Page 166 of Modern Romance September 2025 5-8

‘It will hurt to remember her happy,’ she continued, and Aurora kissed him again. ‘It’ll hurt to know that, however happy she was, she died. But you have to remember more than her death, Sebastian.’

She kissed his eyelids now. His right one, then his left. And Sebastian trembled.

‘You have to remember.’ Her lips feathered his forehead. ‘Remember how she lived. How she was part of your life. How she still is. Face whatever guilt it is you feel, and let yourself move on. Forgive yourself.’

His eyes flew open. He caught the wrists moving from his chest to hold his face. He wouldn’t let her cradle his cheeks and push her innocence inside his skin with her gentle fingers.

He was not innocent.

He released her wrists and caught her waist.

‘Sebastian!’

He ignored her. He could not have her on his lap. He could not feel her warmth when his blood ran so cold.

He lifted her, made his hands be careful, and placed her on the bed beside him.

‘Sebastian,’ she said.‘Please.’

And it hurt him for her to beg. For him to break his promise to never to let her beg for anything from him. But this time, she was wrong.This…he could not change. He couldn’t undo what he’d done.

‘I will never forgive myself,’ he hissed. His chest was so tight. ‘She was beautiful. Innocence personified. She was the definition of it, with her curly black hair, her little button nose that squinched with her squinting big blue eyes when she laughed. And she laughed all the time. In our room we shared. A room with everything we needed, a kitchen. A bathroom. And I fed her. I burped her.I loved her!’

‘I know,’ she breathed heavily.

‘You do not know. You do not know what it is like to have something precious given to you. Something so innocent you cannot help but love it.’

‘I’m pregnant,’ she said. ‘Soon we’ll both be given something precious. Something we will both love.’ She placed her hand on her belly. ‘I feel the baby all the time. Its tiny hands. Its feet.Iunderstand that kind of love. The consuming nature of it. I understand how much you loved her.’

He dragged his hands through his too long hair. Pushed it back away from the skin that crawled with self-hate.Self-disgust.

He closed his eyes. Shut out Aurora. Her misted big brown eyes. He didn’t deserve her compassion. And he’d tell her why. And then he’d open his eyes. Watch her tears disappear. Watch the shame he felt reflected in her eyes with the ugly images he’d now put into her beautiful, determined, naive, and stubborn mind.

He was not naive.

‘Love is never enough,’ he hissed, his eyes still closed. ‘I was given a responsibility. To take care of her. And I did. I held her. I provided for her every need from the moment she was born. Because in the rooms beyond ours…the other rooms, filled with women. With men. Drinking. Having sex. Doing drugs. It wasn’t safe for her there. But we were safe in our room. She was safe withme.’

‘How old were you?’

He squeezed the bridge of his nose. ‘I was twelve, and she was brand new. And she’d relied on me. And for three years, I kept her safe. I protected her. Until one night, while she was asleep in her crib beside my bed, I—’

He would tell her. However hard it was to admit. To thrust the words into her ears and have her know.

She had a right to know who she had made love to in New York.

She had a right to know who the man was she shared her bed with now.

He opened his eyes, and he hid nothing from her. He let her look into his eyes and see the man he was.

Unworthy.

‘The house was full. All the rooms were occupied, and the others who didn’t have rooms spilt into the lounge, the kitchen,’ he told her, and he let the images bloom to life in his head. The open sex.The depravity.

‘Our room was at the top of the house this time,’ he continued. ‘It was a beautiful house. In a neighbourhood where no one would ever expect such ugliness to live. Unlittered and privileged, the neighbourhood was picturesque. All of it was. All but our house. But our room had a lock. And I wanted to get out. I wanted to breathe the night’s air… Needed to paint, to draw, do something with my hands.’

He looked down at them. The hands trembling before him. ‘To create the images I never found in life. Images of softness, of hope. And so I left her. I left Amelia sleeping in our room. I locked the door so no one would hurt her. I locked the door to keep her safe. I left, and I took the key…’

‘Sebastian…’ She cried openly now. Big, rolling tears dripped from the tip of her beautiful chin.