Olivia excused herself to get some fresh air moments before her husband returned. Already finished with his breakfast, Pretending to read a fashion magazine, some of the women in it were interesting, he pictured their faces contorting in pleasurable agony. He smiled to himself and settled back to listen to Bette express her concerns.
"She's barely staying awake sitting up in the chair, and she hasn't eaten anything since yesterday." Bette started in with her best lecturing voice. "Have you even looked at her? I know you don't put a lot of stock in the big G Greggy, lord knows you seem to think you can do it all yourself, but he might be trying to tell you something this time. Beauty looks better then Livie does and she's been out for a whole day. You have to do something."
"I'm not asking her to leave our daughter." He replied firmly as he stared down the bright pink nail polish on her fingertips. "Caitlin might be angry at us, she may even hate us, but she's still our daughter. We need to be here for her when she wakes up."
"I'm not saying you have to take her to the Caymans!" Bette's many ringed hand sparkled as it shook at him in consternation. "Just get her to lie down for awhile. Take her someplace quiet, see if you can do something about this mess you've gotten her into."
He leaned back in his chair and snickered softly as he folded his hands on his knees. "Because it's entirely my fault? I think you missed basic biology."
"It's half your baby. Livie's the one with ALL of the feeling miserable-" She slapped his face lightly in annoyance. "I think you owe her!"
"Owe me what?" Olivia asked from the doorway to Caitlin's room. Looking at her with newly warned eyes, Gregory saw the signs of weakness that had Bette so up in arms. The way she blinked slower then normal when she tried to smile at them and how each step was calculated as she made her way back into the room.
He was out of his chair in an instant to offer it to her. "A whole day of shopping." Gregory covered with easy confidence. "I was just telling Bette how we'd had to reschedule. How are you sweetheart?"
Her chest rose and fell once, slowly, before she even tried to answer him. "I've been better." Not allowing him enough of a pause for him to start snowballing his concerns, Olivia changed the subject. "What did Roger say about Caitlin?"
Gregory smiled and bent down to kiss her cheek, taking that time to think of something plausible. She didn't need to know their conversation had revolved around her instead of their daughter. "She's going to be fine. Just fine. When she wakes up they'll give her a few tests and let her come home."
His fingers caressed the back of her neck and almost made Olivia remember what it felt like not to have her head lost in a haze of dizziness.
Suddenly remembering something, he touched her face gently, secretly testing the feel of her skin. The invisible sweat that came off her cheek on his fingers was a strong point in favor of Bette's suggestion. "I've got another thing to ask him. Don't go away."
"Fat chance of that." Bette muttered under her breath. Turning her frown in a brilliant smile, she leaned over the arm of her chair towards Olivia. "See if he'll drive you to Santa Barbara, there aren't enough stores in Sunset to make a shopping trip with Gregory's open wallet worthwhile."
"I don't need that much." Olivia responded with the most enthusiasm she had managed since returning home. "I'm not even going to wear all of it very long."
"All the more fun." Her flamboyant friend disagreed with a wave of her hand. "Face it Livie, he's stuck you with the baby for nine whole months, at the very least, he can spoil you a little."
Putting a hand on her forehead did nothing for the sudden wave of dizziness that altered the lighting in the room. For a moment the florescent lights of the room were painfully bright. Olivia squinted until they faded back to normal. "He's been spoiling me. London was lovely- the leaves were falling, and everywhere we went had the crisp smell of fall. I went for a walk down the bank of the Thames."
"Spoiling equals things Livie." Bette clucked her tongue in mock dismay. "Haven't you learned anything from moi over our years of friendship?"
Olivia was trying to convince her tired mind to respond when Gregory returned and stole her from the conversation. "Roger would like to speak to us in his office."
Bette mouthed "Finally!" to him as he helped Olivia up from her chair. He replied with a chagrined nod of his head to her as he secured his arm around Olivia's back. "Keep an eye on things for us."
"Oh I always do Greggy, don't you worry your handsome head over it." Bette winked at Cole, who had happened to look up from his magazine at the right time. "Julian and I will hold down the fort just dandy won't we?"
Cole feigned distraction and barely nodded. His heartbeat had skyrocketed with excitement. Gregory taking Olivia to sleep in Roger's office was perfect, so perfect he couldn't have a better set up if he had choreographed the entire situation. Now it was only a matter of time.
Gregory led her directly to the sofa by the wall of Roger's office. Without a word, he guided her to sit and and knelt to remove her shoes. Olivia put a hand on his shoulder, lovingly digging her fingers into the soft fabric of his shirt. "Where's Roger?"
"Doing his rounds." He answer cryptically, nonplussed by the fact that the man they were supposed to be meeting was no where to be found. Getting back to his feet, Gregory retrieved a blanket from cabinet perched on the far wall. Unfolding it as he sat down next to her, he fluffed it over her head and tucked it around her side as he lay her down in his lap. "We're going to wait for him."
The blissful stillness of his lap and the sofa calmed any protest she would have mustered. "How long are we waiting?"
Gregory shrugged, reaching around for a book from the shelf behind him. All of the books were medical, and he tapped his fingers along the gilt lettered spines until he found what he wanted- a guide to prenatal development that was not too advanced for his limited medical knowledge. "A few hours," he told her gently as he searched the table of contents. Conception in the end of June made her nearly fourteen weeks already. Time was flying by. Before he even had time to appreciate the new changes in his life, something even newer appeared. How long would be it be before she needed the maternity clothes they hadn't had a chance to buy?
"You rest." Pulling a dark curl away from her face, Gregory ran his hand over the soft skin in front of her ear. Her face was still damp with perspiration. Was it really just exhaustion? "Bette knows where we are. She's keeping an eye on Caitlin. You don't have anything to worry about."
His calming words were lost to her. Moments after putting her head down, she was already out. Perhaps he had overestimated her health. Surprised by the sudden ice in the pit of his stomach, Gregory stopped reading. Was there something else wrong? The indomitable strength of his wife was something he took for granted. Olivia could simply be exhausted. After all, he had drug her out of bed in the middle of the night and flown her four thousand miles home only to drag her straight to the hospital. Compound that with the stress of waiting by their daughter's bedside and it was no wonder she had passed out the moment she was safe.
Her hair was silky between his fingers as he reassured himself that when she opened her eyes, she'd fine. Olivia had a knack of bouncing back.
The medical book he slogged through proved drier then he anticipated, and as Gregory grew bored with it, he began to realize Olivia's exhaustion wasn't all he was ignoring. All the trying things he blamed himself for inflicting on her were taking their toll on himself as well. After noting that the door was locked from the inside, he closed his eyes. When Roger needed to find them, Roger had a key.
"I'm afraid I must be leaving your side for awhile, I've been wearing this for nearly two days and it's starting to grow rank."
Bette laughed and shooed him out of Caitlin's room. Ironically, Cole's excuse to her had some basis in reality. Though he had no intention of returning to his apartment to change clothes. He was changing clothes. Cole retrieved the duffle bag he had left with a kind receptionist and ducked into the public restroom in the fourth floor corridor across from the offices. Folding his clothes into a neat bundle, he tucked them inside the duffle bag.
He slipped a surgical cap over his head and admired his reflection in the bathroom mirror. He looked very professional in his pale blue scrubs. No one would question his presence. Cole reached into the duffle bag for the delicately wrapped bundle. Removing a syringe from the bundle, he inserted it into rubber tipped bottle that accompanied it. The clear liquid filled the syringe as he pulled back the plunger. It could be anything, water, vodka, acid... Cole tapped the needle, removing air bubbles. This clear liquid had one, simple purpose. He checked his smile in the mirror and headed for the office of Dr. Roger Baxter.
The knob was locked, Gregory was always cautious, but Cole had a copy of all of Roger's keys from his little break in at the Lichfield. It had seemed prudent at the time.
The door clicked open. Cole shut it behind him and waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. Gregory had thoughtfully drawn the blinds closed before letting his dear wife fall asleep in his lap. Taking in his prey, he felt the rush of excitement that tingled up and down his spine.
Gregory's head was back, his eyes closed in sleep. The open medical text lay in his hand on the arm of the sofa. Cole's feet were ghostly silent as he advanced on the sofa. The syringe fell from his sleeve into his hand. Fingers caressed the smooth plastic as he slowly lifted the blanket from Olivia's sleeping body. Her face remained angelically peaceful, her sleep was unencumbered. She had no way of knowing the nightmare standing before her.
His touch was as light as cobwebs as he removed her arm from the blanket. Gently tucking the blanket back over her body. he laid her arm over it. Rolling up the sleeve of her soft purple sweater, he felt the electric sensation of her vulnerable skin. Her skin was the perfect type, the kind of pale that held marks long after the injury had passed. Cole caught her above the elbow, squeezing her arm just above the elbow brought the vein of her arm to the surface.
The syringe broke the skin of her arm, sliding into the vein without disturbing her rest. The liquid disappeared into her bloodstream. It would lurk there, invisibly turning her body against her. When it overtook her, she would be entirely defenseless. Her flesh would fail her, her precious husband-
Gregory stirred, the pages of the text rustling as his hand shifted. Cole looked up at him with a start, forgetting the needle still lodged in Olivia's arm. He removed it quickly, realizing his clumsiness would leave a bruise where the needle had slipped out of her vein into the surrounding tissue. Carefully unrolling her the arm of her sweater, he let her arm remain over the blanket as he shut the door and locked the office again.
"She just came out of it. The nurses are taking her to run a few tests on her nervous responses, but after that we'll be sending her home."
Gregory sighed in profound relief. "When can we see her?"
Roger balanced on the corner of his desk as he signed off on his rounds for the duty nurse. "She'll be back from her tests in a few minutes. Looking forward to seeing you too, must have decided to forgive you and Olivia after all." Setting the charts on his desk, he turned his attention to his friends.
"How's she doing?"
Closing his book and replacing it on the shelf behind him, Gregory squeezed her shoulder, urging her awake. "I'm sure she'll be fine when she hears Caitlin's all right."
Olivia woke to a pounding headache. Her head felt like a metal band had been placed around it in her sleep. The light outside her eyelids bored into it, drawing the vice tighter around her skull. She knew it was Gregory's hand on her shoulder, his voice conversing with the other man.
"Caitlin's awake darling. Roger says we can see her soon." Gregory promised as he moved his arm from her shoulder.
Olivia winced as he moved her head off his lap and helped her up to a sitting position. "She's awake?" Her head protested the movement, any movement, with a flash of prickling pain. Roger slid off the desk to get a closer look at her as she pulled away from Gregory's concerned touch on her temple. "My head hurts."
Both men shared a look as Gregory brought his hand back from her face. "Liv, Caitlin's fine. She's going home soon."
"And I think you're going to wait for her there love." Roger suggested firmly as he nudged Gregory with an elbow. "In bed."
"I can't leave Caitlin here-" The two men coaxed her up to her feet, balancing her between them. "She needs to know we love her."
"She knows Liv." Gregory pulled her in, holding her to his chest. Roger left her with Gregory, heading downstairs to enlist Casey and Bette to take her home. "I'll compromise with you. I'll take care of Caitlin. You go home and and take care of her little brother for her."
She hadn't thought of it that way and the ache in her head agreed with Gregory. "You won't fight with her?"
His left hand smoothed her hair down to her neck. "I'll be on my best behavior," Lowering his mouth to her ear, he felt the rush of emotion she had the incredibly ability to bring out in him. "You keep yourself safe for me." Gregory's voice betrayed his fear, the concern for her that tightened his chest. "Cate and I will be right home."
"Won't even have time to miss you." Olivia added as she slipped out of his arms with a half-smile bravely on her face. "I'll go home."
He rubbed her back as he led her to the door and her waiting escorts of Casey and Bette. "That's my girl."
Her arm hurt. Gregory caught her feeling the sore spot with her other hand. "Must have slept on it funny."
Catching him with that earnest apology in his eyes, Olivia leaned in to his goodbye kiss. HIs concern was comforting, and she couldn't help wishing he was coming home with her now. She knew Caitlin needed him, but maybe having him at her side might banish the sick feeling that twisted the pit of her stomach.
"I'll be home as soon as I can." Gregory promised as Bette crossed her arms impatiently behind Olivia.
"I know you will." She replied gently as she turned away from him towards Casey and the elevator.
Gregory caught her arm, running his hands over her sweater. Stepping up to her directly behind her, he whispered over her shoulder. "I love you."
Her knees were shaky as she stepped up to Bette at the elevator and she couldn't place the tension that knotted her stomach. There was nothing to be worried about. Gregory promised there was nothing to be afraid of. Casey and Bette talked across her, both undisturbed by their 'assignment' as her bodyguards. Their conversation went nowhere in particular, but the good-natured banter was a pleasant backdrop and contrast to the unease in her mind.
Even with them talking and attempting to joke with her, she couldn't shake whatever it was that had her stomach cramping. Olivia swallowed, but it wasn't nausea anymore. Was it part of the pain in her head? They paused on the ground floor.
"I'll go get the car." Casey offered to them as they reached the lobby.
Bette favored him with her best charming smile. "Isn't he a gentleman?"
Olivia nodded without listening. The cramps in her stomach took on a harder edge, becoming almost painful. It must have been obvious in her face because Bette's sparkling hand caught her arm. "Hey Livie, honey, you okay?"
"I don't know." She took a deep breath and tried to find an explanation. Brushing her dark hair back, she let the air out of her chest slowly. "I think I'm just tired."
Eyes wide in sympathy, Bette reached for her hand. "Then we'll sit down." She suggested calmly, ready to lead her to the chairs in the lobby.
Olivia closed down on her hand in a death grip. Her eyes locked with Bette's in terror, pain etched on her face. Her breath caught in her throat as the cramps exploded into agonizing pain. Bette rushed to her as she sank to her knees. Hissing through her teeth, Olivia struggled to breath through her pain. It burned up through her pelvis, radiating through her stomach in flashes of white-hot fire.
"Livie, what's wrong?"
Casey returned from the car in time to hear Bette's desperate cry. Rounding the corner, he saw Olivia fall to her knees, unable to answer.
"Olivia talk to me. Olivia?" Growing more frantic by the second, her voice rose in pitch and urgency as Casey ran over to them.
"Olivia?"
His sandals slamming against the white tiles, he passed them for the first orderly he found. Catching the young woman by the arm, Casey pointed towards the lobby. "We need help. Now."
"She's going home with Bette and Casey. They'll take good care of her." Roger balanced an elbow around his friend's shoulders, understanding Gregory's nervous state. "Though, this constant worry of yours really is romantic."
Gregory shrugged away, reaching for the brown plastic coffee pot in the visitors lounge. "Olivia is everything to me. You know that."
Winking as he ripped open a sugar packet over his own cup, Roger reached for a plastic spoon to stir it in. "I just like making you admit it."
"While we're on the subject of admissions," Gregory blew across the surface of his coffee before taking a sip. "How is living with Bette?"
"Quiet, neat, organized-" Roger's poker face burst into laughter, crinkling the skin around his green eyes. "Never a dull moment. She has a lust for life that's positively exhilarating."
"I'm not sure if I would have used those words exactly-" Gregory coughed suggestively as they headed back towards Caitlin's room. "I hope she finds you equally as interesting."
"You know me Richards, anything for a beautiful woman." Their moment of camaraderie was destroyed by the crackling of the PA system.
"Dr. Baxter to the ER immediately. Paging Dr. Baxter to the emergency room."
Roger downed his coffee and dumped the cup in the garbage can with a grimace. "Duty calls. Tell your beautiful daughter I'm glad she's feeling better and I'll stop by to check on your darling as soon as my shift is over."
"Thank you." Gregory called after him as Roger jogged to the elevator, responding with a wave of his hand as he dove inside.
"Where's Gregory?" Olivia screwed her eyes shut, tears escaping her eyelashes as she writhed away from the nurses. Doubling up, she curled into a ball on the gurney as they wheeled her into the emergency room. Bette ran alongside, wringing her hands helplessly as Olivia bit back a scream.
Her eyes fluttered open as the nurses started cataloguing her vital signs. Bette grabbed her face, swallowing back her horror as she felt the cold sweat on Olivia's face. "You're going to be all right. You just hold on Livie, the doctors are going to make sure you're all right."
The resident physician pulled Casey aside seriously. "We're going to need some information, are you her son?"
"No, no I'm, she's not my mother." Flustered, he stumbled over his thoughts as he blurted them out, "Roger Baxter is her doctor. Her name is Olivia- Olivia Richards- She's pregnant." Casey pointed at the doorway. "Her husband is upstairs, I'll can get him-"
The young doctor nodded quickly. "Go. Hurry." He activated the hospital intercom. "Dr. Baxter to the ER immediately..."
"Bette-" Olivia grabbed her arm, hanging on to her as she lost her breath to a new wave of pain. "Gregory-?" Her voice faded as she squirmed in agony, pulling her hand back to clutch at her stomach. "I need him."
"Casey's getting him right now honey. Gregory's coming." Fussing over her forehead, Bette tried to keep Olivia looking at her. "Roger's coming and he's going to make you all better You just hang on."
"But it hurts." Olivia whimpered as Bette took her hand away from her womb, holding it tight between both of hers. "It's the baby, oh god Bette, it's the baby- this can't be happening. Not again." Terrified and blinded by her pain, she pulled Bette down close, clinging to her. "Tell me it's not happening. Make it stop...please, please make it stop."
When she suddenly screamed, overwhelmed by the pain, all Bette could do was stand helplessly clutching Olivia's hand to her chest as it grew icy.
Caitlin's warm hug meant she had forgiven him. Maybe a brush with mortality had been all she needed to realize how important her parents were to her. That eurotrash boyfriend of hers, Julian Deschanel, stood in the corner. It was decent of him to have stayed with her all of this time. A Deschanel usually left when things got difficult, but he was still here.
"I am so sorry you had to come back early from London for me daddy." Caitlin started apologizing immediately. "I hope Sean wasn't too disappointed."
"Oh no, he wanted to come home too, but your mother and I-" Gregory felt his daughter's shoulders stiffen under his hands when he mentioned her mother. "Thought that his classes were more important. And we knew you'd be just fine."
"And I am." She announced with a huge smile that faded into an embarassed giggle. "Though, I feel a little stupid causing such a fuss."
"Your mother and I-" Gregory watched the same tension play over her face and wondered what it was about Olivia that had her so upset. Was it really just concern about the Cole hurting the baby? Or was there something deeper and darker? "Love you very much. Even when you're angry with us and we need you to know that. Your happiness is very, very important to us."
Caitlin pouted her full lips, unaware of her own expression. "Even if you're replacing me?"
"That's what this is about-" He buried his desire to laugh, remembering trying to explain to a very serious toddler that they'd still love her after her mother had another baby. "Caitlin, sweetheart, we've had this discussion before. Did we love you any less after Sean was born?"
"No..." She agreed weakly. She loved her brother, sometimes he was all she had in their terrible house while she grew up. "Of course not. It's just-"
"Just what?"
Casey burst through the door, his face white with fear. He knew what it felt like to have words rip his heart out. "We need you downstairs. Olivia-"
Shoving his daughter aside, all of Gregory's mind focused on the one thought that governed his existence.
"Olivia collapsed."
Without waiting for his mind, his mouth whispered, "No-" Thundering in his chest, his heart demanded to know so desperately it jumped into his throat. "Where is she?" Choking around the tightness in his throat, he forgot Caitlin was there. He forgot Julian was standing in the corner, watching him with a sadistic smile. Gregory followed Casey, and they were running.
He pressed the down button, beating the round plastic as the light came on. Kicking the corner of the elevator door didn't make it move any faster, but he needed to hit something. Destroy something.
Bette stayed by her, remaining the only constant in the room as the medical team stripped her of her clothes. The pale hospital gown only served to remind her of her vulnerability as it clung to her sweat-soaked skin. One of the nurses slipped a monitor over her finger, another wrapped something around her stomach.
The monitors came as Roger barked orders. Her heartbeat flashed in quick green lines, and the fetal monitor reported the hummingbird rate of the baby's. Keeping one eye on that, Roger straightened out her arm, enlisting an orderly to hold it still so he could draw blood. Olivia's sobbing ripped at his heart, but he needed to concentrate. Gently touching her tear-stained cheek, he smiled at her with all the confidence in the world. "You're going to be all right love. I'm not going to let you lose your baby. Trust me."
Roger's gentle smile gave her something to focus on and the tiniest glimmer of hope demanded to be recognized through the fog of pain.
"Dr. Baxter? Would you look at this?" Roger drifted out of her vision as the nurse drew his attention.
He pursed his lips in surprise as he looked at her arm. A not-so-careful hand had done something to vein in her arm that was already starting to form a deep purple bruise in the crook of her elbow. "Take blood from her other arm, run a tox screen immediately."
"Olivia?" Biting her lip hard enough that she tasted blood, Olivia held still to listen to him. "I know it's difficult but I need you to remember if you hurt your arm."
Shaking her head no, Olivia moaned as she turned away from him. "I don't know. I- I didn't."
"It's okay honey." Bette tried to calm her as she winced away from the needle the nurse was using to draw blood. "If Roger says you're going to be fine, you're going to be fine."
Gregory drummed his fingers on steel rail of the elevator as it crawled down the shaft towards her on the first floor. When the door finally opened with a chime he tore out of it, dragging Casey with him. "Where is she?"
Casey didn't have to answer when her scream of pain echoed across the hospital. Gregory ran. He followed the sound of her voice until he burst through the curtain surrounding her bed. Bette backed aside, letting him into the circle around her bed.
Her eyes were closed, forced shut to keep her pain inside. Thrashing back and forth against the hands that held her, Olivia was in trouble. Her skin shone with cold sweat and the agony in her voice reached into his chest to squeeze his heart. "Liv- Liv I'm here."
Gregory's voice, his arms around her shoulders, the smell of his cologne, the feel of his shirt against her face- everything about him kindled the spark of hope in her heart. "I'm here now."
Roger touched his shoulder, still keeping his eye on the monitors over her bed. Olivia's heartrate had slowed ten points just from the moment of her husband's arrival. Whispering over Gregory's shoulder, he tried to let her keep her new calm. "I need to talk to you for a moment, out of earshot."
Kissing her forehead put the taste of bitter sweat on his lips. "I'm going to talk to Roger, but I'll be right back."
Prying himself away from her dug at his heart, stabbing his chest with guilt as her eyes watched him go. "Make it quick." He hissed to Roger as Olivia's gasp of pain knifed through his ears.
"There's a mark on her arm. I think whatever is happening to her was chemically inflicted. I'm running a toxicology screen and we're treating her with heparin to prevent hemorrhaging." Roger lowered his voice, only Gregory could hear him. "Heparin won't do anything for her pain, but it will keep her from miscarrying."
"She's in a lot of pain." Gregory mussed his hair, nearly tearing it out. "What are you going to do for her? You can't let her."
"It depends." Roger sighed heavily as he listed their options. He'd want to kill him if his wife was lying there. "Stronger painkillers might hurt the fetus and I doubt either of you want to take that chance. I can treat the abdominal pain directly once I find out what in the hell he did to her."
"And you'll know that-?" Gregory advanced on him, tone rising in anger. "Dammit Roger, that's Olivia in there!"