"Argent! They're waiting for you down the hill. Here take a flash light." One of the officers guards the cars nearby, hoping to catch something before anyone else. Spots of light dance all around the trees, I see groups of officers talking to each other and making a plan on the maps they are handing out. "We call to make sure we have cleared the place. We cannot let this animal leave here alive." I join the group of hunters watching them nearby, thankfully they were my kind of people. They packed themselves up with ammunition, handing me a gun of my own. "We head west, Kate and Leo your heading down to the river, the rest of y'all spread out around the perimeter. You heard them, don't let this animal out alive."
We pack more into what we could fit into our pockets, only having the flashlight guide our way down the hill, we tie a rope around us to climb down. Leo goes before me, making sure everything is clear to come and investigate, "Alright, Come down. Slowly." Taking out step at a time, I manage do get down without a scratch. The water was still, like ice. Only the reflection of the moon lights our way. "This is beautiful." Leo walks near the body of water putting his hands on the edge, sending little ripples to the center. "I'll head down the river, I won't be to far." He walks up and over the large rocks, losing sight of him seconds later.
There was no sound coming up from above me, no lights were near, it felt calm. Hearing the trees move around you, the whistles of the branches, you could hardly ever think that the woods would be a dangerous place. I sit down, laying my head against the large rock behind me.
I start to have thoughts of the baby, the different colors of the bedroom. Their clothes, bed, and toys. I couldn't even imagine the pain of labor this could cause for me, but it would totally worth it, for this baby.
The crack of a branch alerts me, I get up quickly and take out my gun, pointing directly to the left of the river. "Leo?" I whisper. But no sound comes through, "Rafael.." And then the bush suddenly moves, "Okay this isn't a joke come out." When the bush doesn't move, I put my gun down, walking to the noise. Then all of a sudden, this big black thing flies in front of me pinning me down to the ground. We struggle a bit, until it manages to get an advantage of me. We roll to the body of water, making it easier for me to get up, and see that the black figure was the animal we are chasing down. In gets on all fours, positioning itself for attack, getting low and then jumping back down at me. I shoot it 4 times, 2 in the stomach and then in the legs, but nothing takes it down. I run for the rope, but it was too late, it bit my leg dragging me down. He took bites all over my body, my arms, legs, and stomach.
Before it leaves, it sets out a large howl to the moon, following 5 other howls. Shots are being fired at it, coming from down above me and to the side. "Kate!" But I start to lose consciousness, the last thing I hear is the cry of a child.
"A young woman, Age 19, Bite marks all over her body. Keep the air circulating, heart beat 56." The noises numb my ears, light come through my eyelids. "Kate, your gonna be alright okay, I'm gonna be right here with you." Rafael's hands squeezes mine before I enter, what seems to be the ER. Doctors enter the room, scrubs, mask, and gloves all freshly put on. Metal scaples, tweezers, and needles, are dragged in by the cart. "Scaple." I feel slight pressure from my body, "Tweezers." My breathing becomes heavier, but doesn't seem to alert them that I can feel everything their doing. "Needle and Thread." In the speed of light, my hand squeezes the railing beside me, a nurse puts the mask back on me. "Her heart rates going back to normal." "What about her baby." The Doctor mumbles something to his assistant, "It's in good health, it's gonna survive."
2 Days Later
I open my eyes to see Rafael pacing in the room, worried. "Hey.." I get the strength to sit up from my bed, but he helps me before I do. For some odd reason, he looks at my stomach, brushing his hand on it, "What's wrong?" He doesn't say anything because he's interrupted by my doctor. He greets Rafael and then myself, "Good to see you awake, Ms. Argent. I hope that you have a good two nights rest, since your going to need it in the next few months." My eyes shoot to Rafael, who isn't showing any emotion to what the doctor just said. "Thank you. When will I be able to take her home." He searches for something in the papers, "Today, actually." And then the tension began.
The moment the doctor left, the air was different, like it was almost suffocating you. A call comes from my phone, 'Chris' I reach for it but Rafael takes it away and answers it himself. "Hey, yeah. Yeah, she's awake. Yeah, She is." He looks back at me with no emotion just staring into my soul waiting for me to explode.
The drive back home wasn't as weird as when we were in my hospital room, the radio lifted some of the tension. The house had not been touched sense I left that morning I went to work and requested a doctor's appointment. I walk up stairs and suffocated myself with the blankets, Rafael comes in after me, only putting my clothes back in the closet, and changing his clothes. "You haven't said a single word. What happened when I was asleep." He takes a moment to himself, then answers me, "When were you going to tell me you were pregnant. 6 months from now, or a year after I accepted to go back into the FBI. How could you keep something like that from me Kate! This is our child, I want to know everything that is going on." This is the time were I wished, I had been in the coma a little longer. "I'm sorry, I'm still trying to cope with this." He sits next to me in bed, tangling going our legs together. "I know, but were gonna get through his together, I promise."
6 Months Later
"Okay. Well you see right here, this is the baby's head, and here's the belly button. Now let's check what you will be having.." Rafael and I had a Doctors appointment today, to see what the baby will be before we start on the room, and naming it. "Well, I would like for you to meet your Daughter." He printed us the sonogram from the other room, "Wow, a girl. I can already imagine her, looking just like you." Rafael leans in kissing my forehead. The nurse cleans me up, and schedules me for another appointment in 2 weeks.
We stopped by the local hardware store for paint and couple other things to get the room ready. "Pink, or Yellow?" Rafael looks at the swatches and then watches my reaction, "White and Pink." He gives up and looks for an employee, "Yes, Can I have 2 buckets of 'Pearl White' paint, with then 'Soft Pink.'" "$35.24" While he pays for the paint I walk around the store for a little bit, and see the girls newborn section. Pink's, Red's, Purple's, and Yellow's cover the counters, diapers, formula, bath tubs, bottle, and pacifiers hang between them. "You ready." He stands in between the aisle watching me pick up a pair of pink ballet shoes, "She's gonna be so little." When I put the shoes on my stomach, she kicks, "Heh, she likes the shoes." "I don't know how I'm gonna be able to handle two girls in the same house for the next 18 years."
We stop again to pick up some food by our favorite fast food place, and eat it outside sitting in the table. The first bite I have had in a while, and all of my cravings are gone, the fries just given it that extra kick. "She's happy." We both look down to my stomach and see that she's moving like crazy, "She's gonna learn to love these burgers one day." And with that, I think back to my father and Chris. Whenever Lawrence, Chris, and I successfully completed our training, our dad would bring us to the diner and eat the special of that day, we would spent the whole afternoon playing at the local games, and dancing to the music. Mom would be so mad, because we would come home, and already eaten something unhealthy, but would be happy when we brought her something as well, her favorite pie.
"I think, I want to go back to Beacon Hills. I need to face my father someday, and I think he would love to be there when she's born. Maybe she can go to school there, and graduate at Beacon Hills." He finishes his last price of burger, "If that's what you want, we can move. And I think she would love to live there, lot's of trees to climb up, maybe when she gets older we can make her a tree house in the backyard." I nudge him, he gets up, reaching down to get a hold of my oily hands.
When we get home, I bring in the baby clothes we had bought from some stores nearby the area, and took them to the baby room. The room wasn't as big as ours, but it also wasn't as small as the bathroom. There was room to get two full sized beds and maybe even a desk, but their hasn't been anything in the room, not crib, no wall color. It was a good start for new parents.
When I go to my room, my phone starts to ring from our bathroom. "Hello?" "Kate? It's Chris." He sounds as if he's whispering, like he's hiding from someone. "How did you get this number? Did dad track me?" "No, I tracked Rafael. You've been gone for so long, I just needed to find you. Why don't you come home, you can explain to dad why you left, and we continue our lives, you can live with Rafael here." I hear footsteps come from behind and see Rafael's shadow stop at the door. "Come in." I whisper, he mouths to me who's on the phone, telling him that Chris found my number. We both sit on the bed, on speaker with Chris. "I have to tell you something, but you have to promise me you can't tell dad. Please Chris." "I won't, last time I did you left. And I don't, know what will happen if I tell him this, and I don't want to know." Taking a deep breath, I rub my stomach. "We're having a baby."
"I'm gonna be an uncle. Kate that's great, that's amazing. How do you feel, how does Rafael feel?" Tears of joy start to come down my cheeks, "It's great, were all great. And I'm exited to see her." I didn't expected Rafael to say anything to Chris, but I'm glad he did, because then he would have been suspicious. "It's a girl. She's due in the end of February." I can hear Chris chuckle on the other end, "We might be planning to move back home, but I'm not telling dad. You're the only person that knows were moving." "I'll arrange a house to be ready for you when you get here, just tell me the date." We both look at each other, smiling. "In two days." And with that we hung up.
We stay sitting on the bed, reading baby names from the local books we picked up from the book store. "Mackayla. Lizzie. Paulina!" "No, we are not giving our daughter that name, it's to normal. I want her to be different, I want her to have a name that not many people have. Here. Savannah, that's a really pretty name. Savannah.." He watches me for a while and then looks for another name, "Olivia McCall. It like it, Savannah Olivia McCall." Something about that name just sounded right, it might sound cheesy, but it was like it was made for her. We agreed with name, and everything after that.
Packing was a pain in the butt the next day, everything was just randomly pushed into boxes, foam balls were dispurst all over the floor. At one point Rafael fell into the box and couldn't get out, he did the swimming moves, the grabs, and the rocking but nothing. His 6'4 ft butt couldn't get out. We packed our clothes in the smallest boxes available in the store, while all the little objects at in gigantic boxes. "Here's the one shoe you were looking for, a month ago." I grab two bottles of water from the fridge, and walk into the living room and sit down on the couch covered in a blanket, "Oh Thanks..." I lean over and place the cold bottle on my ankles. "What? Their swollen." He continues to pile boxes while I wrap the fragile things in newspaper making sort of system.
"Ready, the drive is 9 hours long. And plus we have to beat early morning traffic." I wobble from the top of the stairs to the front door in what I would call a jog, but for Rafael, it was a slow walk. We look back into the house, remembering the first night we came in here, the night we came from the hospital, and the day we leave. "I'm gonna miss this house so much." He finally closes the door, and helps me into the car, before driving out to the street. With the radio really low, it puts me in a deep sleep.
I'm waking up from the bed, when I feel something wet below me. My dad walks in from the bathroom, cleaning a knife, "Where's Savannah?" He gives me a dark smile, "I took care of it, you won't suffer anymore than that child would have made you." I get the strength to walk into the bathroom, a trail of blood I start to cry uncontrollably, almost hyperventilating, gasping for air. "Kate!" Rafael shakes me from my dream, and I scream. "What did you dream about." I wiped the tears away from my face. "I don't think I could have this baby. Not with my father in the room, he would kill her. I can't have our daughter around him, not alone, not in the room, not even in the room with protective glass." He pulls over in live traffic, "Kate don't think about this, don't you dare think that our daughter is going to live in another home. She's not going to an adoption center."
I find the words to tell him, but I'm too weak to even tell what I think he should do. "Let's just continue driving, please. And we can talk about this with no fighting, when we get home." He turns the car back on and continues our drive back in California.
When we finally arrive at the new house, Chris's car is in the driveway. Then Chris comes out, and rushes to take me out of the car, and hug me. "God I missed you. You look happy, amazingly healthy. What about her, how's my niece doing." I hide the tear away from him and fake a smile the whole time he's there. "We named her Savannah Olivia McCall." "It's perfect." He then gets a call which breaks the happiness from the conversation, "That was dad, he needs me to help him with something, but I promise I'll be back to help you unpack." I thank him for all he has done and walk him out the door. To which I come back to a somewhat now angry Rafael.
"We're going to have this baby, and were going to raise it together whether I have to get a swat team to protect her and you from your father. You are my family now Kate, whether were married or not, you have become my family, and I will hurt him if he comes between that." I make him sit down beside me, "That's why. I can't have this child, because I won't be able to raise it, I'm not the motherly figure she's gonna want to look up too. I was raised with riffles, handguns, and knifes for living. Parents teach their young to hunt at the age of 7, I don't want her to be apart of that, I don't want her to be influenced by my father because she was born into this." He tries to hold me but I break away from his grip, "No, I have to tell you this. We can't be together, you belong into a world that needs someone like you. You need to live a life that isn't full of violence, and I somehow feel that I'm responsible for that, for you leaving your job to be with me. I love you, and this baby, but I can't give it the love and protection you both need. And I'm so sorry for telling you this, but I can't continue with this, you have to find someone else. Someone who can help you raise her as your own, just please do that for me, please."
We cry into each others arms for the rest of night, until we fell asleep on the couch.
The next morning, Rafael was gone. He had left a note on the coffee table, with two little boxes next to it. 'I gave you what you wanted, I'm going to find someone who can become the mother of our child. I just hope that once you give birth to her, you won't change your mind, I have to leave another thing for you. I will keep in touch in how your doing, and I will be present at all of your Doctors appointments. I just hope you made the right choice for our daughter. -Rafael' I sit in the living room, filled with nothing but silence. Chris comes around at one point in the day, asking where Rafael is, in which I tell him what we planned. "This doesn't mean that you won't be able to see her, I want you to look after her. Mean while I travel with dad on his new project." He doesn't give me a certain answer but he does promise to tell her about me.
In the next 3 months, not much changes. My dad never find out that I'm pregnant, but I do tell him that Rafael and I are done, and that I'm coming back into the hunting business with him. And that this time I won't have any distractions. Rafael found someone by the name of Melissa, and that she is a nurse at the local hospital. He seems happy with her, from what I've heard. He had sent me a picture of her, to see if I liked her raising my daughter in her home. And I did agree, she looked very nice.
My local doctor visits were normal, the baby was fine, healthy as a horse. He did say that she was growing really fast for a baby, developing hearing and responsiveness when I talk to her. At random points in the day, I would get scratch marks on my stomach, which made my think I was getting stretch marks, but I didn't really care. It was part of being pregnant.
Chris and Victoria helped me paint and decorate the baby's room, at sorts of light pinks and white. Drawings were hung up around her room, a nice white crib, was place behind the window. Everything was perfectly where I wanted. I kept the door locked during the day, and when Rafael came over to drop some stuff for the baby, he would look inside the room. He told me that since they are looking for a bigger place, they might buy this house once I leave with my dad to France. In the back of my head, I want to keep this house as something to come back to and stay to watch her grow up, but then again, I don't want her to become confused in who her real mother is, since she is being anonymously given to Melissa.
Chris, Rafael and I thought out of a plan, I will give birth at the hospital, and friend of Chris will drug Melissa unconscious, making her believe she had a child. Rafael will be by her side the whole entire time when she wakes up, to introduce to her their new daughter.
"Why does it feel like I'm planning my own daughter for failure, when I'm letting her be raised by a women whom her father has fallen in love with, and I'm forced to watch her live with them. They get to teach her how to walk, and talk. Her first day of pre-school, and her last day of elementary, her first boyfriend, her prom, even her graduation. They get to go to her music lessons or dance lessons, they get to go to her little league games, while I travel the world wishing I had her in my arms." "You're giving her the life you want her to live, she's going to grow up, and meet you. And she will love you for what you have done for her one day, this is what mom was talking about when she warned you of bringing children into this kind of lifestyle."
And for a moment I think that what I'm doing is right.
For her.