69. Luna
CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE
LUNA
The first contraction claws me awake like a knife down my spine.
I freeze, fingers fisting the sheets, waiting for it to pass. Nico’s arm lies heavy across my waist, his breath warm and even against my neck. But the pain doesn’t fade away; it radiates down my thighs until my teeth ache from clenching.
I slip out of bed, my bare feet silent on the cold floor. The moonlight spills across the room as I pace with my hand braced against the wall. Another contraction hits—harder, longer—and I bite my lip. Afraid to wake up Nico.
Breathe. Just fucking breathe. I scold myself.
Nico stirs, and I freeze. Even asleep, his body looks strong and lethal. He’ll panic. He’ll try to fix it. And I can’t take that look, the one that turns my pain into his failure for not noticing sooner.
The next wave buckles my knees. I catch myself on the dresser, a choked whimper slipping out. Fire licks up my spine, and my stomach tightens like a fist.
Wrong. This feels wrong.
“Luna?” His voice is raspy.
“Go back to sleep,” I lie, forcing a laugh.
He’s already sitting up, sheets pooling at his hips. I see the exact moment he registers the dampness on my nightgown, the way I’m cradling my stomach.
“Antonio!” Nico’s roar shakes the walls.
Footsteps thunder down the hall. Antonio has lived in the west wing since my eighth month. Nico grips my wrist, pressing two fingers to my pulse like he’s measuring his Blanton’s. “Breathe, or I’ll knock you out and deliver the kid myself.”
Antonio crashes through the door, glasses crooked, hair a mess. He pales at the wetness streaking my thighs. “She’s bleeding, we need the OR.” Bleeding? I thought my water broke.
“No.” Nico’s hand slides to my nape, possessive. “You’ve delivered babies before.”
Antonio’s voice is clipped. “She’s been cramping since this morning. I told her to call me if it got worse.”
Nico’s eyes cut to mine. “You didn’t.”
“It got worse after dinner. I thought it would pass again.”
His jaw flexes. Not angry— afraid.
Antonio doesn’t wait. “Then we’re out of time. She’ll bleed out in your beloved fucking courtyard, Nico. Move.”
The contraction hits like a landmine. I scream into Nico’s neck, my nails digging deep. He doesn’t break stride—just lifts me like I’m weightless, voice urgent, barking orders to the guards swarming the hallway.
“Get the car. Clear Route 12. Now.”
I claw at his shirt. “Nico. I hate hospitals.”
His palm caresses my cheek, thumb smearing my tears. “You claim I’m the storm in this relationship, but it’s always been you, Luna. Not me.”
The engine roars beneath us as he adds, “Every second matters. If they screw this up, they’ll wish they never laid eyes on me.”
But when we arrive and the steel doors slam shut behind us, I don’t care what happens to me. Just—please. Not the baby.
The fluorescent lights are too bright, and the antiseptic stings my nose.
Nico’s grip is iron-tight, his other hand firm at the small of my back as nurses rush in.
They talk in clipped codes—BP dropping, fetal distress, O-negative stat, but their eyes keep darting to the soldiers in the hall.
To the glint of steel beneath Nico’s open shirt.
A young resident steps too close, her fingers cold on my wrist. “We need to get her to?—”
Nico’s knife is at her throat before she finishes. “Touch her again without my permission,” he murmurs, “and I’ll rip out your intestines for fun.”
The room freezes.
I bite back a scream as another contraction rips through me. “Nico.” He doesn’t lower the blade.
“Nico, let them work, or I’ll gut you.”
A beat. Then he smiles mirthlessly before he sheaths the knife. “Do your job. Carefully.”
They rush me to delivery, Nico’s men flanking the gurney, alert and watchful. He doesn’t let go of my hand, not when they strap monitors to my belly, not when the obstetrician barks about emergency C-sections.
“Look at me,” Nico growls as my vision blurs.
“Fuck you…”
“Look. At. Me.”
I do. His eyes are onyx fire, his jaw set like he can absorb every ounce of my pain and make it his own.
“You don’t get to quit.”
“Wasn’t planning to.”
Antonio’s gloves are bloody as he interrupts. “Breech. Cords wrapped. We need to move now?—”
Nico’s palm slams the wall. “You said stable. You said monitor.”
“Nico!” I seize his wrist, dragging his focus back. “Let. Them. Save. Him.”
He stills. “Him?”
A ghost of a laugh tears out of me. “You didn’t know?”
For the first time in years, Nico Caputo looks afraid.
They prep me fast—oxygen, monitors, a blur of voices. Someone says epidural, and I agree. I want to be awake. I need to be.
The cold hits my spine, and I count backwards while the numbness creeps down, slow and deliberate.
When they slice me open, I don’t feel the cut. Just pressure, then a hollow void, and a wail that splits the universe.
Crying. He’s crying.
Nico’s thumb strokes my cheekbone as they lift him—tiny, furious, alive—and something wet slides down his face. He doesn’t wipe it away.
“Luna,” my name, a whisper on his lips.
They place him on my chest, his warmth searing through the numbness. Nico’s hand covers mine on his back, his wedding band smeared with my blood.
“He’s…”
“Perfect,” I rasp.
“No.” His lips brush my temple. “He’s a storm. Just like his mother.”
I want to smile, but the machines shriek, and the room tilts.
Hemorrhagic shock, someone screams. Code blue.
Nico’s roar drowns it out. “FIX HER!”
Antonio’s voice cuts through the panic. “Uterus won’t contract. Type O negative, stat!”
Darkness swallows me whole.