The entire operating room held its breath as Dr. Rossi pressed the sterile portable ultrasound probe directly against my uterus.
On the monitor, right behind where the seventh placenta had been attached, a thick muscular wall—a rare uterine septum that had been completely shadowed on my external scans by the seven crowded amniotic sacs—was pulsing.
"My God," Dr. Rossi whispered, his eyes wide behind his surgical mask. "I need an eighth neonatal team in here right now! There’s a posterior chamber. We have an eighth baby!"
"Eight?!" Matteo choked out, gripping the metal rail of my operating table so hard his knuckles turned white.
"Camilla, stay with me," the anesthesiologist said quickly, adjusting my oxygen as my heart rate monitor spiked. "Your spinal block is still strong, and your blood pressure is holding. Dr. Rossi is bringing out number eight."
Forty seconds later, I felt one last deep pull. Unlike her seven brothers and sisters who had let out tiny, fragile whimpers, this baby hit the cold air of the operating room and let out a furious, ear-piercing scream.
"It’s a girl!" Dr. Rossi laughed in pure disbelief, holding up a squirming, pink infant who had somehow been hogging the best blood supply in the back of my womb. "Three pounds, four ounces—she’s the biggest one of the bunch!"
I started sobbing all over again, laughing through my tears as Matteo kissed my wet forehead over and over. Eight babies. Four boys, four girls. Every single one of them breathing. And contrary to my mother-in-law’s sick expectations, I wasn't dying. Thanks to Dr. Rossi catching a bleeding vessel behind that hidden eighth placenta and clamping it instantly, my vitals were completely stable.
Then, the red phone on the operating room wall buzzed.
The charge nurse picked it up, listened for five seconds, and her face hardened. "Dr. Rossi, that was hospital security outside the NICU. Matteo’s mother, Donna, just tried to force her way through the restricted double doors with a freelance photographer from a national magazine and a notary. When security stopped her, she started crying and told them Camilla suffered massive brain hemorrhage on the table, that Matteo is on suicide watch, and that she has emergency power of attorney to photograph the 'septuplets' for their medical fund."
Matteo stood up so fast his surgical stool crashed to the floor. "I’m going out there right now and breaking that camera over her head—"
"Matteo, stop!" I rasped through my oxygen mask, grabbing his wrist with every ounce of strength I had left.
My mind was suddenly crystal clear. "Dr. Rossi," I said, looking up at my surgeon. "How many people outside this room know I just delivered eight babies instead of seven?"
Dr. Rossi blinked, looking around at his surgical team. "Nobody. The records haven't been entered into the central hospital network yet."
"And because of HIPAA privacy laws," I continued, my voice steadying, "nobody can release my medical status without my written consent, right?"
"Not a single word," Dr. Rossi confirmed firmly. "As far as anyone in that waiting room is concerned, we don't have to tell them anything."
I looked at Matteo. "Let your mother think I’m in a medically induced coma in the ICU. If she wants to file a sworn affidavit in Cook County family court claiming I’m incapacitated so she can cash a $150,000 magazine check and transfer $384,000 of GoFundMe donations into her real estate LLC... let her sign her name to every single page under oath."
Matteo stared at me for two seconds, and then a cold, ruthless calm washed over his face. "My cousin Vince is an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Northern District of Illinois," Matteo said quietly. "If she moves that GoFundMe money across state wires using a falsified medical affidavit, that’s federal wire fraud and aggravated identity theft."
"Lockdown my chart under a privacy alias, Dr. Rossi," I said as they prepared to wheel me to the private recovery suite. "Let Donna plan her big press conference."
