Page 82 of Outcast’s Vow

“Yeah,” I reply. “It’s not bad at all.”

Baptiste takes another sip of his wine. I see something shift in his demeanor. A tremor. A momentary lapse.

It’s so minor. So insignificant. Maybe no one else would notice. But me, now that I’m beginning to know him – now that I am his wife – I notice.

And I take his hand.

“The struggles you must’ve gone through. They must’ve been so hard.”

Baptiste shrugs. It’s disingenuous.

“Life is life.”

“Don’t be modest. You worked hard, Baptiste. Harder than most people.”

He looks at me and nods.

“Yeah, I did.”

He exhales.

Every moment I spend with him contains a new revelation about who my husband truly is.

“I’ve never had to experience hardship like that,” I mutter.

“Everyone has struggles,” Baptiste replies, still trying to shrug it off. “What about you? What fears do you have?”

I take a drink of my wine and tighten my lips.

“It’s irrational, but I worry about my place at the university. That I’d be cast out and forced to work for Father’s shipping business. I know that’s what awaits me if he’d have his way and you weren’t around. I’d have no freedom, which is the one thing that terrifies me above anything else.”

“It won’t happen.”

“You can’t be so sure. That dark future is always there, lingering.”

“I am not your father,” Baptiste says. “With me, you can do anything, Sylvie. Pursue anything. Fulfill your dreams. I simply want you to be happy.”

“You can be happy too, Baptiste. You might’ve had to work hard to be where you’re at, but you can also let yourself be happy.”

He pauses.

“I like this,” he says.

“Like what?”

“I like how you’re trying to take care of me.”

His voice is barely even audible now.

“I want to take care of you,” I reply. “The way you take care of me.”

He swallows. His eyes flash with something raw.

My husband places his hand on my leg again. The electricity shoots through me. And then his fingers start to travel up. We’re in a bar full of people, but no one can see what he’s doing to me under the table.

Despite my body’s reaction to his touch, there’s an even deeper connection between us than merely the physical. Tonight, we’ve shared deep, dark secrets with each other that we’ve never shared with anyone else.

And that is so incredibly sexy.