Fairytale Come Alive (Ghosts and Reincarnation #4)(89)
Author: Kristen Ashley

“Elle –”

“Why?” Bella’s voice was a lash and her body had grown solid.

Prentice stared at her, his impatience vanishing, understanding dawning.

Fiona knew they were in trouble.

Prentice was not a man prone to flowery words. In fact, the words she’d heard him say about her the night before on the balcony (they still made her ghostly belly melt) were the most flowery she’d ever had from him.

No, Prentice was more a man who spoke through actions.

This wasn’t a time for action; it was a time for words and Fiona doubted that Prentice could give Bella what she obviously needed.

Fiona was wrong.

His face gentled, his hand came to rest on her jaw and he answered her question in that soft voice filled with love.

“Your pancakes, your cookies, your smile.”

Uh-oh.

Even said in his beautiful, soft voice, Fiona didn’t think that was a great start.

Bella, staring up at him with fear and doubt barely masked behind the coldness in her eyes, didn’t either.

Prentice wasn’t done.

“The way you care for my home, the way you care for my family.”

Fiona decided this wasn’t going too well. No woman wanted a man to want her because she was a good housekeeper and babysitter and made good pancakes.

“The way you are with Sally, enjoying every second of her, never making her feel silly or getting impatient with her liveliness.”

All right, that was a wee bit better. Fiona watched Bella’s face shift slightly, still guarded but Prentice had struck a chord.

“The way you are with Jason, how you handle him with such care. Showing him that Fiona’s guitar, something she loved, wasn’t an instrument of mourning, which she’d hate, but an instrument to celebrate her and keep her memory alive.”

Bella started to shake her head but his hand at her jaw tightened.

“The way you make me laugh when you forget to be what your father wanted you to be and you’re just you.”

Her head jerked.

“Prentice –” Bella broke in.

Prentice wasn’t done.

His face dipped closer to hers. “The way you respond to me, no inhibitions, so quick, so wild, my kiss, my touch, my tongue,” his voice dropped deep, “my cock. I love kissing you, baby, touching you, f**king you. And I love knowing you love it too.”

Fiona could have done without hearing that but she saw he was getting to Bella because her eyes had grown glazed.

“Pren,” she whispered.

“The way you give of yourself, every second, to everyone without knowing you’re doing it or expecting that first thing in return. You’re the most generous person I’ve ever met in my life.” He got even closer, his arm sliding around her waist, his hand at her jaw gliding into her hair. “And I want you in my life until I’m no longer breathing.”

Bella was struggling with this, Fiona could see it. She wanted to believe but she couldn’t.

Or she wouldn’t.

“I –” Bella started to protest.

Prentice cut her off. “And I want you in my children’s lives.”

Bella bit her lip which had begun to tremble.

Then she said something bizarre.

“I think you’re confused.”

Prentice’s brows drew together, indicating to Fiona he thought what she said was bizarre as well.

“Confused how?”

“With who I am and who you think I am.”

“What?”

His voice was no longer soft and loving. Prentice wasn’t happy he’d laid it out for her and, apparently, it had no effect.

Fiona didn’t think this was a good sign.

“You think I’m that girl you met twenty years ago,” Bella explained. “I’m not that girl. I never was. And you’re confused.”

“So, who are you?” Prentice asked, his voice now edging towards impatience.

Bella heard it and decided not to respond.

Fiona watched as his hand fisted in her hair. “You’re telling me that all this is a game?”

Bella’s body jerked yet again and her face went pale.

“A game?” she whispered.

“Aye, a game,” Prentice clipped. “You’re saying you dropped everything in order to come to Sally… that was a game.”

“No!” Bella replied sharply.

“The laundry, the ironing, making the beds, hoovering the floors, baking the cookies, that wasn’t you? That was what your father said you were doing? That was you playing house?”

It was a low blow and Bella flinched like she’d been physically struck.

Fiona wished she could kick Prentice.

Where was he going with this?

“Of course not,” Bella whispered.

Prentice was relentless. “It wasn’t you that played darts with Annie, Dougal and me? It wasn’t you who asked Gordon over for hamburgers?”

Bella shook her head.

Prentice kept after her.

“It isn’t you who’s teaching Jace how to play guitar? It isn’t you who stares into my eyes like you do, like you’re lost in what you see and you don’t want to be found. And it isn’t you who wraps your hand around my c**k like you never want to let it go and moans in my mouth when my tongue slides into yours?”

Okay, Fiona thought, overshare.

Bella’s face was confused and her reply was hesitant, “Yes, um… well, that all is me but –”

“So, tell me, Elle, if that’s all you then how the f**k am I confused?”

Bella didn’t have an answer for that, evidently, because she didn’t speak.

She just stared at him.

He let her go but didn’t move away. His hands slid down her forearms and caught her wrists. Bringing them up between them, his thumbs slid into her fists, pushing back her fingers. Then he stroked her palms.

Bella closed her eyes.

Prentice spoke and his tone was now gentle. “I’m not confused, baby, you are.”

Bella opened her eyes.

“I’m not that girl you knew,” she whispered.

God, Fiona thought, Bella’s stubborn.

“You are,” Prentice, Fiona knew, could be stubborn too.

“I’m not.”

“Baby, you are, then and now. But, now, with time and maturity, you’re even better.”

Her eyes filled with tears and Fiona worried her lip. She watched as Bella curled open her fingers and lifted her hands, showing him her palms.

“This is me, Prentice,” she said, her voice harsh. “This is who I am. This is who you’d have in your house. This is who I’ve always been, weak, trapped, useless. I saved you when I left you years ago. Don’t you understand? That girl didn’t exist, you made her. She was only alive for you. This,” she jerked her hands still in his wrists, “is who I am.”