The Marakaios Baby (The Marakaios Brides 2)

At least he hadn’t. Maybe Margo had nothing to say...nothing to bare.

‘Leo?’ One of his staff poked his head through the doorway, eyebrows raised. ‘Are you ready?’

Leo nodded. This deal was too important for him to become distracted about Margo.

And yet as he went back into the conference room he couldn’t stop thinking about her. About the hurt he’d heard in her voice and the way she’d hung up on him. About all the painful truths she’d shared about her childhood and all the things he hadn’t said.

He lasted an hour before he called the meeting to a halt.

‘I’m sorry, gentlemen, but we can resume tomorrow. I need to get home to my wife.’

* * *

After she’d hung up on Leo, Margo peeled off her dress and ran a bath. Perhaps a nice long soak in the tub would help alleviate her misery—or at least give her a little perspective. It was one missed dinner...one little argument. It didn’t have to mean anything.

Sighing, Margo slipped into the water and closed her eyes. She felt as if she couldn’t shift the misery that had taken up residence in her chest, as if a stone were pressing down on her.

At first Margo thought the pain in her belly was simply the weight of that disappointment and heartache, but then the twinges intensified and she realised she was feeling actual physical pain. Something was wrong.

She pressed her hands to her bump, realising she hadn’t felt a kick in a while—a few hours at least. She’d become used to feeling those lovely flutters. Now she felt another knifing pain through her stomach, and then a sudden gush of fluid, and she watched in dawning shock and horror as the water around her bloomed red.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

THE APARTMENT WAS quiet and empty when Leo came into the foyer just after nine o’clock.

‘Margo?’

He tossed his keys on the table, a sudden panic icing inside him. Had she left? Left him? He realised in that moment that he’d been bracing himself for such a thing, perhaps from the moment they’d married. Waiting for another rejection.

‘Margo?’ he called again, but the only answer was the ringing silence that seemed to reverberate through the empty rooms of the apartment.

He poked his head through the doorway of her bedroom, and saw how the lamplight cast a golden pool onto the empty bed. Her dress and shoes were discarded and crumpled on the floor and the bathroom door was ajar, light spilling from within. All was silent.

He was about to turn back when he heard a sound from the bathroom—the slosh of water. He froze for a millisecond, and then in three strides crossed to the bathroom, threw open the door, and saw Margo lying in a tub full of rose-tinted water, her head lolling back, her face drained of colour.

‘Margo—’ Her name was a cry, a plea, a prayer. Leo fumbled for his phone even as he reached for her, drew her out of the tub. ‘Margo...’ he whispered.

She glanced up at him, her face with a waxy sheen, her eyes luminous.

‘I’ve lost the baby, haven’t I?’

‘I don’t know—’ He stopped, for she’d slumped in his arms, unconscious.

* * *

Margo came to, lying on a stretcher. Two paramedics were wheeling her to an ambulance, and panic clutched at her so hard she could barely speak.

‘My baby—’

One of them reassured her that they were taking her to a hospital, and Leo reached for her hand. His hand felt cold, as cold as hers. He was scared, she realised. He knew the worst was happening.

The worst always happened.

Just hours ago she’d been buoying up her courage to tell Leo she loved him. Now everything had fallen apart. Nothing could be the same. Her relationship with Leo had been expedient at its core; without this child kicking in her womb there was no need for a marriage.

And yet she couldn’t think about losing Leo on top of losing the baby; it was too much to bear. So she forced her mind to go blank, and after a few seconds her panic was replaced by a numb, frozen feeling—a feeling she’d thought she’d never have to experience again.

It was the way she’d felt when she’d realised Annelise was gone. It was the only way she’d known how to cope. And yet she hadn’t coped at all. And she didn’t think she could cope now—except by remaining frozen. Numb.

She felt distant from the whole scene—as if she were floating above the ambulance, watching as the paramedics sat next to her, taking her vitals.

‘Blood pressure is dropping steadily.’

She barely felt a flicker of anything as they searched for the baby’s heartbeat. They found it, but from the paramedics’ mutterings it was clearly weak.

‘Baby appears to be in distress.’

In distress. It seemed such a little term for so terrible a moment.