Husband Chooses Mistress Over Me

The pain was unbearable. White-hot agony ripped through my body as another contraction seized me, the pressure in my head building until I thought my skull might shatter. The ambulance's siren wailed, matching the screaming of my nerves as my vision blurred and darkened at the edges.

"Blood pressure 190 over 110," a paramedic called out, his voice seeming to come from underwater. "Patient is presenting with severe preeclampsia, possible eclampsia. ETA to Seattle General, three minutes."

I tried to focus on my breathing, the way we'd practiced in our birthing classes, but my lungs felt constricted, as though iron bands were tightening around my chest. My baby. My precious baby. Please let my baby be okay.

"Michael," I gasped, reaching blindly for a hand, any hand. "Call Michael."

Someone squeezed my fingers. "Your husband has been notified, Mrs. Parker. He's meeting us at the hospital."

Michael. The thought of him calmed me slightly. My husband would know what to do. The brilliant Dr. Parker, the hospital's star obstetrician. He would save us both.

The ambulance jerked to a stop, and suddenly I was floating, the stretcher rushing beneath fluorescent lights that stabbed at my eyes like needles. Voices shouted medical terminology I only half-understood despite years of being married to a doctor.

"Jessica!"

Michael's voice cut through the chaos, and relief flooded through me. I turned my head, fighting against the dizziness to find his face. There he was, his dark hair perfectly styled even at this hour, his blue scrubs crisp and clean. His expression, though—something was wrong. He wasn't looking at me with concern, but with impatience, almost annoyance.

"Michael," I whispered, reaching for him. "The baby—"

"I know," he said, but he was already looking past me, down the hallway. "I need to check something first. The team will prep you."

Before I could respond, he was gone, hurrying away as a nurse called after him, "Dr. Parker, your wife's stats are critical!"

Confusion mingled with the pain. Where was he going? The monitors beside me beeped frantically as another contraction gripped me, this one so intense that a scream tore from my throat.

"We need to move now," a doctor I didn't recognize ordered. "Get her to OR three. Page Dr. Evans—we need him stat."

"What about Dr. Parker?" a nurse asked.

"He's been paged repeatedly," another voice responded. "He's with Dr. Sterling in room 204."

Rebecca. The name floated through my mind like a shard of ice. Michael's colleague who had returned from Boston three months ago. The woman whose name made Michael's eyes light up in a way they never did for me anymore.

The room spun violently as they wheeled me toward the operating room. Through the haze of pain, I saw Michael at the end of a corridor, his hand on Rebecca's arm, his face close to hers as he spoke intently. She didn't look critically ill. She was sitting up in bed, her hand resting lightly on her stomach—she was pregnant too, I remembered distantly.

"Dr. Parker!" A nurse shouted from beside my stretcher. "Your wife—"

Michael glanced up, his eyes meeting mine across the distance. For one heartbeat, I thought he would come to me. Then he turned back to Rebecca, dismissing me with a gesture that said clearer than words: Wait.

"BP dropping rapidly," someone called out. "She's crashing!"

As darkness closed in, I saw a man in a white coat rushing toward us, his face set in grim determination.

"I'm Dr. Evans," he said, taking control of my stretcher. "What's her status?"

"Severe preeclampsia, fetal distress, husband has—" The nurse's voice lowered, but I caught the words that followed, "—signed a DNR."

DNR. Do Not Resuscitate. The words echoed in my fading consciousness like a death knell.

Michael had signed a paper saying if I died, they shouldn't bring me back.

My husband had chosen to let me die.

The last thing I saw before unconsciousness claimed me was Dr. Evans's face, his eyes blazing with righteous fury as he snapped, "I don't give a damn what Dr. Parker signed. Get her into that OR now. We're saving this woman's life."