“Sophie is stable,” I said. “She should go home in the morning.”

He turned slowly. “Is the baby mine?”

The question was raw, stripped of all his usual armor.

My hand moved to my belly. “Your daughter needs you right now.”

“Adelaide, please.”

“No,” I said, my voice shaking despite myself. “You don’t get to demand answers after one hundred and eighty days of silence.”

“I didn’t know.”

“You didn’t look,” I said. “I wanted you to fight for us, Elias. You let me leave.”

His face tightened as if I had cut him.

“I was a coward.”

“Yes,” I whispered. “You were.”

I walked away before he could see me cry.

When I reached my apartment at two in the morning, exhausted and hollow, an elegant box waited outside my door. There was no return address, only a cream card under a black ribbon.

Adelaide, some wars cannot be fought alone, especially the ones involving him. Look inside.

The box held a hand-knitted seafoam-green baby blanket and rare vintage pediatric medical books. It was expensive, thoughtful, and impossible to ignore.

But it was not from Elias.

That weekend, I could not stop wondering who had sent it.

On Sunday afternoon, someone knocked. I opened the door and found Elias standing there, looking out of place in my modest apartment building. Beside him stood Sophie, her arm in a white cast.

“Doctor Adelaide!” Sophie said brightly, holding up a container. “Dad and I made cookies. He burned the first batch, but these are good.”

I laughed before I could stop myself.

Elias looked embarrassed. “We’re trying to earn forgiveness with sugar. May we come in?”

Against my better judgment, I stepped aside.

Sophie immediately noticed the ultrasound photo on my refrigerator. “Is that the baby? It looks like a little bean.”

“It’s getting bigger every day,” I said.

Elias watched me quietly. Then he pulled a velvet-wrapped object from his coat and placed it on the counter.

“I didn’t bring this to buy forgiveness,” he said softly. “I brought it because I want you to know what I’ve been doing since you left.”

Inside was an antique wooden music box. It was old and beautiful, but I could see where broken pieces had been carefully repaired.

“It was destroyed when I found it,” Elias said. “The gears were rusted. The wood was splintered. I spent five months repairing it because I don’t know how to fix things with words, Adelaide.”

He turned the brass key. A delicate waltz filled the kitchen.

“It still has scars,” he said, touching a repaired crack. “But it plays. That has to count for something.”

Before I could respond, the intercom buzzed.

“Doctor Adelaide? A woman named Genevieve is here to see you.”

Elias froze.

“Who is Genevieve?” I asked.

“My ex-wife,” he said.

Five minutes later, a stunning woman in an immaculate trench coat stepped into my apartment. Her eyes went straight to Elias.

“Hello, Elias. I see you finally found your courage,” she said, then turned to me. “And you must be Adelaide. You received the blanket?”

“You sent it?” I asked.

“Sophie talks to me every night. She mentioned the pretty doctor who looked very sad a few months ago. I put the pieces together.”

Elias stepped forward. “Why are you here?”

“To warn her,” Genevieve said calmly. Then she looked at me. “Every woman who loves a broken man needs one.”

She walked to the music box. “I loved him for four years. I thought I could melt the walls he built after his parents died. He was never cruel, but he was a coward. I left because I refused to be a ghost in my own marriage. If he is fixing music boxes and showing up at your door, then he is doing for you what he never could do for me.”

She touched my arm gently. “He cares about you more than his fear. But make him earn every inch.”

Then she kissed Sophie’s head and left.

I turned to Elias.

“Is she right?”

“Every word,” he said, eyes wet. “But I don’t want to be that man anymore.”

Before I could answer, sharp pain tore through my abdomen. My knees buckled.

“Adelaide!”

Elias caught me as everything went dark.

I woke to hospital monitors.

“The baby?” I gasped.

“The baby is holding strong,” said Naomi, my closest friend and senior obstetrician. “Severe preeclampsia caused your blood pressure to spike. You were lucky Elias got you here when he did.”