I’d schooled my face to stay ragefully cold. He wouldn’t know what the words ‘life in prison’ did to my insides. He didn’t need to know how bloody twisted I was. Part of me agreed that I’d got a fair punishment.

I’d killed a man. I deserved to never be free again.

But the other part of me hated that my victim had killed so many others and he’d never been caught. He’d had the devil on his side.

Until me, of course.

.............................

“ESTELLE, YOU NEED to sit the hell down.” I pointed at her large belly. “If you don’t do as I say, I’m going to handcuff you to the bed.”

Estelle whirled on me, dropping the two water bottles she’d been carrying to give to Conner and Pippa playing in the shallows. The bottles weren’t heavy, but she’d been bloody waddling all over the camp since dawn. “With what exactly? We don’t have a bedhead and we don’t have cuffs.”

“You know what I mean.”

“No, I don’t know what you mean. How about you leave me alone?”

Whoa, what?

My heart shed its calm beat for a frenzied flurry. My voice was deceptively low. “I suggest you reassess what you just said to me.”

Damn woman didn’t know how to stop fussing. Her constant fretting made her tired. She shouldn’t be tired. She had to be healthy and strong for the birth.

The birth.

I swallowed hard.

Every time I thought about what Estelle would face in a few short months, my temper exploded out of control. There was nothing I could do. I couldn’t take her pain. I couldn’t save her from agony. And I couldn’t do a fucking thing if complications arose and she died.

I hated everything about this pregnancy, including the fact that Estelle seemed adamant at cutting me out of her life. “I don’t appreciate being told to leave you alone when all I’m trying to do is—”

“All right, that’s it! I’ve had enough.” Her eyes narrowed, hands flew to her hips, and her face darkened beneath her honey tan. “That’s all you do these days, Galloway. You follow me around muttering that I shouldn’t do that and I shouldn’t do this. You’re constantly under my feet. At night, you want to hear insistently that I forgive you for knocking me up and that I still love you. What the hell has gotten into you? I’m not dying, for God’s sake. I’m not an invalid.” She poked her stomach. “You’re so needy it’s as if you’ve turned into the baby and I don’t need this one.”

I froze.

The axe in my hands, from chopping firewood, dropped into the sand.

I should leave.

I should turn around and get some air before I said something I regretted.

But the air swirled with a fight.

I didn’t want to fight.

But this had been brewing for weeks.

We’d been off-kilter ever since the raft incident (which I still couldn’t think about without cursing the wasted time) and unable to find our way back to each other.

As the pregnancy progressed, Estelle shut me out. I didn’t think she did it consciously, but she’d done it nevertheless. She didn’t lean on me. She didn’t ask for my opinion. She shouldered more and more responsibility as if she didn’t trust me to do it right.

And it made me feel like an asshole.

Because the more she didn’t need me, the more and more desperate I became.

I needed her.

Not just sexually. But emotionally, physically, spiritually—every damn way. And it wasn’t enough that she cuddled into me at night and let me do the chores she normally would.

The chasm between us confused the hell out of me.

I felt...I feel second best.

Somehow, the baby that I’d shackled her with (the same spawn she’d been terrified of having) had stolen the heart of my woman before it’d even been born.

“Perhaps...we should talk about this later.” I gritted my teeth, doing my best to stay rational.

I bloody hated the distance between us and the fact I was the one to cause it. But I wouldn’t take her bullshit quietly.

If she provoked me again...

Calm down. She’s pregnant. Hormonal. Don’t stress her out.

My pep talk did absolutely nothing as Estelle laughed coldly. “No. You know what? I want to talk about it now. You obviously have something on your mind. So spit it out, Galloway.” Her chin lowered. “Unless, you’re not man enough.”

Okay, that’s it.

Stalking toward her, I wanted to grab and shake the damn idiocy out of her. But I managed to keep my fists balled by my side. Just. “Stop it, Estelle. I don’t understand why you’re being such a bitch.”

“What?” Her voice screeched loud enough to wrench Pippa and Conner’s head up.

They paused, assessing the angry standoff between us.

I glowered down the beach. “If you two so much as move, so help me, you’ll have sore asses for a week!”

Conner held up his hands in surrender. “Not looking. Not our business.” Grabbing Pippa’s wrist, he hauled her from the sea and walked quickly down the beach.

Smart kid.

“Don’t you dare talk to the children like that!” Estelle pushed my chest. “Leave them alone.”

Red dripped over my vision.

I’d managed years in prison avoiding the taunting for a brawl. I could do this.

She’s mine. I love her. I don’t want to hurt her.

“I told them to give us some space to talk. I didn’t hurt them, woman.”