The Power of Love (4 page)

A moment later he stepped away and
looked at her.

“It is not your time, child.” Then he
was gone.

His lungs and throat burned, but Ethan
could not stop the tears. How long would this go on? He did not
think he could take much more. The doctors told them Elaine would
not survive the birth of their child, yet they had brought her
back. They had acted before he could protest. He knew Elaine did
not want to survive like this.

He pulled himself closer to his wife.
The beeping of the heart monitor told him her heart still beat, but
he could barely hear it as he pressed his ear to her chest—wanting,
no needing, to feel the life within her. Her frail body was almost
nonexistent under the blankets. He could not let her go. Not
yet.

Then he felt a hand on his shoulder.
“Mr. O’Donovan.” The nurse spoke in a quiet tone as not to startle
him, but she had just the same. “Mr. O’Donovan, please.”

“Please? Please, what?” He barely got
the question out. Could she not just leave them in
peace?

“This isn’t helping,” she calmly told
him.

“Not helping?” What the hell was the
woman on about? “Please, just leave us be.”

“This,” she gestured toward his
position on the bed which he took to mean his falling apart all
over his wife, “is not helping. You need to let her go. She’s
struggling to stay alive.”

“What?” Even he heard the hitch in his
voice.

“You need to let her go. You need to
tell her it’s all right to go.”

Ethan struggled off the bed and stood
in front of the nurse. She remained calm as she gazed at him. Her
soft eyes were full of remorse but also understanding.

“Mr. O’Donovan, your wife is holding on
. . . for you. You need to tell her it’s all right for her to go.
Tell her you love her, but she can go. Tell her she’ll be all
right, that you will be all right. Let her last moments with you be
serene. Let her hear the sound of your voice in a loving tone. You
can grieve . . . after.”

Ethan gazed into the nurse’s eyes for a
long moment as understanding rushed through him. It would be just
like Elaine to hang on and continue breathing because he could not
let her go. He needed to let her go. He saw that now.

He turned and looked at his wife.
Really looked as the realization of what he needed to do sank in.
When he turned around, the nurse had left him to his task. The door
had made no sound as she closed it behind her.

Ethan took a long, deep breath,
straightened his spine and roughly wiped the dampness from his
cheeks. Then he turned back to the bed where he began straightening
the bed clothes while he murmured loving words into his wife’s ear.
They were things he had said many times over the months they had
been together before they married, the same words he told her
nearly every day since their wedding, the same words he repeated
many times a day since she had been hospitalized. No matter how
many times he said the words, it never seemed enough. He felt sure
that losing his one true love, part of him was dying too, and he
could not differentiate the pain he felt are her impending death
from that piece of him that would also no longer exit.

Deep breath. And another. And another
until he had quelled the sobs he felt welling inside him again.
This was the last thing he would ever do for Elaine while she
lived. If she heard him—and he hoped she did—she would know how
much she meant to him.

Sitting beside her on the bed and
gazing down at her, he took her hand in his, kissed the backs of
her fingers. She was cool to the touch. He was tempted to lie down
beside her again and try to warm her, but the nurse’s words rang
through him. She was right. It was time.

He reached up and turned off the heart
monitor. He did not want the last thing Elaine heard to be the damn
incessant bleeping of the machine. He wanted the room quiet. He
wanted the only thing she heard to be the sound of his
voice.

Finally, he bent over and put his arms
around her shoulders as much as he could then buried his face in
the crook of her neck. It was one of his favorite places. It was a
place where she often dabbed perfume, but also smelled her own
womanly scent. She was warm there, even now, and welcomed him. He
kissed her nape and spoke softly in her ear, telling her one last
time how much he loved her.

Then, “I love you, Lany. But . . .” He
halted. He could not do this. He would not. No, that was being
selfish. “But it’s time. It’s . . . it’s okay to go now, my love.
You’ll be okay. I’ll be okay.” His voice hitched. Who was he
kidding? It was tearing him in pieces. “I’ll be okay, and our son
will be okay. I’ll tell him all about you and he’ll grow to love
you as I do. But it’s time for you to let go, my love. It’s okay to
go. It’s okay, it’s okay . . .”

As he spoke, he noticed her breaths
coming fewer and farther between.

“It’s okay, my love. Let
go.”

And then there was silence.

Ethan remained in his bent over
position for a moment. The only sound in the room was his own
shallow breathing.

He heard the last breath leave his
wife’s body and then he felt her body go limp, if such a thing were
possible in her condition. But he held her a bit longer. He knew
that once he rose, the nurse would return and he would be required
to leave while they did what needed doing with a body which no
longer carried life.

Carried life. How ironic the phrase.
Just hours ago she had carried three lives—her own, that of their
child, and the life and soul of himself that he shared with her.
Now, the vibrant, fun-loving, amazing woman who had agreed to be
his wife just a year ago today was gone to him, in life and in
spirit, and too soon in body. At least he had that for a moment
longer. Just a moment longer.

When he felt a hand on his arm, he
thought it was a nurse coming in to tell him to get off his wife’s
bed again. He had not realized it, but he had dozed. He did not
know for how long though. His wife’s body was still
warm.

When he sat up, prepared to tell the
nurse to leave him alone, there was no one there. But the hand
remained on his arm. His gazed at the hand and followed it up an
arm. His gaze tracked the limb to Elaine’s face. He nearly leapt
off the bed when her eyes fluttered opened and focused on
him.

“Elaine?” he gasped. “Oh,
Lany.”

Elaine reached up and palmed his cheek.
Her hand trembled but was warm.

Warm!

And her cheeks were turning pink. The
circles under her eyes disappeared before his eyes.

What was happening?

“Lany?”

She smiled weakly. “It’s not my time.”
She glanced to the side of the bed and whispered, “Thank you.”
Ethan did not see anyone, but he did not care. His wife was awake.
He did not know how long he had, but he had to tell her everything
he had been thinking while lying beside her on the narrow
bed.

“Elaine, I have so much to say,” he
said, stroking his thumb across her lower lip. She liked it when he
did that. But when she reached up and pulled his hand away he was
not sure what to think.

“Please, listen to me, Ethan. I’m going
to be all right.”

Ethan’s heart pounded. What was she
talking about?

Just then the door swung open and the
nurse returned. When she saw Elaine was awake, she spun around and
left the room. A moment later she returned with Doctor Gibbons in
tow.

Christmas Eve – one year
later

The best feeling in the world had to be
lying in a lover’s arms, completely exhausted after a night of
lovemaking, totally and absolutely sated.

Ethan snuggled closer to Elaine,
weaving his legs with hers and grinning at how the feel of her body
so thoroughly ignited his own.

The warm feminine scent of her body—her
own womanly sent, sweet and exotic and only enhanced by the light
perfume she had put on earlier in the day, and her skin damp with
fine perspiration and the heady aroma of sex—permeated his
senses

In a word, she smelled delicious. So
much so, he’d practically gobbled her up over the last several
hours. Perhaps he would again, he thought, trailing his fingertips
between her breasts then encircled a nipple with his
thumb.

He stroked a fine line down the center
of her belly, cherishing the faint stretch marks, and continued
lower until he felt her damp, silky hairs. She grasped his hand
with hers and kissed the backs of his fingers. “Please, love. I can
barely move.”

Ethan glanced down to the twitch
beneath the sheet just covering his hips. “You don’t need to do
anything, love. I’ll do all the work.”

He loved to hear Elaine laugh. It was
not so long ago he thought he would never hear the sweet sound
again.

He propped himself up on an elbow and
looked down at her. It was hard to believe a year had passed since
he had been lying beside her in the hospital waiting for her to
take her last breath. And now, she was taking his breath away. If
at all possible, she was even more beautiful than ever.

He still did not understand it, but
Elaine had been right about it not being her time yet. Doctor
Gibbons could not explain her turn around either, and all the other
specialists he consulted were sure the test results had been an
error in the hospital’s equipment. She was as healthy as the next
person. Her check-ups during the year proved it and her doctors had
given her the all clear. She could even have more children, if that
was what they wanted. And they did.

Whatever had happened, and there was no
doubt Elaine had suffered from something that nearly took her away
from him forever, they tried not to dwell on it but focus on the
future, however long it was. Every day since bringing her home, he
made a point to show her how much he loved her.

“Do you know how much I love you,
Lany?”

She gazed up at him. “I
have an idea, but if you get a little closer you can
show
me just how much.”
She wiggled her eyebrows at him. “Again.”

“Be right back. Sounds like someone
else needs a little attention.”

“That’s just one more reason why I love
you, Ethan O’Donovan. You’re not a man to shy away from a smelly
diaper.”

“Anything for you, my love. Anything
for you.” He kissed her on the forehead and rose to check on their
son.

When he returned, Elaine was not in
bed. While he had been in the other room, she had turned off the
overhead light, lit the candles and turned on the lights on the
little Christmas tree they had pulled from the attic. She lay on
her belly beneath the tree, nude with a bright red sash tied around
her hips—the folds of the bow resting on the curve of her
bottom.

God, how he loved her!

Ethan strode across the room and knelt
before her, lifting her to her knees. He ran his fingers through
her hair, stroking her cheeks with his thumbs. Sensations raced
through her veins and enflamed her skin. His gaze bore into her,
pooling passion in her belly.

“Elaine,” he sighed, running his hands
over her shoulders and down to her hips. He grasped her and pulled
her against him. Her arms automatically went around his shoulders.
She leaned in to kiss him, but he leaned away from her.

“Tell me what happened that night,” he
said.

“Which night?” But Elaine knew by the
look in his eyes what he wanted to know. He had never asked before
and she had never said. Would he believe her tale? She took a deep
breath and told him everything.

Over the last year, she had let him
believe the reason she wanted to name their son Nicholas was
because he had been born on Christmas Eve. Now she hoped he
understood the real reason. Saint Nicholas had given her every wish
she had thought of that night. He had ended Ethan’s pain and given
baby Nicholas the family life he deserved. He had given her back
her life to make it all happen.

When she was done, Ethan pulled her to
him, folding his arms around her and burying his face in the curve
of her neck. She knew it was his favorite way to hold her.
Truthfully, it was hers too. The feeling of his hot breath on her
flesh went right through her. She trembled at his touch.

“I love you, Ethan,” she whispered into
his ear, kissing him behind it and running her tongue along the
lobe.

He leaned away and gazed down at her.
She saw the glassy look in his eyes. His emotions were on the
surface. “And I’m going to show you how much I love you, Lany.
Every day for the rest of our lives.”

Hours later, when they had truly
exhausted each other and hovered on the brink of sleep, back in bed
and tangled in each other’s embrace, something broke the silence of
the room. Elaine turned to Ethan to see if he had heard it—a
distinctive jingle, soft clattering on the rooftop the jolly
laughter from their living room.

A grin she was sure matched Ethan’s
broke across her face. They threw the blankets aside and raced
downstairs to see what Santa left them, laughing like children all
the way.