Page 94 of Adam & Eve

she could in the small living room. Having her flat-out reject me felt like blunt force trauma to my

chest. No matter how often she did it, I knew I’d never became accustomed to the pain of it. Every

time it hurt a little more.

“I can’t do that, Eve. I tried.”

“You have to. You can’t keep trying to control my life. Trying to impose yourself on me. We

don’t fit. We’ll never fit,” she yelled, slamming her hand against the wall.

“No! I don’t want to control you. You control me. You own me. You could command me to do

anything, besides leaving. That’s not an option. Tell me what I need to do to make things between us

right. I’ll do it.”

“Stop this.” She backed away further, shaking her head. “There’s nothing you could do. Too

much damage has already been done. Look at them.” She pointed behind me to Michael and Jenny.

“You have people half dead in my living room.”

“Don’t say that. Tell me. I’ll give you whatever it takes.” My voice climbed along with my

heart rate. “You want cars? Houses? Clothes? I’ll give them to you. You want me to kill for you? I’ll

spend the rest of my life spilling blood on soil in your name.”

“Stop! Do you not know how crazy you sound?”

“Do you want me to cry for you? Beg? I’ll fucking beg. I’ll get down on my knees right here

and beg for you. I’ll do it. You could ask me to do anything and I’ll do it, but don’t ask me to let you

go. These few months without you nearly broke me.”

When I finished my declaration, a new emotion, one I couldn’t read, was in her eyes along

with a look of shock on her face.

Waiting for her to say something, anything, was causing tightly woven strands inside me to

loosen and when they completely snapped, I didn’t know what I’d do. Why couldn’t she understand

that she needed me as much as I needed her? Now more than ever. We needed to be together, to raise

our child together.

I took a deep breath ready to be her—

“Adam,” she called my name, interrupting my thoughts. I watched through shocked eyes as she

swayed. “I feel funny,” she mumbled and reached for me, then suddenly she was falling.

My heart stopped. I couldn’t breathe, but my body somehow moved. I caught her just before

her head hit the side table.