✓ WICKED VOWS| JAKE (Book II )

51-Child Of A Monster

Ana's pov

The sun peeped through the curtains-a weak, lying shine across the room. I was the first to stir, feeling a strange warmth against my back. Jake's arm was thrown over my waist, and his body was pressed up tightly against mine like every time we slept together. The closeness of our position jabbed me with a cold shock every time we slept like this. 

As I turned to face him, my anxiety worsened but it was well hidden. His cheeks were pinkish in an uncharacteristic, unnatural flush of color against a face normally so much in control. His eyes crinkled at the corners from sleep yet locked into mine with an unnerving alertness. Trapped in this unwanted closeness, neither of us moved; both were immobile from too much intimacy.

"Morning," Jake mumbled, his voice hoarse, his arm still wrapped around me.

"Morning," I said, my voice soft, revealing nothing of the churning dread inside. His confession of the previous night hung heavy between us, a silent strain neither of us was ready to broach yet. We had overslept good as moving out of character. We were always up at five or six, our days carefully mapped out. It was now ten, and morning had sneaked away. A pink touch spread across my cheeks which I smoothed into a mask of composure. As we disentangled, the left-behind heat of where he'd been was unsettling. His confession had unlatched something inside of me, but if I wanted to confront or bury it deeper, I had no idea. We slipped into the comfort of normalcy: brewing coffee. The offer of routine is a phony sense of comfort. Jake followed me into the kitchen, his presence near-weight in the roomy space.

"Coffee?" I asked, seeking something-anything-to anchor us back to the mundane.

"Yeah," he said, leaning into the counter as he watched me pour the dark liquid into two mugs. The silence between us was thick with the words that hadn't been said the night before. We sat at the kitchen table, sipping coffee; the routine, at least, could offer some solace. The conversation was practical but hollow. Terrence and Renard were the subjects; the plan Terrence had begun to realize was the leading theme.

It was then that the sudden sound of hurried footsteps shredded the fragile calm. I looked up to see Jude, hurrying inside with an urgent disarray. Her curly hair fell onto her face as she came towards us. "Can we talk alone Boss?" Jude's voice was low but insistent.

"No, you can say it here," I said, not wanting to break the fragile contact Jake and I had been able to preserve in our morning ritual.

Jude faltered for a moment, looking first at Jake and then at me before speaking. "Adam Barik was found dead this morning." The words hit me like a blow. Adam, placed as a spy in the palace, was one of the reasons we knew what we could about this place. My heart began to race as Jude went on.

"He was found outside London, near Hampstead Heath. It wasn't just a kill; they tortured him." Jude's voice shook as she held out an iPad. The screen showed the brutalized body of Adam-bloodied, with cuts everywhere, a gaping hole where his throat had been. The grotesqueness seeped into my bones. I'm feeling nauseous.

My stomach heaved violently, and though I tried to keep it together, the images were too much. Wordless, I pushed the iPad back at Jude and stumbled from the room, my legs weak as I raced toward the bathroom. My body crumpled in a fit as I made it to the toilet just in time, heaving out whatever was inside of me. The bitter taste of bile burning my throat, tears threatening my vision as the reality of Adam's pictures me. But I know this isn't normal, I have never been queasy by blood. Never.

When I finally emerged, I collapsed back against the cold tile wall, shaking before I started to puke again. The creak of the door opening behind me was followed by Jake instantly at my side, his hand easily cradling my hair off my face with gentle ease as I retched again. His touch was firm but tenderly so, doing little to buffer the storm inside me. Finally, when the heaving subsided, he helped steady me with his strong arm supporting me.