Page 62 of Bound By Blood and Lies

“They’d been moving her between warehouses so no one could trace her,” she continues. “I thought it was…” She stops herself, shaking her head. “That part isn’t important right now.” Her fingers tighten around mine. “Anyway, when I was there Fisher came.”

“He did things to me,” she whispers. “He… he starved me,” she shakes her head, “he tortured me,” she gulps, “and raped me.”

Every word she says lands like another blade sliding slowly under my skin and carving deeper with each sentence. Heat crawls up the back of my neck as a violent pulse of anger makes my fingers curl tighter around hers. It feels like a thousand shallow cuts burning across my nerves as I sit there and listen to the things that were done to her. The urge to move and tear apart the world that allowed it to happen is so strong it makes my hands shake.

“That man is a dead” I snarl.

Fae just gives a small, tired smile and shakes her head. “He already is.”

This time it’s me who jolts back and my mouth drops open.

“Robyn killed him.”

The room goes quiet before I force my mouth closed as the words settle. For the first time since she started speaking, I don’t have anything to say. Sweet, happy Robyn… the girl who used to laugh at everything and prank everyone… killed Fisher.Good for her.A sense of relief slides through my chest despite the violenceof it, and the heaviness eases beneath my ribs at the knowledge that Fisher will never touch her again. He will never touch anyone again. Two of the three people who destroyed Fae’s life are already gone. Only one remains.

Fae must feel the shift in my body because she swallows before she looks back up at me. The tension in the room gathers again, and a crease forms between my brows as I realise she isn’t finished yet.

“The baby… might be his,” she whispers.

The words barely leave her mouth before her whole body begins to shake, like the effort of saying them has snapped the last thread holding her together. My stomach drops as nausea slams into me and the air in the room seems to suffocate me. I hold her gaze, forcing every inch of my expression to stay steady even as violent thoughts shift through my head. I feel my nostrils flare as I gulp before gently squeezing her fingers that are still wrapped in mine.

“That baby is mine,” I say with a lump in my throat.

She blinks. “You’re not listening…”

“No, Tink, you’re not listening. That baby is mine,” I repeat with a steadier voice this time even whilst my heart is trying to rearrange itself inside my chest. “Do you hear me?”

“Roman—” Her eyes fill again.

“I don’t give a single fuck whose DNA is running through their blood,” I continue quietly. “Their mummy is mine. That makes them mine too.” My hand moves instinctively to her stomach. “And I will die protecting both of you.”

Her entire face collapses in on itself.

The last of her composure shatters and she breaks down completely; sobs tearing out of her chest as the tension she’s been holding finally gives way. I pull her into me. This time she doesn’t resist. Her body melts into my hold like she’s finally run out of strength to keep fighting it, and her fingers clutch thefront of my shirt even as her shoulders shake with each broken breath. I hold her tighter and start swaying gently where we’re sitting, one hand moving slowly up and down her back in quiet, steady strokes.

The relief that settles through me is almost dizzying.

This.

This is what she’s been carrying.

All that fear. All that dread sitting behind her eyes since she walked back into this house. She thought this would be the thing that broke us. That this was the moment I would look at her differently.

My beautiful, silly Tinkerbell.

The realisation that I haven’t lost her moves through me like oxygen flooding a room that’s been starved of air. My lungs finally feel as though they can expand again as I hold her closer, letting the quiet certainty settle deep in my bones.

“Is that what you were scared of?” I ask quietly against her hair.

“Yes,” she whispers.

“I told you,” I murmur. “None of this was your fault. And I can’t wait to meet our baby.”

Her head lifts at that. Her bottom lip trembles as she reaches up and her hands come to cradle my face. Her fingers are warm against my skin and her thumbs brush lightly along my jaw whilst she studies me.

“I love you, Roman.”

My heart expands as emotion surges up so suddenly I have to clear my throat just to keep it under control. Since she disappeared, I’ve cried more times than I’ll ever admit out loud, and right now it takes real effort to stop it from happening all over again.