Secrets Revealed
Chapter 10: Baby of Mine


She shouldn’t be here. Emily thought as she pulled her coat
closer around her. She really shouldn’t be here. Sneaking out of a
hospital room in the middle of the night was not good protocol,
especially when your mother was the chief of staff. Especially
when you had been brought in less than 24 hours before not
breathing. She still had the inserts in her arms for the IV.

She shouldn’t be here. But there was nowhere else she
could be.

She takes a long look around her and almost smiles. This is
where it started for Lucky and for her. She remembered that day
so vividly. She had broken every rule she had lived by and returned
to Port Charles to be there for her grandmother’s funeral. She had
intended to slip in and then slip out again. But that had changed
when Lucky had spotted her. Her whole world had changed when
Lucky had spotted her.


Now six years later everything was about to change again.

How was she supposed to make this choice? How could
anyone be expected to make this choice?

God, she wished Lucky was here. Somehow in his arms,
looking in his eyes, she saw herself and the world so much clearer.
She needed her husband.

But their son needed his father so much more.

She closed her eyes briefly and fought for control. She
hadn’t come here to break down. She had come here to think. And
to seek advice from an old friend. She opens her eyes and looks at
the darkened tombstone in front of her. It’s too dark for her to see
the words, but she knows what the headstone says.

Elizabeth Spencer.

Lizzie. Liz. Her best friend. Lucky’s first love.

“I never got to say goodbye,” Emily’s voice is barely a
whisper but it carries in the silent graveyard. “I think that’s what
I’m most sorry about. I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to you
that day at Kelly’s when I left. And I wasn’t here at your funeral to
say goodbye to you then. I wanted to be here you know. I
remember the last time we talked. You were so happy. So full of
joy. All you could talk about was your wedding. You wanted me
to be a bridesmaid. I didn’t have the heart to tell you no. But I
couldn’t say yes. I wanted to. I wanted to be the one to help you
plan your wedding. I wanted to throw you a bridal shower. I
wanted to catch the bouquet at your wedding. I hope you know
how much I wanted to do all those things for you. But I had to
leave town. And I couldn’t come back. No matter how scared or
how lonely or how homesick I got I couldn’t come home. I
couldn’t even pick up the phone. I hope you didn’t worry about
me too much. I didn’t worry about you. I knew you had Lucky. I
knew he would keep you safe. He’s good at keeping people safe.”
Emily smiled.

“I’ve missed you so much. You were the first real female
friend I ever had. My best friend. I could tell you things and I
knew that you understood. I would ask you for your advice and
you were always honest. I would have all these crazy plans and
you were the person who kept me grounded. Kept me real. When
being Emily Quartermaine got to be too much, you let me be just
Emily. You have no idea how precious the gift of your friendship
was.”

Emily lowered herself until she sat in front of the
tombstone, heedless of of the cold ground beneath her. “I need
that friendship now. I need it so much. There is no one else I can
talk to about this. My mom and Lucky’s mom. They try to listen.
And I know they support me and Lucky. But they are treating me
like I’m made of glass. Tiptoeing around the subject and it’s
driving me crazy. I can talk to Lucky. And I will. But if I call him
now, I’ll just distract him. How do I tell him this kind of stuff over
the phone? Do I just call him up and say excuse me Lucky but you
have to chose between me and our child? Who do you want to
live? Who do you want to die? How do I say this to him when I’m
not there to hold and stop him from going crazy? I have to wait till
he gets back and I don’t know when that will be. I miss him. I miss
them both. I pray to God that Jonathan is safe.”

“It isn’t fair you know,” Emily couldn’t keep the tinge of
bitterness out of her voice. “After everything we’ve been through,
we were finally happy. Then Jonathan was stolen. And now the
baby. We deserve a chance to be happy. To be a family. It isn’t
fair.” she repeats the words as if they are a mantra for her to
believe in. Then she stops and realizes what she has just said.

“Oh God. Oh God Liz I am so sorry,” Emily choked back
her tears. “Here I am ranting and raving about how unfair life is to
you. If life was fair you would be still here. You and Lucky would
be celebrating your 11th anniversary. Instead you’re gone. And
Lucky is with me. I want you to know that it wasn’t easy for him
to get over you. But I guess you knew that. I know you are
watching over him. I hope you don’t mind my loving him. Or his
loving me. Somehow I think that the two of us together would
make you happy. I’m not nearly as good a person as you are, but
Lucky makes me a better person.”

“Oh God,” Emily gave a short laugh. “I’m meandering
aren’t I? I can hear your voice- Get to the point Em! I came here
to ask you for your advice, not go on and on about the past. It’s
just been so long since we talked.” Emily drew a deep breath.
“And then again, maybe I’m avoiding it because I don’t want to
talk about. Maybe saying it out loud will make it real. It’s like this
Liz. I’m sick. Tony says I’m really sick. And I’m going to get
sicker. I might even die. But Tony (do you know how strange it is
to think of Tony Jones as a respected doctor again) Tony says
that the medicine that will cure my sickness could make my baby
sick. Maybe even kill my baby. My life or my child’s? I know, it’s
an easy choice isn’t it? I made it before when Helena kidnapped
me. I would have done anything to keep Jonathan safe. I would
have died to protect my child. I still will. But God Liz this is so
much more complicated.”

“If I don’t have the medicine....there’s a chance that I’ll be
too weak to carry a child to term. So we both could lose. Or the
baby could survive and I would die. Or I could take the medicine
and my baby might be damaged or miscarry. I lost a baby once. I
know what that feels like. The way it rips your soul and it takes so
long for the tear to heal. To be the cause of so much pain.”

“And then there’s Jonathan. He’s my son. Mine and
Nikolas’s, but I guess you knew that too. He needs me. He’s only
a little older than I was when my mother died. You know how
screwed up losing my mother made me. How lonely I was. The
emptiness inside that no one, not my friends and not the
Quartermaine’s could fill. And Jonathan is already so scared of
losing me. Did I tell you that after what happened in Mexico,
Jonathan wouldn’t leave my side. Not even when Lucky joined us.
For two years he carried a cell phone and he would call me every
hour on the hour while we were away. Just to hear my voice. Just
to know that I was safe. How do I make my little boy grow up
without a mother?”

“And then there’s Lucky. How do I put him through losing
another wife? How do I make him raise a child from infancy at the
same time he’s guiding another through puberty. How do I make
him a single father? How do I say goodbye to him? How did you?”

Emily let’s the tears go unchecked. “And I know it’s selfish
of me, but I want to live to a ripe old age. I want to see my son
grow up. I want to be there to hear him tell me about the first girl
he asks out. I want to stay up late when he misses his curfew. I
want to teach him to drive. All right, I’ll let Lucky do that. I’ll just
watch. But I get to help him pick out a college. There are so many
things I want to do and see and experience with him.”

“And Lucky. I want to go to bed in his arms. I want to
wake up to his kisses. I want to live my life with the man I love.
Whatever that life brings. I want to race him down the hall in our
matching wheelchairs at the nursing home when we turn 95.”

“But there’s something else I want. I want this little life
inside of me to open her eyes and look at the world for the first
time. I want her to learn to talk. To crawl. To walk. To run. To
fly. I want my baby to have a chance to do all the things that I
wished I did.” Emily’s voice cracks at the last phrase.

“Tell me what to do?” she begs the cold headstone. “Tell
me how to choose.”
The only answer she gets is continued silence. Emily
begins to cry, softly and steadily. Muffled footsteps sound as a
man comes up behind her, lifts her up, turns her into his chest and
lets her cry. The two stand in silence for a few more minutes.

“Come on, Emily.” The man’s voice is laced with
sympathy. “Let’s take you back to the hospital before your
disappearance is noted. Anyone finds out that I did this and I could
be in a lot of trouble. It’s bad enough tall, dark, and silent over
there insisted on coming.” He motions to the bodyguard Jason had
assigned to her. “I feel like some kind of fugitive.”

“I know you could get into trouble for this. Thank you for
bringing me here. I hope...” she began.

Reggie smiled. “Don’t worry about it. At this stage in the
game, your family doesn’t dare to fire me. Can you imagine the
bestseller I could write?”

Emily reluctantly smiles as the two long time friends exit
the cemetery and return to the hospital.

El Paso
Memorial Hospital

There was a sea of blue in the waiting room that spread out
into the hallways and corridors. It even drifted down to the blood
bank in the basement where a line of officers was formed to give
blood. The media waited outside the hospital to file yet another
report of the growing violence in El Paso. All they needed at this
point was to know if the police officer wounded in the violent
shootout at the zoo was alive or dead. One anchor was heard to
remark that she hoped the officer died quickly so that they could
headline the late night news with the story.

Inside the operating room the same police officer was
fighting for her life. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say
that the doctors were fighting that battle and dragging her along
for the ride. She had died three times so far. Once at the scene.
Twice on the table. Each time the doctors feared that she would
not make it back. Each time she did.

Maxie Jones had a tough heart. It was given to her by her
cousin. It was not about to let her die without a battle. Even if the
rest of her body was willing to give in to the shock, bleeding, and
internal injuries and slip quietly away. Her heart wasn’t’t about to
give up. And so the rest of her had to stay and fight too.

The doctors in the operating room were exhausted, the
surgery had already taken six hours. The patient had lost more
blood than she could afford to lose. The internal damage to the
chest cavity was enough to kill most people. But not this one.


The rumors filtered in to the operating room about what
had happened at the zoo. Police officers had whispered it to nurses
who whispered it to doctors. A police detective. This young and
beautiful woman was a police detective. A detective whose
courage had far exceed the realm of duty. She had stepped into the
path of a bullet. She had served as a human shield for a young girl.
A little girl who, according to the nurses who came into the ER to
replenish supplies or check on progress, was sitting in a special
waiting room praying for God to spare the officer’s life. A little
girl who had just lost both her grandparents to a violent crime.
Who had lost her mother a year ago.

So the doctors kept fighting their battle, refusing to give
up. Refusing to call it. And after a while, they couldn’t figure out
whose life they were trying so hard to save- the detective lying on
their operating table or the little girl who wouldn’t give up hope.


What the doctors don’t realize is that they are saving three
lives in that operating room. The third life belongs to the
thirtysomething man with the cold hard stare who has not moved
in over an hour.

“Jason. Jase.” Luke has to repeat himself three or four
times before Jason looks up. “You want some coffee?”

Jason shakes his head. What he wants is for Maxie to be
standing there in front of him. Yelling at him. Calling him an idiot.
Telling him how much she hates him. He doesn’t care. He wants
her alive. It’s all he wants.

Luke shrugs and drinks the coffee himself, thinking to
himself that its a good thing they only serve poison like this in
hospitals.

They are all there holding a silent vigil in a private waiting
room far removed from the one filled with police officers. The
room is small, almost claustrophobic, but no one notices. They are
each in their own way trying to cope with what happened earlier.
Trying to prepare for what will happen next. Whatever that may
be.

Lucky pulls Jonathan closer to his side. The boy has began
to nod off sometime in the last hour or so. He has refused all offers
to find a hotel room and get some sleep in a real bed. It was
difficult enough to convince him to get something to eat. Lucky
smoothes the hair back from his forehead, thanking God yet again
for bringing Jonathan through this latest ordeal. But as he sits
there, quietly sinking in his son’s presence, he realizes that his
concern at the moment is not for Jonathan or even Maxie, but for
Emily. Something is wrong. He can feel it somewhere inside
himself. He had made one call to Port Charles after Jonathan was
recovered, but Laura had said she was sleeping. Knowing that
should have worn herself out with worrying, Lucky had insisted
his mother not wake her. They would be going home on a flight in
the morning. He and Jonathan would. He had a strange feeling that
Jason would not be returning to Port Charles. And knowing Luke,
his father would opt to stay for at least a day or so to make sure
there were no loose ends. No clues yet to uncover. Unconsciously
he pulled Jonathan closer, keenly aware that the danger was not
over. They had Helena’s men, but Helena herself was still out
there. Katherine Bell was still out there. Looking at the grim
expression on Jason’s face, Lucky almost felt sorry for Katherine.
Almost. He glanced around the room and his eyes locked with
Nikolas’s sitting in a chair by himself. They still had a lot to talk
about. He saw Nikolas’s eyes dart back and forth between
Jonathan and Stephanie, who sat next to Jonathan on the other end
of the waiting room couch. The two children’s hands were
interlocked. It was clear to Lucky that whatever ordeal the
children had gone through it had cemented a bond between the
two half siblings. He wondered what Jonathan was thinking about
his new half sister. He wondered what Jonathan thought of his
father.

At that moment, Jonathan wasn’t thinking of either his
father or his sister. He was thinking of that police officer in there.
The one who had sheltered him from the storm of bullets at the
zoo. The one who had taken the bullet meant for Stephanie. He
wanted her to live. He needed her to live. Jonathan knew what it
was like to live with the fact that you had cost someone your life.
Hadn’t he cost Sean Donnelley his life six years ago? At school
one day he had gotten on the internet and looked up Sean’s
obituary notice. He had left behind two daughters not much older
than he was. Somewhere there were two girls who were going
through their teenage years without a father. He had to live with
that guilt. Stephanie would not. This detective, Maxie his dad had
called her, she was going to live. She had to.

She as to live, Jason thought to himself. She has to live.
She doesn’t have to have anything to do with me ever again. But
she has to live. I can’t lose someone I love again. All right. I admit
it. I love her. God help me. God help her. I love Maxie Jones. I
never thought I would fall in love again after losing Robin. But
there’s something about Maxie, she’s so full of fire and life. She
deserves so much more than I can give her. But I love her. He
remembers again the moment she was shot. The frozen second
when their eyes met before she collapsed. When I know she’s well.
When I know she’s going to be okay. Then I’m finally going to do
what I should have done six years ago. I’m going after Helena
Cassadine. And Katherine Bell. I will track them down wherever
they are hiding. And I will make them pay for what they did to
Emily. For what they did to Jonathan. And above all what they did
to Maxie.

The door to the waiting room opened and all eyes swung in
that direction.

“Luke” The woman was older than her daughter, but just
as beautiful. “They said you were here. They said Maxie was....”
Felicia’s voice broke and Luke drew her into a warm embrace.

“Where’s Mac?” Luke asked. Felicia gathered herself
together and stepped back. “You know Mac. He’s asking the
police for their reports and going over what happened. The nurse
said Maxie was still in the operating room. Mac..Mac needs
something to do or he’ll go crazy waiting. After losing Robin”
Jason flinches and Felicia looks at him apologetically. “After losing
Robin Mac will be devastated if anything happens to Maxie.” She
starts to cry again.

Mac, who has entered the waiting room unseen, pulls her
out of Luke’s arms and into her own. “Maxie will be okay. She’s
strong and she’s a fighter just like her mother.” He looks over her
shoulder at the rest of the people in the waiting room. His eyes
narrow when he sees Jason. He is about to demand to know what
happened, when he feels a gentle tug on his shirt. He looks down
and finds himself looking into the solemn eyes of Stephanie
Cassadine.

“Are you the detective’s father?” Stephanie asked.

Mac nodded.

“She’s in there because of me,” Stephanie confessed with
tears in her eyes. “The bad lady, the one who stole Jonathan from
his parents, was going to shoot me but your daughter saved me. I
hope she’s okay.” The last was little more than a whisper.

Mac closed his eyes and Felicia bent and enveloped the
young girl into her arms. “I hope so too,” Felicia whispered softly.
“I hope so too.”


Thirty minutes later, Jonathan shifts and sits up. “I want to
go home,” he says simply and then realizes that he doesn’t know
where home is at the moment so he amends his statement. “I want
to be with mom.”

Lucky nods. “Me too. We’ll be on a plane headed towards
Port Charles in the morning. You’ll see your mom soon. I
promise.” And I’ll talk to her sooner than that Lucky promises
himself. Whatever is wrong, we’ll deal with it together.

“Can I go home with you?” Stephanie asks having resumed
her seat next to Jonathan. “I want to go home.”

Lucky smiles at his niece. She reminds him so much of
Kim. How does Nikolas stand seeing his wife’s face everyday? “I
think you’re Dad wants you to stay with him sweetheart. I’m sure
he plans on taking you home in the Cassadine jet in a day or so.”

Stephanie shakes her head. “I want to stay with Jonathan.
Someone has to protect Jonathan,”

“I can take care of myself,” Jonathan replies. “Besides
you’re just a kid. How can you protect me?”

Stephanie smiles. “After this, my dad will triple my
bodyguards. Where I go, they go. Instant protection.”

Lucky finds himself laughing. “I think she’s got you there
son.”

Stephanie turns to her dad. “Can I go with Uncle Lucky?”

Nikolas hides the scowl at hearing Lucky call Jonathan son
and smiles at his daughter. “I have to stay in El Paso and take care
of some business with your aunts and uncles. Your grandparents
are being buried in two days. I think you should stay.”

Stephanie shakes her head frantically. “Please don’t make
me go. I can’t go back to that house. I can’t go the funeral. I
can’t.”

Nikolas looks up to find himself being glared at openly by
his son. After a moment, he nods. “You can go home with Lucky
and Jonathan. I’ll be home in a day or so. I’ll call Grandma Laura
and make sure you can stay there. You can even take the jet home
and I’ll have it sent back to pick me up.” Lucky starts to protest.
“Don’t argue Spencer. It will get you home twice as fast as the
commercial airline.”

Lucky would have held out except that he wanted, no
needed, to make sure Emily was okay. So he nodded.


Mac has asked Jason to step into the hallway. Expecting
hostility but for Maxie’s sake trying to avoid a confrontation with
her stepfather, Jason quietly accompanies him.

“We haven’t exactly had a chance to talk over the last few
years,” Mac begins.

“You mean outside of your usual monthly round up,”
Jason begins and then sighs. He thought he had grown up more
than that. “Forget it. Your daughter saved my nephew today. That
deserves a truce between us. At least for today.”

“I want to talk to you about Robin,” Mac begins.

“That was a short truce,” Jason said angrily as he turned
back to reenter the waiting room.

“I know what you did,” Mac said.

Jason’s hand stilled on the doorknob, but he didn’t turn
around.

“I know what you did,” Mac repeated. “It wasn’t that hard
to figure out. Her doctor said she had weeks left. But we visit,
Felicia, Maxie, Georgie, and I and somehow during that visit
Robin makes a connection with each one of us. I didn’t realize
until later that she was saying goodbye. And then that night she
passes away quietly. I asked around you were spotted entering the
hospice.”

“Are you going to arrest me for Robin’s murder?” Jason’s
voice is low but he still doesn’t turn around.

“No,” Mac replies. “After today we never have to mention
it again. I just wanted to thank you. I realize whatever you did you
did it because she asked you to. Because you loved her. I don’t
think I would have been strong enough to do it if it was Felicia.”

Jason pauses for a moment without speaking before he
slowly opens the door and returns to the waiting room.

Ten minutes later the doctor enters the waiting room. Her eyes
have a bruised and tired look in them.

“She made it through the surgery. She’s in intensive care. We
lost her too many times to count on the table. If she makes it
through the next 24 hours, she has a chance. We have her listed in
critical condition. There’s nothing more we can do but wait and
pray to whatever God you believe in.”

The silence in the waiting room is deafening.