Blaze (Virtues & Lies 3)

“Trouble. She’s always been trouble. My trouble.”

The machine beeps, and although I know it’s nothing bad, my heart fucking dies a little at the sound.

“We have a…ummm…a baby girl. She wasn’t planned. Neither of them, and you know what?”

“Tell me?” The pen in her hand taps the clipboard with the notes as she finds my stare.

The doctor comes back with a few other nurses or doctors…I don’t know at this point.

“It’s always the unexpected things we love the most.” My murmur makes her lips crack wide.

“That’s a beautiful outlook.”

“Her father told me that when I had to leave her. I didn’t want to, but I had to. Sometimes you have to go to war for the things you love the most. I love them the most. My girls.”

I’m trying to hold my words in. I don’t know Lizzie from Adam. But she’s got the same kind and feisty glint in her eyes as Fleur. Even though I’m not one to usually talk, I can’t help it. It’s keeping me from losing my shit altogether.

Another nurse walks in pushing a resus trolley. My insides shrivel, but she calmly collects the things she needs to insert an IV into Fleur’s forearm.

All I can do is watch while they care for my heart…my life.

Flesh of my flesh.

Blood of my blood.

Everything is a blur. A fast-paced sequence of events that I can only watch. While the doctors examine her, she groans and whinges at the way they manoeuvre her.

“Mr. Gladstone.” The doctor stops in front of me, a folder in his hand as he scribbles in it. “Your wife is conscious, which is a good sign in itself. We’ve given her strong pain relief. She won’t be lucid, but that’s normal. However—” He pauses as another doctor whispers something about bleeding and urgency.

&nb

sp; My stomach knots so tightly that nausea breaks a clammy sweat all over me. My heart falls through the floor. Straight to hell.

“We need to make sure there’s no internal bleeding. At this point, Mrs. Gladstone’s stats are stable enough. But we want to rule out any injuries that could progress to something more serious.”

The other doctor, an older woman, looks up at me. “I’m Dr. Singh.”

A loud exchange is audible from the other side of the door. Before she can continue, Dad barges into the room.

“What’s happening?” he asks both with concern and anger rife on his face.

The lady doctor blows out a breath, focusing back on me. “I’ve requested a CT scan. But we need to make sure that your wife is okay to have one. Is there a chance she could be pregnant? Anything that you’re aware of?”

“I don’t…” Shaking my head at the thought, I feel Dad’s eyes firmly on me. “I don’t…”

“You have her notes?” Dad asks brusquely. He has that infuriated tone in his voice, the one that makes people listen and follow his direction. Their awareness of who he is has just been amplified.

“We just had a baby.”

Dad’s arm wraps around me, like when I was a child and I’d hurt myself.

“It’s okay,” he would say. “You get back up and you keep going. You never quit, no matter what.”

Hand squeezing over my shoulder, he pulls me into him. I’m taller and broader, but I could be that boy with scraped knees and bruised legs from all the times he fell off his bike.

Except I’m not. I can’t be.

“Isn’t that what you have tests for? To be certain?” The words escape me in a brusque flurry while I pull away from Dad to continue watching my wife. Taking in all her injuries.