Blood for my Rose |• Crimson Rose series✔️

Chapter 31

In mute terror, Rose watched him walk back and forth slowly, and also observed how he was training his wrath by not letting short breaths make him feel bottled up.

"You should have said something, dammit."

It was the the fourth time in a roll he'd made that statement in five minutes. The same hoarse voice. The same controlled tone. The exact fucking words.

And like every other time he'd said it, Rose responded to it with a defiant silence. She'd not moved, though her senses were still on the doorknob. Now Mauricio wasn't in the way of the exit anymore, but did running off in a moment like this sound doable?

Eventually, he stopped pacing the hell out it the floor and he stopped making Rose feel like he'd trample on her. "Rose, you're pregnant..." was this normal? Why did it sound like he was asking her again after he'd already found out the answer to that a couple minutes ago.

In his defense, Rose hadn't confirmed his fears, it had to be why he was still asking again. She should have just said no to make him feel alright. But her silence meant an obvious yes. One he'd rather kill than to hear.

His sadness and anger were evenly matched as he - sorry for himself - covered his face with his left palm, found the bed to crouch down on it, and then began to breathe like the world was trying to steal oxygen from him.

You know that feeling of sadness that people always said hurt one's nerves and bones and gut till they weren't sure they could make the next minute without passing out or, worse, dying? It hadn't made so much sense to Rose until now that she could feel it. She was still trying to unravel her emotions, and why she was even angry, when her face warmed up from the tears that trailed down her cheeks.

His voice nearly went below audible notes as he began, "You're pregnant and you've had yourself all tanked up with booze and smoked cigarettes like that should be the typical lifestyle of an expectant mother."

"I didn't know better," she maintained, mortified by his choice of worry. "And at some point when I'd realized I was being too deliberate about harming the baby, I had a rethink of my life." She nudged her shoulders to show indifference as she continued, "I didn't turn out to be the best mother you'd predicted I'd be. Matter of fact, after Rocco had abducted me and I'd realized my life as Riley's fiancée was over before it could begin, all I wanted to do was cut my uterus open, harvest the baby and throw he or she away. I couldn't allow the baby stop me from drinking away my problems."

Mauricio stoned her a look she couldn't have been deceived wasn't from a place of intense hatred. "My god, Rose." He could not believe the kind of vile words that she was capable of using.

"Don't look at me that way, or I'll definitely need alcohol to cure my ache again," she said, her tone innocently begging him to hug her? Make her feel better than the shit she was feeling like? "I know you put me on this huge throne where you adored my abilities and frankly, I hate to disappoint you-"

"Y-you...we just had sex..." he lifted his eyes to hers, the realization of everything coming with an attacking force. "Rose, you're carrying the child of another man."

Rose stifled her outburst of tears and managed, "I know." She whispered to herself, "Fuck, fuck..." and began to cry out loud. She held her mouth with both palms and shame couldn't let her look Mauricio in the eye so she turned her back to him. Sometimes...most times, Rose forgot she was pregnant. She did things and then remembered she should not have.

She should not have located the bottle of wine on the the wine stand frontwards. She shouldn't have tried to open it like she was stubbornly going to drink again. Then, perhaps, Mauricio wouldn't have sprinted to her like greased lightning and snatched the bottle from her.