Simone
After the exchange with Markus, all I can think about is a glass of wine. I even go as far as getting the wine bottle from the rack on the cupboard and placing it on the counter, but of course I don’t pour a glass, or even open the bottle. I rub my belly and whisper, “I guess you don’t want to be drunk yet, right, bud?” I keep waiting for a kick even though I know that’s months away yet.
I sit on the couch and turn on the TV, watching a nature documentary but really watching my phone, waiting for Rocco to call. Even if he hasn’t called and has shown no sign of calling, I still keep expecting my phone to go off. He’ll tell me he can’t take being apart anymore and we’ll fall into each other’s arms and . . . But it doesn’t ring. It never rings. I think about calling him as a pack of wolves chases an elk on TV. My pregnancy hormones have heightened my mind so much that as I half-watch the hunting scene I find myself wishing I was the elk and that Rocco was the alpha wolf. I want to be hunted by him. I get excited just thinking about it.
I think about calling him, but I don’t. I can’t take that ring, ring, ring to voicemail again.
Instead I switch on over to a sitcom. I watch that for a little while, feeling restless. Markus has really pissed me off. Men like him have always annoyed me. There were a few like that at college, up their own asses and certain that if they acted like men did in romantic comedies they could do anything they wanted to women. It’s like they have this tier system in their head where flowers equal kissing and paying for dinner equals sex, all the way to a holiday giving them carte- blanche access. I spend some time fantasizing about a meeting between Rocco and Markus, how Rocco would just look down at him and Markus would melt like a coward.
When my apartment buzzer sounds, I’m certain it’s Mom. She’s come around to give me a piece of her mind. I ready myself for an argument I have no interest in having. I know Mom. If I ignore the buzzer she’ll just hit it again and again, leaving me no choice but to eventually cave in.
But it’s not Mom’s voice which comes to me through the speakers.
“Miss Ericson,” the man says, his voice gruff. “Sorry to call up like this, but it’s—”
“Is he okay?” I snap, a sudden premonition hitting me. “Please tell me he’s okay!”
“He’s been stabbed.”
“I’m coming down!”
We take my car, the biker driving as I sit in the back gnawing my fingernails down to stubs. I can’t stop thinking about Cecilia and Shotgun, how history is repeating itself, things have come full circle . . . And soon I’ll feel the stabbing pain that crippled Cecilia for so long. I jump out of the car and rush into the hospital, running past nurses and doctors and patients until coming to a room with bikers huddled around the door. “Where is he?” I demand when Beast steps forward.
Beast nods at the door.
I walk past him and push the door open. Rocco lies on a single bed, hospital sheets pulled up to his waist, looking completely unlike himself in the crisp paper hospital gown. Tubes are hooked up to him and his eyes are hazy as he opens them. He has a drugged-up look to his face, but he seems lucid enough. He smiles when he sees me, and then winces.
“What happened to you?” I whisper, tears in my eyes. I go to the side of the bed and place my hand on his.
“Stabbed,” he replies. “No real damage, apparently. Though I could’ve died from blood loss if I’d been brought in later.”
“You could’ve died . . .” The tears stream freely down my cheeks. If there was any doubt how I felt about this man, seeing him laid up like this crushes it.
“I shouldn’t’ve said that,” he mutters. “Goddamn meds.”
“I can’t believe . . . oh, Rocco.” I lean down and kiss the back of his hand. “Seeing you like this, I can’t even . . . I’m sorry, I’m trying to get everything out and it’s coming out all jumbled and messed up and I can’t—” I stop, taking a deep breath.
Rocco laughs, and then winces again. “You need to stop doing that,” he says.
“What?” I ask.
“Being all flustered and cute and making me laugh. It’s not fair. I’ve got a knife wound in the side of my belly here, in case you didn’t notice. I know that for a snooty rich girl like you that might not be a big deal—”
“I won’t be talked to in that tone by a peasant, Rocco,” I say. We meet eyes. I giggle. He laughs.
I slap him softly on the arm. “Stop laughing, right this second. No more laughter.”
“I’ve missed you,” he says. He pauses, chewing his lip, and then goes on. “But you shouldn’t be here. It was wrong of them to bring you here.”
“I thought you asked for me,” I say.
“I did. But I was half-conscious. I’ve been steering clear for a reason. You need to leave. It’s not that I don’t want you here, Simone. It’s just—”
“I love you!” I cry. “Sorry to interrupt your grand speech, but I love you, Rocco. I have to say it. I can’t keep it inside anymore.”
“You love me?” He sounds astonished.
“Of course I love you. I know it doesn’t make any sense.” I lean forward and kiss him on the cheek. “I mean, maybe to other people it might not make any sense. But it does to me. I love you more than I’ll ever understand. It’s like . . . okay, I know how this sounds, but it’s like there’s an invisible rope always linking us, and even when we’re apart I feel you. You’re always with me. I never want to be apart from you.”
There’s a long pause as Rocco watches me, and then he says, “I love you, too. I never knew what love was until we met. I never knew it when I was growing up and I never knew it afterward. But you’ve changed me. I don’t know how. You must be a damn magician or something. You’ve changed me, Simone.”
I grasp his hand with both of mine. It feels so good to be close to him, to feel the heat of him next to me. “I have something else to tell you.” I don’t mean to say it. Now isn’t the right time to drop this kind of bombshell. But it’s also exactly the right time. Even if he’s injured, the connection between us has never been stronger. For the first time in weeks, I let myself think about what the future might be like. Maybe I won’t raise this child alone. Maybe we really do have a chance at some kind of life.
“What?” he asks.
“I’m . . .”
I hesitate as a thought occurs to me. What if this scares him away? What if he doesn’t want a kid, with me, with anybody else? But I can’t refuse his dark eyes, or the way he strokes my fingers, or the emotion in his face. Once I thought this man was just a brute, a violent biker, a topless man in a naughty calendar and nothing more.
I swallow, and then say, “I’m pregnant.”
Rocco’s eyebrows go up like a cartoon’s. “And it’s mine?” he says.
I repress my annoyance. “Of course it’s yours,” I say softly. “I haven’t been with anybody else since we were first together. Why, have you?”
“No,” he says quickly. “I haven’t even wanted to.” He pauses, and then goes on: “I’m going to be a father. I can’t . . . This is incredible news, Simone. This is the most incredible news I have ever heard. This changes everything. We can’t carry on with this dance anymore, can we? We’ve got to make a go of it.”
“Do you mean that?” There are tears in my eyes again. I can’t stop them. I don’t even try to stop them.
“Of course I mean it,” he says. “A child, a life. I’m not mad, am I? This really does change everything.”
“It does,” I confirm. “I’m so glad to hear you say that.”
Suddenly he tries to lean up in bed, tugging at his tubes. “You have to get out of here! Right now! I can’t have you here, Simone, not with a baby inside of you. What if the Demons see you here, and they . . . You need to leave, right now! Take the boys who’ve been watching you and hide someplace until this is all over. You have to promise me that. Leave town. Go down to Venice with Cecilia. Promise me. Promise me.”
“I promise,” I say, wanting him to lie back down. “But when will it be over? Will it ever be over?”
“It has to be,” he says, voice firm. “There’s no choice now. I’m not having my kid come into this world with his father at war. No damn way.”
“His father? How are you so sure it’s a boy?”
“Or her. I don’t care one way or the other. A life, a life we made. It’s almost too much to believe. You have to leave, now, please. Don’t stay another second, otherwise I’ll want you to stay all night. Leave, and I’ll end this.”
“But your injuries . . .”
“Screw my injuries!” he snaps. “A job needs doing, and I’m gonna do it. It’s as simple as that.”
“Okay. I’ll go to Cecilia’s.”
I kiss him and he kisses me back, a warm, stolen moment, and then I’m in the hospital parking lot walking toward my car with the bodyguards walking just behind me.
It all happens so fast I have no chance to react. I half-turn and see the bodyguards on the floor, blood pooling onto the concrete. A nurse screams. And then hands clamp down on my mouth, an arm wraps around my neck, and I’m kicking and begging them to let me go.