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I squeeze his hand. My heart is thumping fast again. If we didn’t have to sneak around, would we ever be able to keep our hands off each other? “I think a woman should still be tough. What if her man’s not around, and she needs to protect the kids?”
He presses against my hand warmly. Sometimes, it’s like a ball of fire is expanding inside him. He becomes so hot. So focused. “You’re right. That’s how a good mother thinks.”
I lick my lips, moving my finger over his knuckles. I know he wants to do it as badly as I do. I know he wants to grab, spank, and get obsessed with me. “I hope I’ll be one.”
“So you want kids, too?”
“Yes,” I say passionately. “I never…”thought much about it before you.I still don’t know if he’s talking about having kids withme. Even if our steam comes as naturally as a married couple and burns hotter each time, it doesn’t mean he wants to make me pregnant.
What if I said it?Make me pregnant, Jamie. Then he dropped my hand, stood, and turned. He’d smile at me indulgently, an older man with his silly, confused young girlfriend.“I didn’t mean it like that…”
“Never what?” he says, leaning down, staring right into my eyes like he’s going to kiss me.
“I was never sure,” I murmur, “but lately, I’ve been thinking about it. I’d want to give them the best life, Jamie. Not like you had. Not like…”
“It’s okay,” he says, more emotion in his voice than I can remember. We’re so close to kissing. His warm breath moves all over me. “You can still love your mom and admit you didn’t have it easy.”
I let out a croak. He’s taking me on an emotional rollercoaster—first the lust, now this. “It’s not the same. Your mom, your dad… Jamie, I’m so, so sorry. It’s evil. Nobody should have to go through that.”
“Your father was taken from you. A random act of… I don’t know what.” He sighs darkly. “A plane crash… It’s not fair.”
“Let’s not make it a competition,” I say. “Let’s say we both had it crappy. Let’s say when we’re parents, we’ll both be better.”
Suddenly, he stands. It’s an almost violent way of standing. His chair screeches across the porch. He walks to the railing and squeezes it like he’s going to break it. Demon looks up at him like something’s wrong. “Is that what you want? Forusto have kids? Together?”
My head is swimming. He’s gaslighting me. Or is he? Surely that’s whathemeant? But now he’s acting like it’s the craziest thing ever. Which, okay, maybe it is. Perhaps it’s something I shouldn’t even think, let alone say, but he wasbasicallysaying it too.
“N-no,” I reply, panicking. “I was talking about the future. Whatever. When you find a wife. When I find a husband. I don’t know. I need to… check on Mom.”
“Your mother’s fine.”
But I’m not listening. I walk into the cabin and down the hallway. I need to find the truth from Mom. I have to know why she got so awkward earlier. I have to hear her admit she’s lying. It’s a vicious thing to do. She was only rescued yesterday. She probably still has some of that man’s blood in her hair.
I knock on the door and wait. “Mom?”
No answer. No big deal. She’s exhausted. I probably shouldn’t even be waking her up. I should let her sleep and recover, but now my heart is pounding for a different reason. It has nothing to do with steaminess. I knock on the door again and again.
“Mom?” My voice is getting louder now. I look down the hallway at Jamie. He marches toward me. “She’s not answering.”
“Simone?” he yells, far louder than me. “Simone, are you in there?” He grabs the door and pushes it. It’s locked. He rams his shoulder against it. Demon barks when the lock explodes from the wood.
The door swings open. The room is empty. The window is open. Mom’s gone.
CHAPTERTWENTY
Jamie
I rush over to the window, searching the trees. Whoever did this worked cleanly. There are no footprints on the ground or signs of a vehicle. They’d picked the lock on the window, opened it quietly, and slinked in. Then perhaps they injected Simone to stop her from screaming.
Lena walks right up to me, grabs my shirt, and pulls me close to her. “You have to find her. You have to! I don’t know what to do. I wish there were something I coulddo.” She shoves me, but it’s more like she doesn’t know what to do with her hands. “Do you think she saw us… without us knowing? Then she left?”
“I’m not sure,” I say. “I was distracted.”
She glares at me. Then, her gaze focuses on the bedside table. She walks to it quickly, brushing past me. The darkness in me pulses up and roars at me to grab her, pull her close, and kiss her again. Forget it. “What’s this?Sorry, kid, but I had to—”
I snatch the note from her, reading it quickly. The handwriting is messy and jagged.Sorry, kid, but I had to take the old lady. I don’t want to kill anybody except for you. You know why. You’re not better than me. You never were.
I stumble back and almost fall against the wall, gritting my teeth and shaking my head. Lena gently takes the note from me. “Jack, from the photos? He wants to kill you?”
