Chapter 2 - The Truth in the NICUSophie survived the surgery.
Too much of it.
It soaked through the emergency sheets beneath the unconscious pregnant woman and streaked the gloved hands of the nurses rushing her through the operating-room doors.
“Thirty-two weeks,” the resident shouted. “Twin pregnancy. Suspected placental abruption. Pressure seventy-eight over forty-two and falling.”
Ethan was already moving.
“Massive transfusion protocol. Call NICU. Two neonatal teams. Where’s anesthesia?”
“Right behind you.”
“Fetal heart rates?”
“One-sixty for Twin A. Twin B is dropping.”
Ethan stepped beside the operating table.
“Ma’am, can you hear me?”
The woman’s eyelids fluttered.
Wet strands of dark hair clung to her pale face.
For one second, Ethan forgot how to breathe.
No.
It couldn’t be.
His hands stopped above her abdomen.
The room around him blurred.
Monitors screamed.
Nurses moved.
Someone called his name.
But Ethan heard none of it.
He was staring at a face he had spent five years trying unsuccessfully to forget.
Sophie Bennett.
The woman he had once planned to marry.
The woman he had accused of betraying him.
The woman he had thrown out of his life without allowing her to explain.
And now Sophie was lying beneath the surgical lights, bleeding to death while carrying twins.
Her eyes opened.
They found his.
Recognition came instantly.
The terror already on her face changed into something deeper.
Pain.
Not physical pain.
Something older.
“Ethan?”
Her voice was barely audible.
His chest tightened.
“Sophie.”
She looked around wildly.
“My babies.”
“We’re going to take care of them.”
“No.”
Her trembling hand suddenly grabbed his wrist.
Despite the blood loss, her grip was desperate.
“You save them.”
“I will.”
“Promise me.”
Ethan looked into the eyes of the woman whose heart he had destroyed.
“I promise.”
Sophie began crying.
“You promised me things before.”
The words hit harder than any accusation she could have screamed.
Then her body convulsed.
The monitor alarm sharpened.
“Pressure sixty-nine systolic!”
“Twin B is at seventy!”
Ethan’s training took over.
“General anesthesia. Now. We’re delivering.”
Sophie’s fingers slipped from his wrist.
“Ethan…”
“I’m here.”
“Don’t let them die.”
Her eyes closed.
The anesthesiologist intubated her.
Ethan stared down at her for one terrible heartbeat.
Five years earlier, he had watched Sophie leave his apartment carrying one suitcase while snow fell over Chicago.
He had believed he would never see her again.
He had told himself that was what he wanted.
Now he was preparing to cut into her body to keep her alive.
“Scalpel.”
The instrument hit his palm.
He made the incision.
Blood welled immediately.
“More suction.”
“Twin A coming.”
Seconds later, Ethan lifted a tiny infant from the surgical field.
A girl.
Far too small.
Silent.
“Come on.”
The neonatal team took her.
No cry.
Ethan couldn’t watch.
“Twin B.”
He reached again.
The second baby appeared.
A boy.
Blue.
Motionless.
The NICU physician carried him to the second warmer.
Ethan heard urgent commands behind him.
“No spontaneous respirations.”
“Heart rate sixty.”
“Start ventilation.”
Sophie began bleeding harder.
“Uterus isn’t contracting.”
“Give oxytocin.”
“Already running.”
“Methergine.”
“Pressure too low.”
Ethan’s jaw tightened.
He knew what was coming.
If they couldn’t control the hemorrhage, Sophie could lose her uterus.
If that failed, she could lose her life.
“Ethan,” his partner, Dr. Maya Chen, said quietly. “We need to move.”
“I know.”
Blood continued filling the suction container.
Outside the operating room, two premature newborns fought for their first breaths.
Inside it, their mother was losing hers.
And Ethan Caldwell suddenly understood that every achievement of the last five years—his surgical reputation, the private practice, the awards, the money his family’s medical empire had generated—meant absolutely nothing.
Not if Sophie died on his table.
“Another unit,” he ordered.
A weak cry suddenly came from across the room.
Twin A.
The tiny sound pierced through everyone.
Ethan almost closed his eyes.
Then another alarm erupted.
Sophie’s blood pressure disappeared from the monitor for several seconds.
“Ethan.”
“I see it.”
He worked faster.
“Come on, Sophie.”
He didn’t realize he had spoken aloud.
Maya looked at him.
“Do you know her?”
Ethan never stopped moving.
“Yes.”
“How?”
His voice cracked.
“She was supposed to be my wife.”
Maya stared at him.
Then the second infant finally let out a faint, broken cry.
Both babies were alive.
Now Ethan had to make sure their mother survived long enough to meet them.
He leaned closer to Sophie as the surgical team fought the hemorrhage.
Five years ago, he had refused to listen when she begged him to believe her.
Tonight there would be no refusing.
No walking away.
No pride.
“Stay with me,” he whispered.
Sophie could not hear him.
But Ethan said it anyway.
“Please stay.”
Because if she died before he learned why she had disappeared…
If she died before he apologized…
If she died without ever knowing he had never stopped loving her…
Then Ethan knew he would spend the rest of his life living inside the worst mistake he had ever made.
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And somewhere beyond the operating room doors, one of Sophie’s newborn twins began screaming.
As though demanding that their mother come back.
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