by Amy Andrews
A contraction gripped her and Paige’s gasp interrupted him. She tried to breathe but was crying too hard at the same time. It eventually eased and then Nat came in with the CTG machine and hooked the belt around her bump. She squeezed Paige’s hand. ‘Erica will be here really soon.’
Paige watched the curtains fall back into place as Nat left. She looked at Valentino, so strong and positive, and felt weary, old beyond her years. ‘I can’t do this again, Valentino.’ Paige heaved in deep breaths. ‘Do you hear me? I can’t do it. I don’t have enough strength for this.’
‘Yes, you do, Paige. You are the strongest woman I know.’ He brushed at her fringe. Her face was all red and blotchy, her nose and eyes were streaming and he cupped her cheek, using his thumb to wipe at her tears. ‘Look what you’ve been through already. Look how you survived. You’re a survivor.’
Paige angled her head and leaned her face into his palm and shut her eyes, two more tears squeezing out and trekking down her face. ‘Why can’t something just go my way for once?’ She opened her eyes and straightened her head. ‘You told me it would be okay,’ she whispered. ‘I trusted you.’
He placed his other hand on her face so he was cupping both cheeks. ‘You can trust me. I’m not going to let anything happen. We’ll get an ultrasound and if it is preterm labour then you’ll go on nifedipine and the labour is going to stop and you’re giving up work and going on bed rest and I’m going to support you and feed you and pamper you and this baby will go to full term and then we’re getting married because I love you and we’re going to Italy for a honeymoon and we’re taking the kids.’
Paige was feeling so churned up she found it difficult to follow his stream-of-consciousness speech. She wasn’t even sure if she heard him right. But the conviction in his words was strong and she so wanted to believe him.
And had he actually said the L word? She sniffed and said, ‘What?’
Then the curtains snapped back and Erica arrived, pushing a portable ultrasound machine and looking calm and efficient and in control. Valentino squeezed her hand and they and their future faded away as the immediate danger to their baby took precedence.
‘How are you doing?’ she asked both of them as she switched on the machine and fiddled with some dials.
‘Lousy,’ Paige admitted.
Erica nodded. ‘You?’ she asked Valentino.
‘Scared witless.’
Paige looked at him, startled. He hadn’t seemed in the least bit afraid. He’d been commanding and confident and had got her to A and E and arranged for Erica to be here and told her everything was going to be okay. He’d been the epitome of cool, calm and collected, especially in the face of her histrionics.
Erica nodded again. ‘Normal, then.’ She inspected the graph readout the CTG had traced.
Her face gave nothing away but that just made Paige even more frantic. ‘It’s bad, isn’t it?’
Erica looked her in the eye. ‘It’s showing regular strong contractions. But the baby’s heart rate is steady and there are no decelerations. He doesn’t appear to be in any distress. Let’s have a look first, okay?’ She placed a condom over the trans-vaginal probe and squirted warmed lubricant on it.
Paige grabbed Erica’s sleeve. ‘Please tell me it’s going to be okay.’
Erica glanced at Valentino then back to Paige. She shook her head. ‘I don’t know yet, Paige. But I will in a second. Let’s be sure, okay?’
Paige felt a hot tear escape out the corner of one eye and tried not to tense as she drew her knees up and Erica inserted the probe beneath the sheet. Valentino squeezed her hand and dropped a kiss on her shoulder, which made her tear up even more.
An image flickered on the screen and she shut her eyes tight, turning her head into Valentino’s shoulder. She couldn’t bear to watch.
After what seemed like minutes Paige couldn’t take the silence any longer, convinced Erica was trying to find a way to tell her she was almost fully dilated again. She glared at Erica. ‘Well?’
Erica flicked a switch and the sure and steady beat of their baby’s heart filled the cubicle. Paige broke down at the glorious sound. It seemed so strong but Paige knew at twenty-four weeks their son was so very, very fragile. Too young to be in the outside world.
Erica removed the probe and switched off the machine. She looked at Valentino, his arm around Paige, who was weeping quietly. ‘The good news is you haven’t dilated at all.’
Paige clutched at Valentino’s sleeve as the news sank in. He kissed her head and for the first time since she’d realised she was in labour, Paige felt a ray of hope.
‘But. You are fifty per cent effaced.’
Valentino knew both effacement—shortening and thinning of the cervix—and dilatation were required for the baby to be delivered. ‘So, it’s definitely preterm labour?’
Erica nodded. ‘I’m afraid so.’
Paige was incapable of anything as she went from fragile hope to the walls crashing around her. It was happening all over again. She was going to give birth to Val’s baby soon. Too soon. A hundred memories of Daisy and McKenzie when they had first been born floated before her.
And her son was going to be even earlier. A whole four weeks of crucial development time.
‘So what’s the plan?’ Valentino asked.
‘Oral nifedipine regime to relax the uterus and hopefully stop the contractions, even if it’s only for a few days to give us time to administer some steroids to mature the baby’s lungs.’
Valentino nodded. ‘And then?’
‘Hospital for a few days, monitoring blood pressure and regular ultrasounds to check on the cervix.’
He nodded again. Nifedipine’s normal use was as an anti-hypertensive and had only been used regularly in an obstetric drug in relatively recent times. Paige’s blood pressure would need close monitoring. ‘And then?’
‘If we can stop the contractions, home on twice-daily tablets and lots of bed rest. If she makes it to thirty-six weeks we take her off the medication and let nature take its course.’
Valentino’s methodical medical mind prioritised and sorted. ‘So, the worst-case scenario is that we buy a few days. The best case is we go to term?’
Erica nodded. ‘Spot on.’
Paige was taking none of it in. She was numb now. Numb all over. There were no more tears left. Flashes of three years ago bombarded her—the twins on life support, Daisy’s tiny white coffin, Arnie walking away—as she tried to reach a mental place where she could shut down her emotions and deal with the next few days, maybe months if Valentino’s child was a fighter.
Juggling McKenzie and watching Valentino become ever more distant.
A sob caught in her throat.
‘Paige!’
Valentino’s voice invaded her thoughts and the mental place moved further out of reach. She looked at him as if seeing him for the first time.
‘Leave me alone,’ she whispered.
Valentino could see her withdrawing before his eyes and he wanted to shake her. Dio! He would not let her give up. This wasn’t a battle he could fight on his own, neither could his son. She had to believe it was going to be okay too. ‘No.’
Paige had started to recede again and his insistent denial dragged her back. ‘What?’
‘I said no.’
Paige shook her head. He truly didn’t understand how much of her had died inside her last time. ‘Just do what needs to be done,’ she muttered. He said he loved her? Then he could do that for her.
Valentino looked hopelessly at Erica. ‘What do I do?’
Erica gave him a grave smile. ‘What she asked you to do. Do what needs to be done.’
Valentino glanced at Paige, so near and yet so far. ‘Okay, then.’
Paige swallowed pills and lay passively as they put in an IV and gave her a steroid shot and took her blood pressure endlessly. She didn’t feel the belt of the CTG strapped to her abdomen or notice the contractions slowing and then stopping or Valentino’s bedside vig
il when she was finally transferred to Maternity.
Inside her head she was in a warm dark place with her babies—McKenzie and Daisy and her little boy—and she was singing them a lullaby and as she drifted to sleep they were all happy.
Two hours later Erica strode into Paige’s room to check on her patient. She headed straight to the constant readout on the graph paper. ‘They’ve stopped,’ she murmured.
Valentino nodded, too exhausted from his flight, which seemed a million years ago now, and worry about Page’s mental state to truly appreciate the deep well of joy and sheer relief of his son being okay.
They’d dodged a bullet.
Erica looked down at him and gave his shoulder a squeeze. ‘She’ll be all right,’ she murmured. ‘Paige has been through a lot. It’s just her way of coping. She’ll be a different person when she wakes.’
Valentino nodded but his heart felt heavy as Erica left. He’d been so excited about the baby—his son. About becoming a father. About the things they’d do together. He truly hadn’t considered the mental implications for Paige. She’d tried to tell him she couldn’t cope with another poor outcome and he’d swept all her objections aside, promising her hearts and rainbows.
He’d been an arrogant man.
‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered at her sleeping profile, looking still and pale in her white hospital gown against the white hospital sheets.
He’d been so wrapped up in being in love with her and their joyful future he’d forgotten how truly badly love could hurt.
Paige’s arm slipped off the bed and she jolted awake with a gasp. Valentino jolted awake too. ‘What is it? Are you okay?’ he asked, lifting his head off the bed where it had fallen an hour ago. He stood and loomed over her, blinking bleary eyes and fighting a thick fog of fatigue.
Paige took in the room and the drip and tried to remember what had happened. Her mouth was dry and she had a headache. She looked at him with frightened eyes. ‘The baby?’ Had they taken the baby?
She reached for her belly, expecting flatness and to feel pain from an incision.
‘It’s okay,’ Valentino soothed, placing his hand on top of hers. ‘He’s still there. Feel him,’ he urged, running the flat of her hand around her bump. ‘Erica managed to stop the contractions.’
He pushed aside the bedside chair and checked the nearby growing pile of graph paper. ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘Not one single contraction.’
Paige’s heart banged in her chest. Dared she even hope he was telling the truth? ‘Really?’
Valentino smiled. ‘Really.’
‘So…it’s going to be okay?’
‘Erica’s encouraged by your uterus’s rapid response to the medication. You’ll need to stay on it but…’
Paige couldn’t believe what she was hearing. The last thing she remembered she’d been preparing herself for the worst. ‘I’ll take a truckload of the stuff if that’s what it takes.’
Valentino chuckled for the first time since he’d landed. ‘Two a day should be enough.’
Paige laughed as Valentino resumed his chair. His chin rested on his hands and he looked utterly exhausted. His stubble was longer still and his clothes more rumpled. His hair looked as if it had been raked to within an inch of its life. ‘You should go home,’ she murmured. ‘You look totally exhausted.’
Valentino rubbed his chin against the sheets and it rasped into the silence. ‘I’m not leaving,’ he said. ‘I’m never leaving.’
Paige swallowed. She believed him. The man had seen her at her lowest ebb and was still here. Arnie had never been good with her tears and hadn’t been able to cope with her grief. He certainly would have been at a loss with her withdrawn state.
Valentino had just taken it in his stride.
‘I’m sorry about earlier. I don’t know where I went…I totally freaked out.’
Valentino slid his hand back to her rejoin hers nestled against her belly. ‘You went where you needed to go. It’s okay.’
Paige gave him a small smile and yawned as her eyelids fluttered shut.
‘Go to sleep,’ he urged. ‘I’m staying right here.’
Paige nodded but something niggled at the back of her mind as she drifted off. Three seconds later she was wide awake and sitting bolt upright, her heart in her mouth. ‘McKenzie!’
Valentino squeezed her hand. ‘She’s fine. She’s with your parents. I’ve been giving them regular updates.’
‘Really?’ she demanded, her pulse still racing.
‘Really,’ he assured her, reaching his arms up to push gently against her shoulders. ‘Go to sleep.’
Paige complied as her heart rate settled and her breathing became deep and even, yet still something niggled.
Paige wasn’t sure how much time had elapsed since she’d last woken up but she could see a slight pink hue lightening the sky through a gap in the curtains.
Her gaze drifted to Valentino’s sleeping face. For the first time he actually looked his thirty-seven years. A lock of his luscious hair had fallen forward and was kissing his eyelid. It was such an endearing picture her heart filled with her love for him. She forgot all about being mad at him earlier.
What did that matter now? He had been her true hero tonight and she loved him completely.
And suddenly she was able to put a finger on that strange niggly feeling from earlier as memories from yesterday afternoon rushed back. He had told her he loved her too. And today, at the breaking of a new dawn, after a night of miracles, she was going to embrace it and choose to be happy.
Paige advanced her finger slowly and gently lifted the stray lock back into place. He murmured and stirred and then opened his eyes.
She gave him time to focus. ‘Good morning,’ she whispered.
He licked his dry lips and smiled. ‘Buongiorno.’
She smiled back, her toes curling at his husky morning voice and sexy accent. ‘You told me you loved me.’
Valentino stilled for a moment and searched her face. She seemed relaxed. Happy even. ‘Yes.’
‘Did you mean it?’
‘Assolutamente.’
Paige smiled, not needing a translation for that one. ‘And when did you have this particular epiphany?’
‘About ten seconds after I left your house to go to the airport a fortnight ago.’
Paige laughed this time. ‘I think that was about when I had mine.’
Valentino’s heart stopped briefly before skipping madly in his chest. He slid his hand to her belly. ‘Really?’ he murmured.
She nodded, holding his hand close. ‘Really.’
‘It was before that, though. The moment I fell in love with you. I just didn’t realise until much later.’
Paige quirked an eyebrow, intrigued. ‘Oh? When?’
‘That night at the wedding when you looked so confused as to why out of all the women at Alessandro’s wedding I wanted you.’
Paige frowned. ‘Why then?’
‘Because you truly didn’t know how beautiful you were and that, my darling…’ he lifted her hand off her stomach and kissed it ‘…was utterly endearing.’
She could feel her cheeks turn pink. ‘I think for me it was when you promised me there would be no sleeping.’ Valentino chuckled and she grinned. ‘That was a great line. You’ll have to teach it to our son when he’s older.’
Valentino felt his chest expand. Their son. ‘So you’re not going to fight me any more? You’ll marry me?’
Paige nodded vigorously and snuggled his hand back against the swell of her belly. ‘And the four of us will honeymoon in Italy together.’
Valentino grinned. It sounded like bliss. ‘I brought this with me from the airport.’ He reached into his pocket with his spare hand and pulled out the velvet case he’d produced all those months ago. He presented it to her. ‘Will you wear it?’
Paige slipped her hand out of his and flipped open the lid. The diamond glittered beneath the dim overhead light. ‘Just try and stop me,’ she murmured as she fre
ed it from its satiny cushion and slipped it on. ‘See?’ She turned it around to show him and he rose slightly and pressed a gentle kiss against her mouth.
‘Perfect. Just like you.’
‘Just like us,’ she whispered. ‘Just like him.’ And her hand rejoined his as she kissed him back.
EPILOGUE
‘HE’S perfect. Perfect in every way,’ Valentino mused, peeling back the wad of wrapping in the crook of his wife’s elbow to reveal his one-hour-old son Ferdinando Lombardi.
Paige smiled as her little boy slept. She couldn’t agree more. She was exhausted from a fifteen-hour labour but somehow still too elated to sleep. Erica had taken her off the nifedepine a week ago and their son, after wanting out at such an early stage, had finally decided to make an appearance seven days later, weighing a very healthy three and a half kilos.
‘Can we come in?’
Paige looked up to see her parents and McKenzie waiting impatiently in the doorway.
‘McKenzie!’ Valentino smiled and held out his arms to her.
She rushed into the room. Don and Adele followed at a slightly more sedate pace. Slightly.
Valentino swept McKenzie into his arms and plonked her on the side of the bed. ‘Are you ready to meet your little brother?’ he said as he signed simultaneously.
McKenzie squirmed with barely suppressed excitement. ‘Yes,’ she said.
Paige smiled, still in love with her daughter’s voice as she turned her son around.
‘This is your brother, Ferdinando,’ Val murmured, signing as well.
McKenzie looked at him as if he were a baby unicorn she’d found in an enchanted forest, her eyes big and round. ‘Nandi,’ she said, and leaned forward to kiss the tip of her sleeping brother’s nose.
‘Looks like he’s already acquired a nickname.’ Adele beamed, reaching forward to gently touch her grandson’s tiny fingers.
Valentino chuckled. ‘I like it.’
Paige made way for McKenzie to snuggle into her side and they all gazed on her newborn son’s perfection.
‘Thank you,’ Valentino mouthed after a few moments, interlinking his hand with hers.