We were quiet as I made her a cup of tea and we sat down at the table together. It occurred to me as we sat in silence that maybe if I told Ellie everything I was feeling, Braden would listen to her. I didn’t know what was going on with my usually understanding and compassionate husband, but what I did know was that he was angrier than I’d ever seen him, and clearly unwilling to listen to anything I had to say. He might listen to Ellie.
I opened my mouth to speak when the sound of the bathroom door opening halted me. Both Ellie and I turned to watch for Braden and as he passed the doorway he gave his sister a taut nod of hello and continued on into the bedroom to get ready for work. On a Sunday.
Ellie turned to me, her eyes questioning.
I took her hand and squeezed it. “He slept in your old room last night,” I whispered. “He’s never done that before.”
My friend’s expression grew pained. “Joss . . . talk—”
Nausea hit me before Ellie could finish her sentence and I was up, bending over the kitchen sink. I felt her hands in my hair, holding it back. After spitting up the last of my morning sickness, I sank back against Els, glad for her comforting presence. A flicker of movement out of the corner of my eye drew my gaze and I froze at the sight of Braden staring at me, a muscle ticking in his jaw. He turned to Ellie. “Give Elodie my apologies for missing Sunday dinner. I’ll be in meetings all day. And, uh”—he cut me a look before glancing back at his sister—“stay with her until she feels better.”
Anger burned through me as Braden walked out of the flat, ignoring Ellie’s shocked and questioning calls of his name.
Ellie’s pitiful and sympathetic looks suddenly became painful rather than comforting.
I pulled out of Ellie’s arms. “I’m sorry, hon. I just . . . I’m going back to bed.”
She nodded carefully and let me go.
***
I couldn’t sleep. I kept playing everything over and over in my head, trying to work out what to say to Braden first to make him stop and talk to me. I had it all planned, but dinner passed and he still didn’t turn up.
Then evening.
I texted him and didn’t get a reply. I called. No reply.
I texted Adam but he wasn’t with Adam.
Finally, just after two in the morning, our front door opened. Fury propelled me out of our bedroom and I stormed into the hall as Braden shut the door behind him. His eyes moved to me but it was like he was staring right through me as he started toward the guest room.
Oh, no! Not again!
“Where have you been?” I snapped, grabbing hold of his arm so he’d look at me.
He jerked his arm away from me like he couldn’t stand to be touched by me. “Out,” he told me simply, his tone cutting. And then he disappeared into the guest room, not even aware that I probably looked like he’d run me over with a car.
I had theories as to why he was so angry. I knew he thought I didn’t want his kid. I wondered if he was questioning everything about us. I wondered if he was scared. I wondered why he couldn’t just tell me all that. I thought we had come further than that. No . . . I guess I’d just, probably unfairly, thought he’d see me through anything.
A long time ago he’d almost left me for good for shutting him out. And now he was shutting me out. He’d dived inside his head and he wouldn’t let me near him.
He didn’t even want me touching him, and that hurt and scared me so much I didn’t want to feel anything. I’d sleep to help with that, but sleep was eluding me. Instead I shut myself in the bathroom and undressed. I switched on the shower and stepped into the freezing-cold water, allowing the shock to dissipate into numbness. My mind adrift, my hands covered the small of my stomach protectively, and I closed my eyes. I could be numb everywhere but there.
I thought I heard a muffled “Fuck” and it brought my eyes open just as Braden was sliding the shower door open. He reached in, his features like granite as he switched the nozzle to warm. His eyes cut to me. “Are you trying to catch f**king pneumonia?”
Chittering, I blanched. I hadn’t been thinking. Obviously.
“Stay in there until you warm up,” Braden snapped.
Where was my husband?
Everything I’d been feeling suddenly broke out of the numbness. All the fear, the guilt, the anger, the loneliness of the past few days, and most especially the hurt.
Braden jerked back, confusion and something like fear entering his expression.
But since this man was a stranger . . . I couldn’t give a f**k how he felt.
I reached over, staring at him blankly, shut the shower door, and turned my back on him.