Page 81 of Cruel Love
A lump of steel landed heavily in my gut.“Who killed him?”
She met my eyes across the table, her face stoic.“You did.”
Chapter 28
Willow
James had been gone for four days, and with each passing day, myworry grew.
We were on a deadline. The end of the set time he’d beengiven by his father was looming, and instead of taking every opportunity to put a baby in me, James had disappeared to god only knew where.
Since he’d told me about the ultimatum at his mom’s wake,thatwasall I could think about, and my fear of what would happen if we didn’t succeed in getting me pregnant built to epic proportions.
So much sothatI was barely sleeping.
On day five when James still hadn’t returned home, I dragged mytired ass out to the garden with a blanket and my notepad and pen, hoping to lose myself in writing a story to ease the anxiety dominating my every waking thought.
Finding my secluded spot, I tried to start writing, but with the warmsun beating down on me, my eyelids grew heavy. Ditching my pen and paper, I stretched out on the blanket and rested my head on my arms before closing my eyes and willing sleep to come,evenif it was only for a few minutes.
I didn’t know how much time had passed when my eyes flutteredopen, but the sun was no longer high in the sky, and long afternoon shadows spread across the grounds from the surrounding trees.
Slowly, I sat up, blinking the sleep out of my eyes, and finally feeling alittle less jaded. When a dark shadow fell over me, I spun around, expecting to see James, but my excitement quickly turned to fear when someone I didn’t expect to see loomed over me.
“Hello, Willow. You know, you should be more careful of where youfall asleep. You never know when danger is lurking,”Elijah said ominously, an amused smirk on his face.
I jumped to my feet, my panicked gaze searching the groundsaround us, but since finding this spot, I’d never seen any of James’ staff walking through this part, and I knew now would be no different.
“Aren’t you going to say hello back?”Elijah said, taking a stepforward. Nervously, I took a step back.“What’s the matter? Cat got your tongue?”
I swallowed.“J…James wouldn’t want me to talk to you,”I stuttered,trepidation gripping me hard.
“Ah, that’s right. You do everything James tells you, don’t you?”hesneered, the amusement glinting in his eyes fading, only to be replaced with something far more menacing.“Such a good little girl. Tell me, don’t you ever get bored of doing everything he tells you to do?”
He took another step forward, and I took another one back, my barefeet stepping off the blanket and pressing into the grass.“Wh…what are you doing here? James is away.”
He smirked.“Oh, I know. I’m not here to see James. I’m here to seeyou.”
Anxiety knotted in my stomach, and I couldn’t help but flinch whenhe reached out to tuck a strand of hair behind my ear.“I want to know why you lied.”
The knot pulled tighter.“Lied about what?”I replied, doing my best toplay dumb.
But it wasn’t good enough.
“Lied about the baby. You’re notreallypregnant, are you?”
“Yes, I am,”I protested, but it was a feeble attempt.
He closed the gap between us again, only now, a sense offoreboding had me frozen on the spot. Elijah towered over me, glaring down with daggers in his eyes.“No, you’re not. And want to know how I knowthat?”I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t bring myself toevenshake my head.“I knowthatbecause ever since you came to this house, Edith has been putting birth control pills into your meals.”
An accomplished smirk took over his face as my jaw dropped to thefloor, his eyes lighting up with malice.“You have no idea how miserable she was working for James. All it took was the offer of a few million dollars, enough for her to live the rest of her life with people servingher,instead of her having to serve my asshole cousin, and she was more than happy to do what I wanted.”He paused and looked at his watch.“She left a few minutes ago, her plane to Australia leaves in less than thirty minutes. By the time James discovers what she’s done, she’ll be long gone.”
A reply lodged in my throat, and all I was capable of doing was tostare back at Elijah in complete disbelief, my mind reeling with his confession as Edith’s face flashed in my head. She’d always been cold toward me, but the way she spoke to mewas the same way she spoke to James. I’d always assumed it was her mannerism, it never occurred to methatshe hated working for him.
“Let me fill in the blanks for you, sweetheart. You look a littleconfused,”he said, his tone mocking.“James has something I want, and the only thing stopping me from getting it…”He took another step forward, closing the last remaining space between us.“Is you.”
All hint of amusement fell from his face, and the terror poundingthrough my body seeped right into the marrow of my bones.“If you had his child, the only thing I’ve ever wanted would disappear right in front of me. And I couldn’t allowthatto happen, so I took necessary precautions to make sure you couldn’t get pregnant.”
My head spun, and I swayed when it occurredto methatElijah was telling me this without concernthatI would tell James when he returned home.
