Page 51 of Fragile Wicked Things
"Did you give him your answer?"
"Yes."
The heat from the fire grew unbearable, my breath quickened and I fought for air. "What was your answer?"
"I will not see you with that boy or any other. At first, I thought him mad to request such a thing when he knew you not. Then, I understood the change in your behavior and your schedule. He confirmed it. A courtship in secret."
"I kept it secret because I knew it would upset you, and I didn't want to do that without knowing how I felt about him. I love..."
"Don't!"
The shout was full of anger and pain, pain that I had created; it distressed me, shaking me from head to foot. I began to sob convulsively at the loss of a life with James and knew I couldn't yield to Edward. When I did speak, it was to express an impetuous wish—that I become James’s wife.
"I've cared for you all these years, saved you as you have me. We are bound to one another," Edward said.
"Will you have me endure a life of misery in Europe? To be torn apart from the one I love?"
"What of the one I love?"
I turned from him, for I could no longer bear those eyes, but in doing so, he stepped up to me and forced me to look at him. "Please, don't," I said.
"Catherine, you must know how I feel about you. Since you’ve returned, I…"
"I don't want to hear it."
"Would you have me love you in silence?"
"I would." The words escaped me. In his eyes were pain and anguish; it was my hand that held the blade penetrating his heart, twisting it mercilessly. His voice and hand quivered; his eyes blazed.
"You are to share in my solitude. Do you understand?"
"If you choose to have me torn from him forever, then it is a death to me, terrorizing me with this bond to you. I beg of you, set me free; otherwise, it is a death you impose on me!" I retorted, roused in passion.
"Catherine, will you hear no reason?" He stood near me and whispered in my ear with a gentleness. "It is you I must have and no other. Say you will be mine. Say it now."
My actions were slow as I moved away from him towards the door. "Will you force me to stay? Then you become nothing to me. I can never look at you the way a woman looks at her husband," I said.
"If it's not reason, then perhaps it's violence you will respond to."
His fury was wrought, and he yielded to it at that moment. Edward crossed the floor and seized my arm, grasping me by my waist. His eyes were black and held me with such a coldness that it frightened me as if he would devour me. His look was no longer that of a man but a hideous creature. There rose a darkness in him, and the Edward I had come to know was gone. I knew that one impetuous move on my part and I would not be able to restrain him; one look of repulsion, of fear, and it would have sealed my doom.
Still, I knew that the soul could be interpreted through one's eyes, and my eyes rose to his. However, when I looked into his fierce face, I saw no window to his soul, as if my rejection of him had stripped him of his humanity.
"Please, Edward. Let me go."
"Never. This monster will have you. Every part of my being demands you: it will be satisfied, or it will take deadly vengeance on its frame," he said and bared his teeth. They were sharp and monstrous, and no amount of pleading could stop him. He bore those teeth into my flesh, tearing me apart, and sucked life away.
Fear gripped me in its hold, and I whimpered like a child, unable to speak. A moan escaped me, and I fell into an intoxicating sensation, drowning, succumbing to his every whim. His movements became mine. His desires overwhelmed me. Beguiled by this creature, my arms went limp, and my mouth opened again, lips forming an "o." Edward stopped. I fell to the floor with Edward on top of me, the sound of whimpering now a desolate cry, but not my cry. He covered me with gentle kisses. This creature who had devoured my Edward now drowned me in his tears. I held my hand to my neck to stop the blood from flowing.
"Forgive me," he said.
His hair tickled my face, and his arms held me tight. His hot breath whispered against me.
“I could bend her with my finger and thumb, but what good would it do if I tore her apart? If I crushed her? Consider those eyes, the resolute, free thing looking out of it, defying me. Whatever I do with its cage, I cannot get at it—the savage, beautiful creature. Build a prison and my outrage will only let the captive loose; the inmate would escape to heaven before I could call myself possessor of her. Catherine, comfort me. Rescue me from this monster that dominates me."
Edward lifted me from the floor, placed me on the sofa, shredded a blanket, and wrapped one part of it around my neck. He saw fear on my face, my eyes wide, and my voice silent as guttural cries escaped. I knew then what my Edward was, what he had been all along—a creature of the night that I had read about in gothic tales.
He leaned over and kissed me on the forehead. "Sleep now."
