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Chapter 10- Secrets exposed

Harry sighed as he sat down on the sofa. Accepting this reason would signal the death knell of their marriage far more effectively and quickly than her selective memory loss. He could ride that out. He didn't think he could ride out discovering that she'd been unfaithful to him.

Maybe he was being a fool about that, he thought.

Maybe she didn't even have a memory loss. Maybe all that was just her way of creating a diversion. Anger filled in all the available vacant spots inside him.

He wanted to talk to the Seamus about that night. Even though he had no doubts to what he replied, he needed to hear it straight out.

Grabbing up the pages, Harry walked to the fireplace. Once the women finished greeting him, he asked to speak to Seamus.

"I'm sorry, healer Finnigan is with a patient right now, May I take a message?" she asked.

"No," he snapped after she finished.

"I do not want to leave a message. This is Harry Potter and I need to speak to him as soon as possible"

"This is an emergency" he added.

The woman's voice filled with sympathy. "What kind of emergency?"

"I'd rather speak to him." He answered curtly.

It was clear the woman didn't know whether to believe him or not. Uttering a sigh, she promised to see what she could do. And then the line went dead.

As dead as Harry felt inside.

Moving away from the fireplace Harry went back to sitting on the sofa. Staring at the bill and the parchment that represented the diagnosis he didn't want to accept.

Fragments of conversations he'd had with Hermione both before he'd left for Ireland and after he'd returned, played themselves over in his head.

She knew how he felt. How could she have done this?

For any reason?

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A long sigh of relief escaped Hermione's lips as she made her way to the apperation point of the ministry.

Finally!

After putting her wand in her robes, she turned toward her leaving point with her house in mind. The past twenty-four hours had been interminable, at least three times longer than a normal day.

The previous night's tossing and turning hadn't exactly helped matters. Ordinarily she could drop off the second her head hit the pillow if she was tired.

She could not get the previous night's events out of her mind. Normally not too much made her uncomfortable. But something about that hospital had been different.

After the doctor confirmed her previous visit, she felt there was something in that room, waiting for her to discover it.

Waiting for her to remember.

Like being there before, she thought cryptically. Now that was the problem, she still couldn't remember being there, yet by all accounts she had been.

There was no reason for the doctor to lie about treating her before, or for the hospital having her information already stored in their system.

What had happened in that hospital that was bothering her so much now?

Hermione kept a pattern all night, falling partially asleep, only to think that there were people in her room, crowding around her bed, talking, sometimes to her, sometimes to each other. And all the while, amid the noise, there was all these bright lights shining down on her.

Wry amusement had Hermione shaking her head as she began to apperate. If she had told that part to anyone, about feeling as if there were people in her room, prodding at her beneath bright lights, they'd probably think she was babbling about being the subject of an alien abduction.

Hermione sighed. Damn she felt drained now. After her unsettling night, she went straight to the ministry almost completely exhausted.

She gave her statements to Neville, said her goodbyes and headed home. Hermione pushed thoughts of her princess in the pea type night out of her mind and concentrated on the present.

Finally she was home.

She smiled. Thinking of that drafty, hulking structure, which looked as if it was straight out of something that would have enticed the Adam's family, as home.

She was finally making progress in the right direction. Now she only hoped her news wouldn't put a stop in her trip.

Before Hermione entered the house, she left her hand fall to her belly. She still couldn't believe she was having a baby. Now all that was left was to tell Harry.

Merlin knew she was eager to see Harry. She still didn't remember being his wife, but she was beginning to understand why she had married the man in the first place.

And why she would do it again, if it should ever come to that.

Despite the fact that she'd left the Ministry dead tired, Hermione could feel her body quickening as she opened the door. She mentally crossed her fingers that Harry was able to get out of practice.

Hermione breathed in a breath of relief. She was finally home.

And so was he, she thought in triumph as she noticed his practice gloves and goggles on the kitchen counter.

Hermione could feel her nerves jumpstart as she allowed her hands to fall to her belly one last time before she told him.

Truth be told she was scared. This would add to the already stressful life they were living at the moment. But she was happy.

She prayed he shared her feelings.

Moving through the kitchen, she called out. "Harry, I'm home"

The words had a familiar ring to them. She'd done this before, called out his name as she entered the house. Maybe the night she'd spent in the hospital was indirectly making things come back to her.

She certainly hoped so.

"Harry?" she called again when there was no answer. "Where are you?"

Standing right outside the doorway, she could see into three rooms. His practice gear was in the kitchen and there were lights on in the house. He had to be here.

Harry felt his whole body tense up at he sound of her voice. He'd been waiting for her to come home ever since last night.

Over the past twenty-four hours, he'd run the gamut of emotions, going from furious to confused to heartbroken and back again in no particular order but with almost breathtaking speed.

Emotions still ran through him, moving at speeds beyond his control. And blanketing them was this overwhelming sense of betrayal. He had loved this woman, married this woman, spent ten years as her best friend and apparently didn't know her at all.

It had to be because the Hermione he thought he knew wouldn't have done this. At least, not without talking to him first.

He'd had finally gotten through to Seamus last night claiming to need the information for a friend. Seamus explained the diagnosis to him fully before he ended the call. He barely murmured goodbye.

He felt as if his soul had suddenly become ground zero for an all consuming forest fire. Everything, everything felt dead inside.

He'd gone to practice despite the fact that his mind really wasn't on catching a snitch. He forced himself through the motions, hoping to somehow find a way to deal with this sense of betrayal. To somehow find a way to forgive Hermione.

In his heart, because he loved her, he knew he would have forgiven her for anything. If only she had come to him. But she hadn't. And then the accident had wiped him clear out of her mind.

What did that say?

That he was less than nothing to her? That despite ten years of friendship and a marriage it boiled down to lies and nothing more?

Now it seemed there was nothing left between them but fantastic sex.

It wasn't enough, not for him.

His body felt like lead now as he walked toward the front of the house. Toward her. The woman he no longer knew.

"Harry?" Hermione called out again, beginning to get worried.

Where was he?

She didn't hear any noise, so he wasn't doing anything that could be blocking out the sound of her voice.

Tossing her stuff onto the table, she started toward the stairs. Maybe he was in their bedroom and didn't hear her.

But then she saw him coming toward her from the back of the house. She could feel the smile blossoming on her face, feel it from the inside as well as on her lips.

She hadn't realized until this second how much she'd really missed him. How much she couldn't wait to tell him about the baby.

Or especially how much she was looking forward to tonight.

"There you are." She said moving toward him, her arms out.

All she wanted was to hug him and be hugged by him.

"I was beginning to think you wanted to play hide-and-seek when I have some great news to share."

She grinned.

"No," he told her, his voice deadly still. "I don't want to play at all."

The smile dropped and she stopped just short of touching Harry. Her arms dropped to her sides as she stared at him. From out of nowhere, fear came rushing to her heart. Every nerve in her body tightened.

She could almost feel the skin under her bushy hair tingling. In a very bad way.

Hermione searched his face for a clue and found none. Only that he was shutting her out. Why? She'd been away for only one day, what had gone on here in that time?

Her head started to ache.

"Harry?" she said slowly, trying desperately to smile, to tell herself that everything was all right.

"What's wrong? What happened?"

His emerald eyes were frosted as they looked at her.

"You tell me." He countered.

Like someone trapped in the middle of an ongoing nightmare, Hermione shook her head in what felt like slow motion. She didn't know how much more of this confusion she could take.

Was this some kind of psychological game he was playing with her? Had she let up her guard only to fall for someone who was emotionally abusive?

No, he wasn't like that. She would bet her life on it. There had to be some kind of logical explanation why he'd gone from Dr Jekyll to Mr. Hyde.

"I don't know what you mean? She said.

She tried to soften her voice, to sound as if she wasn't worried, only curious,

"Harry, what's going on?"

Maybe he should just walk out now, before his temper erupted. Before he shouted at her, demanding to know how she could have just thoughtlessly thrown away a life like this.

But he didn't go. He stayed there, right where he was. Maybe, against all odds and reason, there was a tiny shred of him that hoped she could still save the situation. Still make it right somehow by giving him a reason that made sense. Though he couldn't see his way clear as to what that reason could be.

"Struggling to keep everything bottled up, Harry pulled out the bill he stuffed in his pocket, shook it open and held it out to her.

"Maybe this is the great news you wanted to tell me?' he spat.

Looking confused Hermione shook her head. "No, it has to do"

"Doesn't matter" he cut in.

"Does this look familiar to you?" he asked.

Hermione stared at the bill blankly, but made no move to take it in her hand. Afraid that if she did it would cause something awful to happen.

What was it he was accusing her of? And why had he convicted her without a trail? She raised her chin defiantly. Anything she had felt for him only moments ago iced over, including telling him about the baby.

"No," she answered crisply. "Why should it?"

"Let me give you a hint."

He watched her face, waiting for a crack in her veneer. She was good, he thought. She was acting as if she didn't know what he was talking about. But she did. Too many things fell together for this to be some kind of gross mistake.

"It's a bill. From the hospital." He explained.

Why was he carrying on about that? It didn't make any sense,

"So St. Mungo's mailed the bill to us instead of sending it to the vault. So what? These things happen from time to time "

"Not St. Mungo's Hermione" he corrected, pointing to the top of the page where the hospital's address was written.

"London General."

"London General?" she echoed.

It couldn't be. Surely they would not have sent it out that fast

"But …I," she began

But even as she went to explain, some feeling uncoiled in her brain. She resisted, inwardly afraid even as she retained her bravado.

Harry waited as she seemed to struggle with herself to find her voice. He figured when she found it she would tell him it was a mistake. If only she knew how much he wished he could believe that. But it was too late. He'd verified it with Seamus.

"Before you claim it a mistake Hermione, there is no doubts to you being there."

"Harry, I admit this seems strange" Hermione began again.

He saw the confusion in her eyes.

Give it up, Hermione. I found you out. Found out your secret.

"They've got all your information right. Your name, your birthday, our address." He indicated each line as he spoke.

"The timing is right, too. It was while I was away at the Ireland game." He added.

She stared at the sheet like someone in a trance. This had to be the other visit she couldn't remember. It had to be.

"Harry, I don't remember." She told him

Because his heart was still breaking, he shouted at her.

"Hermione, that's getting old. You remember everything, but me and now this. It's too convenient, don't you think?"

Hermione grabbed the paper from him, almost tearing it. She scanned it quickly, but her brain was under siege. It took her several seconds to separate the lines and focus on the individual charges.

What jumped out at her was that there was a charge for the use of the emergency room and for surgical supplies.

Wait a minute she had surgery performed on her.

Hermione looked up at him, a helplessness pulling her under for the third time. Nothing was making sense.

"Harry, this is a nightmare, I swear I don't" she paused. "Wait what are these numbers?" she asked suddenly seeing them. This had to be the key to her previous visit to London General.

He took a breath, afraid his voice would crack.

"That's you diagnosis"

He sounded so odd, so distant. She'd never heard him like this. Something inside of her scrambled fore high ground, for safety. But there was none. She searched for anger to draw on, but even that was deserting her.

"What does it say I had?"

Harry's eyes narrowed. He hated this. They were supposed to be a couple, a team of two, not

opponents. But she had done that to them.

"Don't play dumb, Hermione"

At his words, something inside of her broke.

"I am not playing dumb," she shouted at him

"Don't you think I'd say something if I could remember?" She added.

And then she stopped abruptly as an idea came to her. They were supposed to have had an opened relationship.

"Didn't I tell you why I went to the hospital, when you came back from Ireland?"

Was she toying with him now? Was that it?

Harry found that he really had to struggle to hold on to his temper. He felt almost mortally wounded.

"No you didn't say a word about it. When I came home, you just acted as if it was business as usual. You just looked a little pale around the edges," he recalled.

"In fact it was one of the reasons we made the trip to the field. I figured it was due to work. evidently, it was the strain of keeping secrets from me that was wearing on you"

"I didn't"

She began to shout a protest that she didn't keep secrets from him that she didn't know f she had any secrets to keep, but the word suddenly began to echo in her brain.

"Secrets," she repeated, not looking at him.

Secrets.

She realized that the word had somehow been part of her semi dream as well.

Did she have secrets from him? If she did, they were secrets from her now, as well.

"Yes, Hermione. Secrets."

His mouth twisted into a grim expression.

"A pretty sterile word for what you did."

And then his temper, his hurt, finally erupted.

"Damn it, Hermione, why didn't you come to me before you did it? Why did you shut me out this way?"

Hermione was beyond confusion. She was completely dumbfounded.

"What way Harry?" she cried in exasperation.

"What is it that you think I did?"

How could she pretend not to know? You just didn't forget something like this, like a missed item on a grocery list.

"Hermione, you killed our baby." He choked out.

Her faced turned completely pale as she stared at him.

"That's impossible" she whispered.

"This code," he jabbed at the line with his index finger, "it stands for termination of pregnancy. That was our baby you just swept out of your life. You didn't event think enough of it, or me, to let me know you were going to do it."

He pressed his lips together, trying to get under control. Remembering. They'd sat right there on that couch, with her dangling her bare feet over one upholstered arm, talking about the future. And he'd actually felt bad, telling her they were going to have to put on hold for a while having kids.

God, he'd been such a fool.

"You even had me going with that talk about wanting a family."

He looked at her accusingly. "What was that, your decoy plan?"

The room had suddenly gotten very hot. And the air in her lungs had vanished somehow. She found it was hard to focus.

"I didn't have a decoy plan. I don't know anything about this." She said trembling.

Sweat began forming along her upper lip, her lids, her hair line. Slipping down her spine.

"I …didn't…I'm…p"

Hermione couldn't finish, couldn't push any more words out of her mouth. She was too weak. She started to sway. Her knees felt as if they'd been dissolved, and she didn't have the strength to stand up anymore.

"Hermione?" Harry asked, his eyes showing concern.

She heard a voice. Harry's?

It was coming to her from a long distance away, as if whoever talking was standing on the other end of a long tunnel.

She couldn't see who it was.

Someone was grabbing her hand. Holding her upright. Even with support she couldn't stand. Everything was spinning.

The room was shrinking, its edges rapidly becoming outlined in black. What light there was around her was disappearing.

She tried to scream for help, but the cry became caught in her throat. The darkness swiftly devoured it before a sound could emerge.

And then the darkness came to claim her.

There you guys have it Chapter 10. I know many of you are most likely mad at me for that ending. But have no fear; chapter 11 will be out sooner than you think. So until then please read and review. It makes me feel better…..And a big hug and thanks goes out to each and every one of you that reviewed for chapter 9…

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