‘I don’t know. Could you try and get his wind up?’
What the hell did he know about winding babies? Nothing! But he took his son, rested him against his shoulder and rubbed gently, and was rewarded with a shocking belch that made them both laugh in surprise.
‘OK! I think he might be ready for Mum again,’ Sam said with a smile, and handed him back, still a little awkward. Emelia held her arms out, and he lowered Max into them, his fingers brushing her breast as he did so.
It was covered, but he still felt the impact of it all the way down to his toes, and he backed away and retreated to the window seat again, studying the garden as if his life depended on it.
It was so silly, Emelia thought, watching him. They could have had it all, if only he’d been able to accept her love. She felt her eyes prickle, but held herself together and finished feeding Max, then together they changed his nappy. His skin was so soft, so tender, the little legs bowed and mottled, almost transparent.
‘He’s incredible,’ Sam said reverently, running a finger gently over his downy cheek as she put him in his cot. ‘I can’t believe he’s mine. I can’t believe I’ve done anything good enough in my life to deserve him.’
‘Oh, Sam—’
‘Sorry. It’s just a bit of a rollercoaster.’
It was. A rollercoaster, an emotional minefield, and Emelia was struggling, too. Her own feelings were enough to deal with, but Sam’s as well just overloaded her.
Still, she coped—more or less. Sam brought her something to eat, then she rested some more, fed Max again and began to feel like an old hand. She could do this, she thought. She could cope.
She was OK till she saw Emily.
They arrived at six, and her friend came straight upstairs, tapping on the door and tiptoeing in just as Emelia put Max down again.
‘Hiya,’ she said softly, peering into the cot and pressing her fingers to her lips. ‘Oh, he’s so like Sam!’
‘I know. If there was ever any doubt about what the clinic had done, it went the second I saw him. He really is his daddy’s boy—’
Her voice cracked, and Emily gave a tiny sob and gathered her into her arms, hugging her and rocking her gently. She led her to the bed and sat her down on the edge, perching beside her as she tried to pull herself together, and then she tucked her up in bed and sat up beside her, holding her hand and plucking at her fingers absently.
‘Are you OK, Emelia? Really OK?’
‘I’m fine. It wasn’t that bad. A bit scary, that’s all.’
‘I meant about Sam.’
Oh. ‘No, not really,’ she said honestly, starting to cry again, and Emily shushed her as she rolled into her shoulder and let go of all the tumult of emotions that had built up over the past few weeks.
‘Oh, Emelia. Have you fallen in love with him? I was so afraid you would.’
‘I was OK until he—’ She broke off, but Emily stared at her searchingly.
‘Until he…?’
She shook her head. ‘I spent the night with him. It was crazy, I shouldn’t have done it, but it just felt so right, and then in the morning there was nothing in the fridge and I told him he needed a wife. And he told me about Alice.’
Emily’s sharply indrawn breath was followed by a soft sound of sympathy. ‘Oh, Emelia. How was he?’
‘I don’t know, really. Distant, removed, shut down—she really did a number on him, didn’t she? It sounded awful.’
‘It was. We were so worried about him. I didn’t know him all that well, Andrew and I had only been together a year and Sam was always so busy I’d only met him a few times, but I’d always really liked him and I didn’t like Alice one bit when we met her. I was shocked that his judgement was so skewed, that he’d slept with someone with such dead eyes. She just—she wasn’t there, behind her eyes. Does that sound strange?’
‘No. If she was lying, maybe it was the only way she could do it. Shut herself away so you couldn’t see it.’
‘Maybe. Andrew was shocked when she chose the Richmond Park house, but in fact Sam did well because he sold it for more and bought this place instead, which was the best thing he’s ever done. Or it would be, if only he hadn’t come here to hide.’
‘Well, it’s not really working, is it?’ Emelia said softly. ‘The very thing that scares him rigid has followed him here. And I don’t know if I can do it, Em. He was amazing yesterday—absolutely fantastic. He did everything so calmly, so solidly—he was a rock, and yet today—he’s gone again, retreated back into himself.’
‘Is he scared of the baby?’
‘No. He’s scared of me. Scared of loving me.’
‘But he does love you. You’ve only got to listen to him talking about you. He was so proud of you yesterday—he hardly talked about the baby, it was all about you.’ She sighed shortly. ‘I can’t believe he’s so blind, he just can’t see what’s under his nose, but he’ll come round, Emelia. I’m sure he will. Just give him time.’
She gave a tiny, humourless laugh. ‘He’s had nearly five months, Em. He’s still not come round, not even slightly. If anything it’s worse. And he’s very honest about it. He admits he can’t do it—he even told me he could easily love me if things were different.’
‘Oh, the idiot! Of course he can do it,’ Emily muttered. ‘The man’s a fool.’
‘Anyway,’ Emelia went on, ‘I’m not sure I dare trust him. He’s so wary, so busy not giving anything away that if he did, I wouldn’t be sure he wouldn’t take it back. She’s hurt him too badly, Em. She’s torn his heart out, betrayed his trust. I don’t know if he’ll ever get over it, and I’m certainly not holding my breath. Life’s too short. I can’t wait for him.’
‘So what are you going to do?’
‘I don’t know. Live here, share Max with him, try and get a job in a local school in a year or so, and make some friends, I suppose. I don’t need a man in my life. Sam’s taking care of the practical stuff, and I can live without the emotional upheaval. I never thought there’d be anyone else after James anyway, and I’m not sure I want anyone.’
‘Not Sam?’
She gave a shaky sigh. ‘Of course Sam. I love him. But there won’t ever be anyone else. Loving two men and losing them is enough for any woman. I might take up knitting.’
Emily laughed, a strained little sound at first, but then they both started, and ended up doubled over and leaning on each other.
‘Are you girls OK?’
‘We’re fine,’ Emelia said, smiling at Andrew and kissing him on the cheek. ‘Go and see your nephew. He’s in the cot.’
His face, so like Sam’s in many ways, showed a flicker of emotion as he bent over the crib and introduced himself to his sleeping nephew.
‘He’s so like Sam,’ Andrew said softly, staring at him in amazement. ‘There’s a photograph of him in the pram at a few days old, and he looks just like that. There’s no doubt, is there?’
‘No doubt at all,’ Sam said from the doorway. ‘He’s got my eyes.’
‘Just so long as he doesn’t have your ability to fall out of trees.’
Sam shrugged away from the doorpost and joined his brother. ‘I’ve already had horrors over that. Watching him grow up is going to be nailbiting, I can tell already.’
He straightened up and gave Emelia a slightly strained smile. ‘OK?’
She nodded. ‘I’m fine,’ she lied. ‘A bit tired. I could do with another nap.’
‘We’ll leave you to sleep. I’ll bring you some supper up later.’
‘I can come down. I’m not an invalid,’ she said, and he gave a curt nod and went out, followed by Andrew. Em gave her a hug and slipped off the bed, pausing.
‘Are you really all right?’ she murmured, and Emelia nodded.
‘I’m fine,’ she lied again. ‘Go on, go and talk to Sam. He needs some normality.’
And she needed—she didn’t know what she needed. For them to go? It was lovely to see them, but really she didn’t need any help to do anything
, and she just wanted time alone with the baby.
She wished she’d insisted on going to the cottage, but events had got in the way and she was powerless to change it now, so she lay down, closed her eyes and thought of sandy beaches and the rustle of palm trees in a tropic breeze.
It didn’t work.
‘So what are you going to do next?’
‘About what?’ he asked, although he was horribly sure he knew the answer.
‘Emelia, living in the cottage, so close and yet so far away. Keeping your distance.’
He stared out of the window. She was sitting at the far end of the rose garden, under the arbour, and Max was lying in his little chair in the sitting room at Sam’s feet, guarded by Daisy. The baby was fast asleep, and she’d gone outside for a breath of fresh air. Keeping her distance, as he was?
‘I don’t have a choice. She’s not really interested in me. It’d just be too tidy, wouldn’t it? Why does everybody want to make everything so tidy? Maybe we’re happy like this.’
‘Are you?’
He couldn’t answer that, not without lying, so he didn’t bother.
‘I hope you know what you’re doing, Sam,’ Andrew said softly. ‘For both your sakes.’
He frowned. ‘We’re trying to do the best for our child.’
‘Are you? I think you’re both so busy protecting yourselves you can’t see what the best thing is. I just hope you find out before it’s too late.’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about—’
‘I know you don’t. You can’t see what’s right in front of you. You love her, Sam. And she loves you. Why don’t you just go and tell her?’
His heart crashed against his ribs.
‘I don’t love her—’
‘Oh, tell it to the fairies, Sam! Of course you love her. You haven’t taken your eyes off her since she went out there. And she loves you, too, but she’s afraid to show it because she can’t cope with any more pain in her life. But this is hurting her, Sam, and it’s hurting you, and it’s all so unnecessary.’
He stood up. ‘You don’t need us here. I’m going to take Emily home and leave you two alone.’
‘But Emelia—’
‘Is fine. There’s nothing she’s going to need you can’t do for her. You were there for the birth, you’ve slept with her—’
He jerked his head up and stared at Andrew. ‘What makes you say that?’
‘She told Emily.’
He shut his eyes and swore. ‘It was a mistake.’
‘No. I don’t think it was. I think for once your guard was down and your heart sneaked past it. Sam, she loves you. She’s waiting for you, but she won’t wait forever. Trust her.’
Trust her? How? And how to trust himself? What if he failed her?
‘You won’t let her down.’
He stared at his brother hard. ‘How the hell do you know what I’m thinking?’
‘Because I love you. And she does, too. Do it, Sam. For all your sakes, take a deep breath and do it.’
Take a deep breath and do it.
Andrew had gone, taking Emily with him, but they’d said goodbye to Emelia in the garden and she was still out there.
And Max was sleeping soundly, his little rosebud mouth working from time to time.
Sam looked down the garden, his eyes searching for her in the gloom. There was a light on the wall, enough to see your way along the paths, but he couldn’t see her in the shadows of the arbour. He knew she’d be there, though.
His heart pounding, he stood up and walked out of the French doors and down the garden to the woman he loved.
She saw him coming.
There was something about the slow, measured stride that made her heart beat faster, something about the look on his face in the dim light that stalled the breath in her throat.
Andrew and Emily had gone, she had no real idea why. She hoped they weren’t upset by the baby, but they might have been.
But that wasn’t what this was about. She could tell that—could feel it, deep inside her, in the lonely, aching void where her love for him lay bleeding.
‘Everything all right?’ she asked, and he said yes, but then shook his head.
‘Not really. Mind if I join you?’
‘Of course not.’
She fell silent, waiting, hardly daring to breathe, and after a long moment Sam looked up and met her eyes.
‘I don’t know if I can do this,’ he said softly, ‘but it isn’t just about me, is it? It’s about you, and Max. And yesterday—you were amazing, Emelia. I was so proud of you, and so scared for you, so worried that something would go horribly wrong.’
‘It was OK, Sam.’
‘It could have been worse. Much worse. And I realised, in that moment, just what you meant to me. I think I already knew, to be fair, but I wasn’t ready to acknowledge it, and I’m not sure I’m ready now. I’m not sure I’ll ever be ready, but it can’t hurt any more if you leave me than it hurts right now, wanting you and not being with you.’
He took a breath, looked around. ‘When you did the garden for me, it wasn’t really about the garden, was it—or am I wrong?’
‘No,’ she told him softly. ‘You’re not wrong. I knew your heart was broken. I thought, if I put my heart into the garden, then my love might heal you.’
A tear spilt down her cheek, and he lifted a hand and smoothed it away with his thumb.
‘Emelia,’ he said, his voice hardly more than a sigh of the wind. ‘I love you. I can’t promise not to let you down, I can’t promise to live forever, but I can promise that I won’t hurt you deliberately, or lie to you, or cheat on you. I’ll do everything I can to be a good father to Max, but I need more than that. I need your love. I need you beside me every day. You said once that if I truly wanted you, I’d want you when you were old and grey and toothless—’
‘I think I said incontinent,’ she said with a smile, hope flourishing in her heart like an opening rose.
He laughed softly. ‘Maybe you did—but you were right. And I do love you like that, and I will love you whatever happens.’
He took her hand in his, and knelt in front of her on the fallen rose petals, his eyes burning in the darkness.
‘Emelia, I know I can’t measure up to James, and I know you’ll always love him, but if you could find it in you to share your life with me, to raise our children together as a real family—Emelia, will you marry me? Will you do me the honour of being my wife?’
‘Oh, Sam, I don’t know what to say.’
She was too choked to speak, too tired and overwrought and emotional to come up with anything as beautiful as his words, but it seemed she didn’t need to.
‘A simple yes would do,’ he said unsteadily, and she laughed and threw her arms around his neck.
‘Oh, yes—Sam, yes, yes, yes.’
He shifted so he was sitting on the bench again and gathered her up against his side, and then tenderly, with so much love, he kissed her.
‘I love you,’ he whispered. ‘I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to trust you enough to tell you.’
‘Oh, Sam, I love you, too. I love you so much. I’ve known for ages, but yesterday—yesterday you were just—there for me. I couldn’t have done it without you, and you just knew exactly what to do.’
‘I had no idea. I just winged it.’
‘Well, remind me to have you with me next time, then,’ she said with a smile, and he blanched.
‘Next time?’
‘Of course. I want more babies—lots more.’
‘How can you even think about it?’ he groaned, and she laughed.
‘I might need a few months,’ she told him. ‘And a ring on my finger.’
‘I haven’t got you an engagement ring.’
‘I don’t want one. I just want shares.’
‘Shares?’ he said, his voice wary.
She smiled and kissed him. ‘In your heart.’
‘No shares,’ he said, kissing her back tenderly, his
eyes filled with love. ‘It’s all yours. Forever.’ He lifted his head after a second, listening, then smiled wryly. ‘Yours and our children’s—and talking of which, I think that’s our son demanding his mother’s attention.’
He stood up and drew her to her feet, and arm in arm they walked back down the rose garden to Max—and the rest of their lives. Together…
ISBN: 978-1-4268-8482-5
THE BABY SWAP MIRACLE
First North American Publication 2011
Copyright © 2011 by Caroline Anderson
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