Reed swallows again, his hand moving over my abdomen.
“No one is coming here, Roman, okay? We’re safe.”
He presses his fingers in my belly for a second, staring into my eyes. And slowly his wolf eyes lose the panicked look. Slowly, his eyes fill with determination.
With a different kind of ferocity.
A mix of possession and protectiveness.
Before he does something that he’s only ever done once before.
Two years ago.
In his driveway when he took me out for my first Mustang ride at night. When Iaskedhim to take me on a ride. A good girl asking a gorgeous villain to take her away.
Turns out though, I’m not that much of a good girl and he’s not all villainous.
Right in front of my eyes, Reed comes down on his knees.
His knees hit the ground, his bones crunching the leaves into the earth, and the sound of it echoes in my body.
In my heart.
Then he presses his open mouth on my swollen belly, the belly he gave me and where his baby is sleeping now that he’s here. He presses his lips onto it and, closing his eyes, he simply breathes.
Slowly and methodically, as if calming himself.
As if breathing like this, gulping air with his open mouth on my pregnant belly, is the only way he’ll live.
And I let him do that.
I let him do whatever he wants, whatever he needs to relax. I rake my fingers through his thick, dark hair. I rub his back, his shoulders. I caress his jaw. I let him be.
I love him with my fingers as he gets his breath back.
My gorgeous villain.
A few moments later, he lifts his head, his eyes burning. “You know I’ll do anything to protect you, don’t you? To protect her.”
I nod my head. “I know. I already know that.”
“I’ll turn this world upside down, Fae. I’ll destroy anything,anyone, I don’t care. I don’t fucking care.”
I put my forehead against his, smiling slightly. “I know you will. But you don’t have to. Because we’re safe.”
Something emerges in his gaze again, that panic that I saw, but it’s not as dominant now that he’s touching me and our baby. Now that he’s studying my face from this close, his body so tall that he’s right there, up to my eye level.
“I made you dance for me,” he says in a low voice. “Here, for the first time.”
My heart flutters. “You did.”
“And you called me a villain.”
I caress his face again. “That’s because you were acting like one.”
“I was, yeah.”
“And the song you chose was offensive.”
