As much as she liked Sharona, Natalie could hardly wait for her to leave that evening. Limited activity or not, she had big plans, the first of which was a long, hot, steamy bubble bath with candles, a glass of wine, and soft music. Then she planned to seduce her fiancé. It was too bad, she mused, that she didn't have a bigger tub so she could do both at once. But, as he'd said a few weeks ago, they'd make do.
She put part one of her plan into excellent effect, soaking luxuriously for over an hour. Finally, the cooling water forced her to get out and towel off. After she'd dried her hair and slathered on a layer of creamy jasmine-scented lotion, she slipped into a slinky pale pink silk nightgown.
Natalie was disappointed that Adrian wasn't waiting for her in her — in their — bedroom and, after wrapping herself in a matching silk bathrobe, went exploring.
She found him sitting at the kitchen table, reading a book. He'd recently taken to wearing black-framed, rectangular-shaped reading glasses when dealing with small print, which she personally thought were very sexy on him.
"Hey you," she said, wrapping her arms around him from behind.
"Hey," he said, taking off his glasses. "How was your bath?"
"It felt amazing," she said with a sigh of contentment. "Although I was kind of hoping you'd be waiting for me in the bedroom once I got out." She nuzzled his neck affectionately.
"Actually…" he said, and she could feel him stiffen slightly. "There's something I wanted to talk to you about."
"Uh oh," she teased. "Is this a serious discussion?" When the sober expression on his face didn't change, she felt a tiny frisson of fear in her stomach. This apparently was a serious discussion.
She seated herself at the table, directly across from him. "What's going on?" she asked quietly.
He closed his book but didn't say anything for a long minute. "I need to ask you something," he said at length, staring at its cover.
She could tell, from long experience, that he was working up courage, and felt another tremor of apprehension. But she waited patiently for him to say what he wanted to say.
When he finally spoke, his question wasn't at all what she'd expected. "Are you still taking birth control pills?"
She blinked in surprise. He had never mentioned her pills, not since the very first day they had met and he had mortified her by mentioning them in front of Julie.
"Not at the moment," she said honestly. "Obviously, I wasn't able to take them right after the accident. Dr. Harmon told me when I was discharged to wait until after my next period to start taking them again, and to use condoms for a few months just in case. But if you're worried about tonight, I have some. Condoms, I mean." She'd ducked into a drugstore on their way home that afternoon for that very reason — although her official reason had been that she wanted to buy some new bubble bath.
He didn't respond right away, but instead fiddled with his glasses. "What if… how would you feel if… if maybe you didn't?" he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.
Her brow furrowed in confusion. "If I didn't what?"
"Start taking them again."
She stared at him, absolutely baffled. "What are you — "
And then it clicked.
She sat back in her chair, thoroughly staggered. She felt much the same as she had the night he had proposed. Once again, he'd taken all of her assumptions and turned them upside down.
But she had to make sure she understood him correctly. "Do… do you want me to get pregnant?"
He twitched slightly. "Dr. Bell thought we should talk about it," he said in a low voice. "He said we should make sure that we're on the same page."
That explained why he'd come back so distracted and nervous from his last few sessions with Dr. Bell. "Well," she said slowly, "what page are you on?"
"I don't know." For the first time since their discussion had started, he looked up and met her eyes. "At first I thought it was impossible, but I've been thinking about it, and… I don't know," he said again. "But I thought I should find out how you felt."
"I'm not — I hadn't — " Her mind was reeling. "I'll need some time to consider it, I guess. It's — it's a pretty big decision."
He nodded. "I know."
She straightened in her chair, trying to figure out how to phrase her next question tactfully. "Is there a specific reason why you don't think it's impossible anymore?" she asked delicately.
He sighed deeply. "Trudy wanted children," he said, gazing absently out of the kitchen window as he spoke. "Desperately. But I would never agree. Maybe she would have talked me into it, eventually, but…" He shook his head. "I've always regretted saying no. It was the only thing she wanted from me during our marriage that I couldn't — wouldn't — give her."
"Why not?" Natalie asked softly, although she could guess.
He shook his head again. "I was afraid I'd end up like my father. That one day it'd all get to be too much and I'd just — take off. I was too scared to risk doing that to her, or to our child."
She nodded, understanding perfectly. "So what's changed?"
He huffed out a breath. "When my father was here last weekend, he asked about potential grandchildren."
Adrian certainly hadn't mentioned that tidbit of their conversation to her. "What did you say?"
"I said it wasn't going to happen, because I was too afraid I'd be like him."
Her eyebrows rose. Jack Monk probably hadn't liked hearing that. "And what did he say?"
"He said…" Adrian shifted in his chair, and actually smiled slightly. "He said that I was a better man that he'd ever been, or ever would be. And that I'd never leave someone who needed me."
Natalie was impressed. Jack Monk knew himself, and his son, better than she'd given him credit for. "He's right."
Adrian flushed. "So, I've been thinking about it, and… well… I guess I don't want you to have the same regrets. If you would want to, that is. And if you don't, I understand, and it won't be a problem, but I — "
"Adrian," she said, cutting off his torrent of words. "I don't know what I want, not right now. I'm going to need some time to think about it." She cleared her throat. "Does this mean that you don't want to… um… resume relations quite yet?"
"That's another thing I wanted to ask about," he said, looking embarrassed. "I was thinking that… maybe… we could wait."
He didn't elaborate. "Wait until…?" she prompted.
"Wait until our wedding night."
"Adrian." She stared at him in disbelief. "That's at least eight weeks away. Maybe more."
"I know."
Her eyes narrowed. "Is this payback for me making you wait six weeks after we first started dating?"
"No!" he said indignantly. "I know it's a lot to ask. But it just seems, I don't know, kind of appropriate. If nothing else, it'd give us some time to figure things out about… about the whole birth control thing. And it'd make me feel better about… not accidentally hurting you… if I know you're fully healed."
"Dr. Harmon said — "
"I heard what he said," he interrupted. "But… I'm still scared." Remembering the sight of her incision earlier that day, he shuddered slightly. Both Dr. Harmon and Sharona had said it was healing well, but it had looked raw and painful to him. He knew that he wouldn't be able to think of anything else if they tried to make love, and he wasn't entirely sure he'd be able to… well, perform… while so anxious.
She reached across the table to take his hand, knowing that he could use the physical reassurance. "You're not going to hurt me."
He didn't seem convinced. "It'd make our wedding night really special, you know, if it's the first time we're… together… after the accident. It'd add an extra dimension of…well, symbolism, to it."
"Symbolism?" she repeated.
"You know… starting a new life, after all we've been through. Having our first time together after you miraculously survive a terrible accident also be the first day we start our lives as husband and wife. That kind of thing."
She cocked her head. "'Miraculously'? What makes you say that?"
He mentally kicked himself for letting that particular word escape his mouth. "Nothing. It's nothing, really. I just meant — "
"Adrian," she said, her tone one of warning. "You're a terrible liar."
He sighed, raking his hands through his hair, and made a decision. "I'll be right back." He left the room and came back a moment later with a manila folder in his hands. "I think it's time that you saw these."
Curious, she opened the folder, and realized she was looking at the police report from her accident. She flipped through the pages until she got to the eight by ten color photos of the accident scene.
"Oh my God," she said, staring at a photo of her car in shock. It was so crumpled and smashed that it was hardly recognizable as hers. There were other pictures as well — ones of the driver's side of the car, with the steering wheel tilted at an impossibly crazy angle. She could see blood on the upholstery — her blood — and felt a little dizzy. In her mind, she heard a deafening *crunch* and the echo of her own screams.
"The department's accident reconstructionist had no explanation for how you survived," Adrian said quietly. "Dr. Hector can't explain it either. They both said that at the very least you should have had multiple broken bones, if not severe, life-threatening injuries — quadriplegia, or maybe brain damage — not just some broken ribs and a cut on your forehead."
"But there was internal bleeding — and my spleen — " she said in protest.
He shrugged. "Fairly minor, all things considered." He looked at the photos, his expression grave. "Natalie, I was a cop for over a decade. I saw my fair share of vehicular accidents. There's no logical explanation for how you essentially walked away from a crash like that with only minor injuries."
Something in his voice made her pause. "What about an illogical explanation?"
He squirmed, embarrassed. "Leland said… I know it sounds farfetched, but he thinks… he thinks Trudy saved you for me."
She considered this as she looked at the photos again. "Or maybe Mitch saved me for you."
He smiled at that. "They were working together before they died — maybe they were working together afterwards as well."
Natalie smiled too. "I guess it was miraculous." She very deliberately closed the folder. The pictures had shaken her more than she wanted to admit. She still had nightmares about the crash, although thankfully she wasn't waking up screaming like she had after the first one.
She sighed. "All right. We can wait."
He brightened. "You won't be mad?"
She rolled her eyes. "I won't be mad. Annoyed, maybe. Frustrated, probably. But not mad." She pointed at him. "You'd better lock your door at night or I might give into temptation."
He grinned, looking more relieved and relaxed than he had for days – weeks, really. Natalie realized that the topics they'd discussed — both postponing intercourse and her birth control status — must have been eating at him for quite a while. She felt guilty for not having pressed harder to find out what was bothering him, but she'd been too wrapped up in bed rest self-pity. Some fiancée she was.
She rose from her seat and went over to him, sliding onto his lap. She kissed him, tenderly, and then hugged him tightly. "I'm sorry I didn't realize how worried you were. I'll do better, I promise."
His arms came around her and he held her tight. "I didn't want you to worry about me." They held each other, without speaking, for a long minute. Then Natalie shifted in his lap, having felt something very familiar. He drew back, looking at her with a pained expression. "I'm starting to regret this whole waiting until our wedding night thing already."
She grinned, shifting again. "It's not too late to change your mind."
He groaned. "You'd better go upstairs before my resolve fails."
She kissed him goodnight, and as she slid off his lap, he muttered, "Maybe you should lock your door, too."
