A Shameful Consequence(46)

‘How could she?’ Nico asked. ‘How could she just give up her baby?’

‘I’m sure she had her reasons.’ Connie could feel her heart hammering in her chest. ‘I don’t think you should judge her without …’ Unseen, she closed her eyes at the thought of all that was to come, of the pain she must soon inflict, and her voice wasn’t quite as assured when next it came. ‘Without knowing.’

She would tell him in the morning, before Despina brought Leo back. She would give him the starting point from where to look, and maybe he wouldn’t blame her, Connie tried to reassure herself. Maybe he might forgive her for not telling him sooner.

But even safe in his arms, it was hard to rest on a bed of so many maybes.





CHAPTER FIFTEEN

HE FORCED his eyes open before he jumped, his heart racing, unlike the slow dawn.

How he hated to dream, hated the fear that claimed him while unguarded. His dreams were now of babies, who were walking and talking, dreams of a hundred babies that looked like him.

He should let her sleep, Nico told himself. It was, after all, her first full night away from Leo, her first chance to sleep as long as her body dictated, though his body dictated otherwise. Nico did not like sex in the morning—it was too intimate for him, brought the reckless night into another day, made her think this closeness might continue.

This would.

Again he let himself glimpse the possibility—a future with Constantine as his wife and Leo his son, with a home and a garden of memories. His hands roamed her body and he could feel her soft and warm. What had made him think he might lose them? What, with her here, could possibly go wrong?

She lay there, feeling him awaken beside her.

Felt his hands softly probe her and she could not lie for her family, could not live with deceit for a second longer.

He was nudging behind her, his lips on the back of her neck, and she wanted him inside her, but she wanted to make love with the truth uniting them, not the terrible guilt of the lie she hadn’t told.

‘Nico …’ She wriggled away from him. ‘Can I tell you something?’

‘Tell me here,’ Nico said, pulling her towards him, but she rolled on her back.

‘Nico, please … it’s important.’

It was important.

He wanted to hear that Leo was his son; he wanted to know that she loved him.

Wanted to be inside her when she told him about the family they were.

‘Tell me.’ He rolled on top of her, he kissed her face, he welcomed the news, for he had been wrong. You did not lose, love did not leave. She felt his thigh part her legs, felt the claim of his kiss, and she turned her face away.

‘Nico, please …’ He slipped inside as if he belonged there. Her body was ready for him but her mind was not, for she had to tell him. ‘I know who arranged your adoption.’

She waited for him to stop, for him to die inside her, for him to haul himself off, but there was just a pause, not even a second, an energy that changed.

He looked down at the woman who would have made him a father, who he would have loved for the rest of his life, and she held the answers he had been seeking, just not the ones for which he had hoped.

She knew it was over even as he thrust inside her, she knew from this they could not survive—that he would never hold her again, that she would never feel him again—and she wanted this time, shared in his anger, for she, too, lost.

He pinned her with his body, and she wanted the weight because she wanted to feel him. She wanted the power and the energy and anger of this man, and the anaesthetic of being conjoined.

She tightened around him and tried to halt her own orgasm, tried to calm the flare, tried for it not to be over, for then she would have to face him.

But Nico wanted otherwise.

He wanted it over, he wanted release; he felt her body tame when he wanted it wild, and he worked faster for it, harder for it, till her body could hold back no more and she cried as he pulsed inside her, because she knew now she must face him.

‘You know?’

He looked down at her. He was still inside her and there was no escape from his eyes.

‘How long?’ He did not ask about his past, his questions were solely as to her part in this. ‘How long have known?’

‘I found out last year.’ She wanted to be back in his arms, but he rolled from her, breathless, ominously calm. He sat up in the bed, shot out an incredulous, mirthless laugh and then his face turned to hers and she saw him look now at the witch who had deceived him, for the love had gone from his eyes.