The Sinner by Emma Scott

II

Two years later…

 

“Are you sure?” I asked, holding my wife’s face in my hands.

“I’m sure,” Lucy said, smiling gently. “If something is going to happen then it’s going to happen. We can’t let it stop you from this opportunity. It’s huge, Cas. Once in a lifetime.”

I shook my head. “The opportunity is nothing compared to you. If something went wrong and I wasn’t there…”

“I’ll be okay,” she said, pulling my hands from her face and pressing a kiss to the tungsten and lapis wedding band on my left hand. “I insist. It’s just a week.”

A week was an eternity when your wife was nine weeks pregnant for the second time. Her doctor said everything looked good, but how could she know for sure? If we lost this one too…

“No,” I said, the thought curling my stomach. “I can’t leave you. The Cairo presentation will survive without me.”

“The Cairo presentation is you.”

I fumed. A trove of Sumerian artifacts had been discovered in the gulf region. They’d been transported to the National Museum in Cairo where they awaited me to date and identify them.

“It’s a box full of rubble. It doesn’t mean anything, but you…you are everything.”

“And you are so sexy when you say things like that,” Lucy said, kissing the scowl on my lips.

I started to protest but she cut me off.

“I feel fine. And you are brilliant. This is historic.” Lucy wrapped her arms around my waist, resting her head against my chest. “It’s going to be okay, Cas. Whatever happens, it’s going to be okay.”

I held her tight. “How do you know?”

“I don’t. I just have to trust that our angels are watching.”

“Lucy…”

“Go, or you’ll miss your plane and I’ll be late to my meeting.” She kissed me again. Softly but with her own deep strength pouring in. “We can’t put our lives on hold out of fear.”

I nodded reluctantly. It had been a year and a half since our wedding, and I loved my wife more and more every day. Watching her suffer through a miscarriage had ripped my heart to shreds twice over—once for her and once for me. But she reminded me that we had to go through the hard stuff to make the good all the richer and that even the most precious things don’t always stay as long as we like them too.

I kissed her a final time and dragged my rolling suitcase out the door of our Midtown apartment, leaving her at her desk by the window overlooking the Park. After the resounding success of their athletic shoe campaign, Lucy and Jana had opened their own company dedicated solely to sustainable apparel. I could not have been prouder of Lucy, working tirelessly to make real and lasting change for the good of the planet. She’d proven herself to be stronger and braver than I’d ever imagined, facing life’s obstacles—and heartaches—with courage and love that never wavered. But each step away from her that morning felt like a betrayal. Or a horrible mistake.

Three hours later, I was waiting in line at airport security when a sense of urgency clenched my heart. I caught a whiff of pipe smoke in the sanitized airport air.

“Lucy…”

I shoved my way back through the line, fumbling for my phone while leaving a trail of curses and dirty looks behind me. I called her number. No answer.

“Fuck.”

I was pacing in the Uber pick up area when a text came in from Jana—a string of panicked words that struck me like bullets.

Lucy’s at the OBGYN. Something’s happened. She was bleeding. I can’t be there I’m upstate come quickly.

“Oh fuck, no,” I breathed. “No, please not again.”

The Uber came and I redirected the driver to Dr. D’Onofrio’s office, the woman who had guided us through one agonizing loss already.

“Lucy Abisare,” I told the woman at reception. “I’m her husband.”

Her smile scraped at me like glass. “Oh yes, go right in. Exam room three.”

I burst into the room and my heart ripped in half to see Lucy on the exam table. A paper sheet covered the lower half of her body, and one hand covered her eyes as she sobbed.

“Lucy.” I rushed to her, took her free hand, and pressed the back of it to my lips. “Oh, my beloved. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.”

She was shaking her head, hardly able to speak. “Two babies.”

“I know,”I said angrily, my own cheeks wet with tears. “I know and you’re so brave. So goddamn brave.”

“No, it’s two babies,” she managed through sobs. She uncovered her eyes to look at me, and I realized she wasn’t grimacing in pain; she was smiling. “Cas…I thought they were going to tell me there were no babies but there are two babies.”

I stared, my mouth ajar. “But…you were bleeding…”

“The doctor says it can happen. But I’m okay. They’re okay.”

I shook my head, disbelieving. “Are you sure?”

Lucy nodded and pressed her forehead to mine. “Two babies, Cas. I think they’re the ones we lost… I think they came back.”

“Oh my God.” I couldn’t stop my own tears from mingling with hers as I kissed her. “Twins. We’re going to have twins?”

“Yes, indeed.” Dr. D’Onofrio breezed into the room. “Congratulations, Cas.” She gestured to the grainy black and white ultrasound on the wall monitor. “This is baby number one.” She pointed out an indistinct blob in a little cavern of my wife’s womb. “And this is baby number two.”

A surge of joy tried to find me and hit a brick wall. “But Lucy…she’s okay?”

Because fucking hell, I couldn’t bear to watch her suffer again.

“I understand your concerns. We’re going to be monitoring her very closely, especially given your history. But as far as I can see, everything looks good. Two strong solid heartbeats.”

The doctor explained a little more, gave us instructions, and then left us alone. I clutched Lucy’s hand, hardly daring to let her go.

“Jana called you,” she said.

“She texted, but I was already on my way back. Someone told me to go back.”

She smiled. “I’m so glad. I thought you were already on the plane.”

“I think Grandpa made sure I wasn’t.”

Lucy laughed through tears, and I held her close, our foreheads pressed together.

“They came back,” she whispered. “The two we lost; they came back. Don’t you think?”

I frowned. She’d said that earlier and I’d missed it. “Two?”

Lucy nodded. “The first was in Larsa. Cas…I never told you. When I saw our last night, I knew we were going to have a baby. Li’ili—I—was pregnant.”

I stared. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I wanted to, so many times. But it seemed like it would hurt you for no reason. And then we had the miscarriage last year and I saw how you tried to be brave for me and take all the pain. But you were hurting too. And I couldn’t do it to you again.”

“You were trying to protect me.”

She nodded. “I’m so sorry. I just…I didn’t want to break your heart.”

I shook my head, fighting tears. “We can’t protect each other, Lucy. I learned that lesson the hard way. We can only be there for each other, through the good and the bad. Okay?”

“You’re right. If you had missed this moment because I pushed you to get on the plane, I’d never have forgiven myself.”

“It’s okay,” I said, kissing her forehead, her cheek, her lips. “I’m here. And I think you’re right. They came back.”

“A boy and a girl,” Lucy said. “We’re having one of each.”

“You think so?”

“I feel it. I’d like to name the boy Garrett. After my father.”

I almost told her it was tempting fate to give a name to these little flickering heartbeats, but that was fear speaking, and we weren’t going to live in fear.

“And Aria for the girl,” I said gruffly. “For my sister.”

“Garrett and Aria.” Lucy’s smile was radiant. “Beautiful.”

But she was beautiful, and my heart was filled with so much love, I could hardly contain it. And it came with a certainty that I felt in my bones. In my soul. We’d live again and again, sometimes pulled apart, maybe losing each other for a little while.

But we’d always find our way back to each other in the end.