Page 42 of His Sweet Torment
“I love you,” he said softly, but then screamed with rage and grief as Frederick drove the knife into Padme’s side. She gasped at the pain of it, not wanting to cry out, or give Frederick Ingles the satisfaction. He looked pleased with himself anyway, wrenching the blade from her.
“Finally,” he breathed as if the act of stabbing Padme had released some kind of tension within him. He smiled at a raging, devastated Enver. “As I told Padme over and over, this was inevitable. Now, I’m going to enjoy this, as we take it slow.”
He drew back his arm to stab her again, but there was a sound of breaking the glass and a small red dot appeared on Frederick’s face, just beneath his right eye. He looked confused for a second then dropped like a stone, crumpling to the ground, his eyes open and staring. The red dot began to trail down his face – the bullet lodged in his brain. A sniper had taken him out – finally Frederick Ingles was dead.
Enver didn’t hesitate. He lurched forward towards a bleeding Padme and untied her from the chair, pulling her into his arms. A second later, Lisa, Arlo Forrester and a bunch of black-clothed men burst into the room. Enver gaped at them all for a second, then turned his attention back to his lover.
Padme held her hand over her stab wound, pressing down, keeping the blood inside. She looked up at him with frightened eyes. “The baby,” she whispered, and in that second, all that mattered to Enver was getting his beloved Padme to a hospital and saving their future together.
Dale was getting used to the wheelchair now, and so when no nurses were looking, he scooted down to Padme’s room. She was laying on top of her bed, looking bored, but grinned when she saw him.
“You’ll get in trouble.”
“I don’t care,” he said, grinning. “You look better.”
Padme nodded. “Much. It wasn’t that deep, but they’re keeping me for observation. The baby is fine though, the little slugger that she is.”
“It’s a girl?”
Padme grinned. “I don’t know that for sure, I just feel it. Anyway, how about you? You getting out of that thing anytime soon?”
Dale shrugged. “Looks like. I have to say, I’m kind of sick of hospitals at the moment.”
“I’ll bet. Dale, look, I’m…”
“If you say you’re sorry one more time, Pad, I will kick your ass. From this wheelchair.”
“Try it, bitch.” But she grinned at him. Dale glanced around the room.
“Where’s Enver? Thought you two were joined at the hip?”
Padme laughed. “At the groin, actually.”
“T.M.I.”
She chuckled. “Severin wrestled him into submission and made him go to her house for food, a shower, and some rest. God, it sounds so good to say that. So good to know we can now move freely around, be open…god,heaven.”
“Yeah, because it must have been so rough in TheMaldives,” Dale looked at her askance, and she grinned, acquiescing.
“It is paradise, I won’t argue that, but you weren’t there. My family is here, Dale.”
Dale smiled at her. “I had heard about a move to Italy. We’re not there, either.”
“The difference being you could come there, doofus.”
“I know.”
They sat in companionable silence for a few minutes then Dale said. “You haven’t mentioned him.”
Padme sighed. “Henry? No. I don’t want to hear his name, speak it or talk about him.”
“His trial will be something.”
Padme nodded grimly. “Bastard.”
“Yes.”
Padme’s expression cleared. “Enough of him. The future is all that matters now.”
