AllFreeNovel
Share Us
My heart is beating so frantically I can almost hear it as I prepare to reveal to him something that may well finish the job and destroy him for ever.
“I can’t leave.”
“I don’t understand.”
My voice shakes as I whisper, “I want to leave with you so badly, Jonny. Trust me, I never meant to run. You were everything to me, but I had no choice.”
“What do you mean, you had no choice? Of course you did. I would have cared for you, darlin’, you know I would.”
The tears spill down my face and I note the suspicion in his eyes as I prepare to deliver a life-changing moment.
“I have always known I’m safe with you, but it wasn’t about me anymore.”
“I don’t understand?”
He appears genuinely confused and so, with a deep breath, I hold on to both his hands and say gently, “I ran because it wasn’t just me.” My voice breaks as I whisper, “We have a daughter, Jonny, and that is why I can’t leave with you.”
It’s as if I’ve physically slapped him and he stares into my eyes with an expression of shock that tells me everything. I make to pull away and he grips me hard and says in a voice laced with pain, “I have a daughter.”
“We do.” I nod, my heart cracking under the pressure.
“Where is she?” He says with an urgency in his voice that makes me crumble and the tears flow down my face as I sob, “I don’t know.”
“Then tell me what youdoknow.” He says angrily and my voice rises as I say fearfully, “They took her when I was at the reverend’s wife’s funeral. I came home, and they told me I was going to become the reverend’s wife number five and Hope was already with him.”
“Hope.” Jonny’s eyes are wide, and I nod, feeling like the biggest bitch that ever existed.
“I called her Hope because that is what she meant to me.”
“So, she’s here. In this house.” Jonny says, making to leave and I say quickly, “No. That is why I can’t leave, because my only chance of ever seeing her again is by marrying that bastard. He told me I won’t see her again until he has dragged the devil from inside me and he will raise her in the ways of Heaven. I’m scared, Jonny. He has my – our baby and I’m going out of mind.”
For a second, he stands staring at me in shock as if he can’t understand what I’m telling him and I say with a sob, “I’m so sorry, Jonny. I really am.”
“Sorry!”
He shakes his head. “Sorry doesn’t cut it, darlin’. You ran away from me knowing you were carrying my baby and you didn’t think I’d be interested. You didn’t trust me, Faith, and I’m finding it very hard to deal with that.”
He looks so wounded I want to run to him and make everything better, but I know I can’t. I doubt it will ever be better again and that’s because of me, because of what I’ve done. I’ve wounded him so deeply he’s struggling on life support right now and so I inject some steel into my voice and say quickly, “They can’t find you here. You must lock me back in and let me do everything I can to get our baby back.”
Jonny appears to shake himself and I watch the grim determination of a bastard settle over his face like a shield and for some reason, it freezes my blood. Now I see why he deserves his name because the man standing in the doorway deserves every syllable of it. They call him a sinner, well that makes two of us and for some reason his brutality gives me strength as he says in icy rage, “I’m going to get our baby back. Trust me, darlin’, that bastard is a dead man walking.”
“How?”
I’m both fearful and hopeful at the same time and he hisses, “Trust me, Faith. For once in your fucking life, trust me to do the right thing.”
He stares at me with a hard expression. “As much as it kills me inside, you’re right. You must stay here until I have our baby. Then I’m coming for you and this time you willnotwalk away from me. We will talk and figure things out and there will be no running this time. We will walk proudly away as a family and never step foot in this fucking pit again.”
“Where will we go, Jonny?” I’m almost afraid to ask because the thought of life outside Heaven is scaring the pants off me.
“Hell, baby. I’m taking you to Hell and you will love every fucking second of it.”
He turns to go, and I battle the pain knowing he is leaving because above everything I love this man so hard it physically hurts. Then he turns and in two strides pulls me roughly into his arms and kisses me so fiercely the spark between us explodes as it always did. Desire consumes me as we kiss like starving lovers and my body comes alive at the merest touch. Jonny equals passion and you don’t get one without the other and as he pulls away, he stares deeply into my eyes and says huskily, “Trust me, Faith. That’s all I ask.”
He tears away from me and slams the door behind him, the sound of the lock jangling as he somehow locks me in again.
My tears fall like rapids as I hear his heavy boots walking away down the oppressive hallway and my body still burns from his touch.
My parents called him The Devil. Satan’s soldier and now I know why. The image on his back as he walked away made my soul cower in fear. The Grim Reaper stared back at me with a grin and a promise, and it’s obvious that when he left Heaven, Jonny walked straight into Hell.
