a friendly face is always better for a patients recovery, besides Charlotte is family now and where she wants to be.
Making my way to the recovery unit my thoughts are consumed with all the possibilities I’m about to face.
Is Lily going to be, okay? What is her recovery going to entail? Did that filthy fucking prick rape my angel? Did our baby survive?
As I turn the last corner and enter the sterile corridor, I see Doc striding towards me, he looks spent. My brother has just saved my angel’s life and I owe him everything... my life.
“Doc, how’s Lily doing?”
Doc offers me an exhausted smile and I give him a solid hug, us men don’t hug very often but when we do it’s because we fucking need it, and I know that this has been just as hard on Doc as it has been on me, he literally had Lily’s life in his hands.
“Lily made it through surgery but she is critical, the next seventy-two hours will be the hardest, but for now she’s pulled through the surgery like the angel she is, it’s going to be a long road to recovery but she will do it and just needs time to heal.”
I step back and ask the all-important question.
“Will Lily be okay Doc? Is there going to be any long term damage?”
Doc claps me on the back, “Chief, I was able to repair her liver and stopped the bleed, her lungs are badly bruised and I repaired the hole in her right lung but they need time to heal before we even attempt to bring Lily off the ventilator. So, you need to know it won’t be a quick recovery.”
“Doc, was…” I close my eyes and breathe in deeply and let out a shaky breath because I need to know, “was Lily raped?” I ask, my voice hoarse with rage and emotion.
“No, Lily wasn’t raped, we performed the examination when we were checking her cervix after the bloods came back positive to make sure her cervix was intact and that she wasn’t bleeding vaginally. We found no bruising, fluid or evidence that any sexual assault had occurred.”
I breathe out a relived breath and know I have tears in my eyes, I look back to Doc and he smiles brighter this time.
“Let’s head in and we’ll do a scan, I need to make sure your baby survived, take a couple of deep breaths man, Lily is in a bad way and her visual injuries are quite shocking to look at, so prepare yourself.”
I do as Doc says as we make our way inside the warm sterile recovery area.
When I see Lily, my breath is sucked from my lungs, nothing will ever prepare you for seeing your loved one in that condition. My angel is unrecognizable, she’s hooked up to many different machines and looks so small and fragile lying there and I have to remind myself that she is alive, and the machines vital for her body to recover.
I rush forward and gently brush my hand over her blood stained hair. Lily’s face is so swollen and bruised and all I want to do is get my hands on Trickle, that fucker is going to have a long drawn out death, but I’ll really enjoy torturing his ass before I finally allow him to die.
Doc wheels over a machine and tells me to take a seat.
“Okay, Daddy, you ready to meet your baby?” Doc asks all excited.
I look to Doc, and I know a tear rolls down my stubbled cheek, “Should we wait for Lily to be conscious so we can share this moment together? It feels wrong to do this without her knowing.”
“You can look away, but I need to make sure baby is secure and still alive.” Doc explains.
I want to look, I really fucking do, but I want to experience this with Lily. I nod and lower my head.
“Okay, I’ll be quick.” Doc says getting to work, “I’m jus–”
Doc goes silent, and all I hear is clicks and a rolling sound coming from the portable ultrasound machine. I look up to see Doc with a strange look on his face.
“What is it? Is our baby, okay?”
Doc doesn’t answer me, he’s laser focused on the screen moving the wand over Lily’s lower abdomen.
“Doc, what the fuck is going on?” I grind out.
“I need to do a transvaginal ultrasound; I need to be certain of what I’m seeing.”
“What the fuck is that?” I bite out, all I recognized was, something vagina in his statement.
“When a woman is early in pregnancy or we need to get a closer more in depth look we use this.” Doc holds up a long dildo looking wand with a condom over the top of it. “it is very common for women to have to have this type of ultrasound.”
“Fuck no, Doc, what the fuck man?” I question.
“I wouldn’t do this if I didn’t need to, Chief.” Doc implores.
I close my eyes, fuck me, Lily escaped being raped but now has to have a device inserted into her, a place that only I’ve been an no one else.
“Do what you have to Doc, but be gentle for-fucks-sake, Lily has only ever had me inside of her.” I sigh heavily, I feel the relief finally wash over me that my angel wasn’t raped but this is still hard.
Doc just nods his head while he rolls a stool over to sit on and gets into position. He squirts a liberal amount of lube onto the wand and then it disappears beneath her gown, and I feel like we’re violating Lily, and bile rises into my throat, which I swallow down with a hard gulp. I get that it’s medical and needed. but it still doesn’t make me feel any better.
“Okay, I’m in, turn away if you don’t want to see anything.”
I can’t this time, my eyes are glued to the screen and all I can hope is that Lily will forgive me, I see a lot of white space and my heart starts racing, I don’t know what I’m meant to be looking at, I do see a greyish mass.
“What am I looking for, Doc?”
“Well, your babies are definitely snug and well protected, let’s see if we can find a heartbe–”
“What did you just say... babies? As in plural? More than one?”
Doc looks over to me with the biggest shit eating grin I’ve ever seen his face sport, “Yeah man, congratulations, you managed to knock Lily up good and proper.”
“Holy shit!”
I’m stunned, fuck me, two, two!
“Yes, there are two babies, and...”
“And what? Are they okay? Fuck, Doc, are my...” I have to breathe, my head is spinning, “babies, okay?”
“From what I can see they are perfectly snug and safe, congratulations man, you also have identical twins, do you want to hear their heartbeats? If not, I’ll ask you step out of the room.”
I. Am. Speechless.
Not only have I managed to get Lily pregnant, but we’re having twins, wow. “I’m not going anywhere, fuck, Doc, I need to hear their heartbeats to know they are safe.”
Doc shakes his head and smiles, while clicking a few different buttons on the panel and then I hear a whooshing sound. My eyes are glued to the screen, the anticipation, excitement and fear that everything is okay, is palpable. Then the sound of life can be heard, a heartbeat a very rapid heartbeat.
“Doc, is everything good the heartbeat sounds too fast, please tell me they’re okay.”
“Breathe man, twin one has a perfectly healthy heart rate, babies hearts beat are faster than an adult and especially at this stage in the pregnancy.”
“Okay, okay, and the other baby?” I’m jumping out of my skin in anticipation.
“Twin two is just hiding behind twin one, give me a second.”
I feel like I’m standing in front of the enemy in in the middle of the battlefield during hostage negotiations, my body is coiled tight and my mind on high alert, just waiting for shit to go south.
“There we go, twin two.”
Just as Doc finishes speaking, I hear a second heartbeat. Holy shit I can’t believe this, both survived, I feel my body relax, and with all the hours I’ve been awake my body starts to shake with the adrenalin coursing through me.
“Congratulations, brother. Your babies are perfectly healthy, Lily did good man.”
“Fuck yeah, she did, she is such a protective Mommy. Twins, wow.” I whisper and gently place my hand on Lily’s lower belly.
“Lily is ten weeks into her pregnancy, by these calculations conception would have happened right at the start when you met, January 27th and her due date is October 18th.”
“Hooyah!” I whisper yell and Doc returns one of his own.
Hang on that’s not right, “That would make her eight weeks then?” I question.
Doc chuckles, “Technically a woman is ‘classed’ as pregnant from the date of their last period, so at conception they’re two weeks into the forty week count. That’s also why people say nine months pregnant but the reality is, forty weeks is ten months. Some people will argue the dates especially with an unplanned pregnancy and a reluctant father in the room.”
“Well shit, I can see how that confuses people, it got me too, Doc.” I say shaking my head.
“Yeah man, it is tricky, I usually get people to count each finger as four weeks, and watching their face when it clicks is so worth it, often I see people still counting on their hands in the damn corridor.” Doc says chuckling.
“At least I didn’t use my damn fingers and just took your word, what about healing time?” I question.
“Lily is a fighter and so are your babies, and she really is an angel. I will monitor Lily every step of the way but like I said earlier it will take time to heal.”
“Yeah, she is, my angel. I’m so fucking chuffed man, now I just need Lily to pull through this and wake up.”
“Lily will, I’ll make sure of it, but I’m not going to sugarcoat it, she has a long recovery ahead of her, brother. I’ll use the same cream we used on her back to help heal her wounds and the surgical site quicker because with twins her belly will grow much quicker than a normal pregnancy, and we need those wounds to close and heal fast.”
“Whatever is needed, Doc, I trust you with Lily and my babies lives... wow, babies. I never thought of two at once.”
“Makes a little sense, Chief, Lily is an identical twin herself, so the chances are much higher for her to have multiples.”
“When can we move her to the suite?”
“Lily will need to be monitored closely, needing round the clock intensive care so I have them setting up the room next to Alexa and Davies room, I knew you would want them all together but Lily needs an ICU room for now, room for all the machinery and staff to have easy access, there will be a nurse in her room twenty-four seven.”
“Okay, I can manage that.” I let out an exhausted chuckle.
“What we both need right now is some sleep! Both of us, I know Alexa is asleep and Charlie team is collecting our team, they’re expected in a few hours, they have to stabilize Caroline and that piece of shit before they can leave. And we need to get at least an hours sleep before they arrive, we’ve going hard for forty-nine hours, it’s not a request, it’s an order.”
I’m shaking my head, but I know I need it, or my body will start breaking down, “Yeah, I know.”
“Give Lily a kiss and follow me.”
I do as Doc instructs; I kiss my beautiful angel on her forehead, and whisper how much I love her and our babies, then rub gently over her lower belly and turn away and follow Doc. We don’t walk far before he stops and opens a door, we enter the dark space, it’s like a bunk room we have when deployed. Both of us lay down on the bottom bunks in the room and the sheer relief of having my angel back with us, has me smiling.
“Congratulations, Chief, today was a tough one but we had the best outcome and I’m so fucking happy.” Doc says proudly.
“Thanks, Doc, if it weren’t for you, I don’t know what I would have done, losing Lily is not an option I could bear.”
“I know, and we won’t lose her, I’m confident. Now close your eyes Chief, we need sleep.”
“Yeah, roger that.”
I start to fade as soon as I close my eyes, dreaming of a house full of kids... we need to buy a bigger place and soon. I can picture it, all the noise, giggles, mess, tantrums, and I love it. Alexa is going to be thrilled, and the best big sister to these babies, I can’t wait to tell her, but Lily needs to know first. I fall asleep with a smile planted firmly on my face.