CHAPTER 169
The journey back through the medieval drainage tunnel with a newborn baby and a woman who'd lost significant blood was the longest thirty minutes of my life. I carried Addison against my chest while helping Skylar crawl through passages that had been difficult enough to navigate alone.
"I can't," Skylar gasped about halfway through, her strength finally giving out. "Harry, I can't make it."
"Yes, you can. Look at me." I shifted Addison to one arm and cupped Skylar's face with my free hand. "Look at your daughter. She needs her mother. We all need you."
"I'm so tired."
"I know. But we're almost there. Lucas and Jax are waiting for us, and there's a medical team ready to take care of you."
"What if I'm not strong enough? What if I can't be the mother she deserves?"
"Skylar, you gave birth alone in a collapsed building and then spent the next eight hours documenting evidence to save other people's children. You're exactly the mother she deserves."
With tremendous effort, she managed to keep moving through the tunnel, stopping every few feet to rest but never giving up completely. When we finally emerged into the courtyard where rescue teams were waiting, the relief on Lucas and Jax's faces was overwhelming.
"Medical team, now!" Jax called, helping to lift Skylar onto a stretcher while I carefully transferred Addison to Lucas's arms.
"She's lost a lot of blood," I reported to the Romanian doctor who was immediately checking Skylar's vital signs. "Postpartum hemorrhaging, conscious but weak."
"We'll take care of her," the doctor assured me, but I could see the concern in his expression as they loaded Skylar into the medical helicopter.
"I'm going with her," I said, climbing into the aircraft despite protests from the medical team.
"Sir, there's limited space..."
"I'm not leaving my family."
As the helicopter lifted off, carrying us toward the hospital in Bucharest, I watched Lucas and Jax through the window. They were standing in the ruins of Henry's compound, holding our daughter and looking up at us with expressions of profound relief mixed with lingering fear.
"Is she going to be okay?" I asked the doctor who was establishing an IV line in Skylar's arm.
"She's stable, but she needs surgery to stop the internal bleeding. The next few hours will be critical."
Skylar's hand found mine, her grip weak but determined. "Harry?"
"I'm here."
"The evidence... on the computers in the control room. Make sure it gets to the right people."
"Lucas already copied everything. Every file, every communication, every financial record. Henry's entire network is going to be exposed."
"Good. That's what this was all for."
"No," I said firmly. "This was all for her." I nodded toward where the medical team was examining Addison, their expressions indicating that our daughter was healthy despite her dramatic entrance into the world.
"She's perfect, isn't she?"
"She's perfect because she's yours. Ours."
The hospital in Bucharest was a blur of activity as Skylar was rushed into surgery while Addison was taken to the neonatal unit for evaluation. I found myself in a waiting room with Lucas and Jax, all of us still covered in dust and debris from the rescue operation.
"How is she?" Lucas asked about Addison.
"The doctors say she's small but healthy. Good lung function, normal reflexes, no obvious complications from the early delivery."
"And Skylar?"
"Surgery to repair internal bleeding. They say the next few hours will determine everything."
We sat in silence for a while, each of us processing what had happened and what it meant for our future. Henry was dead, his trafficking network was being dismantled by law enforcement agencies across multiple countries, and we'd successfully rescued hundreds of victims.
But none of that would matter if we lost Skylar.
"She's going to be okay," Jax said finally, though his voice suggested he was trying to convince himself as much as us. "She's survived everything else. She's not going to let childbirth be the thing that stops her."
"She almost died giving birth alone in a collapsed building," I pointed out. "Normal rules don't apply to situations like that."
"Normal rules have never applied to Skylar."
Three hours later, the surgeon emerged from the operating room with an expression that could have gone either way. We all stood up immediately, preparing for whatever news he was about to deliver.
"The surgery was successful," he said in careful English. "We were able to stop the bleeding and repair the damaged tissue. She's stable and should make a full recovery."
The relief was so intense that I had to sit back down to keep from collapsing. "Can we see her?"
"She's still sedated, but yes. One at a time initially."
I went first, entering the recovery room where Skylar lay connected to monitors and IV lines but breathing steadily on her own. She looked pale and fragile, but alive.
"Hey," she whispered when she saw me, her voice hoarse from the anesthesia.
"Hey yourself. How are you feeling?"
"Like I got hit by a truck. But alive. How's Addison?"
"Perfect. The doctors say she's small but completely healthy. She's sleeping in the nursery, probably dreaming about her dramatic entrance into the world."
"I want to see her."
"As soon as you're strong enough to sit up. The nurses will bring her in for feeding in a few hours."
Skylar was quiet for a moment, staring at the ceiling. "It's really over, isn't it? Henry's dead, his network is destroyed, and our daughter is safe."
"It's really over."
"What happens now? What do we do with a normal life?"
I thought about the question seriously. For years, our existence had been defined by missions, by the need to save people, by the constant threat of violence. The idea of raising a child in peace seemed almost foreign.
"I guess we figure it out as we go," I said. "Like everything else we've done together."
"I'm scared," she admitted. "What if I don't know how to be a mother? What if I can't give her the childhood she deserves?"
"Then we learn together. All of us. That's what families do."
When Lucas and Jax were finally allowed to visit, they brought Addison with them, freshly cleaned and wrapped in hospital blankets. Watching Skylar hold our daughter for the first time in proper light, seeing the way her face lit up with pure love and wonder, I knew that whatever challenges lay ahead, we'd face them the same way we'd faced everything else.
Together.
But as I looked around the hospital room at this unconventional family we'd built from trauma and determination, I couldn't shake the feeling that our real test was just beginning.
Because learning how to live in peace might be harder than learning how to survive at war.
And that was a challenge none of us had ever prepared for.
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