Accidental Surrogate for Alpha novel Chapter 275

Chapter 275

Bonded

Ella

My head feels…so heavy. I groan, trying to move my hands up so I can press them against my temples, but I can’t move them.

“Easy,” I hear him say beside me and instinctually I turn towards his voice. Where –

“Easy, Ella,” he murmurs, his words thick with emotion. “It’s all right…”

I peel my eyelids apart, then, confused at the effort. It’s like I haven’t opened my eyes for weeks…

My vision comes back to me slowly, the room around me coming into focus with effort. I blink rapidly, looking around at Sinclair, and Cora, and Roger all standing around me, peering at me with worried faces. I feel very suddenly like Dorothy, when she wakes up from her trip to Oz.

“What?” I murmur, my voice thick and my throat scratchy. Suddenly anxious, I try to sit up, pushing at the bed beneath me but –

What the hell were all these wires, tied to my arms?

“Easy, trouble,” Sinclair whispers, pressing his hand to my shoulder, keeping me down. My body responds to his command, relaxing backwards as I look up at him. But…

“Where am I?” I ask, staring at him, and then I press my eyes closed. It’s all just too much.

“You’re in the hospital,” I hear my sister explain. “After the gift, at the temple…”

But her voice fades, almost as if I can’t hear it. I feel my heart start to pound, my breath ratchet up as my memories start to come back to me. Of being on the temple steps of Cora there, and what we learned about each other of Sinclair’s warm arms around me –

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And then, nothing – and then clouds – and Sinclair again, and my baby –

Oh my god, where was my baby?

“Rafe?” I gasp, spinning towards Sinclair as my eyes fly open, desperate. “Where is Rafe?” Then I start to look all around me, searching for him – he’s here, he has to be, I remember him, my little baby, wrapped in white swaddling, holding him in my arms

“A dream,” Sinclair says hurriedly, “it was a dream, Ella – we met him in the dream –”

He puts his hand on the swell of my stomach then, drawing my attention to it, reminding me that he’s here – of course he’s here, I haven’t given birth yet –

“Oh,” I breathe, moving my own hands so that they rest on either side of my baby. Then I close my eyes, resting my head back on the pillow, and search for him. And it’s hard, it’s distant, but…

There. Yes, there. I can feel him, my ties to him. My bond with my baby. I reach out to him, sending all the love I have in my heart down our bond, and feeling a little pulse back. He hears me. He tells me he knows. He’s holding on.

“Oh,” I say again, feeling my whole body relax. I open my eyes again, feeling a rush of sudden and unexpected joy. I look up to Sinclair and nod. “Okay. Yes. He’s here.”

Sinclair exhales a huge rush of air, grasping one of my hands and lowering his head so that our

foreheads touch. We stay like that for a long minute as tears start to slide down my cheeks,

unbidden but unstoppable. It’s all just…it’s a lot to take in in just a few minutes. To come flying back to reality after such a hard few weeks, after days of struggling in the dream state to get here. It is hard on me, on my mind.

But, there’s no where else I’d want to be.

“I’ll get the doctor,” I hear Roger murmur, and then his footsteps move to the door, heading out the room.

“Cora,” I call, opening my eyes and reaching my other hand for her. Sinclair straightens at my side, letting us have our moment as I take her hand. “Are you all right?”

“Am I all right,” she huffs, laughing through the tears that are falling down her own cheeks. “Are you?”

I smile at her, unable to help myself, and then glance down at my poor beat up little body. “Um, I think so?” I feel so weak but there is also…a warmth, a stillness in me that feels… I frown, looking up at her. “Did you…do something to me?”

“Um,” she says, laughing a little and running her hand through her hair. “Yeah? I gave you back mom’s the Goddess’s – the gift, I gave it back to you,” she stumbles, not really knowing how to explain it.

I gasp then, working to sit up straighter in my bed. “Cora!” I scold. “Why?! I gave it to you – it’s yours

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