Page 111 of The Alpha King's Curse: Part Two

“You’re doing very well, Layla. Just a little bit more,” the doctor urged.

He had his protective equipment on and settled at the foot of her bed. She’d been hooked to a machine to monitor her and the baby.

It seemed Jackson had indeed been prepared for the child to be born in the middle of nowhere. She had assumed she would be taken to a hospital when her labour started, but the moment Faith had burst into the room and found her on the floor with her water broken, she had called the doctor and started preparing all the equipment as if she had been trained for it. She had even pulled out an incubator from somewhere and set her up in the biggest bedroom.

Another contraction hit her before she had even caught her breath.

“Push, Miss Layla,” Faith whispered.

The girl hadn’t left her side even with all the commotion outside. She held her hand, wiped her forehead, and offered her sips of water. She did everything that Jackson would have done if they had been in a proper relationship.

If he had been alive.

A sob wrenched out of her as she pushed. The baby was two months early and was already in distress. The thought of losing Jackson’s child was crippling. He hadn’t loved her, but they had made this precious gift together. The baby was a part of him, a part of the man she would always love. She couldn’t lose it, too.

“Very good. Now, this part is very important. I need you to push only when I tell you to,” the doctor said. “It’s almost over.”

Another push. Another squeeze of Faith’s hand. She followed the doctor's instructions, and not too long afterwards, she heard the tiny wail.

“It’s a girl,” the doctor said. “Congratulations.”

Relief and joy flooded her for a moment before she remembered. And then the sobs started again in earnest.

The doctor placed the tiny girl on her heaving chest. The baby was perfect. She had the longest eyelashes and the thickest curls ever seen. And her hair was a deep red, just like hers.

She couldn’t see a single feature that reminded her of Jackson.

The sobs didn’t stop, even when the doctor took the baby to do all the necessary checks. But when the baby stopped crying, and she felt the doctor’s anxiety rise, the sobs dried up as she sat up in bed.

“What happened?”

The doctor didn’t respond. He took the baby to a station he had set up at the other side of the bedroom, and a woman he had come with opened the door. She exchanged a look with Faith before she watched them huddle over her precious child and start to work on her.

“No,” she cried. “Tell me what’s happening.”

This couldn’t happen. She couldn’t lose everything.

“She’s having a little trouble breathing, but we’re doing everything we can,” the woman answered.

It felt like hours. Someone else came in to take care of her while the doctor worked. All she could do was lie there helplessly and make every promise under the sun to bargain for her baby’s life. Even if it meant someone else would raise her as long as she got to live.

Finally, the baby was placed in the incubator and wheeled next to her bed. The doctor turned to face her, but all she could see were the wires, tubes and sensors attached to her child.

“She’ll be okay,” he said. “Both of you need to rest now.”

But she could sense his uncertainty so she knew her baby wasn’t out of the woods. He was just saying that because he had done all he could.

When he left the room, her tears had dried up. She couldn’t cry anymore. Grief was heavy on her shoulders as she listened to the tiny heartbeat that had accompanied hers for so long. And she listened to the whispers outside the house of the men planning an attack and then heading out into the forest. And she listened beyond it, hoping that Jackson was still out there.

Somehow Faith got her to the shower. She felt like a corpse when she walked back into the bedroom afterwards and found that Faith had remade the bed and cleaned up. The young girl stood over her baby, her hand on the glass.

“She’s beautiful,” Faith whispered. “We’ve never had a Queen before.”

She didn’t react to the slip-up. They had all slipped up several times in the panic to rescue their king. It was a fool’s mission; she already knew they wouldn’t find him. But she needed to hold on to that hope like they all were. Any slip-ups weren’t important anymore.

After Faith left her to rest, she put her hand over the glass protecting her baby and tried to think positive thoughts for her sake. She hadn’t even got to hold her baby for long. A few hours later, the sun had risen again, and she still couldn’t sleep. The urge to hold her baby had kept her awake, and that was the only thought she could focus on.

“I should hold you,” she whispered to the little girl.

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