“That’s not important. What’s important is that I’m not in love with you. You knew that going in. But because our parents were all for us getting together, you bought into it too.”
“That’s not true I…”
“Whatever you feel, or think you feel now, the fact is I’m not in love with you. It would be unfair to you to go through with a loveless marriage, you deserve better than that.”
“But why now? If you say you’ve never been in love, why call things off now, almost two years later?” Why do women always ask questions the don’t really want the answers to?
“It’s better now than later. There’s no formal engagement between us and no matter when anyone else think, this is our lives and we’re the ones who have to live it. I need to get back I have some stuff to take care of.”
I walked away feeling a little sad about the friendship I know I’d just lost, but my heart was fine and the feeling of freedom more than made up for it. I was free to woo Sofia without any lingering guilt.
I stopped by the specialty shop and got her a box of very expensive chocolate which she dug into that night after I snuck her into my room. I’d also pulled up some information online about pregnant women and how to take care of them.
So that night while she slept I stayed up long after reading. I’m gonna need to take a trip to the store. Half that shit I was sure wasn’t in the house. Like ginger candy for nausea and peppermint tea to help settle her tummy.
I made note of everything and made a run to the store the next day after she’d snuck back downstairs. I got Kate to assign her to my wing with the pretense that I needed the extra help reorganizing the extensive library left to me by grandpa.
My parents were so pleased to see me showing an interest that they were all in. I doubt they even knew what she looked like there were so many servants running in and out of here, but that worked in my favor. Mom would’ve taken one look at her and nixed the idea.
For the next couple of weeks we fell into a routine of sorts. Each night she’d sleep in my bed while I slept next door in one of the guest rooms on my wing.
In the mornings she’d wake up an hour early, I’d hold her hair while she threw up then run down and make her some hot tea to go with the crackers she likes to nibble on. Those two things seem to settled her tummy better than anything else.
Then she’d get to work helping me sort books in the library and I’d stay in there with her most of the day keeping an eye on her. I was getting her to talk more and more but we still had a long way to go for me to earn her trust.
But the more time I spent with her, the more I wanted her. I freaked if I came back and found that she’d been sick while I was gone. I made a lot of food runs for the strange shit she had a taste for, and I watched over her most nights while she slept.
SOFIA
I don’t jump as much when he comes near me anymore. I’m still uneasy sometimes but not as much as I’d have expected. I don’t have the fear that some may have, that all men want to hurt me, but I’m still not that comfortable with others getting too close, neither man nor woman.
But he’s different. I know he means me no harm and I’ve known it since that first morning when I woke to find him in the chair next to my bed. I’ve known it every time he’s held my hair as I get sick. And I’ve known it each time I pretended to sleep and felt his hand rest gently over the child.
Those times I could barely fight back the tears. It had taken me a while to accept the child, to separate him from the act that had produced him. But once I did, something else grew in me. As the only male in my family, it was now up to him to seek justice.
But I will need a place for the child to grow. I must give him wings. I had thought to make my way on my own, and then when Draco was so kind to me, I had the fleeting thought that he could be a way out.
And then I felt ashamed of my thoughts. To misuse someone who had shown me only kindness would make me no better than the one who harmed me. So I squashed the idea and went back to planning.