She'd been having lots of dreams lately. In all of them she was traveling towards Judge. He'd just proposed to her and she was going to meet him. Walking up stairs where he waited in bed. Driving across town where he waited at a café, his boots tapping against the ground as a barely restrained smile slid across his face when she approached. But the stairs kept stretching up forever. And the horizon never showed the end of the highway to bring her closer to him. She'd wake up covered in a cold sweat and feeling like she hadn't slept at all. How long had he been gone? Weeks? Was it months now?

Kates turned on her side and sank into her sheets. She'd bought new furniture planning her new life with Judge_Holden. Room redecorated. The marriage had been agreed on by Marietta and they'd had everything set but the band and the formal invitations. And then a shooting accident had taken him, leaving her stretched out in a bed she couldn't fill herself.

After staring for a moment, hoping in vain that sleep would overpower her mind, she turned and slid down to the floor. Her bare feet landed on the carpet and a slight chill in the air sent a shiver up her spine. She reached momentarily for her robe before pulling back her hand. The cold was a welcome respite from the recent heat wave, and it least in reminded her that she was alive. Her bare feet slapped on the tiles as she headed towards the shower.

The warm water burst onto the back of her neck as she leaned towards it, head down, with her arms against the wall as if she were trying to hold it up. For a moment she felt like crying, but she knew it wouldn't help. Every day the same goddamn thing. The same miserable routine with no one waiting for her at home. She didn't even have a fucking cat. This could not continue. The nothingness was tearing at her, devouring another piece of her every day. She'd had friends like this who'd got derailed and they usually wound up in the morgue. Kates had her start. More than once she'd woken up in a bar, or in a taxi. She was fine when her mother or sister were around, but they'd been busy with their own lives, just as she was busy running The Renaissance. The crew hadn't suffered, she knew. It wasn't her business life that had issues. It was everything else that was spiraling, and she could feel herself losing her grip. As she raised her face to the water and ran her hands through her hair, some lines of Yeats echoed in her head

" Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity...."

She breathed, centering herself by thinking of the men and women that depended on her, and might have stood there for an hour- she didn't know. But she heard a car backfire outside and quickly turned off the shower. Grabbing a towel, Kates scrutinized herself in the mirror. She was fast approaching thirty, but she'd never expected this. The daily running and combat training she'd learned as a girl had kept her looking essentially the same when she was 28 as she did when she was 22. But the past year had been hell, apparently, at least since Judge had died. She'd been feeling tired all the time. Her back, perfect before, had periodically been flaring up and it felt like she had the bladder of a hundred year old woman. How the hell did Mom do it? She was damn near 60. The drinking would have to go. And she'd have to start running again. Further.

Kates tied her hair behind her and slid her hands down her stomach, shocked at the slight softness she found. She'd been drinking a bit, to be sure, but this was insane. Frantically, she wiped the steam from the glass with her bare hand as it squeaked against the mirror. She'd always had her body to rely on, even when she knew her brain would be sufficient. It was a wild card, able to get her into and out of almost any situation. Her stomach. Hundreds of men had yearned for that hard and flat stomach, glimpsed under a raised workout shirt or delicately revealed by a dress- they'd been conquered by it, dashed up against it like waves on a rock wall. And now it was round. Just slight... but it was-

She sprinted for the phone, not caring what time it was, dialing her mother's private number. As far as she knew, she was one of 3 or 4 people in the world that could reach the Godmother of Detroit automatically at any time. But she didn't need a Godmother... she needed a mother.

She knelt with her towel barely draped around her in the deep maroon carpet, holding the phone against her legs and listening to it ring for an eternity before the half-asleep voice of Marietta started cursing.

"Mom... it's Kathryne... Mom.... MOM STOP FUCKING SWEARING...... I DON'T CARE WHAT TIME IT IS I THINK I'M PREGNANT!"

The silence was deafening and Kates could almost see her mother's confused and sleepy face trying to process this information. Even as her words echoed around the room, Kates knew them to be true. Exhaling, the words spilled out from her.

"It must have been Judge... the night he told me we'd be getting married... I just... What do I?"

She felt herself pulled back for a moment to that field where they'd spread their blanket and shared a bottle of champagne. The canopy of the stars had seemed to stretch forever, and she could almost hear her screams echoing against the deserted treeline. There'd been no one else in her life for years. It could only be Judge. Judge.

She started crying abruptly, not hearing what her mother was saying and Marietta fell silent again- Kates rarely cried. Maybe it was the shock. Maybe it was fear. Or maybe it was the joy and the pain of knowing that, although she could never be with Judge, never share this moment with him, that she was not alone. That Judge had left her with something- had changed her fate. She loved the Renaissance, loved Detroit, but she'd seen her future as a broken, elderly woman who lived only for her work. She'd seen some of her Bosses and even Wise Guys go home to their other families, and she'd felt the hole in her heart. Remembering the phone, she picked it up and listened to her mother's instructions.

She dressed quickly, bundling up unnecessarily and even wearing a hat, though it wasn't that cold out, and held on determinedly to the railing as she walked down the stairs of her building, measuring each step as if it were a matter of life and death. Smiling, scared, and more alive than she'd been in weeks, Kates stood outside her building and grinned at the people walking by as she breathed in the cool morning air. The sun gently rose over a new day in Detroit.

Don giovanni approaches kates cautiously.

Eveything okay ma'am. I brought you these flowers out of respect. and send you the familys condolences. Hope things will get better for you soon

Thank you, Don-Giovanni. That certainly seem to be heading that way!

Grins wide and listens to people randomly start contributing to two year old conversations.

Although that's strange...

Amazing material as always, once I started going over it I couldn't take my eyes off it. Many congratualtions too!

There is only one thing I can say madam.....can I be one of the Godmother of the baby.

Best wishes to you and the baby, as you said he may be gone but the fruits of your love still remains and will continue.......

Cernobog, in a Chair Outside of the Room, Says "Pozdravy,Kates" and he grasped a Cuban Cigar, Placed it in his mouth and Grabbed his Lighter, he Pulled it once, just a Click, Twice, a click again, he mumbles "Sakra!" and he Looked up at kate an said "Do you have a Light?"

walks up to kate has he leans in for a hug how are you=]

a great read as always boss and congrats on the baby