Page 251 of Jagged Souls

“Even at the risk of the child?” she asks. “He’s yours.”

A boy.

Myboy.

I want to scream. Love and guilt, hope and shame, joy and grief – they all battle it out inside of me at hearing the news from the first time. That I’m a father, and I have a son.

But I had a wife first.Mywife.

“She lives,” I rasp.

“She won’t be able to conceive another,” she says. “There has been too much damage this past year, and even I can’t fix it.”

Those words slam into me. Shove me against a wall, and shake me. I clench my fists as the rage pummels into me. Then I spit out my answer – the only fucking answer there will ever be.

“I don’t care if you have to sacrifice the child in a fucking ritual, Mother. Shelives.”

Gods, just let her live.

Seventy-Seven

HER

I come to with my eyes still closed, wanting to scream and cry and rage against an uncaring, unfair world.

I cut thatthingout of me, braved the agony of it, and yet Antonio is still fucking here inside of me. He haunted my dreams while I was under, telling me Varius would let me die, that he’d save his heir, that I’d just tried to kill his child, so why the fuck would he want me to survive?

A woman’s only purpose is to breed…

I spent fucking hours flitting in and out of consciousness, perpetually being stuck in my nightmares, thinking I would not wake up… Yet now I have, and I don’t know which is worse. Which I would’ve rather have come true.

“Micha.” Varius’ voice makes me want to cry. I know he must have been the one to find me. I did it in our fucking bathroom after all. Why didn’t I have the good grace to do it elsewhere?

Because I panicked.

Because I’m not fucking okay.

No, I am.

Now that that thing is out of me, I’m okay.

I have to be.

Otherwise, there’s no point in continuing on. Because if that didn’t fix me, then what else possibly can?

“Therapy, bitch.”

I ignore Dayne’s voice. He’s dead, so it’s not like he can talk.

My mouth pops open.

“Micha?”

Laughter erupts from me.

I can’t help it.

It just comes out loud and crazed and deep from my soul. He can’t talk. He can’ttalk.Oh my gods, that’s terrible. And he suggestedtherapy.