Page 69 of In Love with the Devil

“Yes, baby?”

“Do you really want this–”

"I want everything with you." I don't understand anything. Julian keeps caressing my arm, holding me. I soak in the affection because I've been starving for it all my goddamn life. “I will never ever hurt our child, Astoria,” he whispers into my hair.“It’s the one thing I can promise you.” He gathers and presses my body to his tightly. “I promise. Now… let’s go eat something. Let’s celebrate.”

He holds my hands as we walk down the stairs and I keep having to look at his face. The thought that I’m going to have a baby with this cruel psychotic monster. Why would he want a baby?

“What do you prefer? Pancakes, waffles, French toast, or crepes?”

“Uh. Pancakes?”

“Pancakes it is.” He walks to the kitchen and begins mixing ingredients, then places a cold bottle of water on the counter before me. “Here, drink this.”

I take a sip, and sit while staring into space. He opens the case to his cell phone.

His cellphone!

I’ve never seen him with one. Maybe I can steal it. I can’t help staring at it. The sound that comes out of its speaker at full blast surprises me. It’s that Spanish song from that kid’s movie…Dos Oruguitasby Sebatian Yatras. He gazes at me with a genuine smile on his face while I try to mask my excitement about the phone.

Julian is trying to makemehappy?

It’s such a foreign concept. He walks around the island toward me, pulls me from the seat to stand, and slow dances with me. Julian looks down at my face and shocks me when he sings the words in Spanish. I listen in awe to the lyrics slipping from his smiling lips and he has to wipe the tears from my face.

Does he not understand that the skull painted on his face doesn’t let me forget that he’s the same man who stalked me, raped me, whipped me, starved me, and who’s almost killed me several times, the man who has me locked in his house? It’s like some psychotic nightmare. This can’t work out. There’s no way. “Julian?”

“Yes, pretty bird?”

A long pause passes while I examine if my next words will get my head banged against a wall. “I’m pregnant–”

“Yes, you are.” The glee curves his lips again as he studies my face.

“With your… fetus.”

“Yes.”

“But I don’t even know how your face looks.”

His smile melts away. He stops dancing, and pulls closer. His eyes dig into mine and the fear that he instills in me makes me need to die. I try to back away but his hold on my hand and my back are firm and tight. As if he's reprogramming his mind, ittakes too long before he promises, “You’ll see my face the day after you give birth, Astoria. Okay?”

His lips take mine and send electric waves all over my body, waves I abhor with every fiber of my being but overpower me and pull whimpers out of me. Julian breaks the kiss and pulls my head to lean on his chest as he sways and sings. The shock and relief that he's not yet again going to force himself on me comes out in my sigh. For once my body relaxes, and I close my eyes. The song promises miracles and new beginnings, and pleads for me to keep going because I don’t know what’s around the corner.

After we eat what I think are the best pancakes I’ve ever tasted, we go for a walk around the house. He shows me a huge field of red flowers. "What are these?"

"You don't know?"

I shake my head.

"Poppies."

"They're gorgeous. Why do you have so many?"

"For you." He yanks a few and hands them to me.

After, we sit under an almond tree for shade while watching the breeze comb through the overgrown grass field. I can't get over the green, the pink petals that have fallen from the dead flowers. His arms and legs embrace me from behind. I pretend it's out of love and not possession. “Julian?”

“Yes?”

“How do you know Spanish? I mean… you’re not, Latino, right?”

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