Veil of Deception: The Replacement wife

One bullet

Major trigger warning: miscarriage

Flashback – Alexander

Recovery Room, 3:17 a.m.
I haven't let go of her hand once.

Her fingers are cold, taped with IVs, the nails still flecked with the polish she wore to the gala. There's a thick pressure dressing over the left side of her abdomen, already bleeding through in a dark, spreading rose.

The ventilator hisses in perfect rhythm, pushing air into lungs that forgot how to do it on their own when the bullet tore through her.

The trauma surgeon steps back in, surgical cap in his hands, face drawn.
"Alexander."

I don't look up. "Tell me."

"We need to talk about the labs from the trauma bay." He hesitates. "Her hCG was positive. Roughly eight weeks. Did you know she was pregnant?"

The words hit harder than the gunshot I heard hours ago.
I stare at him. My throat works, but nothing comes out at first.

"No," I finally rasp. "We didn't know nor did she."
I think of her laughing in the kitchen, stealing the last sip of my coffee. I think of her hand brushing her stomach absently when she thought I wasn't looking. I think of how she kissed me at the door and like it had become real.

We didn't know.

The surgeon nods once, jaw tight. "Maternal-fetal was in the OR with us the whole time. We did everything we could, transfusions, pressors, warming, the works, trying to save them both. But the blood loss was too severe, the shock to her system..." His voice drops. "We couldn't get a fetal heartbeat back. The pregnancy didn't survive the resuscitation. I'm sorry."

The monitors keep beeping, indifferent she didn't even know.

I look down at Scarlet, pale and intubated, the woman who was carrying our child without either of us knowing it.

Our baby is gone and she never even got to feel it kick.

Something inside me quietly shatters.

I press my forehead to the back of her hand, careful of the IV.
"Thank you for trying, but you cannot tell her," I manage, the words tasting like ash.

He lingers a moment, then leaves.

I'm alone again with the machines and the woman I love and the child we'll never hold.

I kiss her wedding ring, taste dried blood and salt.

"I didn't know, baby," I whisper against her skin. "I didn't know we made someone perfect. I'm so fucking sorry I couldn't keep you both safe."

Her fingers twitch, just barely, like she hears me even through the drugs for once just this time I hope she doesn't.

I squeeze tighter.

"I've got you," I tell her, voice breaking wide open.
"I've got both of you. Just come back to me, Scarlet. That's all you have to do."

And I stay holding her hand, carrying the secret that will destroy her when she's finally strong enough to hear it.

Because I didn't know.
And now it's too late.

The room smells like iodine and plastic and the metallic ghost of her blood.

I can't stop staring at the place where her gown is folded down, where the thick white dressing bulges over her left side.

That's where the bullet went in.

That's where our baby was.

Seven weeks.

Maybe eight.