Petrified, Alicia watched as a flurry of medical staff attended him, her tiny baby, lost on a hospital trolley made for an adult, monitors beeping and pinging around him. He looked so small, so fragile against the vast expanse of white sheet. His little face wasn’t damaged. He still looked perfect. Her perfect little boy, his softly curled eyelashes brushing his cheeks as he slept. His perfect cupid lips. His little hands curled into fists. His tiny chest rising and falling. Breathing. He’s breathing. Squeezing her eyes closed, Alicia felt the room shift, breathed in and out with him. Please keep breathing, baby. Please keep breathing.

She could hear someone talking about the positioning of his carrier in the car. Back passenger seat, forward-facing. The words reached her as if muffled by endless fathoms of swirling, icy water. Responsive to pain.

Oh please, God, no.

Folding her arms tightly across her midriff, Alicia felt the tear rip steadily through her heart, felt the tug in her womb where she’d carried him, kept him safe and warm until he was grown enough to come into the world. He was hurting! Her baby boy was hurting, and he wasn’t grown. He was tiny. He was hurting, and she couldn’t make it go away, couldn’t keep him safe. She needed to. She was his mother!

‘Please help him,’ she begged, her voice catching on the sob in her throat. She didn’t want Lucas to hear her crying. It would scare him.

Swiping a hand across her face, she gulped back another wretched sob. ‘Please do something,’ she pleaded. ‘Don’t let him be in pain. Please…’

A nurse came to her side, speaking gently, as if cajoling a child. ‘We’re doing everything we can, Mrs Cole. Why don’t you come and wait in the visitor’s room?’

Alicia felt the woman’s arms close around her shoulders, trying to coax her away.

No! Did they think she would leave him? Did they think she would leave her baby? She needed to stay. She needed to talk to him. He would respond to her voice. He would respond. Oh God, she needed to hold him, feel his warm body next to hers, his tiny heart beating. ‘Please help him. Somebody, please help—’

Justin. Her gaze shot to the resuscitation room doors as they crashed open.

‘You need to step away, Dr Cole,’ someone ordered, as he moved towards Lucas. ‘It’s too personal. You have a possible pneumothorax. You’re in no fit state to—’

‘He’s my fucking son!’ Justin shouted, struggling to get past two colleagues who were attempting to hold him back.

‘Pulmonary contusions evident,’ another doctor said, as he pressed a stethoscope to their baby’s small chest. ‘Get hold of paediatrics. Tell them—’

‘He won’t make it!’ Justin screamed. ‘He’s about to go into respiratory arrest. You need to intubate. Now!’

The doctor looked towards Justin and then, his expression foreboding, back to the other medical staff gathered around him. ‘Tell paeds to stand by,’ he instructed a nurse, as Alicia’s heart slowed to a dull thud inside her. And then to another, ‘Get me an EZ-IO drill. And get the fast scanner here now.’

Alicia knew what he was about to do. She couldn’t bear it. Didn’t think she could stand to hear the sound of the drill whirring and cutting.

She felt Justin’s arm around her. Instinctively, she turned to him, felt his other arm enclose her, pulling her towards him. Guilt rose inside her, her mind screaming what she already knew. It was her fault. All of it, her fault! This was her punishment for the wicked thing she’d done, the dreadful mistake she’d made. But it was her mistake. The punishment should be hers, not her baby’s. Not Justin’s. Not Sophie’s. Her’s alone.

‘You shouldn’t touch me!’ She pulled away from him, feeling she might taint him. Everything she’d ever done had shaped his life, had brought him to this terrible place. He shouldn’t be with her. She should never have made him be. ‘You shouldn’t be anywhere near me!’

Justin stepped towards her, tried to ease her back. ‘Alicia, don’t…’ He stopped, drawing in a harsh breath. Hearing the wheeze rattle his chest, Alicia looked sharply up, saw the agony in his eyes, the perspiration mingling with the salty tears on his cheeks as he looked towards his broken baby. He was hurting. Hurting so badly. How could he ever forgive her? How would she ever forgive herself?

He would never come back from this. He would blame himself. He would never stop blaming himself if…

‘Blood pressure’s dropping.’