Page 18 of The Sins of Saint (The Sins of Saint 3)

“You think this is easy?” He let out a mocking laugh. “Nothing about your presence in my goddamn life has been easy.”

“Good.”

He pulled his hands from his pockets and roughed them through his hair. “Don’t you fucking get it, Mila? Are you so goddamn stubborn, or just plain stupid?”

His words cut like knives.

“I don’t want you here. I don’t want this baby.”

“I don’t believe that.” I lightly shook my head, clenching my jaw to keep the tears from falling. “I don’t believe that for a second.”

“Well, maybe you should.”

“You’re just scared,” I countered. “Which is why I didn’t leave. Everything about our future is uncertain. You don’t have control over our lives, over your life, and that scares the shit out of you.”

He snorted, acting aloof as his gaze dropped to the wilting lilies and broken glass. “I see you decided to redecorate.”

“I was trying to create a visual of my insides.”

“Always the drama queen.” His eyes settled on me, blue sapphires shimmering with cruelty. I’d be fooling myself if I said it didn’t scare me.

“I don’t get it.” He narrowed his eyes, sucking his bottom lip into his mouth as he studied me, a subtle, alcohol induced sway in his stance. “There was a time you wanted nothing more than your freedom, to get away from me. And now that you have the chance, you’re choosing to stay. Is it because you’re knocked up? You’d rather stay with a criminal and a monster than raise a child on your own?”

I crossed my arms and refused to dignify his absurd question with an answer.

For the longest time we just stood there, staring at each other, my heart slowly crawling up my throat. The weight inside my gut was wearing me down while warning prickled the back of my skull. I was scared. But not of him, or what he’d do. I was afraid of where this would end, where this conversation would lead us.

“Saint—”

“You wanted to know where I was tonight. I was at a bar, getting drunk—”

“I can smell that.”

He stepped closer. “And during my time bonding with a bottle of bourbon, this pretty little blonde socialite basically spread her legs for me right there on her motherfucking chair.”

Words that became knives carved through my chest, sharp blades slicing through my heart. I could feel blood drain from my soul, replaced with an emptiness that grew with every word that oozed from his tongue.

I held my breath. “Did you—”

He shrugged. “I guess you’ll never know.”

“Stop, okay? Just stop.”

“Why? Huh, Mila? Why should I stop?” He grabbed my shoulders and forced me to look at him. “You’ve always known I was this man, this selfish bastard who only uses people to get what I want. Did you really think simply because I liked fucking you, professed my love for you, that it would change me? That I would become a better man? A man worthy of being your husband and the father of your unborn child?”

I hated the look in his eyes. I hated the way he looked at me with such emptiness, as if he felt nothing. As if he didn’t give a shit whether he hurt me. My entire body ached, and all I wanted to do at that moment was crawl into a corner and let the pain swallow me whole. But I was stronger than that.

I swallowed my tears and looked him in the eye. “I love you, Saint. And I know you love me. That’s all that matters right now. The rest, we can figure out together—”

“Would you fucking stop!” He let go of me with a jerk. “Stop trying to romanticize this fucked-up relationship we have.”

“Saint, I know that with this pregnancy, and everything that’s happened…you’re scared of—”

“You keep saying that.” He narrowed his eyes. “I’m not scared, Mila. In fact, I couldn’t be happier about this pregnancy than I am right now.”

“But you just said five minutes ago that you don’t want this baby?”

“Oh, I don’t want the baby.” He leaned closer, and menace slithered through the lines on his face. I knew the words that were about to pour out of his mouth would be destructive. Murderous. I could feel brutality radiating off him.

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