Doesn’t matter how or why.
“I don’t say this to everyone, but you’ve got a beautiful little boy there,” says our nurse, a middle-aged RN named Catherine, as she hovers over our sleeping infant in his hospital bassinet, a grandmother-ish tenderness in her crinkling eyes that reminds me of my mother. I’ll never know if having grandchildren would have softened her, but I like to imagine it would’ve.
I’m sure she does say that to everyone—but I appreciate the compliment just the same. Not that I need the confirmation. Our baby is gorgeous with his full head of dark hair, chubby cheeks, and pointed little nose. He’s the opposite of Elsie, with her pale hair and rounder features, but they’re both perfect in their own ways, head to toe.
“Have you called my sister yet?” I ask Luca when he returns to my recovery suite with takeout bags of breakfast from the cafeteria.
My water broke at three AM. By three thirty, Annette was pulling in the driveway with her overnight bag, and by four, I was checked into the hospital, waiting for the anesthesiologist to start the epidural while the nursing team prepped the OR.
At the time, everything happened in slow motion—and then I blinked and there he was, outside my body, showing off a healthy set of lungs and the kind of hair that’d make Elvis Presley jealous.
In that sliver of a precious moment, nothing else mattered.
Nothing.
“I texted her a picture a little bit ago.” He plates my food on a wheeled tray and pushes it over to my bed while the nurse helps me sit up. “She said he’s perfect. But we already know that.”
He gives me a wink and slides my food closer.
“Have you checked on Elsie?” I ask next. I hate to bark orders, but sitting here connected to wires and monitors with a fresh surgical incision brings out the helplessness in me. Micromanaging gives me some illusion of control, I suppose.
Luca unwraps a breakfast sandwich and takes a seat in a guest chair. “Annette says she’s still sleeping, but she’ll bring her in once she’s up.”
I chuckle, knowing what a bear my daughter can be when she doesn’t get a solid ten hours of sleep. It’s a miracle she didn’t wake up in the midst of all the middle-of-the-night chaos, but we managed to make it out without a stir.
“I’ll be back to check on you in about an hour.” Catherine peeks at her watch as someone pages her over the intercom around her neck. “Buzz me if you need anything.”
When she’s gone, Luca scoots his chair to my bedside.
There’s a lightness, in this moment. A catharsis of sorts. As if everything we’d ever wanted was dumped into a few short hours. But that release is short-lived. While we have our daughter and our son and each other, the moment we leave this hospital three days from now, we’re going to walk right back into the mess with Lydia.
Luca would be upset if he knew I still worry, that his comforting words only ever quell my concerns for a short moment. They always return stronger than before, that niggling voice in the back of my mind telling me there’s nothing my husband can say or do to prevent the other shoe from dropping.
The deepest part of me fears it’s not a matter of if . . . but when.
His phone chimes on the bedside table. He grabs it in record time. This isn’t normal Luca behavior. This isn’t the husband I know.
“Who is it?” I force a nonchalant innocence into my voice.
He darkens the screen and slides the phone into his back pocket. “Just the restaurant. Had a question about an order that came in this morning.”
It’s believable enough under ordinary circumstances.
I don’t buy it. I try. But I can’t. My throat swells, and the food turns to rocks in my stomach. Maybe it’s the pain medicine or the whirlwind several hours that have just happened, but my body is rebelling against something.
“What are you not telling me?” My mouth is bone dry. I’d reach for my water, but my fingers tremble so hard I’d likely drop it. “Ever since Lydia came back, you’ve been distant. And whenever I try to talk to you about it, you smooth it over or change the subject or tell me not to worry. And then you make decisions without me.”
He doesn’t speak. Doesn’t chew. Doesn’t protest. Doesn’t move.
“I’m tired of pretending everything’s going to be fine,” I say. “We need to get real, or you’re going to lose me. You’re going to lose us.”
I’ve never threatened him before—I’ve never needed to.
But these are unprecedented times.
A full breath lifts his posture. Placing the remnants of his meal aside, he hunches over the edge of my bed, sliding his hand over mine. When he meets my stare, his dark eyes are glassy and brimming with tears.
In all the years I’ve known this man, he hasn’t shed a single tear. Not once.
“Let me have this day.” His words are a broken whisper, and in this moment, I’m reminded of the man he was when we first met.
Before I respond, he rises and moves for the bassinet, sweeping our newborn son into his arms, his back toward me. The sunlight filtering through the parking-lot-view window engulfs them in a picture-perfect veil of light.
But still, I can’t help but wonder—does he want this day?
Or does he want more time to figure out what he’s going to tell me?
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
LYDIA
“You can’t work for that man anymore,” Delphine tells me after I fill her in on everything. For two hours, she listened in silence. Nodding. Wincing. Gasping. Hands clasped. At one point, she went outside for fresh air and a breather. And when she returned, she sat back down and motioned for me to continue. When it was over, I insisted she google me and encouraged her to fact-check any and everything she felt necessary.
Of course, I can’t prove nine years of torture beyond the marks on my body . . .
“If what he did to you is true,” she adds, “you’re not safe. And I realize I’m not your mother, and you’re a grown woman. I can’t forbid you from doing anything or seeing anyone. But I also cannot, in good faith, let you set foot over there again.”
“I don’t expect you to understand any of—”
She slices a hand through the air, her bracelets clanging. “You don’t fight evil with evil.”
But if I don’t, who will?
Seeing that man in handcuffs serving a measly twenty years for kidnapping and attempted murder would be a slap on the wrist compared to the hell he put me through. And knowing his luck, he’d be out in fifteen for good behavior.
“All due respect, I’d hardly call myself evil,” I say.
“That may be true,” she says, her clear blue eyes wilder than usual. “But you don’t fight fire with fire . . . that only makes more fire.”
“So I should kill him with kindness?” I sniff. I’m pretty sure I’ve been more than kind to him by not going to the police the first chance I had.
“Use the proper channels,” she says, smacking the tabletop. “Go to the authorities, tell them who you are and what happened, and let them handle him. Then and only then can you get your identity back.”
I rise from the table and help myself to another glass of tap water for my parched throat. I can’t recall a single incident in my life when anyone listened to me talk for hours.