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Salvatore gasped. ‘Elisa… ”
She’d looked down and then she’d screamed. The sound still echoed in his mind because it was a sound so full of torment it had gutted him, still gutted him every time he thought of it.
She had lost the baby before they left the apartment and had to be sedated to be moved. They had almost lost her from hemorrhaging.
She had ignored him when he went to see her the first few days out of the hospital. It had not mattered what he said, whether he kissed her or touched her. She’d pretended he was not there. He had gone on the fourth day, hoping she would be better only to discover she had checked herself out.
She hadn’t gone back to work, and with all his security training he still did not know where she spent the four weeks following her short stay in the hospital.
Elisa woke up to the sound of her own scream. Her heart was drumming against her chest her body was clammy with sweat.
She reached for the lamp beside the bed and encountered hairy, male skin.
‘Cara are you all right?” What was Salvatore doing in her bedroom? Then she remembered. Her new bodyguard. Until the auction was over.
‘lt was just a dream.” She shook with the shocking cold the dream always brought with it. ‘No need for you to come tearing to my rescue.”
‘lt sounded more like a nightmare.” His voice reflected not even a whisper of irritation with her short temper. ‘Were you dreaming about the baby?”
‘yes. What made you ask?” Surely he could not know about the dreams that haunted her.
‘you screamed the same way you did when you realized you had lost it.”
‘I didn’t know nightmare screams came with tonal indicators to tell you what event they harked back to ”
‘This is not a cry I am ever likely to forget.”
Her breath shuddered out of her along with any defiance. She hated the aftermath of the dream almost as much as the nightmare itself.
‘1 am sorry ” She didn’t ask what for. She didn’t need to. He’d told her in the hospital. He blamed himself for her losing her baby. If he had ever at any point have said their baby, she might have forgiven him.
Then because she so desperately wanted him to stay, she asked him to leave. ‘1‘11 be fine. You can go back to your room now.”
He got up and left without another word. Feeling bereft and knowing she had no right to, she huddled under the covers trying to rid herself of leftover feelings from her nightmare.
A few minutes later he was back. He left the door open to the suite’s living area, where he had turned on some lights. Reflected light spilled through the opening, dispelling some of the dark shadows in her room.
He stopped beside her and handed her a hot mug. She sipped at it and almost choked on the strong spirits.
‘lt is warmed brandy. It will help you sleep.”
She nodded her thanks, unable to talk, and drank the brandy.
‘Do you have these nightmares often?” Only for the first month after she had lost the baby. ‘No, but last night I remembered.”
‘I also ” That brought her head up to look at him, but his expression was shrouded in the darkness.
‘lt wasn’t your fault.”
‘Was it not?” He turned and went to the window, drawing back the drape, and looked out into the blackness beyond. ‘The doctor told me that emotional stress can cause miscarriage and you were definitely under emotional stress because of me.”
She couldn’t deny that, but neither could she blame him for something that was no one’s fault.
She blamed him for not believing her, for accusing her of trying to trick him and for rejecting their child, but she did not hold him accountable for the death of their baby.
‘Maybe it was for the best.”
He spun back to face her. ‘What?”
