Unbreakable (Unrestrained 4)

I leaned back and shook my head, still unable to believe that Lisa could do something like that to Kate.

“How likely is it that you’ll get a conviction?”

“That’s for the courts to decide.”

I exhaled and rubbed my forehead. “She needs to be put in jail. She could have killed my wife and my baby. We’re lucky that Kate’s bodyguard had first responder training in the Marines.”

“We’re going to want you to come into the station and give a statement,” McDonald said.

“I can come down later today, if you want,” I said, nodding.

“That’s fine,” McDonald said. Then he stood and fastened the button to his suit jacket. “That’s all we need for now so you can get back to your wife.”

He smiled at me, finally, and the two left me sitting in the conference room. I sipped my coffee, still feeling strange about the whole thing. Frankly, I’d been too shocked and in fear for Kate and Sophia to think very much about Lisa and the attack. I was glad they had her in custody and that all this would soon be over.

I checked my watch. Kate had been sleeping for a while and so I went to her room and quietly slipped inside. I took the chair by her bed and removed my cell to check my email.

There was a text from Fred Parker.

Drake, I’m so very sorry to hear about the attack. Honestly, I had no idea that Lisa would do something like this. We’re all in shock. We want you to know that if you need to, you can finish the fellowship on your own time. The department understands that you will need time to adjust and care for your wife. Let me know when you want to continue with your fellowship. We’ll do what we can to accommodate you.

I sent him a text in reply, thanking him for his understanding and that I would probably wait a year before I finished. I wanted to spend that time with Kate and Sophia. Almost losing them both drove home to me how fragile life was and how in a brief second, my perfect life could turn on a dime.

Kate shifted on the bed and I watched her eyelids flutter. She looked at me and smiled, snuggling down into the bed.

“I slept for a quite a while,” she said. “Even just a trip to the nursery exhausted me.”

“It’ll take some time for you to get your strength back.” Then I sat beside her on the bed and took her hand in mine. “I have to tell you something,” I said, and it choked me up to have to tell her but I wanted her to know about her hysterectomy from me instead of from one of the staff.

“What?” she said and my tone must have alarmed her for she frowned, her face blanching. “Is something wrong with Sophia?”

“No,” I said quickly, feeling bad to alarm her needlessly. “No, Sophia is doing wonderfully.” I leaned over her and looked in her eyes, stroking her cheek. I kissed her tenderly. “Unfortunately, when they brought you into surgery, you were bleeding profusely from a small uterine tear. They tried everything they could but in the end, given the C-section and your other injuries, they had to do an emergency hysterectomy to save your life.”

I watched her face and it changed only slightly. “You mean C-section?”

I shook my head. “No,” I said softly. “They had to take out your uterus. They couldn’t stop the bleeding and you’d already had several units of blood. They couldn’t save it. I’m so sorry.”

She frowned and looked away. I stroked her hand with the back of my thumb and then kissed her palm, wanting to touch her, to reassure her. Then she turned back and there were tears in her eyes.

“So I’ll never have another baby?”

I shook my head. “I’m sorry, but they had to do it to save your life.”

She exhaled, her breath ragged and I knew she was overwhelmed. It was too much to take in – waking up in a hospital ICU with no memory of what happened to get there, learning Lisa tried to kill her, being rushed to the hospital for an emergency C-section and then hysterectomy. Her baby premature by ten weeks and in the NICU. Breaking down was understandable.

She looked at me, tears overflowing and running down her cheeks. “I guess we won’t be having any more children,” she said, her voice breaking. “I hope you didn’t want more.”

“I want you,” I said and leaned down, kissing her, stroking her cheek. “You’re alive. Sophia’s alive. That’s all I care about. We’ll be a family, the three of us.”

Then I lay down on the bed beside her and cradled her in my arms, holding her while she wept.

Finally, on the tenth day since Kate was admitted to the ward, she was discharged home with a special duty nurse to help her. We’d been successful getting Kate started pumping her breasts and stocking breast milk, so that alleviated some of her fears about Sophia not being breastfed. Sophia was stronger every day and was being fed Kate’s breast milk but she wasn’t ready yet to be bottle or breast fed and so we had to make do with Kangaroo Care, with tiny Sophia nestled against Kate’s bare breasts or my bare chest for some skin-on-skin contact, which seemed to help babies improve.

For the first few weeks after Kate was home, I brought her back to the hospital and we’d stay all day so she could pump as frequently as possible and keep Sophia supplied with milk. There was a day room Kate could stay in between feeds so she could rest and recuperate.

Sophia did so well that she was discharged home three weeks after being delivered, on a warm summer day, six weeks premature but a little trooper like her mother and grandfather. I credited Ethan’s bulldog determination and hardiness for Sophia’s own survival instinct.

“She’s strong like your dad,” I said to Kate, when Sophia lay crying lustily in her crib in our 8th Avenue Apartment. “Impatient and determined.”