Page 85 of Delirium
My hands itched to touch her smooth skin, to run my tongue over all the tattoos lining her body. Her boobs had grown in the last couple of months and her entire body was changing right in front of my eyes, preparing for our kids, and she had never looked more beautiful to me.
“Who was that?” she asked, pulling out one of my T-shirts and putting it on. “That sounded serious.”
“Seattle chapter,” I lied. I wanted this to be a surprise. I wanted to see how she would react. “I was just checking in on them.”
“And?” She turned around just after she put on her panties, forgoing a bra altogether. I knew that this would be a long, long day.
She grabbed a pair of pants from the closet, closing the doors then. “Everything seems quiet,” I answered, following her every movement. The tight pants left nothing to the imagination, and I groaned internally, battling against my own desires.
All I wanted was to stroll to her, take her in my arms and show her the burning desire living in my veins. But that would have to wait.
“I don’t like the quiet,” she said, pulling on her boots next. “It makes me nervous. It makes me think about what the other party is doing.”
“I’m the same,” I answered, taking her hand in mine as she walked toward me. “It’s been way too quiet, and even her letters have stopped.”
“You don’t think that somebody else got to her before us?”
“No.” I shook my head as we walked outside the room, heading downstairs. “We would have known, trust me. Someone would’ve talked by now. It bothers me that no one really knows who this person is.”
“I know,” she murmured, descending the stairs in front of me. “I hate that all of this is happening. Sometimes I still feel like a prisoner of my father, knowing that there’s someone out there, who doesn’t only want to hurt me, but our kids too.”
“We won’t let them,” I grunted, squeezing her hand as we came to the ground floor. “They won’t destroy this for us, trust me.”
“You can’t promise that, Stormy.” She smiled, looking over her shoulder at me. “You can’t promise that nothing will happen, when both of us know that things happen all the time, and sometimes we can’t stop them.”
“I know,” I agreed. “But I gotta try. I have to believe that we will be able to catch them before they do any real damage.”
I didn’t want us to talk about this, to bring up Belladonna today, but it was obvious that she needed reassurance, that she needed to talk about it.
“And if we don’t?” she asked just as we walked through the hallway. She was leading me toward the exit door without me having to tell her where to go.
“I don’t want to think like that,” I said. “I really don’t.”
Her eyes connected with mine, so many questions lingering in them, but she didn’t say another word. I knew she wanted to. I could see she wanted to argue, to think about the worst possible outcome, but I had to believe that things would work out in the end.
If I didn’t, I would succumb to the dark thoughts that were plaguing her as well, and where would that get us? One of us had to be strong right now, and if that had to be me, I would gladly take the brunt and push through. I worried as much as she did.
Maybe I couldn’t understand the motherly part of her worries, but I was terrified that things would go wrong. That we wouldn’t be able to get back from all of this and that all our efforts would be in vain, but we had to try.
“Kaiser!” Ophelia screeched as the little beast ran toward her, almost knocking her down as she crouched, opening her arms for him. She scratched behind his ears, on top of his head, over his body, while his tail wagged, his entire body wiggling as she showered him with love. “I’ve missed you so much.”
He barked playfully, as if to say that he missed her too.
She was cooped up in our room, avoiding everything and everyone, including him. While I knew that she didn’t want to do it, he couldn’t understand why it happened.
I stepped next to them, crouching down, my hand going to his soft fur. He shifted his attention from Ophelia to me. Before I could move back, he jumped up, pressing his paws to my shoulders and pushing me down to the ground.
“Oh, fuck!” I yelped as the little beast descended on me, showering me with his kisses, licking my face clean. “Kaiser!” I screeched, laughing as he stepped on top of my chest, his weight pressing down on me.
Ophelia’s melodic laughter echoed around us, joined by Zoe who kept snickering at me while the dog mauled me.
And with their laughter, with this big dog on top of me, I held onto that hope that we would all be okay in the end.
We had to be.
18
OPHELIA
