\u2018Check her first,\u201d I said through gritted teeth\u00a0<\/p>\n
The words came out harder than I meant them to but I couldn\u2019t soften them, couldn\u2019t make myself sound reasonable when every instinct I had was screaming that Athena needed to be examined right now, needed to be checked and monitored and made sure she was okay.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cMr. Hayes, I need to establish a baseline for your recovery so I can\u2026\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Check my pregnant wife and our children,\u201d I interrupted, and this time I didn\u2019t even try to keep the edge out of my voice. \u201cNow.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The room went silent.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I could feel everyone staring at me, could sense Orion and Derek shifting uncomfortably and Sarah drawing in a sharp breath, but I didn\u2019t care.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Couldn\u2019t care about anything except making absolutely certain that Athena and the babies were okay, that her reckless stupidly brave decision to save me hadn\u2019t cost her everything.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Dr. Ben looked at Athena who nodded slightly, then he moved to her side and started his examination.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I watched every movement.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Cataloged every expression that crossed her face, every slight wince hesitation, every time she drew breath or touched her stomach, looking for any sign that she\u2019d hurt herself trying to save me.\u00a0<\/p>\n
My jaw ached from clenching it so hard.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The doctor pressed his stethoscope to her belly and I stopped irregular or weak or gone.\u00a0<\/p>\n
thing, waiting for him to say something was wrong, that the babies\u2018 heartbeats were\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHeartbeat one is strong and steady,\u201d Dr. Ben murmured. \u201cHeartbeat two is also normal, no signs of fetal distress.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Some of the tension in my chest eased but not enough, not nearly enough because just because they were okay right now didn\u2019t mean they would stay that way, didn\u2019t mean there wouldn\u2019t be consequences we couldn\u2019t see yet.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cBlood pressure is slightly elevated,\u201d Dr. Ben continued, wrapping the cuff around Athena\u2019s arm. \u201cBut that\u2019s to be expected given the emotional stress\u00a0<\/p>\n
and the energy expenditure from the healing.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Energy expenditure.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Like she\u2019d just run a marathon instead of potentially sacrificing herself and our children to fix injuries that I would have healed from eventually anyway.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I was an alpha, healing was what we did, it just took time and patience and rest.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But this, what she\u2019d done, this wasn\u2019t natural healing.\u00a0<\/p>\n
This was something else entirely and we had no idea what it meant, what it cost, what it might have done to the babies growing side her.\u00a0<\/p>\n
1\/2\u00a0<\/p>\n
11:00 pm G P P P\u00a0<\/p>\n
GPP\u00a0<\/p>\n
Chapter 339\u00a0<\/p>\n
This was the second time she was doing it while pregnant, second. How can she be that careless, how can they be that careless?\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cEverything looks normal, Dr. Ben said after what felt like an eternity of checking and rechecking and monitoring. \u201cAll vitals are within acceptable ranges, the babies are responding well, no immediate signs of complications.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Immediate signs.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That meant there could be delayed signs, problems that wouldn\u2019t show up until later, issues we wouldn\u2019t know about until it was too late to fix them.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I\u2019ll need to monitor you both over the next few days,\u201d he continued, looking between me and Athena with that serious expression doctors got when they\u00a0<\/p>\n
were about to say something important.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cRegular checkups to make sure there are no delayed reactions to the healing, for either of you.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cFine,\u201d I said shortly. \u201cWhatever you need to do.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cMr. Hayes, I really do need to examine you now,\u201d he said gently, moving back toward my bed. \u201cThe hospital will have questions if you leave without a proper discharge and we need to be able to provide them with documentation.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
I wanted to argue, wanted to tell him that I didn\u2019t give a damn about hospital protocol or documentation, but I could see the logic in his words.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The last thing we needed was to draw attention to what had happened, to raise questions about how I\u2019d recovered so completely from injuries that should have taken weeks to heal.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Memories Drifted Into Soft Silence by Kyx Frost 339 \u2018Check her first,\u201d I said through gritted teeth\u00a0 The words came […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[77],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-second-gear-of-love-novel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26496","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26496"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26496\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}