Page 119 of Tied to You

For now? For now means that one day my love for herwon’tbe enough. “Mollie I—”

“I see the way you love. I watch the way you fight for those things too.” Her thumb runs another delicate trail across my rugged face. Her penetrating gaze slices through mine. “You’ll never be like your parents.”

Those words. Her ability to just know exactly what I’m thinking. It’s proof that she is everything I fucking need. Still, “You don’t know that,” I say, sighing a heavy, depleted sigh.

Her cheeks lift slightly as she attempts another smile. “Yes, I do.” Then her hand’s no longer touching me. The feeling of loss and distance—even though she’s standing right in front of me, is terrifying.

She tries to step away.

I take her hand in my grasp, stopping her, lifting it to my lips and kissing her palm gently. She watches me loving her, presumably fully aware of my need to show her just how much brightness she has brought to my life.

One day she wasn’t there. The next, she was. I don’t know why she was sent to me. Whether it was a higher power showing me what I needed or whether it was a just a case of two lonely people happening to fall for each other, completely out of the fucking blue. All I know is that anything that could jeopardise that, isn’t welcome.

I’m just about to take her mouth again when I hear her take a breath. It comes out more like a sigh. “I’m not feeling great,” she tells me in a rush, leaving me raking my eyes all over her face. She looks plaintive, an almost unsure look washing over her delicate features.

“Baby?”

“I’m just tired. I’ll be fine in the morning.”

I kiss her palm again before dropping her hand. “Okay,” I reply. But I’m not okay. Far fucking from it. It’s as though a giant barricade has landed between us. I’m unable to get to her. Unable to love her the way I do best. We’re treading uncharted territory and it’s all my fault.

She waits for me to leave the bathroom before the sound of her using the loo and washing her hands can be heard from our bedroom. I take off my clothes and climb into bed, checking my phone before I place it on the side.

Dean is with Elvis checking the coke. That’s something at least. Means we’re one step closer to finding where it came from.

This shit with the club couldn’t be more proof that bringing a baby into our world would not only be dangerous, but would bring added fear and worry. Loving Mollie is easy. But she would love a baby more than me. She’d have to. I hate myself for thinking it, but I’m too fucking selfish to allow that to happen.

I hear her coughing and I think about getting out of bed to check her, but her feet pad across the floor and with a few steps, she’s in our room.

“I’m taking you to the doctor in the morning.”

She gives a subtle nod of her head, not arguing. “Okay.” She really is tired.

Mollie dresses into her pyjamas, and I drag back the covers for her to climb in once she’s ready. She kneels on the bed, then lowers, facing away from me rather than curling her body to mine how she usually does.

The sting of my empty, outstretched arm burns like a wildfire in my gut. Any reprimanding words I could have said get stuck in my throat, strangled by the heat now flooding my veins. My teeth grind together as I give her no choice, flinging my other arm heavily over her waist and dragging her into me. She doesn’t have to talk to me. She can have the peace that she needs.

But she’ll sleep where she belongs.

Chapter Twenty-Four

MOLLIE

Walking out of the doctor’s surgery, there’s a light breeze that kisses my cheek. It’s fresh. Welcoming. At just after eleven, my clothes are dirty having completed six hours of work already. The tiredness from yesterday and this cough that hasn’t shifted in weeks, have finally caught up with me. I’m exhausted and in desperate need of two days’ worth of sleep.

Travis takes the lead as we walk back to his bike, me following in a sleepy state behind him. I’m passed the helmet then he climbs on and waits for me to follow suit, not saying a word. Clipping the strap under my chin, I step closer, swinging my leg over the back, holding his leather cut to pull myself up. I catch his eyes focused dead ahead, lost in thought.

Wondering.

Something shifted between us last night. Something that tilted our balance. The dreaded conversation about a family was thrust upon us by the arrival of Sophie, only, we never really spoke about anything. He told me the baby wasn’t his. That Sophie had come back to stay with Tanya. But Travis’ admission—his declaration about not wanting children, felt like a knife cutting me down the middle.

One part of me is content with things exactly the way they are. Minus the messages from my mother, subtly dropping reminders that my time away from home is coming to an end, I have everything that I could possibly want. A job. A home. People who care about me. My freedom.

What appears to have happened over night, though, is the sudden need to know where my future is headed. It’s all well and good choosing to stay here at the farm, but unless the man I love wants the same things as I do,there’s a small part of me contemplating what’s the point. Is it time wasted? It sounds so selfish, I know that, I even damn myself for thinking it. It’s just… all night I kept thinking; what if I get to forty and we never have children, and I grow to resent him? It could happen. I could easily fall out of love with him for not getting something that up until yesterday, I didn’t know I may want. Then again, would I really want to go back to galas and functions with my parents, keeping up appearances with the hope that one day I find a man who loves me enough to have a family with me?

My insides scatter at the mere thought.

Surely it doesn’t come down to sacrificing what we have for an eventuality? It can’t. Christ, this is such a mess. One that’s totally scrambling with my head. Perhaps I’m overthinking this. Perhaps my hormones are just making me see things backwards.