Chapter Fourteen #3
Charlie lifted me into the bed. I didn’t have to ask, but he knew that’s what I wanted. Some small part of that familiar intimacy between us reignited, but instead of pushing it away, I went to grab on to it. If today was my last day, I was going out with a smile on my face.
Charlie crawled into bed beside me. I nestled against his chest, and he folded his arms over my body. We sat there for a long time, listening to the tumultuous blasts that were the only sound to break the unrequited quiet.
We hadn’t cuddled since I’d asked for a divorce, and this felt so good.
We were seeking some kind of comfort in each other now that we’d lost everything, and I refused to feel bad about it.
I wasn’t giving him the wrong idea about what we were, because we only had a short time left to enjoy what was left of our lives.
I wasn’t strong enough to tell him that I still loved him, though we were on the precipice of the end.
And I had to admit that I did love him, because with my own death staring me in the face, I couldn’t lie to myself about it anymore.
Being with him in this bed was the only thing keeping me calm.
I wouldn’t apologize for seeking refuge in his arms when I knew that’s what we both needed to pass time, at least until we woke up in a grave.
“Should we be doing this?” Charlie asked, his lips brushing my hair. “We’re not… together.”
The ache in his voice broke me. “We don’t have to acknowledge that anything happened. We can just pretend.”
“What are we pretending to be?”
A happily married couple, because that’s everything we’re not. “We were never happier than when we first got married.” That short period between when we’d said our vows for the first time and before the Infernal Underground were probably the best days of my life.
The smile was clear in his tone as he remembered. “We didn’t do anything back then but go to class and have sex.”
“Yeah. It was great.” My head fell onto his shoulder as I recalled the memories. If we weren’t forced to go to school, we were naked in-between the sheets, tangled up in each other’s arms.
“You made me the most fortunate man alive.” Charlie squeezed me tighter. “I was so lucky to have you.”
I wanted to tell him that he had made me feel like I was the lucky one, not him, but I couldn’t manage to say the words.
“So let’s act like we’re still back there, in our crappy Institute apartment.
You can touch me, and I’ll touch you. We can just…
forget. It can’t hurt now. Nothing can hurt us.
Not anymore.” There were literally no more surprises that would make this situation any harder than what it already was.
Might as well make the best out of the worst.
Charlie chuckled softly. “Is it a good idea to not have our clothes on when the Warden’s trying to get in here?”
“Too bad. I’ll fist-fight him naked. Maybe he’ll get weirded out and leave.”
Charlie gave another sad laugh. “Here’s hoping.”
Charlie shifted against me. “Will you let me kiss you?”
My throat got so tight I had to choke out my reply. “Yes. And make it a good one. I never want to forget it.”
What I was really saying was I never wanted to forget him. I hoped he knew that.
“Okay.” Charlie’s lips brushed against mine, softly at first, before he pressed the kiss deeper. I accepted his tongue into my mouth, sucking his lower lip lightly before softly biting the tip of his tongue. Charlie moaned, his hands running down my back and through my hair as he drew me closer.
I’d forgotten how good of a kisser he was.
He could make my whole body glow with just his lips alone.
I forgot about everything— forgot that he was supposed to be my ex-husband, forgot that I hated him, forgot everything wrong he’d ever done as his hands wandered across the front of my gown, caressing my breasts.
I moved to slip my hand inside his pants, wandering my fingers down his length.
He sighed in gentle relief, and I felt my broken heart relax.
Soft, kind feelings of passion and endearment kept building, until I swore I felt the tiniest bit of myself connect to him again.
We moved slowly together, him massaging between my legs and me stroking his length.
The intimate moment wrapped around us like a protective blanket, until I could slip away and make believe that we were the only people in the world that existed once again.
This felt so sweet and innocent— it nearly resembled our first time.
We’d done so much in the Sanctuary together, so many erotic and devious things to satisfy each of our dark desires, and I’d enjoyed every second, but this moment was different.
It was nothing but pure, devoted love, a reminder of what we’d once been as husband and wife, and I was willing to accept it.
There wasn’t any weight hanging over us about what I’d done, and what he did.
Our mistakes were pointless. The only thing that mattered was acknowledging we were going down together.
While Charlie was touching me, I felt warmth seep outward, though the sensation was off. I felt wetter than I ever had before. I opened my eyes for a moment and noticed his fingers were streaked with blood.
I felt a chill sweep across my cheeks as my face went pale. I yanked up my skirt, looking down. Below me, I sat in a puddle of blood, which was quickly soaking my thighs. “Charlie? I’m… I’m bleeding.”
He stilled. “What? I just thought you were—”
“No, that’s blood. There’s a lot of it.”
Oberi popped up from the floor, panting and looking panicked. He began barking his head off, pacing around the room and emitting loud whines.
“What’s he saying?” I asked.
“I don’t know, he’s just freaking out.” Charlie shook his head. “It’s just a bunch of jumbled words. It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Well, he wouldn’t be acting like this if there wasn’t something wrong with me.” My heartbeat pounded as I felt an innate instinct that I’d missed something in a big way.
Charlie jumped up from the bed. My throat tightened when I realized that his clothes were soaked with blood— my blood— and I hadn’t realized until now. “Let’s get you to the hospital.”
He didn’t even put me in my chair, he just stooped down to carry me. Charlie lifted me into his arms, and he hurried to leave the apartment as Oberi ran ahead of us, barking the whole way.
The halls were pretty empty at this point. It looked like everyone had run out into the city to fight the Warden, who was still banging on the shield outside.
At this point, I barely heard it. My mind was racing to come up with explanations. If I was bleeding, why didn’t I feel any pain? I hadn’t noticed anything different when I got up. Everything seemed normal.
We passed Eddie in the hallway. He was fully armored, carrying a sword like he planned to personally battle the Warden head-on. He dropped it when he saw Charlie carrying me through the halls, and the blood trail I was dripping behind on the floor. “Princess!”
“Come with us. We might need you,” I ordered. Eddie dropped whatever he was doing and hastily went to follow, Oberi barking at him to hurry up.
The hospital was nearly deserted, because most of the staff had run out to deal with the current crisis. Even so, a small group of doctors and nurses looked up when Charlie nearly kicked the door in. They blanched at the blood droplets accumulating at his shoes.
“Ava’s hurt,” Charlie told them. “We don’t know what’s wrong.”
A nurse glanced at the blood staining the skirt of my dress. “We have a room prepared at all times for members of the monarchy in case of emergencies. Come.”
They got me into a bed, where a group of staff started poking and prodding me, checking the area I was bleeding from.
I didn’t tell Charlie to leave. I needed him here, to be some sort of anchor within the chaos.
Oberi sat with his head on the side of the bed, his eyeballs shifting left and right as the staff moved to figure out what was going on.
Eventually, the doctors left to run some tests. Eddie waited outside, anxiously poking his head in every few seconds like he thought news of my condition would pop into the air of its own accord.
I didn’t know what was wrong, but I was dreading the idea of going through another treatment or spending a couple of weeks in the hospital.
Maybe the Warden had picked a good time to show up, after all.
I would rather die than go through another surgery.
I’d had my fill of them. It wasn’t like I would wake up from it afterward, anyway, because the Warden would get here by the time they were done operating.
It only took a few minutes before a couple of doctors entered, and nobody looked happy. On the contrary, they appeared worried I’d order their heads to roll once they delivered whatever bad news they had.
“What’s wrong?” If I was corking off, I needed to hurry up and get it over with. Since the Warden was coming, there were more important things for these people to worry about than me.
The first doctor swallowed, coming forward. “You’re bleeding from your cervix.”
“Okay, so stop the bleeding.”
The doctor shook her head. “We can’t. You’re too far along in the process.”
“What are you talking about?” My mind went blank.
“Cervical bleeding is a sign of pre-term labor, princess,” the doctor said in an apologetic tone. “Did you not know you were expecting?”
Oberi laid down on the floor, covering his eyes with his paws. Charlie stood stock still. I blinked a few times, because I didn’t think I’d heard her right. “I’m sorry, you said you can’t stop it… why?”
“If you had come in sooner, we could’ve given you a progesterone shot, or a cerclage to stop the cervix from opening. But it looks like the fetus has already dropped, and is on its way out of the uterus,” the doctor replied. “This far along, there’s no way for us to avoid a premature birth.”