“Cole—where’s Cole?” I demanded, my voice breaking from the tears leaking down my face and the huge lump that seemed to be lodged in my throat.
“I don’t know. I’m not his doctor,” the doctor told me calmly. “Amelia, you need to calm down. It’s vitally important that you do. You’re jeopardizing your baby’s life.”
“Cole—I need to see Cole!” I shouted, ignoring the doctor. Why the fuck weren’t they listening to me? I had to fucking go see Cole!
The doctor said something quietly to one of the nurses, and she nodded, rushing out of the room. I pulled against the restraints, screaming at the top of my lungs. “I just want to see Cole!” I shouted.
Travis rushed into my room. “Amelia, you have to calm down. Cole is fine. I promise that he’s okay, but you can’t leave this bed,” Travis said gently.
I cried harder, slumping against my pillow. “I just want to see him,” I sobbed.
Katie came into the room and ran her fingers through my hair soothingly. “You’ll get to see him; I promise. We’re getting a room organized for you and Cole to share right now.”
I continued crying. I didn’t believe them. I didn’t believe he was really okay. I just wanted to see for myself.
Katie pulled me into her arms, and I clutched onto her jacket, feeling nothing but pure, heart-wrenching, emotional pain at the moment. It hurt so fucking much not knowing if he was okay, and my last memory of him was being unconscious and bleeding.
“The room is ready,” someone said, poking their head around the door frame.
Katie let me go but gave my hand a gentle squeeze. Travis helped the nurses push my bed down multiple halls, and Katie helped push a machine that had a tube attached to me. I was still sobbing, tears just pouring down my face. It was like I couldn’t stop. It was like a fucking rainfall in my body. I just realized I loved someone, and then they were taken away from me.
I hated feeling like this. I just wanted Cole’s arms wrapped around me, promising me that everything was going to be alright.
When we got to the room, they placed my bed directly beside someone else’s at Travis’s and Katie’s orders. Someone popped their head into the room. “She’s having contractions.”
“Contractions?!” an all-too-familiar, deep voice bellowed.
I jerked my head over to see Cole—sitting up as much as he possibly could—staring at me with wide, fear-filled and worried eyes. “Cole!” I screamed, tears of joy now streaming down my face. I went to sit up but then realized that I was still strapped down to the bed. “Let me go!” I screamed.
“Give her the shot. Hurry. I need to sedate her,” the doctor from earlier said.
I didn’t register his words. I wanted to hold Cole, to know that he was fucking real and actually okay. “Fucking let me go!” I yelled.
I felt something get pushed into my arm. I thrashed against the restraints, but they wouldn’t fucking budge. “Amelia, you need to calm down,” Cole said desperately, his tone soft and pleading. “Baby, please,” he whispered.
Everything went dark.
* * *
Cole
I slumpedagainst my bed once Amelia passed out and ran a hand through my hair. I looked at her doctor, recognizing him as Dr. Kline. “What’s going on?” I asked him desperately. Something was wrong with Amelia. Something was terribly fucking wrong. This wasn’t my girl.
“She’s been in and out of consciousness since she was brought here. She was freaking out about you, but we couldn’t do anything except keep her sedated and monitor the baby. This is the third time we’ve had to stop her contractions,” he informed me a bit sadly.
I blew out a breath. Fuck.Fuck. Fuck! She took me getting shot a lot fucking harder than I had expected.
“Has she tried to self harm or anything?” I asked him, noticing that they continued to keep her strapped to the hospital bed despite her being asleep.
“Not yet, but we’re not taking chances,” he told me. “She was ready to break all of our machines if it meant getting out of bed to see you, and we couldn’t let her walk. Walking helps some women speed up their labor, and I wasn’t willing to give Amelia the chance to possibly lose her baby just because she wasn’t thinking straight.”
I sighed, nodding my head in understanding. I was glad the doctor had done what was best for Amelia, despite how uncomfortable she probably was at the moment. If they thought she was ballistic when I got shot, imagine if she had miscarried.
The doctor left the room, and my mom came over to my bed and sat down beside me. “How’s your wound?” she asked me, her eyes flickering to my stomach that was covered in gauze.
I shrugged. “The pain meds are keeping the pain away, so I don’t know.” I looked up at her. “Did you see her acting . . .” My voice trailed off. Hell, I didn’t even know what to describe her fit as.
She nodded. “It was bad. I’m hoping that when she wakes up, she’ll be calmer with you beside her. We all kept telling her to calm down and telling her it was bad for the baby, but it was like she couldn’t hear us. She was so focused on you.” She huffed in irritation, shaking her head. “Stupid, if you ask me. She has a baby to think of. It’s not just about her and what she feels anymore.”