Disclaimer: See chapter 1

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"Where does it hurt Allie," Reid asked. She pointed to her abdomen just below her navel. Oh my God, he wondered, had he been too rough with her. Had he caused some complication from her surgery? "Did you take anything for the pain?"

Allie nodded, saying, "Tylenol, but it didn't work."

Reid ran back to the bedroom, threw some clothes on, grabbed some clothes for Allie and ran back to the bathroom where he dressed her, trying to be as gentle as he could. "Sit still, I'm going to bring the SUV around to the front of the building." He disappeared, grabbing his keys and running out the door.

He returned a few minutes later. "Okay, I'm going to take you to the ER." Allie started to stand. "No you don't," Reid said as he tenderly lifted her into his arms, "I got ya. Okay," he asked. Allie nodded and they hurriedly left the apartment.

Reid put Allie into the front seat of the SUV as smoothly as he could but the movement still elicited a sharp gasp of pain. He could see her clamp her lips tightly closed in an effort to be strong but tears escaped from beneath her closed eyelids. She looked so pale and beads of sweat dotted her forehead. "Okay," he asked then silently chastised himself. Of course it wasn't okay. He buckled her in, trying to avoid touching the painful area. Then he ran around to the other side of the vehicle, got in and buckled his seatbelt. He started the engine and made his way to the street, heading for Lincoln Memorial Medical Centre, the nearest hospital.

This was all his fault, he thought. He'd been too rough with her during their sexual calisthenics a few hours ago, though, at the time, that had seemed to be how she wanted it. He'd never forgive himself if he added more insult to her already damaged body. "Allie, I want you to tell the doctor what we did tonight. Maybe I hurt you somehow," his voice choked, "God, I never meant to hurt you. But you have to tell him. If I caused it, I'll face whatever consequences there are."

"This isn't your fault. You would never hurt me," she said slowly through the pain.

Reid thanked God there wasn't much traffic on the streets at 3:45am and it was fairly smooth sailing. He tried to drive fast enough yet keep any bumps and jolts that might intensify Allie's discomfort to a minimum. They arrived at the ramp of the ER in twenty-six minutes. Reid exited the vehicle and ran around to the passenger side for Allie. He gently picked her up in his arms and carried her into the ER.

The ER was, thankfully, not busy at 4:15 in the morning. There were two people sitting on chairs in the waiting room and neither looked in dire need of attention. Reid rushed up to the clerk. "My fiancé needs to be seen right away, she's having severe abdominal pain. She had abdominal surgery three and a half months ago after a car accident." The clerk called for an orderly who brought a stretcher. Reid laid Allie on the stretcher. She grabbed his hand in a death grip. "I'll be right here, okay. I'm not going anywhere. I love you." He quickly kissed her and the orderly rushed her off to an examination room.

"Sir," the clerk said, "Perhaps you could give me some information." Reid sat at the desk and answered the woman's questions about Allie.

Allie was wheeled into the examination room and the orderly told her someone would be with her shortly. She lay on her side in the fetal position as it was a little more comfortable that way and tried to concentrate on the room to keep her mind off the pain. She saw five other stretchers in the room with curtains that could be pulled around them for privacy but were open now as she was alone in the room. There were blood pressure machines connected to the wall and a machine with electrodes for heart monitoring. She saw oxygen outlets and tubing, IV poles and a cart loaded with solutions and other supplies. A few minutes passed before a nurse in pink scrubs came into the room. She asked Allie a host of questions about the pain. Where was it, when was the onset, what did it feel like, was it stabbing, dull or aching, could she rate it on a scale of one to ten, had she taken anything for it, what helped and what made it worse, had she had it before. Allie answered all the questions through gasps of pain. The nurse helped her remove her clothes and put on a hospital gown. She then took vital signs. "Pressure, pulse and temp are all elevated," she said. She left the room saying Dr. Meyers would be in shortly. Allie waited, wishing Spencer was there with her. He couldn't do anything for the pain but she felt better when she could see his face and he held her hand.

A man in a white lab coat entered and told Allie he was Rick from the lab and he had to draw some blood. He wrapped a tourniquet around her arm and deftly withdrew four vials of blood in about thirty seconds.

Only a minute or so after he left, another man in blue scrubs and a white lab coat entered with the nurse that had been there before. "I'm Dr. Meyers, Cynthia," he gestured to the nurse, "Is going to start an IV and we're going to give you something for that pain, okay," He smiled at her and Allie nodded. He asked her to lay flat on the back. With the sheet covering her as much as possible he lifted the gown and began a manual examination and palpation of her abdomen eliciting a gasp from Allie when he touched the most painful area. Cynthia had the IV going and injected something from a syringe into the tubing. It felt different from the Morphine she'd been given after her surgery.

"What was that," she asked.

"Just a little Dilaudid," the nurse replied. The last thing that Allie wanted was Dilaudid, she told herself but right now, she'd take anything that would stop the pain.

After the doctor finished examining Allie he said, "You have a very bad case of appendicitis. Your appendix is very inflamed and you'll have to have it removed immediately or it may rupture. We'll get you prepped for surgery. You'll have to go on antibiotics as you've got a fever of 103º."

"So this has nothing to do with the surgery I had after my accident," Allie asked. The pain was easing off markedly with the Dilaudid.

"No, this is a completely separate thing," Dr. Meyers informed her. Allie heaved a sigh of relief. The door opened and the orderly handed Cynthia a piece of paper.

She looked at the paper and said to Dr. Meyers, "Hemoglobin and hematocrit are good. White cells, ESR and HCG are all quite elevated."

"HCG," Dr. Meyers repeated.

"Yes doctor," Cynthia said, "It's 426."

Allie looked back and forth between the two of them. Something was wrong with her blood work. What did it all mean? Why weren't they telling her? "What's wrong," she asked. "What's wrong with my blood work? Is there something else wrong?"

"No, not wrong," Dr. Meyers explained. "We expected the white cells and the ESR to be elevated because you have an infection. The elevated HCG tells us something else entirely."

"Something else, what, what does it tell you," Allie asked anxiously?

Dr. Meyers smiled, "It tells us that you're pregnant."