Hupotasso (Vampire Bachelor Games #2)

30

30

I frown as I dress, watching the play of light across her curls and curves.

As much as I’ve enjoyed bedding her these months since her return from the tour, try as I might to deny it, Sophie is due to give birth soon, and time is running out. Something has to give. I’m locked in a recurring pattern of enthusiastically screwing the woman I married, soothing the fears of the woman I promised to marry, and plotting the destruction of an enemy crumbling my Keep from within and without. And the longer it goes on the less inclined I am to carry out any of my resolutions — and the more confused, trapped, and emasculated I feel.

I recognise I look forward to dinner each evening with Angie. I look forward to what happens afterwards. And I acknowledge we’ve fallen into an unhealthy pattern that needs to be broken. A pattern that I’ve enforced.

“What is it?” She frowns.

“This needs to be over,” I snap, ignoring the instant hurt in her eyes. “I want you pregnant. Why aren’t you getting pregnant?”

“I don’t know,” she snorts, pulling the sheet around to hide her soft, voluminous breasts. “Maybe you’re shooting blanks.”

“Don’t push me, woman,” I growl.

“Or what? You’ll spank me again?”

She rolls over to show her bruised ass, and I grit my teeth. I hadn’t spared disciplining her over the weeks, but I didn’t realise I’d left marks on her. Somehow, seeing my black and blue handprints on her pale body doesn’t sit well with me. I recall seeing similar prints on my mother’s body as a small boy.

‘Jag’s right. I’m becoming my father. This has to stop.’

“You’ve been tested,” I raise my chin and look down at her, pretending indifference to her bruises. “There’s no reason why you shouldn’t conceive.”

“Oh, I’ve been tested, alright,” she snorts, throwing a pillow at my head. “You test me day in and day out. Have you stopped to think that maybe beating me and keeping me locked up isn’t conducive to me conceiving? Maybe you’ve slapped the foetus right out of me.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I roll my eyes. “We’ve had sex most nights for months and I’ve only spanked you a handful of times. You should be pregnant.”

“How do you know I’m not? After all, there’s no Caroline to spy on me now.”

I scowl at her.

“I know you’ve bled because every month since your return I’ve watched you drop glassware, knock over vases and spill drinks. Your fucking moon-dropping is as consistent as the tides. What are you doing to prevent yourself from conceiving?”

“Nothing,” she says indignantly. “And anyhow, what’s the hurry?” She narrows her eyes at me. “Are you so desperate to murder me, My Lord ?”

I pick up the pillow she’d thrown and carefully place it on the bed as I meet her eyes.

“Yes.”

I hear her heart speed up, but her face doesn’t betray any emotion.

“I want you gone, Angelina. I want to be free to marry someone else. I want you out of my castle, my home, and my life.”

“Someone else? Who?”

“That’s none of your concern.”

“Then let me leave.”

“There’s only one way you’re leaving. You know that.”

“You hate me that much?” She whispers.

“I loathe you.”

The hurt in her eyes seems real, just as it always does, but she doesn’t outwardly flinch at my words now.

“I hate you too,” she whispers.

I leave without a backward glance.

For months now I’ve hurt her physically or emotionally, doing everything I can think of to force her to reveal her true nature. Yet every night we end up in bed and it’s like we belong together. Her body feels like a shelter from all life’s storms.

I pause to punch the rock wall of the hallway, my knuckles splitting.