by Joanne Rock
At the dark look in his eyes, the rest of the words dried up. Her hopes withered along with them.
“My brother was right,” he said finally, scrubbing a hand over his face. “Marcel said that wealth doesn’t make up for a lack of love. Apparently, a portfolio is all I’ve got to offer anyone.”
They must have walked out of the park soon afterward, but Sable didn’t remember much from the rest of their time together. Roman had a car pick them up outside the park, and he saw her safely back to the brownstone where he said something about a contract that would formalize a custody arrangement.
When he dropped her off, she stared up at the apartment building that had once represented all her hopes and dreams of a new life. Now it would be the haven she would return to, when she brought her baby home from the hospital. Alone. Tears threatened as the image blurred in front of her eyes.
She didn’t look back as she walked up the front steps. Not after the way Roman had shut down at the mention of love between them. His reaction had told her more clearly than any words that she’d been wise to break things off between them before she was irretrievably in love with him. Except, from the way hurt cracked her insides now, Sable knew she’d been too late.
She loved Roman.
And he’d all but admitted there wasn’t a chance in hell he’d ever love her back.
* * *
Drained, Roman returned to his parents’ vacant New York apartment for the last time to clear out his things, knowing he couldn’t remain in Manhattan when Sable didn’t want him in her life.
He called his Realtor to put his search for an apartment on hold since there was no rush to set up his place. He would still get something to facilitate seeing his child, of course, and living in the same city as Sable made the most sense. All that damn money gave him options. But he wouldn’t be her unwelcome shadow for the next twenty-eight weeks, even though he already missed her.
And not just in his bed.
He already missed holding her hand. Hearing about her day. And he missed the chance to feel his child move in her belly, along with a whole host of moments he wouldn’t get to be a part of now.
It had been five years and three months since he’d felt this empty and alone. A thought which had him opening his laptop at the kitchen counter, seeking a hidden file that he rarely let himself open.
Inside the file were old photos. Pictures of his life with Annette back when he’d been a different man. A better man, who had more to offer than a fat bank account.
He’d forgotten how blue her eyes were. Maybe because Sable’s were hazel and that was the color he saw in his dreams now. Was that so wrong? So disloyal?
His vow to love Annette forever hadn’t just been some wishful youth’s romantic thinking at her deathbed. He’d promised it to her in desperation, as part of a plea to convince her to stay strong in her heart surgery, as if he could animate her exhausted body with his own fierce will. Maybe it had been a youth’s wishful thinking after all.
Scanning more photos, he paused on one from their trip to the Seychelles. He recognized the beach they’d visited on the north shore of Praslin Island—a long stretch of soft, blond sand and crystal-blue water. Annette was alone in the photo, laughing as she slung an arm around a palm tree. As he enlarged the image, the T-shirt she wore caught his eye, a simple white T-shirt with black block letters containing an Emily Dickinson quote: “That it will never come again is what makes life so sweet.”
The words hit him like a freight train. Especially seeing them on the woman he loved who would be dead just nine months after the photo was taken.
Cursing, he shoved the photo away from him, unable to look at it. But memories flowed over him anyhow, moments he hadn’t thought about in years.
He remembered her buying the shirt. He even remembered talking about why she liked the quote since, at the time, a new transplant hadn’t even been on their radar. She’d been in great health, and she was the most vital, vibrant woman he’d ever met at the time they married.
Yet she was always aware of that quote, she’d told him. It was why she lived every day with so much love and joy. She knew life could be taken from her at any moment, and she refused to waste a second of the time she had.
Hot tears burned his eyes and his throat as he forced himself to open his laptop again and look at the image. To look at her, and really see her. Not just the woman he’d loved, but an inspirational figure. A woman who had deep, meaningful insight into life, insight he’d been unable to fully appreciate because he’d just mindlessly wanted that love and joy to last forever.
Shame washed over him like a rogue wave. Not for loving her—never that. But for not listening to her. For not honoring the gifts she’d tried to give him.
His whole universe shifted. Or maybe just his view of it changed. But in that moment he had startling clarity for what he had to do next. He had a lot of work to do, and life was too precious for him to waste another second in the narrow wasteland of his grief.
First and foremost, he would write a letter to his grandfather relinquishing his position as CEO of Zayn Equity. He’d read between the lines with his brother, and no matter what Marcel said, Roman could see that maintaining the connection to their grandfather’s business hurt his brother. If they got disinherited, Roman would move around his assets and find a way to still finance Zayn Designs until it was operating firmly in the black.
He shot to his feet to retrieve his phone. On his way across the living room, he texted the Realtor again to sweeten the offer on the Broome Street storefront. One way or another, Marcel would have a good launchpad for the flagship store.
Full of hope and determination, Roman racked his brain for a way to show Sable he’d been wrong about what he had to offer her. There was more than wealth, damn it.
There had to be, since he’d have less of it at his disposal now that he was about to cut ties with the equity firm.
He wasn’t sure how long he sat there, thinking and planning, but the dawn was approaching when he got a text from a number he didn’t recognize.
This is Blair, Sable’s roommate. I’m taking her to the hospital. She started bleeding—
The words blurred until he couldn’t even see them. His brain hammered, not just with fear for his child, but for Sable, until a single thought drowned out all the rest.
He had to be at her side, no matter what.
Twelve
Sable felt cold everywhere.
Shivering under the bleach-scented blanket an emergency room nurse had given her, she listened as Blair explained her symptoms for the second time since they’d arrived. The first time had been to the admitting nurse. Now Blair repeated the story for an attending doctor who said he’d already called for an obstetrician. Sable had been assigned a room and a bed almost immediately, the hurried movement of the ER staffers telling her they took her condition seriously.
How could she be losing her baby when she’d just seen it moving in an ultrasound twelve hours ago? After crying herself to sleep over the breakup with Roman, she’d awoken to cramps and bleeding a little after 3:00 a.m. She’d almost fainted when she realized what was happening, the trauma of it making her knees turn to jelly so that she stumbled against the sink and shouted for her friends.
Tana had called an Uber, insisting it would be faster than an ambulance. Then she’d personally directed the driver to the drop-off entrance while Blair held Sable’s hand and told her everything would be okay.
Even though nothing was okay.
A minute or two after the attending physician stepped away from the exam room, a commotion sounded outside the door, and Sable hoped the specialist had arrived. As she pushed up in the bed, the door swung open to admit...
Roman.
Wrong though it might be, she couldn’t help the rush of relief at seeing him. No one else knew how worried she’d been. She hadn’t confi
ded in Blair and Tana about the other miscarriage. In spite of all the hurt and heartache she felt with Roman, she knew without question he would understand. Empathize.
“I got here as fast as I could.” Striding closer, he wove his way around a rolling table and dodged a scowling Tana.
“How did you know where to find me?”
“Your roommate texted me.” He glanced at Blair, who was standing beside the bed. “Thank you.”
He sat down at Sable’s other side, dropping onto the bed, strong arms offering her a comfort she desperately needed.
She couldn’t have possibly denied herself that consolation. She tipped her head against his solid, warm chest, knowing he was feeling the same wrenching sense of loss that had devastated her ever since she caught sight of the blood.
Tana hovered at the foot of the bed, looking ready to intervene if necessary. But Blair murmured to her quietly, and tried to lead her out of the room.
“We’ll be in the cafeteria,” Tana called over her shoulder, her expression still wary. “I can be right back here in less than two minutes if you need anything.”
Sable nodded through her tears, then closed her eyes to cry quietly against Roman. He rubbed her back as she melted into his warmth.
After a minute, he spoke, voice rumbling in his chest beneath her ear. “Are you in pain?”
Her heart hurt so much that it took a moment for her to process how the rest of her body felt. “Not right now. I woke up with cramping, but that’s...” The reality of the loss struck her like a blow. “The pain is gone now.”
“What did the doctor say?” Roman tipped her chin up to look in her eyes.
He looked stressed. Harried. But the tender concern she saw in his gaze was so compassionate and kind that she had to remind herself it wasn’t for her so much as their baby.
“He called in a specialist. I’m waiting for an OB now.” She swiped her wrist under her eyes and tried to straighten when she saw that she’d left a wet spot on his blue dress shirt. “Sorry to cry all over you.”
He shook his head, as if to dismiss her apology. He smoothed his thumb along her temple, wiping away more tear tracks. “I’m the one who’s sorry. I’m so damned sorry you’re bearing this, Sable. The pain. The fear. I hate thinking about you waking up alone and hurting. I can’t imagine how scared you were.”
His regrets were so focused on her that she met his dark gaze again, trying to gauge what he was thinking.
“I know you love this baby as much as I do—” she began. But she couldn’t finish.
“And I still do.” He wrapped her in his arms and squeezed her, the scent and feel of him reminding her of all the times she’d been close to him. The times that had made her fall in love with him. He pressed a kiss into her hair. “But there’s no reason to think you’ve already miscarried, is there? There’s still a chance they’ll say the baby is fine.”
A fresh wave of sadness made her pull away, the hygienic pillowcase behind her back crinkling as she moved. “I don’t think you should get your hopes up—”
“This isn’t about my hopes, Sable.” He gripped her shoulders, steadying her as if he could impress the words on her. “I just want you to be healthy and well. I know how much the last miscarriage devastated you, and I’d do anything to ensure you never feel that kind of hurt again.”
The sentiment behind the heartfelt words was reflected in his eyes. Or was that wishful thinking on her part, born out of a need to be loved by him?
While she wondered about it, a loudspeaker nearby crackled to life with a code message, the speaker’s voice urgent. Outside the ER room, she could hear a rush of footsteps as medical professionals scrambled to answer the summons. After a moment, she recalled Roman’s words.
Along with her sense that he might have cared more for her than she’d realized.
“But you really wanted this baby,” she reminded him, unwilling to get tangled up in her love for Roman. He’d already made it clear he wouldn’t return her feelings. “I know your hopes were high, too. I could see it in your eyes both times I had the ultrasounds.”
“Being a father was a gift I didn’t think I’d ever have.” He reached behind her to adjust the pillows before coaxing her to lie back against the raised bed. Then he smoothed her hair from her face, his dark gaze roaming over her features. “You stirred that hope in me, Sable. Not just because you’re pregnant. You made me feel deeply again. Being with you made me long for a life I thought I’d turned my back on forever.”
Her heart skipped a beat, the tempo feeling as off-kilter as she did. “But at the park yesterday, when we talked about the future—”
“I’m so ashamed of myself for not recognizing that I loved you before now, Sable, but I—”
“What?” Her question was barely a breath of sound, but he must have heard it because he squeezed her hands in his.
And repeated the words she feared she’d dreamed.
“I love you, Sable. I didn’t allow myself to acknowledge it because I told myself that I was dead inside after Annette died.” The bleak sorrow she remembered from the day at the Cloisters was there in his eyes again, but it was tempered with a different look now. Regret. “I’m so sorry I refused to see what was right in front of my eyes all along. But after I went home yesterday—”
The door to the exam room burst open, and in the next instant, a tall Latina woman in a lab coat was striding straight to the bed. “Ms. Cordero, I’m Dr. Incarnacion.” Behind the doctor, a nurse rolled in a cart with a small machine. “I read your doctor’s notes from your ultrasound earlier today, and based on the baby’s activity at that time, I hope you’re just experiencing some first trimester cervical bleeding. I brought the fetal Doppler with me so we can listen to the baby’s heartbeat to learn more.”
The woman’s calm demeanor steadied her, even though she could see the nurse was working quickly to set up the Doppler machine. Vaguely, she heard Roman introduce himself while the doctor dragged a stool to the foot of the bed to perform her own exam.
Sable’s thoughts were still half on her interrupted conversation with Roman. He’d said he loved her. The certainty in his voice still hummed inside her, a resonant echo that gave her new courage for facing whatever came next, even though she didn’t fully understand what had changed his mind.
Hearing he loved her—knowing she hadn’t given her heart unwisely—healed something inside her. Helped her let go of the past that had weighed on her shoulders for too long.
The need to take comfort from that love made her thread her fingers through his while they waited for the doctor’s prognosis.
“Are you okay?” Roman shifted so he faced her fully, his dark eyes filled with concern that she now understood wasn’t just about their baby after all.
And for a moment, she thought that maybe she could be okay. Even if she wasn’t able to carry this tiny life to full term, the caring etched in the lines around Roman’s eyes told her that she wouldn’t be alone in the aftermath. He wouldn’t leave her if she didn’t have this baby.
Because this man’s love was deep and true, and he didn’t give it lightly.
Before she could answer him, however, the Doppler machine broadcast the sound of a strong, rapid heartbeat. With the volume cranked up high, that steady and insistent pulsing filled the whole room.
Filled all the spaces of her heart that weren’t already taken up by Roman.
* * *
Relief flooded Roman.
Not just because he already loved the child Sable carried. But because he’d been scared out of his mind over what the loss of another baby would do to the woman who meant more to him than anything.
The joy he saw in her hazel eyes now was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen, making him all the more committed to moving heaven and earth to keep that expression there as often as it was in his power to do so. And, far from fee
ling disloyal to his dead wife, he breathed in a deep certainty that he was—at long last—at peace with her loss. Annette would have wanted him to be happy and live fully. He’d always known that on a rational level. It had been his own need to prove his devotion to her that had kept him from admitting what he felt for Sable.
What he had now was every bit as deep and intense. Now that he’d embraced those feelings, he finally honored Annette’s love of life better than he’d been able to over the last five unhappy years.
Still holding Sable’s hands, Roman lifted each to his lips in turn, kissing the backs of them while the doctor assured them their baby was thriving and that the bleeding was likely from the internal exam performed earlier yesterday. Nevertheless, Roman quizzed the physician about signs to look for in the days ahead, even asking if he should purchase their own fetal heart monitor for at-home use if it could give Sable peace of mind.
“It’s very rare that I recommend them for in-home use,” the doctor explained while she washed and dried her hands at the sink off to one side of the exam room. “The risk of side effects is minuscule in the hands of a trained technician, but unless they’re medically needed, I don’t recommend my patients use them. You can certainly check with her physician, however.”
Roman made a mental note to do just that. And to read as much as possible about keeping Sable safe.
For now, he just hoped he would have the chance to show her how much he loved her and wanted her in his life. Their conversation had been interrupted earlier, even if it was for the very best of news.
“Is it safe to take her home?” he asked while Sable texted the friends who’d brought her to the emergency room.
Friends he needed to thank profusely. Both for their fast thinking and their vigilance in watching over her.
“Yes. Just make sure she gets adequate rest.” The woman turned to the laptop a nurse slid in front of her, and she began typing notes on the keyboard. “She should check in with her doctor tomorrow, and I’ll send her records from this visit. But I would be surprised if they need to see her before the next regularly scheduled appointment. Your baby looks very healthy.”
