Page 143 of Bound By Blood and Lies

Focus on the road.

Riggs:

Tell Fae if she dies, I’m going with her because Roman will definitely kill us all.

Robyn:

RIGGS???

Felix:

Maybe don’t mention death whilst she’s actively giving birth.

Riggs:

oops, sorry

Riggs:

TELL HER SHES GONNA DO AMAZING

Riggs:

ALSO TELL THE BABY HIS FAVOURITE UNCLE SAYS HURRY UP

Roman:

He doesn’t have a favourite uncle.

Riggs:

yet

Fae laughs weakly beside me before another contraction hits hard enough that her hand clamps around the door handle. I can feel every bit of blood drain out of my body as I throw the car into drive. The journey to the hospital is quite possibly the most stressful experience of my entire fucking life. Every red light feels personal. Every slow driver in front of me feels like an enemy of the state. Fae keeps trying to tell me to calm down whilst I grip the steering wheel hard enough that I’m half convinced I’m going to rip the leather straight off it.

“Roman,” she breathes through another contraction. “You’re speeding.”

“Our son is trying to exit your body,” I snap. “I think this is an acceptable exception.”

She laughs again before immediately groaning and clutching her stomach harder. The sound punches straight through my chest. By the time we reach the hospital, I’m running entirely on adrenaline. I swing the car directly into the ambulance bay and slam the brakes hard enough that a porter immediately starts marching toward us looking furious.

“You can’t park there?—”

“My wife is in labour,” I bark whilst already climbing out the car. “Unless you want this baby delivered in your fucking car park, I suggest you move.”

The poor bloke blinks at me whilst Fae covers her face in the passenger seat.

“Oh my God,” she mutters. “You’re actually feral.”

“I’m stressed.”

“You can’t just threaten people like that.”

“I can and I’ll do it again.”

I rush around the car and help her out before stealing the nearest wheelchair I can find. The baby bag hangs off my shoulder whilst I wheel her through the hospital like somebody’s actively hunting us. The maternity ward is warm, bright and somehow far calmer than I feel inside my own body. Midwives move around us with practised ease whilst Fae gets settled into the bed and monitors are strapped around her stomach. At some point, I press play on our Spotify playlist just to fill some of the silence because if I have to sit here listening to every pained sound she makes without distraction, I might genuinely lose my fucking mind. I don’t think I stop touching her once. My hand stays wrapped around hers whilst the other rubs her thigh, her back, her stomach. I just need to be touching her.

Hours pass in a blur of contractions, breathing exercises and me repeatedly offering completely useless suggestions that earn me increasingly threatening looks from my wife. At one point a midwife calmly tells me Fae needs to conserve her energy and I genuinely have to stop myself from asking if there’s a way somebody else can do the pushing for her instead.