Had she started packing up in there? he wondered. He dropped his cases inside his sitting room and walked along the landing toward Rex’s room and flicked on the lights. Nothing much seemed to have changed in here, although there was a scatter of papers on the escritoire that hadn’t been there before. He crossed the room and sat down, turning on the brass lamp which cast a pool of light over the papers.
He thumbed through them, quickly identifying them for what they were. He went to tidy them into a neat stack and put them back inside the file box they’d obviously been taken from when one word leaped out from the page— “abortion.”
The bitter taste of regret rose in his throat. He had to learn to put this behind him, he just had to. He’d forgiven Piper already, in his heart and in his mind, but some perverse desire to know all the details saw him select the papers from the stack and sit down to read them carefully. The more he read, the more bitter the taste grew in his mouth.
Spontaneous abortion. The medical term for miscarriage, just as Piper had said.
All those wasted years of anger echoed in the room around him. Rex had misread the information from the very beginning. He’d failed to see one very vital point in the report, that the terminology said the loss of the fetus had been spontaneous. One of those tragic quirks of nature that no one could explain.
Wade leaned back in the chair and let the ramifications of what he’d just learned wash over him. No wonder she’d been so reluctant to do what he’d asked of her—asked? Hell, he’d demanded, and he’d demanded knowing that she was in no position to turn him down. He’d taken advantage of her grief over her father’s death and her shock at learning of the abysmal position Rex had left her in, and he’d used both to his selfish advantage. And all of it based on a vow he’d made to himself over her perceived betrayal of the child they’d made together.
Wade made a sound of disgust at his own behavior. For so long he’d been solely focused on this one thing. On making her pay for the wrongdoing he believed she’d actively decided upon, and all along he’d been holding her responsible for something she’d had no control over. Something she’d had to endure all on her own.
The thought of her having to face what had to have been a deep personal loss, so far from home, brought a new level of admiration for her. She’d moved on from that, moved forward with her life—apparently devoting it to good deeds, if May were to be believed, and he had no reason not to believe her.
He had no reason not to have believed Piper, either, when she’d tried to explain her anxieties to him two weeks ago. She would have been at about the same stage of her pregnancy as she’d been when she’d lost their first baby. No wonder she’d begun to doubt her ability to bring the baby to term. Such a fear would only be natural, and she’d had to face it on her own, as she’d faced so much of her entire life. In his unique way, Rex had been an absentee father almost as much as Wade’s father had been.
Wade refiled the papers into their folder and placed them back in the box on the desktop. She wouldn’t be alone anymore. Not ever, if he had any say in the matter—if she let him have any say, that is.
Piper sat on the edge of her hospital bed and tried to quell the nerves that twisted her stomach. Had she imagined Wade had been here yesterday? He was supposed to still be in Apia until late Monday night. She must have been dreaming. The fever that had racked her body had made everything feel as if the past couple days had happened in some crazy dream sequence.
She laid a hand against her belly, feeling the baby flutter against her hand. As long as the baby was all right, that was the most important thing. May had assured her everything was fine, even going so far as to bring a portable ultrasound to Piper’s room to prove that the baby was still okay.
And now she knew the sex of the new life growing so healthily inside her. A little girl. She wondered how Wade would take the news. He had always struck her as the kind of man who’d want a son to carry on the legacy he had built with such pride. A sound at the door made her look up. As if her thoughts had conjured him, Wade stood there looking uncharacteristically unsure of himself.
“All ready to come home?” he asked.
Piper fought to hide her surprise at seeing him here. Maybe she hadn’t imagined his visit last night after all. “I…I thought you were still in Samoa.”
“I came as soon as I heard you were ill. The Dexters send their love, by the way. They can’t wait to get you home and spoil you.”
And you? Piper asked silently. What about you? She dragged in a steadying breath. He’d made his feelings clear be fore he’d left for Samoa; she’d be crazy to expect that to have changed.
“So? Are you ready?” he asked again.
“Pretty much. I’m just waiting for the nurse to bring my discharge papers. Shouldn’t be too long.”
“Okay,” he said, and leaned against the wall behind him, his hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans.
The silence stretched out between them. If they’d been a normal couple he’d be sitting on this bed with her, she thought, rather than maintaining casual sentry duty on the opposite side of the room.
“Wade?”
“Piper—”
“You first,” she said.
“No, it’s okay. What I have to say can wait. Probably best said at home, anyway.”
She felt a clutch of fear grip her throat. What was it that he couldn’t say right here, right now? Did he somehow hold her responsible for what had happened on Friday night? It was a particularly bad case of the flu. Surely he didn’t hold her accountable for that.
“What did you want to say to me?” he urged gently, distracting her from her thoughts.
“I learned the sex of the baby this morning. Do you want to know?”
He took his hands from his pockets and pushed himself upright. “Know? Of course I want to know.”
“It’s a little girl.”
She watched as a variety of expressions chased across his handsome features. Disbelief followed by a sheer joy that lit his eyes and made them shine like highly polished steel.
“A girl? That’s amazing. Me, us, having a daughter.”
“Well, it was always going to be one or the other,” she said with a wistful smile.
Either way it made no difference. He didn’t want her to be a part of their baby’s upbringing. He’d made that patently clear.
“I don’t know why but I always assumed it’d be a boy.” He paced the room. “A daughter.” The words held a note of complete disbelief.
“Are you okay with that?” she asked, feeling a heartfelt surge of protection for her baby. Surely he’d want a daughter just as much.
“Oh, I’m more than okay with that.” He beamed. “I never thought I’d be so lucky. Thank you for telling me.”
And there it was again, that stiltedness he’d exhibited when he’d come through the door. She felt a tug of sorrow that things couldn’t be different between them, that they couldn’t have shared this news with the mutual affection and excitement that a normal couple would have.
The nurse arrived at that moment with Piper’s discharge papers and a wheelchair.
“I won’t be needing that,” she protested.
“Yes, she will,” Wade amended firmly.
Piper flung him an irritated look. “I’m perfectly fine.”
“Humor me,” he asked, sending her a look she couldn’t quite interpret. “Besides, you’re probably not as strong as you think you are. You’ve been pretty ill these past couple days.”
She gave in and settled herself in the chair, surprised by his consideration and, frankly, suddenly too tired to argue. He was, no doubt, quite right in his assertion that she wasn’t as fit as she should be. Or maybe it was just this sensation of being on constant tenterhooks around him that made her suddenly feel so weak and incapable.
The ride home was completed in near silence, broken only by Wade asking every ten minutes if she was still comfortable. Once home, she gave herself over to the inevitabl
e fussing from Mrs. Dexter. Finally, though, she was alone in her old room again, propped up against a sea of cushions and with a selection of magazines and a water bottle within easy reach.
Wade came into the bedroom and pushed the door closed behind him.
“Comfortable?”
“I’m fine, thanks.”
If he asked her one more time if she was okay, she’d probably scream.
“Are you up for a bit of conversation?”
She stiffened. Here it came. The recriminations for not looking after herself properly, the accusation she’d put another baby at risk. Piper took a deep breath ready to defend herself.
“Bring it on,” she said defensively.
“May I?” he gestured to the side of the bed and sat down at her nod.
For several very long seconds he stared at the floor and said nothing but then he turned to face her. She’d never seen him look quite this earnest or vulnerable before. It was a side of him that unsettled her, made her anxious about what it was that he had to say.
“I owe you an apology. Several apologies, actually.”
Whatever she’d been expecting from him, it certainly wasn’t that. Surprise rendered her dumb. He reached across the covers and took one of her hands in his, his thumb absently brushing back and forth across her inner wrist.
“I have treated you badly, Piper, and I am so dreadfully sorry. I have nothing to say in my defense aside from the fact that I’ve been a stubborn fool, but I ask that you consider if one day you can forgive me.
“I’ve always been a driven person, but one who was prepared to work hard to get where they wanted to be. You know a bit about my father and my background, how he abandoned me and surrendered me to the state rather than face up to his responsibilities. I always swore I’d never be like him, that I’d give any child of mine my abiding love and support without question. It’s why I was so angry when I heard about your miscarriage.”
At her startled gasp he looked up and met her eyes. “Yes, I know it was a miscarriage. I’m very sorry you had to go through that all alone, Piper. I know we can’t turn back the clock but I really wish I’d known so I could have been there with you.”
“How did you find out?” she finally managed to say.
“I saw the papers you were going through in Rex’s rooms when I came back from the hospital yesterday.”
“You were there,” she whispered.
“Yes, and I’d have been there longer if May had let me. I wanted to tell you that I’d forgiven you for what I thought you’d done. That I could understand that, on your own as you were, you probably felt as if you’d had no other choice.” His fingers wrapped around hers more firmly, giving her hand a squeeze. “But I was wrong about that as I was wrong about so many things. If I had the chance again, please believe that I’d do it all very differently.”
“As you said, we can’t turn back time,” she said sadly.
“No, we can’t. But we can go forward, and I’d really like to go forward with you, Piper. If you’ll let me. I’ll understand if you don’t want to, if you don’t want me, God alone knows I deserve worse, but can I ask you to at least consider staying here with me and raising our daughter together, as a proper family?”
“As a proper family?” What exactly did he mean? Did she dare begin to hope?
“I love you, Piper. More than I ever did before and more than I ever believed I could possibly feel for another human being. I beg of you, please give me another chance. Let me make it right with you this time around. Let me be the man to love you and protect you and stand by you every day for the rest of our lives.”
“Wade—” Emotion swamped her, making her eyes tear up and her voice tremble. “I don’t deserve this.”
“You deserve more, trust me.”
“When I was younger, I always thought I loved you as much as one person was capable of loving another, but I know now that those feelings were nothing compared to how I feel about you now. I was too young and immature to understand what I was asking of you when I demanded you come away with me. All I wanted was the reassurance that I came first with you. All my life I’d been second string to my father’s work. Nothing I ever did was good enough to get his attention for more than five minutes. I know he loved me in his own way, but it was never enough for me. It made me push so hard for what I wanted that, in the end, I pushed it all away.”
She reached out one hand to cup his face. “I didn’t deserve your love back then, Wade, but I would like to have another chance to prove to you that I’m worthy of it, of you, now.”
“You’re more than worthy,” he protested before turning his head to place a kiss in the palm of her hand. “I let you down. I didn’t understand how much you needed me then. I had my life compartmentalized, my plan ahead of me. You totally upset that apple cart and I didn’t know how to do what I wanted to do and keep you at the same time.”
“We were both too young to understand it then. I think what I always craved, more than anything, was the reassurance that I was good enough. But I never realized until a few years ago that that acceptance had to come from within me. I’ve learned that now. I understand that my behavior toward you and Dad was dreadful, but if you can forgive me that, then yes, I would like to be a family with you and our daughter.
“I love you, Wade, more than I ever did before. I want to prove to you that I’m grown up now and worthy of your love, that I’m someone you can rely on in any circumstances, and that I can be a good mother to our children.”
Wade leaned forward to brush away the tears she didn’t even realize she was crying.
“I know I can rely upon you, Piper. We’ve both made some pretty terrible mistakes, but at least we’ve had the courage to learn from them. Will you marry me? Will you be my wife and help me steer a true course for the rest of my life? And then maybe we can keep growing up together?”
“Yes, I will. I’d be honored to be your wife.”
“Then there’s one place you really need to be,” Wade said as he stood and pulled her bed covers aside.
“Where’s that?” Piper said, laughing softly.
“With me,” he said simply, scooping her up into his arms and taking her to his suite.
And she knew as he placed her gently in their bed and then gathered her in his arms to hold her close that she’d always be number one in his life. Always.
ISBN: 978-1-4592-1421-7
THE PREGNANCY CONTRACT
Copyright © 2011 by Dolce Vita Trust
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The Pregnancy Contract Page 17