Chapter 10
Nick
She has to be okay. She has to be okay. I burst through the hospital doors at top speed, heart hammering, passing the elevator and the blur of people.
I take the stairs two at a time. The only thought screaming in my head is this can’t be happening again!
God wouldn’t do this to me. He wouldn’t give them to me and take them away, not like this.
This could be my nightmare, but I’m wide awake this time.
The only person I see is Cat’s mother pacing in the hallway, arms wrapped around her.
When I get closer, she holds her head up and I see her eyes are red and her face is stained with tears.
My heart drops with each step I take toward her.
No, I can’t think like this, I won’t think like this.
They’re going to be fine. They’re going to be fine, I silently chant in my head, willing myself not to think the worst. I don’t know what really happened—all I heard on the phone through her mother’s crying was falling, ambulance, and rushed to the hospital.
I left the restaurant without a word to my client, slamming on the gas so hard I nearly got into two accidents, people flipping me off and cursing me the entire way.
Good thing the old saying a cop is never around when you need one was true today.
“Where is she?” I say to her mother, her eyes bloodshot and red.
“She’s in the room, the nurse is in there with her.” Her voice doesn’t go above a hoarse whisper, and she doesn’t look directly at me. She turns and looks behind her. “She’s stable now, but she’s not awake yet.”
“And the baby?” I hold my breath, not able to hear what she’s going to say next.
I think she doesn’t hear me when she doesn’t answer right away, and she keeps staring at the door to Cat’s room.
I hold her arm and turn her around. Her eyes come up to mine and the tears roll down.
My heart seizes up, and I brace myself for the worst.
“I’m sorry?” She holds her hands over her face.
“The baby didn’t make it?” I say unbelievingly, not able to move a muscle. Her head flies up from her hands, and she vigorously shakes her head her words rushing out together.
“No! No! That’s not what I mean, there’re both in stable condition now, you can see for yourself.”
I almost knock her down moving past her to Cat’s room.
I stop short in the doorway when I see her in all white, her head bandaged, lying in the bed, her eyes closed.
What the hell happened? She was fine, sitting on the bed smiling at me, telling me she loved me only a few hours ago.
Why and how is she here? The nurse moves to the side and looks up at me.
“Excuse me, sir, are you family?”
“Yes, I’m her boyfriend. Is she and the baby going to be okay?”
“Right now they’re stable. I’ll be back in a few minutes to check on her. If she wakes up, try to keep her calm.”
I sit down beside her and take her hand.
Sitting closer, I can see the faint black-and-blue marks around her eyes and a bruise on her cheek.
She looks so fragile I’m afraid to touch her.
I lightly brush a finger over her bruised cheek and put my hand on her stomach, my eyes not leaving her face, careful not to touch the wires from the machines she’s hooked up to that are beeping steadily.
“Baby, what happened to you? You’re supposed to be at home waiting for me.”
I can’t stand seeing her lying here like this. I stroke the unbruised side of her cheek with my hand, and her eyelids move and slightly open. Her head moves into the palm of my hand and I smile. I love her so much. I can’t talk; I clear my throat and wait for her to open her eyes fully.
“Nick,” she says in a whisper, sounding like her mother.
“Baby, I’m here.”
“Where am I?”
“You’re in the hospital.”
“The baby?”
She tries to move, and the monitors start beeping faster. I press my hand against her cheek to make her look at me. “Shh, the baby’s fine, you’re fine. You have to calm down. Don’t move.”
“Whwhats all that beeping, something’s wrong!”
“If you don’t calm down you’re going to make yourself and the baby sick.” I take her hand and put it over her stomach next to the strap checking the baby’s heartbeat, hoping that will calm her down. It seems to work. “See, the baby’s fine, as long as you stay calm and don’t upset yourself. Okay?”
She looks at me and blinks. “Okay.”
“You scared me.”
“I’m scared.”
“You’re going to be in big trouble. Why aren’t you where I left you?
” She looks at me and doesn’t say anything, her lips quivering.
The last thing I want is for her to start crying and get upset again.
“You don’t have to say if it’s going to upset you.
I won’t be angry. I don’t want anything to happen to you or the baby. ”
“I don’t remember a lot. I was at my parents’ house.”
“Why?”
“I don’t quite remember why. All I know is I was at the top of the steps and Kate was there. She was holding my arm, I think we were struggling, and I have the feeling she was angry, so angry. She was looking down at me, and I was scared.”
“I’m here with you.”
“I shouldn’t have gone over there. I put the baby’s life in danger; it would be my fault if something happened to the baby.”
“No, it wouldn’t. The baby is going to be fine.”
“I don’t want anything to happen to the baby. Promise me, Nick.”
“I promise. You need to rest. You’re upsetting yourself, and it’s not good.
Hold my hand.” I squeeze her hand, and she’s crying.
I look at the machines when I hear the beeps steadily increasing with each sob leaving her.
Oh my God! “Cat!” Her eyes roll back in her head and she’s shaking uncontrollably, the machines go off like crazy pinball machines pinging and beeping.
Nurses and doctors rush into the room, pushing me out the way.
“What’s wrong with her?” A nurse shouts at me to move. So many people are around her I can’t see her. Another nurse steps in front of me, blocking me from getting to her.
“What’s wrong with her, tell me what’s wrong?”
“She has a concussion, and now she’s having a seizure, and her blood pressure has spiked. The baby’s in fetal distress. We need to stabilize her and perform an emergency C-section.”
“It’s too early, she not due yet!”
“The best thing you can do for her is let the doctors and the nurses take care of her and the baby by staying out of the way. We’re going to do everything we can for them.”
They wheel her out and I follow helplessly until she’s out of sight.
I stumble back into the room, not seeing but looking at the empty spot where her bed was.
I close my eyes and throw my head back, and pain radiates through my skull.
It doesn’t compare to the pain I’m already in, taking over my entire body.
“Where is she?” I say to her mother when she walks in the room.
“Nick, you don’t understand, it was a terrible accident.”
“Would it be a terrible accident if I wrapped my hand around her neck and squeezed the life out of her? How much of an accident would that be?”
“She wasn’t—”
“Excuse me.” We both turn to the nurse with papers in her hand. “I need the person responsible for Ms. Reed to fill these consent forms out along with her insurance and medical information.”
“That would be me, I’m her mother.”
She’s lost her goddamn mind if she thinks I’m going to let her put a dot of ink on one piece of paper concerning Cat. “I’ll take those.” I look at the nurse and wait for her to hand me the papers; she’s not sure who she should hand them to.
“I’m her mother and the grandmother of her child. I’ll fill them out.” She holds out her hands to the nurse.
Grandmother? A few weeks ago she wanted to kill my child, and now she’s claiming grandmother?
I can’t look at her for fear of what my anger might lead me to do.
The nurse visibly cringes when she sees the look on my face and the sound in my voice that’s meant for the other woman facing her.
“I’m the father of her child and I’m also her legal representative.
She gave me full legal medical power of attorney if anything should happen to her—after you suggested two months ago to dispose of my child like it was nothing. ”
I hold my hand out to the nurse, who looks like she wants to be anywhere but here.
“Like I said, I have full binding medical power of attorney. I’ll have the forms to handle all of her medical issues sent to you within the next thirty minutes.
Any and all medical issues or papers concerning her health or otherwise are to come directly to me and absolutely no one else,” I tell her with all the veracity and seriousness of a Supreme Court Justice.
“Yes, sir.” She hastily shoves the papers in my hand and leaves the room.
I turn to Mrs. Reed looking at me with revulsion, her eyes barely a slit. Back to being a hard, ice-cold bitch of a mother.
“You did this, this is your fault. You turned my daughter against me and turned them away from each other.” She points at the open door to where I assume Kate is.
“One more time, I’m going to give you a potent dose of the truth.
” I pull up close to her so she doesn’t miss a word between my clenched teeth.
I look down at her with as much disgust as she has for me.
“My family is dysfunctional, in fact my father and I can hardly agree on much. As messed up as we are, my family would never do to me what you did to Cat. You turned her out when she needed you. You wanted her to suffer. You’ve always been hiding behind the facade of a semi-decent woman.
Your daughter out there, the one that tried to kill her, I don’t care what it was, accident or not.
You’ve spoiled her and pampered her rotten to the core to make up for what you did.
That”—I point to the door— “ is your creation. I’m going to deal with her appropriately, the way she dealt with Cat, when I’m finished. ”