She sniffed. “I didn’t forget that. My work is different. It involves going into people’s homes.
“Are you going to stop me from fulfilling my dreams?”
Every word was like her hacking away at me with an ice pick.
I gritted my teeth and told her, “No.”
“Will it kill you to know that I’m going into places you can’t scope out beforehand?”
“Yes,” I bit off. “Look, what’s the point of this conversation?”
“You’re the one who brought this up; I was talking about orgasms and massages.” She glowered at me. “I want you to damn well realize that you’re not a monster, Eoghan.
“You’re my husband, dammit. You’re the father of my baby. You know I wouldn’t have gotten pregnant if I didn’t love you and trust you.” Her hand slipped up to cup my cheek. “You can’t ever leave me, baby. I need you.”
This time, her words were worse than an ice pick.
Although, that was probably preferable to this morning’s episode.
I blew out a pain-soaked breath and rasped, “I’m getting worse, Inessa.”
“I know you are, sweetheart. We’re going through more bottles of bleach than the morgue. You disinfect anything that stands still for more than ten seconds, and our bed looks like you made it with a ruler.” She slipped her fingers around the back of my neck, encouraging me to look down at her. “But we all have our quirks.”
“Quirks?” I huffed. “Are you being serious? I must be hell to live with.”
After I’d jumped out of bed and had started scrubbing the bathroom floor until my fingers bled, I’d come to the realization that I wasnotin a good headspace.
And that wasn’t something she should have to endure.
Nessa shrugged. “I’m used to you now.”
I had to laugh. “Is that supposed to be reassuring?”
“No, reassuring is that I don’t dose your breakfast smoothie with cyanide. I know where to get it.”
Her serious tone had me arching a brow. “You don’t.”
“I do. Remember those photography classes I took?”
I blinked. “Yeah?”
“Liquid cyanide helps reduce black and white negatives that have been overexposed.”
“You handled cyanide in class?” I asked dubiously.
“No. Not exactly. But it’s used for that. I’m sure I could buy it.”
I rolled my eyes. “There are a lot easier ways to kill me.”
“Well, aren’t you lucky that I haven’t put my mind to it?” she asked with a huff. “Anyway, I only agreed to have Bump if you were around. You can’t renege on our deal, O’Donnelly.”
Bump had been a mutual decision, one we’d planned for, but she was right.
I’d be reneging on our deal if I left her for her own sake.
Her hand tipped my chin down again. “What’s going on with you, hmm? I need you to stop thinking about leaving me, Eoghan. I can’t handle that.”
“I don’t want to leave you, Inessa. Leaving you would be like slicing my wrists. Do I look suicidal?”