CHAPTER 1: DOCTOR OR DAD?

“Kill that unwanted resident in our daughter’s womb or leave this place with your baby forever !" an enraged Mr. Blaydes threatened. 

Minutes before her arrival, Dmitri and his team had been alerted about the incoming critical patient by Mr. Blaydes' secretary. 

Dmitri paced back and forth, his pulse rushing. 

Audrey was critically ill when brought to the emergency room. 

Blood between her legs was beginning to accumulate on the floor. It was a steady drip, drip, drip as they shifted her from the ambulance to the stretcher.

"The baby is showing signs of distress and its health is getting compromised," the nurse rapidly parroted as the machine beeped.

"An emergency C-section is required to get the patient and baby onto the safest birth route. We need to be quick as there is an immediate concern for the health of the mother and the baby," Dr. Hazel sharply commanded.

The irony: Dr. Dmitri had to operate on the love of his life and his unborn baby whose life was in jeopardy ! They had to be saved. 

"Doctor Dmitri, the operating room is ready. Any other orders before we get the patient up there ?" asked the nurse.

The nurse's voice jolted him back to his reality, the reality of what he was trained to do. 

Fortunately for Doctor Dmitri, his profession didn't discriminate at death's door. 

To him, the operating room was considered a great equalizer. 

All of those who passed through those doors were one and the same. 

In the end, there was no moral dilemma- she was a patient in intense pain and bleeding profusely.

Dmitri had to help her and the unborn baby in spite of the tycoon’s threat.

"No, nurse. Just get her upstairs quickly. It's time to save two lives," Dmitri quickly snapped orders as he regained his emotional and mental strength back. 

"Will you be able to handle this surgery ?" Dr. Hazel stopped Dmitri for a moment before there was no turning back, concern lacing her voice. “Emotions can not be mixed with surgeries.”

It was no brainer what she meant. Lying on that stretcher was someone dear to him. The mother of his unborn child.

"Once a patient is on the operating room table- asleep, draped off, and ready to be cut open, I don't consider him or her my acquaintance," Dmitri replied before pulling on his surgery gloves. 

Surgeons were human beings. Granted. However, Dmitri was cut from a different cloth when it came to his profession. 

Unlike other colleagues of his, he could successfully excel and carry out a surgery in unique situations when critical, valuable lives were at stake. 

Dmitri didn't waste time in adorning his gear and getting ready for the emergency where his loved one was involved. His actions inspired respect and awe amongst his staff but only he knew that he had let his real emotions percolate and hide in the deep recesses of his heart.

"We will not hesitate to kill you too, along with the baby if you let our Audrey know that this demon was born alive or if she, as much as, breathes the same air as you within a hundred miles radius," the powerful tycoon and the father of his beloved had sworn.

Tyler Blaydes. The man who ruled the business world.

For a moment, Dmitri let his emotions get the best of him. For a moment, he was filled with rage at the words of her father resonating continuously in his mind. 

"Nurse, clamp now !" A jet of blood rose and was heading for his right eye. It always did. He turned his head just in time. "I need a wipe," Dmitri ordered.

Tears sprung in his eyes as he operated on the love of his life with laser focus, Audrey's powerful parents’ threat continuously ringing in his mind like a broken record.

“Dmitri !” Hazel sharply called out suddenly. “Your hands are shaking," the doctor noted, behind her mask with narrowed eyes.

“Hmm,” Dmitri dismissively hummed, not bothering to answer. Not because he was a rude man, but because he was afraid that if he admitted to his unnerving emotions, he might have a mental breakdown then and there, and the surgical powers bestowed on him to get Audrey and his baby alive off the table might get handicapped if he let his "feelings" get inside the operating room.

He firmly believed that there was no room for reflection at this hour.

He had to stay strong and level-headed. With every saving stitch, he was not only saving the life of his beloved but of his unborn baby too. He had to stay focused and bring his arduous training to fruition. 

Audrey needed him. His baby needed him. There was no room for any distractions. None at all.

"Dmitri, the heartbeat of your baby is sinking. We need to be quick," Hazel charted, hurriedly getting everything in line.

She did not push the previous matter nor press her childhood friend for a response, knowing that it was futile to press it when his precious treasure was on the other end of the needles. 

Suddenly, Dmitri dropped back his forceps and heavily sighed. 

“Easy there, Doctor. Take three long breaths and get your head back in the game. I know how distressing this surgery is for you but you need to stay cool,” Hazel impelled her best friend-cum-secret crush since their days in the orphanage before taking a majority of the work off Dmitri’s hands.

He was the Head Doctor of the department- the best in his field but he too had stormy days and this was one of them. 

Grabbing back his instruments, Dmitri murmured woefully behind his mask, "I don't consider myself fit to be a good doctor or, in fact, a dad at the moment. Why couldn’t I be devoid of any feelings ?” He gritted out, clearly his anger misdirected at himself. If only Audrey’s parents had been more understanding. 

"Dmitri, you're not a machine,” Hazel sternly ticked him off. “I know you are feeling overwhelmed and reeling under huge pressure but stop wishing that you were a stone-hearted robot in human skin," she tried to knock some sense in him, even though her own heart twisted at this heart-rendering situation. “You are the best doctor that I have ever met and I know that you will make it through. Now stop berating yourself and get that baby of yours in this world to know how strong his daddy is,” she pumped him.

"Yeah ?” Dmitri asked hope rising in his entire being.

“Yeah,” Hazel softly whispered, wishing at the same time for things to be different where she was carrying Dmitri’s baby and had a loving husband instead. 

Dmitri, on the other hand, steeled back himself and got back to his top-notch surgeon form to add another successful operation to the feather of his cap.

However, this particular surgery was not like the zillions of others he had performed. It was personally and emotionally special for him. Something close to his heart. Bittersweet, even if it was meant to be.