I turn my face into her damp cheek. Find her soft lips.
“I insist on it.”
She lifts her head and peers into my eyes. Searching. Perhaps she thinks I’m lying. I should be offended. I have never lied to her. But I’m too enthralled by the thick, damp spikes of her lashes. The puffy state of her lips. The way her nose looks so endearing in that shade of pink.
“I think there’s something wrong with the baby.”
The second the words tumble off her tongue, she bites her lip as if she can stop it. Like she can suck them back in.
“Why?” I ask her instead, genuinely curious.
Her teeth nibble on the fold of skin before she answers, “It’s growing too fast.” She falls quiet as I move her to the altar and gingerly place her down on it. “I’ve never been pregnant and I don’t know everything, but…” She touches the beautiful curve. “This is too soon.”
Careful not to hurt her, I lift her gown up her thighs and over the bump.
It’s been eons since I’ve seen a woman with child, and never like this. Never so close. They would come to me, bellies already swollen, to ask for a healthy birth.
But they hadn’t fascinated me the way Lenora’s body does. The sight of it so taut and full, her soft skin lined with fine, pink marks, does something primal and feral to my senses. It’s not a sharp spear like before, but an odd balloon of warmth. A possessive need that clamps around something like a bear trap.
“How are you so perfect?” I breathe without thinking.
Lenora shifts, cheeks an endearing pink. “I’m as big as a house.”
With a gentleness I can’t recall ever showing anything, I brush her belly. Feel the life flexing within her, and my throat tightens without cause.
“There is nothing wrong with it.”
I feel rather than see her relax. Some of the fear in her eyes fades to a softness made even more devastating by the candles reflecting off their dark surface.
“Thank you.”
Gratitude is such a foreign concept.
I’ve been given offerings as gratitude, as an exchange for something they wanted. No one has simply thanked me fordoing nothing. Or for something as simple as stating the truth. I don’t know what to say.
So, I kiss her.
I capture her puffy lips and taste her gratefulness for myself. I savor her sweet breaths and the gentle scent of her. I shut my eyes and sink into the feel of her arms closing around my shoulders and the fingers she slips through my hair.
Holding me back.
Kissing me back.
I snarl deep in my throat and slip even deeper into this hold she has on me. I gather her close, pull her off the table and into my arms. Never once releasing her mouth. I take her to the stairs and perch at the top with her cradled in my lap. One hand stays splayed across her back. The other rests tenderly along the side of her belly. Over the child that belongs to us both.
The child and mother I would kill for.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Marcus
Wearenotready.
I’m not ready. I don’t know how to be. Even while I put on a brave face for Lenora, deep down, I know I have already failed in this once. I had been a terrible father, an even worse husband. Catherine and the boys deserved far better than I gave them and now, I’m expected to do better.
A second chance, some might call it. But why do I deserve such a thing? What had I done to be given such a gift? Nothing. I still have no idea what is required of me, what I need to do to make this easier for Lenora, because what I’ve done so far has been mediocre. Several fumbling attempts that resulted in nothing.
Even while I want to do better, be better, I’m crippled with the knowledge that I don’t know how. All I can do is hover around her and offer her my hand when she needs to sit or stand or climb the stairs. Useless things that aren’t enough.
