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How long had it been since Katrina had left Grant in his office at home? It couldn’t have been more than thirty minutes. It suddenly seemed like a lifetime.
“Kat,” Grant whispered. He brought her hand toward his lips and kissed her fingers gently. He looked unable to speak.
“I don’t know what’s going on,” Katrina stuttered. She thought, maybe, if she spoke enough and filled the silence, Grant couldn’t tell her whatever he’d come to tell her.
“I’ve been ringing the bell and knocking on the door. Sophie’s always here when I pick her up. She hasn’t missed a single doctor’s appointment. Something must have happened.”
It was still important to Katrina not to tell anyone else about Sophie’s addictions. She wanted Grant to think of his youngest as a treasure. A princess. She wanted him to believe in a different truth.
That’s what love was, she decided. A sort of lie. A cushion against the horrors of the world.
“I’m sure she just went to the store or something,” Katrina said. “People forget things. It happens all the time. I can call the doctor when we get home. We live on a tiny island in the middle of the ocean. Not so many women are pregnant here. We can always go tomorrow. I’m sure it’ll be fine.”
Grant closed his eyes, and a tear drifted down his cheek.
“Not long after you left, the downstairs phone rang,” Grant said. “I was going to let it go, but I had a horrible feeling. An instinct.”
Katrina narrowed her eyes. She wanted to jump out of the car and run away from him.
“It was Jared,” Grant continued, staring through the front window. “They’re at the hospital. Sophie started bleeding this morning. It got bad, so they went to the hospital.” Grant pressed his lips together. All the color drained from his face.
“She lost so much blood,” Grant finished. “They nearly lost her.”
Katrina flared her nostrils. “And the baby?”
Grant twitched and turned his face back toward her. The look in his eyes told her everything she needed to know. The baby hadn’t lived. After just four months, Sophie’s pregnancy had failed. It was a tragedy.
And Katrina couldn’t help it. She felt, in her heart of hearts, that Sophie had caused this. Just as she always did, Sophie haddone something wrong. She’d driven herself to misery. She’d taken a drink. She’d used. It had to be so. The pregnancy had been fine up until recently. Sophie, in all of her ways, had pulled the plug.
And why had Katrina thought it would turn out differently? Why had she thought Sophie could change? Katrina had watched her father destroy himself. She’d watched him hurl insult after insult at her, Norm, and her mother and wake up the next morning none the wiser about what he’d said.
Grant leaned over and wrapped Katrina in a hug, bringing her back to the year 2002. He wailed and shook. Katrina wrapped her arms around him, but she didn’t cry. She couldn’t. The devastation was so complete that it was like she’d forgotten how to mourn.
“I can’t believe she did this,” Katrina mumbled into Grant’s shoulder.
Grant flinched and drew back. “What did you say?” His eyes were filled with confusion.
Katrina understood. She couldn’t blame Sophie publicly. She couldn’t prove herself to be that kind of monster. Grant didn’t understand how far Sophie had fallen. He’d never picked up on her dead teenage eyes or the alcohol on her breath. He’d never understood that Sophie was just Katrina’s father in a different form.
“I can’t believe she’s going through this,” Katrina said instead of repeating herself.
“We should go to the hospital,” Grant said.
Katrina furrowed her brow. She wasn’t sure she could handle that. The minute she saw Sophie, she wouldn’t be able to control what she said. She could feel the vitriol bubbling up to the surface.
But Grant was already starting the car, waving his hand, insisting that Katrina stay with him. “We’ll pick up your car later.”
On the way to the hospital, Katrina sat in stunned silence, gripping her thighs. And when Grant dropped her off in front of the hospital doors, she set her jaw and prepared herself. Whatever happened next, it wouldn’t be pretty. But the wheels had already begun to turn. And she was along for the ride.
Chapter Nineteen
Present Day
Impossibly, Sophie was back in the hospital. Although she was twenty-two years older than last time, with laugh lines around her eyes and a gray tint to the roots of her hair, not so much had changed when she thought about it. Not really. Just like back in 2002, she was approximately four months pregnant and on the verge of losing everything. Over the years, she’d done everything to forget that horrific day, and now, it was as though she was forced to relive it.
Sophie was in a hospital gown, clutching Patrick’s hand as though it was the only thing keeping her attached to the planet. Patrick’s eyes were bloodshot. Every time a nurse or doctor entered the room, he burst to his feet and peppered them with questions, demanding what was wrong.
This, Sophie knew, was different from last time, too. Patrick’s love for her echoed in everything he did.
