way up, willing the quivering muscles in her arms to support her.
Finally she broke free of the icy prison, dragging herself up, over the rocks to safety.
“Ben.” She collapsed next to him, beyond shivering as the cold wind hit her wet body. She recognized the numbing fatigue for the danger it presented. They needed help. Fast.
Her fingers didn’t move very well, but she managed to pry her cell phone out of her coat pocket and fumbled to flip it open. Pushing the buttons for 911 wasn’t easy, but she had to try. She couldn’t rest, not until she’d told someone where they were.
Dimly she realized the connection had been made. The dispatcher wanted to know the nature of her emergency. “We’re on the rocks by the lakeshore in Cedar Bluff Park. We fell in the water. Hypothermia. Hurry…”
The woman dispatcher on the other end of the line continued talking, but Alyssa couldn’t hang on to the phone, uncaring when it clattered against the rocks, disappearing from view. Help was on the way, all they had to do was wait. She pulled Ben against her rounded stomach, sharing what little warmth they possessed between them and doing her best to use her coat to shelter his body from the dangerously cold wind.
“Don’t worry, they’re coming to get us,” she whispered, closing her eyes, the need to sleep nearly overwhelming. “They’re coming…”
Bright lights. Blurred faces. Unintelligible voices.
Warmth. Lifesaving warmth.
Exhaustion. Her arms and legs felt like dead weights. Even her head was too heavy. Tired. She was so very, very tired.
Time had no meaning. She vaguely realized she was probably at the hospital. Maybe still in the emergency department. The people around her were a blur. She needed to know if Ben was all right, but couldn’t find the strength to ask.
“Alyssa? Can you hear me?”
She frowned, blinking against the light, recognizing a familiar face hovering above her.
Jadon?
No, it must be her mind playing tricks on her. Jadon was gone. He’d left.
He was on a personal leave of absence. Gone for months. And never coming back. He didn’t know she was pregnant. He didn’t know he was soon to be the father of twins.
“Alyssa? Look at me. Can you hear me?”
No, she didn’t want to do this. She didn’t want to keep having dreams about Jadon. They were too painful. She closed her eyes and turned away, seeking peace.
Allowing the precious warmth to draw her down into blessed oblivion.
Jadon Reichert clutched Alyssa’s limp hand in his and willed her to open her eyes, to talk to him.
“We need to get her moved up to the OB unit,” Kim Rayborn was saying. She was the OB doctor on call, responding to emergencies as needed, but had informed him that she was also Alyssa’s regular OB doctor.
Pregnant.
Alyssa was pregnant.
With twins. His twins.
The irony of the situation didn’t escape him. He was certain, without talking to Alyssa, that the babies were his. The timing was right, for one thing. He’d thought they’d been careful, but obviously not careful enough. How could this have happened? With everything else in his life falling apart, he hadn’t even considered the possibility he’d left her pregnant.
Even now, when faced with the reality of Alyssa’s round belly, his mind couldn’t seem to grasp the news. He’d told Alyssa from the start he wasn’t looking for a long-term relationship, and she’d agreed that she wasn’t either. But things had quickly gotten intense between them. When he’d received the emergency call from his mother, he’d left Cedar Bluff, figuring the timing was for the best, since he’d been starting to care about Alyssa a little too much.
Now he was back. And Alyssa was pregnant. She and Ben had been rushed into the ED by the paramedics, both requiring immediate treatment for hypothermia on the same day he was being reoriented to the ED by Simon Carter, one of the other ED physicians.
He’d soon learned that Ben was Kylie and Seth’s son. Kylie was relatively new to Cedar Bluff so he’d never met her, but he’d worked with Seth Taylor. The boy had been dangerously chilled after his dunking in the icy lake water, but he’d be all right. Seth had been home sleeping after his night shift, but he’d rushed in to be there for Ben, with Kylie showing up a little while later.
The boy would be fine. And so would Alyssa.
Kim Rayborn hadn’t made a similar commitment regarding the survival of Alyssa’s twins yet.
As much as he’d never considered being a father, he was oddly protective of his unborn babies now.
“We need to move her upstairs to the OB unit,” Kim repeated, as if he were a dimwitted child.
“I know,” he said, in a hoarse voice. “But I’d like to stay with her.”
Kim’s expression held uncertainty. “Jadon, Alyssa has been through a terrible shock. Maybe it’s best for now to give her some time, some space. Why don’t you let her get through this immediate crisis first?” Before disrupting her life, was her unspoken implication.
She was right. Logically, he knew Kim was right. Yet he didn’t want to let go of Alyssa’s hand, to let her be taken upstairs without him. The OB specialist had already confirmed his fear regarding the possibility of premature labor. Alyssa had nearly lost her life. Right now, she needed to conserve her strength.
Clearly, she wasn’t ready to talk to him.
Alyssa had looked directly into his eyes when he’d called her name. The way she’d turned from him, deliberately closing her eyes to shut him out, had stabbed deep. But at the same time he understood she had every right to be angry.
Heaven help him, he hadn’t known she was pregnant when he’d left.
And what in the heck were they going to do about it now that he knew? He couldn’t even imagine how they’d move forward from here.
“All right,” he said, prising his fingers from Alyssa’s and taking a step back. “But please keep me updated on her progress.”
Kim nodded. “As much as I can. You already know she’s starting to have mild contractions. We’re going to see if we can stop them from getting any worse. But I have to be honest, once she’s awake, it will be up to her to decide how much information you’ll receive.”
He clenched his teeth, wanting to protest, but held his tongue. The health-care privacy laws had been in place for several years. As a physician he knew them well, had explained them to many a distraught family member.
But he’d never been on the receiving end of their restrictions until now. He tamped down the helpless anger at how government rules could keep him away from Alyssa and their unborn babies.
Kim snapped orders and the nurses scurried to prepare Alyssa to be transported up to the OB unit. Standing in the middle of the ED and watching her go was difficult.
“Are you all right?” Simon asked, clapping a hand on his shoulder.
“Sure,” he lied, glancing around the ED. Now that Alyssa and Ben had been cared for, the activity level had returned to normal. Almost as if nothing had ever happened. The staff were already getting things cleaned up in preparation for the next emergency. “Is there anything else we need to review?”
Simon’s gaze rose questioningly, not entirely believing he was fine, as he shook his head. “No, I think you’ve got it covered.