by E V Darcy
‘Paige Hamilton?’
‘Yes?’ she said as she gazed up at the older man. She didn’t like the way he stared down his nose at her, the way his beady, dark eyes were enlarged by the glasses on the end of his nose, making his disdain for her clear for all to see.
‘Ms. Hamilton, I am Henry Bracknell, President of The Network.’
‘Oh!’ She’d never met him before, but she’d heard of him. She struggled to stand up, trying to ignore the searing pain that gripped her stomach as she tried to get out of the seat to greet him properly. Casey held his arm out to stop her.
‘Stay seated, Kitten,’ he told her, his narrowed eyes focused on the man that towered above them. ‘You’ll need to.’
She frowned as she turned from Casey back to Mr. Bracknell. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t understand.’ She didn’t, but by the way Casey was acting, she knew she wasn’t going to like this.
‘Ms. Hamilton, you have been quite a controversial figure since you started here. I have to say, I had my misgivings the moment you notified us you were with child.’ The old man sniffed at that, and Paige squinted at him. This was not going to be a good conversation.
‘However, I was promised you’d be popular with the viewers, that they loved you and your’—he waved his hand around as he searched for the word he wanted—‘back story. Personally, I don’t care for it, I don’t care for the smear you are bringing upon this company regarding your situation—’
‘Now wait a moment!’ Paige tried to interrupt, but the man kept going.
‘As such, your probation period ends today and it has been decided your contract will not be extended.’
‘What?’ she whispered. Was he firing her?
‘Today’s show will be your last,’ he said with a sniff. ‘Ensure you hand your pass into security on your way out. You too, Mr. McManaman,’ Mr. Bracknell added before he turned away.
‘I’m fired?’ she whispered to no one in particular, as the group departed.
‘Paige we’re going live in five, four, three…’ the director said into her earpiece. She shook her head, her finger moving up to pull out the earpiece that she certainly wouldn’t miss. But the rest… she glanced around at the rest of the crew who all looked at her with varying expressions. Some were saddened, others indifferent, but it was the ones who wouldn’t meet her eyes that upset her the most. Those were the ones that agreed with the old bastard.
She stood up quickly and immediately regretted the decision. Her whole stomach burned, a fire that raced from her stomach to where Blueberry lay. She grabbed her stomach as she stumbled, her legs trembling at the vice-like grip of agony that clutched at her.
‘Paige!’ Casey said, his voice panicked as he reached out to help her. She snatched her arm away. She didn’t need his help. He was just like the others. He didn’t believe her, no one did. She’d forever be marred as a whore, a liar, a cheat, when she was the one who’d done nothing wrong. She was the only innocent one in all of this. Casey had been off with women from the moment he’d healed enough to screw a nurse in his hospital bed, and Daniel was a lying son of a bitch. She was the only one who could hold her head up high, the one who could say with her hand on her heart, that she’d never let any of them down. Yet she was the one that was paying for it, for their errors, for their failings. And it wasn’t fair.
Her eyes swam with tears as she tried to make it across the set towards the dressing room corridor. She heard the camera’s following her steps—fucking Claudia! She needed to get out of there, to go back to her apartment, to Deanna, but another wave of pain gripped her, making her choke on a sob as she leaned against the wall.
‘Paige.’ Casey’s voice was quieter now, softer. She glanced up at him as she felt her legs trembling, wanting to give way. She aw fear in his eyes. Why was he so scared? She was the one that was jobless—again! She was the one who was going to have a hard time having any sort of life after they’d all destroyed her reputation.
Fuck Hollywood.
Fuck men.
‘Paige, Kitten, your waters have broken.’
Fuck.
28
Her heart race, an erratic beat within her chest that echoed through her body as panic claimed her. A cold vice-like grip held her lungs, making it difficult to breathe. Her head swam, and the lights whizzing by overhead did nothing to help the dizziness threatening to take her.
‘It’s too early, it’s too early,’ she muttered softly as they rushed her through the belly of the hospital. She repeated the words over and over, chanting them as if the mantra could somehow stop what was already in progress. The hand that held hers tightened its grip, anchoring her to the world and stopping her from leaving the horrible sensations behind.
She turned her head, looking to see who had kept her here, who didn’t want her to leave them. The world tilted for a moment as her head lolled, but she saw him. She saw the paleness of his skin, the fear he couldn’t hide in his eyes…
‘Casey,’ she whimpered brokenly.
‘I’m here, Kitten, I’m here,’ he whispered soothingly, his other hand gently brushing her hair back from her damp head. ‘It’s going to be alright,’ he continued. ‘It will be okay.’
‘It’s too soon,’ she whispered. ‘Blueberry… she… it’s too—’ A cry of anguish was ripped from her throat, cutting off her words, as a sharp twist of pain stabbed at her abdomen. It felt like someone was cutting her open, stabbing a knife deep into her stomach, before pulling on her insides.
‘Do something!’ she heard Casey cry out to the medical team around her. A nurse offered him soft words, but Paige couldn’t hear them. She couldn’t focus on anything other than the pain ripping through her belly where she was supposed to be keeping her daughter safe and sound.
Could Blueberry feel it? Was she in pain too?
The idea of her daughter, not even yet introduced to the world, suffering even a fraction of what Paige felt in that moment, tore her heart in two, and a fresh wave of tears pooled in her eyes. She couldn’t even do this part right! The part where her body was just supposed to know what to do, where she didn’t have to make any choices, only had to simply live her life. How the hell was she going to cope as an actual mother? How the—
Another crippling wave of pain washed over her, making her knees try and jerk upwards towards her stomach, but the nurses held her legs in place, kept telling her to breathe through it.
Fuck that.
She wanted pain killers, a freaking epidural! She wanted the agony to stop, and her little girl to be safe and sound once again.
She tightened her grip on Casey’s hand, holding it firmly, as she squeezed her eyes closed and tried to do as the doctors demanded; she tried not to push no matter how much she wanted to. Her body was screaming at her to bear down, to stop fighting against it.
The pain receded for a moment, and she fought to recapture her breath, to calm her heart and prepare herself for it to start all over again when she felt Casey’s hand slipping from hers. She tried to grab on, felt his fingers reaching for hers—
‘—I’m sorry but if you’re not the father you can’t go any further,’ Paige heard someone say as his digits finally fell away. ‘Only family is allowed through.’
‘No! He is the father!’ Paige cried as they turned her bed and pushed it away from the man she loved, the father of her child. ‘Casey!’ she screamed ‘Don’t leave us! Don’t leave us!’
He watched as the automatic glass doors to wherever they were taking Paige slowly slid closed behind the medical team. He watched in silence, blood rushing through his ears and his heart pounding in his chest, as they held Paige down on the bed. She cried out for him, screaming for him not to leave them…
Them. Not her.
Paige and her daughter. His daughter. Their daughter.
Possibly.
He watched as the medical staff who surrounded the bed, turned a corner and took Paige from sight. He closed his eyes and sent a prayer into the ether that it would
n’t be the last time he’d see her.
Them.
He felt the adrenaline that had been pumping through his body since Paige’s waters had broken, suddenly drain away. His knees almost gave out and he found himself holding onto the wall for support.
The swoosh of the doors sliding back again made his eyes fly open. He watched as two nurses, dressed in scrubs, walked through, chatting between themselves. They weren’t coming to tell him that it was all okay, that Paige had made it—
Fuck. What if she didn’t? What if he never saw her again? What if the last image he had of her was screaming his name and writhing in agony? What the hell had she done to deserve that? Even if she’d lied, and Blueberry wasn’t his, Paige didn’t deserve that to be her final moment.
‘—so glad I didn’t get called on that one,’ he heard one of them say. ‘I hate that even in this modern day, we still lose women giving birth.’
Casey moved before he thought about it, his knees suddenly finding strength again as he approached the man and woman. His mouth moved of its own accord, his tongue saying words he didn’t realise he wanted to say until he heard them.
‘Excuse me, I’m the father of baby Hamilton—I need to get to Paige and my daughter.’
The room was in full swing when the nurses hurried Casey, now dressed in his own set of scrubs, into the delivery suite. He couldn’t focus on what was being said, on the directions given by the medical staff; he simply froze as he took Paige in. She was pale, sweating, and swearing like a trooper as the doctor sat between her legs and the rest of the team surrounded her.
She was struggling even he could see that. She looked tired and stretched to her limit. Another doctor was at her side and two nurses were assisting her with something.
‘You can go to her,’ one of the male nurses who’d brought him in said softly at his side. His hand gently took Casey’s elbow and guided the stunned star to the opposite side of Paige’s bed from the other doctor and her small team. ‘She’s lost a lot of blood,’ the man said. ‘But she’s too far along to do a C-section, the baby is already partly through her cervix, but it’s stuck. She’s breech.’
‘Will she…’ he couldn’t say the words, but the nurse understood.
‘They’re doing their best. Just be here for Ms Hamilton while you can. She needs the support. But be prepared to leave at a moment’s notice should we ask you to.’ He nodded absently at the nurse’s words, as the other man took Paige’s hand from the bed and placed it in his own as he stepped to her bedside. He didn’t watch the other man leave; his focus was completely on Paige lying on the bed, desperately trying to safely deliver their daughter.
‘Casey,’ she whispered. Even through the whisper, he could hear how ruined her throat was, how much she had screamed herself hoarse.
‘I’m here, Kitten, I’m here.’
‘Blueberry…’ she whispered.
‘They’re doing what they can,’ he said as her eyes moved to gaze between her legs to where one of the doctors sat. He saw the guilt, the devastation, and determination in her green eyes. ‘Hey.’ His voice was soft but firm, as he reached over and turned her head to focus on him again. ‘No matter what happens, I’m here. Okay? I’m here for you. I’m not leaving your side again, Paige, I promise.’
A dry sob escaped her lips at his words; her eyes closed and he watched as her body sagged back against the bed. Her hand went limp in his.
‘—heart rate is dropping—’
‘—baby is almost there—’
‘Paige?’ He shook her hand gently, hoping to wake her, but he got no response. ‘Paige!’
‘—not responding—’
‘—clear the airways—’
‘—Mr. McManaman, please, we need you to—’
‘Paige!’ he screamed as two male nurses tried to remove him from her side and a doctor began to work on her. ‘Paige, don’t leave me! Don’t leave me! I love you, Paige, you hear me! I love you! You have to come back to me, I can’t lose you again!’
The doors closed behind him once more and Casey felt the tears fall.
29
Blueberry looked so small and tiny in the incubator, the tubes so large compared to her arms and legs. She was sleeping peacefully as the respirator helped her underdeveloped lungs to function properly. Casey was amazed that something so vital to humans’ survival was one of the last things to fully develop.
The doctor had said there might be other issues in her future that they couldn’t spot now. Hearing loss, sight, brain development… Casey didn’t care if she had any—or all—of those problems as she grew up; he’d love her no matter what.
He’d been stunned to feel such an emotion, but it had gripped him tight the moment he’d laid eyes on her when she’d been brought to the nursery window of the baby ICU. She’d battled against the odds; born breech and not breathing, the doctors had worked on her until she’d finally given that little wail. At least, that’s what the nurses told him—he hadn’t been there.
A twist of guilt turned his stomach at the thought of having left his girls—not that he’d had a choice, but the idea of them alone, without him as they fought to cling on to dear life…
Blueberry twitched in her sleep, her little arms moving at her side as she moved her head from one side to the other, so she was finally facing him. He smiled at the sight of her tiny features. Her little button nose, the perfect Cupid’s bow of her lips. She was so delicate, so fragile… How the hell was he going to keep her safe? Because he wanted to, that much was clear to him now.
He didn’t care if Blueberry was biologically his or not, he wanted her as part of his life. Her and Paige; he didn’t want to be parted from them again, didn’t want another day without them. He needed them in his home, at his side… He loved them both.
‘I do, little one,’ he said to the still-sleeping baby. He didn’t care if she couldn’t hear him through the glass; he had to tell her. ‘I love you and your mother and you’re both coming home with me. I’ll be your daddy.’
He watched her for a little while longer until the nurses told him that they had to take her back. When they wheeled her away from the nursery window, Casey turned and headed back down the corridor to where Paige was recovering.
Paige’s whole body ached. She’d never felt so tired, so sore in her entire life. Not after gruelling cheerleading competitions in high school and college, or even after they were rescued all those months ago. Hell, that had been a walk in the park compared to giving birth to her daughter. Deanna was not going to be convinced to give motherhood a go when Paige told her all the gruesome details. She honestly felt she had been disembowelled.
She sighed and gazed towards the silent television where some news story was on. Luc Truman’s face—sans beard—flashed up on the screen with his apparent accomplice. Another false sighting, Paige guessed.
She wasn’t really watching the box; the nurses had switched it on for her. It was something to gaze at on occasions when she wanted to shy away from her thoughts. Or when she felt the itch, the need under her skin to see her daughter, hold her, kiss her, feed her…
That wasn’t allowed just yet. She’d given birth two days ago, and she had yet to lay eyes on her baby girl. Okay, so for one of the days she’d been unconscious, but still!
They had promised they’d take Paige to her later that day, that once she could sit up without wanting to throw up, they’d take her in a chair to the neonatal ICU. She wouldn’t be allowed to hold her for a while yet—which made her ache in an entirely different way—but at least she’d see her daughter. The nurses had taken pity on her, and one had gone down to the ward and taken a picture.
Paige had been horrified at first, at the sight of all the tubes and wires her little one was connected to, but the nurses reassured her that it was routine; this was standard procedure for a baby born so early, and so far—they said—Blueberry was responding well.
The door to her room opened, but from her prone position, she couldn�
�t see who had come in until a head popped around the corner of the room, created by the en-suite bathroom.
‘Casey!’ she exclaimed, both in shock and happiness. She remembered he’d been there when she’d gone into labour and she vaguely remembered his presence when they’d got to the hospital. The nurses had assured her he’d come into the delivery room and she’d spoken to him, but beside the pain, she barely remembered anything of Blueberry’s arrival. A bitter twist sat in her stomach at that thought.
‘Hey, Kitten,’ he smiled as he walked in proper. ‘How you feeling? Or is that a stupid question?’
She smiled at him. ‘I’m sore, but relieved Blueberry is out and okay.’
‘She’s beautiful,’ he said.
‘You’ve seen her?’ she asked, her eyes wide and mouth open at the idea that Casey had been to see their daughter. Both happiness and bitterness warred inside her at the thought. The idea of him seeing their daughter warmed her heart, but the fact he’d seen their child when she’d been denied the right, pissed her off big-time.
‘Yeah,’ he admitted as he took a seat at her side. ‘She’s perfect, Paige, perfect in every way.’ He bit his lip and gazed at the bed for a moment as if gathering courage for what he wanted to say next. ‘Do you remember the delivery room?’
‘Not really,’ she confessed with a shake of her head. ‘It was just so painful.’
‘Ah.’ He nodded his head but said no more.
‘Casey?’
‘Paige, I don’t care if she’s really mine or not—’
‘But she—’
‘No, Paige, seriously, I don’t care. I want you both in my life. Forever. I love you Paige, and I don’t want to spend another day without you at my side. It doesn’t matter if Blueberry is mine or not—I want to be her father.’
Paige felt the tears well up in her eyes at his words. The earnest look on his face told her of the truth of his words. He wanted her, he loved her! And he wanted Blueberry too. Why couldn’t he believe that she was his? Why was he holding onto Daniel’s lies?