Page 40 of Come Fill Me

He forced himself to look at her, surprised he couldn’t see her features clearly, as though he was looking through fog. She sighed. “You’ve guessed, haven’t you?”

Guessed what? That she wanted to break up with him? Would it really be that easy?

“I’m pregnant,” she said.

His dream moved forward at lightning speed, the midwife handing him his daughter, Gabrielle. Her full head of black hair was the biggest part about her. In his hands, she seemed tinier than a newborn pup. Zeke was convinced he’d break all of her bones just by holding her. When she sneezed, he panicked, notknowing what to do.

“Take her,” he told the midwife. “She’s sick. Make her well.”

The middle-aged woman patted his shoulder as she would an idiot son. “Your daughter’s fine.”

Zeke refused to believe it. He didn’t want anything harming Gabrielle, not even a cold. When she settled in his arms and breathed softly, the heat of her body, its weight, and sweet baby scent calmed his worries, allowing him to smile. He fell in love.

His dream continued, showing him snatches of his daughter’s brief life. Gabrielle’s first steps, her chubby arms waving wildly with each tentative move, trying to maintain her balance on her journey toward him. He next saw her at an older age, maybe five, thrusting out her lower lip, stamping her small foot when he refused to give her more candy, another toy, permission to stay up later than she should, any number of things she demanded and he denied.

They battled and she won more times than he did, wrapping her small hands around his heart, never letting go, making him concede with so little effort.

He reached out to hug her. She stepped back, not allowing it this time, her skinny arms crossed tight against her chest. “I have to go. All the girls are.”

Bright red, blue, and green balloons bobbed around her, the kind parents used to decorate their kid’s birthday parties. This one was for Gabrielle’s school friend.

“I don’t care,” Zeke said, crossing his arms as she had. He hadn’t planned on allowing her to attend the party, not because of any danger he’d feared or seen in his visions—they’d been quiet for so long he’d almost forgotten about the continuing threat from the other clan—but because Gabrielle had received such poor marks on her arithmetic test.

“You need a firmer hand with your daughter,” her teacher had warned. She was a pretty young woman, the top of her headbarely reaching the middle of his chest. Despite the differences in their sizes, she lectured him with the ease of a mother. “Gabrielle needs to do her homework, not play all the time. If you don’t start saying no when she’s young, you’ll regret it when she hits her teens.”

For once, he remained firm, taking the party off his daughter’s too-busy social calendar. For days, Gabrielle whined and cajoled, finally crying, deep, wrenching sobs that shook her narrow body. Her tears undid Zeke as they always did.

In his dream, he held a box in his hand that contained a surprise—the yellow outfit she coveted. “You can go to the party,” he said, trying to sound fatherlike and stern, “but only if you wear this.”

She’d danced around their modest house with the clothes clutched to her chest. She modeled them for him, making him worry about the day when she’d do the same with her prom dress and then her wedding gown.

“You’ll regret it,”her teacher had said.

His voice rose in anguish as he smelled the gunpowder and saw the blood. It stained the walls, the still-bobbing balloons, Gabrielle’s yellow clothing. She and Angie were already dead. He held his daughter in his arms, rocking her, willing her to breathe, to live.

Come back.

“I miss you, Daddy.”

Sweet baby, don’t go.

The balloons surrounded then hid her. She slipped away.

Zeke jerked awake, his throat damp with sweat, his chest pumping too hard with each strained breath.

Disoriented, he turned, seeing Liz on his right, Jacob behind her, his arm draped possessively across her waist. A surge of jealousy rolled through Zeke like nothing he’d ever encountered. Teeth clenched, he had an unbearable urge to shove his brotherfrom her, to pull Liz into his embrace, to shout,Mine, not yours, dammit—mine.

“Hey,” Liz whispered, her hand stalling before she’d finished pushing back her hair. “Are you all right?” She eased Jacob’s arm from her, waiting to see what he’d do.

When Jacob continued to sleep, Liz touched Zeke’s lips, running her thumb over his bristly jaw. “Did you have a vision?”

He wished. Since Gabrielle’s death, even Zeke’s worst glimpses into the future had been easier to take than his memories. That was, until his latest vision concerning Liz.

An urgency to protect her drew Zeke closer, the mattress shaking as he repositioned his body.

The movement had Jacob stirring then reaching for her before Zeke could.

“Back off,” Zeke ordered.

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