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“Please, Jericho. Kiss me. Please kiss me.”
“Fuck.” I tilt her head back, kissing the corner of her mouth. When I loosen my grip on her hair, she turns to kiss me like she wants and that takes me over the edge. That is the thing that has me moaning as I release, giving her all my weight. I spend my seed before we slide to our knees on the floor, me crowding her back, panting. Her turning herself so she’s curled into me.
“I love you,” she whispers into my chest, my neck. Her hands on my face. “Do you know that I love you? Devil or not, St. James or not, baby or not, I love you.”
I look down at her earnest face, her huge eyes, small hands holding onto me as if afraid to lose me.
“And I’d never hurt our baby. How can I hurt a piece of you?”
She smiles a small, sad smile. I try to process her words, a part of me wanting to see the lies. The liar. But I don’t. I see Isabelle. I see the Isabelle my own heart has been growing more and more tender for. And I want to believe her like I’ve never wanted to believe anything before.
“You know that though,” she says. “I know you do. You won’t lock me up in here. You won’t.”
I close my eyes. Force her face from my mind. Remember the pills. Remember my rage. But it’s getting harder and harder. I pull free of her and get to my feet, zipping my slacks, leaving her on the floor with her jeans tangled around her ankles.
“Jericho?”
Shit. I need to think. I take a step to the door. Stop. Turn back to her.
“Was it the same one?” I ask, not sure why I care.
“Same one?” She’s confused.
“The nightmare. Downstairs. Was it Gibson?”
She blinks, her expression changing, worry etching a fine line in the space between her eyebrows. She pulls her knees up, wraps her arms around them and shakes her head, shifting her gaze down.
“What was it then?”
It takes her a minute before she answers, and I can see whatever it was terrified her.
“Tell me,” I push.
She looks back up at me. “The grave. The place next to Nellie’s. It was dug up. It was ready for me.”
Fuck.
Jesus.
I push my hands into my hair. Squeeze my eyes shut.
Fuck!
“It’s just a dream, isn’t it?” she asks, voice small. “You’re not going to do that to me, are you?”
I look at her. I can’t help it. It’s a mistake though. I know how fucked I am when my chest tightens and I can’t breathe. When it takes all I have to turn away from her. To walk the hell out of that room. Because after all of it, all that’s happened, I can’t do that to her. Not even close. I’d kill anyone who tried. Because I love her, too. I fucking love her.
39
Isabelle
I see the empty space where he stood. Hear the lock turn on the door. I shudder, looking down at myself. My jeans and panties around my ankles, my inner thighs and between my legs wet with him.
My chest aches and even though my stomach growls with hunger, I don’t think I could eat right now.
I force myself to my feet, slip off the jeans and panties and walk into the bathroom. My gaze lands on the violin and I remind myself there’s hope in the fact that he left my violin. If he hated me, he’d have taken that from me. If he hated me, he’d have smashed it to bits and left the pieces for me to find.
I walk into the bathroom and close the door behind me, strip off the rest of my things and switch on the shower. I need to warm up. I’m cold from the inside. I step beneath the flow and stand there for an eternity.
My mind is working hard to process what just happened. I told him I love him and I’m painfully aware that he didn’t say the words back. That he looked lost. Confused. Not at all the devil I’ve come to love.
I move through the motions of washing my hair, my body. I look down at my stomach. It’s still flat. I lay both hands over it. I meant what I said. I would never hurt this baby. And the fact that it’s his, that it’s a piece of him, just makes me feel even more tenderness toward him or her. I think it’s going to be all right. It has to be. It will take time for him to trust me, and I understand that. I have to. But we will be all right. He and I. And we’ll be a family, all of us.
Strange that I can’t imagine a life without Jericho or Angelique in it. All I feel at the thought is emptiness.
