CHAPTER 12

 

When Cate woke up, Kian wasn’t there. “Where’s my husband?” she asked one of the nurses.

“He’s just talking to the doctor; he’ll be back in a minute.”

The nurse reached for Cate’s bag, “would you like me to help you get dressed, sweetheart? We’re going to be discharging you this afternoon.”

“I’ll be OK,” Cate unfastened her gown and quickly put on her bra. Her breasts felt normal again. She was just putting on her t-shirt when Kian’s voice filtered through one of the air vents. “That’s impossible.” He sounded furious. “I had a vasectomy nine weeks ago.”

Cate was stunned. Did he really just doubt her fidelity?

The door crashed open and Kian stormed into the room. “I’ll…” the nurse looked uncomfortable. She must have realised what Kian had just implied. “I’ll give you a couple of minutes to finish getting dressed.”

“I didn’t realise you were awake.”

“I am,” Cate said coldly, focusing on pulling her jeans up her legs. She wanted to thump him for how insensitive he was being.

“I’ll help you,” Kian reached for the zipper of her jeans; his thumb grazing her bare skin.

“Don’t touch me,” Cate warned. She shoved her feet into her trainers.

After she’d been discharged, Kian helped Cate into the back of the car which was waiting for them by the back door of the hospital. She scooted across the black leather seat until she was huddled up against the passenger door. It was warm outside but she couldn’t stop shivering and wrapped her cardigan tightly around her torso. She was still sore and bleeding but she was glad to be going home. She was desperate to give her three precious children big hugs and kisses.

As they walked through the airport, Cate felt faint but she was determined that she wasn’t going to ask Kian for any help. She still couldn’t believe that while she’d been lying in a hospital bed after suffering a miscarriage, he’d had the audacity to question if the baby was his. Cate didn’t know how she’d got pregnant when Kian had had a vasectomy - right now she didn’t particularly care either – but she was one hundred percent certain that the baby they’d lost had been his. Kian was the first and only man she’d ever been with.

“Excuse me,” a girl with blonde bunches toddled up to them, “please could I have your autograph?”

It took Cate a second to realise that the little girl was asking her and not Kian. She’d never been asked for her autograph before.

“Of course,” she tried hard to smile, kneeling down so she was at the same level. “What’s your name, sweetheart?”

“Lily,” the girl suddenly became shy, clinging to her mum’s legs.

“She loves Stepping Out,” Lily’s mum said as Cate signed her name. “You’re her favourite.”

Lily looked up at Cate, “you looked like a princess last night.”

“Thank you,” Cate smiled, feeling fresh tears in her eyes.

She waited until Lily and her mum had turned the corner before she tried to get up off the floor. Her legs felt wobbly and her vision went blurry. “Kian?” She felt his strong arms wrap around her waist, holding her upright. “It’s OK, angel. I’ve got you.”

When they got to Seattle airport, Kian settled Cate down on the backseat. He’d parked his car at the airport so it would be just the two of them on the drive home. Cate had slept for most of the flight from L.A. He’d tried to get her to eat something but she’d refused. She was still shivering so he took off his jacket and wrapped it around her slender frame.

When he was certain that she’d gone back to sleep, he dialled the clinic where he’d had the vasectomy. He didn’t want Cate to know how stupid he’d been.

“I need to do the test right away,” Kian insisted. Because of football commitments, he’d kept putting off having the sperm count test.

They gave him the first appointment the following morning.

Cate could hear Kian talking above the low rumble of the engine. “If you need to contact me, I’d prefer it if you’d use this number. I don’t want my wife finding out about this.”

Who was he talking to and what didn’t he want Cate to find out about? She wondered if he’d hired a private detective to find out who she’d been whoring around with.

She pretended to wake up, doing a big performance of yawning and stretching, as they pulled into the driveway. Kian hadn’t even stopped the engine when the front door was flung open and Lola came running towards them. “Mum, you were amazing. I’m so…”

She skidded to a halt as Cate climbed out of the backseat. “You look really white. Are you sick?”

“I’m just tired, baby girl,” Cate smiled weakly, giving her daughter a big hug. “I’m so sorry we couldn’t Skype last night. How did you do against Tacoma?”

Lola beamed with pride, “we won 3-2 and I scored the winning goal.”

“That’s awesome.”

Later that night, after the children were asleep, Cate walked zombie-like into the bedroom. She flopped face down on the bed. “Do you want me to undress you?” Kian asked.

“You’re such a hypocrite,” Cate turned to face him, brushing her hair away from her face.

Kian didn’t say anything which just made Cate even angrier. “It scares me how much I hate you right now.”

“Aren’t you going to say anything?” Cate goaded him, sitting up. “Why don’t you just ask me instead of hiring a goddamn private detective?”

“Hiring a what?” Kian spun around. “What are you talking about?”

“Don’t look so shocked,” Cate had such an urge to hit him that she had to sit on her hands. “I heard you in the hospital and in the car on the drive home from the airport. I want you to look me in the eye and tell me that you think there was even a chance that the baby I lost last night wasn’t yours.”

“Cate!” Kian reached out to her but she jumped off the bed. “Don’t you dare touch me. I want to hear you say it.”

Kian backed Cate up against the wall. “I have never once doubted that the baby we lost last night was mine. Never fucking once, OK?”

“Liar,” Cate spat. “I heard you, Kian. You told the doctor that it was impossible because you had a vasectomy nine weeks ago. Whoever you were talking to in the car, you asked them to call you on your mobile because you didn’t want your wife finding out about any of this.”

Kian looked as if he was barely in control of his anger. “You’re right. I said all of that. I did tell the doctor that it was impossible that you were seven weeks pregnant because I had a vasectomy nine weeks ago and do you know what he said? He said that I should have read the fucking literature that they gave me at the clinic. It would have told me that even after the vasectomy, if I didn’t want to get you pregnant again I should have used condoms until I’d had the final sperm count test.”

“Oh,” Cate slumped against the wall.

“This whole fucking mess is my fault, Cate,” Kian slammed his fists on the wall above her head. “The second call was to the clinic where I had the vasectomy done. I was making an appointment to get that final sperm count test done as soon as fucking possible.”

“Why didn’t you want me to find out?”

“I got you pregnant again, Cate,” Kian turned his back, “because I was too stupid to read the fucking literature they gave me. You’re bleeding and in pain right now because of me.”

Cate thumped her fists on his back, “don’t you dare turn your back on me.”

Her eyes flashed with fire. “I was right there with you at the clinic when you had the vasectomy, Kian. If I didn’t want to get pregnant again, it was just as much my responsibility to read the literature they gave us. Each time we made love I could have asked you to wear a condom but I didn’t. What happened last night was as much my fault as it was yours.”

“I’m your husband, Cate. It’s my fucking job to protect you.”

“This isn’t the dark ages, Kian. If we didn’t want to have another baby, we should both have been more careful.”

Kian reached for the hem of Cate’s t-shirt and tugged it up. “I need to feel you against my skin.”

Cate blushed, “I’m still bleeding.”

He stripped them both down to just their underwear. “You said if – if you didn’t want to get pregnant again; if you didn’t want to have another baby. Do you want another child?”

Cate shook her head, “I don’t know. I know I struggled through each of my pregnancies but it’s hard to think that I’ll never be pregnant again.”

Kian entwined their fingers and placed them gently over her abdomen. “I should have known I was pregnant,” Cate looked up at the ceiling. “I keep thinking about all the things I’d have done differently if I’d known. The flights back and forth to L.A. All those punishing hours in the studio learning the Cha Cha and Viennese Waltz, I keep going over every single time I fell over wondering if I hadn’t done that, would I still have had the miscarriage? Every cup of black coffee. I took a couple of anti-inflammatories for my back earlier this week.”

“Angel,” Kian kissed the tears clinging to her eyelashes, “it wasn’t your fault.”

“I lost our baby, Kian,” Cate said. “It was my body.”

Kian couldn’t bear to see the pain in his wife’s beautiful black eyes. “Was it Erin’s fault when she and Ben had their miscarriages?”

“No, of course not. It’s different when it’s somebody else’s.”

Kian pulled Cate so she was lying on top of him and brushed her hair away from her face. “What if this baby just wasn’t strong enough? What if you spent nine months on complete bed rest and managed to carry the baby to full term but they spent every minute of their short life in excruciating pain?”

“Then it would be my fault for making them like that,” Cate sobbed. Even though she hadn’t known she was pregnant, she could still feel the empty space in her womb where her baby used to be. “I was that baby’s mum, just like I’m Lola, Mateo and Sierra’s.”

“I’m not asking you not to grieve,” Kian said softly, kissing her stomach. “But please don’t blame yourself for what happened, angel.”