For now.
Everything is for now.
But...she’s alive.
And...the baby... the weight of it lands fully this time.
Not just what it is. But what it almost wasn’t. What was at risk. What he put at risk.
What he took from us before we even knew it existed.
This...should have been something else.
Something quiet. Something shared. Something where she tells me. Where we find out together. Where there isn’t blood on my hands and a surgeon explaining how close we came to losing everything in the same breath.
My jaw tightens.
Harder this time.
Paul didn’t just take my wife.
He took...this.
When I get my hands on him again, there will be nothing left of him.
Nothing.
The doctor continues, his voice steady, moving through details I only half hear now.
“We’re moving her into a private room,” he says. “A nurse will come and get you shortly.”
I nod.
He leaves.
The silence that follows feels different.
Quieter.
Heavier.
Full.
Jackson lets out a breath that almost turns into a laugh.
“She’s alive,” he says, like he doesn’t quite believe it yet. “She’s...fuck, she’s alive.”
Zach pushes himself off the wall slowly, dragging a hand through his hair.
“And pregnant,” he says quietly.
The word settles again.
Heavier this time.
Real.
I don’t speak.
