Читать книгу Operation Baby Rescue - Beth Cornelison - Страница 8

“Push!”

Elise Norris squeezed her eyes shut, gritted her teeth and pushed through the contraction that wrenched her belly in an excruciating vise grip.

The nurse at her side held her hand and wiped perspiration from Elise’s brow. “You’re doing great! Almost there …”

“Now breathe. Catch your breath. I think the next one should do it.” Dr. Arrimand peered at her over his mask and gave a confident nod.

As the pain eased, Elise rolled her head to the side to gaze at the ultrasound image of her daughter that was taped to the bed rail. The photo, which she’d carried in her wallet for weeks, had been her focal point throughout the delivery. In fact, her daughter had been her focal point for the past nine months. Longer than that. She’d been planning for, saving money for and praying for this day for years.

With a trembling finger, she traced the lines of the fuzzy picture she’d memorized in the past several weeks and smiled. Raising a child alone would be difficult. She had no illusions otherwise. But Elise had known she wanted to be a mother, wanted to raise a family, since she’d been a little girl herself. When she’d celebrated her thirtieth birthday without a husband with whom she could share the joys of parenthood, she’d researched sperm banks and set about finding the perfect donor to father her baby.

“It’s okay, Gracie,” she whispered to the ultrasound picture. “We’ll be fine. You and me. We’ll be a t-team.” The last word of her pledge caught in her throat as another powerful spasm of pain ripped through her. Building quickly to a crescendo, the contraction stole her breath.

“This is it. Keep pushing!” Dr. Arrimand coached.

She clenched her teeth and concentrated on bringing her daughter into the world. All her physical strength and love were focused on the task. Minutes later, the nurse laid a pink-faced bundle in her arms.

Elise gazed into her daughter’s eyes and fell instantly in love. The bond was powerful, emotional, solid. Her daughter. Her flesh and blood. Her dream come true.

With one finger she traced Gracie’s nose and lips. “Hi, sweetheart. I’m your mommy. Oh, you’re beautiful.” She smoothed her daughter’s tiny eyebrows and kissed her sweet forehead. A thin layer of hair the same shade of golden blond as Elise’s crowned Grace’s head, and she saw her own blue eyes reflected in her baby’s cerulean gaze. “You’re perfect. I love you.”

Elise tugged on the pink blanket the nurse had swaddled Gracie in and freed her daughter’s right arm. She lifted Grace’s hand and studied the tiny fingers, perfect fingernails, delicate skin. “So sweet and little …”

Not wanting Grace to get chilled, Elise pulled the blanket back around her daughter and noticed a small red pear-shaped birthmark on Grace’s right shoulder. “Angel kissed,” she whispered to Grace. “That’s what my mom said about my brother’s birthmark.”

A pang of regret stung her heart. Had she lived, what would her mother have thought about her granddaughter, her namesake?

At her side, the nurse fumbled with the tubes of her IV.

“What’s that?” she asked, spotting the syringe in the nurse’s hand.

“This will help with the pain so you can rest.” She injected a clear solution into the port and smiled. “Just another minute, Mom, then I need to take the baby to be checked thoroughly by the staff pediatrician.”

Already the drug she’d been given made Elise woozy. She frowned. She hadn’t asked for pain medicine. She wanted to be alert, savoring every detail of the experience. “I don’t want to sleep. I want to be with my baby, to bond …”

She heard her speech slur slightly as her eyelids drooped.

“We’ll bring her to your room later to breastfeed.” The nurse scooped Grace from Elise’s arms, and Elise felt a pang in her heart.

“Not yet. Give me … just another … minute.” But Elise could barely keep her eyes open. She forced herself to stay awake long enough to watch the nurse whisk Grace through the door to the next room. As she disappeared from Elise’s line of sight, her daughter gave a mewling cry.

Gracie …

Elise fought off the fog of sleep and blinked her surroundings into focus. The patient room at the small-town hospital was not lavishly furnished but was comfortable and painted a cheerful pale yellow. With a sigh she thought of the state-of-the-art hospital in Lagniappe, Louisiana, where she’d planned to give birth.

With her due date still three weeks away, she’d believed she’d be fine driving to the weekend crafts fair in the rural community forty-five minutes from her home. If she began having contractions, she could easily get back to Lagniappe. Or so she’d thought. But the best laid plans …

Her water had broken while she paid for an antique rocking chair, and the contractions had come hard and fast. Within ten miles, she’d been doubled over in pain and had pulled to the side of the road to call 911.

The local ambulance had arrived quickly—thank God—and she’d been rushed to Pine Mill Community Hospital in time for the delivery.

The window was dark now, telling her night had fallen, and she searched her walls for a clock. How long had she slept? A simple white clock over the door read eleven forty-five. Elise rubbed her eyes and worked to clear the cobwebs of drug-induced sleep to do the simple calculation. Grace had been born at 3:30 p.m., so … more than eight hours had passed. She groaned and found the call button on the bed rail.

Enough of sleep. She wanted to hold her daughter. Nurse her daughter. Memorize every inch of her daughter’s face and hands and toes …

“Can I help you?” came the response to her page.

“I’m awake now, and I want to see my baby. Can someone bring her to me?”

Her request met silence then a hesitant, “Um, I’ll … have the doctor come talk to you.”

The doctor? Elise tensed, butterflies kicking to life in her gut. She didn’t like the uneasy hesitation in the nurse’s voice.

“Is there a problem? Is my baby okay?”

“Dr. Arrimand will be in to see you in a moment, ma’am,” a different, more authoritative voice said.

“But what about my daughter? I want to see her.” No response. “Hello? Hello? I want my baby brought to me!”

Again silence answered her. She buzzed the nurses’ station, but her page was ignored. Irritation and concern spiked her pulse. Elise threw back her covers and swung her feet to the floor.

If they wouldn’t bring Grace to her, she’d go get her from the nursery herself. She was Grace’s mother, and they had no right to keep her from her. If something was wrong, she deserved answers … now!

Her head spun as she pushed off the bed, and her body throbbed from the rigors of the delivery. Elise grabbed the bed railing to keep from falling. Black spots danced in front of her eyes, and she waited impatiently for her equilibrium to return. When the room stopped shifting around her, she tried again to make her way to the door.

“Oh, Ms. Norris! You shouldn’t try to walk alone yet!” a nurse fussed as she bustled into the room with a blood-pressure cuff in her hands. She took Elise’s elbow and steered her back to the bed.

Elise tried to shrug away from the nurse’s grip. “I want to see my daughter!”

With a strength that overpowered Elise’s post-delivery condition, the nurse guided her back to the bed. “Dr. Arrimand has been called. He’s on his way, and he’ll explain everything.”

The cryptic response rang warning bells in her head. A bubble of panic formed in her chest. “What does he have to explain? What’s wrong with Grace?”

“The doctor will—”

“No! Tell me now! What happened? Where’s my baby?” Tremors of dread shook her.

At that moment, the dark haired doctor, now wearing a white lab coat instead of scrubs, stepped into her room and helped the nurse maneuver Elise back to the bed.

Elise drilled the doctor with a hard, frantic stare. “Where’s my daughter? Why won’t anyone talk to me?”

Dr. Arrimand took a step back from the side of the bed and cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, Ms. Norris, but while you were asleep, your daughter’s heart …” He paused, pressing his mouth in a grim line, then sighed heavily. “… Stopped beating.”

A chill washed through Elise, and she was sure her heart had stopped, as well. “Wh—what?”

“We did everything we could to resuscitate her, but … we couldn’t save her.”

The room tilted. Blood whooshed in her ears. Shock rendered her mute and unable to move.

This couldn’t be happening. She had to be hallucinating from the drugs they’d given her. Surely she’d heard him wrong. They had the wrong person.

“I’m very sorry,” the doctor muttered, eyeing her with pity.

No. Her baby was not dead.

No, no, no, no, noooo!

The denials in her head became a keening wail. Agony and horror rose in a suffocating wave, filling her chest, squeezing her throat.

Questions pounded her brain. What made her heart stop? Why couldn’t they save her? Why had they waited to tell her? Where was Grace now?

But her heart ached too much to voice them. Shock and grief made all but gasping sobs and tormented moans beyond her reach.

In the blink of an eye, her dream come true had turned into every parent’s worst nightmare. Her baby was dead.