Missing Beats

by K. L. Shandwick

  After pouring my heart out, I scanned over the email I’d written and felt pretty miserable because I was allowing myself to chase dreams based on two sordid nights of passion with the man, from the boy who had been everything to me as a child. Another wave of doubt washed over me and I figured again it was all pointless. I had to let him go. Thinking I had temporarily escaped to a fantasy world, I pulled myself back to reality.

  I closed my computer without sending the email. Kane Exeter functioned on a completely different planet because my world wasn’t about fame, fortune and fun. I was a pregnant and soon-to-be a single mom with an extremely sick baby and my focus had to be centered there. By 6:30 am I had concluded that any notion of a relationship with him was absurd and went back to bed with a heavy heart.

  Chapter 24

  Fade to Black

  Saturdays were always quiet in my house, my parent’s usually spent the weekend at my grandma’s place and Jacob didn’t come home. I loved the stillness of the silent house and used the time to take a leisurely bath before I settled down to do a little work for Dad at my laptop. There had been no word from Kane and although my heart felt bruised, I was glad I had come to my senses and hadn’t sent the email. It would have been like pouring gasoline on dying embers since he’d decided to stay away. Sinking myself into work was a necessary distraction and being able to work right up to the birth was one of the few fortunate things I had going for me. As I began to do some audio work a new email message alert from Candice showed up on the bottom of my page. Answer your phone please!

  My phone vibrated on the side at the same time. I smiled at the drama and swiped to accept her call.

  “Josie? Where are you? Did he come and see you? Do you know what happened?”

  Confused by her anxious tone, I had no clue what she was taking about. Did he come and see you? Kane? I never had the chance to tell Candice that Kane came to visit. It had happened so suddenly and with it being the Thanksgiving holiday, she’d gone to New Jersey to visit her parents. I hadn’t called her because I knew she’d planned an all-day marathon shopping day on Black Friday with her mom.

  “Who? What are you talking about?”

  “Kane. God. You don’t know, do you?” The tone of her voice was loaded with a mixture of emotions. Worry, anxiety, stress, and fear.

  “What is it? Is something wrong?” My heartbeat accelerated and shock waves radiated from the center of my chest until my fingers and lips tingled from the effect of a sudden adrenaline rush.

  “Oh God, you don’t. Kane was found badly injured in his suite at The Drake Hotel this morning, Josie. The news sites are saying he was stabbed and left for dead.”

  The impact of her words made me freeze. My mind went completely absent of any capable thought and I stared at the faux caramel-colored silk drape by the window. It was the only thing that was registering with me.

  “Josie, are you there? God. Is anyone with you?”

  Still I said nothing. I had no questions, no thoughts. Nothing. It was as if my mind had closed down, completely traumatized by her words. Maybe it was my way of protecting myself from further information or maybe it was because my aching heart just couldn’t take any more bad news. I was a jinx. First Elliott and then Kane. My baby. All of those people suffering and all connected to me.

  “The latest report was about twenty minutes ago, it says he’s alive, Josie. Critical, but alive.”

  Still staring blindly at the curtain, I slipped into another dream-like episode, then my mind gave me the first rational thought since Candice had spoken to me. Where is he?

  Suddenly, panic squeezed my heart and I couldn’t breathe, my mind flashed to an image of Kane in a hotel room covered in blood and the weirdest, most peculiar feeling came over me and my head buzzed. I felt like I was outside my own body from the floating feeling in my brain, and something instinctively told me to lie down. I remember doing that right before everything went black.

  “Josie! Josie! Wake up!— Call an ambulance.” I heard Matt’s voice calling. My eyes were heavy and my head ached as I opened them in time to see Jacob enter the room with his cell to his ear and his other hand running through his hair. He looked worried and I felt confused.

  “What happened?” I croaked.

  “I think you passed out, honey, are you okay? Let’s sit you up, okay?” Slowly, Matt helped me upright and I sagged back into the cushion at the back of the sofa.

  “Is it the baby?” I shook my head no and sat confused at what was going on, and why I’d passed out. I watched as Jacob told Matt to get me some water. He pressed the cold glass into my hand when he returned then guided it toward my lips. “Sip it, Josie.”

  As soon as the freezing liquid touched my lips my memory was jolted.

  “Kane!” The wave of nausea rolled my stomach as I searched Jacob’s worried face.

  “Kane was found in his hotel room, he’s critically ill.” Speaking those words just about drained me. Fear and worry filled my mind and I hated myself. If it hadn’t been for me he wouldn’t have been there.

  “What? Where did you hear this?” Jacob asked, but didn’t wait for my answer, instead he began searching for something then crossed the room in the direction of the TV.

  “Candice.” I was struggling to explain myself but in truth I had no more news.

  “Quit with the questions, Jacob, can’t you see she’s in shock?” Matt pulled out his phone and swiped the screen while Jacob grabbed the TV remote and turned to the twenty-seven news station. Jacob’s cell began to ring and he pulled it out answering it and using the remote at the same time to scroll the news clip trailers at the bottom for news. “Turn that off.” Matt scowled then went over to Jacob and shared his screen with him. Jacob glanced at what Matt showed him and looked sick.

  “Fuck.”

  “What? Is he dead,” I screamed hysterically, and tried to rise from my seat, but Matt pushed me down gently and sat next to me for a second.

  “No…not dead. But it’s really bad.” Jacob replied.

  Matt rose again and shoulder barged Jacob for answering me before walking over to the window.

  “Ambulance will be here any minute. Do you have anything you need to take with you, Josie? We want to get you and the baby checked out after passing out like that.” Matt’s attempt to divert the conversation didn’t work.

  “Just tell me what’s going on, I need to know.” My voice was full of determination. I had to know if he was okay. For the first time since I’d heard the news I’d started to feel. Tightening in my belly caught my breath and a wave of emotions, full of anxiety, worry and fear made me burst into tears.

  “Ambulance is here,” Matt informed us as he walked to the door to let the paramedics come inside.

  I felt like protesting but with the knowledge my baby was less than healthy, I wanted to know she was okay too. “Get my bag from my bedroom it has everything in it. I’d hate to be stuck there without my own things.” I was still crying but functioning better than I felt. Jacob ran upstairs and the paramedics checked me over. Initially they were going to leave me at home but I slipped my birth plan to him and when he read my expression and then the notes he quickly backtracked and said that he thought it would be a good idea to monitor the baby since I’d fainted.

  *****

  Safely installed in the ambulance with Jacob, Matt left me to take his car and follow us to the hospital. I was glad that Jacob stayed with me for two reasons. One, we were twins. We had this thing going on where one knew how the other felt most times, and so I knew he would have an idea of what Kane’s situation would mean to me. Second reason was because he was much less resistant to my whiles and would cave easier and tell me exactly what was happening with Kane. I was right about that. Matt called Jacob while I was having tests and Jacob went outside to take the call. When he came back I pressed him to tell me the truth advising him that keeping it from me was only making me imagine much worse.

  Jacob
then told me that Matt had managed to get through to the hospital and speak to Kane’s

  Uncle Dennis. He explained who we were and that Kane had spent Thanksgiving with us. Apparently his uncle and aunt were aware of this so he wasn’t guarded in the information he gave to my brother. According to him, the last person to enter the room was a room service attendant shortly after 10:00 pm on Thanksgiving.

  Kane had arrived back to his room and ordered some alcohol. From his account Kane was alone and a little curt in his manner, but tipped him and closed the door after a polite goodnight.” The morning after, a Do Not Disturb sign was left hanging on the suite door and no one figured anything was amiss. It wasn’t until a few hours ago that his PA, Catherine, who he checked in with twice a day, alerted the hotel that she hadn’t heard anything from him since the Thursday when she called to inform him about an engagement, and had heard nothing since. That’s when they suspected something might be wrong.

  When Jacob told me the news my heart almost fell out on the floor. I thought my head was going to explode under the band of pressure squeezing my brain. All day long I’d been cussing him for not coming, imagining the worst of him, and he’d been lying injured. My stupid misplaced pride wouldn’t allow me to pick up the phone and call him to say I was sorry. If Kane dies it’ll be my fault. Ashamed of myself, I tried to get off the bed to go and find him. I knew enough to know we were in the same building. What if he dies?

  My worrying thoughts made me feel distraught and I bawled like a baby. Jacob looked helplessly at the nursing staff. The young dark-haired nurse shrugged and shook her head. I took that as she had no words of comfort because if she did know anything she may have said so. I think that was the worst part; that no one was even trying to reassure me, and their silence and pitying glances gave me a greater understanding of the gravity of Kane’s injuries. No one had listed them to me, and selfishly, I hadn’t asked because the harrowing news that he was in intensive care meant his life was under threat. So just when I had felt my life couldn’t be more emotionally stressful it got so much worse.

  Strapped to the Cardiotocograph monitor or CTG as the staff called it, I lay watching the flat line on the paper scrolling down from that which represented my womb, while the wiggly line recorded my baby’s heartbeat. Listening to it ticking along then suddenly becoming slow, then fast, soft and loud or a missed beat suddenly made everything real. I felt alone and frightened.

  “Jacob can you sit here.” I pointed to the chair and he immediately came over and sat down.

  Reaching out he held my hand and squeezed. “I know this is hard for you, Josie, but you just have to concentrate on you and the baby, right now.” His worry was etched on his face. “The docs are doing everything they can for Kane.”

  “I need to tell you something. Something I should have told you from the beginning.”

  Jacob stared with a puzzled expression on his face. “What’s wrong, Josie? You’re scaring me.”

  It must have been the look on my face as I gasped for air and tried not to break down in tears as I told him what I’d been hiding.

  “It’s my baby—she’s sick.” A strangled sob escaped from my throat and I wailed loudly. All the months of holding my secret in came pouring out of me. I was in an emotional meltdown. “It’s her heart…listen.”

  Jacob looked at the tracing of my baby’s heartbeat and looked back to me. “I could hear it wasn’t right, Josie, but I thought that was because you were upset.” I shook my head unable to bring words to our conversation. Nothing I said would change the fact that my baby’s heart wasn’t the same as all the other babies out there.

  Jacob bounded from his chair and wrapped me in a tight hug, kissing the side of my head, and rubbing my back. I felt his body shake as grief tore through him, his shoulders heaving as he gasped in air and buried his face further into my neck. “God, Josie. What does this mean? Is she going to die?”

  Even though I had tried to prepare for the possibility, she wasn’t if I had any say in the matter. “She’s fighting, Jacob. Every day she’s fighting. They will operate not long after she’s born to try to help her.” I looked to the nurse in the room for support and she picked up the cue straight away. “Maybe we could leave Josie to rest for half an hour? We can a chat about her baby’s needs if you’d like, Jacob?”

  Jacob nodded. “Why did you do this on your own, Josie?” I knew from his question he thought I was selfish. I felt selfish after I’d seen his reaction. I’d had months to prepare for this and he had a couple of weeks at the most. “You let me take you shopping for—”

  “How would you have treated me, Jacob? How would anyone have treated me, knowing I was carrying a baby that may not survive?”

  “So you carried the burden alone and protected all of us from worrying?”

  “If I thought it would have changed anything I’d have told you all that first day when I’d found out. But I haven’t been alone. Candice knew.”

  “I have a million questions, but I’m going to do what the nurse asks and let you rest.” As he was going out of the door he turned and ran his hand down the metal plate on the door. “I’ll break it to the others. Leave that to me.” His voice was sad, full of sorrow. Swallowing hard, he gave me the smile of a brave man and followed the nurse who had already left the room. I laid my head back on the pillow and breathed deeply. For the first time since I’d found out I was pregnant I didn’t feel alone. Candice had always been there but having my twin, the other half of me, sharing the burden of knowing Ellie’s fate felt like a massive relief.

  Chapter 25

  Fear

  Once I had told Jacob about the baby, I was desperate for news about Kane. I had been trying to keep calm so that the baby check-up would be fine. I wanted to see Kane, I needed to go and find him. About twenty minutes later the professor, who had been taking care of me and the baby, came in to see me. Lifting the paper he put on his reading glasses and studied the trace before he sat down on the chair beside me.

  “Josephine, do you remember when I said that we had to keep the baby in utero for the optimum time?” I nodded and thought he was going to tell me that I needed to rest more. The previous couple of days hadn’t been easy and the shocking news about Kane had almost wiped me out.

  “Yes, I do.”

  “So I know you are only coming up to thirty-six weeks, but my instincts are that it would be prudent to deliver your baby tonight. This trace on the report is beginning to look ominous and it tells me your job in keeping your baby growing inside is done. I’m going to set things in motion for a caesarean section sometime this evening when the operating room is available. I need to contact Professor Miriam, the pediatric heart surgeon, and bring her up to speed. You remember her from your scan and when we mapped out your plan?” I nodded again, too frightened to speak because everything was suddenly real. The massive dark cloud that had followed me around since the day I’d found out about the baby was about to burst.

  When he handed me his handkerchief I realized I was crying again. I’d gotten so used to the feeling by that time that it had become one sad, grief-stricken emotion rolling into another. I was powerless, tired and broken down both inside and out.

  “Can I go and see Kane?” All the time I’d pushed him away, thinking this can’t possibly be what he wants in life, I’d been thinking for him. And to think it was too late to tell him how I felt was killing me. When the professor looked puzzled I expanded on why. “Kane Exeter, he was brought in this morning. We’re close friends.”

  The professor’s brow creased. “The young man who was attacked?” The use of that word made me feel terrible inside.

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll have a volunteer take you up to the care unit, but I can’t give permission for you to see him. That would be the unit specialist’s decision, not mine.”

  Standing to leave, he looked down at me and his eyes softened a little. “You’ve been very brave to make the choices yo
u have in this uphill battle, Josephine, your baby is going to need all your attention from now on.” It was a warning. I knew what he was saying, but if my life was going to be even more different from the moment they took me to the operating room, I wanted at least to know that Kane was going to be okay, because I knew after my baby was born she would become my sole focus and get everything she needed from me.

  An orderly arrived to take me to see Kane. Jacob was accompanying me while I was being wheeled into the elevator to go up to the floor Kane was on, my heart was in my mouth. What if he’s disfigured? I didn’t know what to expect, and to be honest, I didn’t care as long as he lived. When I saw the way everyone stared at me as I got out of the elevator I had to stop myself from freaking out. The expectant look from the guy who was introduced to me as his uncle Dennis was strange. What was stranger still was that he seemed to know who I was. The way he looked at me made me feel like I should have been asking questions, and for a moment I thought that perhaps he thought I didn’t really care. None of it mattered. The only thing I wanted was to see Kane for myself. “Hi, Jo…Kane’s still unconscious. I’m sure he’d be fighting hard if he knew you were here. He’s told me all about you. He thinks the world of you, you know.” I didn’t know what I’d expected him to say to me, but it definitely wasn’t that.

  As I stood up from the wheelchair, he led me into the room where the high-tech machinery whirred, the cuff around his upper arm puffed out automatically as the machine beeped its way to a final count. A long tone signaled his blood pressure and pulse, recorded on a digital screen. Another monitor up above showed an EKG reading of the normal pattern of his heartbeat but every now and again there was an occasional rogue one that spiked higher than the rest. My gaze became fixed on Kane once I had my nerves in order. Fear made me tremble with shock, but at the same time I felt relieved that his face seemed as beautiful as always. A flashback image of him asleep on the sofa came to mind. Almost perfect apart from the white concertina tubing with the valve that came out of his mouth and the sound of a regular puffing noise of the machine it was attached to causing the positive pressure in his lungs.