Page 88 of Sinful Bride

If I can get him down there…

If I can get someone to see him, see his craziness…

He tries to force a kiss on me. I twist my head to the side, but he forces me back to him and oh God it’s disgusting. I press my lips shut so I won’t have to endure his tongue. I nearly scream when he backs me into the nearest wall. The touch of it is so cold on my back, compared to the hot, grinding, vile mass of the man pinning me down.

“Oh, Daphne,” he sighs. He hasn’t let go of my face, but one hand keeps shifting dangerously over my exposed throat. “You’re mine, you know that? All mine.”

This is it.

This is how I go.

I just pray Pasha gets here before he finds our baby.

“If I can’t have you?—”

“You have me!” I hate that it comes out in a sob. I hate how pathetic I sound. But I’ll be damned if I let him get to my baby. Just thinking about her has me fighting for every second on this earth. “You have me. I’m yours. All yours.” I force a smile. “But we have to go, okay? We have to leave before he comes back.”

Conrad nods a little too enthusiastically. “Right. You’re right. You’re always so clever, NayNay. Always so fucking clever.”

I sigh with heavy relief. “Let’s get out of here. Let’s?—”

A sharp, high-pitched scream fills the penthouse.

Tatyanna.

By the look on his face, and the way he whips his head around, Conrad knows it.

“She’s here?” He lets me go and moves away from me. Toward the kitchen. “Your baby is here?”

No. No, no, no! “No one else is here! I don’t know what you’re?—”

“She is, isn’t she?”

On anyone else, that happy grin would almost be endearing. On him, it looks sick and demented. Like a thousand twisted ideas are swirling in his head and every single one of them involve my helpless baby girl.

He sees me glance at the archway leading to the kitchen.

Fuck.

We both dart for the same room at the same time.

The difference is, he wants to put his hands on my baby.

I want to put my hands on him.

I stumble into the kitchen the moment he reaches into her bassinet. I don’t think. I don’t calculate. I just throw myself at him and pray.

Our bodies connect with a solid smack, and the momentum throws him off to the side and into the wall. His elbow connects with my face during the tumble, sending a sharp pain through my eye and cheekbone.

I don’t care. Taty’s still in the bassinet, safe and sound, though screaming her head off in fear.

“I’ve got you,” I whisper to her. “Mommy’s here. Mommy’s got you.”

Goddamn, that hurt. I wince as I gingerly touch the outer edge of my eye.

“She’s so beautiful.” Conrad mumbles between huffing groans as he pulls himself back up. “Just like you. Just like her momma. I just wanna?—”

Again, I move without thinking.

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