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“Never? Not once?”
“I saw her.” I lean across to the bedside table and snag the bottle of wine I brought up with our meals. “The day she gave birth to Cato.”
“You did?” She sits forward on the bed as her cheeks warm. “You spoke to her?”
“No.” I grab wineglasses next and set them on the mattress. “I listened to her scream while she birthed a baby too big for her small body. Jesus,” I begin pouring, shaking my head when I think back on that poor girl’s suffering.
“She can’t have been much older than I was. I don’t even know if she was legal yet. She was so small.” I finish filling one glass and pass it across to the woman who watches me with eagle eyes. Then I take up the next. “Once Cato was out, he was handed to me, with her blood and shit still on his skin. I was essentially given responsibility of a minutes-old infant, and threatened that if I fucked it up, I’d be executed.”
“And the mother?” she rasps, cradling her glass of wine close. I don’t even know if she should drink after last night.Probably not.“What happened to her?”
“She was murdered.” Bitter, I set the bottle back on the bedside table, the base slamming against hardwood and sending its contents sloshing. But I don’t see the movement. Instead, I see that day. I see what happened next.
“I was dating a girl back then,” I say with gravel in my throat. “She was the first and only one—besides you—that I was ever serious about. The day Tim the Second killed Cato’s mom, he took that girl for his own and raped her. He stole her innocence and taught us all not to love anyone.Or else.”
“He raped your girlfriend? A child?” She pushes off the mattress, her toes touching the floor, and the hem of my shirt dropping to cover her thighs.
I hurriedly place my wineglass on the bedside table and shove up to catch her if she falls. But she’s smart enough to hold the bedpost with her free hand. To keep herself from pitching to the side.
“Did he kill her, too?” she demands. “Did she get pregnant?”
“No.” I take her wine, set it down beside mine, and grab her arms. Because fuck, even if she’s steady and doesn’t need my support, I still like to touch. I want her to lean on me. To need me. Towantme.
“That girl from all those years ago…” I bring Christabelle around to face me, her silver stare drilling into mine. “That girl is Savannah Towers. Editor-in-chief atBeguile Magazine, and the author of the article that broke news of our engagement.”
Her eyes widen in shock, so I bring her back to the bed and guide her down to sit.
“She’s alive and well. If not a little hostile at the world.”
14
CHRISTABELLE
THE TRUTH ALWAYS COMES OUT. THAT’S THE PROBLEM.
“Ineed to leave.”
The next day, when my head swims a little less and my legs feel a little stronger, I prick my finger the way I’ve been accustomed to since I was five years old, and squeezing a bead of blood from the tip, I slide it onto the reader and wait for my results to populate the screen of my glucometer.
“It’s been days, Felix. I have a life to get back to.”
“Is that so?” He’s too casual. Too relaxed. Too infuriatingly effortlessly charming, even when he pisses me off.
He steps out of his closet in black pants, a white shirt, and fighting a tie I’m not entirely sure he knows how to knot. “I think you misunderstand the intent behind abducting someone, Darling. I took you.” He stalks closer as my glucometer beeps, leans over me to read my sugars, then grabs my hand and sucks the ball of blood from the end. “Abduction is literally the unlawful removal of someone… without their consent.” He smiles around my finger, his eyes glittering with humor as mine turn to fury. “Are we to pretend the last few days were a friendly slumber party?”
“We can.” I snatch my hand from his with a grunt and turn to a side table, taking the small vial of insulin and a fresh needle—supplies Felixsomehow procured and has kept refrigerated for me since yesterday—and prepare my morning dose. “If you let me leave, I won’t press charges. You can go about your life. I’ll go about mine.”
“Can’t.” He crouches as I lower my filled needle and slide the sharp end into my thigh, watching me work like it’s the most fascinating thing he’s ever seen. “I’d miss you too much.” The second I finish and remove the needle, he shoots forward and glides his tongue across the puncture wound, like he thinks his saliva seals it again. “But you can stay here and do that research I asked for.”
“Stop licking me!” I shove him away and briefly consider sticking my used needle into the side of his head. But of course, I don’t. I merely step around his broad form and…And what? I have nowhere to go. No clothes to change into.“Let me leave, Felix! Jesus.”
“Stay with me.” He pushes up to stand and wanders closer, fisting his hand around mine and prying my fingers open to relieve me of the needle I’ve yet to set down. “Stay forever. I might learn to like you.”
“Asshole.” I slam my free hand into his stomach and dart away before he can reach out and yank me back. “I have zero interest in becoming the next murdered Malone bed-buddy.”
His eyes darken in response, his jaw clenching as he looks me up and down. “You’ve slept in my bed, CeCe. You lived.”
“I almost died in your bed already. The moment we fuck, I’ve practically given you permission to end my life.”
