His Pregnant Christmas Bride(57)
He’d cross that threshold for the last time. When he left, he’d have no more reason to go on living.
At long last, she opened the door, and any lingering hope that he’d been wrong was incinerated under the inescapable proof of her desolation. She looked as finished as he felt.
His heart about to ram out of his rib cage with the need to take her in his arms, to beg her not to recede, not to shut him out of her heart, he met her bloodshot, swollen eyes.
“Why?” At his butchered groan, she said nothing, her breathing becoming strident. He broke down then, begged, “Is there anything I can do to make you love me again?”
She staggered back as if he’d hit her.
Surging forward to abort her stumble, he grabbed her arm, but she jerked it back as if he’d electrified her.
His arms fell limply to his side, crippled by a defeat he hadn’t even felt when he’d been young and helpless and at the nonexistent mercy of the monsters who’d imprisoned him.
Breath emptied from his chest, for what felt like the last time. “I guess I was always waiting for this, for you to come to your senses.”
Shaking, starting to sob, she fell to the bed. Dropping her head in her trembling hands, she rocked to and fro, moaning as if her soul was bleeding out of her.
He kneeled in front of her before he collapsed, his own soul escaping him with the tears he’d never shed since he was a child except on her account.
“Don’t, Anastasia, don’t do this to yourself. Don’t feel sorry for me, or feel bad because you gave me hope or made me a promise. I beg you. Don’t languish in bed, don’t lock yourself from the world to escape your life altogether because I’m in it. I left you once when I thought I’d only bring you danger and anxiety and misery. I’ll leave again, because I only want you to be happy and at peace. I just came to tell you this. That I’ll always be there for you, and for our child, in any way you let me. But if it hurts you this much to see me, you don’t have to see me ever again.”
Her weeping escalated with her inability to draw full breaths anymore. Unable to bear her anguish, he exploded up to his feet and stumbled towards the door.
His shaking hand was on the doorknob when Anastasia’s words hit him like a bullet between the shoulder blades.
“I’ll tell you why. I owe you that. When you know, it will be you who won’t ever want to see me again.”
* * *
Anastasia watched Ivan turning around, hating her very existence even more for the destruction and defeat marring his face and slumping his body. Desecrating his soul. She’d done this to him.
Before she lost all ability to speak, she told him everything. The atrocious, crippling truth.
All through the account she tore out of the depths of her desperation and shame, he remained leaning against the wall as if he’d been riveted there, staring at her as if he couldn’t understand a word she said.
By the time she reached the most relevant part, she felt she’d never stop weeping again. “I l-loved my mother until I learned of the heinous crime she’d committed against you. Now I h-hate her...want her punished. I need you to promise me you will punish her. I need you to punish me. I can’t live knowing my life has been bought at the expense of yours.”
Ivan continued to stare at her. And stare at her.
Then he finally pushed himself away from the wall, came closer with such care, as if she was holding a knife to her own throat and he was afraid she’d slit it if he moved any faster.
His voice was so hushed it was almost inaudible as he rasped, “Do you mean you still love me?”
“God, Ivan, is this the only thing you got out of everything I told you?”
“It’s the only thing of any importance.”
“No, God, no, you’re not doing this. You’re not brushing this aside. You’re not refusing to avenge yourself again.”
“You know I never wanted that. I forgave my parents even before I knew they had no hand in what happened to me.”
“They’re your parents. It’s up to you to forgive them. But she’s my mother, and you don’t get to forgive her. I don’t. Do you hear me? I will never forgive her. I’m leaving this house tomorrow and I’m never coming back.”
He was kneeling before her again, his eyes clearing of the ravages of the tears that had made her want to inflict some serious damage on herself, his lips curving into that intimate smile that stirred her insides into mush. “Of course you’re leaving this house. You’ll be in our home, and you’re coming back here only for visits.”
“No, Ivan, you’re not smiling!”
His smile only widened. “I actually want to laugh out loud and do a backflip. It’s only out of respect for your still raging wrath on my behalf that I’m being so restrained.”