Page 146 of Decadence

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Page 146 of Decadence

“Sorry, just trying to shut my mind off.”

“What are you thinking?” His hand lightly rubbed circles along my back.

“Everything. The possible baby. My mom. How I’d love to have her here to talk to again.” Tears clogged my throat. “I miss her so much.”

Xaden brushed his lips across my forehead, letting me decide if I wanted to share or not. He’d had more loss than me and it wasn’t fair for me to burden him, but my emotions were out of whack. Was that a sign of being pregnant?

“I went a whole day without knowing she had died.” My throat constricted so hard I winced. “She’d been working a double-shift three days in a row and I threw a fit that she had forgotten my birthday. I snuck out of the apartment and hung out with my friends. We did stupid stuff like smoke and stole. I’d left my comm in my room on purpose. I wanted to punish her. Make her worry about where I was.”

He kept rubbing my back, not pressuring me with questions or prompting me to continue. I got the impression that he’d be satisfied with whatever I was willing to share. His compassion had me hiccupping a sob.

“It took the authorities ten hours to locate me and tell me the news. She’d fallen asleep at the wheel and the automatic drive failed.” My throat hurt, but I pushed through the pain. I had to get this out. Had to let him know what had happened. “Her vehicle hit a tree. They say she died instantly and didn’t feel anything, but I-I never wanted that. I only wanted her attention. If I hadn’t rebelled and been out all night, I might’ve stopped her. Could’ve heard how tired she was on the phone and picked her up.

“It’s my fault she’s dead. I never got to say goodbye. I was a selfish brat, and I killed my mom.” Tears spilled down my face as he held me.

I didn’t feel judged or like he was disgusted, but how could he not be?

“If I’d been a good daughter, she’d still be alive.”

“Shhh…” he murmured into my hair as he continued to stroke my back. “Your mother doesn’t blame you and neither do I. It was an accident, Riley. You could’ve done everything right and the accident still have happened. We can’t change the past.”

“I know, but it doesn’t stop me from wishing I could.”

Xaden squeezed me tighter to him. “You and me both, Riley. There are days where the ache to turn back time and fix all my mistakes eats at me. But even if I could, I’d make more wrongs.”

“But if you could have your parents back? To not have been captured—”

“Then I wouldn’t have met you.” He brushed his lips across mine. “And if you had done anything differently, you’d not be here either.”

“So, it’s almost like we were fated.”

“Yes, I guess you could say that. Does it bother you?”

I thought about his words and the way I felt so right in his arms despite all of our dire circumstances. “No.” I cupped his face, breathing in his scent of spicy whiskey, dark chocolate with a hint of tobacco had me in heaven. “I would go on a thousand alien speed dates to meet you.”

He chuckled, low and deep. “You, Riley, are one in a million.”

He kissed me softly and deeply until my toes curled. His hands stroked my back, then drifted down to grasp my ass. Inside, I was burning up to be with him again, but we couldn’t.

“We can’t,” I said against his lips, my voice full of anguish and longing.

He nodded, panting like me, and laid his forehead against mine.

If I wasn’t pregnant now, having sex again would certainly narrow the odds in the Roulex’s favor. And after what they’d done to Xaden, I didn’t want them anywhere near me or any baby I carried.

Baby.

Never thought I’d find the right guy to be in my life forever. Yet, here I was falling in love with an alien prisoner. But did he want that with me? I mean we were stuck in here until we could escape. What if he didn’t want a family? Wanted his freedom to do whatever he wanted like my dad?

“What is it, Riley?” he asked, pulling back to stare at me with those lush amethyst eyes framed with dark eyelashes.

“Nothing,” I lied, and his nose wrinkled like he smelled something bad.

“What aren’t you telling me?”

Everything. How I was fearful I was falling too hard and fast for him. For tomorrow. For being in the same position as my mom that I swore I’d never do. I’d had sex before and many boyfriends, but I'd taken precautions. All of those had been thrown out the window with Xaden.

I shrugged a shoulder, not able to answer him. Because if I opened my mouth, all of my insecurities would come spilling out. And either he’d laugh at me or he’d shake his head in disappointment that I allowed myself to get tangled up in emotions when what we had right now was because we were forced together. What if the drugs they’d shot us up with hindered our inhibitions and in the outside world, we wouldn’t be attracted like this?


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