Page 219 of His Fated Luna

“I’m tired,” Rose murmured weakly.

No sooner had the words left her mouth than another contraction hit, and she bore down, gripping my hand as hard as she could. I smoothed back her hair.

“You’re doing great. I love you so much.”

“This pain is blacking out my vision.” Rose grunted.

Then she screamed again and pushed harder. “I have decided that if it doesn't work, I am going to call it quits and just go home. The baby can tunnel herself out because I am just done. Babies never stay stuck in the birth canal forever, right?” Rose panted, between contractions.

“Come on, Rose…push!” Dr. Danver cajoled.

She screamed, pushing and squeezing my hand with all her might as her contraction hit. I felt like my hand was being squeezed into mush.

And then the pain in my hand subsided as Rose’s grip grew weak. The delivery room erupted in the loud cries of an infant. An infant that was immediately whisked away as Dr. Danverstried to handle the expulsion of placenta post-delivery. I knew he had to make sure there was none still attached inside her uterus.

“Elena!” Rose cried weakly. She looked at me. “Go see her. She’s alone!”

I didn’t want to go and leave her alone. I was still afraid, what if something happened to her while I was gone?

“It’s necessary, Rose, to take her out of the room. We need to make sure your situation is under control first. This might hurt…”

Rose let out a cry of pain and then shouted, “I feel like something is scraping away at my insides.”

“…seems to have regressed…not as bad as before...” Dr. Danvers ignored Rose's words and grunted as he continued with his procedure.

“What are you doing?” I bit out as I watched Rose scream out in pain again. “You’re hurting her!”

“It’s necessary. We need to get all the placenta out. And I need to make sure she didn’t end up with tears inside her uterus,” Dr. Danvers patiently explained to me. “Alpha, she’ll be fine. She’s already healing,” Dr. Danvers assured.

“Go see our baby!” Rose pleaded, and I knew she was more concerned for the tiny life we’d created. “My baby is alone with strangers,” she ended in a weak voice.

I left, sensing that this was important to Rose. In my opinion, we were probably all strangers considering Elena had only been in this world for not even an hour. But I wasn’t about to argue with the woman that just went through hell and back to bring my child into the world.

When I ended up in the vicinity of the nursery, a nurse guided me over to the glass window. There were about five other babies in small cots. Even before the nurse pointed my daughter out, my eyes zoned in on the head of black curly hair and a pudgy fist that kept sucking her hand and crying.

“She’s the biggest one here,” I couldn’t help but say it a little proudly.

“She’s a little chunky baby,” the nurse agreed with a laugh. “Hungry too. The lactation consultant just went to pump milk with Luna Rose right now, so she’ll get something in her tummy pretty soon.”

As if on cue, little Elena wailed louder.

“Got a strong set of alpha lungs, too,” the nurse commented as I heard my daughter cry through the glass.

She was so cute with plump red cheeks that made her eyes look smaller than they actually were. Her tiny little forehead was creased with lines as her cries reached a mighty crescendo. Finally, another nurse appeared in the nursery holding a syringe, without the needle, full of milk for Elena.

“We don’t do bottles because we like to encourage breastfeeding,” the nurse explained to me. “Once they take the bottle, it increases the chance of nipple refusal. Of course, fed is best and we might have to switch to formula…”

I was barely listening to the nurse drone on. I kept my eyes trained on Elena. My daughter. Our daughter. A beautiful product of the love I and Rose shared. Tears stung my eyes. I almost lost this. In another reality, one where I let my ego get in the way, Imight have never had this.

“Would you like to try feeding her?”

The question threw me for a loop, and I said the first thing that came to mind.

“What if I drop her?”

That got me a resounding tittering of laughter from everyone nearby. Suddenly,I was being pulled towards a room beside the nursery, packed into personal protective gear to maintain sanitation. Elena was gently placed into my gloved hands. I breathed out in complete wonder. This was my daughter. The fierce protectivenessI’d always felt for Rose began to blossomand unfurl. It had suddenly increased ten-fold to encompass Elena in its tight hold. This was my family.

The infant peeped an eye open as I tried to get her to drink some milk. As I stared at her green eyes that were almost identical to her mother's, I realized Rose had been right. The word “everything” resounded across my brain. Every single thing that had happened had led up to this moment. This wonderful life I and Rose created together. I could never bring myself to change anything. Because if Idid, there was a chance we wouldn’t have this adorable baby. This amazingly smart daughter, who was clever enough to latch onto the bottom of the syringe and start taking in her mother’s pumped milk in small gulps. Maybe I was just biased, but I’d be willing to fight with anyone over the fact that my daughter was undoubtedly a whiz kid. Cute too. And strong, like her dad.