Page 93 of Like An Animal

I sigh as I run my fingers over his arms, tracing every tattoo from his wrist to his shoulders.

“Are you trying to make me emotional?” I tease as tears prick my eyes. Everything is just so perfect.

“No. I’m trying to make you happy.” He presses a soft kiss to my cheek and I melt against him. “Do you want me to stop?”

“No,” I admit. “It’s perfect, a little too perfect. Like something really bad is about to happen.”

His arms tighten slightly before whispering in my ear, “Nothing bad is going to happen, okay? I’m going to be right here with you and Charlotte. There is nowhere on this planetsafer or more heavily protected than this compound. The only ones allowed to come here uninvited are on a very short list. There are always at least ten guards watching each entrance. As long as you are here, The Fathers can’t touch either of you. I don’t have anything that requires my attention for the next two weeks so I’ll be right here. I need you to trust me, little ghost.”

I do trust him. I know there is no one else in this world that will fight as hard as Jeremy would to protect me and Charlotte. He would die for us and that’s what I’m scared of. I don’t want him to die.

Could I survive it? Sure, but I don’t want to have to figure out what my world would be like without him existing. It’s an ugly, rancid thought.

“I believe you.” I have to because anything else is not an option.

CHAPTER 39

THE GHOST

Two Weeks Later…

Ilean against the end of the bed as Jeremy fills a small suitcase of clothes. He’s only going to be gone overnight, but he said he needed to make sure he had a few changes of clothes just in case he needed them. In other words, in case he has to kill someone.

It’s only supposed to be a meeting out of state, but those can get bloody.

That’s what I’ve been told anyway.

Jeremy walks out of the closet carrying his bag, but he looks just as sour about this as I feel. I don’t want him to go and I know Charlotte doesn’t want that either. Jer doesn’t talk to her a lot, but she has grown attached to him. Shockingly, there’s only one other person she has truly latched onto and they are going with him. It probably pisses Jeremy off that his only child has grown more attached to one of his friends than she is to him.

Xavi.

She has a major attachment to him. She barely lets the man go to the bathroom without her waiting outside the door. She constantly wants him to play with her and it’s adorable becauseeveryone can tell he’s only humoring her because she’s mine and Jeremy’s kid.

Xavi has never liked kids. He used to say they were gross, clingy creatures, but he puts up with Charlotte’s demanding nature.

I wonder who she got that from.

Jeremy walks right over to me, drops the bag, and pulls me into his arms. He peppers kisses all over my face before finding my lips.

“I’ll be back as soon as I can. I promise.”

“I know,” I pout. “I don’t want you to go, but you’ll get more of a resistance from Lottie than you will me. She will make it impossible. It’s a good thing she hasn’t figured out where Alex puts the car keys.”

He smirks. “So determined.”

“She gets that from you,” I quip.

“No. She gets that from both of us. She inherited being a clingy little shit from me.”

I gently smack his arm while glaring at him. “Do not call her a little shit.”

“Sheisa little shit. She got that from me just as much as she did the clingy bit.”

I roll my eyes. Okay so maybe Charlotte is a bit of a turd, but we have been going through this since the paternity test results came back three days ago. It confirmed what I already knew.

Charlotte is Jeremy’s daughter.

The look of shock on Dimitri Borza’s face was comedy gold. He had already met Charlotte, but he didn’t pay her any attention until the results were read.