As it was, Calix had converted the bedroom directly across the hall to ours, into an office so he could do as much work as possible from home. He’d bought me an ereader and allowed me to download to my heart’s content - I did. I had a countless number of books on my to be read list, and whenever Calix was working in the office, I would snuggle up in the reading corner he’d made me in the room, and I would read. Again, I know this sounds odd, but being away from him is physically difficult for me now.
My mind flashed back to the day we’d flown home and my vision glazed over as I replayed our conversation.
“Nova, I need for you to understand something.” Calix placed his hand on my thigh and squeezed gently. I knew this action was supposed to lend me a comfort of some sort, but I didn’t feel comfortable. I was worried. I was worried there was something very wrong and I was worried, because we were flying home and I was terrified of losing the bliss I had found with Calix while on our honeymoon once we’d returned home.
“What do you need me to understand?” I struggled to force the question from the confines of my throat.
His blue eyes fell into my lap where his hand rested on my thigh. “I want for you want everything with me.”
I felt my brows furrow as I stared into his face, trying to find an understanding there in his expression for his very confusing words. When I found nothing, I whispered. “I do want everything with you.”
“You don’t.” He looked up at me and I sensed a harshness in his tone that I hadn’t known in weeks.
“How can you say that?” I asked softly, trying to ignore my hurt. “I don’t understand.”
“Do you want a family with me, Nova?”
I gasped. “Do you mean,”
“A child.” He didn’t allow me the time to finish. “Do you want a child with me?”
“Calix,” I breathed his name. “I,”
Calix took that moment to lower himself to his knees before me. I had never seen this man so desperate for anything. I had never seen a man - any man - so desperate for something, the way Calix appeared to be desperate for a child, in my life.
“Nova,” he twined his fingers through mine on my lap. “Give me a reason to let go of it all. Give me a reason to be a better man, love.”
“You think a child could be that reason?” I frowned through my abhorrence. I’d heard of people having a baby in a foolish hope to better their relationship, to trap a straying significant other, to have something that would never leave and that would love them unconditionally - but this, knowing someone wanted a child to better themselves - that was a new kind of messed-up for me.
I shook my head. “Calix, I can’t.”
He lowered his forehead to my knees. When I heard him speak again, the words, like so many words this man spoke, chilled me. “Give me a family, Nova, and I’ll forgive your father his actions.”
It’s been two weeks since that moment on the plane. We haven’t spoken of our conversation or my lack of a reply to him. However, although I hadn’t spoken of it, didn’t mean I hadn’t thought of it. I did.
Every. Single. Day.
Calix wanted me to give him a family in exchange for him to let go of his need for revenge toward my father - my family. I wanted to. I really did want to give Calix a child, but I just couldn’t wrap my head around his reasoning. It wasn’t right - and if I was being one hundred percent honest with myself, at only twenty-one years old, I wasn’t exactly ready for a child.
The thought of giving Calix a child terrified me. I was stone cold petrified of giving someone like Calix - someone who was so hard - something so precious as a child.
“Nova?” His deep voice interrupted my thoughts as he spoke from behind his desk. Blinking away my thoughts, I looked up at him. “What are you reading, love?”
“Reading?” I blinked again as I looked down at the sleeping screen of my kindle. “Um,”
I watched as Calix rose from behind his desk to move toward me. “Yes, reading.” He pointed to my kindle.
“Um,” I glanced down once more at the screen and spoke. “I’m reading The Boy Who Sneaks In My Bedroom Window by Kristy Moseley.”
He raised a brow. “Is it good?”
“Very.” And I wasn’t lying. I’d read this book before - at home. Jaylah had gone completely fan girl over it and I wanted to know what all the fuss was about, so I’d read it.
“Are you hungry?” He asked, his eyes sweeping over my face.
“No.” I shook my head. “My tummy is still feeling a little off, but I am tired.”