He folded his palms. I recognized his intimidating stillness. I wish I hadn’t inherited it. “I respect you, Nicholas. I always have. You are the best of both me and your mother. I never doubted the man you’d become.”
“You gave me no choice. You molded me after yourself.”
“No. Not quite. You never accepted everything I taught. Max…” He nodded. “Max might have been worth my time, if he hadn’t ruined that leg.”
As if the injury from the crash was his fault. “Max would never have done your bidding. Not like me. I tried for years to impress you.”
“Max lived to impress me. Every minute of every day, but I had no use for a crippled son, just as I had no need for an emotionally weak child like Reed. Your mother babied him. I should have put a stop to it, but Helena always insisted Reed was special.”
“Why?”
“Because he was the least like me.” My father paused. “Did you know your mother feared you?”
He said it to force a reaction from me. He’d get none. “Is that so?”
“Max was impressionable and desperate for attention. Reed was too kind-hearted. But you? She recognized that spark in you that I see every day.” He studied me as if acknowledging my maturity for the first time. “You did as I asked, capturing Sarah Atwood. You bedded her despite your reservations. You insisted your brothers seed her as well. But I saw it, son. That lust. The need. The drive to be the man who finally broke her.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You wanted her child as badly as I did, and you still do. That’s why you stormed my office. That’s why you’ve plotted to kill me.” He grinned. “You realize the only chance you have at finally conquering Sarah Atwood is if I’m dead. You don’t want me to breed her first.”
I fought the urge to lunge for his throat, but returning to Sarah bleeding and broken wouldn’t convince her that she was safe by my side.
“You are as cruel as I am. Don’t pretend it’s love or compassion that hardens your cock. You’re my son. You inherited my instincts.” His voice grated my conscience, scouring every defense that separated his evils from mine.
“I never hurt her.”
“Didn’t you? Even when Sarah told you no? Don’t lie, Nicholas. The first time, when you bound her to the bed and stole her virginity, she said no. And despite how she might have wetted for you, the fact remains you couldn’t help yourself. You saw a woman, fertile and helpless, and you drove into her with the same ruthless desire that makes me the monster you say I am.”
“You’re disgusting.”
“I’m just more honest than you. You rutted that girl. Even if she had fought you through an asthma attack as you suffocated her with a pillow, even if she had clawed so hard against your chest she ripped a nail, even if she offered you everything to her name to let her go, you would have fucked her. Her refusal would have excited you as much as if she willingly spread those pretty pink petals.”
“Stop.”
“I’m sure she told you that too.” My father rarely smiled with genuine amusement. My discomfort delighted him, his own private joke. “Nicholas, you and I are men who understand true dominance. That girl might have convinced herself she loved you, but we both know the truth.”
“What truth?”
“You didn’t give her a choice in any of this. You told her she’d love you. You told her she’d submit to you. You told her you would fuck her and try to breed her and take her even if she didn’t want it. And what was her response?”
She ran from me. She escaped when she could and returned only as a last resort.
She left because she saw in me the same monster she hated in my father.
“Don’t let her go this time, son,” he said. “She needs only another mounting and she’ll crumble for you, permanently. She’s just as fragile now as she was that first day I stripped her and offered her as the ultimate gift to my loyal sons.”
“She was no gift.”
“Yes, she was. It brings me joy to spoil my children, even my daughter.” He patted my shoulder only to elbow my tender, broken ribs. “You should have killed me when you had the chance.”
“I know.”
“You don’t, but I’m sure you’ll understand eventually. Tell Sarah that her Daddy misses her.” His threat riddled with insincere warmth. “And I’ll be visiting her again very, very soon.”
Reed tapped a page in the baby book. “Hey, Sarah. Did you know—right now—your uterus is the size of a grapefruit?”
I burst into tears.
“Nice job.” Max ate his spaghetti but passed me the box of tissues. I grabbed one, but the last tissue pulled out too. I couldn’t reach it before it floated to the floor.
Wasting that tissue was the worst thing that had ever happened to me.
The tears kept coming.
“Whoa.” Reed stuck a knife in his book to mark his place. “Chapter four warned about the mood swings. Probably should have been in chapter one.”
He picked up the tissue and knelt beside my chair. The kitchen table was stocked with every variety of fruit, vegetable, ice cream, and pasta dish, but between the incessant crying and nausea, nothing set right with me except that box of tissues, and now they were gone, and I was pretty sure I went insane sometime in the last week.
“Sorry, Sarah.” Reed rubbed my arm. “Your uterus is lovely.”
He brushed lower, massaging my elbow before drifting to take my palm. He didn’t reach it. His hand circled my wrist.
Then I did remember the worst thing to happen to me.
And the disgust and shame disguised itself as morning sickness. I bolted to the bathroom.
Max called after me. “There’s another box of tissues under the sink.”
Great.
Just what I needed.
I made it two months without breaking down. Two months of strength, courage, and the mental fortitude to survive an attack from that monster.
And I cried over a box of tissues.
Also because I wanted scrambled eggs, but the color, smell, taste, texture, and birthing process of eggs now nauseated me.
I wept over the sun rise in the morning, and then again later while thinking about the sunrise that morning. I freaked out when Reed offered me his spot on the couch when all I wanted to do was pout while standing because I couldn’t decide if I had to use the bathroom or if I needed a nap.
And at night, I muffled my sobs in the pillow because Nicholas respected my wishes and hadn’t returned to my bedroom since the day I first arrived.
That wasn’t hormones. That was legitimate heartbreak.
I didn’t want him with me. I couldn’t imagine spending another night without him.
It was a mistake to return, but after another asthma attack landed my butt on the couch with my step-brothers hovering with medicines, water, and Lamaze breathing instructions courtesy of Reed’s damn baby book, I made the right decision. For the moment, this was my safest place.
I finally had a full-night’s sleep, but, when I woke, I was more alone than when I was running hotel to hotel.
It had to be Nicholas’s baby.
So why was I fighting him?
I didn’t bother returning to the kitchen. Reed built his house with junk food —prepackaged meals and snacks and everything easy to toss into a bag before heading to the beach. None of it looked or smelled good. It was best to avoid food.
I snuck back to my room. Why did a baby the size of a walnut make me so damn tired? I hadn’t read beyond my current What To Expect From Week Eleven part of the baby book, but I hoped once the kid started to look more human and less tadpole it’d stop draining my energy.
I’d need it.
Especially tonight.
At least I wasn’t showing, even with my grapefruit uterus. I double-checked the little black cocktail dress to ensure it hid every secret.
The baby wasn’t visible, but the rest of Sarah Atwood sure was. I gaped at the mirror as Nicholas knocked against the door frame.