Rock Wedding (Rock Kiss #4) - Nalini Singh Page 0,76
which she kept her canned goods. “You had such a lovely mother, a great extended family, incredibly strong roots and the kind of friendships that are forever. I didn’t want you to think I was a throwaway person.”
Abe crushed the grocery list, his fist clenching without his conscious volition. “You were never that.”
“I made myself that,” Sarah insisted. “I was twenty-one when I met you, and yet I’d made no real friends, not even with the charity workers who helped me take the GED.” Her hand tightened on the edge of the cupboard door. “The loneliness was horrible, but I guess I’d been burned so badly that I thought it was safer to keep my distance from people in general.” She looked at him after an eternity. “Until you.”
And he’d kicked her so goddamn hard in the heart that he’d thrust her into the arms of a manipulative fuckhole who turned out to be an abuser. Right goddamn back into the nightmare she’d tried to escape. “I was only ever interested in your background because it was yours. It didn’t matter where you came from or who your parents were.”
“You don’t understand.” Sarah shook her head, her curls wild. “You’ve always had this solid foundation behind you. Always had the Bellamy name, always had people you could rely on. It’s different when you come from nothing and have no one.”
“You have me.” Abe moved to cup her face. “Whatever happens, however this ends, you have me. Always.” Never again would Sarah feel alone and abandoned. “You hear me, Sarah? I’m here for you and our baby. Today, tomorrow, always.”
ABE’S PASSIONATE WORDS CONTINUED TO RING IN SARAH’S SKULL as she walked with him through the permanent pathways of the Farmer’s Market at 3rd and Fairfax, his hand clasped firmly around hers. It made her afraid that he knew so much about her, had glimpsed the scars that marked her… but then hiding her needs hadn’t saved them the last time around. If Abe had known that loneliness was her terror, if he’d understood how her childhood had marked her, would he have left her behind all those times?
“These oranges look good.” Abe bagged up a bunch. “Vitamin C is good for you.”
“I’m starting to think you’re going to be a pain in the butt the entire pregnancy.” Sarah mock-scowled, even as bubbles of delight popped through the heavy darkness of this morning’s conversation and the attendant memories.
Abe touched his hand to her lower back after paying for the oranges and taking the bag, then nodded ahead. “Those look like avocados. I heard something about healthy fats.”
Shoulders shaking, Sarah walked over to the stall and bought several avocados that weren’t too ripe. No one bothered them the entire time they were at the market, and they left it loaded down with fresh goods as well as a huge caramel-covered apple that was Sarah’s delicious nemesis.
“I have one every six months,” she told Abe as she ate a slice after they got into his SUV. “Otherwise, I’d be here every week, stuffing my face.”
“Well, I guess it was once fruit,” he said dubiously.
Ignoring him to munch obnoxiously on her treat, she had sticky fingers when he pulled up at the grocery store where they planned to quickly pick up a few other items. “Do you have a bottle of water?” She wiggled the fingers of her right hand at him.
His eyes turned dark, intense.
Gripping her wrist with a gentle but firm hand, Abe tugged her fingers to his mouth and sucked in a finger, swirling his tongue around it to clean off the caramel.
Sarah whimpered.
“There,” he murmured after he’d patiently and calmly cleaned off each and every one of her fingers, his eyes locked with her own the entire time. “Done.”
Putting a trembling hand on the door, she went to push it open. She needed fresh air, needed to find her senses again. Abe was somehow out of the SUV and around to her side before she knew it. He put his hands on her waist, lifted her down… and she caught the flash of a camera going off.
Flinching, she instinctively angled away her face, while Abe turned toward the man who’d taken the shot. She felt his body bunch, and that was enough to spring her into action. Placing a hand on his chest, she said, “Abe. No drama. I can’t handle it.”
“Bastards,” he muttered but wrenched his attention off the photographer. “We’re just going to the freaking grocery store.”