by Louise Hall
Remy shrugged, “maybe tomorrow morning?”
How could Remy be so calm about all of this? Cate was filled with rage for her selfish, bratty sister. For whatever reason, she’d wanted to find their biological father and so she’d done it. She hadn’t even thought about the fact that he wasn’t just her father, he was theirs too and maybe they didn’t want to find him. Maybe they were quite happy pretending that he’d never meant to leave them at all, that he’d been killed in a tragic accident. No, Liv had only been thinking about herself yet again. She might have moved hundreds of miles away but she was still the same person who’d almost burned down a church because she was jealous that her ex-boyfriend was getting married.
Cate felt the baby kick and it gave her the encouragement she needed. She got up from the table. “I’m going to go.”
“Wait,” Remy quickly followed her out of the restaurant. “Where are you going? It’s late.”
“What’s the point?” Cate shrugged. “Liv’s not here. I don’t want a post-mortem; I just want to be with my family.”
She hastily packed her bags and arranged a taxi with reception. As she waited for it to arrive, she checked the options on her phone – the trains from nearby stations had already gone. Unless, she wanted to spend six hours in Birmingham, she would have to fly. As if the Gods were smiling down upon her, there was a flight from Gatwick which would get her back home to Manchester in the early hours of the morning. Before she could even think about it, she’d booked it. Last-minute, the price was extortionate but for once, Cate didn’t feel the slightest bit guilty using the credit card Kian had given her.
Liv ditching them for Ruby had given Cate the freedom to do what she wanted too.
It was almost dawn when the taxi dropped her off at home the next morning. By then Cate was so tired, she could barely remember where she’d put her house keys.
When she walked into their bedroom, the nightmare journey home was worth every second. Kian was lit up by the sunlight just beginning to stream through the window. He was lying on his front with his arms folded underneath his head. His black hair was all mussed up from sleep. The duvet had dropped to his waist, letting Cate feast on the sight of all those rippling muscles in his bare back and shoulders. She stripped down to her underwear and climbed into bed with her husband. The familiar warmth against her bare skin brought tears to her eyes. She was so, so glad to be home.
“Cate?” Kian turned to face her, his eyes barely open. “What are you doing here?”
“It’s a long story,” she grinned, kissing his shoulder. “Go back to sleep.”
Kian turned over, fitting Cate against him and caressed his fingers over her swollen belly. “Love you, angel.”
“I love you too,” Cate murmured, kissing his bicep. “So much.”
“Mummy,” Cate was woken up a few hours later by Lola jumping and down on the bed. “You’re back.”
“Hey,” Kian scooped Lola up. “What did I say about jumping on Mummy and Daddy’s bed?”
“I’m sorry,” Lola wriggled out of his grasp. “I want to see my brother.”
Cate giggled, “sweetheart, we don’t know yet if it’s going to be a boy or a girl.”
“It’s my brother,” Lola pouted. “Please.”
“Fine,” Cate pulled back the duvet and lifted up her t-shirt, exposing the curve of her tummy.
“Hello baby brother,” Lola grinned, putting her little hands on Cate’s bump. “Daddy scored two goals yesterday.”
“Hey,” Erin peeked around the door. “I’m really sorry to interrupt but did Ben come home last night too?”
“No, he didn’t.” Cate couldn’t look at Kian or Erin. She knew that they probably had lots of questions for her but she couldn’t answer them just yet. She focused instead on her daughter who was chattering away to her unborn sibling.
Remy would have been only a few years older than Lola when their biological father walked out on them. She brushed Lola’s hair back from her forehead. When was the last time he’d seen them? Was it the night before he left? Did he read them a bedtime story and kiss them goodnight? Did he know even then that it was the last time? How could any parent just abandon their children like that?
“Hey, sweet girl,” Cate turned to Lola. “After breakfast, how would you like to go to the park?”
“Yay,” Lola clapped her hands. “Daddy, will you teach me how to do that Crufts turn thing we saw on the TV yesterday?”
Kian laughed, “I think you’re a little young to be trying a Cruyff turn, sweetie.”
While Kian was distracted, Cate grabbed her phone and slipped into the bathroom. She locked the door, ran the shower and sat on the steps leading up to the bath.
“Cate?” Remy answered almost straight away. She sounded worried. “Where are you?”
“I’m at home.”
“That’s just great,” Remy snapped. “You couldn’t have sent me a quick text to let me know that you’d got back safely?”
“I’m sorry,” Cate said. “Can you text or e-mail me your bank details?”
“What do you want my bank details for?”
“I need to pay you back for the hotel room. How much did it cost?”
“I don’t want you to pay me back,” Remy hissed. “I want you here. We’re supposed to be doing all of this together.”
“I wasn’t the first to leave,” Cate reminded her sister. “Are you giving Liv this much grief?”
“You’re damn right, I am. At least I understand why she left. She and Ruby…”
Cate ended the call. She felt that familiar twisting in her gut. “No,” she tried to fight off the impending panic attack but it was futile. She curled up on the floor, hoping the chill against her skin would anchor her to the here and now. As she squeezed her eyes tightly shut, her heart felt like it was hammering out of her chest. She had the same vision of herself on that bench outside the Black Horse pub, of the blood haemorrhaging between her legs and the pain, that indescribable pain in her abdomen. Except this time she wasn’t alone. Ruby was standing in front of her, perfect Ruby.
“I’m going to replace you,” Ruby laughed as Cate felt herself getting weaker. “I’ve already got your Dad and Olivia…” Dexter and Liv came and stood by Ruby’s side. Cate looked imploringly at Liv, “why won’t you help me?”
Kian appeared with Lola. “Please!” Cate cried. Even in her nightmares, she didn’t want her daughter to see her weak and bloodied.
Lola didn’t seem fazed, she ran straight past Cate to the gloating Ruby. “Are you going to be my mummy now?”
“No,” Cate shook her head vigorously. “I’m your mummy.” She tried telling herself that it was just a panic attack, that none of it was real.
“Cate?” Kian hammered on the bathroom door.
“Just a minute,” Cate called back, trying to keep her voice as light as possible.
“Darn,” she cursed, stripping off her sweat-soaked t-shirt and chucking it in the laundry basket. She’d been doing so well lately; she’d thought that her panic attacks were gone for good. Would they always be there, lurking just around the corner?
She stepped into the shower and let the hot water wash away all the physical remnants of her panic attack. Her heart rate slowly returned to normal, the goose bumps on her skin receded and the sweat sluiced off her body and circled the drain. But inside she was still coated with the after-effects because as much as she tried to tell herself that what she’d seen was just a nightmare, a few errant thoughts still remained. Was she really that replaceable? For her biological father, yes. The ink hadn’t even been dry on Cate’s birth certificate when he’d started a new family with Pamela and Ruby.
“Angel?” Kian knocked on the bathroom door. “We need to go to the hospital right now. Erin’s having her baby.”
“She can’t be…?” Cate threw on the first clean clothes she could find. “It’s too early.”
“I know,” Erin sobbed, bracing herself against the doorframe. There was a pu
ddle of water on the carpet. “I want Ben.”
“I’ve called him,” Kian said gently, “he’s on his way. Come on, we need to get you to the hospital.”
Lola was watching from the doorway to her bedroom; she looked terrified. “Mummy, what’s wrong with Auntie Rin?”
Cate knelt down in front of her, “it’s OK, sweetheart. Auntie Rin’s having her baby so we need to take her to the hospital.” Lola was still looking wide-eyed at Erin, who was being helped down the stairs by Kian. “Hey,” Cate blocked her view. “Everything’s going to be OK. Can you put your shoes on real quick?”
When they got downstairs, Kian had settled Erin in the backseat so Cate strapped Lola in the front seat and gave her headphones to block out the noise. She climbed in next to her sister-in-law and clasped her hand, “you’re going to be a mummy, Erin.”
Erin had tears in her eyes, “where’s Ben? I really don’t want him to miss this.”
“He won’t,” Cate said softly. “But right now, we need to focus on you. Breathe in.”
“Aargh,” Erin squeezed Cate’s hand tightly as another contraction tore through her abdomen, “it hurts so much. Why didn’t you warn me?”
“You don’t remember it afterwards,” Cate lied. She didn’t want to remind Erin that she hadn’t been able to have a natural birth with Lola; she’d had an emergency C-section. “We’re almost there, Erin.”
When they arrived at the hospital, Erin was helped into a wheelchair. “You go with her,” Kian said to Cate. “I’ll move the car and then I’ll come back.”
“No,” Cate shook her head. The harsh, antiseptic smell of the hospital… She kept thinking about all the bad things that had happened. Eamon had died right there, just a few feet from where they were standing. Cate tried to breathe but there was a heavy weight on her chest. Erin had lost her babies there. She looked down at her trembling hands, expecting to see blood; the blood which had spilled so freely within these walls, her own, Erin’s, Eamon’s. She could feel the pain like it was still trapped within the walls; her own, Ben and Erin’s, Kian, Sinead and Jean’s.
“I can’t go in there,” Cate backed away, bumping into the car door. “I’m sorry. I know it’s not about me.”
Before Kian could answer, Cate had climbed into the driver’s seat and started the engine. She drove around the car park a couple of times until she trusted herself enough to try and manoeuvre into a space. “OK,” Cate switched off the engine and forced herself to take a deep breath.
Lola tugged off her headphones and looked up at Cate, “Mummy, are you OK?”
“I’m fine, sweetie,” Cate lied. She wiped her sweaty palms on her thighs and walked with Lola back to the hospital.
“Is this where I was born?” Lola asked, as they walked through the main entrance.
“It is,” Cate was trying really, really hard not to think about that day. When they got closer to the maternity ward, she heard somebody running up behind them and quickly pulled Lola to the side so she wouldn’t get bumped.
“Is she OK?” Ben asked breathlessly, sweat dripped down his forehead.
Kian came through a set of doors, “I’m glad you’re here.” He patted his brother-in-law on the back, “she’s asking for you.”
“Is Auntie Rin going to be OK?” Lola asked her dad.
“Yes,” Kian picked her up, “she’s going to be fine.” He led the way to the small café at the main entrance. “What do you fancy?” he asked Cate as they approached the counter.
“Nothing,” Cate shoved her hands in her pockets to hide the fact that they were still trembling. “I’m OK, thanks.”
Kian bought her a carton of juice anyway and they sat at one of the tables by the window. “Mummy, did it hurt when I was born?”
Kian put his hand over Cate’s. She was deathly pale. “Drink your juice,” he pushed the carton towards his wife.
He turned to Lola, “your mummy is one of the bravest people I’ve ever met.” Cate stared blankly out of the window. Kian took his phone out of his pocket and scrolled through the photos. “That’s the very first photo I have of you,” he said to Lola. “Look how tiny you were.”
“Will Matteo be like that too?” Lola put her hands on Cate’s stomach.
She’d heard them talking about Matteo Di Vela and thought that they were talking about her baby brother.
Cate was so lost in her thoughts; she jumped when she felt Lola’s little hands pressing against her stomach. She knocked over Kian’s mug of coffee and it splashed across the table, trickling down the sides on to the floor.
“I’ll, uh, get some napkins,” Cate went to the counter. She wanted so desperately to run away.
When she got back to the table, Irene was there. Cate felt the grip on her insides twist and tighten. She couldn’t look her Mum in the eye; the guilt that they’d gone behind her back and found their biological father was overwhelming.
“I need…” Cate changed her mind; it wasn’t the time or the place to tell Irene what she and her siblings had done. “I need some air.”
She dropped the napkins on the table and ran to the front door. She pushed through the huddle of smokers in their dressing gowns just outside the main entrance and carried on walking until she found an empty wooden bench. It’s not going to be like last time, Cate repeated. Erin’s going to be fine, the baby’s going to be fine, and everything’s going to be fine.
“Cate?” Kian was increasingly concerned about his wife. After she’d run out of the hospital, Irene had offered to stay in the café with Lola. As Kian had chased after her, he’d tried calling India for help but it went straight to her voicemail.
Today isn’t about you. It’s about Ben and Erin and their baby. If you don’t stop being so self-absorbed, you might as well deliver them to Ruby on a silver platter. Perfect Ruby wouldn’t be sat on a bench like this feeling sorry for herself.
Cate slowly opened her eyes. Kian looked worried. She reached up and smoothed the crease between his brows. “I’m OK,” Cate plastered on a fake smile. “I just had a panic attack, that’s all. It’s over now.”
Kian narrowed his eyes, “are you sure?”
“Mm,” Cate stood up and reached for his hand. “Let’s go back inside.”
As they walked back to the hospital, Kian said quietly, “we need to talk about what happened with your dad.”
“Not now,” Cate hissed. She could see her Mum and Lola through the windows of the café. “Mum doesn’t know.”
CHAPTER 23
“So what’s new with you?” India asked Cate on Monday morning.
Cate looked up from the filing she was supposed to have finished on Friday night. It felt like a lifetime ago, so much had happened since then. “Erin had her baby yesterday afternoon,” Cate smiled as she thought about her new, little nephew, Oliver James.
“That’s fantastic,” India beamed. “Please tell me you’ve got photos?”
“I have,” Cate reached for her phone.
“He’s gorgeous,” India said as she scrolled through the photos. “He almost makes me broody, almost.”
She handed Cate back her phone. “What’s my schedule like for today?”
“It’s fairly light,” Cate checked the computer. “Your 10.30 had to cancel; her eldest has got appendicitis.”
“That’s perfect. You can have that slot.”
“Me?” Cate spluttered. “I don’t need an appointment, I’m fine.”
India lowered her voice, “oh really? When did you last have an attack?”
“I can’t remember,” Cate lied.
India narrowed her eyes at Cate. “Yes, you can. I’ll see you at 10.30.”
While India was in with her first appointment, Cate finished off the last of the filing. When she was done, she looked around at the reception area with great pride. It was nothing like the chaos she’d walked into several months ago. There were enough plastic cups stacked at the side of the watercooler in the corner; the glossy magazines were neatly fanned out a
cross the small wooden table in the waiting area. Behind her desk, the tops of the cabinets were empty apart from a vase with fresh flowers. India’s files had been updated and alphabetised and were now stored in locked cabinets.
Cate felt the baby flutter inside her womb and pressed her hand to her abdomen, “I know.” She just needed to apply those same organisational skills to her home life.
“Are you ready?” India asked, interrupting her thoughts.
“Is it 10.30 already?” Cate checked her watch. Her stomach plummeted.
“How are you feeling?” India asked gently as Cate settled herself down on the squashy sofa in India’s office.
“I’m fine,” Cate repeated her stock answer. She took a sip of cold water; her throat was so dry.
“Kian said you had a bad attack yesterday? Do you think something happened to trigger it?”
Cate started to get up, “so he’s telling on me now?”
“Sit down,” India said firmly. “I promise it’s not like that. He’s just worried about you, Cate.”
“He doesn’t need to be,” Cate said defensively. “I’m fine.”
“OK,” India sat back. “Why don’t you tell me what happened this weekend?”
“It’s no big deal,” Cate shrugged. “My sister, Liv… sorry, Olivia, she tracked down our biological father.”
“That sounds like a big deal to me,” India said. “How did you feel about that, seeing him for the first time?”
“I don’t want to talk about this,” Cate folded her arms across her chest. She wanted to go back to last Friday night when she didn’t know anything about Dexter Rathburn and his perfect daughter, Ruby.
India waited patiently for her to continue.
“Fine,” Cate snapped after a couple of minutes of silence. “I didn’t feel anything, OK?”
“Really?” India asked. “You didn’t feel anything at all?”
“No, he’s just a pathetic excuse for a man. He doesn’t deserve anything from me.”
“OK,” India said. “Have you talked to your brother and sisters about all of this? You mentioned that it was your sister, Liv who tracked him down?”
