His eyes darkened even more, and he gave me that same look he always gave me, usually before he buried his face between my legs.
I squirmed and sucked harder.
“Fuck, baby. Go use the bathroom. I’ll pay for our things, and we can go home, yeah?”
He pulled his finger away, and I felt almost… lost, somehow.
After an unnaturally long pause, I nodded and turned around, hurrying toward the bathroom we’d passed when we had been perusing the baby cribs.
I got to the bathroom just in time. I hadn’t realized how much pregnancy would affect my bladder until now, and I almost cried in relief.
After I did my business, I walked out of the stall to wash my hands, taking in my reflection in the mirror.
I licked my dry lips, my eyes tracing over the flush on my cheeks.
I looked like me, but I didn’t.
I still didn’t know if being so compliant with Gabriel’s dominance and giving in to him was a good thing or not, but one thing was certain.
I didn’t look like Gabriel’s mom.
I didn’t want to simply exist.
There was something…livelyabout me that hadn’t been there before.
Since the moment Lucinda had disappeared, I had spent my life in service to a ghost. I hadn’t wanted to move and live my life; it felt unfair since Lucinda couldn’t.
And perhaps a part of me had felt guilty over her disappearance. I had been the last person she was with.
I should have done something… anything.
Maybe if I hadn’t left her alone…
The rational part of my brain knew it wasn’t my fault, that I had very little control over what had happened that night.
It didn’t lessen the weight, but being with Gabriel was something else completely.
He didn’t allow me to live for a ghost.
For the first time in my life, I was thinking about my future, and it might be stupid of me, but it included Gabriel.
It had only been a week since I found out about the terrible shit Luis had gotten into. The grief that had weighed me down, just thinking about what Lucinda might have been through, was similar to what I had experienced the first few months Lucinda was gone, but not as heavy.
Gabriel said he would find the answers I had been looking for, and I believed him.
He would find out what happened to the girl I had grown up with and perhaps…
I could finally move on.
I turned off the water and stared into my reflected blue eyes.
They looked sad.
Ilooked sad… and not.
The bathroom door opened, and I quickly grabbed the paper towel to dry my hands. I didn’t want to be caught lingering in the bathroom, not even by a stranger.
I made my way to the door, but the person blocked my path. My eyes made a slow perusal up the length of her.
