Fairytale Come Alive (Ghosts and Reincarnation #4)(111)

“So, who are you?” Prentice asked, his voice now edging towards impatience.

Bella heard it and decided not to respond.

Fiona watched as his hand fisted in her hair. “You’re telling me that all this is a game?”

Bella’s body jerked yet again and her face went pale.

“A game?” she whispered.

“Aye, a game,” Prentice clipped. “You’re saying you dropped everything in order to come to Sally… that was a game.”

“No!” Bella replied sharply.

“The laundry, the ironing, making the beds, hoovering the floors, baking the cookies, that wasn’t you? That was what your father said you were doing? That was you playing house?”

It was a low blow and Bella flinched like she’d been physically struck.

Fiona wished she could kick Prentice.

Where was he going with this?

“Of course not,” Bella whispered.

Prentice was relentless. “It wasn’t you that played darts with Annie, Dougal and me? It wasn’t you who asked Gordon over for hamburgers?”

Bella shook her head.

Prentice kept after her.

“It isn’t you who’s teaching Jace how to play guitar? It isn’t you who stares into my eyes like you do, like you’re lost in what you see and you don’t want to be found. And it isn’t you who wraps your hand around my c**k like you never want to let it go and moans in my mouth when my tongue slides into yours?”

Okay, Fiona thought, overshare.

Bella’s face was confused and her reply was hesitant, “Yes, um… well, that all is me but –”

“So, tell me, Elle, if that’s all you then how the f**k am I confused?”

Bella didn’t have an answer for that, evidently, because she didn’t speak.

She just stared at him.

He let her go but didn’t move away. His hands slid down her forearms and caught her wrists. Bringing them up between them, his thumbs slid into her fists, pushing back her fingers. Then he stroked her palms.

Bella closed her eyes.

Prentice spoke and his tone was now gentle. “I’m not confused, baby, you are.”

Bella opened her eyes.

“I’m not that girl you knew,” she whispered.

God, Fiona thought, Bella’s stubborn.

“You are,” Prentice, Fiona knew, could be stubborn too.

“I’m not.”

“Baby, you are, then and now. But, now, with time and maturity, you’re even better.”

Her eyes filled with tears and Fiona worried her lip. She watched as Bella curled open her fingers and lifted her hands, showing him her palms.

“This is me, Prentice,” she said, her voice harsh. “This is who I am. This is who you’d have in your house. This is who I’ve always been, weak, trapped, useless. I saved you when I left you years ago. Don’t you understand? That girl didn’t exist, you made her. She was only alive for you. This,” she jerked her hands still in his wrists, “is who I am.”

“You can’t believe that.”

“I know it.”

They stared at each other.

Fiona hovered anxiously.

Then Prentice broke through.

His eyes went soft and he lifted one of her hands to his mouth. Touching her palm to his lips, Bella (and Fiona) watched him kiss the scars tenderly. He repeated this gesture with her other hand.

Then he dropped it and placed it against his stomach, holding her hand flat over it with his.

“Then it’s good you’re with me so she can be alive again because I’m in love with her. I always have been,” he whispered. “And it’s good you’re with me so I can feel alive again.” He pressed her hand into his gut and his face moved closer. “Nothing,” he stated, “I felt nothing here.” He pressed her hand into his gut again. “Nothing, since Fiona died. And I didn’t think I could feel again after I lost Fee. Now it feels warm. Even when you first returned, you made it that way, when I saw you smile, when you made the children laugh, anytime I caught sight of your sweet, sexy ass –”

Bella wasn’t ready to give in, the daft cow (now Fiona wanted to kick her), “Prentice, stop –”

Prentice, fortunately, wasn’t ready to give in either.

“Life, for me, luckily has been a beautiful journey. It put me in this village, it brought me Fee who walked at my side and then Jason and Sally who continue to share that journey with me.” His voice dipped low and his hand took hers from his belly to press it against his heart when he finished, “But, baby, through that long journey, I’ve only ever been home twice. Once, twenty years ago and now I’m home again, with you. You. I know exactly who you are. I just have to introduce you to her.”

Bella was staring at him, lips parted.

Prentice held her gaze.

Fiona hovered.

The tears welled up in Bella’s eyes and slid silently down her cheeks.

Prentice tensed as he watched them fall.

Then Bella spoke so softly, Fiona (even with super-ghostly senses) could barely hear her.

Even so, it hurt to listen to the hesitant but hopeful ache in her words.

“You’re saying… I can be free?”

Prentice closed his eyes slowly but briefly.