Page 74 of Merciless Sinner

Pain was pleasure and pleasure pain, then insanity came and stole us.

I married the girl of my dreams.

But I know we don’t have the fairytale ending she dreamed of.

The ending I allowed myself to dream of, too.

I knew long ago that there was no one else for me but her, but when our families fell out, the dream slipped away from me, and I knew I had to fight to keep it alive.

Then fate struck in the worst way and took her away from me.

But she didn’t die.

I still have part of the dream. I just have to fight for the rest of it.

That’s why I’ve thought of taking her away for the next two days. Two days at a beach house in the Hamptons. It’s four in the morning, but I just booked it.

We leave later today. I got up after Olivia fell asleep and did some work so I wouldn’t fall behind.

The idea is as spontaneous as everything else I’ve done, and the timing might suck, but I don’t want her to look back at our wedding and think of the sad parts.

It’s not the honeymoon I saw in my dreams, but it’s something for the moment. The Hamptons is just two hours away from us. If I’m needed back here, I can be here.

I plan to make it up to her with a real honeymoon the first chance we get. I just wouldn’t feel comfortable going anywhere else, or too far, during this time.

And not while my mind is so preoccupied. You can’t have fun when you have danger hanging over your head.

The slight pad of footsteps cuts into my thoughts. They’re careful and quiet but there.

It’s not Eden. There’s no way she would be up at this hour for anything.

Moments later, my wife enters the kitchen, and my dick goes instantly hard, wanting her all over again.

She doesn’t see me straightaway because I have the light dimmed down so it almost looks like it’s off.

I’m also in the corner.

I watch her and wonder if she’s going to head to the basement again and try to escape me, mere hours after we got married.

She’s not dressed like she is. A flimsy nightshirt covers her body. But that might just be a prop for her plan.

I never know what her state of mind is. The moments when I get close are when I’m tasting her. Earlier, when I was inside her, I felt her, but she never allows me into her mind.

I’m sure she knows by now that she wouldn’t have succeeded that escape attempt. The woods she hoped to run into are also guarded and have cameras, but that’s not information I share with anyone. Not even Eden. That’s for her safety, too.

When Olivia walks over to the cupboard and takes out the tin of crackers, I almost sigh with relief.

But when I push away from the wall, I startle her, and she drops the tin and the crackers smash all over the floor.

I turn up the light, brightening the room, and stare back at her clutching her heart.

“Sorry,” I say, the word feeling strange on my tongue because I rarely say it in that capacity.

“You scared me half to death,” she gasps.

I move toward her, crouch down, and pick up the tin.

“Going on a walkabout again?” I push to my feet, towering her. She’s so tiny next to me, and with her hair scooped up in a ponytail, she looks teenage young.

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