“Normally, yes, but given she shouldn’t be driving so that’s out of the question. She needs to be resting, not driving a car along winding mountain roads, and if something goes wrong help isn’t easily at hand.”
“Fair enough.” Cedric nodded. “Don’t worry, Doctor, I’ll soon talk her around.”
“You will not!” Anna blurted out again.
Remembering, finally, that Anna was actually the patient, the doctor turned to address her. “I’m going to go through your antenatal history, but in the meantime I want you to lie there and relax, and perhaps your husband might be able to talk some sense into
you.”
“I’ll do my best!” Cedric said.
Alone with Cedric the fire seemed to die within her. Three weeks had past since his last visit to her house, and he’d given her space… Just as she asked. He kept in touch. Calling everyday to make sure she and the baby were okay. Asked about her day and her online course. Sometimes he even sent flowers, and he never brought up the topic about her moving back to Haerton. He’d been in around for a month now, and knowing that he hated the place, Anna wondered when he’d leave, but as time went on, it was beginning to seem like he was here to stay.
Everything had been fine…. until today. She’d gone to visit Collins, and she’d stood up from her chair to get her purse, when the room spun and suddenly she was falling. Thankfully, Collins had been there to catch her. As he drove her car to the hospital he’d informed her that he’d call Cedric. A suggestion she declined immediately, telling him that she’d be alright, but apparently her words had fallen on deaf ears.
Impossibly shy and confused, she stared again at her fingers, utterly refusing to look up, to be the one to break the oppressive silence, but, when it was clear Cedric had more staying power than her, finally Anna relented.
“What are you doing here?” she asked him.
“I’m seriously wondering what sort of question that is, Anna,” Cedric quipped. “You’re my wife and that’s my baby you’re carrying in there…” His voice trailed off and if she’d looked up she’d have seen his face soften slightly. “When Collins called and told me you collapsed, did you really think I was going to sit back and not show up?”
“You didn’t need to come.” Anna replied stubbornly.
He stared at her for a while, “I was worried about you.” he admitted, “Scared as hell too. I just had to make sure you were okay.”
“Which I am.”
“Not according to the doctor,” Cedric pointed out, but his voice was gentler now. “He seems to think that you’re not well at all.”
“This isn’t your problem.”
“Will you stop saying that!” Cedric almost yelled, losing his temper, and as she looked up she could see by the look on his face that he was trying hard to hold it together. “That’s my child you’re carrying in there. I know we have our issues and things are not quite right between us at the moment but for God’s sake you’re still my wife and I’m responsible for you… Both of you,”
“I’m just saying,” Anna began. Her voice gave an involuntary wobble but she quickly recovered “… You don’t have to be so worried,”
“Oh wow, isn’t that great,” he muttered, flashing a malevolent smile, just to show he was still in control. “So I take it you want me to go?”
Anna nodded, not trusting herself to speak. Cedric leaving was the last thing she wanted, but it was safer, so very much safer this way.
“Alright then,” he said, “I’ll let the rest of your visitors in on my way out, shall I?”
“The rest of my visitors?” She stared at him nonplussed, simultaneously kicking herself as she realized she’d fallen directly into his trap.
“I thought as much,” Cedric said with a note of triumph.
“Where’s Collins?”
“He left,” Cedric told her, “Said he had a work emergency and he figured you’d be fine since I was here already,”
She could feel the sweat beading on her forehead, feel its icy rivers trickling between her breasts, her pale cheeks flushing as Cedric’s eyes bored into her, running a tongue over impossibly dry lips as she carefully avoided his gaze.
“So tell me, Anna, if I do leave, are you planning to drive yourself home?”
“Of course. I’m fine now!”
“Not according to this you’re not.” Picking up her chart, he skimmed his eyes down it; not like a normal person, though, Anna noted. Normal people squinted at charts upside down, made sure no one was looking as they tried to decipher what had been written, but Cedric Blackwood, damn him. He was holding the chart and reading it authoritatively as if he were the blessed consultant. “It says here that you’re underweight, dehydrated and your blood pressure’s way too high.”
“Of course it’s high.” Anna’s voice was rising now. “I’m stressed. What the hell do you think? That I don’t care about the child? That I wasn’t scared when I fell and…”
Tears started then, horrible, uninvited tears that she didn’t want him to witness, that she didn’t want to stoop to. But seeing him here, another layer of emotion on top of her hellish day was all too much and the tension, the utter, unbearable tension that had been holding her together, snapped then, whipping her reserve away as sobs drenched her fatigued body. Cedric was over in a second, pulling her into his arms and holding her tightly. It was the only place on earth she wanted to be, the only place she had ever truly belonged. And even though it was scary, even though it could surely only complicate things, right here, right now she needed him.
Oh she’d missed him. She wanted those strong arms to hold her and needed just a fraction of the strength that was Cedric Blackwood. Even though it was only transitory, she allowed herself the indulgence of being held by him, of just letting go and leaning on him for a tiny while.
“Everything is going to be fine,” his voice was low and deep and comforting “- and I know you don’t want me around you right now…”
She inhaled his scent, dragged on his strength, even moved her head a fraction in denial. She didn’t want to admit it, but Cedric was everything to her, always had been, and always would be, but sensibility prevailed, holding her back at the final moment.
“But I’m here for you,” he continued, “‘Let it out, Anna,”