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“It’s not my fault Lev’s a reckless driver. And I used two hands while I sat in the passenger seat. The cut’s just at a hard angle. I kinda had to do it by feel.” Not the most pleasant part of the trip by any means.
“You should have let me do it,” she scolds. “Now it’s not going to heal properly.”
I shrug. “It’s just another scar. I have plenty.”
Mel’s onyx eyes snap to mine in the dim light, and the sadness in them strikes a chord deep inside my chest. It leaves my heart aching with the need to fix her pain.
“What?” I ask, trapping her chin between my finger and thumb.
Taking my hand, Mel brings her lips to my palm, kissing it so tenderly it makes my pulse pound. Then she turns her attention back to the bandage so she can carefully seal it against my skin once more.
“Mel,” I say gently, “as hard as I’ve tried, I can’t read your mind. So unless your goal here is to drive me insane, you’re going to have to give me something.” Because the doubts trickle in during the silence, and I can’t help but question the meaning behind her sadness.
Is it a sign she’s going to run?
Does she regret sleeping with me?
As if in answer to my unspoken question, Mel gently shakes her head no. And only then does she lie back down, resting her head on the pillow beside mine, trapping her hand beneath her cheek so she can meet my gaze evenly.
“It feels selfish—that I should benefit from all the pain and suffering you’ve been through. And still, no matter the risks, you don’t even hesitate. I just… I don’t want to be the reason you have more scars. I don’t want to be the reason you had to kill your brother…”
Sighing heavily, I curl an arm around Mel’s midriff and pull her snugly into my arms, pressing her back against my chest. And as I wrap us in the covers, I hold her close. “None of that is your burden to bear,” I assure her. “I would have had to face my past eventually. And for you, I would do it willingly. You don’t belong in that world, Mel. You have too many scars of your own to carry. If I can shield you from the ones my family would inflict, I want to. It’s the least I can do to make up for my past.”
Mel’s breath hitches, and she interlaces our fingers at her waist. “What could you possibly have to make up for? You’re the most decent man I’ve ever met.”
Air rushes from my chest as her words fill me with a deep longing—a wish that I could be as faultless as she perceives. But all I can do is keep looking forward. Be the man now that I nearly lost sight of before I left my family. “I’m trying” is all I say.
“Thank you,” Mel breathes. “For everything.”
I press a kiss to the skin behind her ear, and my arm tightens instinctually around her.
And after several minutes, her breathing grows steady, her muscles relaxing as she drifts off to sleep.
But I can’t seem to follow her into oblivion.
Because my mind won’t stop replaying the day’s events. And the moment it loops over and over isn’t the moment I killed Miko. It’s not my confrontation with Vinny.
It’s that agonizing silence that stretched between me and Mel at the breakfast table.
That infinite void that tells me she still doesn’t trust me completely.
The sadness in her eyes triggered it in my memory, and now I can’t get it out of my head.
What is Mel still keeping from me?
21
MEL
Soft rays of sunlight beam in through the window the next morning, washing across my face. And they gently rouse me from my deep, dreamless sleep.
Without a shadow of a doubt, I know that I feel better rested after he holds me. A soft smile creeps onto my lips just thinking of it. And the deep contentment his body brings.
I could seriously get used to falling asleep curled against Gleb’s muscular chest.
Wrapped in his strong arms, whose warmth I’m currently missing.
And though the sheets are soft and welcoming, they’re nothing compared to the weighted comfort of Gleb’s sure, lithe body enfolding me.
