“I don’t know up from down with you,” I say, my voice a whisper. “I don’t understand what’s happening. What to believe. Who to trust.”
“I’ll tell you, Isabelle. You choose me. You trust me.”
“You have me chained, Jericho. Literally chained. How can I trust you?”
He grips my hair, lifts my head, and turns it, forcing me to look at him. “My chains will keep you safe. My chains will keep our baby safe.”
Our baby.
My God. What a mess we’ve made.
I exhale, tears pouring from my eyes, my lips salty with them. He kisses me and I think he must taste them too, those tears. It’s what he wanted when he took me. To watch me cry. To bleed me.
I hear the whip drop to the floor and he’s behind me, pushing the hair off my neck, kissing along my shoulder, my jaw. He nudges my legs wider and a moment later, he’s inside me.
“Trust me, Isabelle. You need to trust me. To choose me.”
Choose him.
He thrusts into me, wrapping one arm around my middle to lay the flat of his hand over my belly, over our baby. The other he slips between my legs, expert fingers finding my clit, knowing just how to manipulate it.
“I want to,” I tell him. It’s true. I do want to.
“Then do. I won’t hurt you. Haven’t I already told you that? I choose you.”
I choose you.
He draws his arms to either side of my own and a moment later, I’m free of the chains. He’s turning me, holding me. I cling to him, my back to the altar, my legs wrapped around him, our mouths locked, eyes open.
“I won’t hurt you,” he says again.
“You promise?”
“I promise. You just have to choose me. Be mine. Only mine.”
I want to believe him. I need to. Because this is too hard. And so I nod, closing my eyes, and holding tight to him as the first wave of orgasm comes. I drop my head into the crook of his neck, his skin salty against my tongue. I moan, coming and feel him come, feel him shudder. I think about this act in this chapel, this holy place. I think about Draca and Nellie. What he did to her in this same place. And I think maybe one cancels out the other. Love canceling out hate.
Love.
Love overwriting hate.
Choose me... I choose you.
I feel fresh tears slip from my eyes. Warm and wet and sad. Because I think I love him. I know I do. And I also know that when he says he won’t hurt me, it has nothing to do with my heart. I am chained to him. I am his prisoner. His. But there’s too much history between us for anything close to love. Centuries worth. And even if he wants to choose me, I don’t think Jericho St. James can put his vengeance aside to love me.
21
Jericho
I don’t bother to knock before I walk into Zeke’s office after taking Isabelle to bed. I can’t think about what happened between us tonight. Can’t process it. I meant what I said. I won’t hurt her. I won’t let anyone else hurt her either. I choose her. But that choice is wrought with too much history. Too much tragedy.
The night I took her it was my intention to use her for my vengeance. But everything is different. Every single thing. And I don’t look at her like I should. Like I meant to. I care about her, and it has nothing to do with her carrying my baby. It’s her.
Zeke pushes back from his desk and looks at me like he was expecting this.
“What were you doing out there with my wife?”
“What do you think I would be doing?”
“I don’t know, Zeke. You tell me. Because you keep a lot of secrets.”
He snorts, gets to his feet. “Isn’t that the trademark of our family?” he says, moving around the desk to stand inches from me. He has never been cowed by me. I sometimes wonder if he wouldn’t like a fight. Get some of that old anger out. My brother has always been my equal in size and strength. At least since we were adults. He was skinnier than me when he was a kid. Like he and Zoë seemed to split the weight between them until they were about fourteen. That’s when he started to grow into himself. Zoë remained petite, developing slowly. She was still a girl when she died.
Zoë. Shit. I miss my scrawny, goofy little sister. Not that she was that way toward the end. In the half year leading up to her suicide she’d grown so quiet and secretive. Dark. The few times I tried to reach her I couldn’t. I wonder if I hadn’t given up she’d be here today.
I shake my head. To think of that is like drowning. I can’t dwell in that place. On the waste of it. The loss of her. I couldn’t save her. I couldn’t save Kimberly. Now there’s Isabelle who needs saving. Will I fail her too? My track record would suggest so.
I push my hand into my hair and step away from Zeke. “Why were you out there?”
“It’s where I always go when I come home.”
“The chapel?”
He shakes his head. “The graveyard.”
He’s a better man than me. I’ve never made visiting Zoë or Kimberly my priority. I realize how shitty that makes me. “Leaving flowers at their graves.”
He nods.
“Dad’s too?” I ask, needing to deflect my own lack.
He slaps his hand to my chest and shoves me. “Fuck you, brother.”
I grab his wrist. “What were you doing with my wife?”
He tugs free. “Your wife was already there. In the chapel. I saw the candles were lit and went inside to investigate only to find Isabelle there.”
He’s not lying. I can see that. He’s never lied to me. That goes both ways. But we do keep secrets and secrets are as bad as lies.
“She went to the chapel on her own?”
He nods. “Catching up on her reading.”
I feel my breathing tighten.
“She’s all right?” he asks.
I study him understanding his meaning. He knew what I would do tonight. He’s read Draca’s diary. We all have. “I said I wouldn’t go that far. I didn’t lie.”
“But you wanted to scare her.”
I don’t answer because what kind of devil would admitting that make me? I already know the monster I am. No need to admit it to my brother.
“You know, Draca St. James wasn’t one to idolize either, brother,” he says. “But you have a bad track record when it comes to choosing your gods, don’t you?”
Dad. He means dad. And I remember our last conversation in my study. I remember how that conversation moved from dad to Zoë. To her death. To him finding her hanging in the cellar. And again, that nagging feeling returns. It should have been me. I was the older brother. I should have found her and spared him that.
“What did he do to her?” I ask and I swear he knows exactly what I’m talking about. I see it on the lines that etch his face, in the darkness that casts shadows from inside him. It’s when I see the similarities between him and Zoë. The only time. For a moment, I just watch as my brother breaks. Just for a split second I see it. I see the fissure that’s been there for years. Deep. Deepening. The one he’s so good at hiding beneath a casual, cool exterior.
“Leave it,” he says in an almost unrecognizable voice. He clears his throat. Stands up straighter. “We have a more urgent problem.” He reaches into his pocket for something. He opens his palm and I see a cigarette butt.