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When we stepped out into the sunlight, he headed to his truck, not letting go of my hand. My SUV was in the other direction. I started to say something, but his body language made me stay silent.
Once we were at his truck, he opened the passenger door, and then, without an explanation, he picked me up and sat me in the seat before closing the door and walking over to the driver’s side. I took a deep breath, trying to calm my nerves. I shouldn’t let him get to me like this. It wasn’t like he was going to hurt me. The man had never hurt me. He wouldn’t even let me go do small errands alone, for fear someone else would hurt me.
Blaise opened his door and climbed in, not looking at me as he started the engine. I didn’t want to continue this entire ride in silence.
“Are you going to tell me why I’m in your truck and not driving my own home?” I asked him.
He glanced at me then, and his eyes dropped to my stomach, then lifted to meet my gaze. “Are you going to tell me what you really bought at the pharmacy today?” he replied.
Shit. He knew. How did he know? Did they have cameras there he could get ahold of too?
My hands fisted in my lap, and I looked away from him.
“It wasn’t motherfucking aspirin,” he told me.
“No, it wasn’t. But you already know, don’t you, Blaise? So, why ask me?” I said angrily.
This was not how I’d wanted to tell him. I’d needed time to deal with it myself. But he had eyes everywhere. It was as frustrating as it was infuriating.
He pulled over just as we drove out of the entrance and put the truck in park.
“Why wouldn’t you tell me the truth, Madeline?” he asked me.
I felt his eyes on me as I sat there, staring down at my fisted hands.
“I was scared. I am scared,” I admitted.
“Look at me,” he ordered.
I lifted my head and turned my gaze to him.
“Scared of me?” he asked.
I shook my head. “No. Scared of the reality. What it would mean,” I choked out, feeling emotion clogging my throat.
“You’re mine,” he said.
“For now,” I whispered.
He narrowed his gaze. “What the fuck does that mean?”
The lump in my throat was making it hard to swallow. I had to force it down. I didn’t want to cry. Not now.
“What happens when you don’t want me anymore? What happens when it’s not just me and there is … there’s a baby? Then, we can’t have sex anywhere and anytime we want. We will have diapers to change and a baby who needs attention. I will be a mother. I won’t be so easily accessible, and I’ll have someone else who needs me.”
“Fuck!” Blaise growled out, then swung open his door and got out.
I blinked back the tears, feeling as if I might shatter into a million pieces. Taking several deep breaths, I watched as he walked around the front of the truck until he was jerking my door open.
“What—” I started to ask him, but he was picking me up and getting me out before I could finish my question.
Blaise put my feet on the ground in front of him, then let go of my waist to cup my face instead. “I’m going to make something real fucking clear, Madeline. I thought I already had, but I guess it wasn’t clear enough,” he said as he looked down at me. “I’d never loved anyone. It wasn’t something I was raised to do. I didn’t need love. I thought it made a man weak. But I fell in love with YOU.
“Before I spoke to you and held you the first time, I would have taken a motherfucking bullet for you. Standing back and watching you be strong, brave, and so innocent in the midst of the shit life you had been handed was so damn hard. But you survived. I respected that. You were loyal. I wanted that. You loved without question. I fucking needed that. My need to keep you safe pushed me to keep you from me. I tried to protect you from this life. From danger. From all your mother had fled from. But I couldn’t. Because I needed you more than I needed my next breath. So, baby, when I say that you’re mine, that isn’t just your hot little pussy. That’s all of you. Because I want it all. Not for now. Forever.”
The tears I had fought so hard not to shed were running freely when he finished. Why he had chosen me I didn’t understand, but then I realized he saw me differently than I saw myself. I wanted to see me the way he did. Maybe then I wouldn’t be so insecure.
