Fires of Autumn (48 page)

***

By
morning, Casey was in trouble.

Exhausted
and weakening, her labor was in full-force by the time dawn broke.  She still
wouldn’t let anyone touch her or hook her up to any monitors, screaming at them
when they tried.  Dr. Steele tried to convince her that everything would be all
right if she would only let them help her, but Casey was far gone with hormones
and agony and grief.  It was a devastating combination putting her in an
unsteady frame of mind.  She told Dr. Steele that she didn’t care what happened
to her.  She told the woman she just wanted to die.

Russ and
Tracy came over in the pre-dawn hours to try and talk some sense in to her. 
Riley had called the President and gave him the update, which had the man and
his wife driving over to Walter Reed with their entire Secret Service detail at
an ungodly hour.  Every Secret Service agent knew that Casey was pregnant with
Colt Sheridan’s baby and because of that, they all felt a certain connection to
her and to the child. This touched them all on a personal level. 

Russ was
shattered by her attitude, feeling as if everything was his fault, and Tracy
cried steadily as Casey moaned her way through hard labor.  It was a horrific
situation.  So many people wanted to help her, but Casey was numb to it.  Life,
to her, was ending.  Without Colt, she just didn’t care, not about anything.

As dawn
lit up the eastern sky, what they feared the most finally happened. Casey
suffered through a big contraction and a tide of blood erupted from her.  Dr.
Steele swung into action and an entire trauma team went to work on Casey, who
quickly passed out from the loss of blood.  As a huddle of terrified people
collected in the waiting room, Casey managed to naturally deliver a nine pound
baby boy, who screamed lustily the moment he emerged. 

The
Neonatal team whisked the baby away as Dr. Steele and the surgical team went to
work on Casey, who was quickly bleeding out.  They were pumping blood into her
as fast as she was losing it, and Dr. Steele cut Casey open in an emergency
caesarean even though the baby had already been delivered. She had to get to
the placenta which, now ruptured, was draining Casey of her blood and her
life.  She had to seal it off.

As the
doctors struggled to save Casey’s life, the neonatologist discovered that the
baby was a very healthy specimen.  At nine pounds and two ounces, he was twenty
two inches long and had a crown of blond hair.  He screamed furiously while he
was weighed and checked out, but he quieted soon enough when his grandmother
sat in a rocking chair in the Neonatal unit and fed him.  

Janice
wept over her new grandson, so torn between grief and happiness as her daughter
fought for her life.  She wanted to stay with the baby because she couldn’t do
any good for Casey worrying out in the waiting room.  If Casey passed, then
Janice wanted to be with the baby, a piece of her daughter that was still alive
and vibrant.  The baby had to know he was loved.

As life
and death went on upstairs, down in the lobby of the hospital, the morning sun
was just starting to trickle in through the big glass doors.  There were six
Secret Service agents spread out in the lobby, four of them near the elevators.
They were quiet and subdued, listening to updates from Harrios through their
radios.  People were arriving at work for their shift and there was general
bustle going on around them as they kept a sharp eye out.  

One of the
agents was standing near the lobby doors and he noticed a taxi pull up,
spitting out a very tall and very big man.  He was dressed in jeans, a worn
white shirt, and his hair was shorn very close to his head. He was very nearly
bald. As the man entered the lobby, the Secret Service agent took a closer look
at him because something odd rang familiar about him. The man had piercing dark
eyes and a big, dark mustache that merged with a trimmed beard on his chin.  
He was very tanned, swarthy, and rather scary looking.  But something about him
was very familiar, a feeling that grew stronger as the man approached.

“Sheridan!”

Steven
Case was one of the agents back by the elevator bays.  He nearly shouted the
name, causing all of the agents to look at him in shock.  Colt kept walking in
spite of the surprise of his fellow agents, marching up to Steven as the man
stood next to the elevators with his jaw hanging open.

“Colt?”
Steven still wasn’t entirely sure; Sheridan didn’t look anything like himself.
“Is it…?”

“Where’s
Casey?” he demanded.

Steven
smacked the elevator button. “Third floor,” he told him. “She’s in labor and
delivery. The President got the call this morning that….”

The
elevator door opened and Colt pushed his way in. Steven followed as the lift
doors closed behind them.

“We
escorted the President and Mrs. Talbot here about three hours ago,” Steven was
looking at Colt, who was staring up at the display as they rose between levels.
He still could hardly believe he was actually looking at the man. “She gave birth
about twenty minutes ago.”

Colt
looked at him, then, and something of deep shock registered in the intense
eyes. But he didn’t say anything.  When the elevator doors opened, the first
person he saw was Peter, looking at him as if he was seeing a ghost.  Colt
looked at him but blew right by him.  Peter had to run after him to catch up.

“It
is
you,” Peter hissed. “I thought the guys downstairs were smoking crack.  I can’t
believe you actually came. I wouldn’t have recognized you if I passed you on
the street, other than you’re still the biggest man I’ve ever seen.”

Colt still
didn’t say anything. He didn’t trust himself to.  He was frazzled, strung out
on caffeine, and so emotionally volatile that he was truly afraid what he would
do if he snapped. He’d been traveling non-stop for almost three days.  All he
wanted to do was see Casey.

Russ saw
him coming from his position in the lobby.  He leapt out of his seat as Tracy
gasped, which caused Riley to turn around to see what the commotion was about.
Spying Colt, Riley flew at him with open palms.

Colt
grabbed her hand before she could smack him, but another hand came up just as
swiftly and he barely missed being decked.  He grabbed both of Riley’s flying
fists as she snarled.

“You
bastard,” she seethed.  “You did this, you goddamn bastard. You left her and
she was pregnant and… and you
left
her! I hope you rot in hell, you
asshole!”

Colt
pinned Riley up as Russ and Tracy tried to prevent her from fighting him.  Russ
actually put himself in between Riley and Colt.

“Riley,
listen to me,” Russ hissed. “Honey, it’s not his fault. He didn’t go away
because he wanted to; he went because he
had
to. Don’t blame him for
leaving. It couldn’t be helped. The important thing is that he’s here now,
isn’t it?”

Riley was
still struggling but she burst into tears.  Distraught, she turned away from
Colt and he let her go.  He watched her collapse on Tracy as he turned to the
President.

“I
received your message,” he said hoarsely. “Please… what happened? Where is
she?”

Russ was
still in shock over Colt’s appearance; the man looked like a bandito from the
Old Wild West.  He was still big and chiseled and handsome, but he didn’t look
anything like the clean-cut All-American hero that Russ had come to know. The
transformation was astonishing.

“I didn’t
really think you’d show up,” he said honestly. “You dropped off the face of the
earth, Colt. No one heard from you and no one could find you. I honestly
thought you were dead. It’s really… astonishing.”

Colt
didn’t want to explain what drove him into hiding, not now. He was only
concerned with Casey.

“Please
tell me what’s going on with Casey,” he begged softly.

Russ
grasped his elbow and pulled him away from Tracy and Riley.  He struggled for
the words. 

“I don’t
even know where to start,” he said softly. “I never thought I’d actually see
you to explain all of this to you, so I’m sorry if I’m blunt.  Casey’s
pregnancy went well until about two weeks ago.  She went into pre-term labor
and the doctor discovered that the placenta was blocking the birth canal. The
risk there is that it can tear during the labor process and she can bleed to
death.  So her doctor put her on bed rest here at the hospital but for some
reason, she left the hospital last night and disappeared.  The cops found her on
the roof of a parking structure near the White House.  They thought she was
trying to jump but the managed to get her off and get her back to the hospital.
By the time she got back here, she was in full-blown labor but she refused to
let anyone help her. She just kept saying she had nothing to live for.  We all
tried to talk to her, but she was despondent.  About a half hour ago, she gave
birth to your son.”

By this
time, Colt was looking at him with tears in his eyes.  “A boy,” he murmured.
“Is the baby okay?”

“He’s
fine,” Russ assured him. “Big and healthy.”

“And
Casey?”

Russ
sighed faintly, his hand on Colt’s shoulder. “Last we heard, they were
performing emergency surgery on her,” he said softly. “She was bleeding badly,
Colt. They were trying to stop it.”

Colt
blinked and the tears ran down his face.  “Oh, my God,” he whispered, hanging
his head. “I… I have to see her.”

“You
can’t, son. She’s in surgery.”

Colt acted
like he hadn’t heard him. “I have to talk to her,” he murmured, tears dripping
off his chin. “I didn’t want her to… I know I stopped contacting her but I
didn’t have a choice. She has to understand that. I’ve thought of her every
minute of every day in the one hundred and seventy eight days that we’ve been
separated.  She’s all I’ve thought of.”

“Then why
did you stop contacting her?” Russ whispered. “What happened?”

Colt
didn’t even bother wiping at his face; he let the tears fall. “Because I’m a
marked man,” he replied in a murmured. “I pulled off Noestra’s assassination,
but the entire
Norte del Valle cartel is looking for me because one of my
contacts flipped and told them who I was before I could even get close to
Noestra. So I went into hiding. I couldn’t take the chance of being seen or
recognized, so I’ve been hiding out on the Caribbean coast. I couldn’t even
chance going into town, for any reason, not even to make a call.  I had to stay
out of sight, do my job, and then go back into hiding until the heat died
down.”

“But
you’re here now.”

Colt
looked at him, then. “I had to come,” he muttered. “Casey’s worth more than my
life. I had to take the chance and try to get back here.”

Russ could
see how exhausted and tense the man was; he was still in hunted mode, that
transition into something almost inhuman because his life was on the line every
second of the day.  Russ had heard about agents getting this way but he’d never
seen it. Colt wasn’t the Colt they all knew at the moment, but he was getting
there. Slowly but surely, he was returning to normal.  He was coming back to
the world. 

“Do you
think they followed you here?” Russ asked.

Colt
half-nodded,half-shrugged. “I was smuggled out of
Riohacha
,” he muttered. “But the cartel wasn’t far behind; they
never are.  They’ve got eyes and ears everywhere. It was a running gun battle
on the boat until I reached a Navy destroyer in the gulf.  After that, I had to
wait for the destroyer to get within helicopter range of the coast and from
there, I took a plane from Galveston to Dulles.  It’s been three days of hell
and it’s not over yet.”

Russ wasn’t
sure what more he could say to that. Colt was being hunted because of what he
had done for him with the Norte del Valle.  Russ knew that group; he’d known
them for twenty years. He knew what they were capable of.  His guilt returned.

“Thank
you,” he whispered. “For everything you’ve done for me, thank you. It doesn’t
seem like enough to say that, but it’s the truth.”

Colt
sighed heavily and wiped at his wet face. “I need to see Casey,” he began to
look around, as if he was looking for her. “Please… can you just ask someone
how she is? Can you ask them if I can see her?”

Russ could
see he was starting to get agitated. “They’ll tell us something as soon as they
know anything,” he promised. “You have to let them do their job, Colt. She’ll
be okay. Meanwhile, come along with me. There’s someone I think you should
meet.”

Colt let
Russ pull him down the hallway with a half-dozen Secret Service agents in tow. 
Colt could hear babies crying and suddenly, they were standing in front of the
nursery with big, wide windows opening to the incubators beyond. Russ knocked
on a security door and a nurse opened it.  She allowed the President and Colt
to enter but made the Secret Service agents stay outside, which freaked them
out a little bit.  But Russ assured them that he was safe with Colt, so they
backed down.

Russ
explained why they were there and the nurse made Colt and Russ wash their hands
and put on surgical gowns.  Once they were properly scrubbed, they were allowed
to go into a small nursery area with several incubators and a few bassinets. 
There were Cpap and other machines all over the place, looking odd and
threatening amidst the puppy and kitten wall paper.