Page 25 of Cruel Juliet

The sound of my own breathing fills the room. I drag air in slowly, force it out, but the rhythm is uneven. I can fight with her, but I sure as fuck can’t fight this.

“Feel that?” she asks quietly. “That’s our baby girl.”

My throat works around a reply that never comes. I nod once, curt, because I can’t trust my voice not to betray me.

I think of the men I’ve killed, the blood I’ve shed tonight. For the past three days, I’ve kept Sima in this room like a prisoner. If she thinks I'm a monster, she isn’t that far off the mark.

But none of it matters in this instant. What matters is the thump against my palm. Proof of life. Of legacy. All my choices, even the bad ones, led to this.

Our baby.

I want to pull away, but I can’t. Not yet. My fingers flex against her without meaning to, as if holding onto the moment will make it last longer.

Her gaze doesn’t waver. Neither does mine. The silence stretches between us, thick with everything we’ve said and everything we haven’t.

Finally, I meet her gaze again and realize how close we are. If I bent my head the smallest bit, my mouth would find hers.

I remember the taste of her lips, the heat of her skin under my hands. Nights when I had her without question, without fear she would slip away.

A slight tremor runs through my hand as I keep it still on her stomach. Every part of me wants to let it slide higher. Over her ribs, to her half-unbuttoned blouse.

I want to finish the job. Strip her bare, remind her that she’s mine. That she belongs tome.

I crave her. Fuck me, Iwanther. Want to hear her gasping for me, moaning my name for the whole house to hear.

My body reacts to those thoughts before I can stop it. Within seconds, I’m rock-hard. My hands ache to hold her down, show her exactly what she’s doing to me.

For a heartbeat, I almost do it.

She knows what I’m thinking—becauseshe’sthinking it. I can read it on her face, plain as fucking day: She wants me, too.

But if I let myself have her—if I let her have me—then I’m done for.

So I stop. I drag myself back before I can do something I know I’ll regret.

My hand falls away from her stomach. The skin of my palm feels cold the second it leaves her.

I step back. My fists clench at my sides. I cannot let myself give in. Not now. Not when she already slipped through my fingers once.

The memory of that loss is still fresh. I tried to bury it, but it never left. I barely lived through it then. I would not survive it again.

The hunger does not ease, though. It pounds in me, steady and merciless. I want her, and I always will.

But I will not take what I cannot trust. I will not hand her another weapon to use against me.

So I turn back, walk out the door, and lock it behind me.

12

SIMA

A hard knock on the door jolts me awake.

Morning light cuts through the curtains and stabs into my eyes. My back aches from the stiff mattress and my neck is all kinked to hell from sleeping half-sitting-up against the headboard.

Why? Because I don’t fucking trust this house of horrors. So I’m sleeping with one eye open—literally.

Though I’m not sure what I was expecting to see last night. An axe murderer? The ghost of a Victorian orphan?