Heavenly Blood

23 - Alec

My jaw tensed. I had thought my heart had been broken enough at seeing her broken and savaged by the vampires only a few weeks ago, but no. No pain compared to watching your wife and mother of your unborn child throw herself off a cliff. It had been a reflex to catch her. My body responded before my brain had time to process and thank god it did. I clutched her to me like my life depended on it and yet she continued to scream for death. I couldn't listen to it. Max had called to tell me about her call with Alice and advised a may need to sedate her. It had killed me inside to do so but I did. I felt sick to my stomach. I was so scared. I shuffled away from the edge and clutched her to me.

This was my fault. I never should of left her. I don't know what I expected. That the pain would be easier to bare? Losing her would never be an easy thing. My hands shook as I slipped her ring back onto her finger. My fingers have never trembled, never quivered. I didn't know they could.

I didn't know what to do. I called Max. She arrived forty minutes later, stopping dead in her tracks as she looked at the scene. Alice lay unmoving in my arms and I was broken. My sister immediately went to Alex's side, checking her over. In all the years we had been finding and loving and losing one another I had never seen her contemplate suicide. Alice had always been the strong one, the one making me believe that we could live together and survive together. That there was something better. Not this. Never this.

"We need to get her back to yours. And fast," Max said finally.

"Why?" I croaked, "What's wrong?"

"Hopefully I am." I didn't take comfort in her reply.

I carried her back to Max's car. I could feel her ribs under her jumper. Had I done this? Was this because of me or the baby? Baby. The word I had been avoiding all this time. It made it a life, a thing, something personal. I could no longer deny that I cared what happened to our baby. It was ours. We had made it and she was growing it. I placed my hand on my wife's stomach. A faint da-dum-de-dum pulsed against my finger tips. There was a connection, I could feel the babies presence in my head. I smiled. It was alive and loved us. It had no thought, no words but I got a sense and that sense was warm and close and personal. It was a bond. I took may hand away as Max parked down one of the back roads, our connection was cut. I carried my wife back up to our bedroom and laid her down on the bed. Max moved to take my place.

There was an old saying, one of several verses removed from the Bible to protect ourselves from mankind. The light of God destroys the darkness of Draven and he who baths in it shall be eternal welcomed. I used to think this was bullshit. But Max and I were prefect representations of this verse. Whenever I got Alice into trouble, as it was invariably my fault, it was always Max who got us out even at the expense of her own girlfriend. She saved Alice from whatever destruction I had created. Although she would never get to be in the eternal light, another fault of my creation. Just being affiliated with me was enough for damnation. As I watched my sister work on my wife all I could feel was a sinking guilt. I should have stayed away. A millennium ago.

Max fell back against the floor. I dropped to my knees, catching her just before she fell. The colour in her cheeks had drained, I could hear her heart thumping in her chest. This wasn't good. She shakily pulled herself up, clearly disgusted with me.

"Max?" I choked.

"Look at her."

I turned away from Max and sat next to Alice. She laid on her side, her skin paper white. A death white. I touched her cheeks with the back of two fingers. My hand dropped to fall next to her but instead fell on a rounded lump. My head snapped to look at Max. She just looked at me. Yanking off the covers, I fell to the floor. Alice's stomach had grown massively, like beginning third trimester large. If my heart could beat, it would have stopped.