"Help!" I yelled at him. "Call 999! She needs a doctor."
The guard flipped on the light. He paled when he saw the duchess lying fragile and motionless in my arms, blood dripping down her head, a pool of her blood beside us.
"She fell down the stairs. She hit her head badly." I stroked her hair and whispered to her.
It seemed to take forever for medics to arrive. When they did, they took one look at Haley and ordered a medical evacuation helicopter to take her to London.
I walked next to the stretcher, holding her limp hand on the way past the castle to the copter.
"What's going on?" Sid stood on the driveway, being restrained by a policeman. "That's my sister. Let me by. Hale? Haley! Riggins?"
The entire staff was outside on the steps and spilling into the circular drive, watching the helicopter as it waited on the open lawn.
Gibson put his hand on Sid's shoulder. Bird and his son were there. Bird was staring at Sid, looking like he was seeing a ghost.
I didn't have time to stop. I was going in the copter with Haley. "She fell, Sid. She's hurt. We're taking her to a hospital in London. I'll text you the address. Get a car to drive you and meet me there."
Bird stepped forward. "No need, sir. We'll drive her. My son and I will take her." He shot Sid a look of what could only be described as fatherly concern.
Haley
It was all just impressions. The sensation of flying. Light shining through closed lids. Voices, some of them talking to me. Imploring me. Begging me.
I didn't want to open my eyes. I didn't want to see or hear or talk. The pain was too great.
There was something they were afraid of. There was something I was afraid of. But I couldn't remember what. I didn't want to. I wasn't strong enough. I couldn't.
Something bad had happened. Something terrible. I couldn't feel my body. I felt separate and distinct from it. I wanted to sleep, just sleep.
Riggins
I stood in the fanatically bright lights of the hospital waiting room and prayed through the long hours while we waited. Prayed like I never had before until Haley's neurosurgeon appeared and called me back to talk to me. Dr. Brace was reportedly the best neurosurgeon in London. I had to trust that was true.
"Is my wife awake? Can I see her?" I walked briskly to keep up with her.
The doctor was kind and friendly, reassuringly arrogant about her skill. "The duchess is sedated, sir. But considering the severity of her fall, the duchess is in good condition. Despite the trauma and the fear of internal skull fractures, the CT scan showed no major surgical lesion."
I barely understood more than her confident tone. I gathered a lack of surgical lesion was a good thing. Why couldn't doctors speak English? Especially here, where the language was born?
"The baby?" My heart pounded wildly. Suddenly I desperately wanted the little interloper. If the baby died, I'd never forgive myself for not wanting my child from the beginning. And Haley would be heartbroken.
"I'll explain more in private." The doctor took me to her office.
I was vaguely aware of pictures of her family. Prints of birds and gardens on the wall that were probably meant to be calming. The usual medical posters. Many of them detailing all kinds of neurological traumas, which were not as reassuring.
"Your wife has had quite the bang to her head," the doctor said, pulling up the CT scan. "There's a hairline fracture. Here." She pointed. "If we can get the swelling down, it should heal without surgical intervention. She was lucky, very lucky."
I imagined Dr. Brace thinking and adding, Not to have cracked her head wide open.
I shuddered at the imagery that crossed my mind. I had expected to find Haley broken and cracked. Seeing her head lying in a pool of blood was bad enough. I should have breathed a sigh of relief, but there was more. I could feel it.
"We have her on an IV and medications to relieve the swelling in her brain."
"Swelling in her brain?" I took a deep breath.
"I'm afraid so. As these things go, it's mild. But it is causing her to remain in a comatose state."
I must have paled. I felt very cold.
The doctor gave me a reassuring smile. "I believe the medications should correct it. But brains are tricky creatures and impossible to predict. But, again, the swelling isn't severe.
"She's sedated to reduce the pain of her broken arm and the other trauma from her fall. And prevent her moving around if she regains consciousness suddenly. The head of her bed is elevated to aid fluid drainage from the brain.
"The good news is that despite what you perceived as a large blood loss, she didn't present with either hypoxia or hypotension … "
She kept talking, giving me medical terms. I asked questions that I hoped made some sort of sense. I was operating purely on autopilot.
"We set her broken arm."
I nodded. "She was trying to protect the baby as she fell." I had explained how she'd tripped.
The doctor nodded. "She's bruised and has a few cracked ribs. But no other internal damage that we can see."
I hated to ask the next question. "Will she have any long-term damage?"
The doctor gave me a kindly look. "Time will tell."
"When will she wake up?" This was the question we'd been dancing around.
"When she's ready." Dr. Brace patted my hand efficiently.
"The baby?" I took a deep breath. "It's alive, but is it-"
"The baby's beautiful," the doctor said. "Absolutely perfect and healthy. Moving and kicking. It's in no danger. We did an ultrasound. I recorded it if you'd like to see it before I take you to your wife?"
I nodded.
"We know the sex," she said as she brought up the ultrasound on a computer. "Would you like to know what you're having?"
I hesitated only a second. Would it make a difference if I knew? Would it change my mind about anything?
I nodded. "Yes, thank you. I'd like to know."
Haley
I saw nothing but the images my mind created. Dreams or visions; I wasn't sure what they were. I couldn't move. Or maybe I just didn't move. It was hard to tell.
I was wrapped beneath heated blankets, but at times I was chilled to the bone. Weary and wanting to give up. Lights shone through my eyelids. There was beeping and the sounds of machines. That was as close as I got to consciousness before I retreated into the darkness.
The images that swirled through my mind were dark. A handsome man, an older version of someone important, but I couldn't remember who. Pain. A stone staircase. A ghost, a ghost, a ghost. A castle. The end of something. Something chasing me. Someone dead. Someone else I didn't want to lose.
Something I urgently had to hide. It was too late.
I wanted my mom. I called out for her, but my lips didn't move. I screamed for her, but no sound came out. Then I remembered, I was grown and she was dead. And I was all alone.
Sid! Where was Sid? Who was taking care of her?
Sometimes I thought I heard her voice, all grown up and trying to coax me back. And then she faded away.
I was all alone again. Everything was up to me. I had an overwhelming fear of loss.
Someone was holding my hand, squeezing it, kissing it with warm lips. Pressing my hand to wet cheeks. Calling my name. Calling me back. Telling me he loved me. Begging me to come back to him.
I didn't want to come back. I wanted to stay where it was safe and I didn't hurt.
I felt a tiny fluttering as soft as a butterfly in my abdomen. A happy, effervescent feeling, like bubbles in champagne tickling your nose. But this was in my body. Not in my stomach. In my womb. I was still growing a life. Everything was going to be all right. I hoped. All I really knew was that this bubbly little thing needed me. I had to come back for it.
I remembered who I needed. And, more importantly, wanted. I had to fight the darkness. I had to come back. I wanted to come back. His name formed on my lips.
Riggins. Riggins. "Riggins."
I was shouting, screaming for him. Despite all my effort, the words came out a bare whisper, just wisps of words amid the electronic beeps in the room. My eyelids felt heavy as I struggled against the weight keeping them down. At last, my eyes fluttered open.
"Haley?" Miraculously, he was there, sitting next to my bed with worry and wonder on his face.
I hadn't dreamed him.
A look of relief crossed his face. Tears stood in his eyes as he smiled through them at me. "You're back."
I nodded, squinting against the light in the room. I'd been in darkness for what seemed like forever. Still holding my hand like he'd never let go, he reached up and dimmed the light by my bed.
"You called me back. I had to come." My throat was dry and scratchy. It was hard to speak. My left arm didn't move, but the right one seemed to work. The rest of my body was sore and bruised.