Page 113 of Possessive Mafia Vows

Falling…

Choking sobs stick in my throat, clogging my airways and making my chest heave as I struggle to fill my lungs. Everything hurts. I need to move before the wind and the sea drag me away, but sitting up requires too much effort. My face feels as though it has been impaled on a sharp rock, and when I open my eyes, I find myself staring at a sheer wall of jagged stone.

Lying perfectly still, I begin with my toes, trying to get my bearings. I’m saturated from the rain, but I’m not submerged, which means that I’m not in the sea. I try to consider this a bonus, but it isn’t much consolation. I’m lying on my stomach. I can move my feet, but I’m scared to go too far for fear that I’ll start falling again.

The fingers on my left hand flex, scritch-scratching against icy rock. It’s my right arm that sends spears of blinding white pain shooting through me.

Then a griping pain twists my stomach into knots, and a cry escapes my lips.

The baby.

I can’t lose the baby. The universe can throw any kind of shit it wants at me, but not this.Please, not this…

On the edge of the cliff, I knew that I would do whatever it took to save Kyle, but now there’s our baby to protect too. Kyle might call me his leoin, his lioness, but he hasn’t seen anything yet. Because if anything happens to our child, I’ll scale this cliff with my bare hands and rip Nick Morris’s heart out of his chest myself. With my teeth if I must.

Gritting my teeth against the spears of pain, I drag my right arm close to my side and shield it against my body. Then, a fraction of an inch at a time, I pull my left arm under me and prepare to support my upper body. Another dull wrenching pain blossoms in my abdomen, and I force myself to ignore it.

If I can sit up, everything will be okay. I’ll save our baby. All I need to do is sit up, get my bearings, and wait for Kyle to rescue me.

That’s the mantra I repeat inside my head as I use my left arm as leverage to raise my head from its rocky pillow. Slowly. My face comes away from the sharp flinty point glueing me to the ground, and I feel the trickle of warm blood on my cheek. I’m facing the cliff, so the rain is pummeling my back, offering my face a momentary respite.

Until I twist my neck and peer out across the foaming choppy sea.

Every part of my body tries to curl up into a ball and pretend that I’m somewhere far away. With the needle-sharp rain still hammering the cliff, it’s impossible to see where the ominous black sea and the storm-riddled sky merge. It’s like a scene from a Gothic horror story where the main character is plunged into a world filled with shades of gray, and where every sound is a threat.

However, it seems that when I rolled over the side of the cliff, a ledge broke my fall and saved my life.

But the drop beneath me to the lethal rocks below is even more frightening than the view from the window of the mansion. Because now, all that stands between me and a certain death is anarrow bed of rock, and the wind is an angry fucking bitch who has just been cheated out of claiming my life.

My heart is pounding against my ribs, yelling at me to get the fuck away from the edge. In response, the wind unleashes its wrath and curls around me with the intention of dragging me over the side and hurling me to my death.

Panic takes hold. Sobs erupt inside my chest and lodge inside my throat, but I push myself backwards, staring out at the sea, praying that it will take pity on me. I’ve come too far to give up now. This isn’t my time to die.

“It isn’t my time to die,” I murmur to the universe. Louder, “It isn’t my time to die!”

If it was, I wouldn’t be here now.

A cramp in my abdomen jolts me back to the ledge with a bone-shattering thump. I slide my left arm underneath my body, careful not to make any sudden movements or to raise my body too far above the ledge and let the gusty wind in.

I cradle my belly. “Hang on in there, baby. I’ve got you.”

Another sound competes against the wind for my attention, making every hair on my body stand on end. I press myself against the rocks behind me, straining my ears.

Nothing.

Then I hear it. It sounds like voices.

“Sienna!”

I recognize it instantly, and a sob escapes my lips. “Kyle?” The wind snatches the name and flies away with it as if it too, knows this is my lifeline.

“Sienna! Don’t move! I’m coming to get you!”

I can’t be sure if this is what I heard or if I’m imagining it, manifesting my own escape route in my head. But I have no intention of going anywhere.

Instead, I close my eyes and pretend that I’m sitting on a sandy beach on a warm summer’s day. The sun is high in the sky. The breeze is gentle, caressing my bare arms with the salty air stolen from the water’s surface. I tilt my face towards the brochure-blue sky and soak up the sun’s rays, feeling the energy coursing through my veins.

In my dream, Kyle wades out of the shallows, water dripping from his hair and his tattooed chest. My sex instinctively clenches at the vision. Other heads turn as he walks up the beach to where I’m sitting on a striped towel spread across the sand. He has eyes only for me, and when he smiles, I tingle from head to toe.

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