Page 96 of Monster
Vincent
One month later
One month has passedsince I almost killed Essa.
One month since I lost myself.
One month of changing who I am so I don’t lose the one person I can’t seem to live without.
I have become but a shell of the man I used to be.
“Vincent?” I hear her voice call out to me and my entire body locks up with trepidation. We have spoken nearly every day for two weeks and it is always the highlight of my miserable existence, but we still haven’t talked about the one thing that made me lose my mind.
“Yeah, baby doll?” I answer her as I move about the kitchen, pouring us each a cup of coffee before bringing them to the table. I set hers down in front of her before taking a seat across from her. I keep my eyes locked on hers above the ridge of my cup as I take a drink. She meets my gaze, matching it with a confident one of her own.
That is another thing I have noticed about her over this last month. She seems different—stronger almost, as bad as it is to say that. I don’t want to be the reason she’s stronger, but I can’t fucking change what I did. I can only live with the regret of it.
“It was the accident,” she says out of nowhere and my mug clatters to the table when it slips from my grasp. Coffee splatters out and spills across the entire tabletop but neither one of us moves to do a thing about it.
Her words ring loud and clear in my head, but they don’t make sense. I can’t fucking piece together what she means.
“What do you mean ‘it was the accident’?” I ask hesitantly.
“The baby…Ourbaby. I didn’t know I was pregnant until after the car accident and a nurse—Joyce—told me.”
“Wha—” I stop. I’m so fucking confused.“What do you mean?” Her words aren’t making any fucking sense.
“I mean, the accident I was in. The one that killed Holley…” she cuts off with a sob. Tears stream down her face but she doesn’t let it deter her. “The accident caused the miscarriage.”
I absorb every word she is saying, but for the life of me, I cannot make it make sense. She killed our baby.
Right?
Her losing the baby because of the accident means itwasmy baby. It couldn’t have been Dominik’s because she didn’t even know him then.
“You didn’t kill our baby?” I ask, to be sure. This feels too fucking good to be true.
“No, Vin. I didn’t kill our baby. I wouldnever.”
Vin… She called me Vin. And she didn’t kill our baby.
I jump up from the table, ready to crush her to my chest but my sudden movement has her flinching away from me, and it’s like ice water crawling over my skin. She clenches her jaw, but I see as clear as fucking day how her eyes widen as she stares at me.
She’s fucking afraid of me now. The entire dynamic of our relationship has changed drastically. I can’t be who I truly am with her anymore because I will scare her off and I would rather pretend to be someone I’m not than to not have her at all.
“I’m… sorry. I’m still not—” I sigh as I run my fingers through my too long hair. “I’m not used to being different with you. But I’m willing to try. I still don’t fucking know why you didn’t leave when Leo offered. He said he would set you up with your own bank account with money that was yours and yours alone in a new town, in a new state, thousands of miles away from me. I know you’re scared of me—and for good reason too—which is why I don’t understand.”
I drop my gaze to the coffee-stained tabletop as I pull my pack of smokes from my pocket. I bring one to my lips and bite it as I pat my other pockets for my lighter. When I don’t find it, I lean up to go and grab one, but Essa standing directly in front of me startles me. Her left hand is extended in front of her and in it, is a white lighter. She flicks it and the flame sparks. She slowly brings it to my cigarette. I force myself not to move a fucking muscle as she shifts closer to me.
Just having her near sends desire straight to my cock. I close my eyes to suppress my groan but quickly flick them back open when I feel the warmth of the flame near my face. I pull in a drag as Essa lights the end before pulling it away.She tosses it on the counter but remains standing in front of me. I’m confused as fuck, and I let it show on my face too.
She hasn’t wanted to be near me lately, and I’m nervous as to her motive. I take another drag, but my cigarette is quickly pulled from my lips as Essa puts it to her own. She sucks in a drag before pulling the cigarette away. She blows the smoke out from between her two plump lips, and my cock grows painfully hard behind my zipper.
Wrong fucking time, bud.
I shift as nonchalantly as I can, but it’s useless when Essa’s gaze drops to my lap.With the cigarette locked between her teeth, she hesitantly takes a step closer to me. The smoke curls around us both as she nestles perfectly in between my legs.
“Essa…”
