Page 84 of Broken Doll

I haven’t helped at all. The email that Jack sent was just more pictures of Hope, with the wordsI will have her again, and you can't stop me. Find me, or you lose her.

Reading what I'd just received from Jack pushed me over the edge and I know that I shouldn't have snapped at Hope, and now she's scared of me, that's the last thing I wanted.

“You want to go talk to her?”

“And say what?”

“How about you try and find out what the doctor said to her?”

The only thing I seem to be doing is upsetting her tonight. Passing Jackson my cigarette, I head upstairs and pray that I don’t do it again.

I stand by the door; she's not in her usual spot by the window. "Hope?" I take a step in and see her sitting in the corner of the room with her knees close to her, head on her arms. I can hear her crying, and my heart aches for her. I walk over to her slowly and kneel. "Hope?" She sits up and moves away from me a little. "Why are you not sitting by the window?"

“You think he’s not got eyes on the house? He has, he’s watching me,” she tells me without looking up.

“Are you scared of me?”

Her silence tells me my answer. “No.”

Sitting in front of her, I place my hands on hers. “The last thing I want is for you to be scared of me, Hope. I never want you to fear me. I meant what I said, I love you and I won’t, Ican’tlet anything happen to you." I place my head on her hands, and I feel one of them move. She runs it through my hair. "Hope, please talk to me."

“I want it to end.”

Lifting my head a little, my chin still on her hand, I bring my hand to her cheek and wipe the tears away. I know she wants all this to end, but the moment she got off the phone to the doctor something changed in her.

“It will, but you have to know that I can’t put you in any danger.” I slowly stroke her face with my thumb. “If anything were to happen to you, then…” the words get stuck in my throat as just the thought of her getting hurt knots my insides.

“I’m pregnant.”

My hand freezes on her face, my head shoots up as I sit up straight. Did I just hear her right? No child should be around me. I can't bring any light into that child's life. The only thing that comes from me is darkness; a darkness that shouldn't be around a baby.

“I thought—”

“Doctor Adams said that my medication was a lot stronger and ended up overpowering my implant. I’m sorry. This is my fault.” Her eyes are rimmed red and wide with fear.

"How is this your fault? I still should have used protection." How could I have been so stupid? When the hell do I have sex without protection? I know that I should be happy for her, not to scare her away even more, but at the moment I don't even know how to process this, something that I never wanted, something I never once thought about having. Now it's happened, and my head is all over the place.

“I’m sorry,” she tells me again with a trembling lip and tears streaming down her cheeks.

I shake my head at her. “Hope, can you please come downstairs and eat something? If not for yourself, for our baby.”

She wipes her face, and I help her up. I wrap my arms around her. "Did you think I would have done something bad when you told me?"

"Yes. Uncle Jack beat me. He beat me for three days, didn't feed me and…" She starts sobbing into my chest, her whole body shakes, and her legs weaken.

That bastard got her pregnant then killed the baby and could have killed Hope. He gets sicker by the day and my hate for him increases even more.

Cupping her face, I make her look at me. "I love you Hope, and I promise you one thing, everythingwillwork out this time.”

Wrapping her hands around me tighter, she buries her head into me again. “I’m sorry. I know this shouldn’t be happening.”

“Don’t be sorry.” I take in a deep breath. I just need a moment to process all of this. It’s a lot more to take in than I thought. “Let’s go down to eat.”

* * *

Standing in the kitchen as I finally got Hope to eat something, I let out a big sigh.She’s pregnant.

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Jackson says as he hands me a beer and a lit cigarette. The smoke in my lungs has never felt so good.

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