Wanting What She Can't Have(19)

She thought about the test kit in the restroom trash. Those things had a  degree of inaccuracy, surely. She'd wait until she had official  confirmation from the doctor. Then she'd decide what to do. Until then,  everything would remain as it had been before.





Eleven

Raoul couldn't take his eyes off Alexis as she played with Ruby. The  weather outside was miserable, cold and wet and blowing a gale. Alexis  had lit the fire in the family room and put the guard around the  fireplace. He'd wondered about the wisdom of the fire, even with the  guard, but after watching Ruby he realized that she'd been schooled by  Alexis to stay well clear of the hearth.

"Dad-dad!"

She'd spied him and ran toward him as fast as her little legs could  carry her. He could hardly believe that an almost eleven-month-old baby  could move so fast. Her hair was longer now and Alexis had tied it up  into a little spout on the top of her head. Whoomph! Two little arms  clamped around his legs as she came to a halt beneath him and gabbled  off a rapid chain of baby babble.                       
       
           



       

"I think she's asking you to lift her up," Alexis said from her spot on  the floor, her cheeks flushed with the heat of the fire.

"Asking, or telling me?" he said, bending down to unpeel her arms from his legs.

"Probably the latter." Alexis laughed. "Go on, pick her up."

"No, it's all right. I've got work to do."

"Oh, for goodness' sake! You won't drop her."

Alexis got to her feet and picked up Ruby and thrust her at him.  Reflexively he took her. "Hold her! She's not made of glass. She's  growing up before your very eyes, she's hale and hearty and everything's  fine."

"Got out of the wrong side of the bed this morning, did we?" Raoul commented, awkwardly holding Ruby on his hip.

The baby reached for a pen he had in his shirt pocket and began playing  with the clicker, eventually getting ink down his front. He extricated  the pen from her increasingly deft fingers and waited for her to protest  so he'd have an excuse to hand her back to Alexis. Instead, she lay her  little head on his chest and gave a big sigh.

"You know exactly what side of the bed I got out of," Alexis responded, her voice softer now as she watched him and Ruby.

"She must be ready for a sleep," he said.

"No, I think she's happy to just sit with you for a bit. Why don't you read to her?"

"Read?"

"Yes. You know, pick up one of those paper things with the cardboard on  the outside and words and pictures printed in the middle? I need to go  and check on some washing in the dryer."

She was gone from the room before he could protest and he couldn't very  well leave Ruby alone in here, especially not with the fire going. It  felt weird, but he sat down at the end of the sofa and picked up one of  the baby books Alexis kept stashed in a basket on the floor beside it.  He adjusted Ruby on his lap and opened the book, starting to read from  it. It's not like it was rocket science. The words were simplistic and  thankfully few, and the pictures were bright and colorful. He'd just  finished the book and closed it, ready to put it back on the stack when  Ruby grabbed it off him and opened it again, her little fingers  struggling a bit to turn the pages. Giving in, he started to read it for  a second, and then a third time.

By the time Alexis came back into the room, a basket of folded washing  on her hip, he was on to his fourth attempt. Ruby had settled back  against his tummy, her little head growing heavy against him.

"Oh, look at that. She's out for the count," Alexis said softly.

"Must have bored her to sleep," he commented, thankful he could at  least stop reciting the story line, now committed to memory, over again.

"Actually, no. She obviously feels very secure with you. At her age she  can be a bit off with some people. A baby's stranger awareness is honed  around this age. Some kids start even earlier. I think it's lovely that  she knows she's okay with you."

Raoul felt outrageously proud but hastened to downplay the situation.

"It's just because she's used to being here now. That'll all change when she goes back to Catherine and you go back home."

"You're still sending her back to Catherine?" Alexis sounded shocked.

"Of course, that was the plan all along. Here, take her and put her to bed."

"Sure thing, boss."

There was something about the tone of Alexis's voice that set his teeth on edge.

"Alexis, just because I read her a story doesn't mean we're going to play happy family."

"No, of course not. That would take far more heart than you're prepared to admit to."

With that, she deftly scooped the sleeping baby off his lap and  disappeared out the room. Her comment rankled. It shouldn't, but it did.  He hadn't asked for her to leave him alone with Ruby and he certainly  hadn't asked for her opinion about his plans for Ruby's long-term care.  Yet why had he experienced that absurd sense of pride that the baby had  settled with him, and why did his arms feel ridiculously empty now that  she was gone?

* * *

It was almost ten weeks since Catherine's surgery. Ten weeks since  Alexis had come to look after Ruby. Catherine was walking steadily on  her own now and, with regular physiotherapy sessions, was regaining her  strength and independence day by day. She'd asked Alexis if she could  have Ruby to visit for a couple of hours and Alexis took the opportunity  to make an appointment to visit the doctor and get official  confirmation about her condition.                       
       
           



       

She'd done the math, by her reckoning she was just over six weeks  pregnant, thankfully still far too early to show. Luckily, so far, her  only symptoms were that she felt queasy every now and then only if she  was overtired.

Even if her symptoms had been more drastic, it was unlikely anyone  would have noticed. Raoul was still incredibly busy conducting his  one-man band of business in the winery. Alexis was in two minds about  it. Half of her was hugely relieved he spent so many hours out of her  sphere right now, especially as she struggled to deal with the mental  ramifications of her pregnancy. The other half, well, that just saw the  time he wasn't there as missed opportunities to keep building up the  tenuously fragile link that was starting to develop between Ruby and her  father.

Still, she reminded herself, progress was progress, even if the steps were tiny.

What scared her most was, what on earth would happen when her pregnancy  started to be more obvious? She and Raoul shared a bed, shared one  another's bodies, every night. He knew her body so well, eventually he'd  feel the changes that she had begun to notice herself. Already her  breasts were more tender and responsive than before and, as she'd  noticed when she'd fastened her bra this morning, they were already  slightly fuller, too.

Somehow she had to find the courage to tell him before he picked up on  the physical cues that she had no control over. Picking the right time  was going to be the challenging part.

The visit to the doctor went smoothly. The doctor congratulated her on  her pregnancy and she tried her hardest to show the appropriate  enthusiasm. Even though she knew everything was okay, that she was  strong and healthy and that the pregnancy should continue to develop  normally, she still felt an underlying anxiety. While termination was  out of the question, how on earth would she cope with all this?

She'd already put her working life on hold to be there for Ruby and  yes, granted, she was paid for her role here, but that was nothing  compared to what she could potentially earn as her fashion clientele  continued to grow. Having Tamsyn keep things running smoothly in her  absence was one thing, but would she be able to continue to expand her  business if she was busy with a new baby, as well?

Making the decision to come here had come from a position of guilt-from  the fact that she'd owed Bree's daughter the support and love she'd  failed to give the child's mother. When she'd started to withdraw from  Bree, after meeting Raoul, she'd felt her friend's confusion, the hint  of hurt in the background of her initial emails.

The lengthy, handwritten letter Bree had sent her before she died had  been full of apology for some slight she had imagined was the only  reason that could have caused a wedge between herself and Alexis. Bree  was sad that they'd drifted apart the way they had but she'd felt, of  all the people she knew, that she could still turn to Alexis in her hour  of need.

And Alexis hadn't been there.

She and Raoul both lived with their own sense of guilt, and it pulled  at each of them constantly-drove them to make the choices they did, feel  what they felt. Alexis could only hope that, with its source being a  common link for them both, that somehow they could find a solution  together for the future.