“No.”
Carmen and I answered in unison. We’d been listening to poems about mighty warlords killing things for an hour.
Velik chuckled, also odd. His satisfied smile somehow even more adorable than it had been yesterday. He was more and more perfect every day. He was becoming extremely difficult to resist.
“Then we will sing instead.” He returned to his back and forth communication with the infants in his arms. “What song do my girls want to hear?”
He left the kitchen to walk up and down the long halls. His voice rose, a deep baritone that many opera stars would kill for. His tone was smooth as silk. Deep. Sexy. Gentle. The way he looked, singing lullabies to my—our—babies? Sweet songs about love and protection and family?
More tears. They filled my eyes, burned like fire water.
Shit. I hadn’t been this much of an emotional wreck—not counting the whole You’re-not-my-mate-I’ve-never-seen-you-before thing—since right after I gave birth and the hormone swing, combined with exhaustion, threatened to ruin me. One day I’d cried for almost an hour because I couldn’t find a particular pair of shoes. Insanity.
Carmen sat down opposite me in one of our cream colored chairs and raised a brow. Velik had wandered to the far end of the hall, where he would make the turn and come back to the kitchen. Repeat.
“What are you doing?” Her whispered words sounded more like an accusation than a question.
“What are you talking about?” I whispered back.
“Him.” She swung her hand, half eaten sandwich and all, in Velik’s general direction. “What are you doing with him? Are you being deliberately cruel? Or are you really this stupid?”
Her words landed like a boot in my gut. Only a best friend, or a sister, could get away with saying something like that. Carmen wasn’t my blood sister, but she was as good as.
“I’m not being mean. I want the twins to know their father.”
“That won’t work. It’s all or nothing. I told you. All. Or. Nothing.”
“I don’t believe that.”
“You haven’t done your homework.”
I hissed. “Watching Bachelor Beast on T.V. is not doing my homework.”
“What about Henry?”
“What about him?” He was most likely sleeping over at his latest cover model girlfriend’s apartment until Velik was gone. “Did you text him?”
“Yes.” Carmen shrugged with an –uh, huh, you are so totally freaking delusional—look and shoved the rest of her sandwich into her mouth.
Good. If her mouth was full of turkey and lettuce, she couldn’t badger me.
Velik and the twins were getting closer, too close for me to have this argument with Carmen—again. A man could be a fine father without being in a relationship with their mother. I’d seen it play out with some of my friends from school whose parents had divorced. Carmen thought I should forgive him, have non-stop sex, and move to Atlan—where there were no jellyfish.
Part of me wanted to. A big part of me. But the other part of me, the part that had broken and cried at his betrayal, the part that had hoped and made the leap, had trusted him when I’d learned early in life not to trust people—especially men—just couldn’t jump off that cliff again. I hadn’t touched him since the orgasm festival that first day. He slept on the floor in front of my bedroom door. I offered him a spare room. The couch. Anything.
He refused. Which was endearing and aggravating at the same time. I told him he could sleep in the babies’ room. He refused again, stating that would leave me unprotected. Me.
I didn’t want him focused on me. I had agreed to let him stay here for a couple weeks, but not for myself. Since the fiasco in my bedroom, where I’d lost control and had sex with him—again—I had very carefully and deliberately avoided any kind of serious discussion. I loved him. I wasn’t such an idiot that I would lie to myself with him right here in front of me. I loved him, but I didn’t trust him not to vanish on me. Walk away. He claimed I was his mate, that we would be together forever.
I’d heard that line before. Less than two days later he’d walked up to me in front of multiple people, looked me in the eye, and claimed he didn’t have any idea who I was.
His goddamn sperm had probably been working its way into my fertile little egg at the very moment he denied he knew me at all.
Some things were hard to forgive. After he’d refused to accept my comm call out in space? Nail in the forgiveness coffin. He’d hurt me so badly, I’d felt dead inside by the time I had stopped crying. Actually dead. Cold. Numb.
I never wanted to feel that kind of pain again.
Carmen hopped to her feet with a bit too much energy. I scowled at her. She grinned, mouthed the words ‘Talk to him’ and called out for Velik to bring the twins to her.
