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He felt more protective of her than ever and couldn’t wait until they were finally together, with their baby, in their home again.
Her name came up on his phone and he slid to accept the call.
“I know, I know,” he said. “I’m grabbing a few things from the house, then I’ll—”
“Molly’s bleeding,” she said starkly. “The nurse is here and the helicopter is on its way. We’ll meet you at the hospital in Athens.”
“Is the baby—?”
“I don’t know, Rafael. I don’t know why this keeps happening! Why am I not allowed to have a baby?” Her anguish was knife-sharp and ripened by fear, but the words and the old defeat baked within them sent a cold flush through his body.
“Alexandra.” He wasn’t consciously aware of grasping at that old name, but he instinctively knew that’s who he was talking to. “Do you have your memories back?”
“They never left,” she cried. “I tried to forget, but—”
“You remember everything? You’ve been lying to me all this time?” It was such a crack in the face, it should have knocked his own memories into another universe.
“Rafael.” Her tone pulled back from hysteria.
“No,” he said, because he couldn’t accept it. Not right now. Not when their baby was in jeopardy. “I’ll meet you at the hospital.”
He ended the call, so blind with outrage he couldn’t form a thought or move a muscle.
“Sir?” Tino asked, reminding him that his assistant had been hovering this whole time. “I heard ‘hospital.’ Is there something I can do?”
That kicked Rafael’s sluggish brain into gear.
“Yes. Tell the driver we’re going into the city, not the helipad.” He gave him the name of the hospital Molly would be flown to.
Her mother. Somehow his scattered thoughts snagged on the importance of informing Molly’s mother.
Rafael wasted precious minutes flicking through old emails until he found her number.
Patricia sounded distracted when she picked up.
“It’s Rafael, Alexandra’s husband. I wanted to let you know that Molly is on her way to the hospital—”
“I just got off the phone with Gio,” Patricia cut in. Tension was evident beneath her firmly controlled tone. “He’s in New York and has arranged a flight for us. We’re leaving the house right now. He said we should be there in twelve hours or so.”
Gio. How the hell had he heard about this? Molly? It didn’t matter. Patricia and Molly’s sister were on their way. That was all that mattered.
“I’ll update you at this number?” Rafael asked.
“Thank you. We’ll see you soon.”
She was a midwife, he recalled. She was likely used to medical emergencies, but not ones that involved her daughter.
Guilt assailed him along with profound worry. He didn’t know Molly well, but he liked her. He had to wonder, however, whether she knew that his wife had been lying to him all this time?
He would bet any money that she did, given how close she was to Sasha. The thought made him even more furious, filling him with such a sense of betrayal he could barely function.
He stewed all the way into the city. Molly had just arrived when he did. She was being assessed so he was directed to a private lounge.
Alexandra was already there. She wore one of her casual sundresses that buttoned from its square neckline down to her knees. A drawstring at her waist gave it a figure-hugging shape, but it was crushed and one of the buttons had slipped free.
She was ghostly white and froze when she saw him.
Conflicting impulses rocketed through him. He had an instinct to rush forward and comfort her. To comfort himself with the solace of her willowy body leaning into his. Getting to twenty-four weeks had made this seem like a sure thing. To have the rug pulled at this stage would be devastating.
