Page 63 of Inheritance
I held her gaze, heart tightening. “No,” I whispered. “I wouldn’t.”
Her shoulders slumped. She exhaled, shaky. “Exactly. So why do they expect me to move on like Ivan means nothing?”
Her voice broke on the last word. She buried her face in her hands. I placed my hand on her back, rubbing slow, soothing circles. I scooted closer, giving myself a few seconds to think.
“I don’t think anyone wants to take your love away,” I said gently. “It’s just that your family values your safety more than your feelings.”
“They’re all killers. Gabriel loves killing people just like Ivan does. How is it any different?”
“…Gabriel doesn’t love killing people.”
Her laugh was sharp and hollow. “Oh, please. You think Ivan is evil, but Gabriel isn’t? Damien isn’t? They’re all the same, even Isabelle.”
“Your brothers and sister aren’t evil,” I said.
She rolled her eyes.
“I guess the problem is how Ivan treated you. How he treated me.”
She blinked. “You were his prisoner. I am his wife.”
I shook my head. “On paper, yes, but?—”
“No. I am, and always will be, his wife.”
She looked unhinged.
“Do you think it’s right for a husband and wife to be separated?”
“No, but it isn’t that?—”
“Yes or no.” She interrupted.
I hesitated. “No.”
“Would you stop two people who love each other from being together?”
“Caroline.”
“Yes or no?” she pressed.
“No.”
A faint smirk appeared—then faded. The sadness in her eyes vanished, replaced by something else. Something intense.
“Do you promise that’s how you feel?”
“I promise,” I said, the word sinking cold in my chest. As if answering her in yes or no stripped everything down to a single truth—as if she could make me to accept her entire perspective by forcing me to answer through the narrow frame she’d built.
Her smirk returned, darker. “Good.”
She rose as if none of this just happened, and an empty wine bottle clattered to the floor when her knee brushed the nightstand.
“Whoopsie.” She staggered to the vanity, nearly falling over, fingers closing around a pack of makeup wipes. Maybe that was all this was—a desperate need to be understood, to make someone else agree she wasn’t wrong to be in love.
She glanced at me through the mirror after drunkenly cleaning her face with a daring glint in her eye, as she pinned her hair into a bun and started applying foundation.
“What are you putting makeup on for?” I asked lightly, stepping closer. “It’s pretty late.”
