Total pages in book: 139
Estimated words: 135958 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 680(@200wpm)___ 544(@250wpm)___ 453(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135958 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 680(@200wpm)___ 544(@250wpm)___ 453(@300wpm)
I started up the sidewalk, and someone shoved me in the shoulder.
“Hey!” came Jonah’s voice.
The guy cursed next to me, “Watch it!”
A second shove.
I cried out.
I lost my footing. The world was tipping upside down.
I tripped, trying to catch myself. I went farther than I’d wanted. I felt the brush of a car behind me, a parked car. I reached out for it, trying to steady myself.
My insides were on alert. Red. I was going nuts. I had to get a handle on this, or my worst nightmare would come true.
Gritting my teeth from the sheer force, I righted myself against my own dizziness. I clung to that car and waited for everything to settle around me. And then, still holding on, knowing I wasn’t out of danger, but perilously close to it, I felt one last shove against me.
“Fuck! Sorry! Hey—He—”
A horn sounded.
I fell back, my hand flailing in the air, reaching for a stronghold, and then…
Pain.
CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE
I woke to a light beeping sound, my mouth parched, and a splitting headache.
“Ow.” Lifting my head, I winced. Pain shot through me, and I almost doubled over. That hurt worse.
“Don’t move.”
No...
I kept my eyes closed, but I knew he was there. I’d felt him even before he spoke. I didn’t want him here. If he was here, it wasn’t good. There was only one thing that would bring him to my bedside.
God, no.
Please. Please.
I prayed silently, but then Kai spoke. “The baby’s gone.”
I didn’t want to hear those words. My hands moved to my stomach. There’d been the slightest bump starting. It felt flat again.
“No,” I choked out, curling in on myself. “No, no, no.”
“Riley—” The bed dipped under his weight, and I whirled around.
“NO!” I shoved him. “Get out! Get away from me.”
“Riley.”
I turned away again. I didn’t want to see his pain. I didn’t want to see that he’d lost weight, how haggard he looked. Gaunt. I didn’t want to see his obvious suffering, because no matter what, none of it mattered. He’d torn out my insides, unknowingly leaving behind a part of him. And now that small blessing was gone.
“No.” I started to sob, hugging my pillow. “No.”
He sighed from behind me, his voice cracking. “Riley.”
“Go away!”
“No!”
The bed shifted even more. The sheet lifted, and I felt his hand on my back. He just placed it there a moment, his fingers trembling, and then he began to smooth it up and down. He grew more confident when I didn’t yell or shrink away.
“I can’t. I can’t—not anymore. Not after this.” He sounded so broken.
A tear leaked from my eye, and I hugged that pillow even tighter.
“By the time Jonah called and told me what happened, I was already coming. You have to know that. God. Do you even want to hear all of this?”
His hand paused, but began to move again after a moment. It glided up and down from my neck to my hip. Over and over.
“I thought I could keep you. I was too selfish to give you up, but watching you through my meeting with the council, then knowing how you were going to deal with your father, I got a glimpse into the future. I saw myself. I saw my mother. I saw you being stuck in this world. Me. Tanner. Brooke. Jonah. We were born into this world. We can’t get out, even if we wanted to, but the level of ugliness this world thrives on, I don’t want that for you.”
I didn’t want to hear this, but I couldn’t move away. I was trying. I wanted to tell him to save it all, stow it, and I wanted to call for a nurse to make him leave.
But I did none of that.
I listened.
“It took me four days to let you go. I thought about it over and over. Every time I thought I could walk away from you, I’d end up reaching for you again, and then that last day—God.” He expelled a ragged sound. His hand pressed harder against me, shaking. “You have to know I ripped my own heart out when I said those words. And they were lies. I just needed you to go, be free of this life as much as you could.”
A sob caught in his voice. “I don’t deserve you, Riley. The reasons you fought against me were the reasons I had to let you go. I had to. You might not think you deserve a normal life, but you do. You deserve that and more. You deserve the goddamn moon and stars and all the cheesy lines in the world, because it’s true. You are my goodness. My redemption. My lifeline. Jesus, you woke something good in me that I never knew was there, and I realized every time I held you that I was destroying you. Little by little. The more goodness you gave to me, the more darkness I gave back. I was changing you. I have changed you, and now this.”