Chapter 33
Leda
Later, after Lucas and I had a tender lovemaking session, I lay next to him, listening to his heavy breathing. My emotions were all over the place, some due to the pregnancy and others due to Lucas’s sudden shift from aggressor to protector. I had been pissed off at him in the beginning, but that was an emotion I could easily handle. After all, I had wrapped myself in the ability to handle harsh words long ago.
But this Lucas had turned some sort of corner that I wasn’t sure what to do with. He loved me. He wanted to marry me. He had even gone as far as purchasing a ring. What he was saying was true.
My life was forever tied up with his, and I didn’t mind.
I reached down and cupped the gentle swell of my stomach, the same one that Lucas had kissed and whispered words to that I couldn’t hear earlier. Had this happened the first time we met, like Nico and Rory, I wouldn’t be so certain that this child was going to have a life worth coming into.
But now, I felt like he or she would. My child would have a perfect life, because both parents already loved him or her too much. I had never seen Lucas like this, and it was heart-rending.
No, it was everything.
“Thank you,” I whispered, rubbing my stomach. “Thank you for saving him.” I had nothing to do with it. It was this child that had saved him.
I didn’t know what was going to happen with my father, but Lucas was right. I wasn’t going to be the one to kill him. He had to die, of course. I wouldn’t be free until he did, but it wouldn’t be by my hand. I had so much more to live for. This child, Lucas—we all needed to live for us and not for anyone else’s plans.
Turning over carefully, I gazed at Lucas’s sleeping form, smiling a little at his relaxed state. Lucas was trying to give me everything I could have ever wanted in my life, in my future. I didn’t care about the money or titles or the fact that he would be someone of power.
I just wanted to be loved, and while his proposal wasn’t exactly a proposal, I had heard it in his voice. He wanted to spend the rest of his life with me, and that was what I wanted. I wanted our own little bubble, a place where he could be this Lucas all the time and not the Lucas that had grown up alone and in darkness.
That, and I wanted him to have a chance to teach our son or daughter how to be an amazing person one day. Lucas had his flaws. I wasn’t trying to discount that at all, but his flaws were what made him such a wonderful, complex person. They were what drove him to be the man I loved.
Sighing, I pressed my body up against him, feeling him shift in his sleep to pull me closer. Lucas hadn’t been the best person, but he was going to be the person with whom I was going to spend the rest of my life. So, in order to do that, I had to keep him alive. I had to make sure he didn’t sacrifice himself for this child or for me to end this shit with my father.
I needed him more than I cared to admit. Most of all, I wanted Lucas to be happy. I wanted to watch him one day on a beach somewhere, playing with our child, and to see that smile, oh that smile that was carefree and happy, on his face.
I would do anything to have that happen, but happiness wasn’t in the cards right now. Right now, we had to end this with my father and Adrian, or we could never be truly happy.