21. Cat
— ? —
Cat
He doesn’t put me down until we’re inside the farmhouse.
Even then, he sets me on the kitchen chair like I’m made of glass, hands already moving over my arms, my shoulders, checking for damage.
“Max, I’m fine.”
“You fell.”
“I didn’t fall. You caught me, and then you fell with me on top of you.” I try to catch his hands. “If anyone’s hurt, it’s you.”
“I’m not hurt.”
“You just took a full-body impact on rocks and tree roots while holding a pregnant woman. That’s not nothing.”
“I’ve had worse.”
He’s already got his phone out, thumb hovering, the panic barely leashed behind his eyes.
“That’s not the reassurance you think it is.”
“Cat, please. I need to call the doctor. Just to make sure the baby-”
“The baby is fine. I can feel her moving right now.”
“Please.” His voice cracks. “Let me call the doctor.”
I stop arguing.
We move into the medical suite while we wait. Dr. Rossi arrives within twenty minutes, mid-fifties, efficient, calm in the way of people who’ve seen everything twice. She examines me while Max hovers in the doorway, arms crossed, shoulders rigid.
“Baby’s heartbeat is strong,” she says, removing her stethoscope. “No signs of distress. Blood pressure’s slightly elevated, but that’s expected given the circumstances. I don’t see anything concerning.”
“You’re certain?” Max steps closer. “No internal issues, no placental problems, nothing that might show up later?”
“Mr. Moretti, medicine doesn’t deal in certainties. What I can tell you is that right now, your wife and baby both look healthy. We’ll monitor, and you’ll call me immediately if anything changes. But at this moment, I see no cause for alarm.”
“See?” I say to him. “Fine.”
He doesn’t relax.
Dr. Rossi turns to Max. “Now let me look at you. You have blood on those shirts you’re carrying and what looks like a nasty scrape on your shoulder.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re bleeding. Sit down.”
Max glances at me, calculating escape routes.
“Sit,” I say. “Let her look.”
He sits.
Dr. Rossi examines the scrapes on his back with practiced efficiency. In the harsh light, I can see the damage clearly, a long scrape across his shoulder blade, smaller cuts on his forearms, bruising starting on his hip.
“Most of these are superficial,” she says, “but this shoulder wound needs proper cleaning and bandaging. The edges are ragged. You caught it on something sharp.”
“I can handle it myself.”
“You can’t reach your own shoulder blade.”
“Then Cat can do it.”
Dr. Rossi looks at me. I shrug.
“If that’s what you prefer.” She hands me supplies, antiseptic, gauze, tape, ointment. “Clean thoroughly, apply ointment, cover with gauze. Change the bandage twice daily. Call me if you see signs of infection: redness spreading, fever, unusual discharge.”
“I know how to do this.”
“I imagine you do.” She doesn’t ask why. “Call if either of you develops any concerning symptoms.”
She lets herself out. The farmhouse goes quiet.
Max is still sitting shirtless, his back to me. The scrape looks angry, raw and red, flecked with dirt.
“Come here,” I say, patting the space beside me on the cot.
“You should be resting.”
“And you should let someone take care of you for once. Come here.”
He moves slowly, like he’s not sure this is allowed. When he sits, he angles his body so the wound is easy for me to reach.
Always protecting. Even now.
The room is quiet except for his breathing.
“Hold still,” I say, opening the antiseptic. “This is going to sting.”
“I’ve had worse.”
“You keep saying that. It’s not comforting.” I dab the wound carefully. “This is familiar, you know.”
“What do you mean?”
“Me patching you up. The bathroom at the house, after you came home bleeding.”
“I remember that night.”
His thumb traces the back of my hand while he says it, absent, like he doesn’t know he’s doing it.
“Why did you come to me? You had doctors. People whose actual job was this.”
“Because it was you.”
“That’s a sentence, not a reason.”
“It’s the reason.” He’s quiet while I work. “When things were bad, when I was hurt or scared, I wanted to be near you. Even when I was pulling away, you were still the only place that felt safe.”
“You had a funny way of showing it.”
“I know.”
I smooth ointment over the wound, my touch gentler than my words. We’ve been over this ground before, the distance, the silence, how it broke something in me. I don’t need to hear him explain it again. What I need is something else entirely.
I press the bandage into place, smoothing the edges carefully. “There. Done.”
He turns to face me. We’re close now, close enough that I can see the gold flecks in his eyes, the tension in his jaw, the way his gaze drops to my mouth.
“Thank you,” he whispers.
“You’re welcome.”
Neither of us moves.
“Max.”
“Yeah?”
“I need to ask you something, and I need you to answer honestly.”
“Anything.”
I take a breath. This question has lived in my chest for months, too terrifying to voice. But we’re here now, and he’s looking at me like I’m everything, and I need to know.
“Do you truly not want to kill me?”
His face shifts, shock, then pain, then something like grief.
“What?”
“The note. Everything that happened. For months I believed you wanted me gone. That you were working with Marcella to get rid of me. I know you’ve explained, I know Nico told me about the coup, but there’s still this part of me waiting for everything to turn out to be another performance.”
“Cat-”
“I need to hear you say it. Do you truly not want to hurt me?”
He takes my face in his hands, gentle, reverent.
“I would rather kill myself than injure a single hair on your head.”
“That’s dramatic.”
“It’s true. Every word. I’ve done terrible things in my life, Cat. Things that would change how you see me. But wanting to hurt you? That’s never been on the list. Not once.”
“Even when I ran?”
His thumbs move slow along my jaw, and I make myself hold his eyes, because the truth is I want to hear the rest even when it hurts.
“Especially when you ran. When I found your note, the one telling me to stay away, I thought I was losing my mind. Not because you defied me. Because you were alone, thinking I was the enemy, and I couldn’t find you to tell you the truth.”
“You could have told me the truth before I left.”
“I know.”
“You could have trusted me. I would have understood. I would have helped.”
“I know that too.” His thumbs brush my cheekbones. “I made every wrong choice. I was so focused on protecting you from the war that I forgot to protect you from what my silence was doing to you.”
“It almost broke me, Max.”
“I know. And I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to make up for it.”
His eyes are wet. I saw him cry once before, in the church, but this is different, quieter, more broken.
“I’m not asking for forgiveness,” he says. “I know I haven’t earned it. I just need you to know you’re safe with me. That I will listen when you tell me what makes you feel unsafe, and change it instead of asking you to endure it.”
I believe him. Despite everything, the coldness, the note, the running. I believe him.
I lean forward and press my lips to his.
The kiss starts soft, tentative. We’re both careful, him because I’m pregnant, me because I’m not sure how far I want this to go. But then his hand slides into my hair, and I make a sound against his mouth, and careful stops being an option.
He pulls me closer. My hands find his bare shoulders. This isn’t like the woods, that was testing. This is months of wanting finally given permission.
“Cat.” He pulls back, breathing ragged. “We should stop.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re in a paper gown and I’m half-naked and I’m not going to be able to stop if we keep going.”
“Who says I want you to stop?”
His eyes go dark. “Don’t say that unless you mean it.”
“I mean it.”
He kisses me harder, hands sliding to my waist. I feel the bandage rough under my fingers, the heat of his skin, the trembling in his body.
“Wait,” I say, pulling back.
He freezes instantly. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I just need you to know something first.”
“Okay.”
“I haven’t forgiven you yet.”
His expression doesn’t change. He just nods.
“I know.”
“I mean it. This doesn’t mean everything is okay. It doesn’t mean I trust you completely. It means I want you, and I’m tired of pretending I don’t.”
“I understand.”
I keep my voice level, keep the boundary sharp, because the alternative is admitting how much I’ve missed this.
“Do you? This isn’t me saying yes to everything. This is me saying yes to right now.”
“Then I’ll take right now. Whatever you’re willing to give me. And I’ll keep working to deserve more.”
“You have a lot of grovel left.”
“I know, baby.” His mouth grazes my jaw. “I still have a lot of grovel to do.”
“Good. Just so we’re clear.”
“Crystal clear.”
The silence after crystal clear sits between us like a held breath.
His mouth is still on my jaw. My hands are still on his bandaged torso.
The farmhouse medical suite smells like antiseptic and the ghost of his cologne, and the paper gown I’m wearing crinkles every time I shift on the narrow medical cot.
“Still clear?” I ask, because I need him to say it again with his body, not just his mouth.
“Crystal,” he repeats, softer. “Right now. Not everything. I heard you.”
He kisses me again, slower, checking. I open for him. Wanting floods me hot and inconvenient, tangled up with anger that hasn’t finished burning. I haven’t forgiven him. Max’s hand rests lightly at my waist, asking without words.
“Okay?” he murmurs, his palm warm against my side.
“The baby is fine. I’m fine. Horny and unresolved and fine.” I cover his hand with mine. “Just, be careful. And don’t mistake this for a pardon.”
“I won’t.” His forehead rests against mine. “Tell me how you want me. You’re in charge of every inch of this.”
The paper gown is a joke of coverage, open at the back, thin enough that his body heat prints through it. I tug the knot at my shoulder and let it sag down my arms. Cool air hits my breasts; his breath follows. He looks at me like the months apart rewrote his religion around the new shape of me.