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The comment in parentheses had been unemotional.
We would advise our client that this particular charity is supportive of pro-choice options for women with unplanned pregnancies.
In a single sentence he had read heaven—and hell.
She was staring at him now, still as white as a sheet. She felt the words he’d thrown at her sear into her brain like a burning brand of accusation. Her mouth opened. Words were desperate to take shape, to fly across the gaping space between them, to counter the dreadful accusation he had hurled at her.
‘Nikos! It isn’t like that. It—’
But he was cutting right across her, stopping her speaking.
‘Don’t try and defend it. You can call it what you like, but we both know the truth of what you are planning to do.’
The terrible words were like knives, slashing at her. She could not bear to hear them. She gave a cry, backing away as if he had struck her physically. Features convulsing, she thrust past him, out into the roadway.
She had to get away—oh, dear God, she had to get away.
There was a screech of brakes, a hideous sound of squealing rubber. And then, as if in some horror movie slow-motion, Nikos saw the car hit her...saw her frail, fragile body crumple like paper and fall to the tarmac.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
HE WAS THERE in an instant—a heartbeat. The space of time between living and dying. He was yelling—he could hear himself yelling—but it was as if it were someone else. Someone else yelling as he saw that fragile figure crumple to the ground. Someone else yelling like a madman for an ambulance.
Because he was on his knees beside her, horror in his face, his eyes, in his whole being.
Let her be alive! Dear God in heaven, let her be alive. It’s all I ask—all I beg! Anything else—anything else at all—I can bear. But not that—oh, not that!
It was all that consumed him in the eternity it took for the ambulance to arrive.
She had a pulse—it was his only desperate source of hope—but she was unconscious, inert, scarcely breathing, still as white as a sheet.
I did this to her. I did it. The punishing accusation went on and on in his head.
The paramedics tended her, phoning ahead to the hospital that they were bringing her in, checking the car’s driver for shock and whiplash.
Nikos piled into the ambulance with her. ‘Is she going to be all right? Please God, tell me.’
But the ambulance crew were adept at tragedy, and only gave platitudes to him. There could be no answer to that question until she was in A&E...
Time stopped...time raced. Time blurred.
When the ambulance arrived at the hospital the emergency team fell to work. Nikos hung on to the doorjamb of the resuscitation bay and prayed—prayed with all his strength.
‘Just tell me!’ He was beyond coherence.
One of the doctors looked up. ‘Looks like only bruising, lacerations—no sign of internal damage...no lung damage,’ he reeled off. ‘One cracked rib so far. No skull trauma. Spine and limbs seem OK, though she’ll need a scan to check thoroughly.
‘And she’s coming round...’
Nikos swayed, Greek words breaking from him in a paean of gratitude. Mel’s eyes were flickering, and a low groan sounded in her throat as consciousness returned. Then, as her eyes opened fully, Nikos could see her expression change to one of anguish when she saw all the medics clustered around her.
‘My baby,’ she cried. ‘My baby! Oh, please—please don’t let my baby be gone. Please, no—please, no!’
Immediately the doctor responded, laying a calming hand on her arm.
‘There’s no sign of a bleed,’ he said. ‘But we’ll get you up to Obs and Gynae the moment you’ve had your scan and they’ll check you out thoroughly. OK?’
He smiled down reassuringly and Mel’s stricken gaze clung to him. Then, before Nikos’s eyes, she burst into crying. ‘Thank God. Oh, thank God,’ he heard her say.
Over and over again...
And inside him it felt as if the world had just changed for ever.
‘Thank God,’ he echoed. ‘Thank God.’
But it was more than the life of his unborn child he was thanking God for—so, so much more...
Then the emergency team were dispersing, and a nurse was left to instruct that Mel be wheeled off for a scan and then up to Obs and Gynae. Once again Nikos was prevented from accompanying her, and frustration raged within him. He needed to be with her—needed her to be with him.
After an age—an eternity—he was finally told that she was in Obs and Gynae and that her scans, thankfully, had all been clear. Again, Nikos gave thanks—gave thanks with all his being.
