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Cold shivers raced up and down her spine when she heard Reginald screeching and hollering, “Get that snake away from me! Please, oh, Lord, save me!”
Then suddenly everything was quiet again.
Jessie wondered whether he had returned to his room, and if so, would he go to sleep again tonight?
Had her opportunity to leave passed her by? Would she have to wait another long day before finally gaining her freedom?
She hurried to the door.
She winced with pain when she placed her sore hand on the knob, then opened it very slowly and carefully just in case Reginald might still be in the corridor.
Just as she opened it, she gasped, for Reginald was on his knees only a few feet away.
His pajamas and face were wet with sweat. His eyes were glassy and wild as he looked over his shoulder and saw her standing there, her eyes wide as she stared back at him.
Jessie jumped when Reginald leaped to his feet and stepped directly in front of her.
“What are you staring at?” he stormed at her.
He grabbed her painfully by the shoulders and shook her. “Quit staring at me!” he shouted, spittle running from the corners of his mouth as he looked hysterically into her frightened eyes.
Afraid now of what he might do, for he seemed totally out of his mind, Jessie felt nauseousness sweep through her. Her shoulders hurt from his fingers digging into them as he held her in a tight grip.
“Oh, no,” she cried, knowing that there was no way to hold back the vomit. It spewed out, most of it landing on Reginald’s pajamas and his bare feet.
He yanked his hands away from her as he stared down at the mess all over the front of his pajamas. He shivered with disgust when he saw the vomit on his bare feet and felt the heat of it creeping between his toes.
r /> He looked wildly at Jessie, then slapped her.
Jessie recoiled from the blow, and when Reginald seemed ready to hit her again, she took a shaky step away from him.
“Please don’t,” she cried as she wiped her mouth clean of vomit with the back of her sleeve. She put her hand to her cheek. It was hot from the blow he had inflicted on her.
“I . . . I . . . am with child, Reginald,” she sobbed. “Please! You might harm my baby! Reggie, oh, please remember how close we were as children. Remember how we cared for one another when either of us fell, or got stung by a bee. Reggie, please, oh, please.”
He looked taken aback by her announcement. He stared at her, his gaze moving down to where her hands lay protectively over her belly.
Footsteps could be heard coming down the corridor, but he ignored Jade, even when she stopped only a few feet from him, her eyes wide, her whole body trembling. All his attention was focused on his cousin.
“Jessie, I don’t want a whining brat around my house,” he shouted. “Nor my expensive things. You are enough to deal with. I’ll take you to Doc Storm tomorrow. He’ll get rid of the baby. The baby’s father is dead anyway, so why have the child?”
Jessie felt the color leaving her face and an iciness she had never known before circling her heart.
Had she heard him say those terrible things?
Did he actually think she would allow anyone to abort this child?
“How could you say such things to me?” she asked, her voice quivering with emotion. “How could you think I would agree to such a thing as that? Reginald, what has happened to you? I . . . don’t . . . know you at all. You aren’t anything like the boy you were those years ago.”
“Just you shut up,” Reginald yelled, flailing his arms in the air. “You’ve come here and disrupted my life by telling me you’re with child, and you think I’ll allow it? No, Jessie. I won’t. You’ll go with me to the doctor tomorrow and do as I tell you.”
He shrugged. “Anyway, no one will believe you about having been married,” he snarled. “They’ll say that you’ve come this far to live with me only to hide from those you knew back where you came from . . . that you’d sinned and got pregnant out of wedlock and fled to hide the sin.”
Jessie’s mouth opened in a gasp; then she swallowed hard and fought back tears as she took another step away from her cousin. “Do you believe this, yourself?” she asked, a sob catching in her throat. “Don’t you really believe that I was married?”
“I’d not put anything past you, for you are nothing but a stranger to me now,” he said, shivering as he became suddenly aware again of the vomit on his pajamas and feet.
Then he looked up at Jessie again. “Those times when we were children are far in the past now,” he said coldly. “And, anyhow, you don’t know just how jealous I was of you then, because you were always healthy even though you were petite, and I was always sickly. I was poked fun at all the time because I had to wear thick-lensed glasses. I was called four-eyes. You were called beautiful.”
