Chapter 3 - The Knife and the Secret
Dr. Hall rushed into the room. She didn't look at Adrian. She looked only at the monitors. Her face was grim. "Heart rate for Twin B is dropping significantly. The umbilical cord is compressed." "What does that mean?" I asked, panic rising in my throat. "It means we are out of time," Dr. Hall said. "We need to do an emergency C-section. Now."
Nurses flooded the room. Beds were unlocked. Machines were unplugged. Everything became a blur of blue scrubs and bright lights. They wheeled my bed out into the hallway. Adrian walked right beside me. His hand never left mine. "Sir, you can't come in," a surgical nurse said, blocking the double doors to the OR. Adrian stopped. He looked at the nurse, then down at me. "I'll be right here," he said. "On the other side of this door. I'm not going anywhere." I nodded, tears finally spilling over my cheeks. Not from pain. From fear. "Adrian..." I choked out. "I know," he said. "They're going to be fine. You're going to be fine. I promise you, Claire."
The doors swung shut, cutting him off from view. The OR was freezing. The anesthesiologist moved quickly. A screen was erected over my chest. I couldn't feel my legs anymore. I could only feel pressure. Tugging. Pulling. The sounds of surgical instruments clinking against metal trays filled the sterile air. "Okay, Claire, here we go," Dr. Hall said.
Minutes stretched into hours. Then, a cry. A sharp, piercing, beautiful cry. "Twin A is here! A boy," Dr. Hall announced. Relief washed over me, but only for a second. "Come on, Twin B," the doctor muttered. The tension in the room thickened. More tugging. More pressure. Silence. A terrifying, absolute silence.
"Heartbeat is faint. Need suction," someone yelled. "Come on, baby. Breathe." I stared at the ceiling tiles. I prayed to a God I hadn't spoken to in years. I begged. Take me. Take anything. Just let them live. Ten seconds. Twenty seconds. A small sputter. Then, a wail. A loud, furious, demanding wail. "Twin B is here. A girl. She's mad, but she's breathing perfectly," Dr. Hall sighed heavily.
Tears streamed into my ears. A nurse brought two tiny, squirming bundles over to my face. They were red. They were wrinkly. They were the most beautiful things I had ever seen. "Hello," I whispered. "Hello, my loves."
They took them to the NICU for observation. I was stitched up and rolled into a recovery room. I drifted in and out of a heavy, drug-induced sleep. When I finally opened my eyes properly, sunlight was filtering through the blinds. Adrian was sitting in the armchair in the corner. He was on his phone, typing furiously, but he looked up the moment I stirred. He put the phone away and walked over. "They're perfect," he said softly. "Both of them. Strong and healthy." "You saw them?" "Through the glass." He offered a small, rare smile. "The boy has your nose."
I closed my eyes, letting the relief settle into my bones. "Thank you," I said. "For last night. For stopping Grant." Adrian sat on the edge of the bed. "Grant is a problem that I am going to solve permanently." I looked at him. "Why, Adrian? Why are you doing this? We barely knew each other before the divorce started. You were just Grant's enemy."
He looked at his hands for a long moment. When he looked back up, the mask was entirely gone. "Because six months ago, I acquired a small data firm. In their servers, I found encrypted files belonging to Mercer Development." My heart skipped a beat. "What kind of files?" "Files detailing massive fraud. But more importantly," Adrian's voice hardened, "files detailing Grant's plan to frame you for it."
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The air left my lungs. "Frame me?" "You were the fall guy, Claire. The signature on the dummy corporations? Yours. Forged, but perfectly executed. If his company went down, he was going to hand you to the feds and take sole custody of the twins as the 'grieving, betrayed husband'." I felt sick. The nausea rolled over me in waves. "That's why he fought for full custody in the first draft of the divorce," I whispered. "Yes." Adrian leaned closer. "I couldn't let that happen. So, I reached out to your lawyer. I started pulling strings from the shadows to ensure you got a clean divorce. And I promised myself I would destroy him before he could ever hurt you or those kids."
He reached out and gently brushed a stray lock of hair from my forehead. "He thinks this is just a business rivalry," Adrian said quietly. "He doesn't know it's a war. And he doesn't know he's already lost."
