“I’m all right, just shaken up. They had a plastic surgeon put seven stitches in my forehead. My head hit the steering wheel pretty hard I guess; the doctor thinks I have a mild concussion. And a nasty laceration on my arm from the airbag,” she says, holding up her bandaged forearm.
“And that’s it? Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m fine. Well…,”
“Well what? What’s wrong?” I demand.
“Nothing! They x-rayed my legs and my spine because I was trapped in the car but, I don’t have any broken bones or damage anywhere. But the doctor who examined me insisted on running all sorts of tests just to make sure there are no internal injuries or anything. I’m just waiting for him to get back with results.”
“And you’re sure that’s all?” I ask, caressing her face with my hand. “You’re really okay?”
“Yes. I’m sure.”
Folding her into my arms once more, I take a deep breath and let it out slowly, feeling my heart finally begin to calm down. “You have no idea how scared I was, Sam. And I couldn’t find you; I had no clue which hospital you were in. Why didn’t you call me?”
“I lost my phone, I don’t know where it is.”
“Oh, yeah,” I mumble, reaching into my pocket and pulling out her cell phone. “I found it in the floor of your car.”
“Thank you,” she smiles meekly at me. “I guess my car is totaled, huh?
“Yes. And the sight of it scared me half to death, baby.”
“What were you doing out that way anyway? How did you know about the crash?”
“I didn’t know. Conner and I were headed out to Kirkland, following up on a lead in a case when we saw the crash and stopped to help. Where were you going?”
“I was headed back home,” she says softly. “After I left the salon with Megan, I went out to my mom’s house to talk.”
“Your mom’s?” I can hear the surprise in my voice, and she nods at me.
“I was thinking about everything you said the other day. Everything she told you at the gallery. And I wanted to tell her about us in person. I didn’t want her to hear it from Lucas,” Sam says softly.
“How did that go?” I ask, looking into her eyes, still caressing her lovely face.
She shrugs and gives me a small smile. “I think it went okay. She seemed … supportive?”
“That sounded convincing,” I smile at her and she giggles. God, I love that sound!
“No, really. She was … accepting. And gracious. She apologized again, and she actually spoke somewhat fondly of you.”
“Of me?”
“Um hm. She said she was impressed by the things you said about me when you showed her my artwork at the gallery. She said it was obvious to her that you really do love me.”
“Your mother said all that?” I ask skeptically.
“Yes, she did,” Sam giggles again, and I smile at her.
“All right, Ms. Colby,” a tall blonde doctor enters the cubicle, looking over what I presume are Sam’s tests results. I stand as he enters the space and he stops talking when he sees me. “Oh, I’m sorry Detective but, we’re not finished here. Can you give us a minute, please?”
“No, doctor, it’s okay,” Samantha speaks up, taking my hand. “Detective Pierce is my fiancé.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Very well then. Ms. Colby, I have gone over all of your test results and your blood work, and I now feel much more comfortable giving you a clean bill of health,” he says, looking from her to me. “But I want you to know, you’re a pretty lucky girl. From what I hear, there are several fatalities and numerous serious injuries flooding all of the area hospitals right now, not just us.”
“Yeah, I was at the scene,” I tell him. “It looks like a war zone out there.”
“I can imagine,” he replies, nodding at me. Then he turns to Sam and says, “Go home, maybe take it easy for the next 24 hours.”
“And you’re sure everything’s okay?” I ask him, feeling all types of grateful for our good fortune right now.
“I assure you, Detective, besides the mild concussion and a few scrapes and bruises, your fiancée and your baby are just fine.”
“My what!?”
Samantha and I say those words in stereo and the doctor looks at us in bewilderment.
“Oh. I’m sorry,” he says, looking slightly confused. “You’re so far along, I just assumed you knew.”
My head is spinning. A baby? Fuck.
“Um, how … how far along am I?” I hear Sam asking, her voice sounding very small all of a sudden.
“I would say around eight or nine weeks,” he answers, and Sam frowns. “Do you have an OB/GYN, Ms. Colby?”
“Yes. Dr. Lake.”
“Oh, Dr. Susan Lake,” he asks. “Yes, she’s excellent; she has office hours here actually. You might want to consider going by there and making an appointment as soon as possible, okay. And she can help you pinpoint an exact date.”
A baby. Eight or nine weeks? I’m no math wiz but, that can’t be right. I listen in a daze as the doctor tells Sam to go upstairs to her gynecologist’s office to make an appointment, and my mind is running a mile a minute trying to process everything. A baby. A fucking baby. Really?
This is all my fault. I should never have listened to her when she said she was on the pill. I should never have stopped using the condoms. Fuck! What a minute, what am I saying? This is not my fault. She’s the one who insisted we didn’t need the condoms anymore. Did she do this on purpose? Stop it, Pierce. Don’t be an ass. Why would she do this on purpose?
The doctor gives Sam her release papers and she stands, a bit unsteadily, reaching out for my arm to lean on. I wrap my arm around her, still in shock, as we head out of the cubicle and down the corridor. I spot Dave standing at the nurses station, talking on his cellphone, and he hangs up as we approach him.
“Hey, Samantha!” He gives her a gingerly hug as she leans against me.
“Listen, Dave, why don’t you go ahead and take the cruiser back to the station. We might be a little while here.”
“Is everything all right?” he asks with a frown. No doubt taking in the shocked expression on my face.
“Yeah. Everything’s fine. We just have to go upstairs to take care of something.”
He hesitates a beat, looking from me to Sam. “Okay, here,” he says, fishing the keys out of his pocket. “You take the cruiser and I’ll just get a ride with one of the blue and whites. Lord knows there’s enough of them milling around right now with the accident. I moved it to the emergency parking lot.”
“Yeah, okay. Thanks,” I say sedately, taking the keys from him.
He gives me another curious look. “Okay. Call if you need anything, all right?” I nod at him. “I’m glad you’re in one piece, Sam.”
“Thanks.” She smiles meekly at him. He turns and leaves then, and we head for the nearest elevator.
We’re silent on the ride up to the fifth floor and I get the feeling Samantha is just as stunned by this news as I am. As we enter the doctor’s office I feel suddenly tired. It’s been a rollercoaster of a day.
We walk up to the window and Sam tells the nurse who she is and that she was just in the multi-car pile-up on 405, and that she just got a pregnancy diagnosis down in the ER. She tells the nurse that she just wants to make an appointment but, once the doctor hears that she was in the accident, she insists on seeing Sam immediately.
We are ushered into a large exam room and I still feel as if I’m in a dream sequence or something. But looking at the exam table with the stirrups attached to it, I know this is very real. A baby.
We sit nervously, waiting for the doctor to come in, and Sam gently slips her hand in mine. Reflexively, I give hers a light squeeze as I continue to glance around the room, taking in the chart of the female reproductive system that hangs on the wall.
“Say something,” Sam whispers softly, and I turn my head to look at her.
“What do you want me to say?”
She doesn’t answer f
or a long moment. And then she doesn’t get a chance to as the door opens and the doctor comes in.
“Hello Samantha,” she says brightly. She’s not what I expected. Dr. Lake is young, maybe a little older than me, and very smart looking. In fact, she has a librarian thing going on with her red hair pulled into a tight bun and glasses. “And you are?”
“Detective Joshua Pierce,” I say, clearing my throat to introduce myself.
“Josh is my fiancé,” Sam explains.
“Oh, how nice to meet you,” she smiles. “So, Samantha, you were in that horrible pile-up on the Interstate, and the doctor in the ER just informed you that you’re pregnant?”
“Yes. He said about eight or nine weeks but…,” Her voice trails off as she frowns.
The doctor turns to her computer as they talk, looking up Sam’s records. “And I’m assuming you’ve not been suffering from any symptoms? No nausea, fatigue or lightheadedness?”
Sam doesn’t answer right away and, when I look over at her, she is blushing a pale rose color and chewing her bottom lip. “Well, I … I have been sort of tired a lot lately. And the nausea … but I just thought it was nerves and stress over everything going on. We just moved into a new house and … my show…”
She wipes a lone tear from her cheek and looks away, embarrassed, and I lightly squeeze her hand once more. Shit. This is real. A fucking baby.
“All right. I’ve just looked up the records from your ER visit and looked at Dr. Erbert’s tests results. No sense repeating your blood work if I don’t have to,” Dr. Lake says. “But I see why he believes you to be so far along. I’d like to do a trans-vaginal ultrasound right now, if you have the time.”
She looks at us expectantly and Sam looks up at me questioningly. “Yeah, of course,” I answer with a tired sigh.
“Excellent. I’m going to step out for a moment and give you some privacy. Everything off from the waist down and hop onto the table for me. You can cover yourself with the paper blanket.”
She leaves the room then and I watch as Sam strips out of her skirt and shoes. She folds the skirt neatly and places it on the chair beside me, and then steps out of her panties, placing them on top of the skirt. She climbs onto the exam table and covers herself up with the paper blanket and lays back, waiting for the doctor to return.
We say nothing as we wait and I begin to feel anxious and really out of place. Maybe I should just wait outside in the waiting room. There’s a light knock on the door then and the doctor comes back in.
“Everyone ready?” she smiles as she walks over to the ultrasound machine and turns it on. “Do either of you have any questions for me while we wait for this contraption to warm up?”
“I just don’t understand how this happened,” Sam says quietly. “I haven’t missed a single day of my pill.”
“Well, as we discussed when I prescribed it, no birth control is one hundred percent, although some forms have slightly higher percentages then others. Sometimes these things just happen. All right, if you’re ready, we’ll get started. Feet up into the stirrups.”
Sam complies and then looks over at me anxiously, and I can read the silent plea in her eyes. Taking a deep breath, I stand and walk over to her, taking her hand. I watch as Dr. Lake puts what looks like a long thin condom over the wand of the ultrasound.
“You might feel just a little bit of discomfort,” she warns as she slowly inserts the wand, and Sam’s hand tightens around mine. She closes her eyes tightly and I frown at the thought that she might be in any pain. With my free hand, I lightly run my thumb over her forehead, carefully avoiding her stitches, and she opens her eyes and looks up at me.
“Hmm,” Dr. Lake mumbles, studying the screen on the machine. “Do either of you have twins in your family?”
“Yes. My father was a twin,” Sam answers. “And Josh’s mom is a twin.”
“Really? Both sides, huh?” She smiles as she continues to study the screen. “Well, I’d like to introduce you both to the newest set in your family.”
What!
“Are you joking?” I hear Samantha say, and she sounds as horrified as I feel.
“Nope. I’m not joking,” the doctor says. “I’m seeing two gestational sacs, right here.” She points to the screen and I see a cloudy, black and gray image with two darker, sort of tear-shaped holes in the middle. “Floating inside each one of those sacs,” Dr. Lake continues, “is a tiny little dot, you might have trouble seeing … right here, and right here. Those little dots are smaller than a pea right now. And they’re your babies.”
She smiles at Sam and then up at me. Only I can’t return her smile. I’m too stunned to do anything but stand here and stare at that strange image. Two babies. Fuck! I swallow anxiously, and I can feel myself starting to panic. My heart is pounding and my breathing shallows and I can feel the sweat on my brow. I run my free hand through my hair and turn away from the image on the little screen.
Dr. Lake removes the wand and disposes of the protective condom. Then she punches a few buttons on her machine and turns it off. “Here. A screen capture for you,” she says, handing Samantha a small picture of the image we just saw on the screen. “Why don’t you get dressed and then we’ll talk.”
She leaves the room again, and Samantha and I are silent once more as she dresses. I think we’re both just trying to process everything. I can’t believe this is happening. I try to pull myself out of my own head and focus on Sam. What is she thinking right now? How is she feeling? I look into her eyes as we both sit back down and wait for the doctor to return. And I open my mouth to say something but, there’s that light knock on the door again, and Dr. Lake comes in and takes a seat.
“Okay,” she says opening up a calendar and looking up at Sam. “Let’s pinpoint a conception date, shall we?”
“How far along am I?” Sam asks quietly.
“Well, that’s the reason I wanted to do this test,” Dr. Lake responds. “The ER doctor assumed you were farther along than you actually are because your HCG levels were unusually high. HCG is a hormone we use to determine pregnancy. It’s what most of the over-the-counter urine tests are searching for, but a blood test can tell us so much more than a urine test can. The levels in the blood tend to peak toward the end of the first trimester so, when he saw your numbers he just assumed your pregnancy was more advanced than it is. But HCG levels also tend to be unusually high with the presence of multiples. And judging by the size of the fetuses, I would say you’re actually only about four weeks along.”
I listen in a daze as she questions Samantha about the dates of her last cycle and when she began taking the pill. And as they ramble on, their voices seem to fade into the background as the noise from my own childhood rises. It’s almost as if someone is turning up the volume control on a radio and all I can hear is all the yelling and the screaming and the fighting. I see images of my childhood flash in my mind’s eye. I can’t put a kid through that hell. Two kids, Pierce. Shit. Two kids. Two fucking kids! What the hell am I going to do?
Samantha stands slowly, bringing me abruptly back to the here and now, and I hear them making arrangements for another appointment in a few weeks. I stand as she gives Sam a prescription for prenatal vitamins and several pamphlets to look over. She reaches to shake my hand.
“It was nice to meet you, Detective,” she says, giving me a knowing smile. “Congratulations to you both.”
I shake her hand, and then wrap a protective arm around Samantha as I usher her out of the exam room. Once again, we are silent as we take the elevator down to the ground floor. We say nothing as we make our way through the hospital corridors and out the door to the cruiser. I open the door and help her inside, and then I slide behind the wheel and we get underway.
We don’t say much as I drive to the station; I need to return the cruiser and change cars. I pull into the back lot and park the cruiser in her designated spot. Then we get out and head over to my truck. I open the driver’s side door and help Sam climb in.
> “I’m going inside to put the cruiser keys away and clock out. I’ll be back in two minutes,” I tell her quietly and she nods at me. I head inside the PD in a daze, my head a jumbled mess as I put the cruiser’s keys away and clock out for the day. And I’m grateful that I don’t see the Lieutenant or anyone else who might want me to stop and talk for a minute.
I wander back outside and over to the truck and climb in beside Samantha. Slipping the key into the ignition, I start her up and we get underway. Sam rests her head on my shoulder as I drive but, we still don’t say anything. And I wonder if her thoughts are as jumbled and erratic as mine are.
I take her hand in mine as I drive home, lightly rubbing my thumb over her knuckles and playing gently with her engagement ring. And I think about how happy we were just two days ago when I put this ring on her finger. How happy we were all weekend long. How happy she makes me every single day.
Once we get home, I sigh heavily as I pull the truck slowly into the garage, looking over at the space where her Maserati should be, and I can’t help but conjure up an image of Sam’s mangled car sitting on that highway. The memory of the gripping panic and fear make my stomach roll, and I take a couple of deep breaths to try and shrug it off. You could have lost her today, Pierce. If things had played out differently on that highway today, she … and those babies … could all be gone right now. The thought is sobering.
We get out of the truck and I take Samantha’s hand as we head inside the house, discarding our jackets in the mudroom before entering the kitchen. Sam turns and goes immediately up the back staircase, heading to our bedroom, but I need to calm my nerves first. I make a beeline for the refrigerator and pull out a Corona. Opening it up, I take a long, savored swig of the icy cold liquid as I walk over to the island.
Beer in one hand, I grip the island with the other as I stare unseeing out the window over the sink. Babies. Not just one kid, but two! How the fuck did this happen? I just got comfortable with telling Samantha how much I love her. I just asked her to be my wife, for fuck’s sake. Two days later, I’m gonna be a daddy! I take another swig of my beer as I try to wrap my head around it.
Pierced: Pierced Trilogy Boxed Set Page 85