Page 16 of Shattered

Bauer’s jaw clenched and he turned his head away, facing the others across the cargo hold. “I didn’t have the option.”

Huh? “Why not?” Had there been some kind of complication Nate hadn’t heard about, and the docs had taken over?

Big guy still wouldn’t look at him, seemed to flounder for the right words. Not that Bauer was very wordy in the first place. “I was…busy doing other shit, okay?”

“Yeah? Like what?” Because Nate couldn’t imagine not doing that honor. He planned to be right in there during the birth, couldn’t wait to help bring their child into the world. His biggest problem was going to be resisting the urge to take over from the doc and nurses.

Bauer waved a hand around in exasperation. “Shit was going down, all right? Zoe was screaming, and there was blood everywhere—and yeah, it’s way different when it’s your wife screaming, and it’s her damn blood all over the place. Plus I was holding one of her legs back for her,” he finished.

Nate still didn’t understand. “After the baby came out?” That made no sense whatsoever.

Bauer’s jaw worked. “Yeah, after.”

“But why?” As far as he knew, women didn’t need anyone to hold their legs back while delivering the placenta. That was supposedly the easy part. Or so he’d heard, and the few births he’d attended had seemed to confirm it.

Bauer was quiet a moment, his nostrils flaring. “Because I was still in my chair.” he muttered in a low voice.

Wait, what? Nate stared at him, not sure he’d heard right. “They put you in a chair? What for?” Nate eyed him.Unless…His eyes widened as he stared at Bauer’s hard face. No way. “Did you pass out?”

“What?” Cruzie called out across from them, staring avidly at Bauer. “Youfainted?”

Answering snickers and chuckles from the rest of the team were drowned out by the plane’s engines powering up.

“No,” Bauer snapped, giving them all the evil eye as they began moving down the runway. “I just had to sit down for a while near the end. And fuck you all, until you’ve seen that happen to your wife and her lady bits, you don’t know shit about it, so you can’t judge.” He raised his chin in defiance, bumped Blackwell with an elbow. “Blackwell gets it.”

Blackwell, ever the peacemaker, slung an arm around Bauer’s shoulders in silent support. He and his wife Summer had been to hell and back trying to have a baby. The entire team had been ecstatic when little Sam was born healthy without any complications. “It’s okay, man, I hear you. It’s intense.”

“Yeah, see? It’sintense,” Bauer echoed to everyone else, arms folded across his wide chest, jaw set in defiance.

Blackwell paused a heartbeat before adding, “But I still managed to man up, stay vertical and cut the cord.”

A roar of laughter rang out at the diss. The tops of Bauer’s cheeks turned red, and he threw Blackwell’s arm off him as the plane picked up more speed, hurtling them along the runway. “Don’t touch me,” he growled.

Blackwell shrugged good-naturedly and grinned. “Just giving you a hard time, brother.”

“Whatever. Backstabber.”

The plane’s nose angled upward, easing them up into the air. Nate was still smirking to himself as he leaned his head back and closed his eyes, ready for a snooze.

He let the motion of the aircraft lull him as they climbed skyward, the lift pushing him down into the seat.

A series of loud, rapid bangs pummeled the fuselage of the aircraft, loud as gunshots.

Nate’s eyes flew open. Everyone was frozen and quiet in their seats, looking at each other.

The sound of the engines changed, dropping audibly. And then the aircraft pitched downward with enough force to practically lift them out of their seats.

Nate threw both hands down to clutch the bottom of his. He grunted when the plane suddenly jerked upward, slamming his ass down with enough force to make his teeth clack together. He reached for the nylon straps of the seatbelt to tighten it, but it was too late.

A deafening bang split the air.

The aircraft seemed to stall in midair, then tipped sharply to the left and began dropping like a stone out of the sky.

Chapter Six

“Holy shit,” Nate blurted under his breath, scrambling to tighten his lap belt. There were no windows back here. He couldn’t tell where they were, how far up they were. Or whether the pilots had managed to wrestle the plane around to get back to the runway in time.

All of a sudden the loadmaster appeared at the front of the cargo bay, his face grim. “Brace, brace!” he yelled, strapping himself into his own seat.

---