her news of an imminent governess, so when the rain eased, she escaped to her garden, to find peace.
No peace. Not here, not for her. She had vowed not to succumb to heartbreak, but heartbreak, it seemed, was a physical thing. Her limbs were tired, her middle heavy and aching, and although she had been mercifully free of nausea today, she had a hollow where her heart should be.
The rain began again. Softly, but enough to trap her here, in her folly, with her flowers and her fountain and her regret.
Good. She could not move anyway. It seemed very important that she did not move.
She closed her eyes and listened to the soft rain falling on the roof. From the bushes came the chattering of birds, indignant about the weather. In this spot, she and Joshua had made love, when she had no words and had tried to hold him with her body.
Stop giving up your space. Fight for what is yours.
Perhaps she should have fought harder for him, but it had been hopeless from the start.
“Cassandra.”
How she loved the way he said her name, his voice rough and husky over the rain, a soft lilt on the middle syllable like he was chanting a refrain.
“Cassandra.”
That hint of urgency, as though she mattered, as though he loved her too. As though any moment now he would scoop her up into his arms and hold her tight and never let her go.
“Cassandra?”
A confused note too. Worried even. She did not like him to be worried. Even a dream could wound her heart, so she opened her eyes to dispel it.
It was not a dream.
Joshua stood on the edge of the folly, the rain falling behind him, watching her with his hot-coffee eyes. She let herself look at him, his whole dynamic length. Hers, yet not hers, and so very real. Droplets of rain clung to his hair and to the wool of his coat, and his beloved face was gentle and told her nothing.
He came back!
He came back?
The horrid fiend left her and then dared to come back? Did he so enjoy breaking her heart that he wished to do it again?
“No,” she said. “You left me, so you can stay left.”
He took one step toward her. Two. Her body wanted to move, but she must not move. Instead, she began to shiver.
“Please, Cassandra. I have so much to tell you.”
She hugged her heavy, aching middle. “You cannot come and go and come and go, and play with me like this.”
“First, know that I do love our child,” he said. “I want and love our baby.”
“No. No!”
Her agitation was too much. It overcame the lethargy and the ache, and she hauled herself to her feet.
Wetness gushed between her legs. Her belly cramped. Her legs failed her.
He caught her before she fell.
Every muscle in her body clenched and she grabbed onto him hard. His face was pale and no longer gentle. His eyes held her: He held her up with the power of his gaze. If he looked away now, they would all fall down.
“There’s blood.” He spoke with no voice. She watched his lips move. “On your skirts.”
Her head began to float away. Then her arms and her torso. Floating away and dissolving into the rain. She felt so light. She had no weight. No, his arms took her weight. Her legs were no use to her now. She could not move. She could not speak. How could she move or speak when she could not even breathe?
I want and love our baby too. He had been afraid to love the baby and now she had lost the baby and he would hurt so much that he would turn away from her and she would lose him too, all over again.
She was losing both of them. She was losing everything. She had to stop this. She had to stop the blood. She had to stop time. She had to stop the sun from setting and the rain from falling and the flowers from growing.
“I can’t stop it,” she said.
Her hand ached. She looked at it, puzzled: a white claw gripping his arm. The arm that held her up. The arm that was all she had left in the world and that would leave her again too.
He scooped her up in his arms and, before she had gotten her bearings, he was striding out into the rain, away from her flowers and her fountain and her peace. She curled up into him