AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I don’t know how they expect me to function like this,” he mutters when Kane and Phoenix go find something to do other than listen to his complaints.
They have a mountain of work to finish up since the boys missed getting the trace on Leo. I can tell Phoenix has a few ideas, all of which will probably be successful if he’s not being thwarted by his secret hacker or whatever, but I know neither of them is feeling particularly optimistic. And James isn’t helping.
“Isn’t it just a flesh wound?” I ask, looking up at him. I’ve got my head on his chest, and his stump is resting against my hair. I can feel the muscles flexing as he gently rubs my crown, and it makes me feel warm inside.
“Which is why I should be up and about and not stuck in a fucking sling.” He flops his head back, looking like a dramatic adolescent. “I need to learn to eat with my toes.”
I laugh, but I know there’s a measure of sincerity in his words. God forbid anything happens to his arm—that’s the life he’d be living, and these boys are nothing if not overprepared for anything to happen.
“I can feed you if you want,” I offer.
He looks down at me and sighs. “Can you look at food without vomiting all over my lap? Because I love you, darling girl, but I do have limits.”
I grimace, not sure how to answer him. I thought this pregnancy was going to be a fucking breeze. I thought morning sickness was supposed to come in the mornings and not all goddamn day and night. I thought James loved me enough that his child would go easy on me.
Wrong on all counts.
My latest health check told everyone that I’m anemic, slightly underweight, dehydrated from all the throwing up, and my blood sugar isn’t where it should be. Or something. It was all kind of a hot mess of words that I didn’t quite process because this whole experience is defying my expectations in all the wrong ways.
And I’m still horny as shit, but being jostled around makes it hard to enjoy anything.
“Alice?”
I blink and realize I zoned out. “Sorry.”
“I’m worried about you, love,” he says. He goes to reach for me and hisses, drawing his arm back against his chest.
I slap his thigh. “That’s what the sling is for. Just be a good boy, okay?”
His eyes darken just slightly, and it reminds me of what a praise kink he has. He shifts a little closer to me and uses his stump to urge my head back. In spite of the pain I know he’s in, he leans in to kiss me, and I let it linger, soft and honey slow and everything I need in the moment.
“I think you should sleep,” he says when he pulls away.
I scowl, even though he’s right. The stress of him coming home injured made everything feel that much worse. It’s almost like a sense of impotency because there’s nothing I can do to make any of this better. I could probably get Leo to talk to me if he doesn’t already know I’ve made my choice, but I have no real way to reach him.
I’m on his timeline, and that pisses me off.
With a disgruntled sigh, I shift further down on the bed until I can lay my cheek on his thigh, and I curl one arm around the crook of his knee.
“I wish I could hold you, darling girl,” he says. “But my fucking arm…”
“This is enough,” I tell him, and I mean that. I don’t think these men quite understand how serious I am when I tell them this is the most anyone has ever loved me. I mean, I know my mother did, and I know my baby sister did in her sweet, innocent way. But it wasn’t like this. My mother could never fully be a parent to us, and the more I learn about my family, the more I start to wonder about her.
Was she playing some long game to unseat my father? Or was she just a fool who fell for the wrong man?
If I could talk to my biological father, I would, but that’s not possible, and I don’t know that Leo has any real answers. Plus, he warned me about him—about what a cruel bastard he was to him and his brother growing up. There’s no chance in hell he’d have been a better parent to me than Guido was.
And I can’t imagine my mother falling for a monster like that when she already had one at home.
“What are you thinking about, love?” James asks.
“How I can help,” I tell him. I’m not ready to admit I’m thinking about my family just yet. Wanting to know why I wasconceived feels almost like a weakness, and it’s too tender to say that aloud. “I want to try to get ahold of Leo.”
“Kane will cut his own tongue out before letting you near that—”
“Kane will understand reason,” I interrupt, turning so I can look up at him. His eyes are dark, glittering, furious. “Leo isn’t going to hurt me.”
“Leo is a man I understand a little too well,” James says. He looks every bit like some vengeful pirate with his curls coming loose from his bun and the scars on his face and the missing arm. I can see him wearing frills and velvet and ripping someone’s guts out with a platinum hook. “Leo is a man who will do anything for the people he loves.”
