Chapter 6 - Mercy Hospital
The emergency room at Mercy Hospital moved in a blur of sterile white tiles, shouting medical staff, and cold metal monitors.
Dr. Angela Martinez, my obstetrician, met the ambulance gurney at the trauma bay doors with her scrubs already tied.
"Her vitals are dangerously elevated from acute psychological distress," Dr. Martinez told the resident while checking the fetal heart monitor.
"We need magnesium sulfate running right now, and prepare the operating room for an emergency C-section if the fetal heart rate drops below one-twenty."
The rhythmic, galloping beat of my daughter's heart filled the delivery room, fast and erratic like a terrified bird flapping against a cage.
Sarah entered the room twenty minutes later, wearing blue paper scrubs over her tailored legal suit, holding my cold hand tightly.
"Leo is safe with your sister Clara," Sarah told me, leaning close so I could hear her over the hum of the infusion pumps.
"Clara picked him up from family services half an hour ago. He's eating pancakes and watching cartoons at her house."
Tears leaked from the corners of my eyes, soaking into the paper pillow beneath my head.
"Julian tried to take my father's legacy, Sarah," I whispered, the magnesium making my veins feel like liquid fire. "He was going to leave my children with nothing."
"He took nothing, Audrey," Sarah replied firmly, squeezing my fingers with fierce determination.
"The bank flagged the transaction the moment Melissa walked out because your father had instituted a multi-signature safeguard before he passed."
"The funds never moved an inch. Your father protected you even from beyond the grave."
A sudden alarm sounded on the fetal monitor; the steady galloping beat abruptly plummeted into a slow, terrifying crawl.
Dr. Martinez pulled back the curtain, her eyes wide above her surgical mask.
"The cord is compressed. We are going to the OR right now. Audrey, look at me—stay calm, you are going to meet your daughter today."
They wheeled me through double doors into the freezing brightness of the surgical suite before the spinal anesthesia numbed me from the chest down.
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Twenty minutes later, on a gray Tuesday afternoon in October, a tiny, furious cry echoed through the room.
"She's here," Dr. Martinez smiled, lifting a tiny, perfect bundle wrapped in pink flannel. "Five pounds, eight ounces. Healthy lungs, Audrey. Perfectly healthy."
