Page 127 of Seizing Control: Part Two

My eyes burn as reality hits. Body wracked with shaking, I hold my son, his scant weight pressed to the bare skin of my chest as the nurse explains that I can spent as much time as I want on the unit with him. He can barely lift his head, blinking slowly now that the white Bili-light mask covering his eyes has been removed. His skin is almost translucent, the nobs of his spine are easy to count as he peers up at me.

“Garrett was small, but nothing like this.”

Neither of the men standing behind me speak.

It takes me a second to understand why.

They weren’t around right at the start.

Garrett as a newborn is something they missed.

One of them by the choice.

The other by circumstances.

“Do we have names?” Deborah asks when the silence drags on. Her soothing tone, the innate enthusiasm she brings to a sorrowful situation a boon to my overwhelmed senses. “We can put them on the cards before you leave... if you’d like.”

Turning so I can see what she’s gesturing at, my heart sinks when I see the cards above each neonatal crib. Baby Hudson One and Baby Hudson Two. Although the nurses didn’t know any better, it feels disrespectful to Lazarus, yet I haven’t the first clue how to broach the subject without upsetting either man. His rush to organise a DNA test was a shock, especially since he’s been so brilliant with Garrett.

Since I would’ve preferred to remain oblivious, I’m in unchartered waters.

“We started a list...” Tipping my head back to meet Lazarus’ gaze, I raise my eyebrows as he leaves his sentence unfinished. He grins, a wry look that tells me we’re on the same page. “I don’t think any of them fit.”

The worry in his expression clouds his normally animated eyes. I see his strain, the impotence he feels at the realisation that we can’t do anything for the twins beyond pray that they’ll be given time to get stronger. They joined the world too early, a failure of my body, yet another round of bad luck in a relationship that has been characterised by unearned cruelty.

Sometimes I feel like I’m cursed.

Destined to never find peace.

Eternally punished for my mistake with Alex.

“I had a couple of ideas last night,” Slash comments in a voice that’s barely more than a whisper. He’s been hanging back, apparently feeling out of place now that it’s established that Lazarus is the biological father. “Couldn’t sleep so I jotted a few things down.”

Before I can prompt my husband, Lazarus says, “We’re all ears, brother.”

My heart flip-flops when he uses the term of endearment that my wayward heart killed.

“Asher Adeline for the little lady,” my husband offers slowly. Heart in my throat, I hold my breath to see if his next suggestion is just as perfect. “And Ezra Miles for the lad... last name, Hudson, of course.”

My immediate reaction is elation.

Slash’s ideas are an homage to past and present.

My mother’s full name pre-marriage was Scarlett Adeline Cherub.

Her father was Ezra Cherub.

Hades is honoured as well—Hades Asher Miles.

Which means Zeke is memorialised too.

The Trinity is also kept on side with the use of my husband’s last name, not that I’m one-hundred percent sure that’s Slash’s motivation. He’s been very cagey today, from his surprise appearance at the end of my hospital bed to the sly looks he directs toward Lazarus when he thinks I can’t see. The big man isn’t as confident in the terms of their truce as my first love appears to be, and that affects my belief in their assertion that they’re not going to make me choose.

Especially when the major ramification of my hysterectomy really sets in.

I can never give Slash a child that is biologically ours. It’s not something I’ve fully come to terms with, but I can’t imagine how my husband feels about it. My ability to conceive was doubted for years after Alex’s first assault. It sat heavily between me and Zeke. The miscarriage almost broke me. I failed to carry the twins to term. There would have been a lot of reticence to endure another pregnancy, knowing all the risks and potential heartbreak, in the beginning, at least, but imagine that I would’ve tried again in a few years’ time to expand my family—with Slash or Lazarus.

Now, we’re living on a wing and a prayer, heading for disaster with our eyes closed.

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